Transcription
Let's go to the word of God. Mark 5, and we're going to just read three verses. Mark chapter 5, verse 1-3. If you have it in your Bible or your smart device, uh, you can just stand with us and you can read it on the screen. Today, I'll be reading from the King James version. When you have it, say, "I have the bread."
>> I have the bread.
And they came over unto the other side of the sea into the country of the Gadarenes. And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the tombs, and no man could bind him. No, not with chains. Verse three, who had his dwelling among the tombs.
And all of God's people said, "Amen." You can be seated in the presence of the Lord. Uh, today, just for a few moments, I want to speak to you from the subject entitled "Living in the Cemetery."
>> Living in the cemetery.
First of all, why would someone live in a cemetery? How did they get there in the first place? Well, you go to the cemetery when you're letting go of something. You go to a cemetery when you're burying something or someone who died. It's a finale. You know, it's one thing when you get the news that somebody passed. It's another thing when everybody starts coming by the house and bringing food. It's one thing when you have what we call the homegoing celebration. But that cemetery is when it becomes very real. It's the finale. It's the period.
But I want to say this to you that are in this room with me. Just because it's a conclusion and because it's in a conclusion of a thing does not mean it's always closure of a thing. So, in our text, how did this man end up living in a cemetery? Maybe he went there, but when it was time to leave, he stayed. Grief can make you stuck.
>> There's something called good grief >> that we all need. We all have to in life process a loss. Whether it's the loss of a job, whether it's the loss of an idea you had for your life. How many right now, when you were younger, you had an idea of your life and things didn't really pan out the way you thought it was going to pan out, >> right? >> I mean, you have a blessed life, but the truth is, this is not the way I thought it was going to go. >> And you have to grieve your idea. >> You have to sometime grieve the plan that you had for you. Grief can make you stuck. Just because it's over doesn't mean you're over it.
>> Yes. Signing the divorce documents. Yes. A relationship coming to an end. Oh, it's over. But that does not mean you're over it. This is why I want to encourage all of the rebound saints. >> Don't be so quick to jump out of one thing into another.
[Applause]
>> Your healing comes from Jesus, not another person. >> Tell your neighbor, "Just because it's over," >> tell them, "doesn't mean you're over it." Living in the cemetery is a sign that you're living in the past. >> And you can always know when someone is living in the past because their language reflects it. When you're living in the past, you're always talking about what was, >> who it used to be, how it used to make you feel, what they did to you, what they said about you. You realize said and did is all past tense. >> When you find yourself in a cemetery, it means you're you're living in the past. The cemetery isolates you. Living in a cemetery means you're still dealing with guilt, shame, and regret.
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>> Guilt, shame, and regret. Lord, guilty can be your status, but guilt is the emotion that comes with it. So, what happens when you've been guilty and then forgiven? >> Some of us have been guilty, forgiven, but we're still stuck at guilt. >> I'm not screaming, but I'm preaching to somebody here.
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>> Repentance moves you forward, >> but regret keeps you stuck. My God. >> That's good. >> Yeah. Repentance does not not mean just to be sorry. That's just remorse. >> I mean, you're remorseful, and you should be. The Holy Spirit convicts. Hallelujah. >> But it's the spirit of the accuser that condemns. For the Bible says, "There is therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." And it's hard for us to wrap our mind around that.
>> Yeah. Yeah. We shout about being saved, but isn't it something that you can be saved? I mean, you can be saved and still bound. >> I mean, Christ has saved you and set you free. Took the lock off of the gate, and you'll get out enough for church. But you always go back to prison after church because your stuff is still there.
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>> I mean, to to the point this becomes a drug and a high, and oh, thank you, Lord, for saving me, but still yet you go back to captivity. >> And and we we preach Galatians, what Paul says to the Galatians. He says, um, "Stay in the liberty in which Christ has set you free." And he says, "Be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." And minister rule, when we preach about the yoke of bondage, especially in Pentecost, we usually preach about the yoke of bondage being drugs. It's being alcohol, fornication, adultery, all, you know, the sins, homosexuality, smoking weed, you know, all the sins. Now, I want to challenge you when you read that text, it's really not talking about sins. It's not. Now, stay away from that and be free from that, but that text was not talking about those who are entangled in addictions.
