My Praise Is My Weapon | Associate Pastor Chad Erickson

turn with me in your Bibles the Judges chapter 7 in verse number seven and I just believe that the word of the Lord as it goes out today I believe a heart is going to be touched I believe somebody's going to respond to the word and in your response your life is going to be changed somebody shout amen Judges chapter 7 verse 7 says and the Lord said unto Gideon by the 300 men that left will I save you and deliver the midianites into thine hand and let all the people go every man unto his place skip down to verse number 19 so Gideon and the hundred men that were with him came under the outside of the camp in the beginning of the middle watch and they had but newly set the watch and they blew the trumpets and break the pictures that were in their hands and three companies blew the trumpets and break the pitchers and held the lamps in their left hands and the trumpets in their right hands to blow with all and they cried watch this right here the sword of the Lord and of Gideon and they stood every man in his place round about the camp and all the hosts or all of the enemy ran and cried and fled and 300 blew the trumpets and the Lord set Every Man's sword against the fellow even throughout all of the enemies camp and one more verse in your hearing II Timothy verse 1 chapter 1 verse 7 says for God hath not given us the spirit of fear but of power of love and of a sound mind these are all Spirits we read that with me we're all we're all talking about spirits here the spirit of fear the spirit of power the spirit of love the spirit of a sound mind God hath not given us the spirit of fear so if he's not given it to us then it must be for somebody else you understand what I'm going with this if the spirit of fear now he's given us power he's given us love and he's given us a sound mind but the spirit of fear is not meant for you and I oh I'm so glad to be in the kingdom of God today anybody glad to be in the kingdom of God no fear I'm just going to Simply preach in your hearing today and we're going to pray but I want to preach in your hearing my praise is my weapon my praise is my weapon put your Bibles down and just lift up your hands as high as you can come on lift up your voices a little bit higher than your hands and begin to pray with me Father we love you oh God I feel your presence in this house you are here oh we're celebrating Lord God that your presence is in this room I just believe somebody has come into this room with a need in their life Lord and and maybe an insurmountable odds are against them Lord God they don't know what they're going to do they don't know where they're going to go they don't know how they're going to get there from here but father you are here and because you are here we will not fear because you are here there's going to be power in the house there's going to be love in the house there's going to be a salmon we're going to respond to your word because we have a sound mind in the house I wish somebody doesn't lift up your voices a little bit louder and give God praise and glory and adoration if you believe he's in the place he's in this house he's in the room he's in the church house today come on now clap your hands and give him glory we bless your name father so many shout in Jesus name you may be seated in this place today amen hallelujah I feel the Holy Ghost in here I just looking around so many new faces Pastor Nolan said it said it well there's so many new faces in the house thank you for making this your place of worship thank you for making this your place uh where you can come and have your life changed that's what we do every time we come into the house amen if you come here for any other reason you've missed the point of being in the house of the Lord now I know we come to praise I know we come to worship I know I understand all of that but we come here for a purpose we come here for a reason I want my life changed I don't want what's out there to affect me so I've got to make sure that I'm in here here in the word of God and responding to the word of God Amen fear we have not been given the spirit of fear now listen I'm just going to be honest with you I I don't scare easily I don't it's it's definitely an issue because there's some situations that I should be scared in do you understand I'm saying to my my wife my wife gets on to me because I don't mind sister Stephanie I don't mind stopping at a truck stop late at night I'm not talking about a nice truck stop I'm talking about I'm talking about a truck stop that's kind of sketchy I'm talking about a group of people out front of that truck stop that I probably should have went on to the next gas station but for brother baldry for whatever reason I just don't scariestly I just pull in and and my wife's like surely you're not you're we're not stopping here are we I'm like baby four drug dealers at the door it's not a big deal I just I mean honestly I walk through them I nod how are you doing walk on through it doesn't bother me and it's not because I think I'm tough or I'm not I'm not carrying heat or anything it's not because of that I just don't have enough sense sometimes to be scared my wife is saying amen she's Amen to me like she's never Amen to me before if I've ever felt felt the feeling of fear I don't really think I've ever felt the feeling of fear because there's a feeling that goes along with fear this is crazy until last month in Branson Missouri I don't think I've ever felt fear now there's been dismal situations I'm not talking about roller coasters and and when you hear the click and you know you're about to go over the edge I'm not talking about that kind of fear I'm talking about fear that makes your body freeze I was I was in Branson for our fall planning for for next year's conference got my part out of the way brother Hammond I was with him and he was he was still in meetings as youth president meetings and the Carpenters were still in their general superintendent meetings and my my job was done as conference coordinator I had presented everything got everything passed approved and and so I had a few hours on my hand and and I looked on my phone I was like what's there to do in Branson Missouri because I've done it all in Pigeon Forge you know what I'm saying and so I I looked at my phone and I thought they've got a zoo well that sounds like fun so I pull up to the zoo and it's definitely owned by a family okay because if you thought the truck stop was sketchy this zoo was so sketchy and so I'm thinking brother first I'm thinking by the way