Pastor Brad DeLong - Wholly His

i feel a word for his church today the book of romans chapter 12 paul talks about a change the lord has just set us up this morning a time of change and consecration paul talks to the believers in the chapter before about the mercy and the grace of god that they shouldn't be arrogant because of the grace they should never get to a point where they look down on others for not having the same grace that they've received it uses some strong language chapter 12 and verse 1. in the next chapter he says i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god those mercies that are extended to you today that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable to god which is your reasonable service do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind he's just renewing our minds today he's aligning our hearts and our minds with his and you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god that's what we're all after today really is the will of god we want his will we want his direction we want his will and the circumstance or the life we just presented to him paul says in other words because of the mercy and the grace you've received and the redemption salvation that's extended to you you are called to be transformed and changed not in conformity or compliance with the world in manmade ideals but in obedience to the will and the word of god because of this great grace and the power to overcome that you have received you're called to present yourself a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto him which is your reasonable service and i want to preach to you along those lines this morning as the lord calls all of us to present ourselves completely and to surrender ourselves to him in whatever change he wants to do in our lives i want to convey today a message of consecration i preach from this title holy his holy his you are in his hands today you're in his presence today you're in his glory today i invite you to let him do whatever change he wants to do in your life for all of our guests we're so thankful that you're here and i invite you like several of you have already to just present yourself to him knowing that he will do what's best for you i want to invite you to pray with me this is a holy moment god is helping us would you lift your voices with me as a church and as a body of believers and let's pray over the next few moments of god we're asking for your help we're asking for your word to challenge and stir us and convict us if need be that you would help us lord to do exactly as you've called us to do in whatever change you desire to make in us today that we would see that fulfilled this morning in the name of jesus we pray amen you may be seated i saw an ad the other day displayed two iphone screens that were side by side on the right side there was a phone screen that looked a lot like my personal phone screen it had apps scattered all across the screen with little to no arrangement most likely with notifications abounding on each of the apps that were displayed i'm sure i've got a couple kindred spirits in the house who are not bothered by the 10 notifications on your app and the lack of explicit organization when it comes to your phone you all can attest that there is a method to our madness we know what we're doing everything is where it needs to be and then there are the others in the room probably a majority these individuals are represented by the phone on the left side of the ad all of its apps tucked into strategically placed folders all of its widgets whatever those are they're in order all of its rows and its columns are in a cohesive arrangement in order to maximize efficiency and structure you've got your notifications completely clear your apps have all been closed immediately after they're used to enhance your battery life you could see the the difference in these two phones in this ad they were markedly different the ad rather your phone could look like this as it pointed to the orderly screen on the left the one had that puts half or more than half of the room at ease when they see it and the others of us are not nearly as bothered

by the inverse of it this ad in the ensuing line of thought that i had reminded me of a common term a common trend a habit that i have seen surface more and more of late i've heard it discussed over other pulpits more in recent days and years it was represented to some extent in this ad and it also makes its way into our calendars our routines our families our mindsets and even into our spirituality and our walk with god at times sometimes all the time what i'm referencing specifically today is the tendency of ours to compartmentalize a word that i've heard and experienced more and more in recent years a word that just means to divide in a categorized it's a trend it's an inclination in a habit that has surfaced more and more even with regards to the church and to the kingdom of god it's not always a bad thing it's not a harmful habit all the time we find the need to compartmentalize to categorize on a regular basis things like schedules and working family time and budgets and tasks even our smartphone apps it's not inherently a horrible or detrimental practice or inclination but the reason that it surfaced so frequency of late is because we often do not compartmentalize our compartmentalizing we can often find ourselves allowing this mindset to bleed into the things of god even to our walks in our lives with him for example we may start to categorize our church time in our god time and we make those two one in the same and we reduce them both to a sunday or a wednesday only schedule we may compartmentalize our walk in relationship with god forcing everything into this expedient time slot this convenient mold you divide