>> It's just those who It's really those who are entangled with faulty theology.
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>> Those who Christ has set you free, >> but you're still trying to pay penance for what he's already paid for. >> I want to set somebody free today. And I want you to be free. Just in, you know, I can feel them in my hands, and oh, I'm free in my feet. I want you to get free in your spirit >> because some of us are still living in the prison and still living in the cemetery that God, oh my God, has evicted us from.
>> I want you to look at your neighbor, tell your neighbor, "Stay here if you want to, but I'm leaving the cemetery. Today is my last day in the cemetery. I got my moving truck outside, and my freedom is going to go beyond praise and worship. My freedom is going to go beyond dancing at the altar. I'm going to walk in the freedom that Christ died for me to have."
>> Look at your neighbor. Tell your neighbor, "Stop discounting God's deliverance.
>> Something he gave you for free." And you say, "Well, I'll give you $10 for it." Hear me what I'm saying to you.
>> Repentance >> is different than just being remorseful.
>> Because you can be remorseful and still keep doing it.
>> Repentance comes from a word, a Greek word called metanoia, which means to rethink it. In other words, if you don't think differently about it, you'll still keep doing it. Stop doing it without rethinking is behavior modification.
>> And when you have emotional and spiritual a and and physical memory, that means your body and your thinking is already bent toward a cycle system you've been a part of for years. I hope I'm preaching slow enough for your translation. I'm I'm trying. Thank you. I'm trying to do better, cuz sometimes I be preaching so fast and the translators are still at the first sentence. Yes. Let me explain to you what I mean bent. Physically, emotionally, and spiritually bent. Because some things you all are calling the devil is not the devil. It's your fallen nature.
>> If you don't have this written down already, you need to write down these three things. It's the system of the world.
>> It's your carnal nature.
>> And it's Satan. Those are three things that work against us. And they are not all three the same.
>> Some of us are rebuking the devil when we need to deal with our own personal discipline.
[Applause]
No, I mean, the, you know, the Bible says we're in the world. You can't change that.
>> What you can change is being a representative of the world.
>> And the thing about it, you got a carnal nature that's that's bent towards sin.
>> Now, I know there's an argument theologically now that has come up in many seminaries now concerning original sin. There are some who say that there is no such a thing as original sin and we're born innately good. Well, I have not sat in the great halls of academia and seminary, Oxford Theology and Duke Divinity, and I'm very impressed by their books and and their seminar their seminars. But I have gone through a class called ramp early learning center >> and ramp babies.
>> And I realized, no, you don't have to teach them to do wrong.
>> They say no before they say yes.
>> You know something is wrong, right?
>> They learn mind. They know covetousness and possession.
>> It'll be toys laying in the floor. They have nothing to do with it until another child comes.
>> So, we're bent. We're bent towards sin. Glory be to God.
>> You don't have to train yourself towards sin, but you do have to train yourself toward holiness.
>> And it got to start in your thinking. Because if you don't change the way you think about something, you'll automatically go back to doing it innately. Let me explain again a little deeper, a little bit more practical when I mean bent. I'm trying to do it in layers so I can hit everybody.
>> Glory be to God.
>> The ability for a fragrance to trigger a memory.
>> Glory be to God. Hallelujah. Some of you who smoked all your life.
>> See, a cigarette smoker >> can put their fingers to their lips without a cigarette even being in their hand.
>> They said, "I need a smoke. I need I just need something." I'm serious. You're bent. After a meal, you need a a I don't mean to take you there. I'm just trying to give you an example, >> you know, cuz it's something you always do.
>> Always >> something you've always done. Okay, maybe y'all didn't get the cigarettes. All of the late night ice cream eaters, come on. You come on in the room, then, you cookie and cream demon.
[Applause]
>> Because that's what we do. We rebuke it all as demons when the truth is, there's no devil. He will lure you in with what you desire. And some of us are always dealing talking about who pulled me, who tempted me. No, you got to deal with your desire.
>> It's it's bent.
>> You're you're bent toward. So being sorry that you got there is not enough >> because being sorry that you got high can make you go get high. >> Being sorry that you fell in fornication can take you deeper in fornication. I'm just going to keep this pace right here. I'm just going to talk it through right here. Woo.
>> Being mad at yourself, >> being angry with you >> can put you in an abyss of depression and not deliverance.
