Transcription
Dan, bless you, bro. All right, good evening, everybody. How are you? Uh, am I like preaching the rest of the night? Like, how's this going? All right. This wasn't on my schedule.
Um, it's amazing. I'm here. I drove up from Pennsylvania, uh, to another event with Eddie yesterday. And the hosts are here. Raise your guys' hands. Pastor Rick and Alicia. Amazing people. Um, amazing, amazing. I mean, they made a lobster feast for Eddie's team and I, and my family, and everybody the other day, and it was just like, it was amazing. Yeah.
Um, but we were supposed to have the second night. We had a Tent Revival style over at their place. They have a beautiful property. And, uh, drove up to do that event last night and tonight. And, and when I pulled in on, what, Thursday? She said, I feel like the Lord spoke to me and said, for you to pray about it, but I'm supposed to release you Saturday night to go with Eddie and his team over to Faith Bible College. And I didn't even have a clue what this was. I just met Pastor in worship. And, uh, she said, I believe the Lord wants to do something special. And I said, okay. So I'm here.
Um, how many of you have no clue who I am? Uh, I said it last night. I said, that's fresh meat, and I'm a carnivore. I love it. Um, how many of you know who my dad is? Dan Muller? A few of you. I think he preached here before.
Um, I'm going to move this a little bit because I'm a wanderer and I'll probably trip over it. Um, guys, tonight is so powerful. Like, uh, and it's, it's amazing. It's amazing. I didn't know tonight's the first night back for the fall semester, and it's just a really good night. Cuz I, I, when I preach, people always say, man, that was really good. And I have no clue what I said because I don't make, I don't, I don't prepare a sermon. Um, I don't have sermon notes. And some people go, whoa. Um, and it's okay to do that because I have some friends and pastors that are amazing. They write great sermons, and the Lord's present, and it's powerful. But a long time ago, it was prophesied over me. It said, they said, go into the world and preach, and open your mouth, and He'll fill it. And a lot of times when I preach, I just preach out of the life that I've lived. That's the Holy Ghost. I just preach how the life lived and what God's done for me in my life because, like you guys heard tonight, the testimonies, like what Justin was just talking about. I could feel in the room. I'm a discernment guy. I could feel in the room a lot of people were uncomfortable because of how raw he was. But the reason he's able to get up and be that confident is because he knows who he is in Christ. Yes.
And I, I think a lot of times we're afraid to talk about the rawness and the real of what we've been through, simply because we're afraid of what people are going to think. But he understands the reality of God. See, there's a difference. And this is a good night for you guys to be first coming back for your semester because you can start it off on the right foot. Tonight, when you leave, you're going to have a choice. You can come to this school, this college, and I think it's amazing how many of you guys are here as students. A whole bunch. That's so amazing. Yeah, that's amazing. You can come here and learn about the Lord and learn the word. But there's a difference between knowing about God and knowing God. Big difference. When you learn about God and you learn about, see, you could be a pastor, you could be an evangelist, you could flow in the giftings, and you could read the word and study the word to preach, and you could talk all about Jesus and why He came and the purpose of the cross, and you could know scripture front and back. But you might not walk in love. And the whole purpose of the gospel is to walk in. See, if you know about God, you'll have convictions in your life, and maybe even condemnation, which is never Him. But if you know God, it brings transformation. See, conviction compels you to change. But knowing the Father will change you. It's impossible to walk out your true identity in Christ and the gospel. It's impossible. Possible to manifest God's glory, Christ in us, the hope of glory. It's any glory is any manifest presence of God being seen. Any attribute manifest presence of God being seen. The only hope we have is for God's glory to be revealed through us to others. Amen.
But it's impossible to do that if you don't understand how the Father sees you. And it's really easy to read scripture and compare it to things you've been through in your life, and the way the world's taught you, and the things you've experienced. And then you read scripture, and it doesn't line up because the world is evil and God is good. And it's easy to read those scriptures and say, well, I haven't seen that in my life. And then all of a sudden, we justify and make excuses why that scripture is not possible for today because of our experience we had out there. Are you with me?
