And For That Reason...I'm Out! | Assoc Pastor Chad Erickson
by Chad Erickson
First Apostolic Church of Maryville (Maryville, TN)
Kind: sermon
Scripture: Luke 15:14-19, Philippians 4:11, John 20:25, Romans 8:1, Luke 15:21-24

Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/chad-erickson--and-for-that-reason-i-m-out
Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page.
Free to copy and share with attribution.

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luke chapter 15. i want to read a few verses in your hearing and then we are going to uh maybe maybe teach a little bit maybe preach a little bit just whatever whatever the lord has his way i i'm just i can't i can't tell you how impressed i am uh with just the crowd of worshipers that are here this morning i didn't know what to expect have not been here uh in a few sunday mornings uh that we've done our past few years of marriage retreats so i didn't know what to expect but but i just kind of had a feeling that we were going to look down but we look we look good come on somebody look around you we look good come on let's put a smile on your face because you know we're in church and we're in the best place we can be and if the joy of the lord is not our strength we've got some issues amen but there's joy in this house i feel it there's just a spirit there's a spirit of joy in this place amen got some more good news for you we're going to get out early today amen so some of y'all got your crock pots all heating up you can just get home and get get to that get to that crock pot or whatever you do and we're just going to have church before that hey we've got at least one that wants to get baptized this morning that's exciting news we're going to do that before we go home amen just looking around i see guests that are here in this place today thank you so much for coming out and worshiping it makes it absolutely makes our weekend uh when we have guests that say hey i want to go to first apostolic and worship worship with them and that just makes our day thank you thank you so much for for coming out to the house oh lord today at first apostolic well luke 15 chapter 14 lord of mercy we could probably we could probably quote a lot of this but the bible says and when he had spent all there arose a mighty famine in that land and began he began to be in want and he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country it's interesting to me that whenever the devil doesn't really want to be defined he just he just kind of just shows up in different different areas of life just bible says the prodigal son joined himself to the citizen of that far-off country and we know that far-off country represents the world so here he is he's joined up he's joined up to the devil himself and the bible says he sent him into the fields to feed swine and he would have feign have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat and no man gave unto him and when he came to himself right there oh i'm going to preach about that he said how many hired servants of my fathers have bred enough despair and i perish with hunger i i will arise and go to my father and will say unto him father i have sinned against heaven and before thee and am no more worthy to be called my son make me as one of the hired servants i'm gonna read this uh from the from the niv translations just 17 and 18 says when he came to his senses he said how many of my fathers hired servants have food to spare and here i am starving to death verse 18 says i will set out and go back to my father when he came to his senses he said i'm out that's my title matter of fact my title today is simply and for that reason i'm out and for that reason i'm out let's put our bibles down and raise our hands father we love you and we're so thankful oh god for your spirit that is in the church today oh i feel your holy ghost it's just moving through this place lord i i believe today lives are going to be changed hearts are going to be changed lord i believe decisions are going to be made in the mind of every person in this place lord that we are going to do everything we can to get out of whatever we're in that is not your will god i just believe today lord god if if people lord under the sound of my voice will hear the word that you have given me to preach to them god i just believe lives are gonna be changed people are gonna leave here and they're going to be different than the way they came there their homes are going to be different their families are going to be changed i just believe lord god victory as the singers sing about victory is in our future god because your spirit is going to change us if we will be obedient to your word come on if you feel that way today just lift up your hands and just love him just for a moment before you're seated and come on just tell him say god i want your will your perfect will to be done in my life today i want to make decisions in my life today lord that i can wake up and i can leave the state that i'm in and lord i can return to whatever your will is for my life in jesus name go ahead and clap your hands and give the lord praise with your lips come on give him vocal worship today i wish the church would lift up their voices and just give him vocal praise i bless the name of jesus i praise the name of jesus i honor the name of jesus the name above every other name in jesus name you may be seated and for that reason amount anybody recognize that statement i saw some of you all kind of give me a look listen uh enter the shark tank probably probably one of my probably one of my favorite tv shows probably the only tv show that i really uh got uh i've got a youtube tv and and it just always pops up it's on my home screen the first thing it just it's like a never-ending channel of of shark tank and and i gotta admit that there's some stuff that comes on there you gotta you gotta click and get out of it uh but but but typically and just in case and just in case you uh i don't wanna get too far and you're like shark tank what is this like a fishing show it's not a fishing show uh let me tell what it's about shark tank is an american business reality television series that premiered on august 9 2009 on abc it shows entrepreneurs making business presentations to a panel of five investors or what they call sharks who decide whether to invest in their company the sharks often find weaknesses and faults in the entrepreneurs valuation of their own company their own product or their business model some of the investors are are usually kind hearted and try to soften the impact of rejection like the panel member barbara cochran while others such as kevin o'leary can be brutal and show no patience even for the tales of hardship and man some of these some of these are i love i love inventions anyways i i love the idea entrepreneurs you know there they got an idea to start a business something inside of me they just i don't know if it's the gold the color my real color the gold inside of me i just i just love the idea of of coming up with something that helps people that you can you can put out there on the market and and i love to see what they come up with it's it's it's interesting um but at the same time a lot of times they'll bring numbers and and these sharks or these investors will ask them you know how how many units have you sold in the past year and and and they'll put on an awesome presentation but then they'll say well well we we haven't really sold any units yet right stuff like that and and they'll start grilling them and well where'd you come up with these numbers and and here you are asking for 250 000 and you haven't sold one unit yet and they'll kind of they'll kind of grind them a little bit and and the entrepreneur can make they can make a handshake deal a gentleman's agreement on the show if a panel member is interested however if all the panel members opt out the entrepreneur leaves empty-handed the show is said to portray the drama of pitch meetings in the interaction between entrepreneurs in tycoons a pitch of around 45 this is interesting right here a pitch of around 45 minutes by a contestant is edited down to a segment of roughly roughly 11 minutes long 11 minute long segment so when you're watching shark tank and they're up there for about 11 minutes they've really been it's really edited down from 45 minutes of them trying them trying to get the investors to buy in to what they're doing there's around 40 000 companies that apply each season with 158 getting to pitch to the sharks and only 88 of those actually make it to the air and if you watch the show you kind