>> So repentance is rethinking. It is metanoia. That's why Romans 12:1 says, "I beseech you therefore, brethren, >> by the mercies of God, take this carnal body, present it." The reason why you got to present it to him because you can't do nothing with it >> as a living sacrifice and then let him make it holy.
>> Glory be to God. And acceptable, which is this is your reasonable service. Then verse two says, "Be not conformed >> to this world, but be ye transformed by the what?"
>> It's not enough to be remorseful. Remorse and regret keeps you stuck, but repentance moves you. It moves you forward. And so we find ourselves stuck in a cemetery of regret, the years you spent in a bad relationship, the mistakes you made in days past, the mere fact that you should have graduated by now.
>> Oh, I should be somewhere closer in my relationship with God. I should be deeper in the ministry by now. I should be somewhere different financially. Anybody in this room have ever been in a season of your life where you couldn't enjoy the present because of the stains of the past?
>> Where a good moment ain't even good. It it's it's almost like you're like Israel. You came out of bondage. Finally. Finally, I got things in place. Finally, our Exodus has come. Prayers have been answered. Somebody shout, "Finally."
>> Finally.
>> And what happens when they get out? All of a sudden, the past starts coming after them. Oh, I feel the Holy Ghost here.
>> And listen to me, when the past comes after them, the past does not have them. When the past begins to pursue them, >> then they say, "We should have just stayed in Egypt and died."
>> Isn't that something? That's what happens when you get triggered by the past. It makes you negate what God has done in the present.
>> I don't want you to look at your neighbor. I want you to look at yourself and tell them, "Rehearse the present miracle." If you keep if you keep rehearsing the failures of the past, then you're going to start convincing yourself that nothing has changed. You're going to start convincing yourself that it was better in captivity. That's what starts to happen when you start having present challenges in a miraculous place. When you start having present challenges in the place of answered prayer, when you start having present challenges, when you're in the place that you prayed for, >> past situations can trigger you to make you think it was better before you tried. It was better before you got out. But look at your neighbor and tell your neighbor, "I take my chances in the present. I refuse to live and die where it happened." I want to tell somebody right now because somebody's marriage is stuck in a cemetery. See, the thing about a cemetery, there's a date on it that doesn't change.
[Applause]
That means it's when you're living in a cemetery, that means it's possible to be 10 years down the road, but emotionally you're still stuck in the same place.
>> Oh, I feel the Holy Ghost here. I I really I'm going tell you, I really feel like I know I'm not calling out people's name, but I I feel like it's prophetic this morning. I feel like the Lord has me speaking to somebody to pull that moving truck up to that side door right there and come out of the place you've been stuck in because the enemy has his foot on somebody's chest. But I need you to tell your neighbor, "I'm leaving. I am leaving. I've made up in my mind that I don't have to die where it died. I don't have to die where they died. I don't have to give up where I failed." Hallelujah.
>> Let me tell everybody who is playing it over and over in your mind.
>> The Bible says, "A just man >> falls seven times."
>> Woo! Hallelujah. And then don't you tell no lie in this church. I don't want you to lie in the church, but tell somebody, "I've fallen more than once." See, y'all like, "Oh, look at y'all. Y'all got your head coverings on today and you got your long skirts and your robes. You don't want to be honest. Y'all want to talk about the one time, but if you be honest, God is more than a God of a second chance. He's the God of another chance. Cuz some of us blew second chance back in 1992. Some of us blew second chance a long time ago. Some of us on second chance of 2025. Look at your neighbor and tell your neighbor, "He's a God of another chance."
[Applause]
As some of you think you're doing God a favor >> by not accepting his grace.
>> You can't >> you can't repay somebody back >> if you don't get up and go back to work. You can't you can't repair something if you don't ever go back and show up to repair. Reconciliation is coming back together. I want you to look at somebody, tell them, "I can't do nothing about the past. Oh, but I'm going to take the remaining days that I have and I am going to make up for lost time. I can't go back in history, but I know someone who can. The God we serve is not just the God of this time. He's the God of all times. He's omnipresent. That's not just geography, but he's all he's in every time at the same time. The God we serve is in our past. He's in our present. And he's already in Wednesday of next week waiting for us to show up." Somebody scream, "I'm leaving. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. I'm leaving. I'm leaving." And listen what he says in Colossians chapter 2. Cuz I'm going to tell you I'm going to tell you when it becomes our flesh is bent, right? We make decisions ourselves. We're living in a world that's conducive to it, and we're fighting an enemy that lures us with the world that we desire. It's almost like we've been set up for failure.
