The Gospel According to Humpty Dumpty

come on why don't you put that you put your hands together for Jesus come on Magnify Him for what he is doing in our lives hallelujah hallelujah wow wasn't that panel discussion Inc incredible that's our struggle isn't it he can't get us in a lot of other areas I don't know what your Thorn In the Flesh is but because this room is full of men you don't have to work in the gifts to know what your Thorn In the Flesh is that's right this is a Men's Conference I wouldn't say this at ladies conference if you're watching online ladies it's your at your own risk but when David was about to die they put a young lady in his arms he didn't get get excited they said the king is dead God can't change that part of us and leave us the same way we've got to overcome it but that's who we are that's how God made us and God's going to give us Victory invite your attention to Romans 8:28 Romans 8:28 while you're turning there let me give honor to the tremendous Ministry leadership team brother Chester brother Batson brother Reinhardt brother McGee what great great leaders and my didn't brother Chester and brother McGee preach last night I'm so comfortable this morning they both knocked the ball out of the park my good friend Anthony wils is following me he will knock the ball out of the park all I got to do is bunt run real fast if I get on base he's going to bring me home no pressure everything's good everything everything's good I also give honor to our executive board of the aljc don't ever don't ever cease to give gratitude for great leadership in your life brother Carpenter brother Wilson brother Vasquez brother Wimberly and brother Allan love these men so much aren't you thankful for great godly leadership as always as already been mentioned I'm thrilled to have Coco with me Landry and Clancy and my wife are watching from home and thrilled that Coco's here and wish the rest of them could be here give honor to the Great Men of Faith Apostolic church germant toown and the men of the Tennessee district Romans 8:28 I feel like I stand here today on assignment late last year God gave me the message I'm going to present to you and when he did I immediately felt like I would be preaching that here I had no reason to believe that I was ever going to be asked to preach Men's Conference anytime now you spiritual preachers that happens all the time but when that happens to me that's that's a big deal all right my prayer is that God will help me deliver and for us to receive what God has for us today Romans 8:28 and we know turn to the Buddy next to you and say we know this that all thing turn to them and say everything works together for good to them that love God to them who are the called according to his purpose turn back to him and say that's me now I've got one more text I want to use today but I think we can quote it together I'm going to give you the first word and we'll see what happens here but I I've got confidence in you Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall Humpty Dumpty had a great fall all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again I want to talk to you for a little while this morning on the Gospel According to Humpty Dumpty turn to three people give them a high five and say The Gospel According to Humpty Dumpty and you may be seated this nursery rhyme tells us three things one Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall two Humpty Dumpty had a great fall three all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again and then the illustrator of the little book that I had when I was a kid introduced the most mindblowing d detail of all Humpty Dumpty was a giant egg which begs the question Humpty Dumpty what in the world were you doing setting on a wall why were you living on the edge Humpty Dumpty was exhibit a of people who should never sit on a wall I I can hear his parents Humpty we eggs are a fragile lot Humpty because we're a we're kind of round we're not the most balanced folks in the crowd therefore it's an excellent idea to never ever ever set on a wall don't don't live on the edge boy you're fragile you're not very balanced one wrong move in you're scrambled one wrong move in your posted what one wrong move Ming you're fried I'm really trying to make this over easy this morning I'm trying to preach this sunny side up Humpty Dumpty was in the last place that he needed to be he sat on a wall he had a great fall well of course he did what did you expect it was only a matter of time oh yeah written as a math problem it would be Giant Egg plus living on the edge equals great fall so that makes Humpty Dumpty a whole lot like every man in this room doesn't it we're all fragile we we all have a tendency to not be balanced from time to time we we've all lived on the Edge at least once in our life if you doubt that Isaiah confirms what I'm saying he said all we like sheep have gone astray we have turned every one to his own way going to quote Paul in Romans a little bit today he said there is none righteous no not one and the old spiritual said it's me it's me it's me oh Lord standing in the need of prayer it's not my brother it's not my sister but it's me oh Lord standing in the need of prayer Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall Humpty Dumpty had a great fall all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again well well of course they couldn't have you ever tried to put back together a broken egg it's humanly impossible the best you could do is clean up the mess