May 15, 2022 - Just Informed Talk - Craig James
08:47
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| Because we do trust in God, and we put God first above all else, and we proclaim our faith into the world every chance we get, and we share it with others, and if you don't do that already, I beg you and plea with you to consider doing it, because it'll change your life for the better. | |
| It can make your life go from kind of just a non-meaningful existence to actually having true and meaning with God in your life. | |
| Now, I know that because God saved me, right? | |
| And I know that He can do wonderful, great things with us when we turn our lives over to Him. | |
| So I'm going to plead with all of you out there to do that in your lives. | |
| Turn your lives over to God. | |
| And today we're going to do our God's Graces Greater segment with... | |
| Very powerful set of words here. | |
| Again, I said we're in the 14th section of Psalm 119, the longest chapter in the Bible. | |
| And we're going to read verse 105 to 112. | |
| And I hope this touches your heart like it does mine. | |
| Let's read it. | |
| It says, Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light on my path. | |
| I have solemnly sworn to keep your righteous judgments. | |
| I am severely afflicted. | |
| Lord, give me life through your word. | |
| Lord, please accept my willing offerings of praise and teach me your judgments. | |
| My life is constantly in danger, yet I do not forget your instruction. | |
| The wicked have set a trap for me, but I have not wandered from your precepts. | |
| I have your decrees as a heritage forever. | |
| Indeed, they are the joy of my heart. | |
| I am resolved to obey your statutes to the very end. | |
| And this is what we're taught to do. | |
| You see, when we put God first in our lives, He becomes a lamp for our feet and a light on our path. | |
| And what does that really mean? | |
| It's talking about a path that is dark. | |
| We're walking through this dark world and we're looking for the path toward God. | |
| It's easy to get lost. | |
| I've been there and I still struggle. | |
| I'm not perfect. | |
| Nobody is. | |
| I make mistakes all the time that I have to go to God and be like, please forgive me if I was too judgmental or I did this or I did that or I got upset or something or the other and I didn't want to do that. | |
| And I know what God's teaching us, so I go back to God every day, and I beg Him to show me the way. | |
| And the more you stay in prayer, mark my words, the easier it is to stay on God's path. | |
| Because the closer you are to God, the more things light up around you. | |
| And this is what this is talking about. | |
| He is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. | |
| He'll show us the way forward, but we have to go toward Him. | |
| We can't just expect that He's going to come running after us, which He will. | |
| It does talk about how Jesus in His parable talks about the 99 and the one sheep, and how the shepherd is joyous and rejoices after he goes and finds the one lost sheep. | |
| And there's a number of other verses that talk about how it's so much more important to bring one sinner than 99 people who don't need repentance to God. | |
| But that doesn't mean that in our lives we shouldn't remember that going toward God is the ultimate goal. | |
| It's the ultimate thing that we should be looking toward to help us through tough times and navigating this dark, dark world we live in. | |
| It may seem at times as though evil is winning, but that's neither here nor there. | |
| What matters is what we do. | |
| We can only control what we do in our lives. | |
| We can't control things that are happening outside of our actual sphere of control. | |
| So what do we do? | |
| It says here, when we look to God, We have to keep His righteous judgments, solemnly swearing to do so. | |
| And even though when we are severely afflicted, we go back to God and ask Him to give us life through His word. | |
| We ask God to accept our willing offerings of praise. | |
| So that's what I'm saying when we go to prayer with Him every day, multiple times. | |
| And you know, even Jesus said you should pray alone by yourself. | |
| That doesn't mean you shouldn't go pray with your family and friends and do that regularly to instill that in them and help share in that praise of God. | |
| But it also means that prayer has to be a conversation, a dialogue that happens from your heart to God. | |
| Without it being like the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin and all the rest and the people of the temple who would go out and pray just so everybody saw them praying so that they looked good in front of everyone else. | |
| That's not what it's about. | |
| It's about genuinely going to God and saying, I need your lamp on my feet. | |
| I need your light on my path. | |
| I need you to show me the way because I know the way is so wrought with distractions and wrong turns and you can fall off of it and you can be hit by Blindsided by things you never expected. | |
| All types of things can happen when you're trying to follow God's path. | |
| But you've got to go back to God day in and day out, every moment of your life looking to Him. | |
| He'll help you. | |
| Like I said, the more in prayer you are, the more faithful that you can be in your heart, the easier it is. | |
| It doesn't mean it's going to be easy all the time. | |
| It's just going to be easier. | |
| It means when you're going to make that wrong turn, when you're going to stumble, when you're going to do something that you know you might regret, you may think twice about it. | |
| You may go to God again in prayer and say, God, I know I'm about to do something that I don't think I should do. | |
| And God's going to show you how to avoid it. | |
| He'll give you that strength. | |
| You'll feel it coursing through your body like I do right now talking to you. | |
| You'll feel the power of God overwhelm you in that moment and give you a way out. | |
| And it will show you the path that you should be on. | |
| So remember, As it says, although our lives are constantly in danger, we do not forget His instruction. | |
| Although the wicked have set traps for us, we have not wandered from His precepts. | |
| His decrees are our heritage, and they are joy in our heart, and we must be resolved to obey Him to the very end. | |
| And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how we overcome the evil that is of this world and how we stay on the path toward God. | |
| So share this with your family, your friends, your loved ones. | |
| Share it as far and as wide as you can. | |
| But also, know it and believe it in your heart. | |
| Because that, ultimately, is what matters more than anything. | |
| So I'm going to go ahead and wrap it up here with a little bit of prayer. | |
| And we'll sign off. | |
| Dear Lord and Heavenly Father, we know that you are a lamp to our feet and a light on our path. | |
| Help us find that path every day. | |
| Help us avoid the pitfalls. | |
| Help us avoid the detours and help us avoid all of those things that can make us stumble and not come towards you. | |
| We pray that we can do all that so that then we can become stronger. | |
| So that then we can show others your path. | |
| So we can be a light for them to see you. | |
| Right? | |
| Not to see us, but to see you in us, Lord. | |
| That's ultimately what we pray for. | |
| We want to save as many people as we can. | |
| We want to save our fellow brothers and sisters. | |
| We want them to be in heaven with us. | |
| We want them to have that peace and joy that comes to your heart when you find God so strongly, when we find you, Lord, in our hearts so strongly, and we accept Jesus as our Savior. | |
| We want that for everyone. | |
| We want to share that with the whole world. | |
| But we know it's going to be a dark path that we may be on sometimes and that it's not going to be easy. | |
| Lord, I pray that for all those out there who are watching this message, that you will speak to their hearts, show them the way, help light their path, help them come to you in prayer when they need you, Lord, more than anything else that they do in their lives, to go to you first. | |
| All the time. | |
| All day, every day. | |
| And Lord, just be with us, because we know that we just must humbly submit to your will, and we do. | |
| We thank you for every day, Lord, every moment, every blessing. | |
| Thank you for all those, our family and friends, and everyone that we know, Lord. | |
| We pray that you'll help us speak to their hearts and show them the way toward you. | |
| And we thank you most of all, Lord, for your son's sacrifice on the cross and our eternal salvation through him. | |
| We know how great it is. | |
| And we are thankful beyond any measure that we could ever express beside to say, Lord, we love you and we put our faith in you always. | |
| We thank you for this day and every day. | |
| In Jesus' name we pray. | |
| Amen. | |
| Alright guys, well, there's my message. | |
| I hope you guys share that. | |
| Get it out there, your family, friends, loved ones. |
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