And I see it happen a lot of times where we, we study the word, and we, and we sincerely have a heart for the Lord. We want to walk in our true identity. But we miss relationship. We miss what it looks like to actually get before the Father and seek Him apart from all the distractions. Apart from, like the Bible says, that knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. And my deepest concern and my deepest struggle that I see with the body of Christ, and this isn't, I'm not saying it's you guys. I'm not talking to a bunch of hypocrites, a bunch of people that don't want to be here. If you guys didn't want to be here, you wouldn't be here on a Saturday night. You wouldn't be enrolled in a college. So I'm not condemning. I'm never condemning. I'm stirring you up in loving good works. Amen. Just want to get that clear because sometimes when I say things, they can come off real sharp, and they go, wow. But if it hits your heart, I want to challenge you tonight. It's never, oh no, I should be doing better. It goes, wow, God, you are so good. Thanks for another chance. And you turn and you go the other way, and you seek Him. Amen.
But I see so many Christians, discouraged Christians, countless, where they get their hopes up. How many of you, you got born again, and everything was great? You were on fire for the Lord, you're seeking Him, you're reading the word. And then life goes on, and jobs go on, and circumstances change, and family deaths happen, and friendships break apart, and things happen. And before you know it, you look back and you realize that you're not on fire like you used to be. I believe tonight, we saw it last night. I believe God has a message in my heart to bring people back to their first love. And I believe if you're enrolled in this college, whether you're enrolled here or not, this message is for everybody. But specifically, if you are enrolled in this school, now is your chance to know that you came here not just to learn the word, but to know Him. Because knowing Him will change you. Knowing about Him won't. It'll help you walk through life. But if you run into a situation or a circumstance and you try to apply the last thing you read to your problem, you're too late. When the storm comes, you need to have your house on solid ground. And the only way your house will be on solid ground is understanding who you are in Him and believing, making the choice to believe, believe what He says about you is true.
Because there's times in our lives, guys, listen. I was raised in church. Five years old, I gave my life to the Lord. My dad became a pastor. Two years later, he was traveling full-time all across the country. And at age seven, I got baptized in the Holy Ghost, radically. Like to the point, me and my sister were on the school bus, and for three days, speaking in tongues. And the bus driver asked my family, what's wrong with us? And it was amazing. And some of you hear that and you say, well, wasn't that fortunate? I didn't have a Christian family. I wasn't surrounded with that. I didn't have both parents. But let me encourage you, your story doesn't define where you are today. Your story doesn't define you where you are today. Listen, if somebody asks how you're doing, and you say, well, you don't understand what I've been through. What about what He's been through for you? So you don't have to go back to that place. See, because it's really easy. It's really easy. It's so easy to define yourself through past failures and past mistakes. And you don't know what they did to me. And I was tough. Strong. And you know, we heard a testimony earlier about a young man that was molested and things happened to him. He has a choice. He could tell people when they say, how are you doing? He could tell them they're his two biggest problems and say, keep me in prayer. Or he can realize that he's a new creation in Christ. And if he doesn't have to be a product of somebody else's mistake. Because if you allow yourself to be molded, when He's the Potter, by somebody else, you're only going to be as strong as their weakness. And why would you want to be calling yourself a Christian, but you're still bound by somebody else's issues and you're in prison? But we cry, Jesus is Lord. But somebody else is the one governing our life because we blame them for where we're at now. It's deep. It's deep. But it's so easy. It's a choice, guys.
You can come to sermon to sermon, you can come to church, you can worship, you can do all the right things, you can put your tithes in the offering bucket with a giving heart. But if you don't know Him and don't let Him transform you, what's it matter? First Corinthians says, love is patient, love is kind, it does not envy, it does not boast, it's not proud, it's not self-seeking, doesn't dishonor others, it holds no record of wrongs, it does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. Love never fails. But it says that you could fathom mysteries and know all the prophecies, but if you don't have love, you have nothing. It's quiet in here. You guys all right? Yeah. I can feel His presence so strong right now. It's so good.
