Takers, Part 12

apply to our lives today. So, pastor, as we wrap up this series, is there a big takeaway that you hope somebody is going to be leaving this series with, uh.

Will you take Jesus, receive him, believe on him, because the Bible says in acts chapter four, verse 12, and there is no other name given among men under heaven, whereby we must be saved. I tell people this when I do marriage seminars and the like, I always conclude like this Christ plus nothing equals everything. Everything without Christ equals Is nothing. If you meet me and forget me, you've lost nothing. But if you meet Christ and forget him,

you've lost everything. We couldn't go up. So he came down. And now that he came down, we can go up. The Son of God became the Son of Man. That the sons of men may become the sons and daughters of God. I trust that you'll receive him as your personal Lord and Savior.

our series entitled takers. So one more time, join us in the book of Joshua, chapter one. Here is Pastor Ford.

Be strong and of a good courage, for unto this people thou shalt divide for an inheritance the land which I sware unto their fathers to give them. Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou may observe to do according to all the law which Moses my servant commanded thee. Turn not from it to the right hand to the left that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest. Now get this. Get this with me. Let me. Let me do a couple of things. Let me show you

some things. Three times he says to him, be strong and of good courage. Three times. Now notice he says it in verse six. He says it in verse seven, and he says it in verse nine. Here's all I want you to see. Every time he tells him to be strong and of a good courage, it's about something different. It's not the same thing. Look at what he says. Be strong and of a good courage that has to do with his provision. You see that be strong when it comes to your provision. But wait a minute. Look

at verse seven. Only be strong and courageous about my precepts, obeying my precept. So be strong about obtaining your possession. Be strong about obeying my precepts. Then look at verse nine. Have I not commanded thee? Be strong and of good courage. Be not afraid. Neither be thou dismayed. For the Lord is with you. So be strong. Against persecution. So, so so. he's trying to cover all the bases. What? Why is he telling Joshua that? Because he knows that Joshua is

feeling the fear. God says you don't have to be afraid. And that's what's stopping us. What is fear? Come on, everybody, say it together. False evidence appearing real. That's all it is. And how many fear knots are there in the Bible? Somebody said a lot. How many? 365. Somebody counted them. 300. Now, what does that tell you? One for every day of the year. God said, you know, my people are going to be afraid. They have a tendency to do that. But we know perfect love casts out fear because fear,

fear and faith are like oil and water. They cannot coexist. If you fear, you rule out faith. If you have faith, you rule out fear. And so fear knocked on the door. Faith answered, nobody was there. That's what Doctor King said. And so we have to launch out and step out in faith. And he says, I don't want you to be afraid. And the word be strong and courageous literally speaks of not allowing other things to stop you from the things that God had. Let me put it this way.

Don't let the little things stop you from the everything that God has for you. Amen. And so he says, listen, here's what I want you to do. I want you to readily obey my precepts. Mm. I had two dogs. They were pit bulls, Angel and Toby. And Angel was white. Toby was brown. And I had them trained to nonverbal commands. I did like that. No matter where they were, that Angel would come and heal at my left. Toby would come and heal at my right, and they would look

up in my face to wake my next command. I go like this. They roll over. I go like this. They sit. If I ever point it at you better run. That's all I have to do to have them. I don't have to say sic em, just point. And they would attack. I often thought, boy, it would be nice if I could get my wife and children to respond like that. That would really be a great thing. You say, well, what's your point? My point is that these dogs waited

on their master's command, that they didn't do anything. Like, for example, if they were hungry and my children or my wife said, here, come and get to eat. And I had told them to come and I had done this, they would not move. They keep looking at me. Don't look at them. Come here, come here, come here. And they look at me. And if I didn't release them, they wouldn't go. I said, man, wouldn't it be something if we treated our master like that? I was, I was down in. I did a revival in our six

churches in on the island of Saint Croix. We have six churches there. And I did a revival there, and everybody had dogs. And so I was saying, I was saying, man, all these dogs. And they said, yeah, because there's a lot of thievery that goes on in the island. So I said, okay, well, if I wanted to rob your house because they go from island to island, there's nothing for them to go to Saint Thomas and some of

the other of the islands, you know. And so I said, well, well, well, what would you you know, if you're away, I can steal, because I can poison your dog. You know, they told me, no, you can't. I said, why? They said, because these dogs. He said, there's three people on this island that everybody gets their dogs from, and they all train them this way. They will only take food from their master if their

master didn't give. I said, boy, wouldn't that be great if the church was like that because we eaten everything. The devil throwing. I said, we eating everything. The devil throwing and man, he throwing stuff and we just. Oh I'm hungry. Oh, drew, I'm tired of waiting on you. Ain't no gods in the church. They either. They either he's in jail or he ain't got.

