Introduction:
For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
~Isaiah 9:6
You Will Call Him... (Isaiah 9:6)
- My God .
- Romans 10:9 - Jesus is Lord
- John 20:31 - Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God
- John 8:24 - unless you believe that I am (he)
- Matthew 12:32
- My Mighty God.
- 2 Chronicles 14:9-12a
- 2 Chronicles 16:7-9 - For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him.
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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01:20-01:22
We are in week two of our Christmas series.
01:22-01:25
Open up your Bibles to Isaiah 9, verse 6.
01:26-01:28
Rich Sprung kicked us off last week.
01:29-01:42
The series is called "You Will Call Him." And we're looking at a very familiar passage, Isaiah 9, verse 6, but we're slowing down.
01:45-01:57
in each of these phrases, "that you will call Him." It was a time of political corruption, oppression, inverted morality.
01:57-02:02
What was evil was considered good, and what was good was considered evil.
02:02-02:04
And it was a time of fear.
02:05-02:10
And it was a time of a wicked king named Ahaz.
02:10-02:12
You can read more about him in 1 Kings 16.
02:15-02:30
But before you complain too much about the leaders that we have in our country today, or in our state, or whatever, A has - he was a wicked human being.
02:33-02:36
He was pro-child killing.
02:39-02:41
to the point that He sacrificed His own Son.
02:45-02:52
I guess to appear woke to the other people that worship the false gods.
02:53-02:55
He promoted idolatry.
02:55-02:57
He was terrible with foreign affairs.
02:57-02:59
He was a true worshiper.
02:59-03:01
It was a terrible time.
03:04-03:09
And God's people need to know God was still in control.
03:12-03:19
And if it sounds familiar, people living in fear, under corrupt leadership.
03:23-03:25
Israel was suffering.
03:26-03:27
Israel needed hope.
03:28-03:33
And you know, there's a lot of people today feeling the same.
03:34-03:34
Like, where's the hope?
03:35-03:36
Where's the hope?
03:36-03:37
Christmas, did you hear?
03:38-03:39
Where's the hope?
03:40-03:45
Well, through Isaiah, the Lord said, "Hope is coming." Hope is coming.
03:46-03:50
And you see, God's answer wasn't political reform.
03:52-03:55
God's answer wasn't social justice.
03:57-03:59
God's answer wasn't even religion.
04:00-04:11
God's answer to all of the problems that Isaiah's culture was facing, his answer was a baby.
04:13-04:14
And that's Isaiah 9.6.
04:15-04:19
He says, "For to us a child is born.
04:21-04:23
To us a son is given.
04:24-04:26
And the government shall be upon his shoulder.
04:28-04:37
And his name shall be called, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
04:39-04:44
In the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, names were often a commentary on character.
04:46-04:49
And here, the name of the Messiah will be called.
04:49-04:55
In other words, you will call Him - first of all, we saw wonderful Counselor Rich cover that last week.
04:55-05:00
The counsel of Jesus Christ is timeless and it's personal, and it's life.
05:01-05:03
You will call Him my wonderful Counselor today.
05:05-05:08
You will call Him my mighty God.
05:10-05:15
So on your outline, if you're taking notes, it doesn't get much simpler than this.
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Number one, you will call Him my God.
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Write that down.
05:20-05:24
You will call Him my God.
05:28-05:30
Matthew or Isaiah promises a baby.
05:32-05:32
Right?
05:32-05:36
But not just a baby and not just a man.
05:36-05:44
We see here very clearly, God says this baby is going to be born, and you're going to call this baby God.
05:47-06:26
And I have to remind you here, for some this isn't a reminder but new information, but believing that Jesus Christ is God for salvation. I'm going to say that again. Believing that Jesus Christ is God is essential for salvation. You know, there are a lot of religions out there that acknowledge Jesus on some level. You can talk about the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Muslims and the Christian scientists and even the Scientologists. You realize all of those cults are pro-Jesus, right?
06:27-06:43
If you would sit down with one of the members and say, "Jesus, thumbs up or thumbs down?" They would all say, "Thumbs up, Jesus!" But none of those cults believe that Jesus Christ is actually God in the flesh, and they're not saying.