>> No. No. Really, we're living in a world that with a fallen nature, with a Satan that lures us with the world that our fallen nature desires.
>> So, let me give you good news. Colossians chapter 2, verse 13 to verse 15. I want y'all to read that. This is powerful. And you being dead in your sins >> and and and in the uncircumcision of your flesh. In other words, you without covenant, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you of what?
>> All this is communal Sunday. Can I just preach the gospel?
>> All trespasses? Verse 14. This is a good opportunity to praise God. When you read it, I want you to take a moment and praise God. After you read it, just read it.
>> Right there. Now, praise him right there. Praise him right there.
>> Now, praise him right there. Praise him right there. Praise him right there. He blotted out all the handwriting and ordinance that was stacked up against us. He removed all the evidence that was stacked up against us. He removed all the naysayers that Come on, somebody ought to praise God right now cuz it was stacked. I said it was. Look at somebody, tell them it was stacked up against me. But what did God do with the ordinances that was stacked up against us? He blotted them out. He didn't erase them. He blotted them out. Because if he erased it, it can be traced. But when he blots it out, somebody knows something happened there. Oh, but they can't figure out the details. I need you to take only 5 seconds so I can finish this message and praise him for the blot out. Praise him for the blot.
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All right, that was good for all of you who were uh on the periphery of sin. But all of you that God delivered you from a deep place of sin where your sins were higher than a mountain, I want you to now praise him. The rest of y'all sit this one out. Paul said, "I was the chiefest of sinners, but when we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly." When I was polluted in my own blood,
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Hallelujah. Said, "He blotted out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and he took it out of the way." Woo! I said he took it out of the way. Some of y'all got some something that's holding you back from walking out the rest of your life. You got something that's been held over your head to keep you from walking out God's purpose. But I want you to pull somebody. Tell them, "God took it out of the way. He took it out." The very thing that was your hindrance, the very thing that was holding you back, he took it out of the way. And when he took it out of the way, what did he do to it? He nailed it. Heyo. He nailed it to the cross. My weakness. He nailed it to the cross. My proclivities. He nailed it to the cross. My past, he nailed it to the cross. My cycles, he nailed it to the cross. My insecurities, he nailed it to the cross. My anxiety, he nailed it. He nailed it. He nailed it. Oh,
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He nailed it to the cross. And if anybody praise him, we ought to praise him. What shall I render? What shall I render unto the Lord for all of his benefits? Push somebody, tell them, "The cross is enough." If he never does anything else, he's done enough at the cross. He said three words on the cross while he had my stuff nailed. He said, "It's finished." Grab somebody by the hand. And said, "Neighbor, the only way I got past it is because he took it. I didn't have the strength to take it, but he took it and he nailed it to the cross." And listen at verse 15. And after he nailed it to the cross, uh, he spoiled the principalities. In other words, he robbed the principalities. Uh, he robbed the spirit of darkness. Uh, he robbed demonic powers and he made an open show. My God. Lay hands on somebody and tell your neighbor, "When he delivered me, it wasn't a secret. I know who did it. It wasn't a self-help book. I know who did it. It wasn't a 12-step program. I'm thanking God for what he used, but at the end of the day, it was Jesus." And what did he do? He triumphed over the thing that was holding me back. He triumphed over the Egyptians that tried to overtake me. I see Israel standing at the Red Sea with the past coming behind them. But there's a Negro spiritual that says, "Oh Mary, don't you weep. Oh mother, don't you moan, cuz Pharaoh's army's army got drowned in the Red Sea." Somebody ought to praise him because your past will not pass. Get out of your seat and tell three people, tell them, "Your past will not pass. Not in this new season. I'm not dragging old stuff. No dead bodies in a living place. No dead bodies in a new season."