and we fellowship Christian Academy. My children went there. They had a play, and I was rushing. Everybody knows my right foot still ain't saved. And I went to 83rd and Jeffrey. And at that time, they had a sign. No turn on red 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.. It was 658. I didn't think it made that big a difference, so I made that turn at 658. I was halfway down toward the Kentucky Fried Chicken when I saw the siren, and I'm thinking he ain't coming after me. So I pulled over to let him go. Go on around. And

he pulled behind me. I'm saying, now, what up with him now? And so he came out. He says, sir, let me see your license registration. I said, okay. He said, you have a out of town plate because at that time that's what we had. We still had our Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania plates. He said, you have a out of town license. He said you made an illegal turn. I said, no, I didn't. He said, yes, you did. I said, well, you know, I'm a pastor and I'm on my way

down to take my children to Fellowship Christian Academy. And he said, I can't help that, you know, you you violated the law. I said, yes, I did, officer, he said. I know you did. You ain't got to tell me. You ain't got to agree with me. I saw what you did and I said, I said, well, you know, officer, I'm sorry. I was you know, I thought, well, it's 658. And then he said this. I'll never forget it. Now, this is 33 years ago. I'll never forget it. He

said it's 658. 7:00. I said, but he said, answer my question. I said, no, sir. He said, alright then. He said, now this is out of town. License plate. Out of town license. Do you have a bail bonds card? I said, from Pennsylvania. He said, that ain't good enough. You got one for Chicago? I'm a Chicago police officer. I said no, sir, I don't. I said, how do we handle that? He said, you follow me. I'm not going to put you in the squad car roll. You bring,

you follow me. You're going to jail. So my kids was in the back. They said.

hid them and disobeyed God. And Joshua got down to pray. And God said, quit praying. It's time to get up and deal with people who didn't do.

place where the Black Mamba was. And the Black Mamba was one of the deadliest snakes in Africa, supposed to be more venom, more deadly than a cobra king cobra. And so it was coming out of the tree, and his son was under the tree, and the snake was going down to to to his son. He said, the only thing I had time to do was say, son, drop, roll, run. He said his son immediately dropped to the ground, rolled, and then got up and ran to him. I said, wow, he did. I said, what if it had been one

of our kids son Drop, roll, run. But I got on my true. Ah! Hey! The time to obey God is now. It's always now.

So if you'd like to stand with us as a giving or prayer partner, find out how to do that or give your gift when you come to our website, it's Treasure Truth radio.org. Back to the message again. Here's Pastor Ford.

with thee whithersoever thou goest. We have that prophecy and that promise in the New Testament that God's presence is always with us. And so then he tells us Isaiah chapter 43, verse two, when you pass through the waters. Not if when you pass through the fire, not if you are going to pass through water, you're going to pass through fire. I will be with you. Didn't say he put the fire out. Didn't say that. He drained. Drained the water. He just said, you won't drown. I'm

with you. And sometimes God will not deliver you out of your problems. But he wants you to know he's always with you in your problems. Come on, Daniel, tell us that it was the presence of God. He didn't deliver you out of the lion's den, but he was with you in the lion's den. And the angels shut their mouth. They said, it's Daniel will shut my mouth. And all night he was there. And them lions were hungry, not hungry, hungry. And the next morning King Nebuchadnezzar said, Daniel,

are you alright? He said, My God reigns, my God reigns, my God reigns. I don't care what they put you through. Your God reigns. And remember that sometimes their rejection was for your redirection that you sometimes didn't know. It's time to leave. And God says, okay, I gotta give you a little push. I gotta let them push you because I got something better for you. I got something bigger for you. Don't listen, listen. Don't ever think that no matter what happened to you, that it was designed to

make you bitter. But God always says it's going to make you better. I don't know what he's going to do. All I do know is it's going to happen for you. It's going to happen for you. I don't know where. I don't know when, I don't know how, I don't know who. But it's going to happen for you. Little Johnny's mother said, Little Johnny, go in the pantry and get me a can of tomato soup and get me a can of chicken noodle soup. He said, mama, it's dark in there. I don't want to go in there.

It's dark. Oh, come on, son, you have you have Jesus, right? Yes. Well, you know, you not only have Jesus in you, but he goes before you. He's already in that pantry. Well, Johnny say he is. Yes. So he went to the. He said, okay, mama. He went to the pantry door, opened it up. He said, Jesus, can you hand me a can of tomato soup and a can of chicken noodle soup? Here's the last one. Here's the last one.

