Build an Altar (It's in the Prep Work)

well i am here on an appointment and i'm very humbled today to say that when pastor looked at me last week that i did have a word so may i throw you on the spot today somebody here needs to hear the word somebody on the internet may be needing to hear this word i know this that god has a plan he has a plan and he always designs these plans and weaves them into our lives and they are divine appointments so don't ever pass over an opportunity for god to show up and whatever it may be today whatever it may be would you just lift your hands and accept whatever it is god that you are you are talking to me about i feel this in my spirit whatever it is you're talking to me about that god you will give me the direction you'll give me the divine direction and you'll let me know what is it that i need to do would you lift your hands with us right now in the name of jesus god i trust you today i trust in you i trust in your word i trust in your ever loving spirit that i feel here lord i trust you today and i ask you lord that you would reach down and touch each and every one that is in this room speaking to us the word that you would have us to hear in the name of jesus and everyone say in jesus name say it again in jesus name amen and amen god bless you you may be seated there are lessons in life there are things that god shows up and he tries to teach us and he tries to give us direction and the truth be told is all he ask of us is to simply trust him just to trust him circumstances and even sometimes complex things that goes on in our life those things that happen they're not there to distraught us and to drag us down they're not there to destroy our lives but they're simply there for god to show up and him say look what i've done there are simple little things that god does along the way when you have a trial when you have a test he doesn't show you the outcome a lot of times god is taking you on a journey and you don't know where he's taking you but yet we are in our human minds we say god where are we going where are you taking me god where is it that i i would like just a little more information how many you've ever been there god give me just a little more information and the truth be told is all he says is do just do what i say isaiah 55 8 and 9 simply says this for my thoughts are not your thoughts nor my your ways my ways saith the lord for as high as heavens is the high as high above the earth so are my ways you don't know how god thinks can we settle that this today is you don't know how god thinks and you will never figure that out but we do know this that god is faithful he will always be there for you we find in romans 8 verse 28 says that all things work together for good to them that are called by his name and his purpose everything that god does trust him simply trust him there are testing times there are those times that sometimes your faith will be tested but understand faith does not tell you where you're headed it just simply says trust simply says trust me god has a plan oh hallelujah there is a man that i want to talk about today and this is something that uh this will be the word that i will give you today but there is a man that is in the scriptures that we find that takes up a lot of genesis and his name is abraham abraham was known in the book of james as a friend of gods he was god's friend we find that abraham is not we don't see lot a lot of abraham as far as his earlier years we don't meet him until he's 70 years old wow he we don't know much about his birth but what we do know that when abraham shows up that his life is full of relationship with god it's full of him talking and corresponding with god there's a lot of things that god would like to tell you and he would like to tell me and all it takes is just a relationship with him you see abraham was that guy that god could speak to him and he says okay i mean now you've got to take it through a committee now if you're going to do something that god says right god speak a word and you got to go say uh where's sam at oh he's busy uh what what's lauren say about that but in reality if we would learn to just trust god when god speaks see okay god spoke to abraham and told him in the book of genesis the 12th chapter and this is not my text today but we will start there somebody said to me said well where are we going i said well if we can't get them in genesis we'll go to revelations but in genesis the 12th chapter we find that god begins to speak to abraham and he tells him he says i want you to get out of your father's house get out of your father's land he said i'm going to take you to a place and i'll show you that place he didn't say where did he no he didn't call it by name he didn't say chattanooga it just happened he didn't say that but he said i'll show it to you and abraham gathers all that he has along with light and he grabs everything he's got and here he goes and he comes to a place and then god says this is it so think about it abraham is that guy that just says god said abraham he says here am i he said i want you to go okay now how many of us would do as if god was to speak to us today about something in something in our life particularly speaking something that he has for you to do could you just okay god most of the time we get caught up in all of the thinking about it and saying well was it really god or was this was this true or is this something that i need to do or does it make sense because god doesn't make sense we would ask those questions is this something that i should do abraham did not ask he just did god promised him and these are god's promises how many you have promises yes god promised him lands that he didn't own said you're going to own these and your name is going to be great you're going to have you're going to have many nations and you're going to be blessed he said if they're those that bless you i'll bless those that curse you i'm going to curse and all of these things god set in order and he did so abraham had his battles he had those battles that he had to fight and god helped him fight those battles but i wanted to zero in on something about abraham that i found again god begins to deal with me a couple of weeks ago and and then all of this started coming together and i don't know if you understand but sometimes god gives you bits and pieces but i begin to begin to think along the lines of what what to say today and i i want to take your attention to the book of genesis the 22nd chapter god has promised and just prior to this god had promised abraham that he was going to be a father and