When God Gives You What You Ask For - Tim Timberlake

In this message, we walk through Acts 7:38–43 as Stephen confronts the Sanhedrin and exposes a dangerous spiritual cycle: God sends revelation, people resist His voice, idols are created, and eventually God allows them to have what they insisted on. Through the story of Israel in the wilderness, this teaching challenges us to examine our own hearts. Are we truly following God, or have we constructed idols out of impatience, comfort, success, or relationships?

This message reminds us that deliverance from a place does not guarantee deliverance from a mindset—and that what we worship today determines the direction of our tomorrow.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey, I'm Tim Timmerlake, and I want to thank you so much for listening to the Celebration Church Podcast. I hope this message encouraged you, strengthened your faith, and gave you something you can carry into your week. If you'd like to stay connected, I encourage you to join us live every Sunday at 9 a.m. or 11 A.M. on YouTube. We would love to have you there. And if you're ever in the Jacksonville, Florida area, come see us in person. We have a seat saved for you. Thanks again for being with us. We're so grateful for you and see you next time. Scripture reads, This is the one who is in the congregation in the wilderness together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Sinai. And who is with our fathers, and he received living oracles to pass on to you. Our fathers were unwilling to be obedient to him, but repudiated him in their hearts and turned back to Egypt, saying to Aaron, Make for us gods who will go before us. For this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what happened to him. And at that time they made a calf and brought a sacrifice to the idol and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. But God turned away and delivered them up to serve the army of heaven as it is written in the book of the prophets. It was not me. You offered victims and sacrifices for 40 years in the wilderness, was it? You also took along the tabernacle of Maloch and the star of the god Rampha, the images which you made to worship. I also will remove you beyond Babylon. Read it to you again. This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Sinai, and who was with our fathers, and he received living oracles to pass on to you. Our fathers were unwilling to be obedient to him, but repudiated him in their hearts and turned back to Egypt, saying to Aaron, Make for us gods who will go before us. For this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what happened to him. At that time they made a calf and brought a sacrifice to the idol and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. But God turned away and delivered them up to serve the army of heaven as it is written in the book of the prophets. It was not to me that you offer victims and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, was it, O house of Israel? You also took along the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of the god of Rampha, the images which you made to worship. I also will remove you beyond Babylon. And I want to utilize this text for our subject matter today. When God gives you what you ask for. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We ask that you would move in this place. We ask that you would change us, transform us, renew our mind because of the word of God. May our faith be built, may our destinies be set. May we give you all the glory, honor, and praise for what you do in our midst, in this moment in time. It is in your name we pray, the name that is above every other name, the name of Jesus the Christ, our King. And everybody under the sound of my voice that's glad is still alive and well, one time real loud, can you shout amen? You can take your seats in Jesus' name. For those who are joining us on this journey, and give context to where we have been. In Acts chapter 7, Stephan is standing trial in front of the Sanhedrin Council, and he's going through the Word of God, showing them that they are repeating a cycle. The cycle that they are repeating is that they find themselves in bondage. God sends a deliverer, they reject the deliverer, and they stay in bondage longer than God intended for them to stay. And now we find him teaching the Sanhedrin Council by utilizing the life of Moses and the children of Israel. What I want to do is I want us to go through each scripture line by line, precept by precept, word by word, starting at verse number 38. And if we pay close attention, we'll see that each verse has a subject matter in and of itself. Verse 38, it teaches us the privilege of divine revelation. And Stephan reminds the Sanhedrons that Israel was giving living oracles. This phrase means that God gave Moses living, breathing words directly from God, not dead religion. We've gotten accustomed to dead church. We've gotten accustomed to dead messages. We've gotten accustomed to messages that make us feel good about our lives when we are living in sin. The word of God comes not to cater to us, the word of God comes to change and to transform us. And what we see happening in verse 38, we see scripture teaches us that God gives Moses divine oracles. He does not give him empty tradition. He entrusts him with his word. And what an