Spiritual Myopia by Elias Limones 2003 · The Pentecostals of Alexandria, Alexandria, LA Kind: conference session Scripture: 2 Peter 1:4-9, Proverbs 4:18, Psalm 84:7, 2 Corinthians 3:18, Isaiah 37:3, John 4:35, Psalm 51:10 Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/elias-limones--spiritual-myopia Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page. Free to copy and share with attribution. ------------------------------------------------------------ clap our hands unto the Lord hallelujah give him praise one more time let's give him praise one more time you are worthy Jesus we worship you O God we thank you for all the things that you have done thank you for the service last night I God thank you for the tragedies hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah praise the Lord praise the Lord praise the Lord what can you say after what we felt an experience last night what a powerful move of God and it's a little difficult for me to come this morning and stand before you having my elders on my left which I have honored this morning and of course with a Mangan this helped us so much through the years through this meeting because of the times my life was changed 13 years ago when I came to this meeting I never been the same I went back home I was telling brother Williams in the office after being in because of the times I went back to California I resigning my job and I went full-time in the ministry and I went from a peer financially to down here financially but God blessed us with a tremendous revival we have archives over 800 people since then hallelujah so I'm so thankful to God for this powerful meeting it's just the opportunity to be a pyro it's good to see a lot of friends in the audience this morning makes me feel a little more comfortable and thank God for last night I don't know why can I add to what happened last night but I'm gonna do what the Lord has told me to do and we're going to go for the reading of the word to the book of 2nd Peter chapter 1 verses 4 through 9 I'm not gonna read all the verses but I just kind of going to glance through verse 4 Peter start telling us whereby are given unto us exceeding great precious promise by dzv money might be partakers of the divine nature having escaped the corruption that is in this world through lost I think he goes on to verse 5 talks about giving and besides this giving all diligence add to your faith virtue and he keeps telling us to add things until we get to verse 8 for if these things be in you and abound they make you that ye shall not be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ and then verse 9 look to the Fraser but he the lack of these things is blind and cannot see afar off and have forgotten that he was purged from his sins I like to take that phrase cannot see afar off and I like to preach to you for a few minutes this morning under the subject is spiritual myopia the spiritual myopic King I see afar off you can only see up close but you cannot see afar off let's pray one more time before we are see the Heavenly Father hallelujah I need your spirit right now cut it touch me that's my mind put thoughts in my mind put words in my mouth oh God let the spirit flow hallelujah that I know anything God the power that comes from you God you've bested us last died and you here today are you here to stay Oh Lord we are hungry of we want more of your God hallelujah talk to us talk to our God in Jesus name can you say in Jesus name you may be seated I'm not gonna elaborate too much in this verses because I know one is standing before preachers of the gospel well rate on the scriptures but what the Apostle Peter is telling us that I walk with God our knowledge of God in our relationship with God is a progressive thing that there is no limit on how high or how deep we can go in God in other words there is no limit to our experience acknowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ in the book of Proverbs son among who speaks on the same line of thought and he says but the path of the just is is the shining light the shining more and more a more a more unto the perfect day and then the psalmist in Psalms 84 and 7 he tells us that we will go from one is strength from one power to another power Paul in the second book of Corinthians 3 and 18 tells us that we will go from one glory to another glory this is a progressive thing we can I stop we cannot feel satisfied we need to reach for more anymore anymore anymore in fact the word of God uses many analogies in regards of how high we can go how deep we can go in our relationship acknowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ the prophet Isaiah compared the believer to an eagle spreading its wings and reaching heavenly places while the Simon's compare us or the Jasmine to upon tree whose Ruth reaches way down underneath the surface to drain from the streams of fresh waters the mason flourish in the middle of the desert now those two analogies is speaks about how high you can go or how deep you can go in Jesus so it is established in the Word of God that there is no limit to our experience with our Lord Jesus Christ you can go as how you can go as deep as you want to go now this is also - in regards of revival in church growth in stock women and giving and praying and fasted and godly living we can have as much as revival as we want to have we can win as many souls we want to win we can teach as many Bible studies we can teach we can give as much as we want to give there is simply no limits hallelujah he all depends