06:47-06:55
And you're like, "Well, Jeff, what about somebody, "like what about my neighbor that maybe thinks He said, "Jesus was just this really good teacher.
06:56-07:01
He was this really good moral person, but I don't necessarily believe that He's God.
07:01-07:04
You know, what would you say about that person?
07:04-07:12
It's like, I think Jesus was a good person and I believe His teachings, but I don't believe He was God." That person's not saved.
07:15-07:16
Like, how can you say that?
07:16-07:19
Well, there's no - listen to this closely.
07:20-07:28
There's not one verse in the Bible, not one, that allows for believing in Jesus simply as a good teacher.
07:29-07:37
But there are many verses, many verses in the Bible, that teach you must believe that He is God in order to be saved.
07:38-07:39
Let me give you some examples here.
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Romans 10, 9 says, "If you confess with your mouth that..." What?
07:44-07:52
"Jesus is Lord." That means so much more than Jesus is just my boss.
07:52-07:55
This is Jesus is the exalted God.
07:56-08:02
If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, believe in your heart God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
08:03-08:04
John 20, 31.
08:06-08:10
We're gonna get here Lord willing, unless he returns before that in our series in John.
08:11-08:13
But he tells us the whole purpose for his writing.
08:13-08:19
He says, "But these are written that you may believe "that Jesus is the Christ." Look at this next phrase.
08:20-08:25
"The Son of God." And some people say, "Well, 'Son of God' means that He wasn't God.
08:25-08:29
He was like the Son of God." And that is completely ignorant thinking.
08:30-08:37
Because in Jesus' day, if you're walking around telling people, "Hey, by the way, I'm the Son of God," they knew exactly what you were saying.
08:37-08:41
You were saying that you were the embodiment of Almighty God in the flesh.
08:41-08:42
That's what that phrase means.
08:42-08:44
Not lesser than God.
08:44-08:46
I am God in the form of a man.
08:46-08:47
That's what that means.
08:49-08:54
And John says he wrote everything he wrote for that reason, that you would believe he's the Son of God.
08:54-08:57
And then, what would Jesus Himself say?
08:57-08:59
What would Jesus Himself say?
08:59-09:00
Well, here's what Jesus said.
09:01-09:05
Jesus said, "I told you that you would die in your sins.
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For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins." Now, I put "He" in parentheses because you know He's not in the original language.
09:15-09:25
Jesus was literally saying here, He says, "For unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins." I am - what's I am?
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I am is God's name.
09:27-09:30
The Old Testament name for God.
09:30-09:30
Yahweh.
09:31-09:33
God said that's what My name is.
09:33-09:35
It means I am. I am who I am.
09:36-09:53
And Jesus said, "Unless you believe that that's who I am," look what He said, "you will die in your sins." and I stand up here and tell you, you must believe that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh in order to be saved, I did not make that message up.
09:53-09:55
That comes from the Bible.
09:57-10:00
So if you're struggling to believe that, your struggle is with God.
10:01-10:02
Best of luck to you on that.
10:06-10:13
Okay, I see what you're saying, but why do I have to believe that Jesus is God?
10:13-10:15
Why is that essential for salvation?
10:15-10:16
I mean, think about that.
10:18-10:24
I have to subscribe to a particular theological framework in order to be saved.
10:24-10:26
Why do I have to believe He is God?
10:26-10:27
I'm going to tell you why. Listen.
10:27-10:35
Because until you recognize Jesus for who He is, you will never receive what He offers.
10:38-10:40
I'm going to rephrase that in a positive way.
10:43-10:44
You might want to write this down.
10:44-10:48
When you believe who He is, you'll receive what He gives.
10:50-10:51
That's why it's so important.
10:53-10:55
That sounds like a Dan Smith thing, right, Mike Wolsky?
10:55-11:00
Until you believe who He is, you'll never receive what He gives.
11:04-11:10
In other words, if you think Jesus was just good moral teacher, you'll always receive Him on that level.
11:10-11:14
"He has a little nugget of information to help me get through my day and help me be a good mom today," or whatever.
11:16-11:17
He is so much more than that.
11:19-11:22
Or Jesus says, "Jesus is my life coach." Really?
