See, maybe you got a certain fear, anxiety. May be you haven’t had the boldness to say, “I want a new life and I want it now. And I don’t care what it’s going to cost me. I am taking all of my paraphernalia, whatever I’ve accumulated, all of my lust, all of my evil desires. All of the objects that leads to sin in my life, physical or people.” Bring it to the foot of the cross, say, “Lord, I am surrendering to you.” It’s only when you surrender your life to Jesus by faith. When you say, “Lord, I don’t know, you know. But I know one thing- I need you and I want you Lord. I want you to cleanse me, Lord. You died on the cross for me. And Lord, You are a great savior, I am a great sinner, we make a perfect match. I need You Lord, cleanse me, cleanse me, heal me and I will walk in your way. Give me strength by the Holy Spirit.”
I want to say one more thing. There are people who know the Lord. Ok, there are people who know the Lord and they are still struggling. How many of you heard that? They are still struggling. They say one day, “It’s a beautiful day, I think I’ll go to church. I think I’ll read the word, fellowship, come here to Pacific Garden Mission, hang out a little bit. “I feel good! I feel nice! Sugar and…? Spice! I feel good, it’s a feeling. But there’s only one problem. Monday comes along. Monday, the devil starts talking to me again. He says, “You know that feeling you had, it was just a – “Lovin’ feelin’!” That’s all it was. You are “Righteous brother!” but only for one day. But, I got you the rest of the time, so stop pretending. All of these things come.
You know why? When somebody says to God, “I think Lord I will try to you. I want to be with You. I need a new life. I agree with all of that. Preacher man, I agree with every single thing you said. There is only one problem. When I am by myself with my old friends, I just don’t seem to have the power. What’s happening? Same problem that happened to the person who didn’t get saved. The one who really got saved and loves Jesus Christ they also still got some more surrendering to do. Amen. That’s the crux of the matter. Until you and I die to self, and we say, “Lord, I am nothing without You. You are my everything. Lord, even when I come to know you. I come to Pacific Garden Mission, or hear on the radio, these things that coming in front of me and I know I am missing something in life, something major. I need Jesus Christ. But all these lies are coming, I feel weak.”
The Lord says, “Surrender completely.” “ I surrender all.” The day you say to the Lord, whether you don’t know the Lord or you come to believe in the Lord and you’re still struggling, you who may be backsliding, come back to the Lord and say, “Lord, do a deep work in me. I still have some things to give up.” You know what happened to me. When I got saved, some years ago, I got healed. I had bronchial asthma for 11 years to the point of death. I couldn’t run, I couldn’t play, I was afraid of the future. I had my medicines – taking them day and night, you know. I kept praying. But between the sin and sickness, I felt hopeless. But I loved to go to church. And I knew that there was something with God that I was missing.
Well, a friend of mine said to me. Did you know that Mathew 18:19 in the Book says that “If any two of you shall agree on earth, Jesus said this, as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father. He quoted that scripture to me. Put his hand on me, and quoted that scripture and said to me, “I am going to pray for you. So believe and he said, start thanking God.” Well God did a miracle. No other way to explain. I have been going to my doctors for 11 years. Within 2 weeks of May 1990, the Lord took the whole disease away. I was jumping for joy. Glory to God. You know what that did for me. That showed me that God is not just an imagination. He is not some imaginary creature. He is not just something to lean on when I feel like I need some hope. He is a Living God and He has got the power to heal you inside and out. Amen! God is going to manifest His power even in your mind, your body and your spirit. Now, He may not instantly take away your disease but He is going to let you feel His presence and He is able to do everything. And then before you feel, we’ve already talked about the wind; before you feel any different open this mouth that God gave you and start praising Him. Amen? So if you prayed, “Lord God, deliver me from the immoral heart that I have. My mind is messed up, I can’t seem to get away from immoral thoughts. God, what’s wrong with me? Please help me.” The Lord says, “I hear your cry and I will deliver you. Do you believe?” We ought to say, “Yes Lord.” And then start thanking Him. You get a hold of this Book, the Holy Bible. You start reading it for your dear life. And you say, “Lord, every Word is true.” “Lord, if You said that, ‘Sin shall not have dominion over me,’ then I believe your Word. It’s got to go. It’s got to go. And I am going to start praising God for that. Lord, I thank You that You are going to deliver me from this!”
