How to Identify a Counterfeit

So let’s pray, and then we’ll continue on with our service. Father God, we just thank You for today. We thank You for Your Word. We thank You for Your presence, and even as we maybe don’t always know how to navigate it, Lord, we thank You that Your desire is to be present with us together. And so, Lord, we just pray that we’d continue to hear You speak and learn, that our hearts would continue to be softened, and that we would really respond to the word that the time is now. God, I just thank You for that. I thank You for Your faithfulness to Your people. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.

Pray to the Lord of the harvest

Well, something before I actually get into our sermon. I know not everyone was at our membership meeting, but we had talked about Matthew 9:38. Many may be familiar with it. Matthew 9:37 says — this is when Jesus is looking at the crowd of people — “Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.’”

So many times we can hear the scripture and we focus on the part where the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. But really the crux of this verse is, “Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” And something we asked — I don’t know if it was really caught or done; I know it took me a few days to even do it — we are asking our people in our congregation, would you set your alarms on your phone for 9:38? You can do it a.m. or p.m. And take that time, for just a season, to begin to pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest.

On my little note, I literally have the actual scripture that just says, “Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” We know prayer changes things. We know prayer matters. And here Jesus is instructing the disciples to pray to the Lord of the harvest that laborers would be sent out into His harvest.

It’s really funny, because the first few times I’m like, “Why is Jay’s phone going off?” He did it at night, and it didn’t really register. And then all of a sudden one day both of our phones went off — we didn’t say if we were going to do a.m. or p.m. — and we’re like, “Oh, we have the same timer.” And I’m going to tell you, it’s just really cool when both of our phones all of a sudden start ringing and we look at each other. Sometimes we pray together, sometimes we pray individually. Actually, last night I was not home, and my alarm was going off in my purse, and someone was like, “Do you guys hear that?” It had probably been going off for 15 minutes, and finally I was like, “Oh, I’m so sorry, that’s my phone. Let me go turn off that timer.”

But I just want to encourage you, if you’ve not done so already, would you just join us in prayer? It doesn’t have to be hours. Literally, it’s just a moment for us to pause and declare, “God, I pray to You, the Lord of the harvest, that You would send out laborers into Your harvest.” And that’s just a good way for us to remember, because if you’re like me, I easily forget something that I say with very good intention I’m going to do. So this has just been a really great way to do it.

Seek first the kingdom

So anyways, what we’ve been talking about: Your kingdom come. Matthew 6:33 — and we talked a little bit about it at the membership meeting — says, “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” That’s a very familiar scripture, but we had felt very intentionally that that was a prophetic word for today, for our church: to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and let all the other things be added to you.

If we’re being instructed by Jesus to seek first the kingdom of God, there’s an implication there. The implication is that there are other kingdoms that can be sought. But here He’s saying, “I want you to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

The other thing about kingdoms is in each place, in each region, there are different kingdoms that rise up. I grew up in California, and so I can tell you, it can be winter here and winter in California, but I do not dress the same way. It could be the exact same date — November 15th, December 29th, whatever it is — same time, two different locations, and I don’t dress the same for both. Why? Because the atmosphere is completely different. Here I’m likely going to have snow boots on, my jacket, everything going on. And the reality is, winter in California, maybe it’s a sweatshirt, maybe it’s a hoodie, maybe it’s a light jacket. Same time, same season, but the atmosphere is different.

And what we want us to continue to realize is the atmosphere here in Madison, Wisconsin, is different than any other place. It’s even different if you get out of Dane County. If you get into different cities, even there you begin to feel the difference, because there are various things at play. There are various priorities in each city. And here we’re reading that Jesus is saying, “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” So we are calling you at this time to talk about what it means to be about the kingdom of God. I believe He wants us to be set apart and have an understanding of what it looks like to live out kingdom dynamics here on earth. But the reality is we can get distracted by the different glories and manifestations of the different kingdoms, and we’re going to look at that in just a minute.

Bankers practice with the real thing

Today’s message is called “How to Identify a Counterfeit.” How to identify a counterfeit.

I was at my favorite place, Oasis Cafe. That’s where you can find me probably twice a week with regularity. In fact, when I have not been there, it has now become, “Why aren’t you there?” There are certain people that just know on certain days I can very likely be found there. Before we had a church building, our offices were in the home, and I’d get too distracted — “Oh, I’ve got to clean, I’ve got to do this” — so I often had to get out of the house. And we’re still trying to figure out our rhythm of what it means to have a church building, to be here, to have an office, how to share an office, all of those things. So I still just go to Oasis.