honor and a privilege it is for the God of all gods, the king of all kings, the Lord of all lords to entrust us with his word. He trusts you with his word. And the very fact that he trusts you with his word is an indication of how great of a God we serve. Because without him, you're not very trustworthy. But because of his word, he allows you to steward what has also saved you. He allows you to steward what has also healed you, what has also set you free and delivered you. And what Stefan is teaching the Sanhedrons is that you can possess the word of God and still resist the God of the Word. And some of you you find yourself there today. You hear the word week in, week out, and you still resist the God of the Word that you hear. And you pick and choose what you apply to your life because you think that you're not that bad. You think that you only need a partial gospel. You think you only need the portion of the gospel of Jesus Christ that tells you that God is going to bless you instead of God is going to blister you. You think that you only need the gospel of Jesus Christ that curates to your dream board and to your Pinterest wall instead of the gospel that cuts the sin out of your life and removes the toxicity out of your conversations and reminds you that without him it is impossible to please him. You you think that you are not that bad, and the reality is that you are. I sure hope my kids are paying attention and you think that the word of God is for everyone else except for you. When in fact, this word has been tailor-made for you and for you and for you. And you will miss what God is saying if you already assume you know what he's going to say. The scripture teaches us they physically left Egypt, but they were still tied to Egypt because their mind was still trapped in captivity. Here's the reality for some of us. Some of us would rather be comfortable in captivity than experience freedom in the unknown of the wilderness. Verse 40 teaches us the profound truth. Verse 40 teaches us that if we're not careful, we'll allow situations and circumstances to dictate what we do instead of God. In verse 40, it says, the children of Israel complained to Aaron, and they said, We do not know what happened to him. In other words, they said, We cannot wait for God's process. And so we want God's provision, but we don't want God's process. We want God's fruit, but we don't want to go through the production line of waiting and being patient and allowing God to strip us of things that we've applied to our own lives and strip us of mentalities that we've picked up along the way and strip us of relationships that we uh never got approval from God to steward in our lives, and we don't want the process, but we want the produce. And so they asked Aaron to make visible gods, and this is where human nature falls time and time again. We prefer a God we can control over a God we can trust. And so instead of waiting on the Lord and being of good courage and again waiting on the Lord, we would rather rush the process and manufacture our own blessing and breakthrough in season and ask God to stamp his stamp of approval on it instead of sitting down and being patient enough to get what it is that he has for us. We do not know what happened to him. We we don't want to wait for the process of God because we were not patient enough to sit still in his presence to see his hand provide and perform on our behalf. So we're just gonna build our own God. Verse 41 it says they celebrated the work of their own hands. They built the golden calf and they celebrated it. And this is the great deception of idolatry. We begin to worship what we manufacture. This is why some of us can't lift our hands in worship because we are our own God. This is why some of us can't step into seasons of breakthrough because we're so stuck in our own mentality and our own mindset and in our own way that we can't see what God is actually doing in our lives. I want you to think about this for a moment. How great was the grace of God to provide an enemy for the children of Israel? What do you mean, Pastor? What do you mean by that? Enemies aren't good. And I would argue that enemies are, because enemies force you out of one place. And they position you on a journey to discover God in a way you never could if you had not been impacted by the enemy in the first place. How how great was the grace of God to position an enemy in their midst to force them out of comfort into the wilderness? How great was the grace of God to position them in a wilderness where they couldn't depend on anything or anyone else, and they still made an idol because they were impatient enough to see what God was actually doing. We oftentimes think, God, the devil put me in this wilderness. He put me in this place, he put me in this season, he put me in this hardship, and sometimes it's the grace of God keeping you and protecting you and shielding you from the tactics of the enemy, and he's hid you away in the wilderness so that you would not fall prey to your own efforts and your own will and your own intellect and your own power and your own desires and your own flesh, and God, his grace is so significant that he would position a Pharaoh in the lives of the children of Israel, and he would position them in the wilderness when they were wandering and searching, and they still erected an idol because