your lives or we divide our actions our words and our conduct at times between church and work or church friends and work friends in other words compartmentalizing can lead us to talk one way when we're here and talk another way when we're not or we think one way when we're in his presence or we think a different way when we're not we pursue righteousness and holiness when we're in an altar space and we forego them to an extent when we're not we can tend to compartmentalize our church life home life work life in every area in between which leads to dangerous grounds into the exact opposite of what the bible calls and requires us to do you see when i make up in my mind that any part of my life can be separated from and categorized apart from god and apart from his spirit and apart from his authority in his dominion i have compartmentalized to my own detriment and i have drawn lines where he never intended for me to draw them when i make up in my mind i live one way at church or another way at home i'll talk one way with church friends and another way at work i i'll uphold values in one way at the house to the lord but when i get to my own house i'll forego those values and i'll watch that show or listen to that artist i'll defame that brother or that sister i have allowed myself to relegate god in his word and his dominion to only one little corner and minuscule area of my life and not all the others and the truth of the matter is i cannot have a church life and then a separate home or work life conflicting with it they are all one and the same and the further truth of the matter is every part of my life is his every part of my life is under his authority every part of my life is to please every waking moment of my life whether it is in this building or otherwise they all belong to him and they serve to honor and please him so i cannot compartmentalize my walk with him to two days of the week or maybe three or four days of the week i've got to have it every day of the week instead of that i live in devotion to him every day every moment of every day you might be asking what in the world does this have to do with our text and our title and i'm glad that you asked you see god's not looking for just a small portion of our lives our hearts our time and our devotion he wants more than a compartment or line item in our lives he desires more than just three hours a week that we spend in the house of the lord he's not looking

for a single part or portion of our lives instead he is looking for and he is deserving of the entirety of our lives the entirety of our life he desires more than just a corner or a piece of our hearts he's after and he's looking for our whole hearts i feel him pulling and drawn as someone today he's calling for more than minuscule moments and marginal fragments of our schedules and our intentions but instead i believe he's looking for our full attention for a lifestyle that places him jesus at the center of it all a couple weeks ago i preached that we have his full attention that god is fully focused on us that he's ever present and he's with us all the time he's fixated on his people he is ever present but i wonder today if what he's after and what he's looking for is our full attention now and our full devotion that maybe god's focused on us and attended to us but could it be that we haven't been as attentive to him but instead of placing him in a convenient compartment of our lives and our schedules and our routines that we just break the box this morning and position him in his rightful place at the center of all of our lives and our commitment simply put he wants all of us today he wants our whole hearts it is ours for us to be holy his and he spells that out clearly all throughout his word the shema itself deuteronomy 6 speaks to this very important passage in scripture hero israel the lord our god the lord is one you shall love the lord your god with all your heart with all your soul with all your strength of course this command is repeated over and over again especially in the new testament jesus has asked point blank by a pharisee trying to trip him up they said what's the greatest commandment lord and we ought to take special attention to what he says first of all because it's jesus and everything he says is important second of all because this is the greatest commandment according to he doesn't hesitate you shall love the lord your god with all your heart with all your soul with all your mind this is the first and great commandment that's striking in and of itself then you recognize what some others have proposed about this command that the inclusion of our hearts our souls our minds might have been jesus way of saying in other words you ought to love the lord with everything you've got many polio people believe that these three made up the entirety of a person and made up the entirety of their being whether you believe that or not the command is clear it's repeated over and over again which is pretty important in and of itself love the lord your god and love them with all you god love them and serve them with your whole heart your whole being your entire life in existence and the same premise runs throughout the word of god as a whole there's a consistent call in scripture that we give our all to him our whole lives deuteronomy 10 and 12 and now israel what's the lord your god require of you fear the lord your god walk in all his ways to love him to serve the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul chapter 11 and verse 13 it shall be that if you earnestly obey my commandments which i command you today to love the lord your god and serve him with all your heart and with all your soul then i'll give you the rain for your land and it's season chapter 30 and verse 6 and the lord your god will circumcise your heart in the heart of your descendants to love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul that you may live notice the themes in joshua 22 the same is repeated joshua commissions the the eastern tribes are about to go over to jordan it's one of his last addresses to them very important he says take careful he to do the commandment and the law which moses is serving the lord commanded you what is that commandment to love the lord your god walk in all his ways keep his commandments hold fast to him serve him with all your heart and with all your soul and several generations later samuel exhorts the people including you and me along the same lines in chapter 12. he said don't turn aside from following the lord but serve the lord your