Probably even prior to COVID, I would come in and study there, and this couple would come. And finally one day they asked me, “So, I see you reading your Bible. Do you go to church?” And we just started having conversation, and I’ve become friends with them. It’s just small-world Madison. So this last week we’re sitting there, and we start talking about kingdom dynamics, about what it means to be a church. And literally, it must have been uncomfortable — he was turned around this way the whole time. I never sat at his table, he didn’t sit at mine. I could have pulled up closer. I don’t think we were planning on talking for an hour; that was not the intention when he turned around.

And he said something that sparked a thought in me. He said, “You know, Suzie, my wife used to work in a bank.” Now, you guys may all know this. This was absolute news to me. I will be the first one to admit I was blown away by the next statement — but Jay knew this. He said, “You know, they don’t actually teach you about counterfeit money in the bank. They actually teach you what real money is all about.” He asked his wife, “How do you know what a counterfeit bill is like?” And his wife told him, “It’s because they actually have us practicing with real money all of the time.”

So I was like, “No way.” So of course, what did I do? I went to Google: how to identify counterfeit bills. And sure enough, would you believe it, in the bank system the focus is not the counterfeit. The focus is the true stuff. They teach them to understand what money feels like, what it looks like, what the attributes in the money are, what holograms you can find. And so they practice — 40 hours a week, or however many a banker works — just real money, real money, real money, so that when they are presented with a counterfeit, they know.

And I just thought, oh my goodness, have we as a church been so hyper-focused on the counterfeit that we’ve actually not taught people how to identify the truth? This is a way that I have to consider — I’m up here teaching people. Will I have to stand before God and repent, or work through, that my focus has been so much on the counterfeit that I’ve actually not been able to teach people the truth?

So my first point is we need to focus on what is the truth versus evil. What is the truth versus evil.

When I talk to a lot of people of varying ages, I will often hear them say this: “I don’t know if it’s God speaking to me. I don’t know what His voice sounds like. I don’t know what His plan is in my life.” And just as it was news to me in that moment — 41 years, and I’m just learning that bankers learn how to tell a counterfeit not by encountering counterfeits but because they have practice with real money — it hit me right then: oh my goodness, for too long I’ve made the focus about the wrong thing. Because we continue to hear people in the church — not people who don’t know the Lord, not people who aren’t in relationship with Jesus, people in the church — still struggle with this very truth: “I don’t know if it’s God speaking to me. I don’t know what He’s saying. I don’t even think He’s speaking to me.” And I just wonder if for too long we have focused on the counterfeit and not focused on the truth.

On the offense with the truth

For too long, I believe, as a church we have been defensive rather than offensive. For too long we’ve tried to defend Jesus and the truth — defend, defend, defend. But when we look at Scripture, when Jesus was standing in front of Pontius Pilate and they were coming at Him with accusations, what blows my mind is He doesn’t even try to defend Himself. And then finally they say, “Say something,” and He says, “It is as you say.”

For too long we have for some reason thought that if we didn’t defend the truth, then people wouldn’t know the truth. And I’m going to tell you, I think we got it wrong — and by “we,” I mean me. We tell kids, “Don’t run with that, you might poke your eye. Don’t do this, this might happen.” And so many times that never actually happens. Instead of equipping them, telling them what they can do. And I think as a church, for a long time we have moved out of fear — fear of maybe being wrong, fear of misleading people. We’ve been moved by fear. And when we’re motivated by fear, truth cannot reign. If I’m motivated by fear in my relationships, truth cannot reign.

If I know what I don’t want something to look like, but I can’t tell you how it ought to look, there’s a problem. If I can’t tell people what the church ought to look like, there is a problem. And for too long, yes, we’ve been known by what we don’t like. But scratch that — what if we just went on the offense with the truth and the Word of God, rather than fearing being misunderstood or fearing that you’re going to get it wrong? Because the reality is, you are going to be misunderstood. They are going to interpret something maybe you’re not saying. And even bigger, we’re going to get it wrong. I’m going to be wrong. Why? Because I’m human, because I’m imperfect, and because I am not called to perfection. I’m called to being perfected in Christ and in truth. And I believe — I believe, I believe — we are called to be a people who speak truth, who live from truth, and who operate in truth. What would the church look like if that was the stance?