of understand that a lot of it is just you just want to promote your product whether they buy into it or not there's at least millions of people that have watched your product and they're going to go to walmart and they're going to look for that whole thing thing that says as seen on tv that whole little section there because they understand that they can put on their box as seen on shark tank and that right there will sell their product and but here each one of the sharks and this is just i i get into it because it's funny there's a lot of comedy in it um but but each one of the sharks have this phrase when they decide the deal is not favorable for their intended investment they will give the reason and then they'll kind of get up and they'll they'll say you know i just don't feel like what i do is gonna work good with what you're pitching to us and then they make the simple statement and for that reason i'm out and usually the person will thank them and the entrepreneur will thank them and they'll go on to the next person and then all five may just go ahead and say you know what and for that reason i'm out and they turn around and walk out the door and they are better just because of the popularity of what they're trying to pitch but you know there's always going to be red flags that go up with these business tycoons because they've heard it all they've they've been told you know this product is going to sell this product is going to make money we got people that like this product but even a tycoon their wisdom they know enough because they're already millionaires and some of them are are probably close to billionaires and so they already understand there's some pitches that are just going to be a little bit too good to be true amen kind of reminds me i kind of have a personal i uh before before i i had just a little bit of wisdom before my my wisdom started growing in my sideburns by about 20 years ago i remember um when uh when an apple when a mac pro first came out and i was i was beginning to edit the apostolic connection the television series here at the church and i remember getting on ebay and i was looking i thought man if i could get a better computer if i could get a faster computer if i could get something that'll render faster i could be so much more productive i could be more effective as an editor and so i got on ebay and i found that this this mac computer i'm talking it was it had all the bells and whistles that i needed it was fast it had the ram it had memory it had everything i needed in order to edit video now we're talking about 20 years ago 18 years ago and i got on ebay i had not much experience on ebay but the guy that was selling it he was selling it for about a thousand dollars less than anybody else was selling it for and i thought that sister jean felipe i thought to myself i am getting a deal of a lifetime and then he let me know that he was actually he was based his company was based out of europe and i thought well okay you're i have to wait a bit longer for shipping and and then he went on to tell me that he could even lower the price a little bit more if he didn't have to pay ebay fees and paypal fees yeah yeah i know some of y'all looking at me this was 20 years ago i didn't know any better i had no wisdom growing in and so i thought well you know he's got pictures of it he i told him i said send me a picture of the front of it send me a picture of the back of it you know i was trying to get him you know i want to see do you really have what you're telling me you're about to sell me and sure enough he would send me these pictures i just there was something that caught my attention that something was wrong but at the same time i thought but he's got the pictures so i went to western union y'all i don't like western union and it's not their fault because they warned me they probably had me signed four times do you personally know the person you're sending money to i was like he's my ebay friend we've been talking a lot lately i thought you know man this is gonna be so good i think i think it was around twelve hundred thirteen hundred dollars which which in today's in today's money to me would have been like about you know four thousand dollars right and i'm thinking man this is a lot of money but boy sure i'm just gonna i'm just gonna send it on i signed the paper and of course western union they'll tell you right away you you ain't getting it back there's no way once once they take this money you cannot get this money back so i found out the hard way that when something seems too good to be true it's probably too good to be true because i never saw that computer matter of fact i lost all contact with my ebay friend his account disappeared the moment that western union payment went through but some things and and i i guess i talk about that and i tell you that story because i'm sure that all of us can relate to having something stolen from us and not only stolen from us but i'll go a step further before that guy got off ebay i was i was sending him messages hey hey i sent the western union man are we good silence are we good in silence about a week later he just types in hahaha i mean not only not only getting stolen from but getting mocked i tell you that that was probably it listen it wasn't even it wasn't even the 12 or 1300 that lost it as much as that hurt it wasn't even that as much of feeling the feeling of being mocked when i did it but but i've got to think because as i began to think about that i thought my god what about the story of the prodigal and let me say this first because a lot of people say you know how many messages have we heard about the prodigal son brother brother erickson all that is is a parable well i got news for you there's not one word that's written in our bible that's there as a filler it's the infallible word of god which means simply if the word or the punctuation mark is in this right here it was placed there on purpose matter of fact that that's why we get so we're we're very careful which version of the bible we get our doctor from because if you're not careful you can read a version that is an interpretation right it's somebody that reads the hebrew or reads the greek or or maybe even reads an english version and they interpret what they think it means do you understand that that's what we got to be careful we get in the book of acts you can't just read any version you got to make sure you're reading what is closest to what the hebrew in greek wrote because so so when we start talking about parables and we start thinking about parables yes i do realize that that this was not a real story i realized that this did not happen but jesus i don't know there's no other parable that jesus told that was so i mean he went to talking about every little situation that happened within the life of this boy almost as if although it was a parable maybe he was representing a story that really took place maybe he wasn't naming a lot of times we'll tell stories from the pulpit and we won't name names because we don't want to embarrass people or we don't want to call people out but a lot of times we'll tell stories of other things that have happened in all reality and we're like listen if we can learn from other people's mistakes i'll tell you a story without names if you at least take the context and and take on the subject and understand if we can learn from the mistake of this prodigal son that remains nameless that all it is is apparel my god jesus didn't put one part of that story he didn't put one thing into that parable that didn't mean something to us and so as we study i i just want you to understand i i'm gonna look into everything that jesus told because if i look into it if i if i look around the subject more than just what i read if i if i think of how the how the prodigal must have felt how the father must have felt what was it like to be a prodigal in a far-off land when when you were used to having jewish everything that you did was a jewish jewish tradition or you followed the jewish practices or the jewish laws and now you're in a far-off country that doesn't think like you and doesn't act like you and doesn't follow through like you follow through doesn't worship like you worship i begin to think to myself what must have that felt like when he woke up one day and had nothing oh it's easy when you've got money it's easy when you've got friends when you've got popularity when everybody wants to hang out with you and go to your parties and and allow you to pick up the tab at the bar everybody likes you in those situations but what about