god with all your heart and do not turn aside for then you would go after empty things which cannot profit or deliver for they are nothing let me just pause here and say there might be some things in our lives that we're going after and we're given our devotion and they're not going to profit you not one bit you might even be spinning your wheels or worse yet it may be pulling you away from god there are some things that profit nothing and we might exchange those things exchange the presence of god exchange a relationship with god for one of those things in the long run in the end it will not profit me at all it says you're good for nothing verse 24 fear the lord sermon truth with all your heart considering what great things he has done for you and the same god has done great things for us he speaks to us himself jeremiah 29 and 12 gives instructions to the captive of israel they had turned towards some other things that didn't profit them he said then you'll call upon me and pray to me and i will listen to you there's a promise for someone when you prayed earlier he listened to you and you'll seek me and you'll find me when you search for me with all of your heart i will be found by you says the lord notice the commands in the theme coupled with his promise and his instructions you saw these words over and over again the scriptures i just read words like all whole completely phrases like all his ways all your heart all your soul they hinged and revolved around the same theme and the same commandment which is the one i'm echoing today and that is simply god is not content with part of our hearts or a fraction of our devotion he is not satisfied with half-heartedness and divided attention and affection and devotion but instead i believe he's looking for a church and he's looking for a people that have invested all of themselves into their pursuit of him and into the desire to please him and to obey i believe he's looking for a believer who's willing to love and to worship him with every part of their lives and not just when it falls conveniently on a sunday morning or a wednesday night but he's looking for a church and a people who are holy his holy acceptable unto him she has our reasonable service this obviously leads me to our text i know some of you have been waiting on it it spells out very clearly his desire for his church for each and every individual that's here today paul just finished talking about the undeserved grace and mercy of god and gentiles and people everyone received he ends that chapter 11. this is what he says in verse 36 for everything everyone say everything including you and me comes from him and exists by his power that's all intended for his glory all glory to him forever amen and now because of that i beseech you therefore brother all of you have received that grace by the mercies of god that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable into god which is your reasonable service and do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what's that good and acceptable and perfect will of god in other words be holy his by presenting your bodies your entire beings your entire existence has a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto him which is your reasonable service the context the verses around it the passages around this echo the same sentiment of the verses i just read earlier paul tells us we're all his in the first place we were created by him we're created for his glory and on the heels of that he beseeches us he entreat he implores us one one version of it says he begs us present your bodies the greek word there is soma presented to the lord as a living sacrifice and that word there simply means your body in its entirety and since we know paul isn't asking for us to literally put our human physical body on an altar thank god the implication is that we're to present our whole selves our whole being our whole hearts if you will before the lord he says present yourself place yourself entirely at the disposal of the lord and do it as a living sacrifice unto him and that whole phrase in wording it's actually a little peculiar if you think about it see typically historically there's no