Matthew chapter 4 — this may be familiar for you. Satan is tempting Jesus, and He’s in the wilderness. He’s just come out of this place of having this deep encounter with His Father. And verses 8 through 10 say this: “Then the devil took him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.” He took Jesus up to an exceedingly high mountain and showed Him the kingdoms of the world and their glory. How that happened, I have no clue. All I know is that if it’s in there, it’s in there for a reason. He took Jesus up to this place where He could see all of the kingdoms of the world. And these kingdoms were not sly — no, these were glorious and flashy. When I think about this, there was a level of something He could see with His eyes. There was a glory that could be seen. And the devil said to Jesus, “All these things I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.”

See, when we’re thinking about seeking first the kingdom, we have to realize that the kingdoms of this world do have something to offer us. There is a glory to the kingdoms of this world, because we’re reading it here. And we have to wrestle through what it means and what it looks like to seek first the kingdom of God. And Jesus immediately responds — not with panic. He doesn’t respond with how they’re wrong. He doesn’t respond with why it’s not going to last. He responds with truth and the Word of God. “Then Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! For it is written…’” He combats the evil not with trying to be right, but with the truth of God. And then He says, “It is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only you shall serve.’”

This isn’t a place of negotiation. He’s not in this conversation about why it’s not going to work. Nope. He just says, “No. The Word of God says this.” I believe He’s calling us to be a people who would respond with the truth and the Word of God, rather than panic and fear of something being dismantled or your image being changed.

Renew your mind

So how do we seek first the kingdom of God? We must renew our minds with God’s truth as our focus. We need to renew our minds with God’s truth as our focus.

Romans chapter 12, verse 1. I still have my Bible here. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove” — here’s what we’re supposed to be proving, catch this — “what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” We do this by renewing our mind.

The Passion Translation — I love it, because it kind of shocks you. How many of you have that scripture — you don’t have to raise your hand — “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”? Many of us probably have that in our mind, and I think sometimes when it’s so familiar, it becomes familiar. So here’s what the Passion Translation says: “Beloved friends, what should be our proper response to God’s marvelous mercies? I encourage you to surrender yourself to God to be his sacred, living sacrifice. And live in holiness, experiencing all that delights his heart.”

Man, isn’t that a beautiful image? It’s not just being perfect. No, there’s something when He looks — there’s a delight. As I was just saying, when I watch my kids, there’s a delight that happens in me as I’m watching them work through and navigate and operate in a way that their bodies can operate, because I can tell you I can’t do things that they’re doing. But there is a delight that comes in. “And live in holiness, experiencing all that delights his heart. For this becomes your genuine expression of worship.”

Now here’s where it is, when we talk about the different kingdoms and their glories: “Stop imitating the ideals and opinions of the culture around you.” Stop imitating the ideals and opinions of the culture around you. Well, what culture is around you? What does church culture look like around you? What does home culture look like around you? What does the world’s culture look like around you? We have to see in what places we have begun to imitate ideals of what something should look like. “But be inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how you think.”

So what happens — well, I am 41, and I’m called to renew my mind in a total reformation of how I think. Just think about this. If we’re reading Scripture and it’s living, that means there’s a place of continual transformation that’s intended to happen, and it doesn’t just stop because I become a Christian and I get older. No, I’m continually living in submission as a living sacrifice, and my mind is called to be renewed daily. Which means that what was maybe acceptable at one time is no longer acceptable now. Why? Because I’m daily being transformed by the renewing of my mind by God’s Word.

“But be inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how you think.” Are you and I willing to surrender how we think, to learn about God in a new way? Or are we so beholden to what we think needs to happen and what it should look like that we aren’t going to allow ourselves to be renewed? We’re just going to hit rewind, and rewind again, and rewind again, because we liked it that way.

I’m telling you, if there’s anything that will jolt you into “What the heck do I believe? What do I do?” it will be having teenagers. And it’s not a criticism of them. There is nothing more that I love than being with my kids, because they stretch me. I had a conversation with one of my kids, and I just realized, “Suzie, be quiet. Just listen. Maybe you just don’t know everything.” Now, I do have the Holy Spirit, and I do pray, and that trumps some of those things. That’s not what I’m saying. I don’t let go of my responsibilities. But am I willing to allow the Lord to renew how He would have me to parent — I’ll let that be a safe one — in a way that is uncomfortable to me? Am I willing to allow my mind to be completely transformed again?