And I am going to take some steps. Do you know when you really have faith, you are going to do some actions. So, if you say Lord help me to go up this way to heaven, I am not going to be walking in the opposite direction - the other way, right? I am not going to say, “Lord, let me go to heaven.” That’s a contradiction. So if I say “Lord, I want to be clean.” And my old friends start calling. “We got a special thing going on. You are the man, we want you to be there, you are the life of the party.” You got to say, “Hello!” “That man is dead, I am a new person now. I am a new creature in Christ Jesus. I don’t go that way anymore.” And they say, “What do you mean you don’t go that way, you think you are better than us? You got religious, you crazy? You are in trouble. You are not our friend anymore. Furthermore, you are going to get hurt.” This is all from the devil. Everybody who knows the Lord is going to suffer some type of persecution.
But Jesus Christ is the truest friend who will help you overcome all of that. And you are going to stand one day as a testimony that when Jesus saved me and I believed the Word, I took Him at His Word and when He told me, “Don’t go to that street of sin anymore.” And I say, “Lord I feel the tug of temptation.” I get down. I start crying out. I say, “Lord I don’t want to go. Lord, even if it kills me, I will not sin against you.” When I say like that, God knows I mean business. I said that before to the Lord; “Lord, if I can’t serve You, I don’t want to live.” That’s a good prayer. Because God will take you seriously. He will give you the grace to overcome sin. He will give you the grace. Every step you take for the Lord, He will take you two steps forward. That’s the grace of God. That’s because He loves you.
So please be assured tonight that if you say to the Lord Jesus Christ, “Lord, tonight I believe that you died on the cross 2000 years ago for my own sins, my wickedness. Lord, forgive me for lying.” You start saying to the Lord, “Lord forgive me for stealing. Lord forgive me for wishing I had hurt somebody. Lord forgive me for pride. Forgive me for all of those things that are not good. All my sins, Lord, I believe that Your blood is able to cleanse me thoroughly from my sin and I am pleading with you Lord. Save my soul, I want to be born again.”
What is born again? Not going in to my mother’s belly a second time and then coming out. But in my heart becoming a brand new person. The Holy Spirit Who we can’t see with the eye, when you believe on Jesus Christ, will begin to work in your heart and change you completely. But you keep walking brothers. You keep walking with Him. You keep meaning business with God and He will make you a testimony.
When you have 10,000 people around you who say, “I have heard about Jesus too but am still a sinner i.e. I still go back to sin. I still watch the things that I shouldn’t watch. Oh, it’s not as bad as before but, you know, it’s drastically cut down but I still have a problem with that. So, I know about Jesus, so I don’t need to hear any more.” You know what you can say one day? You can say boldly to those people, “What you are telling me has got to be a different Jesus because my Jesus not only saves me from sin; He delivers me from the power of sin!” Amen? He can help you walk clean so that the crowd of people around you can say, “This is unbelievable but actually it’s believable because this man does not even go near the old things that he used to be addicted to.” That’s the power of God. That’s the grace of God. None of us here who is sitting up here or standing up here or in the audience who know the Lord can ever claim that we can keep ourselves, we cannot. It’s the power of Jesus Christ. It’s the power of the Holy Spirit.
But we got to start somewhere. So, I am asking you tonight. The Lord sent me here tonight from New York. You know my life is the Lord’s and I love the Lord and His ministry comes first. That’s the way our family is. And the joy that we have in doing that is lives are changed. I want to tell you tonight, we have seen people; even under the influence of drugs, right in front of us, fully flushed red in the face and body, trembling. When we prayed and they believed; they got set free from sin and addiction. They were set free to the point that their color actually came back and they were rejoicing in God. That’s the power of God. Nobody can tell me God can’t do that today. God is still alive and still on the throne. So believe Him with all your heart.
Whatever you have in your heart that’s keeping you from Jesus, tell Jesus, “I am going to throw that thing out. Whatever it is Lord, with your help, I am going to get rid of this because it’s not worth it.” That’s why the Lord says, “What can a man give in exchange for his soul?” Nothing. Nothing. Don’t let the devil tempt you to forfeit your soul and go to hell because your soul is worth far more than anything else. Keep your soul in Jesus’ love. Walk with Him and He will transform you and use you to go back to your family, your relatives, your friends and even your enemies. And they will come to the cross seeing your life. Hallelujah! That’s the life I want to live. How many of you want that kind of life? To live for the Lord in a way that is well pleasing to Him so that He can use your life to count for something more than for yourself; for his glory and honor. One day I guarantee you, this white suit I am wearing tonight here, this is going to go to the grave, one day it’s going to be destroyed. But He is going to give me another robe. He is going to give you another robe. It’s the righteous robe that will never grow old, it’s going to be shiny because of what He has done for you on the cross because you surrendered to Him. Amen? God can deliver you. Amen! Praise the Lord!
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Until next time may the Lord richly bless you!