they could not see what it was that God was doing. And some of us we've done the same thing today. And although you can't see a golden calf in front of you, some of you look at the golden calf every single day on your phone, and you check your app and you check your bank account, and you're in relationships that God never called you to be in, and you wonder why you have not heard the voice of God, it's because you're entertaining Moloch. And you come to church and you think that church is about you. And so you got first-person syndrome as it pertains to scripture. When you read stories like David and Goliath, you think you're David. Read stories like God parting the Red Sea and you think you're Moses. Some of you are even arrogant enough to think that you're Jesus turning water into wine at the wedding ceremony because surely scripture has to do about you, and surely God left you scripture so that you can see you in scripture when in fact God gave you scripture so that you could see him in scripture. And if you get a glimpse of God, then he'll reveal to you who he desires for you to be. And so you have to stop being your own idol. The deception of idolatry is that we will dance around something we built ourselves, or utilize language like I got here. I hustled, I grinded, I made it happen. Live or die trying. Ah, ah, ah, I'm gonna get it one way or another. I'ma get the bag. Ah, ah, ah, and you don't even realize that you have crafted and carved a golden calf, and you're not experiencing the presence of an Almighty God, you're experiencing the presence of an idol you built for yourself and you're dancing around it. How do you know when you got an idol in your life that you're dancing around, when you talk more about that idol than you do about Jesus Christ? How do you know when you got an idol in your life when you talk more about that relationship than you do about the person that put you in that relationship? How do you know when you got an idol in your life when you think more about the amount you have to give God versus who you're actually giving to? How do you know you have an idol in your life when you pick and choose, when you spend time with him, when he gives you daily bread, when you pick and choose, when you pray to him, when he says, I want to spend the rest of my life with you, I want to spend all day with you. I want you to see and hear and read my word and you take days off because you got an idol in your life and you don't even know it. How do you know when you got an idol in your life when you only read the word of God because you got to share the word of God with somebody else? How do you know when you got an idol in your life? When you're stuck on your little devotion instead of sharing what God has showed you in His Word with other people. This word isn't just for you. This word is supposed to be carried through you. This word is supposed to be shared by you. And if you ever get a real revelation of what this word actually says, then you will receive what the Great Commission tells you to receive, which is go ye into all the world and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. But Pastor, I'm not a minister. Yes, you are. You've been called by God, you've been saved by God, you've been redeemed by God, you've been chosen by God. And the word of God says he called you and chose you for such a time as this. If he has given you the word of God, he has not given you the word of God for the word of God to stay with you. He's given you the word of God for you to catch that word, to carry that word, and then to cast that word. But some of us we're stuck because we think that the word of God is simply for us, and we forget that there are people dying around us because we're so selfish. And we make an idol out of our knowledge. We make an idol out of our information, we make an idol out of our wisdom. And the word of God says that you can have wisdom, you can have knowledge, you can have information, and it puffs you up, and you don't even know the one that reveals himself to you as the living, breathing word of God. And the children of Israel find themselves there, too impatient to wait for God, so they build a God. And verse 42 is one of the saddest verses of scripture in all of the Bible. It says, And God turned away and gave them over. When people persistently reject God, sometimes the judgment from God is not fire from heaven. Sometimes the judgment from God is allowing them to actually have what they insist on. And some of you are in the season that you're in, not because God has forsaken or abandoned you, some of you are in the season you're in because you prayed for it. You begged God for it. And you weren't patient enough to wait for God's perfect will to unfold in your life. And so now you're dealing with God's permissive will in your life. And some of you are frustrated because you married an idol. And God says, You want it? You got it. God, I need you to change him. No, no, you wanted that man. You weren't patient enough for me to develop him, so you got what you asked for. God, she talked too much. You knew that before you put a ring on her finger. And you got exactly what you prayed for because you were not patient enough to let me mature her into becoming the daughter and the queen that I called her to be. And so you got what you prayed for. God, these kids driving me