abraham and sarah had no children we find that isaac was born and they had this child and i i don't know about you but uh your children especially that first one you're always running in there checking on it making sure everything is okay and there was probably those times of of abraham looking at isaac and saying oh does he have a little bit of sniffle and it's just just that worriness about that child he loved isaac he he wanted isaac because this was to be the one that inherited everything he had he was the one that was going to be the one that carried his name on and we find that god has spoken once again now i i want you to really and i hope that i don't dissect it too much today but i want you to get the meaning behind as much of these rocks that we turn over today i hope that god can speak to you because god begins to deal with you individually and i want you to really grasp what i'm talking about but god begins to speak to abraham again and he speaks a word to abraham and he says i want you to take that son that you love i want you to take him to a place that i will show you again we're at that place with god that he has no clue all he knows is he is going to the moriah area now i want to enlighten us just a little bit on moriah and i am not going to go into a hebrew lesson this this evening this afternoon but moriah was a was in in the hebrew language was torah moriah means torah which means teaching so he was taking him to a land of teaching he was taking him to a land that there would be a master and there would be a student there would be somebody that's going to learn a lesson and as he begins to uh talk when the god when god began to speak to me about this i i could not help but think about the fact that we go through places where god it's not for it's not for destruction it's not for just a test hey how many of you know that god's he's trying to get a point across and if you fail a test what do you do you got to retake that test and god begins to tell me in my spirit that he likes to take people on missions to teach them something so whoever you are today won't you get this lesson and i i i hope that it it gets you like it's getting me i i i we get to the place in first the first chat first verse here in verse 22 of chapter 22. god speaks to him again and abraham says here am i god said i want you to take that son that you love that you have you've watched to start to grow and the one that you take care of so much i want you to take him and you love him so much i want you to take him to this land of moriah this place of teaching this place where there's going to be some lessons learned and i want you to take that son and offer him as a sacrifice a burnt sacrifice i want you to take him and i want you to offer him there now i want you to notice this that in verse 3 abraham asked no questions he didn't try to say god but that's my only boy god you already promised me you made this promise and now what's happening he didn't say all of that but you and i would say stuff like that wouldn't we we would be saying okay god but he didn't say that he said okay god the next morning the scripture says that they awoke and he saddled the ass and then he went on and he brought two more young man men with him more than likely those that worked for him and he took isaac his son and the scripture said he claimed wood he cut it chopped it up then he that that was for the burnt sacrifice he rose and they just departed and then the scripture goes on to verse 4 and says that on the third day abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off i'm not going to go i'm going to go a little further here in just a few moments but i've brought with me today and sometimes i use little things to kind of remind me and i want to remind us today i asked my son my only son i asked him the other day i said son you chopped a tree down out there and i'd like to have all of that if you could cut it up for me so he cut it up for me and i told him i said bring it to me i want to use it today by the help of the lord i want to share with you something that god began to talk to me about you see in that day moses or abraham had had wood that he had to chop then he had a knife the scripture says that he had a knife thank you sir i'm sure moses didn't have a k bar but he had fire many of you if you've been in bible classes you understand that they had to keep fire burning uh in the tabernacle time and i i'm trying to stay off of that but in the tabernacle days there was there was levites that was among those that stayed in the tabernacle and that was their job to keep the fire burning that was their job and that's a message in itself praise god but they had fire and the scripture says that after the third day now i i want you to imagine with me just for a little bit that son would you come they if you'll sit right there don't you just sit there he did he knew it was going to be used today but he didn't know how he was going to be used but i want you to imagine with me that as he's cutting this wood up the scripture says this that he claimed the wood i want you to imagine with me that abraham is cutting the wood and he's getting all of those sticks together i want you to think about what was going through his head he hasn't told isaac that he has said isaac has no idea what's getting ready to happen but he's he's looking at it and he says isaac the lord the lord is good there's there's something that takes place in preparing for sacrifice there's something that takes place in the heart when you're getting ready to build an altar god spake to abraham and told him he said when you get there i want you to build an altar he said and i want you to sacrifice had no clue he has no clue and he begins to tell him about some of the some of the remarkable things that god has done in his life you see this is what we call preparing ourselves when we get to an altar of repentance we start talking to the lord and we start talking about those things that god has done for us we're getting we're getting ourselves positioned we're getting ourselves ready for god to do something and when god begins to work on us and i know there had to be a part of him that said you just don't know how good god is son you you really don't know the mercies of god and he begins to tell his son the stories of how that they came to all of the the places where all of these kings were were fighting and they were doing some horrible things and abraham said i take my 319 and i take them out and god blessed him because of that because he knew there was a relationship with him and god he knew that there was something