all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty back together again but I would add but at least they triy they could have walked on by and said SMH this guy's all cracked up man the yol's on this guy I mean it it's it's on him at least they tried Paul in Galatians says Brethren if a man be overtaken in a fault ye who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of meekness considering thyself lest thou also be tempted I am convinced that I've met some people who have found translations of the Bible that I've never found they seem like good people I'm sure they are I'm sure they have great motives but I've never found their translation anywhere one translation says ye who are spiritual ignore such a one another translation is ye who are spiritual destroy such a one oh somebody one time says that the church is the only group that kills their wounded how would add that the church is the only group that shoots their healthy and then kills their wounded but Paul says if you want to identify the spiritual you won't identify them by how high they jump or how fast they run if you want to identify the spiritual you need to look for the dirt of restoration under their fingernails you need to smell their clothes and smell the smell of redemption and you need to listen to the sound of Freedom coming out of their mouth the spiritual worship and they welcome the spiritual love God and their fellow man they pursue God and they pursue their fallen brother or sister ye who are spiritual restore such a one got a dear friend by the name of Tom vely he's the former president of New Beginnings an Apostolic adoption agency years ago and tupo there was a a a system a program they had if a young lady found herself pregnant out of wedlock they could move to Tupelo have the baby go to term put it up for adoption and then go back home without the stigma of that pregnancy there was a young lady in that program who was an Apostolic pastor's daughter she had gone to an abortion clinic she had laid down on the table to abort her baby she wanted to see what the ultrasound looked like and they turned around the screen and she said so what's that beeping thing there what's blinking and they said oh that's the baby's heartbeat she said get me out of here I'm I'm leaving today I can't I can't do this one day she is in brother V's office and he asked her girl how in the world did you as an Apostolic pastor's daughter ever come to the point that you were willing to abort your baby and her answer is telling to us as apostolics she said brother vely i' convinced myself that it was a easier to obtain the Forgiveness of God than the Forgiveness of the church ye who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness considering thyself lest you also be tempted I've got to tell you this morning if someone's restoration bothers you there's a good chance you're a Pharisee because we've all been broken we've all gone beyond the point of no return humanly speaking we've all been beyond repair others may have given up on us Society may have given up on us we may have even given up on ourselves all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty back together again but I'm here to preach to you this morning the king can the horses and the men can't put you back together but but the king can nobody can put our lives back together again but if we can gather up the broken pieces of Our Lives we could drag it into the lights and give the broken pieces of their life to God the king can put us back together again Isaiah said it this way come now let us reason together says the Lord Lord though your sins are like Scarlet they shall be as white as snow though they be red like Crimson they shall be as wool I'm told to obtain the color Scarlet in that day and age you had to double dip the cloth in that dye and so Isaiah is saying even if your life is double dipped with sin it shall be white as snow if it is red like Crimson it shall be as wool therefore if anyone is in Christ he is a new creature old things are passed away behold all things have become new I I suggested every once in a while you ought to argue back with your Bible one day I was reading that and I thought well that's good but I don't really want to be a creature I've never gone to get a book from bars and Noble about the best way to be a good creature don't want to be a creature what does that word mean in my limited understanding of Greek I begin to research and I thought that I knew what it meant I thought it meant well it's going to make me a new person that's what it meant but what I discovered was something totally different it doesn't mean that it would just make me a new person but that word literally means a new species that means that not only is God going to change me my Offspring coming forward everything coming out of me coming forward is going to be changed therefore If any man be in Christ he is a new species old things are passed away behold all things are become brand new you would to see this in scripture look at the life of Jacob he was so messed up his word means means deceiver his name means supplanter it just means you you the guy's going to take you yet one day I was praying and God just nudged me he said Steve do you know who Joseph's Daddy was Joseph was the exact opposite of Jacob Joseph is one of those four main characters in the Bible that we can hold up and say there I can't really find anything wrong with him but out of it Jacob The Deceiver God somehow did a work in Jacob's life at the brook and he