11:25-11:31
No. Jesus is nothing less than Almighty God in the form of a man.
11:32-11:34
And that's what Isaiah was prophesying here.
11:35-11:38
And when you believe who He is, you'll receive what He gives.
11:39-11:41
I want to illustrate this for you.
11:41-11:45
You don't have to turn there now, but I want you to turn there later.
11:45-11:46
Matthew 12.
11:48-11:57
I just want to use this passage to sort of illustrate this idea that you absolutely have to receive Jesus as He is.
11:58-12:00
Believe who He says He is.
12:01-12:05
In Matthew 12, Jesus healed a demon-possessed man.
12:05-12:14
And the Pharisees come along and they're like, "Well, he did that by the power of Satan, you know." And Jesus said, "Well, a house divided against itself can't stand, right?
12:14-12:20
Satan wouldn't go around casting out Satan." But listen to what Jesus says here in Matthew 12.32.
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I think we'll have this on the screen here. Yeah.
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Jesus said, "Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven." But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.
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Jesus said you can speak a word against the Son of Man and be forgiven.
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In other words, someone could initially reject Jesus Christ.
12:56-13:01
out of ignorance, but then repent.
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And say, "I was wrong about who Jesus is.
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And I see who He is now, and I believe that Jesus is who He said He is." And that person could be saved, for sure.
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That happens all the time.
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What's happening in this passage?
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Again, I want you to look this up.
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Because I'm going to explain what's happening you understand that when you believe who He is, you'll receive what He gives.
13:28-13:33
In this passage, the Pharisees saw the Holy Spirit at work through Jesus.
13:35-13:41
What the Holy Spirit was doing was giving everyone clear evidence that Jesus is God.
13:43-13:53
So the Pharisees witness, again, through the Testament, the Holy Spirit, God at work, and they walk away with the conclusion Jesus is satanic.
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Here's what this means.
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You better listen really close to this.
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When you see Jesus for who He is - God.
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Through the Word of God, and instead of receiving Jesus as God, You choose to dismiss the evidence.
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You are denying what the Holy Spirit is testifying to you.
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You are denying what the Holy Spirit is speaking into your heart.
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And there is no hope for you, whatsoever.
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When you hear the Word of God proclaimed, and the Spirit of God works with the Word of God, The Holy Spirit is saying to you, "Jesus is God. Jesus is God.
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Jesus is God.
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Put your faith in Him.
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Believe Him. Trust Him.
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Cry out to Him.
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Jesus will save you because He's God.
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Jesus is God." And the Holy Spirit is speaking that to your heart, and you know the Holy Spirit is speaking to your heart, and you just dismiss Him.
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No.
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There's no hope for you.
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It's just not.
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That's what some people call blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
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Right now I can tell by the look on some of your faces, you're asking, "Have I ever done that?" Have you ever wondered that?
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Don't raise your hand, but have you ever wondered that?
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Like, "Oh my gosh, this is serious business.
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Have I ever done that?
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Have I ever committed the unpardonable sin?" Well, if you're asking that question, you haven't done that.
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Do you feel the air pressure just raised with the sighs of relief that went in the room?
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If you're asking the question, you haven't done that.
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Because the person who truly does this doesn't care to ask.
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You see, that's the difference.
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The person who blasphemes the Spirit, the person who wholesale rejects the person of Jesus Christ, they're not sitting around asking, I wonder if I committed the unforgivable sin.
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They don't give a rip. They don't care.
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They've made up their mind.
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They're not going to believe despite what the Holy Spirit has revealed to them.
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And the point is this.
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You have to receive Jesus Christ for who He is.
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and a refusal to acknowledge clear testimony from the Holy Spirit of the deity of Jesus Christ, that's an unforgivable sin.
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Because God doesn't have plan B.
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God's not going to say, "Oh, you're not interested in My Son?
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Well, let me see what other option I have for you to get you into Heaven." There is no plan B.
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Your eternal destination hinges upon Jesus is who Isaiah said this baby is, and that is He is God.
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He is God.
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Okay?
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So if you've been visiting this church, or you've been coming for a while, you've been watching online, and you're wondering what do we really think about Jesus, can I make it any more clear to you?
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He is God!
