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We have spent the last several lessons talking about the real thing. It is not something we make happen out of our own initiative or efforts. God does all the work. He makes it happen. We simply plug into it and receive His reality. Do you want that? Do you want the real thing? If so, I would like to invite you to plug in to God. Just enter into communion with Him. It is not a strain or a push. It is not a terrible grasping. It is just saying, "Jesus, that is what I want. Just take my life, take it, take it, take it."
Ask yourself what would your life look like if you gave God total freedom to do anything He'd like with it, instead of you getting Him to make your life work. What would it look like if He could do anything with it? Get rid of your burden, get rid of the pressures, get rid of the weight. Get rid of the compulsion. Get rid of all the things that weigh you down and pull on you. Begin to drink in the goodness of God. Tell Him, "Jesus. I come to a place of complete rest in You. I come to a complete stop in You. I just want the real thing, I don't want to struggle anymore. I just want to taste deep, and drink deep, Jesus. I want the passion that you have. I want the same thoughts and feelings that course through Your blood to course through my blood. I want your life in me Lord, and I want it free, Lord, because You died to give it to me. I just receive it free of charge. I don't want to insult You and insult Your grace by working for it Lord. I just take it, I just receive it, Jesus."
God is able to clean out our hearts. He is able to wash away the burdens and the fears and the pressure and the problems. He is able to make us usable to Him. He is able to make us a fragrance of His presence. He is able to qualify us to serve Him. He is able to give us the energy that represents Him, it is His energy and not your energy.
We're out of energy, we're tired. We don't know how to change our cities, we don't know how to change the climate and the environment where we live. Just the thought of doing it can be exhausting. So we want to plug into that extraordinary power, that infinite power that God has. Don't worry about all that stuff. Just fix your eyes on Jesus, just desire Him. Come to Him, and His grace.
Lord, I ask that grace would just pour out on these people, according to their faith, according to the desire. Just come on them. Just feed them what they're hungry for, Jesus -- water without cost, bread without cost. Oh God, what we see in Africa. What we see in China. What we saw in the Indonesian revival. Pour it out on these people, Lord, Your kingdom without cost. Let them know you as a God that is just utterly gracious. Your blood Jesus is what we want poured out on us, until we have the real thing. The real thing, right here. In an ordinary community, in ordinary high schools and churches, Lord. Give us the real thing, where your power is with us.
You are with us, Lord. We are not going to push, Lord. God, we couldn't earn Your favor. We couldn't get You to do anything. We just want to do what You do. We just want to be motivated like You are motivated. The same energy and life that is in You, we want in us. What thousands and hundred of thousands of Africans are drinking from now Lord, we want to drink from that. Just love us today until we just can't stand it, Jesus. Love us until we're yours. Love us until we thrill You as much as You thrill us. Love us until You get what You want from us, instead of us always wanting to get what we can from You.
Just do an awesome, beautiful job of capturing hearts. You know how to do it, Lord. You know how to capture hearts. You are the ultimate lover, Lord. The most emotional person in the universe; I love you for that. You're just emotional; You're just a romantic person. You invented romance. Those that are hungry for romance, feed them, Lord. Feed those who are hungry Lord, for romance. Feed those that are hungry for rest. Feed those that are hungry for life. Feed those that are hungry for more than life as usual. Feed those who are hungry for heaven on earth. Oh, God, heaven on earth.
There's evil all around us Lord, just be with us. Just be with us and we will have heaven on earth. Just stay with us Lord, keep your company with us Lord. Walk with us Lord, be our mind. Be our brain. Be our heart. Be our emotions. We will have heaven on earth, we will have what we want. Miracles chasing us Lord, we can't stop them. We can't stop the miracles, we can't keep the people from getting healed. We can't keep people from coming to you. We can't hold the revival back in Africa; it's going so fast and so strong that we can't hold it back. We can't get enough missionaries and helpers. We can't get enough people to teach in the Bible school because so many thousands of people want to be in Bible school. We have people jumping in the boat, ready or not, fishermen, or not. They're just jumping in, they're just jumping in, they're so hungry for You. They want You!
Who wants Him that bad here? Who can't live without His supernatural power? Who doesn't want to go through a day without seeing miracles flowing naturally? A normal day is one where miracles do happen every few minutes. They happen even when you don't notice them and aren't aware of them. Everything is a miracle; everything is flowing from his hands. Everything; it's like heaven!