changed him so much that when we turn and we look at Joseph we're saying dear Lord if I could be a man of in of Integrity like that if I could be a man that was full of character like that I am here to tell you today regardless what your past is there is a bright future for you and your species in Matthew 11 people are doing their best to tear Jesus down they're finding all kind of ways to insult him and say they call him a friend of sinners Luke 15 one of my favorite chapters in the Bible I love Jesus I love Jesus for a whole lot of reasons that you may not think I would love Jesus for so sarcasm is my love language and you read you you start reading through the gospels he could give it as well as he could take it oh you don't you you don't want to get in match with Jesus he's going to beat you and so in Luke 15 the Pharisees are saying this man welcomes he eats with Sinners and basically Jesus spends the rest of Luke 15 saying oh it is way worse than you've ever imagined let me tell you three stories that tells you how much I love Sinners he tells the story of a Shepherd that leaves 99 safe sheep to look for one lost sheep when he finds it he puts it on his shoulders and he comes back watch this in every one of these Parables there is something lost then there's something found and then they throw a party and in the first two Parables it's just not a party here it's a party in heaven there's a celebration when there is is a restoration then he tells the story of one lost coin in that day when a lady was married she would have 10 coins on a chain and it would be an embarrassment to lose one of those coins it wasn't a lost sheep it was just a it was an embarrassment Jesus says I care about you enough that I am going to help you I'll get on my hands and knees to help you find that one lost coin and when it is found they gather the neighbors together and they throw a party and again the scripture says that In Heaven There is a party over one sinner that repent and then that great classic Parable that we call the prodal son to say that it is one of the best known of all biblical Parables is an understatement almost every major English an American fiction writer Through The Years references this parable in a way this story becomes a touchstone of literary Consciousness Shakespeare alludes to it in two of his plays this Parable has been called the Evangel within the Evangel or the heart of the Gospel of Jesus in it Jesus is dramatically answering the accusations of the the scribes and Pharisees that he welcomes or receives Sinners and eats with them he holds up two boys one of them can't wait for his dad to die I've got three boys I would not advise any of them to try this stunt walks in and says Dad you look real healthy I can't wait for you to die so give me my inheritance right now he goes off and Wast everything in riotous living the scripture says when he comes the first time he says father give me but he came to himself in the pig pin some people have to learn the hard way they never will learn until they get to the pig pin and he said several key statements he said I'm in the pig pin right now but I will arise I'm going to stand up I I've not made any movement now but I'm not sitting down anymore some man in this room needs to just stand up and say I will arise but after I stand up I'm not going to stay there I will go I'm going to go to my father you've got to stand up you've got to go and then he said I will open my mouth I will say I'm going to say father I've sinned against heaven and before you and I am no longer worthy to be called your son when he left he said give me now he says make me one of your hired servants I'm going to stand up I'm going to go and I'm going to say I'm not looking for a handout dad but if you can make anything out of my life do it the scripture says that while the sun is still a great way off the father saw him and had compassion upon him and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him this tells me several things this is a parable this is a story but the way I've always imagined the story is man it's like Bonanza they're out on the big Ponderosa there man they they could see from Isles but but commentators say that in that day large land owners typically lived in town you see something else you see that he didn't just accidentally see his son coming I could imagine that dad from the moment his boy walked away saying I'm GNA look for my boy I'm GNA keep my eye on my boy what are you doing out here I've got a boy that walked away and I'm looking for the day that he comes back why did he do this because he wanted to be there when he came home then it says something amazing it says that he ran old men in the East don't run it's not dignified matter of fact this old man in the South doesn't run much there were two re reasons that he ran to his son Dylan come help me Dylan Moody run up here real quick he's been looking for a son all these years he's been waiting for his son to come back but what he said is I've got to get to my boy because I want to show him love but the most important one is if you flip in your Bible to Deuteronomy 18 you will discover that they had the right to Stone this boy for what he had done he had wasted The Inheritance he had embarrass the village and the daddy said I've got to get to my boy because if they're going to throw a rock and hit my boy they going to have to go through me first they a going to have to go through me first I'm going to be there when my son comes home I'm gonna break all of this