But I get saved, five, baptized in the Holy Ghost at seven, raised in church. By the time I'm 12 years old, I'm in school, and there's peer pressure. And, you know, I would get made fun of. I talked about it last night very briefly. I said, my parents would pull me out of, uh, Halloween parties and things like that at the school because they didn't agree with celebrating it because I believe it's demonic. And that's just my revelation. And I pray you get yours if you don't agree. But by the age of 12, I get peer pressured into hanging out with the wrong people because I was made fun of. So now, instead of finding my identity in Him, now I'm trying to find it through the acceptance of other people. So now I'm doing whatever I can to make other people like me and appreciate me. It's called the way that seems right to a man, but in the end, it leads to death. And at age 12, I start getting high, smoking marijuana. That's how it started. Then I go into a cocaine phase through high school. I graduated high school, praise the Lord. But that's where it got really dark. I'm keeping things moving here because I don't have a lot of time. And that's a challenge for me. I get into cocaine, that turns into crack. Now I start selling drugs to pay for my drugs. But I can't make money off what I use because now I just buy more drugs with the money I have. Still working at the time, but my family obviously saw a difference in my life because I went from being on fire to the Lord to completely distant, isolated, cutting everybody off, avoiding the people that I love most. Sound familiar to anybody? It's called the fall of Man, guys.
And I went through my whole life making these just ridiculous decisions. But the whole time, I knew the truth. I knew the truth. Proverbs 22:6 says, train a child up in the way they should go, and when they're old, they will not depart. Depart doesn't mean they won't stray off for a while, make some really goofy decisions, make bad choices, do the wrong thing. Depart means to completely separate from. But see, I never completely separated because my parents planted that seed in me as a young boy, and they continued to speak life over me. And I share it everywhere I go that that when I would run on these tangents for days and days and days and not come home, and there were times I moved out for a year at a time and would live with a girl that had children, just trying to find satisfaction through something, just trying to find satisfaction through something, trying to fill a void. And everything was just a counterfeit of the Holy Spirit. And I said it last night as well, I'm repeating some things because I told my heart that anything that alters your mind to give you peace is a false hope. And that's what I did for a very long time. But in that time, I know my mom's probably watching on livestream tonight, and she cries and she texts me and says, I'm proud of you. And it's crazy because she, she did that when I was in a mess too. She would text me at 4 in the morning when she didn't see me for days, and I'm out getting higher in a crack house, strung out with nothing. And she would text me at 4 in the morning. She wouldn't say, what are you doing? Where are you at now? You know better. We raised, we didn't raise you this way. When are you going to come home and ask for more money? I'm sick of your manipulation. You need to get it together. She didn't never say that. She would text me at 4 in the morning, morning when I'm missing for a week, not even know if I'm alive, guys. And she would text me. I'd read my phone and it would say, I love you, man of God. You talk about getting to your heart. I love you, man of God. Do you know what that means? You might say, well, why would you do that? You weren't living a man as a man of God. Just because I wasn't living as a man of God didn't mean He didn't predestine me to be one. And she saw that. And that's called speaking life into your situations. They talk about there's power of life and death in your tongue. What your heart's full of, the mouth will speak. Her heart was full of love, and she understood that God never lost sight of her on her darkest day. So who would she be to lose sight of me on mine?
But see, it's impossible to walk like that without the understanding of what He says about you. Amen. See, the room could get really weird when I say something like this because we've been so trained by a lie. Did you know that God sees you as perfect? Did you know that He actually sees you as forgiven of your sins? Amen. We always say, well, I'm just a sinner saved by grace. No, grace empowers you to be free from sin. The Bible says die to it. Romans 6 says, reckon yourselves dead to sin, alive to Christ. See, we missed the point. We turn Christianity into praying a prayer to forgive us of our sins so one day we can go to. We all know that. But what about getting that kingdom back inside of of us while we're still here? There's so much more to praying a than praying a prayer to get to heaven, guys. It's about becoming more like Christ. It's about becoming more like your Father.