on your spiritual perception on your vision because if you don't add these things to your relationship with God to your knowledge of Jesus you are suffering from the spiritual myopia you are blind you are unfruitful myopia is a defect in your eyes that keeps you from seeing objects afar off you can see objects that are close to you but you cannot see objects that are far away I heard somebody tell the story that this man went to see the optometrist he was having problems seeing things far away so he went to the doctor and the doctor check his eyes and after he checked his eyes he said sir you don't have nothing wrong with your eyes the problem is that you mean sitting in front of you competed for too long and your eyes does have a just to see things up close so what I want you to do is go to the highest point of the city and from that point fix your eyes and the furthest point that you can see if you do this exercise every day you ëyesí is going to improve let me apply this principle to our spiritual eyes the truth of the matter is that we've been looking up close for too long we will look into ourselves we will look into our needs we've been looking to our own organization we've been looking to our own churches and cities and this morning our time to tell you this is the hour to see beyond ourselves this is the hour to see the thousands of people there are in our cities and they not even know who the Lord Jesus cries is hallelujah we have been looking to ourselves for too long and what we need to do is do what the Lord told us to do say not ye there are yet four months and then cometh harvest behold I say unto you lift up your eyes lick lift up your eyes and look unto the fields for there I are ready to be harvest this is the hour to see beyond ourselves this is our to see beyond our culture this is the hour to see beyond our communities this is our to see beyond our color of our skin this is our to see beyond our language this is the hour to see beyond the material things of this world look at to the fields there are why ready to be harvested the church is pregnant right now the church is pregnant right now with the greatest revival ever I remember when my wife was expecting a child and she was carrying my son and I went to Lamaze class and I went through all those things but when the time came that she needed to give birth my first sign I forgot all the techniques I didn't know what to tell it to blow to crown and to breathe I completely forgot all those things that had taught me just few weeks ago before that but you know I was just telling a little bit more push honey it's coming it's coming I was encouraging her oh oh I wasn't terrible paying myself but I was strutting Carter the church is pregnant with the greatest revival ever but we found ourselves in the same situation of the king of Judah Hezekiah whence inoculum came against him his Akaya lifted his voice up and saying I said 37 and three day of trouble and enough review in a but blasphemy because the children had come to the point of birth but the one that is giving birth nothing have any strength so prophet what we want you to do is pray that the Lord give us the anointing to the Lord give us the power that a girl give us the burden so we can give birth to the new generation of believers I believe guy is up in the windows of heaven looking down to because of the times say a church keep pushing keep praying keep fasting keep reaching keep giving because it's a great revival coming your way like you had never seen before come on let's couple hands unto the Lord don't give up don't give him that's the greatest revival ever we heard from them in a gala style and I'm so excited about I can hardly wait till I get home I want to go I want to do it I want to have the revival the Dolores promises their pathology Jesus name Church is pregnant with the greatest revival ever think we need to keep praying to the Lord God give us passion God give us the power and anointing the unity to give birth to the dis new generation of Apostolic believers I have yet to see I don't know maybe you have but I have yet to see a farmer looking a farming wedding glasses farmers usually like the ones I know they don't wear glasses and the reason somebody says because they get up in the morning and they stand on the porch of the house and the mixture the fields just by looking at them they exercise their vision every morning they measured the growth of them from the front to the back hello in the Lord exemplify these one time when he went up to the mountain and he looked down to Jerusalem he looked down to Jerusalem he started whipping and crying Oh who's your saline cushion Rosalyn oh she resigned when was the last time that you wept over you silly when was the last time that you spent a season a break crying out before the Lord God give us revival in our city he was revival in North America when was the last time they spent a season cried out before the Lord God gave us revival he has a thank God for all the good things that God is bestow upon the United Pentecostal church I truly believe we got the best preachers in the whole wide world oh we got some of the greatest singers and God has blessed us financially we are built the best buildings that we have ever seen in the history of the church I mean gray buildings and thank God for all of this but oh I wish we can say the same thing about our soul winning in our church planting oh when I went to my city and I talk to brother prize where the price again go ahead we need a church in