down to you this is the simple message of what God gave me to give to you God is for you there are way more of us in this room than we want to admit we all take the Escape Clause well we need this for a friend we need the we we more of us related to the panel discussion than we would like to admit but God is for you you say I'm disqualified I never will be what God wanted to be me to be if God knows everything when God called you don't you think he factored in your Humanity don't you think he factored in your Frailty God still is for you come on give God praise in this place and so Jesus is staying in story for I do way more than welcome Sinners I'm the kind of God who will leave the 99 safe and wonderer out in the cold and the rain to find one lost sheep I would get on my hands and knees and look in the corners of the house for a lost coin and I'm the dad who will pick up his robe and run to my son because if anybody else is going to get after him they're going to have to go through me first now hallu throughout my life when I've read the word sinner in Luke 15 I didn't know we could do this back there but now we can I would choose the pronouns them him her and others I looked at Luke 15 as being a a chapter about those who are far away and had never been in the Ark of Safety I never used pronouns like me mine and mine it was it was uh it was not us it was them it was not ours it was others but but in all three of these stories in the Sheep In The Coin and the prodal son there were objects that had been in right relationship but now they were estranged they had been in place but now they were misplaced in every one of these I argue with you that in a broad sense Luke 15 is about Sinners all around the world but specifically it is talking about people just like me and you who do the best that we can but we stumble we fall we make mistakes Jesus said I love them so if I were you sitting out there I would say well you've convinced us of your absolute low level of academic prowess by telling us about a nursery Ryme wooo good for you you've told us three stories from the Bible it's good but they're stories they're Parables they didn't happen can you give me just one example in the Bible of a real person that this principle has applied to I'm glad you ask there was a guy in the Bible he had an anger issue oh my word he had an anger issue matter of fact he got so mad he killed a guy one time he was a murderer he got so mad this one doesn't make any sense to me later in his life God told him to go to the ruler of the country he was in asked him to do something God even told him he's not going to do it and yet when he left the presence of that ruler the Hebrew word for anger is the most intense you can be he is living God told him God told him I mean wouldn't you just think well I'm just here delivering mail you're not going to do it anyway no he he got so mad one time at the people he was leading God said I want you to speak to a rock and he struck a rock of course I'm talking about Moses and so his life's over right he's a murderer I means he got an anger issue I that's what kept him out of the promised land well when you look at your Bible the first five books of your Bible are attributed to this murderer that had an anger issue you you see when you look at this book you're going to find that the whole Bible is full of messed up people that God used you know why God uses messed up people because he doesn't have anybody else to work with oh there's another one in the Bible he didn't have an anger issue he had a he had a woman problem I mean pretty bad matter of fact he had an affair with a lady and then Mastermind to have her husband killed and yet God said David regardless of your mistakes I'm going to let you write much of the book of Psalms you you move a little further you see another guy he didn't have an anger issue he didn't have a woman issue but he systematically tortured and killed people of the way yet Paul wrote the majority of the New Testament that's why he could say this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save Sinners of whom I am Chief when God show me this it blew my mind outside of Jesus Christ these three characters are mentioned in the bible more than any other characters Paul has mentioned more than 200 times Moses is mentioned more than 800 times David is mentioned more than 900 times in my closing moments I want to hold up the lives of Paul Moses and David for your consideration this morning Revelation 1210 calls the devil the accuser of our Brethren if you have ever committed a sin in your life and let me make this easy for you you have the enemy of your soul will never forget your transgression and he will never stop accusing you if any if anybody should have got a pastor from the de it ought have been Paul I mean really I mean he he writes half of the New Testament I mean in second Corinthians he says that five times I receive 40 Stripes minus one Jesus had it once he had it five times three times I was beat with rods once I was stoned don't get excited that's not he he wasn't using marijuana three times I was Shipwrecked a night and a day I've been in the Deep he out night in a day he was lost in the ocean in Journeys in waters and Perils of robbers of my own countrymen he just here blows my mind this is the Apostle Paul the same Apostle Paul that said and my God shall supply all your need according to his riches and Glory he said in code often and nakedness meaning I was threadbear this guy had a quit to him he had a faith that