crazy. You're absolutely right. But you prayed for those kids and you continue to call those kids exactly the opposite of what I called them. Stop calling them little demons and little imps and little children from hell. You get what you absolutely ask for, and God, He will turn away from you and turn you over to the things that you ask for when you're too impatient to wait on Him. The judgment that you are experiencing is God allowing you to get what you want. And when you think about this, when you really boil down. To why you sin and why you fall short, it's because you got what you wanted. You read your word, you'll see. David said, The Lord is my shepherd, I have no wants. Because if you get what you want, you negate getting what you need. That's why in Philippians he says, I'll supply all your needs according to my riches and glory through Christ Jesus. He never promises to give you what you want, but he will in fact give you what you want if you beg him enough for it. And he'll turn away and turn you over to the selfish desires of your heart. And he will allow you to wander in the wilderness and ask the question, God, are you there? So that he's the only one that can answer you when you feel alone. And you think God is not with you. The fact that you're in the wilderness is an indication that God is, in fact, with you. He wants you to be isolated so that you don't entertain the voices of other people, so that you're isolated enough to hear his voice and his voice alone. Because some of you you're too distracted by the voices speaking to you, because you rather live for the applause of people than the affirmation of God. Verse 43 teaches us that idols lead us to exile. And Israel carried their tents, they carried their idols of Moloch, the star Rampha. What this teaches us is you can in fact pretend to worship the living God by carrying your idols in your wallet and in your purse. Eventually, this idol you worship will lead you into exile. Because idolatry always promises freedom, but can only produce captivity. I want you to write this down, point number one. You can carry God's word and still resist God's will. That's why some of you can sit under a message like this and still idolize time more than the presence of God. I can almost guarantee you, when I say, okay, let's get ready to give, 10% of the church is going to grab their things and head for the door. You know why? Because we're so used to making our own idols that we don't discern the difference between the presence of God and the idol we constructed for ourselves. You can absolutely carry God's word and still resist the will of God. Revelation does not guarantee obedience. God can reveal Himself to you, but only you can obey what God reveals to you. Revelation does not guarantee obedience. The danger of this is not the ignorance we carry of God's word. The danger is becoming familiar with what we have been ignoring. And some people don't reject the Bible, they simply neutralize it with being familiar with it. We become familiar with the presence of God. We treat the presence of God just like he's anyone else, like he is anything else. And we we try to limit the presence of God in our life because we like control over our lives and we like control over our time and we like control of our situations and circumstances. And whenever God places his hand on it, we ask God to move it because we don't know the outcome of what God desires to do. And so instead of trusting God in the unknown, we would rather construct an idol that we know. And the most dangerous place in the world to be is hearing God's voice so often that it stops shaking your soul. Some of you are like, man, I just want to hear from God. And you don't open his word. I just want to feel God's presence. But you don't pray. I just want to receive the blessing of God, but you don't sacrifice. Because you've constructed a golden calf for your own life. Instead of surrendering to the King of Kings that can actually guide you out of the season that you're stuck in. The word of God was never meant to decorate your mind, it was given to you to dominate your life. And if the word of God is not dominating your life, then you're being led by a false idol. And that's why you like to add things with Jesus. That's why you like to pray and ask Jesus for certain things, but check your horoscopes every day. Because Jesus isn't enough. That's why you like to pray and pray with sage. Y'all don't got to talk to me. It's okay, I know. Because y'all asked me to pray for you after you go through these things. I know I'm talking to you. Because we're too impatient to wait on Jesus to respond and answer us. So you you pray to Jesus while you're also sleeping with the demon you are asking Jesus to deliver you from. I want him to deliver me. I want him to deliver me, I want him to deliver me, I want him to deliver me, I want him to deliver me, I want him to deliver me, I want him to deliver me. I want him to deliver me. What you doing? Pastor, I'm praying for a job. I'm praying for a job. I'm praying for a job. What are you doing right now? I'm just waiting on God. I'm just I'm just waiting. Have you have you put together a resume? No, no, no, no, no. I'm just I'm just waiting. I'm just I'm waiting, I'm waiting. Have you created a LinkedIn profile? No, no, no, no, no, because that's not how God works for me.