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That's what we believe at Harvest Bible Chapter.
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He's God. You will call Him my God.
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Secondly, you will call Him my mighty God.
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My mighty God.
17:59-18:06
You know, like you, I've read this passage hundreds of times, or heard sermons on it.
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It's on the Christmas cards.
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Charlie Brown might have said it.
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But when I heard "My mighty God," I used to think that that word "mighty" just spoke to His power, like creation power.
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Like God speaks and He creates.
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Or like His miracles.
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I used to think that that's what "mighty" meant.
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And listen, yes, God does have that kind of power, creation, miracles.
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He can do that.
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Now this, this word "mighty" is speaking very specifically to something else.
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The Hebrew word is "gabor," which literally means "to prevail." In the Hebrew, it's a military term.
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It refers to military might.
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You could say a proven soldier, or a champion, or someone who is unconquerable.
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That's the flavor that the word "mighty" has here.
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And to try to illustrate this in a human sense, "mighty" doesn't look so much like this.
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Now before you ask, give back to that, no give back.
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Before you ask, that is me.
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Some of you might not recognize me because I didn't have a beard, my hair was darker back then.
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I used to think, "Well, this is what'mighty' looks like.
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Power, right?
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But that's really not the Hebrew word "gebur." "Mighty" doesn't look like this.
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Okay, go to the next picture.
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Here's what "mighty" looks like in the Hebrew.
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That's "mighty." Do you understand the difference between the two?
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See the difference?
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In other words, this Hebrew word is telling us That Jesus is a warrior.
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Jesus is a fighter.
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That no enemy can prevail against Him.
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That's the message that Israel needed to hear.
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And church, that's the message that we need to hear today.
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because let's be honest, doesn't it feel right now that we are being smothered by evil?
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Doesn't it feel like that? Right?
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We've got wicked leaders, we've got sex trafficking, we've got abortion, we've got violent protests, we could go on and on and on and on.
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I can't even turn the news on anymore, honestly.
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I'm like, I'd rather just not know what's happening today.
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Because it just got to be so much.
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And not just what's on TV, think of the battles that we face personally with sin, and with sickness, and with anxiety, and with autism, and with addiction, and with depression.
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We feel smothered and overwhelmed.
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And like Israel, what we need, we need someone who's going to fight for us.
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We need somebody that's going to overcome that which we cannot overcome ourselves.
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That's what we need.
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And like Israel, our answer comes in the form of a person.
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He's a child born, He's a son given, Jesus Christ, the mighty God.
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That's God's answer.
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I could be done now.
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But I'm not going to be.
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Now I'm going to tell you why.
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I don't think saying that Jesus is God, I don't think that's a hard sell in a church like this.
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I imagine most of us sitting here, and most of the people that watch us on TV, and all over the world people watch this stream, I just, I don't imagine it's a hard sell.
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To say Jesus is God, I imagine most people are like, yep, yep, yep, not a hard sell, not a hard sell.
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I think the harder sell for the church, honestly, I think the harder sell is that He's mighty.
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I believe the harder sell, even for Christians, is believing that we can, today, experience the power of God on our behalf.
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Like today.
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I think that's the harder stuff.
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We talked about this recently going through John.
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We talked about Jesus being the "I Am," which is the name of God.
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He said, you know, it's interesting that God revealed that as His name.
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I am.
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That God didn't say, "I'm the I was." Like God's like, "Hey, you know what?
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You should have seen me back in high school.
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I was great back then." He didn't say He's the I was, and God didn't say I'm the I will be.
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Like someday, someday I'm going to be something in this town, and I'm training, and I'm saying my prayers, and I'm taking my vitamins, and I'm going to be awesome someday.
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you wait. God's not the I was and He's not the I will be. He's the what? I am. Jesus Christ is the I am. And back when we talked about this in John, we said, sometimes in the church, we read our Bibles and we say, "Wasn't God awesome back then?" Remember back in like Moses' day and Noah's day and Abraham's day and David's day. Wasn't God awesome back then? Wasn't he just, God was always like, you know, every day just doing really awesome things and boy God was awesome and then we turn to Revelation and we're like, isn't God gonna do awesome things in the future?