such thing as a living you sacrifice see that very often sacrifices were not alive they didn't live and breathe once they were sacrificed that was the point they probably didn't have a choice in the matter they didn't have any other options they didn't have any other opinions that they could express in the matter sacrifices usually involve the death of the animal or the creature that was being sacrificed whether they consented to it or not they probably wouldn't have sacrifices involved the expiration the extinction of the animal and the thing that was being sacrificed and while we are not a literal sacrifice this morning thank god for that the same is still true with us no one is forcing you to present yourself that's why we're called to do it ourselves and present ourselves and when you do when you present yourself as a living sacrifice to him you are willingly laying down your life your will your entire being as a sacrifice and one that is acceptable to him you're aligning yourself with jesus and his will and even the apostle paul who said that he has crucified his flesh in order to give himself completely to christ who lives in him this is part of what it means to be holy his to give yourself completely to him to present your body your being your entire existence to him which is our reasonable service it's no less than what jesus asked from us himself he said if anyone desires to come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross follow me for whoever desires to save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it so that in mind our prayer today he said lord i present myself completely every part of me i'm not going to hold anything back from you i'm not going to hold back anything not not anything from you including my whole heart and my time and my commitments and my ambitions my desires my will my plans my family my home and everything that happens in my home my resources my devotion and my affection i want to be holy his so i present myself a living sacrifice knowing this that sacrifices have never once had a say or an opinion in which part of their lives the lord would call to be sacrificed for his glory and for our betterment instead their sole recourse and responsibility was to simply lay themselves down completely and give themselves an honor and obedience to him this is what it looks like to be holy his i don't get to choose which part of my life i surrender in the ones that i don't i don't get to choose which part of my lives my life that i surrender in the areas that i don't but instead i just give it all to him and i trust that when i place my life and whatever i'm facing whatever i'm going through completely in his hands he will know what is best for me and for whatever i present to him god will know what's best for that and this is applicable whether you've been in the church for for years or all your life or just the past hour and a half in the service i encourage you today whether you've been here for 40 years or the last 40 minutes give yourself completely to him this morning be holy his give him your whole life your whole hearts your whole being and existence even all the hurts even all the pains even all the places you don't want anyone to see even the hidden places even the hurts and scars that no one else knows i encourage you give it all to him the places you don't want him messing with give that place to him those places that you've been wounded why don't you present all of that to him today place yourself completely in his hands present yourself on an altar today knowing that he is worthy of all of you nothing less than that i'm going to ask you don't leave any of your area or any area of your life off the table this morning or make any area off limits to god but present yourself completely to him this morning and i don't know entirely who i'm speaking to right now on an individual level but you're here today and you've kept god at arm's length from your life in certain areas of your life you've kept him at a distance he said okay lord you can you can touch me in this altar service you can change this and that but this area i'm

going to keep to myself and when you do that not only do you reserve that area of your life for yourself or for someone else but you're also keeping the healing of god in the restoration of god in the goodness of god at arms leave god's want to do a deep work in someone's life today and maybe that area is full of pain and hurt and you said okay god i'll let you i'll let you work on every other area and change every other but not this one i got to hold on to this bitterness or i got to hold on to this wound i'm after someone today because he is there are certain areas of your life that you held on to and that great physician has walked in today and said no no no i need that one too you're not completely mine today you held some areas of your life i need that one this morning in fact before we move any further i wonder if you just lift your hands right now and begin to surrender to him and maybe that's that area in your life that the lord's brought to your mind again would you just begin to surrender yourself to him completely right now oh would you call on his name let him know oh god i am completely yours i am completely and holy yours this morning oh jesus we surrender it all even those areas we don't want anyone else to see or know you know what's in those areas you know it's in the dark lord you know what's hidden in those corners of my life oh you know what what that person did to me you know how they hurt me god oh but i'm gonna give you this unforgiveness i'm gonna give you this bitterness lord i'm gonna give you this poison it's in my life that's holding me back and holding back your peace and hold back your strength i encourage you today i just feel like there's a vein of the holy ghost that someone's harboring some unforgiveness you've got some bitterness in your life it's been stunting your growth and keeping you back from god and away from god i encourage you today give it to him maybe he won't heal in an instant maybe it'll be the process of forgiveness by encourage you do not leave anything off the altar today leave anything off the altar we want to be holy and acceptable unto him if this is if you're a guest with us today this is your first time you can be holy and acceptable unto him you can repent of your sins which just means turning away from sin and towards god you can be baptized in the name of jesus and have every sin washed away from your life you'll have no spot you'll have no blemish and then you can receive the gift of the holy ghost when god fills your life with