Natalie happy birthday 15th birthday today is that right happy birthday Natalie see things trigger my mind say I like that so I I pull up to the zoo and um I'm like okay so they probably have some goats and some sheep this is obviously a children's petting zoo but as I'm walking in I realize they've got lines of tigers and bears yeah you got it they've got giraffes and zebras and I'm like and when I say family has anybody ever been to that Zoo a few of you so I'm walking up in the very first thing I come upon is the cage of a tiger except there was no tiger in there and so now if I was at the Knoxville Zoo or the Atlanta Zoo or if I was in San Diego at the zoo there would be a partition between me and that wall between me and the tiger but in this family-owned zoo that had these two like chain link fences I'm looking for this tiger and I don't have I remember I told you I don't scare easy and I did not have enough sense to realize that this is a family-owned zoo and there should be more than two chain link fences between me and a tiger and so I'm walking around looking for this tiger I don't see the Tiger and I walk around the side and brother step I don't know if I was supposed to be on the side or not but there was nothing stopping me from being on the side of the cage and so I'm walking around and all the sudden y'all listen I didn't even see it my body went I froze and I just turned my head and there probably from me from me to that keyboard was a Bengal tiger that thing it was taller it's the taller than that keyboard and my body just me and two little tingling fences and for the first time I thought to myself that is what fear feels like to where your body won't even move you're Frozen in place he didn't growl he didn't growl at me I didn't even hear him well I must have heard him I didn't even see him my body just sensed him there and fear took over my body the only maybe the only other time the only other time that I've ever felt fear maybe not quite like that but a different kind of fear brother skip Jeter had built me a house in this nice neighborhood I was still I was still just a young Bachelor but in Maryville probably a few years I found this piece of property and nice little cul-de-sac brother brother Jeter you remember that build me this nice this nice little house and just everything was awesome I had awesome neighbors well I was there for probably I got married to Fallon and probably within about two years we lived there been there probably five or six years and the neighborhood started going downhill and people started moving to the neighborhood that probably shouldn't have been living in the neighborhood you know what I'm saying and it was at night and one thing that I do I can't sleep unless I have a sound machine going anybody ever had a fan or silence you know what I'm talking about good good got good company in the house gotta have some some kind of noise going on in the background right well I had the sound machine I Like it Loud to where it drowns out every bit of noise worst sound of sleep it's about 2 A.M and I start hearing pounding and my doorbell is ringing and a woman is screaming maybe you remember that absolutely and I remember and this was over I could hear her screaming over my sound machine that was next to my head and so of course she says go check it out I was like you go check it out this was before I owned Smith and Wesson this was before the shotgun you know this this was back in the day when I thought oh dear lord so I went and of course I was smart enough to know don't open the door I was smart enough for that and I could hear I said I said who's there try to act big you know she started yelling at me and I could tell something was way off I said I'm calling the police but but from that moment there was just something that that I couldn't sleep like I used to sleep you know what I'm saying and then and then beyond that I'll tell you what happened beyond that is I had a I had a burglary alarm in my house that the keypad was in the kitchen and it used to go off frequently at night and so here you are you hear this loud screaming alarm going off you can't get out of your room because you don't know if somebody's in the house or not you can't turn the alarm off because you can't get to the alarm anybody ever been there and so here you are you're just kind of making a will I guess I opened the door I die I don't know but I can't I can't live like this I I can't go back to bed with this alarm on right but feather there's something about fear and it's a good there's times when it's a good Instinct but but I believe that every person in this room you you have a fear of something some of you might have a fear of of a dentist drill and that smell of burnt teeth right I feel like I'm ministered to somebody I can't remember who was the other day they're like oh I've not been at the dentist for so long I can't I can't stand that dentist drill I was like they do knock you out you know you can you can take the fun gas to where you're like ah put it in my mouth it's all good yeah try that if you never tried that just if you've got a problem with that but everybody there there's all there's always something that causes fear to enter the heart and God calls it a spirit but in his word he makes it very clear that that spirit of fear is not meant for his people the spirit of fear and and I guess Gideon's battle that we love to tell the story about the story of the 300 that fought against the midianites I began to read this from from a different perspective of of a perspective of somebody that had fear but God proved himself in a way that caused the fear to go from Gideon into these people these Wicked people called the midianites but I'll give you just a little bit of backstory because uh chapter 7 is where we're going to begin reading read verse 6 and learn why the people called Gideon you're rubbable all right I know in verse one it's spelled j-e-r but the J is a y it's your rubber ball and you're rubbable means let Baal contend and so verse one I'll throw that up on the screen seven and one says then zoruba bull or your rubber bull who is Gideon and all the people that were with him rose up early and pitched beside the will of Herod so that the host of the midianites were on the north side of them and by the hill of Mora in the valley so let me kind of talk backstory you have Gideon Gideon is just a good good young man get in he's he's a worker he's a worker for the kingdom the people of God they've left truth they've left Jehovah they're serving other gods they're serving