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Like someday when he comes back he's gonna do awesome things. Isn't that gonna be awesome? Awesome, awesome, awesome. You're like, please stop saying awesome.
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God's gonna do awesome things in the future and I think sometimes in the church that's what we've done is we've put the awesomeness of God in the past in the past and the future, but not the present.
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And that's why when I say, "He's a mighty God!" You're like, "Yeah, someday He will be." And I'm saying, "No, He is right now." And I want to ask you, what battle are you facing today?
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What enemy are you staring down today?
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What victory do you need the Lord to win today?
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Because when Isaiah says, "He's mighty God," it doesn't just mean He can pick up heavy things mighty.
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Mighty God means He whoops the enemy mighty.
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That's what that means.
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But you're like, "Okay, so how can I experience our Lord as my mighty God?" I'm going to tell you, it's not so much something that you need to do as much as it's something you need to stop doing.
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2 Chronicles 14, that's another passage.
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Bookmark it. You can turn it off if you like, but I want you to bookmark it and read it later.
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I'm going to paraphrase it for you as we're coming down the homestretch here.
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2 Chronicles 14, Asa was the king of Judah.
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And Asa, he was a good king. He honored the Lord.
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And the Bible says that Asa had an army of 580,000 men.
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but we're going to look at verses 9 through 12, first part of 12.
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It says, "Zerah the Ethiopian came out against them with an army of a million men and 300 chariots." I can stop here.
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That just always cracks me up.
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They had a million men and 300 chariots.
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Do you think they ever thought about who got the chariots that day?
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And they're like, "Hey, Mr. Zerah, there's a million of us.
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Do you think we can make a couple more chariots?" It just always cracked me up.
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Like, how big was his army? "A million men and 300 chariots!" Okay, sorry. Continue.
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"He came as far as Mirashah, and Asa went out to meet him, and they drew up their lines of battle in the valley of Zephathah at Mirashah.
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And Asa, look at this.
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Remember, he's got a little over half a million, and the Ethiopian's like a million, right?
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Asa cried out to the Lord his God, "Oh Lord, there is none like You to help between the mighty and the weak.
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Help us, oh Lord, our God, for we rely on You, and in Your name, we have come against this multitude.
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Oh Lord, You are our God.
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Let not man prevail against you." So the Lord defeated the Ethiopians.
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There's more of the story, but you can go back and read.
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But fast forward to chapter 16.
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In an act of civil war, Basha the king of Israel - remember Israel and Judah were split at this time - Basha the king of Israel, He built this town called Ramah in order to block all of the traffic that was going in and out of Jerusalem.
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It was an aggressive act of war.
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Like, "I'm going to put this town here, and I'm going to stop all the traffic from coming in and out of Jerusalem." Okay, so Asa in chapter 14, "Cried out to the Lord and saw the Lord defeat a million men and 300 chariots." And now, he sees an act of aggression from Israel.
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Let me ask you, what should Asa do in this situation?
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What do you think he should do?
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I don't know, cry out to the Lord like he did before, right?
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I mean, didn't God show up and win the battle two chapters ago?
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Another threat?
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Fall on your face, cry out to the Lord, trust God to do what only God can do, right?
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But do you know what Asa did?
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He took money from the temple, and he took money from the king's house to pay off Ben-Hadad, who was the king of Syria, to help him.
29:31-29:34
See, Ben-Hadad at that point had a covenant with Israel.
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And Asa goes to him and he's like, "Hey, if I give you a truckload of money, will you break your covenant with Israel and join us and help Judah out?" And he did.
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What I want you to see is what was said to him afterwards.
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"At that time, Hanani the seer came to Asa king of Judah and said to him..." Look at this, "Because you relied on the king of Syria, and did not rely on the Lord your God, the army of the king of Syria has escaped you." Weren't it the Ethiopians and the Libyans?
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A huge army with very many chariots, 300, and horsemen?
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To that prophet, 300 was a lot of chariots.
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Yet because you relied on the Lord, He gave them into your hand." Look at this last phrase.
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How can I experience mighty God on my behalf, Pastor Jeff?
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Right here.
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"For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth.
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He gives strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward Him." Your Bible says the Lord's looking right now.
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He's searching the earth.