his spirit and god overflows out of you and his abiding presence stays with you there's just nothing like when jesus gets in and changes your life and there's some testimonies to that today if you've had that experience would you testify to it there's nothing like when he changes you and you give your heart to him completely and every one of them can say it doesn't stop there but in altar service after alter service we continue to come and we continue to present our life these are people that paul was writing to they'd already received the grace of god he'd already experienced they were church goers so he says yes you and the church present yourself again holy and acceptable unto him we've got some elders who are here today that have presented themselves to the lord hundreds if not thousands of times and they'll probably be some of the first ones coming back up here and laying their lives before him because they recognize that it's a process of holiness it's a process of becoming more and more like him that we continue to give him ourselves and he chips away in our old life and he chips away at our old habits and chips away in our flesh things that doesn't please him it's a process of time and it's not only external it does involve what we wear and it involves how we present ourselves to him and to others but it's right here as well holy and acceptable involves what you say and how you think and how you speak to others paul's saying give yourself completely even those conversations you have at work that are not pleasing to me i want you to lay

those on an altar even that even that thing that you watch that you continue to watch i want you to lay that on the god is after all of us today i feel i feel him after someone today full transparency i said this a couple weeks ago i don't ever want to preach something that i don't practice and i don't live as recently as this week i felt the lord dealing with me i'm not ashamed to admit it three areas of my life that god's trying to change and he's working with me on i will never get to the place where the lord is and still dealing with me i will never get to the place where i am exempt from laying my life on an altar holy and acceptable unto him which is my reasonable service so i've been praying creating me a clean heart oh god renew a right spirit within me search me cleanse me see if there's any wicked way in me lead me to life everlasting is what david prayed i want to be holy his that being the case i echo the psalmist again psalm 110 it says with my whole heart i've sought you oh let me not wander from your commandments your word have i hidden in my heart that i might not sin against you why why have i given myself completely to him i want all that i am to please him i want to be holy his i want to be acceptable in him and paul says lastly it's my reasonable service it's my reasonable service it's my rational response it's my acceptable sacrifice it is my appropriate answer to both the call of god and the command of scripture to the sacrifice that was already made on my behalf it is our reasonable or sensible service to lay everything before him knowing that yes it's counter-cultural and yes it's counter flesh these are not easy messages to preach they're not easy ones to receive we don't like these oftentimes at least our flesh but we've experienced the grace of god and if you haven't experienced the grace of god you will in jesus name you will and you'll recognize just how reasonable and just how appropriate and just how sensible it really is because the truth of the matter is it is entirely reasonable because he already did it for me he already laid it down for me psalm 116 12 begs the question what shall i render to the lord for all his benefits towards me what do i give him for everything he's given to me i believe ii corinthians 5 answers it for the love of christ compels us those benefits compel us because we judge thus that if one died for all then all died and he died for all so our response is that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died and rose again i don't live for myself anymore i live for him to please and honor him because of that i also live for others i live for the one who died for me and rose again or do you not know that your body is the temple of the holy spirit who's in you whom you have from god that you are not your own you were born at a price the price of his life therefore glorified god and your body and your spirit which are gods i do not live for myself i'm not my own i'm his i'm a living sacrifice unto him which is my reasonable service because he already willingly became a sacrifice for me he paid my debt at a high and heavy cost he covered my sins and his bloody now on the list of sins that i had committed to the cross so today it is reasonable it's acceptable it's sensible it's only rational that i give myself completely to him and then every day i get to breathe i give my life to the god who put that breath in my lungs in the first place i'm his today holy completely his musicians come it's entirely reasonable especially when i consider the cost it's going to cost me something today yeah i will have to expand some part of myself at an altar today i wonder if you just keep that in your mind before you come this morning that when you come down here god may ask you for something it's going to cost you something we were in a college class at gateway our professor was talking about consecration what we ought to give to him the same theme he painted a picture for us brother bowman