Baal the servant asked her off they're serving all these other gods they've left I preached a little bit about on Wednesday night they've left God God creates uh creates an atmosphere for them to where they're put into captive by the surrounding countries by the surrounding Nations and here we have once again God punishing his people by allowing other nations to take them captive and so these midianites and other nations that are surrounding they would come in and harvest time and they would totally they would reap all the Harvest that the Israelites had planted and so it turned out to happen was they would all be ran into the caves of the mountains they were there they were scared matter of fact Gideon is found by God threshing wheat in a wine press he's he's not even in a place where you with fresh wheat he's hiding in a wine press and he is with his own hands he is beating the wheat and he is threshing the wheat he is he is doing something and even in this place the angel of the Lord says Thou Mighty Man of Valor and of course I can see Gideon at that point going I don't know what you're talking about I'm hiding in a wine press and I'm threshing wheat of all things I'm not a mighty man if I was a mighty man I'd be doing something about my people being in captive to all all these surrounding Nations but but that was not the case God said I see something in you that you don't see in yourself and I'm calling you out of this wine press I'm I'm calling you out of hiding because you're going to lead an Army against the midianites and you are going to take over because God said I'm done punishing you but before I'm done punishing you you've got to do one thing you've got to go and you've got to cast down all these Idols of Baal and all these Idols of asteroth you've got to go and and they have what were called Groves of trees they would plant at these Idols at these altars and the Groves of trees were sacred and they were to cover these these altars to give shade while the people worship these false gods and God said the angel of the Lord said I want you to cut down the Grove cut down the trees use those trees cut them up into firewood firewood and I want you to build me an altar I want you to put a sacrifice on the Altar and I want you to light that wood I want you to tear down these Idols of bail I want you to put that in with the wood you're going to light it all on fire and you're gonna sacrifice and give me praise and then I'm going to reverse this curse that I have on you and I'm going to send you out to be the leader of this great Army that's about to take control and give you your Liberty back to the children of Israel so that's that's the back story so now we get into uh verse one of chapter seven because the people they're like you know what we're gonna kill you you don't cut down the Groves you done to bail you Ashraf you you've destroyed all of our Gods all of our Idols all of our altars we're gonna put you to death Gideon and Gideon said hold on a second before you put me to death why don't you have Baal defend himself he said if Baal is so great why don't you let him defend himself instead of you defend him why does your Gods need you to defend them and so they said okay and they started referring to him watch this right here they referred to him as the gods that he had destroyed it's going to make sense here in just a moment but look with me look with me in verse number two because in verse number two says and the Lord said to get him the people that thou are with or that are with thee many for me to give them a nice in their hand lest Israel Vault themselves against me saying mine own hand have saved me because you're getting is getting has 30 000 Warriors and and 30 000 Warriors might sound like a lot of Warriors but when you're coming up against hundreds and hundreds of thousands of midianites 30 000 Warriors does not compare and so already Gideon's a little bit frayed he said he said God I know you told me and and God I know I put a couple fleeces before you and you made it obvious that I'm your guy but I'm still just a little bit worried about being defeated and God said let me tell you something you've got too many people with you even now he said because if I allow you to go out with thirty thousand and you defeat them with thirty thousand you're gonna think it was because of you and God said I've got to make sure that everybody understands it was because of me that you won this battle so verse 3 look with me it says now therefore go to Proclaim in the ears of the people saying whosoever is fearful and Afraid let him return and depart early from the Mount Gilead and their return to the people 22 000 and there remained but ten thousand and so Gideon now you know Gideon is getting nervous he's getting he's like man I thought I was bad I thought I had a band with third two thousand but now you've only given me ten thousand and I don't have time to read it but you know the story because then God says I'll tell you what ten thousand is still a little too many because there's still there's still some of you in there that are fearful and we can't have fear when it comes to fighting this battle and so he takes them down to a brook and and they begin to drink and and God says I want you to look around get in anybody that has their face down to the water and drinks the water straight out of the brook straight out of the river I want you to tell them to go on home get their stuff and go on home anybody that takes water in laps takes it in their hand and the Bible says a lapse it like a dog what a lap or drink it out of their hand they're gonna be your guys and wouldn't you know this 300 are left so now getting he's like well this is kind of crazy God but you give me 300 and and because you've only given me 300 I guess you're going to show up and do something great but God told him one more thing and this is important he said I want you to tell all those that are leaving leave their food leave the lamps and leave their trumpets because in in an army of 32 000 there were probably only about 300 trumpets and so now what that gives Gideon is it gives Gideon an army that has 300 trumpets they have enough food to sustain them and they also have 300 torches or 300 lamps and under those 300 or over those 300 lamps like a bushel they have these vessels they have these clay jars that are over the top of their lamps so if you will just imagine with me 300 men not near enough because if you look into the valley you see the midianites and if you see the midianites you're going to notice the Bible never even gives