unknown 29:23

Come on now, Pastor.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

God don't want me to work hard. He don't want me to have to pray and make sacrifices for my next season. He don't want that for me. He calls me his very own. It was meant to dominate your life. And if the word of God is not dominating your life, you're leading your life, and you're leading your life into destruction, and you don't even know it. Point number two. Some people escape the place of bondage, but never escape the appetite of bondage. And so your clothes may change. But if your appetite doesn't, you won't be able to fit those clothes very long. And you pray that God will usher you into a new season. And God, in fact, takes you from glory to glory, faith to faith, into a new season, but you're still stuck in the same old mentality. And so you recycle the same thing from your old season and the season that God has ushered you into because some people escape the place of bondage, but they never escape the appetite of bondage. And you can leave Egypt without Egypt leaving you. And Stefan exposes Israel's hidden problem. In their hearts, they turned back to Egypt. Now I want you to hear me when I tell you this. It does not say they physically turned and they went back to Egypt. In their hearts, they turned back to Egypt. That's why some of you, you're married and you still think about your old flame. Because your heart has turned back to Egypt. And although God has removed you out of Egypt, you have not changed your appetite, so you still crave the diet of onions, leeks, and mushrooms. God is saying, I've given you manna. And you're saying, God, I'm tired of eating the same thing over and over again. I want onions, I want leeks, I want mushrooms. And God is saying, I'm providing for you daily bread every single day, but God, it's not good enough. And whenever God provides for you, and it's not good enough, you have become your own God. Their bodies were free, but their desires are still enslaved. Freedom in your location means nothing if captivity still lives in your imagination. What you need to know is that deliverance is incomplete until your desires change. What do you desire today? Who do you desire today? What is it that you're desiring that's contrary to what God desires for you? Some of you, you are trying to use God for your outcome instead of being used by God for His outcome for your life because of your selfish desires. And deliverance is incomplete until your desires change. And so you can get free. You can go through freedom. You can actually sit through deliverance courses. And if your desires do not change, you'll still entertain the same demons you've been entertaining for the last five years of your life. And some of you come up to me after service and say, Well, Pastor, how do I know if this is the right person? How do I know? I, you know, I want to marry him. And my questions are simple. Are they pursuing Jesus? Well, no, they're not pursuing Jesus, but I can change them. I can change them. I can change them. How do I know what job God wants me to have? How do I know what job? Are you are you chasing peace or are you chasing a bag? Because sometimes it's more valuable to take less and keep your peace than to sacrifice your peace and have more money. And what the wilderness reveals in all of us, the wilderness reveals a powerful truth. The wilderness reveals whether you actually want God or whether you just want relief. And you know Egypt is still alive in you when comfort becomes more attractive than your calling. And some of us chase comfort. And so we'll stay in places that we know God has moved on from because we found community there. And you'll ask me, Pastor, what do you think about this? And I'll tell you, and it's not what you want to hear. And so you'll come back to me and ask me again, Pastor, what do you think about this? And I'll tell you again, and you'll ask me again, and I'm not going to tell you no more. Because you didn't listen to me the first time. And you will absolutely stop hearing the voice of God if you don't honor it. Because the voice of God flows towards honor. And you want to know where you stop hearing God, you stop hearing God where you constructed your last idol. And you make relationships with people, the God over your relationship with Jesus. And God is no longer there. And you wonder why you haven't felt his presence, why you don't have any peace, why you're not hearing his voice, why you're not getting the things that God told you that you would step into and you think that God lied. No, God has not lied. You got lazy. And you know Egypt. But you're unfamiliar with the voice of God in the wilderness. And you will not truly be free until that thing that has enslaved you loses its appeal in your life. Point number three is this. Impatience with God is the factory where idols are made. When you cannot wait for God, you will manufacture a substitute to replace him. And while Moses was receiving revelation on the top of Mount Sinai, the children of Israel built a golden calf in the valley, which teaches us a valuable lesson. Impatience with God produces man-made solutions. When people lose patience with God's process, they start inventing their own gods. And every idol in your life is born in the waiting season that you were impatient in. Every idol in your life was birthed out of you being too impatient to see God do something significant and supernatural and seismic in your life. Every idol that you currently are entertaining is the fruit of your impatience in a season of you supposedly waiting on God. So what you refuse to trust God