for those that know him i'll never forget this moment in his class and he said picture yourself at the foot of that cross at the feet of jesus looking up on your savior who's expending some of his last agonizing breath i don't do this for emotional appeal i just do it because it was a reality sometimes we forget about the cost of that cross i'm gonna hold on to something when he laid it all down for the booming through tears he said if you're standing there at the foot of that cross him dying for you is there anything in your life that he would ask for and you'd say no not that lord is there anything he said that's unreasonable god that's not reasonable is he hangs on that cross is there anything that wouldn't be sensible or appropriate i want that area of your life this morning in his holy presence is there anything in light of that cross that god he's already asked some of you for it long before this service happened he's going to ask some of you for some other things is there anything that would not be worth it in light of what he paid for us feel the lord call on his church he wants more of us today he wants more of our lives what's more of your heart i wonder if you stand with me very reverently in the presence of god i'm going to ask you to find an altar today and i i want to ask this do not make it a convenient altar i've had too many convenient altar calls i laid down one little thing to appease god and then i picked it back up as i left i'm asking for you to sincerely seek him today to find a place to pray if you just step out of where you are and begin to find an altar and find a place where you can present yourself to him a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto him oh i feel our savior calling us the consecration today if you're a first time guest or you've never received the gift of the holy ghost the best thing you could do in this moment is to begin to repent of your sins and tell the lord you're sorry for anything that you've done that was not pleasing to him ah and then receive the gift of the holy ghost to be baptized in his name today god is calling for a whole hearts would you kneel down and find a place to pray right now in reverence to him i wonder if you just lay yourself on an altar right that is not yours oh there's something i've been holding on to i'm laying before you today it is entirely reasonable it is entirely appreciated everything i give to you withholding nothing i surrender all to you everything holding lovely withholding nothing with holding nothing withholding nothing holding nothing withholding nothing with closing nothing i give you all of me i give you all of thee i give you all of me i give you i give you all of me i give you all of me to you everything i give to you withholding nothing i surrender everything holding nothing with holding nothing holding nothing with nothing i give you all of me i give you all of me i give you all of me i give you jesus forever my savior forever jesus my savior all forever me give you all of me everything i give to you i sure everything i give to you with holding nothing my savior i forever you all jesus me jesus my savior forever i'd like us to stand together some of you are already doing this if you've got a family your family nearby or if your family's not here link up with one or link up with another individual this is a direction i really felt like the lord wanted us to go this morning before we conclude because this is not just a commitment many of us for ourselves this is a commitment that infects or affects our household and it affects others i'm asking you to be accountable to your family or to whoever you linked up with right now if your family's not here if they are go to be where you are or they are what i'm looking for today and what i believe the lord is looking for is for some young men and women to hear their parents making commitments and some spouses to hear their spouse making some commitments to lay it all down some friends who are linked up with other friends to be accountable to

one another join that commitment with one another we're just gonna lay everything today that includes your family your relationships homes everything that happens in your homes jobs careers finances hurts wounds everything going to present them before the lord together would you lift your voices with that individual that's next to you and would you pray right now in the name of jesus oh god we give it all to you lord we give it all to you as a family oh as a church family as a body we commit everything to you jesus we will not hold anything back from you oh but everything is on the altar today whatever you had asked for us to give whatever you had asked for us to lay down i want it to happen in my home lord anything in my home of god that needs to go that needs to come and stay i want it today jesus we avail ourselves give ourselves completely to you this morning our family's yours god this church is yours these relationships and friendships everything we've got is all yours lord it's all to please you it's all to honor you we stand in unity we stand with one another we commit together going to give it all we're going to give it all oh jesus as a body we laid on the altar we lay this church family on the altar were yours today were your church or your people oh jesus there's a song we sung recent years i will give you all if all is what you ask of me i will not withhold and if my sacrifice is lest and given you my very best help me remember calvary's cost and be willing to say yes what we know today is when we place something on the altar before him it honors him and i believe he consumes it god's helping us today i wonder if you just lift your hands and thank him this morning for what he's done in your life and what he's done in this service lord we thank you for all those benefits we thank you oh we thank you for your glory and your power and your presence it's here today for the call that we've responded to for the strength of your body in this church family we thank you jesus we thank you amen