when the money runs dry and you're all by yourself and you begin to be the bible says in want then what happens well then we can study the prodigal story and we can find out that listen everything is not as it seems we we look outside listen we we have got to preach and i'm so glad because what i do know about today is i knew that all of our strong tower students would be here i recognize that we might have a lot of our home builders and our married couples and our trendsetters out but i did understand that we would have a lot of our students here and i want us to think about this because this story this parable that jesus told he's saying listen i'm trying to help you out in a certain subject that if you will stay in my house if you'll remain in the father's house all your needs will be supplied you'll do everything that you're supposed to do listen there this prodigal he was he was he was happy where he was it wasn't like he lived a life of an abuse it wasn't like he had he he had servants think about this this young man had servants he had people doing all the chores he had people ladies he had people washing the dishes young men he had people taking the trash out there was there was nothing that he really had to do except be a part of the father's house yet somewhere in his mind somewhere he began to think i wonder what's happening outside because that's what usually happens usually it's it's the restless spirit that causes people to want something they don't have not that they need something they don't have they just want something they don't have i'll give you an example it's like people people that feel like like they're too thick and they want to be thin i can relate to that but then i talked to somebody listen and i try every i try every way to lose weight i try every new fad that comes out i try it for at least a day or two might be my problem but then i'll talk to people that i'm looking at and saying dear lord you you can go to taco bell and order 15 burritos and lose weight i hate those people i look at the menu and gain weight yet those people are going if i could just get thicker you got you you got listen it goes with every aspect you got women you got women who have beautiful long hair and i wish my hair wasn't so long and you got other women who whose hair is thinning out and and who can't even grow their hair and they're like i wish to god i could have thick long flowing hair and you have people that feel like they're too short and they want to be tall then you got people that feel they're too tall and wish they were shorter and and the average man he he wishes i would i would dream to be famous to be a movie star and then you have the movie star that says i wish i could just be an average man i wish i could just go to mcdonald's and sit down and eat a big mac and nobody bother me you all see that it's it's almost as if whatever we are there's a spirit that wants to get a hold of us to make us want to be what we're not and i believe that's what really happened i believe it was this restless spirit that took a hold that took a hold of this boy and the restless spirit who has everything this person who has everything just wonders what's going on outside the father's house and they got to learn to be content look with me philippians 4 and 11 and you can look on the screen if you don't have your bible laid out in free but philippians 4 and 11 says not that i speak in respect of want it's it's not that i i want i need anything or want anything paul to say for i have learned in whatsoever state i am therewith to be content and maybe this is just our society i i'm looking out at our trendsetters and i kind of wonder some of you that they went through post-depression eras you didn't have you counted every slice of bread it was inside the bag the loaf of bread and you counted out you said okay this is gonna be monday and this is gonna be tuesday and we're gonna eat this on wednesday my grandfather was like that my grandfather he was post he was world war two post depression period and they he rationed out every bit of food my mother my mother remembers he would let them go into the refrigerator he wouldn't let them open a food cabinet they were not allowed whatever was placed on the table that's what they ate they were not allowed to go into the kitchen everything was rationed but you know what there was some of the most happy people you've ever met although they had nothing it kind of reminds me of of traveling to africa and traveling to the philippines or or traveling to third world nations and and you have never seen so many smiles in your life these people have nothing they live they live in huts and they live in in glorified holes they have no windows they they have no running water they go they go to an outhouse they they they have but you'll never see so many teeth in your life because they all got smiles and you go to church teeth is all you see that man those little filipino kids just smiling little papa new guinea kids just smiling everybody's got to smile and and i think to myself so obviously joy is not brought on by things happiness is not brought on by things because a lot of people get confused they they think that blessed is having stuff no no no no stuff is just kind of like the symptoms of blessing but you don't have to have the symptoms to be blessed joy of the lord happiness right love man if you if you today are in a family that's filled with love you don't need to be driving the latest and living in the latest and and going to the greatest aruba bahama on pretty mama you don't need all that stuff right if you've got joe now however if you don't have joey in your home you can go to aruba hawaii you can you can go to every little island and and sit in every little palm tree and sip every little glass of of iced tea and if you don't have joy in the home you're not blessed you're not blessed but but i think to myself i and this is something this is a learned behavior being content is a learned behavior that's what paul said he said i have learned in whatsoever state i am there with to be content listen listen i'm not proud i'm not proud of this but there are two times a year that i've got to look in the mirror and just say to myself say chad be content two times a year honestly that's all two times a year you know when those two times are when we're on vacation something something gets something just gets ahold when i'm on vacation you think wait wait vacation what do you what how can you not be content on vacation i'll tell you why because my mind is not at work i'm at rest i'm resting i mean it's not a bad thing but i'm in an idle state on purpose a vacation i'm trying to let my mind unwind but just the way i'm made up when my mind begins to unwind i'm not content and i've got to i've got to say to myself dude you're on vacation be content stop looking at oh where are we gonna go eat and i hope it's the restaurant i wanna go to and i hope i don't have to go to some some disney park and stand in line for seven hours for a dumb ride can i get an aim in from any father in the house but however i did let me let me put a pause hit the pause button right there i did realize that if i'm gonna wait in line i might as we went live for something fun right because i mean if you go if you go to dollywood or you go to disney wherever you go you're going to be waiting in line with this line of the bathroom or it's a it's a line to eat or like you might as well be if you're going to be standing there you might as well be standing somewhere where it's gonna be fun when you get to the end it might only be 70 seconds of fun but it's crazy because the the people that should be content are usually the people that are not content and those people i was just talking about who should not be content man they're just glad to have one white shirt to wear on sunday every sunday of the year man they're happy as cheese i've told you the story in papua new guinea i went back a couple years ago right actually right before all the borders closed and and we had our national conference there and i had a boy that was about i don't know he's probably about 17 he comes walking up to me and he has this tie like this and he's like i don't i don't even know if i can't remember he spoke just a little bit of english but i knew what he was saying to me and i looked at his tie and i was like man that looks familiar and he said ten years ago ten years ago i hadn't been there in 10 years he said 10 years ago he said i wear it every sunday you wear a tie every sunday that i gave you used it was probably worn out when i