we normally don't think about because here's the deal with Paul how are you going to stop him not possible they stoned him and left him for dead then they started seeing some rock piles just a mooving and he moved on you can beat the everliving Daylights out of me and as long as I have life I am going to keep doing what God has called me to do if anybody should have got a pass I mean if I'm the devil I just leave Paul alone oh yeah I mean what can you do with Paul yet when you turn to the last chapter of our book the book of Acts you see Paul on a ship going to present his case before Caesar and that ship becomes wrecked Paul is such a great servant of God although he is cold and he is wet he is helping picking up sticks he's not sitting around saying I'm the great Apostle somebody else serve me I'm going to do what I can do and out of the fire comes a Viper watch this watch this don't miss this I'd have left Paul alone I wouldn't have messed with him but watch the words that come out of the mouth of those people that he had never met they said no doubt this man is a murderer the devil never waste words they didn't say no doubt this man's womanizer no doubt this man's a liar or a cheat or a thief they called him what he really was if the devil won't leave Paul alone there's a pretty good chance he's not going to leave me and you alone either and then that guy named Moses I mean I'd have given him a pass as well I mean the guy he he led the children of Israel out of Egypt he received the Ten Commandments from God he led the Israelites in the wilderness for 40 long years but turn to that little one chapter book called Jude in the ninth verse it says Yet Michael the Archangel in contending or arguing with the devil when he disputed about the body of Moses dared not bring a reviling accusation but said the Lord Reb reuke you according to Jeremy brookl Jeffrey brookl and Jeremy payner Jude seems to be referring to an incident that was recorded in The Testament of Moses dating back as late as the first century according to the Testament the devil came to claim the body of Moses it that didn't make any sense to me because he felt he had a right to the body of Moses because Moses had murdered the Egyptian however the Archangel Michael came and denied his claim the devil had slandered Moses character but Michael refused to condemn the devil for a slander instead the Archangel rebuked him using the Lord's own words from Zechariah 3:2 which says and the Lord said to Satan the Lord rebuke you Satan the Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you is this not a brand plucked from the fire I feel the word of God and the spirit of God in this room this morning saying over the men in this Sanctuary the Lord rebuke you Satan is this not a bran plucked from the fire whatever you've done whatever you've gone through the Lord rebuke the condemning voice of Satan in your life and so here's the reality the devil refuses to forget but God refuses to remember when you're home teaching a home Bible study you are doing that aren't you you get to that point where you talk talk about who God is and it'll teach you to tell everybody that he's omnipresent he's all present and he's omnipotent he's all powerful and he's omniscient all knowing I don't want to split any theological hairs with people but I never say that I say oh absolutely he is all president he is absolutely all powerful and he has the ability to be all knowing he has the ability to be all knowing but our kind merciful loving God when we put something under the blood chooses to relinquish a part of that ability and say I could know everything but I've chosen not to know everything you're beating yourself up over things that God refuses to remember Hebrews says it this way for I will be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their iniquities I will remember no more the devil refuses to forget but God refuses to remember Micah says it this way he will turn again he will have compassion upon us he will subdue our iniquities and thou wil cast all their sins into the depths of the sea and then my spiritual father Bob mcco Senior used to always say then he posted no fishing sign if it's in the depths of the sea what do you do in fishing for it in your life or anybody else's life the devil refuses to forget but God refuses to remember the psalmist says as far as the East is from the West so far hasth he removed our transgressions from us why did he say from the east from the West why didn't he say North from the south because if you left here in a few hours and you left marville Tennessee and you started going north eventually you would get to the North Pole you would know that you were there because you would see a polar bear drinking a Coca-Cola but as soon as you see that polar bear you're going to start going South and you can keep going south till you get down to the South Pole and then you see that polar bear's twin brother who's also drinking of Coca-Cola and then you you start going north again but if you leave this conference today and you start going west you make it all the way to the Left Coast as I like to say it's way out there and you keep on going west you can forever go west and never start going east again God says if you bring the broken pieces of your life to me I'm going to send you one way and I'm going to send your sin another way and you will never never again meet the devil refuses to forget but God refuses to remember that's why Paul says there is therefore now brother Whitley