the city but in that church was one United Pentecostal church there's over a hundred thousand people in the city and the pastor told me no this is my city ain't nobody else is gonna come in here and start another church oh what a sad day Oh series with a thousands of people and you're not living a mango and it's not a second church I know we had to work in unity and I know we had to work with ethics but that's what the manual elder the United Pentecostal churches is not to stop of the growth of the church it's becoming a the revival is coming and if that's not the case we need to review it and we need to change it if you have to but we got to paint churches we got to have revival we have to reach this loss and die well we are blind we are short-sighted we are seeing up close I thank God for the things that's happening right now even in this meeting I'm so glad are you having us I'm not tears last night to cry I'm so excited this is about souls this is that about me or you these are our souls and it's about Jesus Christ that's good all about we are so concerned about our own things that we forget that thousands of thousands of people from all walks of life they are lost and going through a devil's hell if they the Church of the name that's and do something apart we better check our hearts they told us we better check our hearts pull it just let me tell you these in parentheses I don't want to get off my subject and I want to stay with it the time that is being allocated to me but old car we better check our harness the Prophet told us last night when we got baptized in Jesus name we were in filled with the Holy Ghost God gave us a new heart a heart it was programmed to obey his law because he says I will read I will write my law and die hards so he came already programmed to obey his law but the heart can only survive in the spiritual dimension that's the only way the heart can keep breathing if you keep in umbria infesting and dying to the flesh into the world every day if you don't keep the heart and other spiritual dimension the higher eventually it's going to die and you're not going to have a heart relationship with Jesus you're just going to have a mental relationship with him and you won't be able to obey the laws of God because you high is and yes you know who Jesus is and yes you know all the things about the doctrine that we embrace they praise God for that but everything has become mental because you high instead that's what David say God creating me and clean hi you know what that word created I'm not too large humble and intelligent enough to know that it's the same word that was used in Genesis 1:1 when God created the heavens and earth David didn't just say God renew my heart like it was sometimes bridge though he says create get this all is stony hard learning filthy and put a new heart enough fellas night God was doing just that he was putting new hearts inside of us oh I felt the last night oh you better check your heart you better check your heart you quit preaching you quit loving Souls you quit fasting and your spiritual heart is going to die you're gonna have instead of having a heart relationship with the Lord or you're going to have is a mental relationship with him and there's a big difference because the Lord says you that you are loved by God not only with your mind but also will you hide praise God they better check you heart today again oh god help us God helped us to see Christopher Columbus was a man whose idea was rejected time and time again until somebody gave him a chance Christopher Columbus never gave back because he saw beyond the mindset of the people of the day he saw beyond the possibilities and beyond himself and now in basado lead in the former capital of Spain there is a monument there has been in memory of cursor for Columbus there is a inscription there there's been written in Latin disease knee blues ultra and that means there's nothing beyond they thought they'd be young in Spain there was nothing else they thought that I was it but we think that way ourselves we think it this is Edie but this a lot more you know what they died after Christopher Columbus discover America and he went back you know what they didn't build a lion in front of that and the lion is racing up it's all in and stretching the word knee in the only thing you can read now is plus ultra which means more beyond we have come to that time there's more beyond ourselves this more beyond what we're doing here today this is great but there's no more room people to read you there are hungry people out there that we need to reach we need to scratch the word knee and the only thing we need to read there is the more salt the wind the steamer churches the plane Thurston Murray Bibles to preach there's more series in countries in the world that we need to reach we need to see beyond ourselves when I read the story and I when I was there where the sun's took me over there oh I thought to myself it's easy to fall for to fall into the idea that we have arrived and then there is nothing else beyond like what we have accomplished in the kingdom of God sometimes we even act like there are no more souls to save and to reach sometimes moving and then there's no more churches that we need to plan oh there are cities with hundreds of thousands of people oh they doesn't have one Church with the Apostolic message and they we are just looking just relaxing this is the time to run with a message oh I felt that so deep last night I wanted to get up from my seat run to the airport get