us a number of how many there were it just simply said it was like Locust covered the ground which might not mean much to us but if you're ever in a region that has locusts when the locusts come in they're on every square inch of the ground and then it talks about the the camels of the head they said their camels are like the sand of the sea they have so many candles so you camel so you're looking you're just looking at at 300 people that are looking into a valley and going get in what in the world are we doing but Gideon said ah I've got a plan I've got a plan because this plan is not even going to involve us fighting it's not going to involve our swords it's simply can involve us being obedient to what God wants us to do you ever notice that God only works in the miracle Realm if we can do it God says you know what I there's really no need from me in this situation you know if you've got a doctor that's gonna gonna give you and prescribe you medication that's gonna manage your pain if you've got your pain manage you don't need me to step into your situation and um I promise you I'm not telling you not to take whatever prescription your doctor is giving you I'm not saying that I'm simply saying this we can realize so much on mankind that we forget that we first have a God who before we even have to go to the doctor before we have to go to the hospital before we have to walk into the pharmacist we can say God but I want to give you the first opportunity because I put my faith in you first you know as long and I'm just going to preach what I'm feeling God wants me to preach this morning but as long as you're making excuses for your children who are backslinned or you're making excuses for your spouse that's backslidden as long as you're making excuses God said hey if you've got this all figured out and you've got all the answers I'm just going to step back but it's when you decide God I have a miraculous situation that I need you to step into I can't do it by myself I can't pull myself up by my own boots trap sir I can't I don't have answers Lord that I need I need you to step in because that's where Gideon was Gideon was at the place that he didn't know what to do because he said we're not powerful enough we don't have the answers we don't have the man power that's that's able to fight this fight for God if you don't step in I don't know what we're gonna do and so God said okay when it's obvious that you can't do it on your own then that's when I step in and I turn this into a miracle situation the midianites submitted account Locust camels as sand of the sea and then you just have Gideon he's got 300 men and God says I want you to divide them in hundreds I put a hundred here put a hundred here and I want you to put a hundred on the other side of the valley matter of fact we're gonna we're gonna break out into three divisions and we're gonna surround the valley with your men and and I I know it doesn't sound very sane but he said trust me it's gonna work you just kind of believe because God even told them when to do it he said he said after they change watch after the one Watchmen leave and go off to bed and the new Watchmen are coming on and and they're not really sure what all is going on yet they haven't had their they haven't hadn't gone around and walked around and walked to make sure everything was okay and and they hadn't done their they hadn't done their duties yet and so God said when all the transition is taking place this is what I want you to do he said I want you to blow your trumpets I want you to break the pictures I want you to break the vessels that are over the top of your torch and your flame and I need you to shout three things blow your trumpet break the pictures that reveal the flame and Shout these soldiers even if they had swords the Bible is very clear it says in one hand they had the picture in the other hand they had the trumpet God was making it very clear these were unarmed men they did not have swords in their hands however all this is where I love it because in the New Testament Church in our dispensation we're here today the church's enemies are routed with a sword out of the mouth yeah Revelations 19 21 says and the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse which sword proceeded out of his mouth and all the fowls were filled with their flesh let me tell you something I'm talking about a verbal sword called a shout for we wrestle not against flesh and blood this is not a man to man a woman to woman fight but this is about a spiritual fight this is about a people that understand that there's power in words and there's power in worship and there's power in Praise so here we have the signal is given in Gideon's band of 300 men they do just as they're directed and fear turns into frenzy and probably over a hundred thousand midianites are killed by Friendly Fire they come out of their tent and they realize we're under attack and the reason why they knew they're under attack is because they heard a sound they they heard a trumpet sound but not just a trumpet they heard 300 trumpets they were surrounding their Campa and they thought to themselves all of the Nations and the surrounding have come with the people of Israel and we are under attack and so as they came out of their tents all they could see was light the Torches all the way around them and so they had assumed that the Warriors had already got into the camp and so they drew their swords and the Bible says they began to slay one another until there is only a few and those few ran off into the mountains so the moral of the story is simply this Gideon had a spiritual weapon that caused him to conquer the physical I'm going to say it again he had a spiritual weapon that God gave him to conquer the physical let me tell you something we also have this weapon this spiritual weapon that they can defeat enemy of hell oh the enemy of the Grave we have this spiritual weapon and is called praise praise is our weapon we sing about it our praise on bear and land I'll shout by God's not dead I'll dance on the enemy's head my praise is a weapon come on and I know I know listen listen I struggle with this as I was studying the preaching and then God was speaking to me in one ear and the devil was speaking to me in another ear and he was saying oh you're going to have a bunch of sophisticated people in that church service Sunday morning and they're going to look up at you and say now brother Erickson it's not all about the sound it's not all about the noise it's not all about the shout and the devil was right but I rebuke