Listen to what I’m saying. We’re seeking the truth. This is based on the truth and the Word of God. This isn’t to make God’s Word be something it’s not. That’s not what I’m implying. What I’m saying here is this version just has me thinking, Lord, would I allow You to totally reform the way I think? Because then understanding this will empower me to discern Your will. That’s what it says here: “But be inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how you think. This will empower you to discern God’s will as you live a beautiful life, satisfied and perfect in his eyes.”

What does it mean to be transformed by the Word of God and keep that as my focus? How is God’s Word changing how I’m doing things? Because I can tell you, how I did things when my kids were babies is not how I could continue to do things when they were toddlers. And when they were toddlers, I couldn’t keep doing it that way when they got a little bit older. Why? Because the situations were changing. The values and the truth that I live by didn’t change, but the way that I had to do it — I had to keep that surrendered. And I think for a little bit, as a church, we’ve held on to how we think things ought to look. And I just want us to consider: if my mind is to be transformed daily, then maybe something is not the way it ought to be. We’re not to discern the bad, the plots, or the schemes. No — I think it was in either the ESV or the Christian Standard Bible — we discern what is the good and pleasing and perfect will of God. We renew our minds with God’s Word, which is the truth. We get God’s Word and we wrestle through it as if it’s truth, and that is how we are to live our life.

Keep preaching Jesus

And then lastly, number three, when we’re talking about what it means to seek first the kingdom of God: we must keep preaching Jesus. We must keep preaching Jesus.

Second Corinthians chapter 4, verses 1 through 6. I’m going to first start in the New King James, and then I will go over the Passion Translation. This is what it says: “Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God. But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. For we do not preach ourselves” — thank God we do not preach ourselves — “but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

We must keep preaching Jesus. How do we do this? We must reject the shame that comes with life. In the Passion Translation it says, “Now, because of God’s mercy, we have been entrusted with the privilege of this new covenant ministry, and we will not quit or faint with weariness.” We can rest, but He’s saying let’s not quit and let’s not faint with weariness. “We reject every shameful cover-up.”

I think part of the reason why we sometimes don’t want to preach Jesus is because sometimes we feel like our lives don’t coincide with preaching Jesus. In the conversation I had with this gentleman, I shared a moment of vulnerability — something I was working through personally, and my response. And later, when we were done, immediately the thought came to my mind: “Why would you share that? You’re a pastor. What do you think he must think of you?” And I sat there for probably five minutes with that thought: “Oh, Suzie, that’s not maybe how God would handle people.” And I started walking down this path of shame that was not the Holy Spirit.

And you know how I knew it wasn’t the Holy Spirit? Because it came after my identity. It said, “If you were a pastor, why would you share that? Why would you say that?” That’s not how the Lord operates. That’s not the voice of God. The voice of God does not say, “Well, Suzie, because you are a Christian, you shouldn’t…” So I immediately knew. And I think so many times we hide in shame because we feel like our lives are not lined up. But what I loved about this in the Passion Translation: “We reject every shameful cover-up.” As ministers, as we preach Jesus, we reject every shameful cover-up that the enemy would try to have us put on as our identity. We say, “No, no, no.” The first thing that we do is we reject every shameful thing that does not line up with the Word of God.

And then, number two, we are people who refuse to resort to cunning trickery or distorting the Word of God. When we preach Jesus, we cannot let Jesus just fit into our lives. That’s not how He does it. We need to be a people who refuse to make the Word of God conform to our lives. We see it everywhere, actually. I was telling someone at the football game — I was sitting with just this one part that says, “nor handling the word of God deceitfully.” We are a generation, a culture of people, who are deceitfully using the Word of God to conveniently make their life look like it lines up with the Word of God, and it does not.

This is why we need to continue to preach Jesus. This is why we need to continue to renew our minds, because God will not fit in your box. That’s what makes it uncomfortable. That is why we cannot just sit by as bystanders, because the Word of God is intended to be light in a place that is dark. Light is supposed to shine — not dimmer. No, no, no. It is supposed to expel darkness. And we’re living in a generation that will take the Word of God and start saying, “Well, is that what it really means?”