for, you will try to build yourself. And this passage teaches us a valuable lesson, Stefan. He's teaching us a valuable lesson. I pray we pay attention to the revelation of this text. The golden calf was not created because God was silent. The idols that they constructed, the idols that they built, was created because the people got restless. They got tired of waiting on God. They got tired of being patient. They got tired of resting in his presence, and they wanted to create something that they could see, something that they could touch, something that they could dance around instead of dwelling in the presence of the God who bought them out of Egypt and opening up the Red Sea for them and delivering for them daily bread. They forgot who provided water in the wilderness and they constructed their own God. And my question to you right now is what idols have you constructed to take the place of Jesus because you were too impatient to wait on him. That's why in the Old Testament, God leaves us verses like, wait on the Lord and be of good courage. Again, I say, wait on the Lord. And I just want to encourage you today, in order for you to get to where God wants you to get to quickly, you got to slow down to follow the steps that He's ordering on your behalf. And he said, I'll be a lamp unto your feet, and I'll be a light unto your path. And although we celebrate over the light, and although we celebrate over the lamp, we forget that he leaves the speed up to you. And although God lights your path, you dictate the speed in which you walk it out. The children of Israel were too impatient. And so they constructed an idol. And every idol begins with the lie that God is taking too long. And some of you have been single for many years. Some of you have been waiting for increase in promotion, and God will wait until you sacrifice promotion on the altar. God will call you to sacrifice everything significant and place it on the altar so he can test if you're really after him for him or if you're after him for what he can do for you. That's why God told Abraham, place your son on the altar. It wasn't that he was making him sacrifice the promise, he was making him sacrifice the blessing so that he could fulfill the promise. Isaac was not the promise. Isaac was the blessing that needed to be sacrificed so that God could fulfill the promise through Abraham. God never promised him that you would have one son, he promised him that I will make you a father to many nations. And if you're not willing to sacrifice your Isaac, then you're never going to possess what it is that God desires for you to possess. Every idol begins with the lie that God is taking too long. God, when will it be my season? God, when will it be my time? God, when will I see the things I've been praying for? God, when will I get my spouse? God? When will I get my child? God? When will I get the promotion? God? When will I get the bag? God? When will I get the thing, the thing, the thing? God, will I get the car, the house, the things, the things? And you have made idols out of these things instead of promoting God to the place of priority in your life. And some of you are angry with God because He's pulled you out of a season that you thought was your promise. When in fact it was your Isaac. And if you're not willing to put your Isaac on the altar, you're not willing to discover the ram and the bush. What you refuse to trust God for, you will eventually build yourself. And if you build it, it better be strong enough and powerful enough to take you into eternity. Because the idols you construct, you have to be willing to serve them for the rest of your life. If you don't surrender your life back to Jesus Christ, I have been in a lot of situations and circumstances, and I have made idols out of things that God never told me to make idols out of, and I have made gods out of things that I did not serve and I did not want to become my master. And never in my life did they save me. Never in my life did they heal me. Never in my life did they deliver me. Never in my life did they set me free. Never in my life did they promote or elevate me. Never in my life did they change my mind. They always pulled me away from Jesus Christ. And some of you, you're on your knees in front of the idol. You've constructed for yourself, thinking that it will save you. And no one can save you the way Jesus can. Scripture says there's only one way to the Father, and that is by the Son. There aren't many pathways. Don't listen to people that tell you there are many ways to God. You can serve Buddha and serve Jesus. You can serve Allah and serve Jesus. You can serve Hare Krishna and serve Jesus. You can't serve both of them. You can only have one master, and the one that you serve, he better be strong enough to usher you into eternity. If not, you will spend damnation in eternal hell because you chose an idol that could not save you. Point number four is this what you worship today determines where you will live tomorrow. Scripture says they made idols, they created gods, and those idols led them into exile. What you worship today determines where you will live tomorrow. What you worship will eventually carry you into exile or carry you into eternity. And Stefan reminds the Sanhedrin's that idolatry led the children of Israel into Babylon. Idols never liberate, they always enslave. And idols promise power, but quietly steal your freedom. And a heart led by idols. Will always end up in exile from God's presence. Because the reality is you can never just carry an idol. That idol carries you. And how do you know when it's an idol? When you can't walk away from it? How