him anyways see here's the deal the Bible talks about that Satan he's the prince of the power of the air and we have been given listen praise and worship is this is not just some Pentecostal thing that we picked up on Azusa Street or or we picked up when we were over on the continent of Africa and we we learned how to shout and how to preach and how to wave our hands and how to dance and we didn't pick all that up there we picked that up because praise when you lift up your voice when you open up your mouth something begins to happen in the atmosphere the very atmosphere begins to shift and begins to change that's why if you're seeking for the Holy Ghost today you've got to open up your mouth you gotta begin to allow words to come out of your mouth you're going to be a whole lot of Praise that come up out of your mouth you can't let the enemy tell you to keep silence the worst thing you could do is just sit down and think somehow everything's gonna go away but if you will begin to lift up your voice and lift up a shot of praise and take your praise is your weapon it's how you're gonna get out of situations that you're in it's how you're going to get out of sickness that's in your body you got to be able to say God I give you praise anyways God I give you praise in advance God I give you praise no matter what the devil said I give you all the praise because it's the weapon that you've given me to defeat the enemy of the air you see God turn the fear around and he used a fear tactic instead of a fight tactic he said I don't even need y'all to go up in there I just need you to open up your vows you see you everybody's heard of the term arachnophobia yeah the fear of spiders but there's also something called phonophobia and that's the fear of loud noise and let me tell you something Satan can't stand when a group of people come together it begin to lift up their voices listen if we just came in here and we just sat down and crossed our legs and opened up Bibles and just had a good little bible study there would be no fear here but the fear comes when the people of God begin to lift up their voices did you feel what I felt when the choir began to sing about a trumpet and about a grave opening up did you feel the power I'll tell you why we felt the power it wasn't because there's a pretty song although it was a pretty song but it's because the people of God begin to lift up their voices and say ain't no clay he's gonna hold this body down Satan Ain't No Grave gonna hold this you've come against me long enough I put up with you long enough I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired when the grave opens up I'm out of here you made me see this speaking of fear and this just kind of hit me right here speaking of fear there's gonna be a trumpet sound one day kind of like the midianites heard and there's going to be two camps of people there's gonna be one that are rejoicing because the trumpet sounds and then there's going to be other that hear that Trump is sound and it's gonna cause fear inside of them I want to be in the campus rejoicing let the trumpet sound when the Eastern Sky splits what blow the trumpet of Zion here we have an enemy it has an overwhelming fear of intense irrational noise and that's all listen that's all God intended of those people when they play the trumpets there was not some Beautiful Noise brother Aaron that came out of those trumpets matter of fact it was probably the most god-awful sound that Ever Was Heard 300 of those trumpets it was probably the loudest most obnoxious sound it wasn't oh When the Saints Go Marching In trumpet it was obnoxious it was loud and kind of like me getting woke up at 2 A.M by that woman ringing my doorbell coming out of your sleep you can't tell me the fear of here I don't care how Mighty you think you are midianites when you hear that trumpet sound and then all of a sudden light breaks through all the trees and here it is I'll let this out but the next order of God was tell them to stay still stand still don't go anywhere because you don't want to get amongst them they're about to go crazy you gotta stay out stay up out stay up on the Mountaintop and watch the Lord win the battle for you God said I want you to see what I can do when you go back home and you start telling your daughters and your sons and your wives about the goodness of God you can tell them hey we were up on the Mountaintop and we saw our enemies slay themselves because fear was turned around fear was turned around I just believe there's somebody here who feels like you're up against insurmountable odds I believe it's time for fear to strike your enemy instead of you yeah listen I remember I remember when I was a 13 year old youth camper up at burn New York Upstate Youth Camp I remember a man named Ron Libby come in and preach I'm looking over here because I know we have some of the Saints Ron Libby come to preach Our Youth Camp and he preached a message and his whole message was one theme he simply said turn it around and I remember as a 13 or 14 I remember dancing up and down through the Altar and shouting because he came and preached that simply whatever the devil tells you is good for you because all you got to do is turn it around because he can't help himself but to lie so if you understand the devil's talking and you're here and trying to bring fear into your life all you got to do is whatever he says you got to turn it around you gotta turn around say devil I know you didn't mean to help me but you're helping me brother Kenny when he says you can't make it you want to dance because that means you're gonna make it when he says you're going back on drugs you'll get back on alcohol all you got to do is say thank you Jesus because I'm gonna turn it around he's the father of Lies he can't help himself you may be seated I believe there's people here that you're facing a fear called disease in your body you don't have to fear that you don't have to allow that Spirit to get inside of you you don't have to lose sleep at night and have insomnia nights but you can wake up the next morning refreshed because you said I refuse to have the spirit of fear if God's Gonna heal your body sister Thompson you're going to be healed if God says I'll heal you you're going to be healed I can't live my life with fear I can't live my life and worry oh my God I believe there's people here today you're suffering in a home of marital issues you're suffering it in a home where you don't know if you're gonna make it to next year with your spouse you don't know if your kids are going to stay home