Mercy over judgment

I saw something this week — it’s not even fully worth repeating — but I was blown away by the amount of disregard, blatant blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and the Word of God. And they were perversely using the scripture, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” And I just thought, Lord, have mercy. First of all, have mercy on that person. Have mercy on that church. Have mercy. Because it is not my place to call out for judgment. It is not my place to call out for vindication. My place is to call out for mercy on people’s behalf.

And so when we begin to preach Jesus, we begin to preach mercy over judgment. We begin to preach mercy over the situation. Or we can be people who will judge and say, “Oh, that’s not that.” No, no, no. We’re not called to be the judge. We’re called to be people who bring heaven to earth, and in heaven there is mercy. There is grace over judgment. That is who we are called to be. So when we are preaching Jesus, we are preaching mercy over judgment. When we see things that are not lining up, we should be praying mercy on those people who are proclaiming a gospel that is not the gospel, who are proclaiming truths that are not the truth, who are proclaiming death over people.

We need to be a people who preach Jesus and do not take the Word of God to fit into our life. We need to reject the shame of life. We need to be people who refuse to make God’s Word fit into our life, but people who are transformed by the Word of God and are living holy and acceptable lives. We need to continue to preach the lordship and the covenant of new mercies, life in Christ, and that our lives would be transformed so that they can shine. Our lives are the testimony people will see to come to know Jesus. And in my vulnerability, in my humanity, it’s God’s mercy and God’s goodness and God’s grace that leads people to repentance.

And I will need to be led to repentance every day, because I will make decisions, I will do things out of my own humanity, out of my own fear, out of my own insecurity. But guess what? That does not disqualify me, and that does not disqualify you, because the point is we are to be preaching Jesus — not ourselves.

Lives that reveal the counterfeit

And it’s a time for us to stand up now. Because when people have an encounter with us, would our lives be so much like Jesus that when they experience a counterfeit, they know? Would we live in such a way that when they encounter us, they know, “That person’s a Christian. That person follows Christ”? And then all of a sudden, guess what — they come to someone who’s proclaiming some truth. There’s some kooky, crazy stuff out there, guys. There is some crazy stuff that is being preached. There is some crazy stuff that sounds really good. And I could either be focused on trying to say why that’s all not Jesus, or I can just continue to be transformed by the renewing of my mind and let my life be a living sacrifice, a testimony of God — so much so that when someone encounters a counterfeit, who says they’re a Christ follower but they’ve conformed the Word of God to their life rather than being transformed by the Word of God, they know that’s the counterfeit.

That is what we are called to do every day. I’m telling you, it does not mean that we need to be perfect. There is a lot we all need to continue to work out. But as I read, I’m saying, “Lord, Your desire is for my mind to be fully transformed every day.” That is the hope and the truth. Now is the time — that word that I gave. I was stirring and saying, “Lord…” But I believe that He’s telling us, stop looking. Stop looking. There’s a lot of noise. A lot of noise. There’s a lot of injustice, and some of you might be called to a realm and to a place where you will be able to vocalize the injustice that’s happening. What you first need to understand is: get into the quiet room. Get into the quiet place and say, “Lord, what is Your will for my life?” Because some of us He’s going to call to places that are really dark, and we have to be transformed, so that when we walk into the room, we walk in with His presence and His authority and His grace and His mercy. And we would be the living sacrifices, living lives holy and acceptable, to proclaim the good and acceptable year of the Lord.

You guys, we’re not into playing church. I’ve been listening to this podcast, and it’s helping me get back into the complexity of people’s lives. My life is complex, and I know Jesus. But there are so many people — and we can’t stop realizing — this isn’t so that we can build kingdoms filled with glory. I mean, you can. There are plenty of people who are doing it. And it’s not my story to tell, but this gentleman was sharing about some life choices he was making, because he said, “Suzie, in the end, what does it matter?” What does it matter? And we see it in Scripture: we have this whole world we’ve built, but we lose ourselves.