going on but you know he could stop in the middle and i could just imagine this now just just imagine that he stopped and he says god your mercy endureth forever god you're so good to us it in the whole time we're seeing god do something even in isaac we're seeing something and he don't understand it all he don't know what's going on but he's watching what dad's doing he's watching what dad is doing in that in that moment and he stops and he prays for a moment and talks about god's goodness and then he says god's good son and he goes on and he begins to think about the things that god has has reminded him of as as this man right here was this young man was to be born i'll bring a personal up son you wasn't even supposed to be here your mama wasn't even supposed to be able to have a child again she had she had something in her that that said no and yet the doctor says i don't understand it but you're here you see what god does is god shows us those things and the power that comes in all that is going on during the process you see in the preparation of getting things ready god is working we find here in the scriptures that that third day abraham looks up come here son and isaac is with him and they've made it and they've got all of the things they're supposed to have and he says you know what god spoke to me and that's where we're going that's where we're going you see god gives us another word he begins to talk to us and the whole time he's learning how to trust god he's learning because dad's already he's already got it in him i know who god is but i i won't i want isaac to know god i want isaac to know who my god is all of this stuff starts happening and they're unsettling the donkey and everything's getting in place and the scripture says that abraham takes the wood and i'm not going to put him in a bind but he said son i want you to carry this won't you carry him has has no clue what's getting ready to happen has no clue the scripture tells us that he lays the wood upon isaac he grabs the knife and he grabs the fire he says son we're going to worship we're going to worship tells the young men there stay here with the rest of the stuff son and i is going to worship and we're coming again we'll be back the entire time abraham in his mind said god i don't know what you're going to do when we get up there and i know what i've been putting in this boy i know what i've been teaching him and it's the entire time what i've been teaching him and they get to going and walking along and the boy looks at his dad and says dad he said i got a question how many ever been asked those difficult questions said dad i i got the wood here you got the fire got the knife where where's the lamb where's the lamb at scripture tells us that abraham says verse 8. he tells his son god will provide himself a lamb for the burnt offering we know what god has spoke to abraham he didn't know all the words that was given to abraham but we do know that abraham trusts god he trusts god and as he begins to move toward that mountain that place of teaching the boy scripture doesn't say anymore but there was something in my spirit says the closer they got to the place abraham's spirit begins to get heavy but yet he said i trust you god i still trust you god has not yet said anything to abraham about any kind of sacrifice but him that's all he said but i trust you god the scripture says when i got to the top i found this interesting too they get to the top i'll give you some and now abraham he's got to build an altar this guy he's old doesn't say anything about isaac building an altar but i still want to think sit down there i still want to think that as he's building the altar he's pulling rocks from everywhere that he can find and he's building that altar that the whole time he's saying god you have always provided for me you've always been there for me let me tell you something god sometimes will let you he he'll wait to the last minute he'll wait till there is nothing else and all you got is god to trust everything else is gone everything that you have even thought about you can't pay your way out you can't make your way out and all it is is you and god and you've prepared that altar you just keep building that altar i challenge you today folks i want to challenge you today you start building an altar and see what happens see what happens in your spirit you start building that altar and all of a sudden there's something in your spirit says you know what son i just feel like something good is going to happen i don't know what it is but i feel like that god's going to do some things and the scripture says he built the altar and they the scripture said he took he took the wood and he laid it in order the whole time he's talking about the goodness of god he's talking about what god could do and what god's going to do and i don't know how long this took i really don't but there there's something inside of me that he's saying okay god i i'm i'm still trusting you i'm still believing you and the scripture said that he took and i'm not gonna do it son because i know you're gonna you you're gonna get all out of sorts the scripture said that he took his son and he bound him up won't you lay across that okay just lay on it i'll clean your clothes later just lay down on it it's gonna feel it's gonna really feel bad see this is some of that teaching stuff it's gonna be it's gonna be it's gonna be rough on you son it's rough on daddy but it's also gonna be rough on you i want you to lay down son i want you to lay down i i i hope you get this this morning that that there are some things that god wants to take us to he wants to lead us too the whole time he's hearing me talk of the goodness of god and how god provides and now he's on his back tied up and waiting and here comes dad with this i'm gonna leave it in the sheet and he's waiting on dad dad you said there would be a lamb dad you said that god was going to provide how many of you moms and dads you you got your children sometimes and they that things is getting a little tight and you're wondering how am i going to explain this to the kids how am i going to explain this all you got to do is god i i trust you i i trust you god i trust you the whole time abraham's in his mind he's saying god i know and the scripture says that he drew back the knife he pulled it back and all of a sudden there was a sound oh hallelujah there was something that happened at that moment and that son probably thought what what's going on son i told you i told you god would provide i told you and now you and i are going to worship you and i are going to lift up