or they're going to run away God knows he sees he understands where you are you just got to be able to say God I refuse to fear I'm gonna give it over to you I'm gonna stand back and let you find my battle for me and I know those people here you look at me said brother Eric said okay please mother I know I know that God could cause over a hundred thousand people to turn on each other and I know the people of God come in but you just don't know what's going on in my home and I say what is going on in your home that compares to God defeating an army what what what in the world could be so bad that God couldn't step in and fix it how rebellious is your kid that God can't walk into their bedroom at night and start speaking into their life and saying I need you I need you to live right I need you come on that's what conviction is all about thank God for conviction we ought to pray that prayer God convicts me convict my spouse convict my children God we want to live for you oh somebody give him praise in this place we gotta fight this with praise we gotta fight this with worship something inside of us is going to be louder than the voices that are in our head financial crisis oh my God as if finances are a problem for God he owns the cattle on a thousand Hill what bills do you need to pay you don't think God can help you with God can sure put a roof over your head God God can put food upon your table don't give up on you don't give up on God you just gotta be able to say God I'm gonna fight this in the spiritual I'm going to fight for this in the spiritual I'm not going to get mad I'm not going to get on Facebook I'm not going to down people and talk bad about this talk bad about that but instead I'm just going to give it all to you it's not lifting my voice in praise and allow praise to be my weapon even listen even even Gideon had the spirit of fear he said there's too many I didn't read this earlier I purposely left it out but God said I'll tell you what to do go down into the camp go down to the enemy's camp we sing about it he said go down to the enemy's camp and I want you to listen to what they're saying so he says okay he grabs a servant boy with him and they they Sleek they sneak down into the enemy's camp and they come up upon a tent and they hear people talking inside the tent this is just how God does people are talking inside the tent and Gideon what catches getting his attention is that he hears his name I'll talk about this is a foreign army but he hears his name and he stops and he realizes that there is someone interpreting a dream for somebody else inside the tent inside the tent he's like yeah he starts telling the dream to The Interpreter he said yeah uh our tents begin to get knocked over and he said it was Gideon Gideon stops what the god that's translating the guy's interpreting his dream he said I'll tell you what this means it means that Gideon's coming after us and Gideon's bringing an army after us and getting said that's all I needed to hear getting those getting go sneaking back up to the top of the mountain he starts telling everybody say Hey listen when we go out it's very important that you say that you come in the sword of the Lord and in Gideon because these people have already been told by God that I'm coming to defeat them and so it's so important listen me person of God people of God listen to me it's so important that you come with the name that can defeat any situation it's so important now we're the New Testament Church huh we're different now because we've been given a name we've been given the name the saves we've been given a name that heals we've been given a name that delivers now Kitty and he was a mighty man of Valor but he doesn't compare to our Jesus he doesn't compare to our healer Our Savior our deliver our restore our chain breaker spirit of fear was no longer on Gideon because Gideon heard with his own ears that God had already been given dreams and because he had already been given dreams oh they've been given dreams there was already fear in the campaign why would we fear if they're gonna fear that makes no sense why were the people of God fear when they openly understand that the people of the devil the people of the enemy fear I'm telling you something God has not given us the spirit of fear but he's given us a spirit of Victory he's given us a spirit of power he's given us a spirit of Love he's given us a spirit of the right mind so here we go it's very simple I can I'm gonna bring this Old Testament story into our new testament church because here we have Gideon in his 300 men and he says them he says here's what we're going to do he says I want you to blow your trumpets I believe that represents our music so first thing we do we come to the house of God we get that keyboard going we get those drums going we get that music fired up why do we do that well it's simple there's got to be a sound that takes over the atmosphere because all week long we've been hearing voices in the hair we've been told things we've been lied to we've been told we're not good enough we've been told why are you even here your body's sick why did you even come to church Don't You Know You're Gonna Leave Here sicker than you came he's already been telling all kinds of Lies so the first thing we do is we pull out the trumpets and we begin to sing praises unto God we're going to do that in just a moment the second thing you gotta break the picture now when you break a picture in that day the sound of the breaking picture sounded like the sound of clapping all right y'all follow me we're gonna do this in just one moment I'm gonna give you instructions like Gideon gave his men instructions music started and then they began to clap their hands or they begin to break their pictures and that sound began to take place off and then he said I want you to shout at the top of your lungs and that's where vocal worship takes place and it reminds me of Psalm 47 where it says oh clap your hands all ye people and shout unto God with the voice of Triumph but don't stop there for the Lord most high is terrible he is a great king over all the Earth he shall subdue the people under us and the Nations under our feet there ought to be shouting they're already clapping there ought to be music discussion happen in this house and then he said hold your torches High hold your lips high and let worship break through us something about when the people of God are broken and the light that's inside if you've got the Holy Ghost you've got the light living inside of you but you know what we got to get broken