on the plane and go to my city and start running with the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ I feel like we need to ride please please please please please give them a chance thank God for the United Pentecostal church thank God for our superintendent brother Haney thank God for our director iHome Misha's director brother Cunningham thank God for reaching all the cultures and all the people that are living within the United States of America North America is the longer one culture country in one language country we got people from all over the world living in the United States we got 35 millions of Hispanics living in the United States and we need to reach them I say we need to Rick Stein in an Austin Tice the language can be a barrier but but you have a burden for the lost even the language it's not a barrier I wish mother modeling was here nah my superintended by brother Marlon from South Carolina up men tall Caucasian man o healing no a world in Spanish but he went to a city for the claim too much telling me the superintendent says he went to the city and it was a large community of Hispanic people and he felt a burden for them he didn't know how to communicate and he talked himself in Spanish you know he's pastoring these people and bridging today and in Spanish now when you have a burner for self you overcome any handicap I try anything you can accomplish when you have a burden for selves I'm not telling you that you need to go and learn in Spanish but I just telling you you better have a burner for sauce Oh Buzz Aldrin the second man to walk on the surface of the Moon after Neil ancient and his book title they return maybe some of you have read the book he made some very very very important statements in his book he says I wrote this book with intention about waking me and new interests in the United States his face program which has twist drift of course the United States of America produces more astronauts than anyone else in the world but for the last 20 years no one has walk on the moon Audrina stays for these for this space program not to fail and ultimately disappear it is necessary to maintain contact with a lunar surface we must take advantage of the opportunity that is given us we have astronauts that are waiting for the opportunity to make history again so when I read this I thought of all the cities in North America the four years had not started one church the out broke the proclaims the Apostolic truth many churches had lost contact with their community many churches hurl of contact with their series and their people and the people around them and we have leaders trained ministers in our churches that are capable it arises they are ready to go instead of church but some of us are holding them back oh we need to let them go let the lose send them send them sandé let's start Church everywhere where we can pull up a starling Jesus name Church let's betwen because the program of evangelism which will be the primary focus of the churches is paralyzed preacher your vision is awfully short-sighted oh god help us our worst enemy is not the world our worst enemy is not even the devil our greatest enemy is our own carnal nature is our flesh our flesh is that thing that is keeping us from reaching our spiritual potential church girls in revival a unity in an admired chapter 8 verse 22 they brought to the Lord our blind means did touching and the Lord did something out of the norm when you do something that goes against the mindset of the people you are going to be criticized nevertheless where you go I'm going to repeat that when you go again so you do something against the mindset of the people you are going to be criticized but nevertheless the Bible says that the Lord is spit on his eyes and put his hands upon him and then he asked them if he was able to see in the answer day he reply was really intriguing because he says yes I see but I see ministries so the Lord came and touched him for the second time in making look up and his eyes side where it was restored for he saw every man clearly and what happened last night I felt there was a second touch from God and I do believe if you came to this meeting suffering with a spiritual myopia do you wait touch last night and if you were not touched last night you can be touched today you can be touched I'll hop tomorrow imagine it'll be touch before you lane displays with this anointing that we're feeling here oh we need to see beyond we didn't see beyond ourselves beyond me myself a night there are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of our cities even people like it we heard the testimony pastor Manning this morning back these preachers and people from other denominations are coming they're hungry and we need to see beyond ourselves and reach these people bringing me come on let's bring you me we're not going to compromise the truth just like it was tall last night but we need to see beyond ourselves oh come on let's give a cup unto the Lord right here I have a an article like I was in the hospital took out your home into the hospital while I was waiting for him to come out I was reading a magazine and I just ripped the page I think you done that too some time in your life when you see something you know I know we shouldn't do it up this caught my attention I read the page I was looking around see nobody see me but but it was so interested I said I'm going to use it sometime because he it speaks about our men are in English men his name is Bernie Rainier and he's talking about