gave it to you because i just was taking ties off and hand them out but the people who shouldn't be content are somehow content but it's the prodigals who live in the father's house who have everything they need and they say i'm gonna go out and see what i can find because i'm not happy here so here he goes and i don't want to spend a lot of time because we know the story of the prodigal as he requested his inheritance and the prodigal he leaves home and he he wastes his substance with riotous living and he joins himself the bible says to a citizen of the country and you've heard the word you've heard the words dead bondage or or indentured servant or indentured laborer that's what he was because here it is he not only ran out of funds but he got into debt he got into debt in a way that he had to find a way to pay it off and so he finds anybody he can find and say hey hey i will be your servant you don't even have to pay me a salary you don't have to pay me wages i just need you to pay off this debt for me i'll work for you as long as you need me to work out i'll spend all my time i'll live where i work i'll eat wherever i work that's why the bible talks about that he would have eaten the very husks that the swine were eating because he said i'll do whatever i have to do to get out of debt let me stop right there stay out of debt students let me talk to our students because a lot of you don't have credit cards yet if you're in your your high school years listen i know if i don't have a credit card i can't build up credit if i don't if i can't build up credit then i can never one day get a loan for a car i get all that but you've got to have enough sense to understand that that credit card desires for you to get into debt because if they can just get you to start making their minimum payments and at first the minimum payment is ten dollars and it doesn't seem so bad but then the next thing you know then it's 50 a month and and then and the next thing the minimum payment is now 75 dollars a month and and the credit keeps on building and building and building let me tell you something credit is a prison that you can't see credit listen debt will get you so far under lord god i'm not preaching against credit cards i got 10 of them but i pay each one of them off every month because i refuse to let to allow debt to imprison me god help us do we understand that debt will break up more marriages in 2022 then infidelity will break up think about that there'll be more divorce court there'll be more divorces that happen in our country over two people that got into debt and they couldn't take the stress and so they fight and fight it's your fault why are you spending why aren't you making enough money why aren't you working why are you at the ball game you should be working a second job all this stuff happens and we end up with two people imprisoned by debt it turns into bondage in certain verse 14 and when he had spent all then there rose almighty famine in the land and he began to be in want and he went and he joined himself to a citizen of that country and he sent him the citizens sent him into his field to feed swine and i've really come to you today just to really ask you two questions that i need you to answer in your own mind number one what is your pig pen all right follow me with this we've already got we got the prodigal son we've got the younger brother we've got the younger son he's he's left he's spent everything he's had he's messed around he's done all this debauchery and life he he's done everything that he thought would be cool it would be fun and looking i've been looking forward to this moment all my life i've always heard about people going and doing things and having money and having fame and popularity he's done all of this thing and now he finds himself listen never in a million years did he ever dream that he would be in the predicament he found himself in never imagined he would end up like he would end up to be in a trap listen there's some people in here and i know usually when we preach this subject we preach about living life of drugs and alcohol and in women or men and and addictions and i i i understand those are usually the things we talk about fornication and all the all the things that happen but let me tell you something there's a whole lot more pig pens out there than just the life of debauchery because we can look at number one a lot of those lifestyles are a lot easier to come out of than some of the stuff we get ourselves into because here we always look at the prodigal as being somebody who leaves the church spends all they have and goes and lives under some bridge somewhere and finally has it so bad that they wake up and one day realizing you know i'm sick of living under this bridge i'm going to go back to church again and and that happens and that does happen and thank god and it's probably the easiest thing to happen can somebody say amen because you get to a place that's so barren and you're so desperate that you really have no other choice you're rock bottom the only the only direction to go is up but the problem is that's not the only pig pen that you can find yourself in there's some people here today and i'm gonna go through some of these because some of these are the hardest to get out of your pigpen might be doubt say doubt yeah it's simple but doubt is uncertainty of belief that often interferes with decision-making did you did you catch that you're like brother erickson come on now don't be don't be uh don't be pointing fingers at me i know i got i know i got some doubt but but here's the deal doubt is the opposite of faith and without faith it's impossible you you can't it you can't be a christian without faith so if you're a doubter if that's just who you are well i just i tell you what i i'm this type of person you got to prove it to me i i'm gonna i'm gonna doubt it until you prove it if you're that if you're that doubting thomas poor thomas gets a nickname he does one thing great great guy does a great work for god disciple of christ and does one thing he doesn't show up to a prayer meeting after the resurrection he's the only one everybody all the disciples are there they're all they're all like oh what are we gonna do jesus shows up reveals look at my scars man you know proves that he is who he is and and they're all excited go to thomas wright and thomas what is he says uh the other disciples therefore uh john 20 25 the other disciples therefore said unto him we have seen the lord but he said unto them except i shall see in his hands the print of the nails and put my finger into the print of the nails and thrust my hand into his side i will not believe god help us let me tell you something if you're a doubter in this place today i pray that you'll wake up i i pray that you will come to yourself and come to your senses because you're in the same situation that the prodigal son was in because we can't please the father unless we have faith we can't please the god in heaven we can't even how can we even say that we're apostolic how can we believe in heaven if we're doubters how can we believe in healing if we're dollars how can we believe that there's a holy ghost or or there's a baptism that can wash away sins if we're truly doubters we gotta say god take that doubt listen you don't have to understand every single thing in the word of god all you gotta do is say i will obey it i know there's new converse in this place today you can't explain your way out of a bible study with one of your co-workers at work i know that i understand they ask you questions that you don't have answers for and you don't understand but you can still have enough faith inside you to say god keep on speaking to me keep on showing me your word i'm just gonna believe it even though i don't understand it and although i cannot explain it my faith is still in you god i believe there's somebody here today they say i would get baptized but i just can't wrap my mind around how getting into a big tub of water and letting somebody dunk me how how that has anything to do with salvation there's people in here that that are doubters that say i can't even understand let me say something we were never commanded to understand god's word we're only commanded to obey god's word don't let doubt keep you from returning to the father's house your pig pen the swine the swine that you have to take care of it might be negativity god help us if jesus himself walked into this place and said i'll tell you what everybody's up in marriage retreat i'm gonna come in here and i'm gonna minister there'll still be people