See, when God sent Jesus after the fall of Man, we know the story of Adam and Eve in the garden, and how Eve bit the fruit, and she gave it to Adam, and then they were naked, and now they hide themselves. We see the cartoons with fig leaves like this, and we read all that, and we're like, oh, and it becomes a story sometimes, and we miss the actual power behind that. We miss this, what happened. See, God, God is love, and He created man in His image. Genesis 1:26, it says, God created man. Well, 26, he talked about 27, he did it. He created both man and woman alike. He said, let us make man in our image, and His image is love. So let us create men and women in love, and then they multiply and reproduce. He's not just talking children, he's talking multiply the image of God. And they had everything perfect in the garden. But He gave them one rule, and He said, do not eat off of this forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil, for the day you do it, the day you will surely die. And they ate the fruit, but they didn't fall over. But He said something was going to die. So what died? Love. You know why? Because love doesn't seek its own. And they were created in the image of God to be love. And the moment they turned their back and did something that God said not to do, that's when selfishness entered the world. And now every man lives for himself at the expense of the next person to get what they can get from him. And that's why people are offended, miserable, and upset. As Christians, and that's why you must be born. It's really easy.
So then God sends Jesus as a man, empowered by God, in the flesh. And He says, follow me. See, if He just poofed appeared in the desert at 30 years old, I'm God, we couldn't follow that. He's God. But instead, God is so intellectual with that, He says, you know what? I'm going to send my Spirit into a virgin woman, and she's going to give birth to a man named Jesus. And He's going to face every temptation that you'll ever face and show what's possible when you actually walk with the authority inside of you and recognize who you are and who you're empowered by. See, because you can't follow God, but you can follow a man. Are you with me? Yes. Yes. Okay. Some of you were like, first time you heard the gospel or something. It is the gospel. Nothing I said isn't in the word, right, Pastor? He gave me a thumbs up.
The whole Christian life isn't about what God can do for you. You don't come to this school for God to bless you and benefit you, and you learn the word so you can be prosperous. If you do that, you're going to be let down because Jesus promised trials and tribulations, but He said, take hold, I've overcome the world. See, when you become like Him, things, you don't react to things the same. When tragedies occur, if you just know about Him, then you'll try to respond like Him without knowing Him. You can't respond like somebody unless you know who they are, unless you know how it is. We talked about revelation the other night, and how important it is to have your own revelation. And I grew up in church, and when I went on this drug tangent and going crazy, a big reason that I rebelled is because growing up in church, I was told, how many do I have any preachers' kids in here? Wow, a lot. Raise your hands. Wave. A lot. Growing up, I was told that I had big shoes to fill, and I was told that I had to be somebody because of how my dad was, and he was so well-known. And now I have this big role to fill. So my whole life, growing and believing a lie, created a pressure where I would have to perform to get your approval. And then when I wouldn't line up with your expectations, I felt like I failed you and God. And it pushed me away from the church. Amen.
So I go through a 12-year drug addiction. I end up going to a Teen Challenge. I leave four months after I go there. Four months. The Lord did an amazing work in me. I did great for about a year. I saw miraculous healings, just amazing, good stuff taking place in my life. But I didn't, I didn't have my complete foundation and understanding my, my identity completely in the Lord. I was still holding on to some stuff. I call it taking a little bit of hell into heaven. Can I say that? It's called holding on to your old life and trying to say, I'm a new man, but you're still holding on to old tendencies. But Jesus said, die to yourself. He said, deny yourself, pick up your cross, and follow me. The old man dies, the new man comes. You can't have half and half. But because of this pressure, I still had these tendencies, and I would always fall short. I was always fall short. I was always fall short. And what I would do is I'd watch these profound ministers on YouTube and social media, and I'd go to these services, and I'd hear these powerful messages, and I'd say, you know what, man, I want to be like that. I can do that. So I would go take what they're preaching and apply it to my life, and then I would stumble and fall short time after time after time again. And then I would always question God, why He was so good to them but not for me. Am I too deep in to be forgiven? Until I was sat down one day by the Holy Spirit Himself, and He taught me, you cannot feed off somebody's else's revelation for eternity. You can walk, you can look up to somebody, you can look up to somebody and be empowered by a message they're