Trafalgar Square Trafalgar Square those days I've been visiting London you know that it thousands of pigeons fly flying you know over Trafalgar Square in the lawn the Mayor of London he says we are spending a hundred and forty five thousand pounds a year just to clean up their mess so he says we're going to let those pigeons die we're going to shut down all the the shops that are selling it's a very seat to the tourists we're going to shut them down and we're going to let these birds die so one of the honors Bernie Rainier he went to battle he went got money from the bank he went and blow his resources hire the best lawyers and went to battle and the thing is the bottom of the story is that he lost the case but when he was interviewed asking why you think says well I lost the case but at least at least something trying to save those birds he says now they're not gonna let me work here and try to say it's all these bird seeds to the tree so I'm gonna go to Italy and just start another shop over there because I have a passion for birds there is somebody that's giving everything brother caning thank you for what you say the other day of bearing son Luis thank you very much there is I'm ending gave it all trying to save some merits and they not even have souls and here here we are today are we doing everything that we can to reach our cities we are fighting we are talking we are doing all these things sometimes we feel like if we owned our city are you gonna be responsible for all the blood of those a hundred one hundred and fifty two hundred and five million people are you sitting by yourself I don't think so oh why don't you let somebody come in and help you to reap the harvest this way hey where do you do this morning once again to see beyond ourselves you are suffering from the spiritual myopia and what we need to do the Lord told the Lord said Church of the Book of Revelation since law descends you think you have it all but I'm telling you you don't have nothing you think you reach you really pull it what you need to do is use some of my eye drops then you know in your eyes that you may see and sometimes we are so blind with our prosperity and think God forward we are so blind with a popularity and I'm so thankful for all those things that good preaching at all we are supplying for all of these things and we think we have it all together and the Lord came last nigh and told us a you think you have it all together but first of all you go have to go down and repent let me put some of my eye drops you are suffering from a spiritual myopia you seen up close and you not see him beyond so let me clear your eyes sigh let me clear your vision and I felt the Lord dropping in my eyes and annoying from above and this morning my vision is clear the only thing I see is hundreds upon hundreds and thousands of people they don't know Jesus they don't know there's one God in heaven then they don't know that God came down the manifest themselves and the name in the person of Jesus Christ and now through him we can be saved we can be baptized and he's saying we can be him filled with the power of the Holy Ghost we can walk in the newness of life they don't know that and we need to pick up a burden this morning we need to read each lesson stand everybody please give them a chance please reach them brother prizes now here some of my elders are not here but taking off from the prize because 15 years ago I went to this location church and I sit there and I assist a pastor and I told the pastor say I want to start Hispanic outreach let me start just a service here please I have a burden for sister Lucille farmer the woman that came is a mission of the first time to Ecuador when I was just a 7 years old a beautiful woman tall and slim blue eyes blonde hair my eyes never I never before now I've never seen somebody was so beautiful I told my my dad I said God God I never see anybody so beautifully look transparent to me she was so blond so it's beautiful she passed away three years ago but that woman before she passed away I went to see and she says Elias pull a box under my bags is that wouldn't a cardboard box so I pulled it out it was full of pictures and I started looking those pictures when I was just a child since and I pray for you every day that you never lose the burning the passion for you people don't forget of your roots she told me and I waiting through that church that occasion and I told let me you know these this was his answer now I'm not trying to complain because that's under the blood and and I live on the path I was looking up to the future and the things that God has ahead of us but you know what what he told me he says all the Mexicans and all the Hispanics need to learn English if they want to be safe you cannot say nobody with that kind of attitude that our interstates I want from the doors of the church with my young wife crying I told brother price I don't want it carry a United Pentecostal Church license I want you to take my license this is what happened to me he came he got me under his wing he prayed with me he talked to me says don't worry about it today in that city any given Sunday that you walked in there we can have about 800 people worship and the noise somebody says there's no way but today there is a shortage because a buddy gave us a choice if you're not seeing beyond you culture if you're not seeing it on your language if you don't see beyond the color of your skin you are suffering from a spiritual myopia and you live like God the noise rise this morning