that go home today and won't be able to find anything good because they've allowed a spirit to grab a hold of them and i'm talking about things that are harder to shake than drugs and alcohol these are lifelong things that slowly it's a slow fade they slowly get a hold of our minds until where we we can't even think in a positive manner all thoughts turn to negative and i don't know about you i don't like being around a negative person because a negative person pulls everybody down around them god help us not to have a negative mentality that we always see the half empty instead of the half full it would be satan's good pleasure to have us go home today and say i can't think of one good thing that happened today man we had this person missing they're my favorite singer and this person's my favorite musician and pastor carpenter wasn't here and and we didn't have a record crowd here and i tell you what i got all in this suit and got all trash my god have mercy on you pull that negativity spirit let that chain break off of your life because you're never you're never gonna have revival you can't make it back to the father's house unless you allow these things to wake you up and you realize i'm in a pig pen full of negativity i'm in a pig pen full of greed that's some people now listen listen there's a popular opinion that says you've got to be rich to be greedy that is not true that's not true because greed is simply the opposite of generosity that's all greed is creed is just a self-centered world view got to take care of me my myself i it's my knees the matter greed pulls everything towards you and sees the need but says i would rather hold it and hoard it right here to myself some people here are in a pig pen called condemnation romans 8 and 1 says there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in christ jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit and i've always given a hearty just like you i've always given a hearty amen and i've always even preached it my god once you've been baptized in jesus name and you're baptized into christ that there's no longer condemnation but that's not what it says look with me again romans 8 there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in jesus christ or in christ jesus keep on reading who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit because there are jesus name baptized holy ghost-filled people who could be in this house even today who are stuck in a pig pen of condemnation because you're not walking after the spirit that's inside of you you're walking after your flesh that simply means that you make decisions that are not spiritual decision but they're carnal decisions and when we make carnal decisions we have to live in condemnation oh yes we do that's what the word says i know we've always i know we've always said uh my god once you're baptized in jesus name therefore no more continent that's not true it's the opportunity for no more condemnation and if we do what we're supposed to do and walk in the spirit there's no more condemnation but there are people here that like the prodigal you found yourself in want and you're living in a life of the past let me tell you something you can't do a thing about your past you can't do one thing to make it right you can't do one thing to change if you are married to somebody else in the past you can't fix those things however you can say god i choose to walk in your spirit because when i walk in your spirit all the things in my past are washed away because i've been baptized in your name and i no longer have to dwell on them i no longer have to think about them they no longer have to give me nightmares and i don't have to lose sleep over it and have insomnia but instead i can walk in the spirit and say will you leave me lord i will follow i'm not going to spend time looking in that small rearview mirror i'm looking out the windshield and saying i am moving forward get out of the pig pen of condemnation somebody needs to wake up in this place and realize you're at a place you don't need to be pig pens such as self-pity oh man people have done you wrong and over time you start thinking everybody's done me wrong and pity turns in it's just a self it's an inward it's you looking in your whole paradigm your whole worldview is self get out of yourself dear god get the revelation of the power that you get and the satisfaction that you get and the joy that you get when you add value to other people stop worrying about what was wrong and he promised me this and and she told me that by this time i'll be doing this and i was supposed to get that raise and that promotion and i've been pushed down the ladder i'm trying to climb the ladder i've been pushed down my god look at people around you and say who can i add value to because the more people you find to add value to all the sudden it starts coming around it's a cycle you bless others it's just a natural principle you will be blessed it's a cycle that's why we preach come on bring your tithe into the storehouse bring offerings into the storehouse is it so the storehouse can have have grains and have barns that are overflowing absolutely not it's because the principle is this if i look beyond myself in my own knees and i see the needs of the filipinos in the philippines if i see the needs of the sierra leones and africa if i see the needs of other people and i say you know what i i got enough to pay my bills and and i got enough to pay this tuition here you know what i'm gonna bring this offering i just feel like i'm gonna bring this offering in the house of god the principle is simply this you help others i and others will help you i'm reading i'm reading this book and and i wish i would have brought it with me and i could have gave you the author and title but but but i'm bad about that i'm bad about like like singing songs and don't have a clue who sings them that's my text to my wife all the time like who sings blah blah blah and she's like hello the choirs sing like 17 of their songs i'm like i don't know i just listen to stuff i read stuff and i really don't pay a lot of attention who wrote it i should but i'm reading this book it's an awesome book about the blessings of giving and it's simple the whole moral of the story is this if you receive a big blessing then bless big it's it's it's the it's the most simple but but we my wife and i we've been doing it and you say no no so what does that mean you give more to missions sometimes but but it could be that we were we were in denver denver colorado and we got there whenever you go let me just tell you this whenever if you go to denver colorado make sure whatever you're going there for get there a day early because it takes a full 24 hours to get your body acclimated to the elevation so we always if we're doing a if we're preaching or doing a quad whatever choir clinic whatever we're doing we always try to go a day early just because i've learned that if you try to teach choir songs the day you arrive you will die because there's not enough oxygen you're just like you're like sucking air i mean you will you will die so i've kind of learned that so we were there day early and and and it was it was really they're they're they're struggling just getting over a major coveted season they're kind of struggling there in denver and um had this waiter come to the table and just just a nice guy you know i'll be honest with you we didn't have a huge conversation i just noticed god had blessed us god had blessed us the week before uh we weren't expecting it we we got a blessing a financial blessing and and and i just looked around i thought i looked around i thought we are the only table that this poor waiter is even waiting on you know and i even kind of brought a conversation and he talked about yeah yeah yeah my family at home and this and that and talking about his kids and and i thought to myself this poor guy he can he couldn't but i have maybe five or six tables this whole evening he's he's not gonna make nothing and so a way that you can give outside of yourself and i thought you know what we're gonna leave him at tip but i'm not doing it to receive any kind of gratitude from him i said when he walks towards the kitchen we're going to lay the tip down and we're going to get out of here because i want this to be right spirit i don't want to be because i'm waiting for him to come chasing us down we're going to leave it it's not for any kind of glory it's because he's got a family at home he has no tables to wait on and god's blessed me so i'm gonna bless him and of course my wife she she's the