[Music]
It's the silent weight. Regret is a silent weight that keeps many believers bound to yesterday's mistakes. Somebody shout, "Silent weight." It's the echo of what could have been that drowns out the sound of what God is doing right now. While conviction is of the Holy Ghost, conviction leads us back to God. But regret, when it goes unchecked, becomes a weapon of the enemy that keeps us trained. Hear me when I tell you here in Mark chapter 5, the Bible says Jesus gets off the ship and he's met with a man that's living in the cemetery. He wasn't visiting the cemetery. Somebody shout, "He was living there." That means he may have went there one day, stayed longer than he anticipated. Is there anybody in here? One day turned into a week, and a week turned into a month. And the truth is that if we look and track it back, that month has turned into years. But here comes Jesus. The Bible said he had broken chains. Broken chains. If you're taking notes, you need to write that one down. What kind of chains did he have? He had broken chains. In other words, people tried to help him. And when helping him was not successful, if people can't help you, they'll bind you. They'll push you over in a corner. They'll make you a secondary Christian. They'll make you a part-time believer. Oh, because of what people know about you. We can't use you. You can't sing in the choir. You've been divorced. You can't be used. Oh yeah, you had a promiscuity issue. You had a child out of wedlock. But I want you to look at the people around you trying to have come out of those shadows whom the Son has set free. He's free indeed. You either saved or you're not. I know where we say, "Well, they saved saved." No. No. You either saved or you're not. You can't be no more saved than me. Your standard may be higher than me, but if I'm saved, I'm saved. He's still sanctifying me, but I'm saved. He's still delivering me, but I'm I need every blood-washed believer in here. I want you to shout it louder than your accuser. Shout, "I'm saved." And it can't be undone. I'm saved. I still got some stuff I'm working on, but I'm saved. I still got a fight in my mind, but I'm saved. Sometimes don't want to obey God, but I'm I had a relapse, but I'm saved. How you Somebody say, "How can you have a relapse and still be saved?"
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>> How can you have a relapse?
>> I need to I need to speak this in this room. I need >> How can you have a relapse and still be saved?
>> Yes.
>> Because after relapsing, >> Yeah. I couldn't get comfortable.
>> It used to be a tie. Yes, sir.
>> If I had a relapse, that relapse could turn into a whole weekend binge. Yes, sir.
>> Yes, sir.
>> But when you know you're saved, if you ever fall back into something >> that God delivered you from, it'll never feel the same. And the mere fact that I felt some kind of way about it tells me that's the Holy Ghost on me. The Holy Ghost will convict you. The Holy Ghost won't let you stay comfortable. Scream at somebody and tell them, "The Holy Ghost won't let me stay in the cemetery."
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He won't let me stay. Test three people, tell me, "He wouldn't let me stay. He kept convicting me. I tried to sleep through the conviction, and I couldn't sleep through it. He wouldn't even let the high be a high. He would let me keep talking the way I wanted to talk." The man had on broken chains. In other words, whatever they tried to fix him didn't work.
>> So, they just let him stay out there. And now he got on broken broken chains. And then what is it? What is it that can keep you back? Keep you living in the cemetery? Yes, it can be your regret, but let me tell you something. Your guilt, but all that is is a doorway. That guilt, shame, and regret is a breach.
>> This is when it becomes more than willpower to get you out. Amen.
>> See, when you first get in it, you maybe you can have positive thinking and rearrange some things.
>> But when you stay there long enough, it becomes a breach.
>> And you all know what a security breach is. If there's a security breach, that means it gives access >> for something else to get in.
>> That man stayed in the cemetery too long.
>> Maybe he lost somebody close to him >> and instead of getting around people to help him, instead of being around people to bring joy, cuz you can be in grief where you don't want no joy.
>> You can get in a place where you're discouraged, and if people try to encourage you, you get annoyed. I don't want to be encouraged.
>> Now, I understand moments, but you got to be very careful cuz you'll get in that place, and then it becomes a security breach. That man stayed in the staying connected to the past too long. Oh, I feel the Holy Ghost here. Will you stay connected to the past too long? As a matter of fact, there were different ways Nero in the Bible, uh, the Nero, which is the Caesar of the, they believe was the Caesar in the days of the Roman Empire when Paul was living, that he, um, crucified Christians. He persecuted them, but in many ways, crucifixion was just one way. He would boil them in oil. He would put them in an arena and put wild animals, and it was entertainment.