preaching, but it won't change you. Knowing Him will. Because if you just try to take what somebody else is preaching and apply it to your life, you'll never fall short because, yeah, we serve the same God, but we all have different callings, but the same purpose. Their calling might not be your calling. That's right. That's right. Are you with me? It's impossible to live the way somebody, God didn't create you to live like somebody else. Preacher's kids, God didn't create you to be like your father or your mother. He created you to be the best you you can be in Him. You say, well, my dad's been a full-time pastor, and I feel like I need to be in full-time ministry. Listen, you could leave here and go work at the grocery store, and that's your ministry. And some people, well, you know, I really want to be in full-time, full-time ministry. I don't like that. Well, that means it's still about you a little bit, and God's not going to fully use you until it's all about Him. Because if it's still a little bit about you, and gifts still flow through, because gifts are without repentance, you might start finding your identity and your fulfillment through how God's using you rather than whose you are in Him. You might flow in the miraculous and the healing, and you might have words, prophetic words, and words of knowledge, and it's amazing. But you still might be a little twisted in another area. Just like Anthony said, or not Anthony, sorry, Justin. Justin was saying, him and a friend of mine, Anthony, they're good friends. And now I called him Anthony. Justin was still flowing in a certain type of way, but living anti-Jesus. People say, well, that's impossible. No, gifts are without repentance. There was a time in my life where I was praying for the sick, watching people get healed, I watched blind eyes open when I was getting high. That's bad. That's scary. It's great that God moved, and He loves them. But it's bad for me because I might, might think, wow, God's okay with me doing this. And then you get to heaven one day, which we all hope for, and we say, Father, Father, I healed the sick, I cast demons out in Your name. He says, depart, I never knew you. It's not a good day, friend. Tomorrow's not either.
So after I go through Teen Challenge, I come home, I go through that little mess for about a year. Um, and then I backslide. And I got to a point in my life where people say, you know, how many of you have ever come out of addiction? If you're comfortable talking about it. Okay. A few of you. Man, we got some holy people in here. Thank you, Eddie. It was a joke. I wish I never did what I did. Um, but I don't live in that place. Amen. Amen. Can you tell I did drugs for 12 years? I can't either. And that's what the gospel is. People say, well, and I'm not going into my deep story, and I don't have time. But some, some of the things I say and talk about when I have a, you know, an hour and a half or whatever to share, people come up to me later and they're like, I can't even see you doing that. And I'm like, well, that's good. That's the point of the cross. See, I'm not holding on and say, well, you know, there was a time in my life that, you know, and my parents and, well, that's not me, guys. See, nobody else is responsible for your life except you in the Lord. In the Lord, we can't allow other people to dictate where we are today. I feel that so strong. I know I said about three times, but it's probably for a reason. You cannot allow where someone isn't to determine where you are. You cannot allow sin around you to produce sin in you. God called you to be free from it. Why would you weigh your, why would you weigh your value based off of what someone else did to you? What about what He did for you? When you were yet a sinner, Christ died for you. When you had nothing to offer, He gave you everything.
When Adam and Eve messed up in the garden, and they took off running, that's what they did. They took off running. Before that, it said Adam walked in the garden in the cool of the day with God, best friends, one with the Lord, walking together in the garden. That would be pretty cool. The moment he does something he knows he's not supposed to do, bites the apple, gives into selfish desires, now all of a sudden condemnation comes in, self-guilt, justification. The first thing he answered God to whenever God said, why did you eat the fruit? Adam, he didn't say, well, Lord, you know, it just looked delicious. He said, it was the, the woman you gave me. He couldn't even say he did it. It was her. If you didn't give me, if you didn't give her to me, I wouldn't have did it. The first thing they do is self-justification. And the moment that disobedience entered, fear took place. See, if you have fear in your life, there's probably still some things that you're living for yourself for. If you have discouragement in your life, it's probably because there's some areas in your life that you need to take before the Lord and say, wow, I might still be a about me for this. This might still be about me a little bit, and it needs to be all about You, Lord. Forgive me. And the moment you say that, you don't live there anymore. You step over and you believe and just say, you know what? I'm going to believe the truth of what God says about me. Because the second time you repent for it, He doesn't know what you're talking about. Amen.