no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit but what about David David David's called a after God's Own Heart not because he was perfect but because he was always pursuing the heart of God he was after the heart of God David's greatest mistakes were his sin with bash Sheba and numbering the people David didn't have a whole lot of mistakes but those two are his biggest sins he committed adultery with basba and had her husband Uriah killed and he didn't he didn't divulge it to anybody wasn't like he sinned and ran to the altar much later when the prophet Nathan came to him and rebuked him he said to God cast me not away from your presence and take not your Holy Spirit from me his priority in that moment wasn't the kingdom it wasn't anything else it was the presence of God the baby born of that Affair died yet there were other children born to David and baseba he also numbered the people which angered God because he was counting on what he could count on instead of counting on God and God sends a plague and S ,000 men are killed and David rushes to the angel that is administering this plague and he wants to sacrifice to appease God so that the plague will stop or n the scripture says he he wanted to live too here here take the cows take everything take get it go quick time time ticket he's right there and David said oh no no no no I will not offer anything to God that doesn't cost me something David's most significant accomplishment was the was the construction of the temple through his son and heir to the throne now he killed Goliath he did a good job I've not seen Goliath anywhere anytime he he wiped out the Philistines that's pretty amazing I didn't see Philistines anyway anywhere on my way here not even in bies I mean they're they're gone but in my mind the greatest thing that David ever accomplished was something that he physically didn't get to do but he drew the blueprint and he got the materials together that was his greatest accomplish M yet how God chose to achieve this endeavor is beyond my comprehension according to Leviticus 20:10 David and baseba should have died for their act of adultery okay I get that give him give him Mercy he's very valuable he he's the MVP I mean I get that I mean the child died all right that's good but but but four more Sons were born to them all right and when it comes time watch this when it comes time for God to select a successor to the throne of David in my mind David God does the unthinkable they should have died the baby did die God gave them more children but if I were God that is where the mercy would stop back away from the mistakes and nobody gets hurt and we're leaving it right there well we're not going to do anything else here yet when God selects David's successor he reaches down and one of Beth sheba's Sons named Solomon to sit on the throne there is no way in the world that I would have ever done that it looks like God is condoning sin it looks like God is is justifying immorality and validating wickedness I mean at one point David had 19 Sons God you had plenty of candidates to put on the throne I mean for crying out loud God if David had lived a moral life Solomon wouldn't even exist he wouldn't even be alive he wouldn't be a candidate for the throne God Solomon is a product of a mistake isn't it funny we're comfortable with forgiveness and Reconciliation we're comfortable when God brings people back into relationship with him but can we dare to imagine a God who wraps his arms around a prodical son and elevates him from a slave to sunship to protect him from the Wrath of his neighbors can we wrap our minds around a God who can turn our greatest mistakes into our greatest moments who can take our most shameful sins and make them our most shining successes who can take our lowest times and turn them into the highest triumphs hear me don't misunderstand me God is never soft on sin any man who has ever taken a journey into sin would never come back and say oh go do it have all the fun you can because God will forgive you nobody would ever say that the prodal was brought back into sunship but he he'd already wasted The Inheritance that's it buddy I mean David was restored by God in so many ways but the drama that unfolded in his family because of that Affair is absolutely mindblowing can we wrap our mind though around the god that while he is not soft on sin he is always merciful to the repented sinner he is always the god that will look at the lady caught in the act of adultery and saying you are forgiven now go and sin no more live up to the image that I made you to be David's greatest mistakes were sins with bash and the numbering of the people his most significant achievement was the construction of the temple through his son Solomon so you use the product of a mistake to build the temple where are you going to put it now God you know I was thinking there was this place it's recording in 2 Samuel 24 where David ran to the threshing floor of oron I I was thinking if I'm going to use the byproduct of a mistake I'm going to use the location where I showed Mercy out of a mistake you've got to get this in your spirit if God used a product of David's sin to build the temple if he used the location of his transgression to be the location of the temple then God can do something with the Messes in our lives as well here's really what I'm preaching to you God is way more merciful than we could ever imagine he is way more merciful than I am he's way more merciful than we are he loves sinners and so I submit to you that for