Teach us to walk and talk with You in a way that we're not struggling to believe if You're there or not. Let us just walk and talk with You and drink You in. We're struggling to get You to pay attention, Lord. Make us understand that You are totally focused on us. We don't have to get You to pay attention. We accept You, we receive You, Jesus. We just receive you Lord, freely, without charge, without pressure, without straining for you. We don't want to strain for You, we just want You, Lord! We just want to be in love with You. We're not trying to get You to come close, Lord. We just open our doors and open our hearts. You're here. We just take you Lord. We take You by the feet, Lord. We grab a hold of You, and You're not ever going to get rid of us, because that's how bad we want You. You're stuck with us Lord, forever!
Give your life to God. What is holding you back for doing that? Get it over with now, die now, and you'll have a much better life! Throw your life away now, don't wait until you wreck most of it! Toss it now, give it to God now! It will be harder later, just get rid of your life now. Junk it! Toss it out the window; gone, finished. You know, get a new one. Get one that's worth living. Get one that's fun, get one that's really exciting! Get one that's full of power and goodness and purity and excellence. Let your life be something that's going to honor God on judgment day, something that you're going to be proud of and happy with. Don't let it be something that's going to be hanging around your neck and making your heart heavy all of your life. Get a new life! Junk it, junk your own!
God knows how to lead you. You don't have to struggle to have Him find you. You just have to let Him in. That is faith, believing that Jesus is as good as the Bible says He is. In my experience in the Christian life it's always finding out that He is better than I thought He was. He always turns out to be a lot better than I thought He was, and that makes me wish I hadn't wasted my time before. I wish I'd been to Africa a long time before I got there.
What could God orchestrate in your community with His wisdom and His power? That's what we need to look for. We need to look for His glory and His power to be manifested. That happens when we believe that He is as good as the Bible says He is. Oh, perfect love casts out fear. Every hope and dream that you ever had in God, everything that He ever put there. Let it happen. He didn't put these things in you to frustrate you, if you ever had any dreams or ambitions in God, hopes, if the Holy Spirit has ever touched you before, that's just the start.
Whatever happened last week, it's just the start. Grace drops a curtain on yesterday, we don't have to drag up the past. We don't have to drag out what we did last week, or how we failed last year. We don't have to have years of counseling and all of that to get straightened out. A lot of Jesus straightens you out in one moment, in one flash. Forget what lies behind, and press on to what lies ahead. His grace is total and complete. The devil can't blackmail us, the devil can't wreck our lives with what happened in the past. Nothing, God sets us free. Don't even look back. Don't worry about yesterday. He's the total redeemer, it's that thundering white Niagara Falls of His grace that washes away everything, everything, everything that isn't perfect and pure and clean and excellent.
Your life in Him begins new every morning. His mercies are fresh. That is the real thing, that's what I'm interested in -- real revival, without strain, without pressure, without compulsion. It comes without trying, hard at anything. Real life. Real freedom.
How did I get there? I gave it all to Jesus. I gave Him my life and I gave Him control of everything I possess. Nothing is mine anymore. I don't have anything anymore except God. My house is not mine, my car is not mine. My children are not mine. Heidi is not mine, my marriage is not mine. My own wife is not mine; she travels all over the world and does whatever Jesus asks of her. She's not mine. But I get Jesus out of the deal! God blesses me in ways I can't even imagine. I don't own anything, except Him. I am my beloved's and He is mine, and that's it. That's the end of it. He's the only possession I have. The only possession I have, and I'm rich. We just travel everywhere and try to get people as rich as those orphan kids! We don't own anything, don't possess anything except Him. And we have Him because He gave Himself to us.
Will we take Him? It's not a matter of striving after Him, there is no striving in the kingdom of God. Just receive Him. It's hard to imagine something so good, and to get it all you have to do is just receive. But it's so good until it breaks us and we are conquered. It's not a new gospel, it's not something we just found out. This is the same gospel that has been preached for 2,000 years. It's just the plain, ordinary gospel of Jesus, and Him crucified. It's all Paul knew. And when we're in Africa and we're facing hundreds of thousands of starving people with their terrible problems and all, all we know is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This is all we know, and we see food multiplied. We see the dead raised, and we see people in visions, and we see churches growing by the hundred and by the thousands. It's all we preach, we just preach Him.
God is the only One we trust. I don't trust Heidi, I don't trust my old pastor, I don't trust my seminary professors. I don't trust World Vision or Red Cross or United Nations. There's nobody I trust but Jesus. That's it! So, how do I go to the mission field? That's God's problem. How do I pay for it? That's God's problem, not mine. How am I going to get enough compassion when I get there? Again, that is God's problem. How am I going to know what to do when I get there? Guess what, that is also God's problem. What am I going to do with my house and my kids? That is God's problem. It's all His problem, I have no more problems! I am problem free, issue free! I love Him for that. Would you like to be problem free as well? Give them all to Jesus and take the real thing from Him.