first and when we get broken and allow that light to shine through let me tell you something ain't no devil in hell okay he said hold up your lamp as high as you can and let praise begin to become your wealth and one weapon he said just do what you know to do and give God a shot of praise so I want you to stand I want musicians I want you to come quickly because I want application to this message just it's not enough that you hear it we've got to do it you've got to respond I promise you church family some of you are going to think this is odd if this is the first time you've ever been to Apostolic Church you're going to think we're a little bit crazy but that's okay because they thought Gideon was crazy too we're gonna have a little bit of fun but with a little bit of fun I believe something that's going to take place in the air in the atmosphere there are people here tonight that are struggling spiritually they're struggling physically they're struggling financially and I would do you a disservice if I preached about being Victorious and didn't even give you a chance to be victorious you see this there's no rule no reason why here today we can't strike fear in the enemy in a way that he gets off your back stops messing with you stops telling you lies stops telling you half truths oh my God so many people they hear half truths and they roam with it like it's truth and it's not truth if it's not holy truth it's a lie I want you to recognize I want you to recognize that the name that they called out brought fear to the enemy I don't want you just to lift up your voices and Shout oh no because there's a lot of people shouting matter of fact yesterday at ball games those people shouting all over the place but when you shout a name that brings fear into the enemy that's when Victory really takes place listen we're people of the name as Church you could be at 25 different churches down Williams driving up and down 321 and you ain't ever going to hear the name Jesus they ain't gonna hardly say it no let's shout it but I want you to think about when we begin to shout the name that's going to bring power into this place when we begin to break our our pictures and we begin to clap our hands up to the Lord when the light begins to shine from within us what I want you to do right here I will just play a low pad somewhere and I I want you to close your eyes in this house and I want you to think of the very top thing that brings fear into your life it could be sickness in your body it could be a backslid and loved one it could be somebody that's close to death in your family it might be somebody that's backsliding this rebellious somebody that's far from the Lord ow and you've got fear in you because you think to yourself I don't know if this situation is ever going to handle itself it's not going to handle itself but I know what God if we could begin to put those concerns in our minds and say God I refuse to fear over this I refuse to fear God I wish you would start to clap your hands in this house I wish somebody would start to break pictures come on you gotta bang them together as hard as you can you gotta have faith inside you to believe whatever it is you have fear we're gonna turn this thing around now somebody starts shouting somebody's son lives in up your voice so we saw Jesus the sword of the Lord and Gideon the sword of the Lord and Jesus say that you can't have our praise problem you can't have our praise fear you can't hold us down turn it around turn it around come on don't let me fly to somebody long enough he's told you I lie long enough you gotta begin to turn around and say devil you got fear we're gonna give you come on let the decibels fly out of this place let their decibels rise in this place let the decimals rise hello then they they clearly received the word were baptized in the same day they were added unto them about three thousand Souls can you imagine what it sounds like for 3 000 people to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost at the very same moment foreign people on the day of Pentecost said hey I agree with what's being preached by Peter and since I agree I'm gonna get baptized in the name of Jesus for the remission of my sins and because I get baptized I receive the gift of the Holy Ghost what did that sound like when 3 000 people begin to speak in an unknown tongue what did they do to the spirit that was in the air well I like to try and see if I find out what happens if we hit about 600 people in this room begin to lift up their voices in another tongue oh the devil doesn't understand he's gonna get nervous because you're praying something he doesn't understand what you're saying pray in the Holy Ghost Let It Be Your Weapon pray in the whole Quran come on this is what it sounds like a little bit louder let the Holy Ghost rise extra Holy Ghost rides yes yes louder the kingdom of God the king of God was formed the kingdom of God was established with 3 000 people begin to speak in another tongue yeah yeah come on praise come on praise huh come on give him glory come on give me praise shouting the guy with a was a Triumph let your praise be your weapon let your praise be your weapon yes what do you need praise him what do you need praise him what do you need praise him what do you need begin to give God praise open up your mouth and give him praise open up your heart and give him praise we are victorious God is most high over all the Earth Jesus has conquered Satan is defeated the enemies and or sink oh so right now right now you don't have to pray this loud we'll shout in just a moment but I just want you to start saying God you know my situation I was just start calling that situation out we got people here that are addicted to drugs you're addicted to alcohol you're addicted to cigarettes you're sick and tired of the cycle you're in you're ready to get out of it I want you to start saying God I'm gonna praise you in advance I'm gonna start praising you for the victory come we got those that are sick in their bodies got disease and their bodies got tumors in their bodies I wish you just begin to praise God in advance before the doctor gives you a good report if you if you stop praising God shut up come on the Holy Ghost says holy ghost is stepping in this house right here come on where the Praises go up the glory comes down right here I hear you God hears you if you I said I hear you God hears you the enemy hears you Jesus name I give it to you Lord I give you my fear it's not spirit for me I give you my fear it's not a spirit for me I give you my fears though break