every man that the enemy has legitimately taken out of the fight there are 10 others in this room that he has talked into voluntarily setting out of the war if we are to be fighting men we've got to get back in the battle if we are to be Fearless we've got to pick up our sword and fight I am pleading with every man in this room to get off of the bench and get back into the game regardless what your past has been if you are a red blooded man then you have a red hot Mission if you are a living breathing person then you have a god breathed purpose hear me if you don't hear anything else today if you are still vertical you are still valuable the enemy refuses to forget but God refuses to remember my question to you this morning is whose side are you on are you refusing to forget the mistakes of your past or are you refusing to fixate on the failures of your yesterday Paul said it well in Philippians Brethren I haven't arrived I count not myself to have apprehended but this one thing I do some of you are thinking I want to be a mighty man of God but I can't even control where I surf on the internet I want to be used of God but I can't control my thought life God wants to help you with that God wants to give you the structure around you to help you with that but you've got to walk out with one thing that I do forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth into those things which are before I press I press toward the mark for the prize of the High Calling of God in Christ Jesus we cannot press forward without forgetting the past with God's help we need to learn how to get over what the enem is getting over on us and so I rise on this morning of Men's Conference to hopefully give a different perspective to a verse that we have only applied to trials and difficulties in our life and we know we know that all things oh you've not believed that all your life matter of fact when I give you some examples you're going to think I'm preaching heresy all things even the intentional sin that you committed in your past all things work together for the good of those who love God who are the called according to his purpose look you made a mistake and you're not proud of it you're not glorifying or deifying it but take the the chain off of your leg take take quit living rent let the devil live rent free in your mind and move on with freedom and power to be everything that God has called you to be come on Humpty Dumpty you can stand with me he canot only put the broken pieces of your life back together he can use your greatest mistakes to achieve your most significant victories when a pastor in New York there was a Apostolic counselor that we used as the from the church he was a great trainer for pastors he lived about five hours away from us and so if it was pretty dramatic people drove there and he would counsel them one day I called him and said hey certain lady in our church told me last night that she had had an affair he said good I said good why would you say that he said I I always say that I mean somebody has an affair they beat their wife or their kid always say good why would you say that he said because they've been broken the whole time but now they can't hide it and he said I wouldn't wish any that on my worst enemy but if they'll do the work they need to do they will have a stronger marriage on the other side than they have right now gentlemen what are you going to do today there's a great story in the gospels where Jesus walks up to a man with a withered hand and here's what Jesus does he says stretch forth your hand how many meetings have you been in just like this where Jesus said stretch forth your hand and you wimped out you didn't stretch forth your withered hand you stretched forth your Healthy hand oh man hadn't we had good preaching this weekend boy hadn't hadn't this be great we we we've had some great food and fellowship and the whole time that withered hand is sitting there and he's saying I can heal whatever you will reveal whatever you will bring out of the darkness into the light I can heal it there is an army of men in this room that need to come forward of these altars and lift your hands to God and say Lord if you're for me I'm going to bring all the broken pieces of my life and give it to you I'm not proud of it matter of fact I'm ashamed of it but Lord I want you to heal me and use me not just restore me into relationship but restore me to be productive in your kingdom God I'm not looking for a mic I'm okay with a mop but I want to be useful in your kingdom I'm tired of setting out of the game because of a mistake that I've made in the past come on lift your hands to heaven right now and talk to the Lord Lift Your Hands to Heaven right now and talk to the Lord God I pray that your word will go deeply into our Spirits let this not be an emotion for a moment but let us remember if God could use three murderers to re write much of the Bible there's a good chance he can use us if God could use David's biggest mistakes to accomplish his greatest accomplishments there is a good chance he can use us come on talk to God man talk to God man it's just between you and him it's just between you and him it's just between you and him God I'm bringing it out of the darkness into the light you can heal whatever I will reveal God I want you to heal my withered hand I will stretch out not only in the altar but I'll get help I'll go to Apostolic moral Purity and I'll get help I'll talk to my pastor I'll get help I'll get some accountability in my life I would do