But Adam and Eve run, and they hide. The same God He's walking one with, He goes, runs, and hides from. And I see us do that so many times in our life where we have a pure heart, and we serve the Lord, and we want to serve the Lord, and then we just make a really decision, we make a mistake, we do something, we look at something on TikTok or Instagram that we probably shouldn't look at, or we respond to a message the way we shouldn't respond to it, or we treat somebody the way we shouldn't treat them. And now all of a sudden, we feel condemned and feel like the Lord's frustrated with us, and we're not in a safe place to go over and commune with Him and pray with Him like we normally do because of what we did yesterday or last week or last month. And now a time goes by where we stop our relationship with God because of this. Now we stop this and push this away, and now we're isolated. And that's the enemy's tactic is to make you think that you're not worthy and that you have to act a certain way to please God. But God's already pleased with you. When you were, when you had nothing to give, He gave you everything. And that's not a twisted grace, guys. That's not a license to sin and get away with it and live how I want and God's going to forgive me and God's going to love me. Listen, grace is not to empower you to sin and get away with it. Grace is designed to empower you to humble you and say, wow, I was this messed up and You still loved me. I was this messed up and You still showed up. I was this messed up and You were still there for me, and You restored things in my life. How much greater if I would walk? 1 Timothy 1:5 says, the goal of our instruction is love. The goal of our instruction is love. And that comes by a pure heart, a clear conscience, and a sincere faith. The moment you violate your conscience, you mess up your faith walk, guys. You mess it up. And then you feel like you're not worthy, you feel like you need to press back. But the whole time, He's walking for you, going, where are you? I love you. Where are you? Adam, where are you? It's real good.
So I got what I got, like 10 minutes, 15, five. Okay, I got five. So I go to a second program. This time, I go into a program called Life Changers Outreach. And, uh, it was a 12-month program, totally free. Nobody made me go this time. I hit rock bottom. I still had a job, a few thousand dollars in the bank, a nice car, and a really good job. But I knew that if I continued on the way, the path that I was on, I was going to die. I knew it. So I thought, you know what? And I made a phone call, and I got into this place. It was crazy how it happened. Not going to go into it. Long story short, I end up in Tennessee from Pennsylvania to Tennessee. Three days later, I go through a whole 12-month program, graduate. Then I get chosen to be an assistant teacher, a director. I plan, help plan a center in West Virginia, and I get to go there in two months and preach. And that was 10 years ago. I get to go in two months and preach. And some of the students I had 10 years ago that didn't even believe in God are now the executive directors and pastors of those programs. We call that fruit in the body of Christ. You who know me will bear much fruit. See, it's the goodness of God that leads men to repentance, guys. Nobody, nobody kept scolding me and telling me, you know, you need to do better, you need this, you need, you need to get it together. There were some strong talks with my dad and my mom, and they said, you know, you really need to change. You need to become a man. You're acting like a child. You know better. You do know better. But it was never a condemning, you know better. Does that make sense? It was speaking life. It was speaking encouragement. And then when I went through that program, the moment when I stepped in, the Holy Spirit brought back to remembrance everything that's been taught. That scripture. He brought back things that I learned as a child and as youth. And all of a sudden, the word becomes alive inside of me. And now I realize for the first time in my life, look, I'm not just following God because daddy told me to. I'm following God because I see just how good He really is.
So I want to challenge you tonight. I'll close with this. I want to challenge you tonight, guys. When you get in your word, never study the word just to fulfill an assignment. Never study the word just to give a scripture or a lesson because you'll be tested in what you preach. And the enemy's number one tactic would be get into your mind and think that you're not good enough. But it's because he knows that you just quote things and don't know them. That's good. So make your goal being here this year, however long you guys are here this semester. Focus one semester at a time. You know what? I'm going into this thing with my eyes on the prize for one reason. If your eye is single, your whole body is flooded with light. If that's not your motive, you'll be very discouraged because God's not here to benefit you and serve you. You're here to let Him transform you. And from that place, Matthew 6:33, seek Him first and the kingdom, and everything else will be. Amen. I'm done. Hallelujah.