your praise come on we'll rise a little bit higher before we sing we're gonna rise a little bit higher okay yes yes yes God whoa come on come on hey there's a spirit in this room he's backing out slowly there's a spirit in this room that's back in our floor he said I can't stand this Holy Ghost I can't stand this praise I can't stand this worship I can't stand the name of Jesus I I can't stand the name of Jesus I care how there's a there's a spirit walking out the back door thank you I believe God wants to put marriages back together but you gotta say God I need you God I'm willing to pray I'm willing to praise I'm willing to worship I'm going to fight in a Spirit come on your marriage is gonna get put back together your kids are gonna come home there's gonna be a restoration in your home I believe it in Jesus name foreign the Lord is foreign down with the boys jump for the victory now listen if you need healing in your body I'm not even going to call you up front here you're in an Apostolic church you can get healed right where you are I just want you to lift both hands as high as you can in the year right now if you need healing in your pot if you've got something going on physically that you need a healing come on now right now without the aid of a song I just want to see if you can praise and shout unto God and allow your praise to become a weapon that fights against any sickness in your body any disease in your body you don't have to accept it you don't have to think that it's normal you know how come on somebody don't just contain a time don't just pass you around with it you gotta say God I'm giving it to you I hear you I hear you shout there's probably about 300 there's probably about 300 that are shouting right you sound like the children of Israel foreign this erupted from this room there's praise that's erupting from bodies that have sickness there's Praises erupting from people in the Deliverance in their homes there's Praises erupted from people that need to be restored back to ministry again be filled with the Holy Ghost be filled with the Holy Ghost be ye filled with their Holy Ghost and Fire foreign oh yeah okay listen listen so they blew the trumpet that was the instruments they broke their vessels that was clapping but then that was out of the way then came the shout so with no music Don't Clap Your Hands because that's easy to do sometimes that's a that's an easy substitute for worship just lift up your head throw your shoulders back and give God the loudest praise you can give them right now come on praise him praise him praise him praise him now mix in the name of Jesus mix in the name of Jesus with your shelter the sword of the Lord in the name of Jesus yes come on we're breaking through strong holes we're breaking through strong holes we're breaking through strongholds right here if you lift up your voice come on let the Holy Ghost break out right where you stand right where you worship her I've never seen somebody get the Holy Ghost without opening up their mouths I've never seen something in the Holy Ghost without giving God praise give God praise I'm not gonna cheerlead you anymore I just want to see if a praise break what happened in this house I I'm not going to cheerlead you no more from here come on I just want to see if a praise break will break out in this place today foreign foreign oh my God hey I feel a chain breaking spirit in this place I feel a jail while shaking spirit in this place oh breakthrough in my heart breakthrough in my mind breakthrough in my spirit breakthrough in my soul pray through in my worship breakthrough in my prayers oh and a spirit will break through take place in this house today let a spirit of breakthrough let it overtake every household every household every mother every father every son every dollar let us feel breakthrough let a spirit breathe there's a spirit of fear in this house but there is a spirit of power there is a speed of breakthrough ah I think it's okay to linger just a little while if you get uncomfortable while we linger I'm sorry if it's awkward for you I'm sorry welcome to Pentecostal I want to linger in the Holy Ghost just a moment I believe somebody came here you have not received what you came for yet and God is waiting on you to lift up your praise he's waiting on you to say God I don't understand but I'm still gonna do it still gonna do it still gonna do it foreign a case of Hell shall not Prevail against the church the Gates of Hell shall not Prevail you can't compare you can't Prevail you can't win I wish we had a trendsetter that would do war in the spirit right now I wish you would begin to pray in the spirit I wish there was a trendsetter a pillar I was somebody in this church who's been in this thing for 40 50 years we begin to pray in the spirit and do war in the spirit right now we got young people in this church that don't know how to pray like you pray they can't touch God Like You Can Touch God they can't pray in the spirit they can't intercede like you can interstate I wish we had a trendsetter that would take me serious and say I'll be the one to intercede but by my spirit saith the Lord I want you to find somebody nearby I'm sorry I understand guys don't let me go on this find somebody nearby and just begin to pray for them I don't know what their problem is I don't know the situation it doesn't even matter if you know what it is huh God knows what it is we need somebody to pray in the spirits come on God knows what the problem is you don't need to know what the problem is God knows God knows God knows God sees he doesn't need some Warriors to worship him and all our praise to be the weapon foreign foreign situation right now you're living in a Barren situation right now you gotta learn to praise on Berry land you gotta learn to praise when there's no water there's Spirit ready to help you when you don't have that real cup as a deer pandas after the water broke up so do I desire the presence of the Lord I'm thirsty it's dry it's bearing but I'm gonna please anyways sure yeah Praise on burial in my praise is cheers foreign my place is alive okay no more times tonight one more time give God glory before we dismissed give God praise him give God all of this to his name victory is mine victory is mine Victory today is if you're still praying keep on praying we have those seeking for the Holy Ghost keep on seeking for the Holy Ghost we have those getting ministered to keep on getting Minister too for the rest of y'all we'll see you tonight prayer 5 30 service says six o'clock God bless you dismissed in Jesus name