do you know it's an idol when you can't give it up to God? How do you know that they are an idol when you can't cut them off when you know you should? The thing you bow to today becomes the master. You cannot escape tomorrow. In Israel, they rejected God, they rejected Moses, they rejected the prophets, and Stephen is teaching the Sanhedrin. Now you reject Christ. This Christ you reject. He came not to just change your heart, he came to transform it. He came not to just be a part of your life, he came to be your life. He did not make the ultimate sacrifice to enhance your life, he made the ultimate sacrifice to exchange his life for yours. And in 2 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 16. Scripture says, But whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. God did not bring you out of Egypt just to watch you build another Egypt in your heart. He brought you out of Egypt to usher you into the promise that He's prepared for you. He brought you out so that He could live on the throne you once gave to the idols you erected and constructed. He brought you out so that you could be reminded that there is no one as powerful and mighty and worthy as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. He brought you out so that you could testify of his goodness and remind you that we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by the words of our testimony. He brought you out so you could be reminded that on your own a few things are possible. But when you believe in him, all things are possible to those that believe. He brought you out so that you could be a living, walking, moving, breathing testimony of the faithfulness of God. He brought you out so that you would not stay stuck in sin and stuck in the wilderness and stuck in Egypt. He brought you out so that you can fulfill the very promise that God has given you. He brought you out. And I wonder if there's anybody that's listening to me right now that can acknowledge that it was God and God alone that brought you out of Egypt and placed you on the path of righteousness, not for your sake, not for your name, not for your family, but for his name's sake, saith the Lord. He brought you out. He is the one that gave you the ability, he gave you the gifts, he gave you the talents, he gave you the resources. He is the one who did those things. And sometimes we need to be reminded that it was not ourselves that positioned us where we were, and it was not ourselves that opened the door, that we got a chance to run through. It was not ourselves that positioned us in a new season. And we have to remind ourselves that if it had not been for the Lord on my side, where in the world would I be? And I wonder, are there about 30 people that can recall who you used to be without Jesus Christ? Where your mind was without his saving grace, where your life was without his mercy and his steadfast love towards you. You need to be reminded that you're no longer stuck in Egypt. Because where the Spirit of the Lord is. You've made a relationship, your God. You need to lay it at the altar. You've made other people and other things your God. You need to lay it at the altar. God says, I will have no other gods stand before me. I am God and God alone. And beside me there is no one else. We gotta stop playing church and stop thinking that this life is about us. No, this life that God has given you is about his glory and his glory alone. And if your life is not a reflection of his glory, then you have constructed idols. And if you can't make it to this stage, you make wherever you are at night, or you drop down in the aisles. If you gotta kneel on the step, you kneel on the step. If you're on the platform up there, you kneel on the platform. If you're in the overflow, you find a space in that overflow and you make an altar there to burn that idol that you've constructed. There's freedom for those that desire it. I'm not gonna pray over you, you pray over yourself. You ask God to wring that thing out of you, you ask God to burn it, you ask God to empty you of the sin you've been carrying in your life, you ask God to remove every idol, every false God, everything that has tried to take its place. You you pray and you ask God, you you ask him for forgiveness, you ask him to be redeemed and to be set free from the things that you've constructed in your life that are not him. And you pray loud enough for the enemy to hear you. And you may be hearing you like, does it take all that? If it doesn't take this, then tell me what it takes. The Spirit of the living God. We declare that you and you alone are God. Beside you, there is no one else, and you and you alone deserve all of the glory, all of the honor, all of the praise. And so we ask that you would burn every false idol. We ask that you would kill every false God. We ask that you would wring out of us every sin that we've been carrying in our hearts, that we've tried to hide and bury and tuck away. We ask that you would reveal yourself to us in ways we never thought were possible. And God, we declare that we will give you all the glory, all the honor, all the praise for the supernatural work that you have done on the inside of us. And so, right now we declare that you are able to do exceeding and abundantly above all that we can ask or think, according to the power that's had work on the inside of us. We declare you alone a worthy of all of the praise, all of the honor, all of the worship, all of the glory. Right now in this moment, lift your hands, begin to lift up the name of the King of Kings of the Lord of Lords, begin to exalt his name, begin to make money to the name of Jesus.