We’re living in a culture and time that is pushing Christ out, and we fit Him in where we can. We’re getting busier, busier, busier, busier. So now, guess what happens? Your weekends become more sacred, right? Because you’ve been go, go, go, go, go. “Well, I needed time to rest.” Yes, Sabbath is important. Sabbath is about reflecting and positioning yourself and contemplating and spending time with the Lord. But I can guarantee we — myself included — don’t even have the correct perspective of Sabbath. So when I’m resting, I’m like, “Lord, help me learn how to Sabbath. Let me learn how to rest.” But we’re going, we’re going, we’re going. And where does the Lord fit in? “Oh, we’ve got to do this, we’ve got to do this, and I have this and I have that.” And it sounds great to those all around you. If I can talk about all the great accomplishments and all the things that I’m doing and the places I’m visiting, I can tell you how many people agree with that and celebrate it. But that just means I’m reflecting more of culture.

We’ve got to work it out. It says in Scripture to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. That’s not that we are afraid of God. No, it’s with reverence. We’re to be preaching — I think one of these scriptures says — preaching the lordship. When you say yes to Jesus, it’s saying, “Would You be Lord of my life?” We don’t understand kingdoms, because we don’t have a king, we don’t have a queen, we don’t have a monarchy. We don’t have this idea of all the reverence that goes into monarchy life, and kingdom life is quite astounding. But if we were to take it back and look — Lord, what do You call Your kingdom? We call Him Lord of our life.

I believe more than anything we’ve got to sort through this, because I believe our lives are going to be what people know is truth or counterfeit. People will look to us to see how we respond — not with perfection, but with the testimony. Our lives lead people to repentance. And He knows where we struggle. He created us. He’s not like, “Oh, I didn’t see that coming.” Where it talks about how much an earthly father would give, how much more your heavenly Father gives — I get it. When I look at my kids, I see their potential. I even know their footsteps. I hear them coming down the steps, and I know who is coming down the steps. Why? Because I intimately know them. And that’s what we get to be — that we would know Him. For too long we were consumed with the wrong stuff, and He’s saying, “I want your life as you are — complicated, intricately made — to be a living testimony, so people can know when they’ve experienced a counterfeit.”

All right, let us pray. Let’s pray.

Well, Father God, I just thank You. I thank You for who You are. God, more than anything, our heart is to be a living sacrifice, Lord, that keeps our eyes set on You. Lord, as we keep Your truth at the forefront, we realize that preaching Jesus is enough. Living like Jesus is enough. Jesus, You came and You lived humbly. You lived and operated in obedience to Your Father. You spoke truth, You lived truth. God, You saw when no one else saw. You saw Zacchaeus when he was in the tree. You knew when the woman with the issue of blood came. You saw, and You knew differently than everyone else around You.

So God, I pray that we would be a people who would see things differently around us, that we would be people who are sensitive to Your Spirit, that we would feel the inclination that something needs to happen, that we could come and bring Your presence wherever we go, because You are with us all of the time. So God, I pray that we would be awakened to Your voice, that we would be awakened to Your leading.

God, I cast off shame. We say, shame, you have no place or authority in this place over these people — shame for what has been done, shame that would come to try to crowd out the truth of who Jesus Christ is. And Lord, we release Your forgiveness. We release Your peace, Lord. When You release that, ears would be open to hear You speak. Lord, I pray that as we read Your Scripture, there would be an awakening to who You are. Lord, I pray that as we fill our lives with truth — the truth is what sets us free.

So God, I pray that as we keep our eyes on You — when it says seek first the kingdom of God — Lord, that that would be at the forefront of what we do, and that we would be deeply transformed, not because we don’t know what we should or shouldn’t do, but deeply transformed because of what You’ve already done and what You’ve already said about us long before we were created. God, I thank You that this place would be a place that preaches Jesus, that keeps Jesus, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever, at the forefront of what we do.

God, I thank You that just like You were not moved when Satan took You up and showed You all of the kingdoms and their glory, Lord, we would be a people that would say, “Yeah, but God’s Word says…” “Yeah, everyone around us — this is happening, but Lord, You have already spoken to me. Your Word says…” And we would be deeply transformed by Your Word. God, I pray that we would be a people who would not try to make Your Word conform to our life, but we would be transformed by the renewing of our mind with Your Word, and we would be a people in motion who know You. We thank You for who You are. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.

Amen. If this resonated, go back and listen. Ask the Lord. Don’t just let this be a moment of, “Oh, that was great,” and then go back. No — there are people every day, there are people you will encounter today, that need an encounter with Jesus. And I pray that we would be a people that would be awakened to that.

Transcribed from the message recording and lightly edited for reading.