she's the brains of the of the party and she's like well if we're gonna leave a big tip we're gonna leave him a church card i was like okay yes that does make sense you could feed your family and still not be right so i thought yes okay so we'll leave a tip we're gonna bless others we're gonna leave a church card but you could there's so many ways my god i know i know people listen i love this and this and one day if god blesses me accordingly i know people that just have rolls a hundred dollar bills and they'll just be walking through the mall and see somebody looks like they're in need and just just hand it to them and keep on walking i love that kind of stuff because it's reciprocal you bless and the blessings come back if you're if you are caught in the pig pen of self-pity the best thing you could do is try to bless somebody else the best thing you could do oh my word teach a bible study win a soul disciple somebody is there is there any better bible study teachers in the house is there any better feeling than walking out of a bible study where somebody you saw the light bulb go off when you're teaching a bible study i'm talking you you can't think of yourself after you get done doing that but god help us to wake up help us to figure out what are we in what about what about depression my god again depression a lot of times revolves around thinking of ourselves if we can get out of thinking of self self victimization i thought i made up that word and then i googled it i was like that's a word self victimization always the victim come on we gotta go beyond that is just a mentality we choose to have and we don't have to choose to have that mentality has something been done done wrong to you i'm sh i i guarantee you and it's stuff that that we probably couldn't even talk about in mixed company horrible things but you just you gotta make up your mind am i gonna sit among the swines and feed them tusks and husk and turn that around and and gnaw on the same slot that they're eating when you think about servants back home that are at your father's house that have bread and enough despair i gotta start thinking about i thought how many of us are caught we're struggling in the very things that people around us don't even struggle with does that scare anybody that that bothers me to think i'd feel with the holy ghost i've been baptized in jesus name i've been walking this walk all my life and i could have issues in my life that people i'm walking through the mall with don't even have think about that that's that's what he was saying the prodigal he came to himself and he began to think here i am the son of the father i am a son i'm in the family and we've got servants who got way better than i've got god i hope they would wake somebody up listen listen uh one more thing and i know and and strong tower students i had some of your parents come up to me and say say say brother erickson i hear you're going back sunday morning preach to my kids i'm going to tell you who it was i said preach to my teenagers but some things that we could get we can get in as a student is is the pig pen of laziness and we gotta under we gotta understand the word the word teenager is not our friend the word teenager came up in the in the mid mid to early 1900s and it was supposed to be this this this fun era between childhood and adulthood that we just kind of didn't put any responsibility upon our 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 year olds but instead we just said you know just have fun be young have fun y'all heard that statement that comes from the whole teenage era and i began to think to myself my god we have got to teach our students to do hard things matter of fact i know pastor hammond is about to he's about to start that series back up again that's one of my very favorite books read the book i'm not asking you i'm begging you read the book do hard things because it will cause you to want to do things it'll cause you to want to do things that nobody else your age is doing it'll cause you to try listen god has given some of you all talents you can't wait until you're 20 to start perfecting those talents you got to do it right now god's give god has given you callings in your life and some of you are in a pig pen i'm talking about your bedroom although it might look like one but some of you are living in a pig pen of laziness that if you would step up to the plate my god who knows listen why aren't we still sending out 21 year old home mission pastors i'm about to jump up on my soapbox i remember the day when we were sending out 23 year old missionaries why do missionaries have to be in their 40s now when we send them out why do pastors have to start passing in their 40s why can't we send out 20 year olds that say you know what for the last 10 years i've been studying the word of god for the last 10 years i've been given bible studies for the last 10 years i've been when everybody else was playing when everybody else was being a teenager i was doing hard things and now i look at asia and i look at the at the huge city of hong kong that does not have a missionary yet my god where are 21 year olds and 22 year olds who will step up and say i'm not gonna wait until i'm 40 to do something with my life i look upset and maybe i am just a little bit but i feel anointed because i just believe we can raise up young people that don't wait to be used of god who can step out and be like david oh it was saul that said my god you're just a youth david you're going to try to fight this giant who has been fighting since he was a youth and that's offensive to me brother naomi because saul was saying that this giant could fight from his youth but puny little david over here couldn't fight from his youth and somehow sometimes we as a church can look outside of the four walls of the church and we got no problem my god there's a 21 year old entrepreneur who started a business and he's already a millionaire he's on his fifth his fifth company and look at this doctor over here my goodness he he got out of high school at the age of 15 and he's already a doctor in his early 20s and mid-20s and and wow this and wow that yeah we look at our own young people and we don't expect any more out of them y'all i'm sorry i found my soapbox i'm about to step off of it i'm just simply saying we as young people could live in this little this little apostolic society that we've formed and never get out of where the prodigal came to himself and we can stay you know why there's so many 25 year olds who are still staying up all night playing video games and sleeping all day because they spent their teenage years doing that and they never stopped because they they didn't realize when they went from 19 to 20 they were no longer teenagers i'll apologize help our young people get something inside of them says there's no giant great enough there's no giant strong enough i i'm not too young i'm not in able i can listen we have some of the most talented young people oh dear god our school is every year is graduating and be far before they're graduating we are sending forth young people that are talented in music and and talented and preachers we got some young men who get up in chapel service and they preach they preach oh i've heard them preach greater than some evangelists i've heard preached that are in their 30s and 40s we've got so much talent and so much ministry and so much anointing my god don't get stuck feeding the swine and not realize that there's so much potential in the father's house you gotta get to the father's house question one i'm almost done question one what is your ping pin you're living in what is your pig pen you're living in in question two what is it gonna make up your mind that you're gonna come to your senses what is it that you're gonna say and for that reason i'm out because you can understand what your pig pen is but until you come until you come to yourself into your senses and say i'm sick and tired of living in this condition this is not who i want to be listen there's nothing worse than living in a cycle of sin you say sin oh yeah absolutely all these things i'm talking about when all you think about is self that's there's sin involved there when you when you can't look outside yourself there's sin and satan would have you to be content because here's the deal there are good reasons and sometimes there's good excuses for you to feel the way you feel i'm not taking that away from you i get it i get there are some horrible situations that have happened in this place but how long are we gonna stay where we are before somewhere