Here's the last one. Recruit God's people. That's ten and 11. Now, let me just let me just summarize this because I'm I'm going to let this go. But, but but it says recruit God's people. Remember what he said. Take my people in. Take those people out. Take that place over. Now he's saying, listen, you've got to get the people involved. Now I'm talking corporately. You can apply individually because there are individuals who are designed to help you get where

you're supposed to go. Guess what? My education in undergraduate and in graduate was over $100,000. Ask me how much I paid. Not a penny. Other people came along and saw God's gift in me, and God gave me favor with them. And so I came to tell somebody, you don't need money. You just need favor, because favor never runs out when money does. I'd rather have favor than money any day. Y'all don't believe that. And I'm telling you, I've lived it. I've. I had faith every time I

turn around. Favor favor favor favor favor favor. I said, man, I gotta do a message called the Flavor of Favor. Yeah, I gotta do a message like that because it's like, man, I ain't going to use anybody's illustration but my own. It's like, yeah, I was doing this. And then boom came up and this is my lady. Let me tell you, my ladies, I know. I said, I'm gonna get you out of here, I am. I said, I want to write. I told you before, I told you in January, this

is my decade of destiny. I want to write at least five books a year. And some of you are saying you took you three years to write one book. How are you going to do it? I didn't know how I was going to do it. And then the woman who was the general editor, top woman for urban ministry for 20 years, God gave me favor with her, and she took a series of messages and turned it into a book in three weeks, three weeks. And so he said, you got to get the people involved. Now

you get them involved in this order. Get the leaders together first, then get the laity together first. So he he begins to communicate to the leaders, listen to this. Then Joshua commanded the officers of the people saying, pass through the host and command the people, saying, prepare you victuals, for within three days you shall pass over this Jordan to go into the land which the Lord your God giveth you to possess it. Now basically, here's what he's saying.

He's saying that that that the leadership needs to carry out what the Joshua is saying and share that with the people. So it is it is a hierarchy that we have here. We have elder rule. And so he says, I want to the participation of the laity. I want submission to the direction of the leadership. Verses 16 through 18. I want submission to the declaration of the leadership. Why? Because you're telling them what I told you, not what

you're telling them. As long as you tell them what I'm telling them, then they can follow you as they follow Christ. Some people are born again. Some people are born against. It's like. It's like, uh. He said, you got to get the people together. Well, I was looking at the word action, and, you know, it's not one word. It's three words. Think about it. Act I. On action. Act I. On action. Let me close like I started. Because how I started was talking about this Joshua or Joshua.

I don't know about you, but I am what I am because of. I am who I am. Yeah. That's right. That's what he said his name was I am. And Jesus is a taker. And so what did he do? He took away what we didn't need and gave us what we did need. He took who we shouldn't have and gave us who we should have. He's the Christological Robin Hood who takes from the poor and makes us rich. So Jesus is a taker. He took away my sins on Calvary because he's a taker. He took the sting

out of death because he's a taker. He took victory from the grave because he's a taker. He took power from the devil because he's a taker. He took souls out of hell because he's a taker. He took my sin and our sin and gave us his salvation. Because he's a taker. He took our sadness and gave us his gladness. Because he's a taker. He took our brokenness and gave us his wholeness. Because he's a taker. He took our perversion, gave us his purity because he's a taker.

He took our barrenness and gave us his is fruitfulness. Because he's a taker. He took our ashes and turned them into beauty. Because he's a taker. He took our weakness and gave us his power because he's a taker. And the greatest taking hasn't been took yet. That the Bible tells us in first Thessalonians chapter four, verses 11 through 13, that Jesus Christ one day will crack the clouds, the trumpet shall sound, and the dead in Christ shall rise.

He said, he going to take up the dead, and their bodies are going to be changed in a twinkling, in a moment of an eye, he's going to take up the living. Then he's going to take us to heaven, and then he'll take us to the judgment seat. Then he'll take us to the battle of Armageddon. Then he'll take us into the New Jerusalem. Then he'll take us into all eternity and for all eternity. He's going to love us up because he took us. And we need to be like our Jesus. We need to be takers.

Take the promises, take his plan, take his presence, take all of those things and accomplish what God said you can do.

who have given a gift to treasure truth. Thank you for doing that. If you've never given a gift to this listener supported ministry before, I hope you'll do so today by coming to Treasure Truth radio.org and clicking on the donate button. Well, thanks for doing that. Thanks to our producer, Amy Rios for Pastor Ford, I'm Steve Hiller. Treasure truth is a production of Moody Radio, a ministry of the Moody Bible Institute.