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Right now the Lord is saying, "Who loves Me?
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Who's seeking Me? Who really trusts Me?" Because it's to that person, "I'm going to show up and give strong support." It's that person, I'm going to show up and I'm going to win their battle for them.
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But we have this tendency.
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You and I, we have this tendency to be like Esau.
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We know God's power, we've seen God's power, but we forget God's power and we start to rely on other things and other people.
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Why do we do that?
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And you're like, "Well, I bet you Asa learned his lesson after this, right?" No.
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Because your Bible says three years later Asa became ill, and instead of seeking God, he sought the physicians.
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Now, we are not condemning going to the doctor.
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I know for a fact that God is pro-doctor.
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Do you know how I know that?
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Because a doctor wrote about half of the New Testament.
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Okay, so God is pro-doctor.
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That's not the point.
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The point is this, church, why are we so quick to exhaust every other option, explore every other avenue, and try to solve our problems with our own resources instead of crying out to the Lord?
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Why do we do that?
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Why is God so often our last resort instead of our first resort?
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Why do we do that?
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Why is it that when we're in a financial crunch, we'll whip out the credit card instead of seeking and asking God to provide?
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Why do we do that?
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Why do we trust the government to help us instead of crying out to the Lord to help us?
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that. Why do we turn to medication before we cast our cares upon Him? And again, I'm not anti-medication, but do you understand the point? So often, people that struggle with anxiety think that the answer is going to rely on medicine, and it's not. When you You need to cast your cares upon Him.
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The Lord is looking right now.
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And He's saying, "Who?
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Who is going to let Me fight their battle?
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Who?
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Who's going to let Me?
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Who here has faith to believe that I not only can show up and win their battle, but I will show up and win their battle?" Were you?
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Were you?
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We've faced a lot of things together in 2020, haven't we?
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Sickness, fear, division, economic collapse.
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I saw an advertisement a couple of weeks ago for a Christmas ornament.
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It looked like a little dumpster, and there were flames coming out the top.
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And it said, "Christmas 2020." And I thought, "That is an icon for our year, the year of the dumpster fire." And it sure has felt like that to a lot of people.
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I just want us to close by crying out to God the way Asa did.
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To God when he was facing the Ethiopians back in 2 Chronicles.
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I'd like you to bow your heads as the worship team makes their way up.
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I'd just like you to bow your heads for a moment.
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I just want you to think about the enemy over which you need victory.
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I want you to think about what battle needs to be won.
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Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the mighty God?
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to lead us in praying exactly what Asa prayed.
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When he said, "Oh Lord, there is none like You to help between the mighty and the weak." God, we echo that prayer to You today.
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There is none like You, God.
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There is no one who matches Your sovereignty, Your authority, Your power, Your majesty.
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There's no one who matches your omniscience, your omnipotence, your omnipresence, God.
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No one comes anywhere close to being who you are.
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Asa continued, "Help us, O Lord our God, for we rely on You, and in Your name we have come against this multitude." And God, I cry out on behalf of this church, help us, God.
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We rely on You.
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Father, it's in Your name that we've come against many battles.
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God, we need You to show up and do what only You can do.
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We rely on You, God.
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Asa said, "Oh Lord, You are our God.
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Let not man prevail against You." Father, we echo that.
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We say Jesus Christ is our God.
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And He will not let man prevail against Him.
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God, we've read the book and we know how it ends.
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And we know that victory is available today.
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I'm asking God, please, grant us the grace to repent from seeking other solutions first.
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And instead, Father, let our knee-jerk reaction, let our impulse be in any battle, the first thing we do is to fall on our faces and cry out to my mighty God, Jesus Christ.
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It's in His name that we pray.
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Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read Isaiah 9:6
What was your big “take-away” from this passage / message?
Why is believing “Jesus is God” necessary for salvation? Why can't someone be saved by believing “Jesus was just a great prophet and example for mankind”?
What is “blasphemy of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 12:32)? Why is that an unforgivable sin? How do you know when someone has committed that sin?
Name some ways people look to other avenues for help instead of seeking the Mighty God’s help. Why are we so prone to do this?
Breakout
Pray for one another, specifically to seek the Lord to fight your battles, instead of enlisting other help.