along the way a reason doesn't pop up to our mind and say for that reason i'm out of here for the reason that my father has hired servants who have it better than i had it for that reason i'm out of here oh come on somebody i wish you would help me i refuse to continue to allow doubt to exist or negativity to exist or or greed or laziness or some i just want to say satan i'm out of here i know listen oh i know there's a citizen of this world that would want to have us bound and to keep us keep us right where we are and make us feel okay where we are but there's just a preacher that's preaching you today and i'm trying to bear to you my heart and say if you could ever come to your realization that this is not the life that you've got to live the rest of your life this is not what you have to be for the rest of your life you can do something great for the kingdom of god if you can get out of the situation you're in it is said that most women who live in abusive relationships never get out of the relationship because they can't imagine themselves by themselves how will i survive how how will i pay the bills how am i going to feed my children how can i pay the doctor's bill when when i don't have my husband's uh insurance benefits and and they can't even visualize themselves out of where they are and they remain in the pigpen that they're living in they remain mistreated where they are they continue eating what the swine are eating because they just can't get a vision of themselves outside of where they are it broke my heart i i watched the documentary of the last days and the in the in the in the death of gabby potito the other day they had they had this documentary and it was it was y'all it was gut-wrenching i sat there and i cried as i watched because here this beautiful young girl it was obvious that she was in an abusive relationship and i know she was trying to make it work but the reality is this as they began to show the the the body cam footage of those police officers that had pulled her van over and then and there had been word or they had gotten a report that this man was beating on this woman and so these officers pulled the van over and they separated they separated the fiancee him from her and they began to question them and we saw i saw in this documentary as gabby lied to these police officers and tried to make these police officers they didn't believe her but they had no choice but tried to make them believe that it was her fault why he had begun to beat her she lied and said i i hit him for she's weeping crying beautiful young girl weeping crying saying i i hit him first he he had no choice but to hit me back he was just defending himself it was not true it was a lie and even the officers as the documentary goes they showed inside the cop car as the police officers got back in the car one of the police officers he made this he said he said that girl is the kind of girl that's going to end up dead he said it plain as day and sure enough within a week or two they found her body in the middle of nowhere that beautiful young girl who had her whole life to live they found her body but here it is here it is good church family the reason why she died when she couldn't see herself out of the situation she was in she couldn't imagine herself they were engaged they were planning a wedding they were getting ready to be married they were on they were on a vacation of a lifetime she couldn't see herself beyond the situation but i want somebody to hear me today but for that reason i'm out i refuse oh my god i refuse to have a lack of vision that allows me to never see around what god is trying to show me in my life if we can just peek our head above the pigsty and look back towards the father's house and realize that the father wants us to come home the father is desiring the father his journey come back home i know you thought it was gonna be better on the other side i know you thought it was gonna be so much crater but please come home but do you know what that young man in the bible jesus made it very clear in the in the parable do you know what that young man feared the most about going home it's what his father was gonna say it's how his father was gonna react because the whole time he's saying i'm gonna go home and i'm gonna say father i've sinned against you and i've sinned against heaven and his whole worry his whole fear was simply what is my father gonna say well let me tell you something i began to read through the parable and do you remember what the father said he didn't say anything the father said nothing to him all the father did was wrapped his arms around the boy he wasn't speechless the father wasn't speechless because he was there speaking he was there speaking to his servants i want you to see what he says right here in luke 15 and verse 21 and the father sinned and he said unto him he said father i have sinned against heaven into thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy son but the father said to his servants he didn't say one word he didn't give one word of combination i i told you not to go i told you that would happen if you went i told you you would end up broke i i told you you would make a loser of yourself i told you you would come back here with nothing i told you you would be sorry his father didn't say any of that he simply said bring forth the best robe put it on him and put a ring on his hand and put shoes on his feet and bring hither the fat and calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry for this my son was dead and is alive again he was lost and now he's found and they began to be married i don't know about you but sometimes we view our father in heaven as a god who's gonna get on to us when we come back to the father's house and i realized i don't understand it but i realize there's people in this house today who had fathers who had biological fathers who did not represent your heavenly father will they didn't talk to you nicely they they put you down they told you you were never going to amount to anything they told you you were going to end up in prison like your uncle they told you all kinds of horrible things and said all kinds of horrible things but that does not represent our heavenly father for our heavenly father is a god of love our heavenly father is a god of mercy our heavenly father is a god of kindness and compassion my god he's looking out today and he's saying i wish that somebody would come back to the house i wish somebody would come back to the house and all we have to do is understand that the prodigal he didn't hear it from daddy he heard celebration from daddy he didn't hear it from the servants there was celebration my god in this place today if you're trying to get out of a far off lane and i hope that you are if you're in a pig pen today i pray understand the father's just simply saying bring the special robe and i want you to put it on my son i want you to fetch the family ring he's not lost his place in the family bring the ring bring the family ring and put it on his finger oh come on somebody he's saying bring the shoes bring the robe kill the fan and calf we're gonna celebrate for my son who was dead is now alive standing your feet with me today i'm so thankful for a father in heaven who looks at a bunch of prodigals and i know there's some people here wearing halos and you ain't never consider yourself as a prodigal but i'm right here i'm gonna i'm lifting my hand right here come quickly i'm lifting my hand right here and i'm saying oh my god i found myself in so many pig pens i i found myself failing so many times but the difference between a saint and a sinner is a sinner falls and a sinner remains in their pigpen but a satan gets up again and says but i've got to get back to the father's house i've got to do whatever it takes to get back into the will of god so two questions does it begin to play two questions i ask you today one is what kind of pig pen are you living in in number two what is it gonna make what's what's gonna have to happen for you to come to your senses because it's not enough to know where you're living there's gotta be enough of a wake-up call for you to say i'm not gonna live here anymore because this is not what the father desires do you love your heavenly father i got some blank looks from some of y'all do y'all love your heavenly father i i i don't i don't wanna i don't wanna shoot at nobody right here but i feel there's a lot of people looking at me blankly and you're some of the people i'm preaching to i'm just gonna go ahead and tell you looking at me like oh another sunday