the name of god you and i are gonna we're gonna see some things happen folks i don't know who you are today but i feel in my spirit that if you would obey what the scripture says this morning you would start building an altar you would start getting yourself ready for what god has in store for you you would start making things right with god and say god it's a little altar but it's okay i've got something that i want to do for you today god and i don't know how it's going to happen i don't know where the sacrifice is going to come from but god i'm going to sacrifice myself today i'm going to sacrifice myself i'm gonna lay myself down whatever it is god i'm willing i want you to stand with us today i want you to understand this this morning that god he wants to do something in your spirit he wants to do something for you he wants you to find that place in him how many of you could say today that you've brought the wood you've brought the you've brought everything you need for sacrifice god i i this is all i got left you're at that point i i don't know what else to do can i tell you that there is some lessons to be learned in the prep work there's lessons to be learned in building the altar there are some things that god wants to show you in building the altar you start laying stone upon stone you start talking about the goodness of god you start laying down those sticks and saying god i know that you're going to work things out god i got some things going on in my life and i don't know what to do i love you jesus i thank you for your goodness i thank you for your mercy and all of these things that you can talk the goodness of god and all of a sudden right in the middle of that you hear this i'm telling you god's going to show up for you he's going to show up for you just trust him trust in the lord allow god to do something in your life allow him to do something for you today hallelujah would you give him praise hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah i i know i know you say you brought all them props up there i i want you to know something today god's got a word for somebody in this room and god wants you to want you to know if you'll start building an altar he'll show up there was so many things in the scripture when we talk about altars in the scripture oh that if you'll build it if you'll just build the altar god will show up you gotta you got a prophet that's out there and that prophet saying oh go ahead build an altar douse it with water he he's throwing all kinds of things at it because here's the thing if i build the altar i know this god's going to show up dedicate a place to god may i tell you as the families and i know this is this is a time that we dedicate we dedicate ourselves as families if you would learn to start building some altars on some things that's going on in your family life start building some altars about some things that's going on do you realize how many altars has been built when we talk about old testament times the altars that's been built i challenge you just go out there and i know google's not always right but just go to google and see how many altars was built in about just boom boom and i know there was altars that were that were reestablished and reused repurposed but let me tell you something there's nothing like taking it from the ground up and saying god i don't know what the outcome is going to be and you've not given me all the details about this but i do know that i trust you and i put this one down because of you i put this on there because of you i put this on because of you god you're merciful you're gracious you've been faithful and you've been there for me the whole time wherever you are this morning wherever you are i just challenge you would you would you just come to the altar and lay and i know we've got figuratively speaking this is altru but i want you to come build something right here today come build something that's going to be lasting come build something and say god i want my children to see me build this altar i i want my isaacs to see this i want my my children to see that god shows up even when i don't quite understand it and you can it's okay to admit you don't know what's going on i don't know the outcome of this but i do know this i trust god break up on brick wood stacked up stack it up folks this is all up to you now it's all up to you now can you can you teach your children how to build a i can i can promise you this i can promise you this isaac from that day on no question pastor he he knew he knew how to build an altar he he didn't have any question about it and if you ever get to that place little tucker i hope that you learned to build an altar son show him oh hallelujah would you lift your hands with us once again lift your hands to him right now in the name of jesus hallelujah come on church we have been challenged come on are you willing today lord god lord god oh god i need a meeting with you lord i need an altar god with you i know you speak alter language i know you speak altar language lord i'm coming to you come on are you hungry for him that's right come on jesus jesus not sure lord that i understand it all i'm not sure lord if i have it all grasped in my mind but lord it is worth going through it god preparing lord jesus to give it to you come on church hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah jesus jesus jesus hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah trust you jesus come on somebody pray mom and dad if you're here with your kids pray over them come on kids this is how we pray this is how we give it to god the name of jesus the name of jesus in the name of jesus the name of jesus we jesus have your way great savior have your way mighty god have your way mighty god have your way have your way you've come to love you jesus jesus oh that's right have you come to me i need an altar in my life jesus do you think i need this place in my life jesus come on if you need the holy ghost today is your day reach out to him come on begin to talk to him that conversation i love you jesus i need you jesus i adore you jesus without you i am nothing come on begin that conversation lord i'm coming to you lord i'm coming to you i'm coming to you jesus blessed me the name of the lord oh god blessed be the name of jesus holy is the name of jesus your great god your great god your great god your great god oh yes jesus holy is your name jesus that's right come on pray church pray god's doing the work in your life god's doing the work in your heart he's doing a work in your family i'm trusting you for it jesus i am trusting you for jesus