morning about to come to close and you're just you're just gonna keep on eating the husks of the same dumb swine you've been watching while all along there's a father that's looking for you yeah you yeah you that have been in church for 40 years i'm talking to you father's saying come on how long are you going to be selfish how long are you going to be self-centered how long are you going to want everybody to wait upon you and and want to do your ideas and do the things that you want to do how long are you going to stay in that same old swine bit he's saying my arms are open wide i'm not going to condemn you when you return i'm not going to scream at you and throw things i don't know what your daddy did when you were a kid he said i'm not gonna throw stuff and stop my foot and punch a hole through the wall i'm gonna lay my head upon your shoulder i'm gonna barely whisper listen you gotta envision i again it's a parable but you've gotta look you've gotta read between the lines of every parable jesus jesus ever told you've gotta read between the lines and you've got to see the father that jesus is speaking of as his head is upon his son's shoulder and he thought himself i thought he was dead i thought i lost him i thought i would never see him again but here he is and all the father could do is say bring me the ring bring me the robe bring me the shoes strike up the band for my son who was dead he's come home again i wish you just lift up your hands and let the lord begin to speak into your heart today i feel the holy ghost in this place come on i know i'm breaking through some hard calloused hearts i i know and i'm not i'm not afraid to do it because god gave me this and and he even put people people's names upon my mind and i knew it was going to be a hard callous i knew the work that i had to do this morning was not going to be easy but come on if you can somehow look around you are you truly happy where you are spiritually are you truly content if you are content i say thank god and i'm surely not trying to paint with a wide brush and say that everybody is living with the swine but i hate to say it but i believe there's more people than realize it there's too many people that don't know that they don't know and i'm praying that god right now will begin to smote hearts and begin to open your mind and let you truly look around you look at what you're feeding look at what you're standing in look and smell what the stench is that's coming into your nostrils there's nothing that stinks more than a pig farm you're standing in the middle of absolute disgusting mess come on somebody you gotta ask yourself how in the world could this be better than returning to my father's house how in the world could this be better i am sick and tired of being sick and tired i'm sick and tired of always thinking about myself and allowing the devil to speak thoughts into my mind that everybody's against me i want to tell you something today everybody is not against you because when god is for you when god is for you i said when god is for you who can be against you when the lord is on your side who could be against you come on somebody i want to open these altars my question is what are you gonna do what are you gonna do about the situation you're in are you just gonna live with it are you just gonna say hey i'm just gonna just sit in it i'm just gonna deal with oh no i believe there's people in this place they're gonna say i'm headed back to the father's house i'm headed back to the father's house i'm headed back to the father's house come on come up in this altar and just say god from this point forward i want to be your son i want to be back in your family again oh i want to put your kingdom first it's not my will but let your will be done come on right now pray that prayer come on pray that prayer stop letting the devil lie to you the lord loveth you he careth for you your father's house is where you need to be your father's house is where you can survive where you can thrive where your ministry can be what god has meant it to be come on somebody welcome home welcome home oh come on it's more than just for the drug addict it's more than just for the alcoholic we want you but we also want every person in this place who are facing a pigsty that they aren't happy living without welcome home welcome home yes oh yeah come on young people make up in your mind you're gonna do hard things make up in your mind you're gonna do hard things come on the broken will be healed hey the broken will be healed i'm coming home yes the wear is fine the curse will be blessed come on home come on empty find rest in this place be blessed in this house come home yeah find risk in the father's house find blessings in the father's house welcome home welcome home come on every hand lifted where you are right today come on because you come down to this place you're not condemning yourself as some horrible person every one of us deal with situations in our life what i want you to do right here right now is just begin to say god reveal to me those things that keep me from your house come on i want you to ask i want you to say that i want you to pray that prayer god reveal to me those things god even think things that i don't even realize things things that i don't even see in my own life god i'm not praying this right here father reveal it to me god i want to make sure that everything that i do lord god centers around your kingdom everything i do centers around people everything i do centers around making sure your kingdom lord god is what your kingdom ought to be lord i want to play my part i want to fulfill the calling that you've given me come on pray this with me god help me lord god anything in my mind oh god any lies of the devil anything lord god that's trying to take hold of me lord i don't want to be a doubter i don't want to be a powder lord god just help me lord god to overcome those things god help me lord god to wake up and realize what i'm doing and lord god help me to get out of what i'm doing i don't want to be negative lord god i don't want to be self-centered i don't want to live a life in depression lord i want to get outside of myself in my will and do the very things that you have created me to do jesus name in jesus name they're going to sing this song from the top come on i believe this song right here is calling somebody home in this house today is saying somebody come on home somebody come back to the father's house come on we're gonna sing with them in worship and praise as we end yeah yeah yeah yeah come on sing it brother come on do you believe that if and we know that freedom's coming so oh forever but would you send those orphans home we were waiting all day long and the ring of the robe is ready we can see them coming now just like the protocols forever and strongholds start to break at the sound of our voices at the sound of our praise and now just get out of our way can't you see us dancing there's no room for you to stay no no no strong at the sound of our voices foreign come on lift up our hands right now and raise them towards the baptistry so thankful the decision to be baptized in the name of jesus for the mission of sins come on let's pray right now over this young man father i'm so grateful lord god that he is following your word your plan of salvation oh i'm thankful that every sin that he has ever committed in his life is about to be washed away he's about to have him totally taken from his life lord god remitted oh god in baptism today in jesus name bless his future we just believe in jesus name kevin carter upon the profession of your faith and in obedience to the word of god i now baptize you in the name of jesus christ for the remission of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the holy ghost in jesus name come on let's celebrate right here in jesus christ let your power fall lord god we thank you lord jesus oh we bless your name let your holy ghost fall from heaven lord god the curse will be blessed and they're coming home and broken they're coming home church yeah will be filled yesterday welcome home oh come on sing it again sing well that's the desire of the father and that's the desire of the church come on home come on home yes come on home holy ghost hallelujah thank you thank you thank you thank you jesus hallelujah as you leave this place today we leave with joy amen greet one another so excited amen brother jerry dean pastor jerry dean will be preaching tonight preaching the word come expecting amen bring somebody invite somebody to church with you tonight you're dismissed in jesus name you