>> But there's another thing he used to do. Come up here, Thomas, if you will.
>> He would take two Christians, kill one, and tie a live person to a dead person.
>> Now, somebody say, "Well, I would rather have that than boiling oil." I don't know.
>> Cuz if you get boiled in oil, you're going to go in shock >> very quickly, >> right?
>> Crucifixion, >> you know, it was it was amazing how Jesus stayed alive as long as he did, >> but being chained to a dead body >> is a slow death. Where the death over here, where you stay tied to the past, >> death over here starts spreading in every area of your life.
>> A breach.
>> And when that breach happened, when he stayed in the cemetery too long, >> what got in? A legion.
>> This is when you know it's demonic. Right.
>> I >> I know y'all want to make uh fear just an emotion, but there's a level of fear that's not an emotion. It's a spirit.
>> Y'all don't believe it.
>> Well, you ain't got to believe in demons for them to be real.
>> The Bible say God has not given us the spirit of fear.
>> Yes, I know depression can be a physical thing. It could be a chemical imbalance. But you also got to know when depression is a demon. You You got to know. You got to know when that thing is just something you do. When it's something that got you.
>> That's it.
>> The Bible says this man was in the cemetery so long that he was bound by demons >> to the point the demons recognized Jesus >> and they said, "Why have you come to torment us before time?" More time.
>> Don't you know the devil knows something that maybe some of you don't know?
>> There's an expiration date on him.
>> Hallelujah. God is not going to let him plague your life forever. And the demon spoke out and Jesus says, "What's your name?" Not because Jesus didn't know, he asked for us.
>> He says, "My name is Legion, for we are many." So there was one spirit that spoke for all spirits in that man >> because he stayed in the past too long >> that there was a that was a breach. Now he's at the point if he wanted to come out of the cemetery, he can't. That means if he wanted to change now, he found himself because now a troop I wish I could take y'all to Genesis to show you the prophecy. There's a there's this prophecy in Genesis that says a troop will overtake you, >> the tribe of Gad.
>> And we're in the Gadarenes, >> but say at the end it will be overtaken. Yeah.
>> So, here comes Jesus in the land of the Gadarenes,
[Applause]
>> dealing with Legion, which is a military term that means a troop.
>> And the Bible said, Jesus said, "You know what's You know what's about to happen? I got to get this man out of the cemetery, but in order for me to get him out of the cemetery, I got to get you out of him."
>> Glory be to God. Tell your neighbor, "Deliverance is necessary."
>> No. No. I need y'all to say it loud. Shout, "Deliverance is necessary."
>> You got to know before he transports you to where you need to go, >> he needs to transport something out of you.
>> There's a system that keeps you locked to the past. There's a language that keeps you communicating to the past. There's a faulty mechanism in you that keeps choosing wrong when God is pulling you right. And this is it. And thank y'all for being patient. But the Bible said this, the demon spoke out and said, "I know you're going to send me out, but uh, if you will, don't send me out of the region. Deal with that. Deal with that.
>> We don't want to leave the region."
>> Satan thinks he's slick. Why would Satan want to stay in the region? Cuz he's hoping you'll keep the door open.
[Applause]
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>> I'm talking about all of y'all that have good breakthrough in church, >> but you don't follow it up with decision.
>> I'm talking about you to have a good praise and you got all the tears. The Bible says when that spirit comes out, you got to build the hedge back up.
>> You got to repair the breach.
>> Cuz if you don't, why that one spirit goes out, it gets seven more.
[Applause]
>> Now then when they come back, it comes back as eight spirits.
>> And then the the number eight means new beginning. That means they start something new in you that was worse than the first time. Is why it seems like you get in this loop and it keeps getting worse and it keeps getting worse. Somebody shout, "Repair the breach."
>> Cuz he wants to stay in the region >> just in case you get lonely.
>> He wants to stay in the region >> just in case you change your mind.
>> Now my problem is not their request.
>> PJ, my problem is that Jesus gave them permission. Why is the demons that's possessing me, oppressing me, making a deal with the Jesus >> that's setting me free?
>> They said, "There go pigs right there. Let us go to the pigs." And Jesus said, "Okay."
>> Why? Tell them, "No, >> no, you don't get you don't get the region. You don't get the pigs. Get out of here.
>> Go to hell."
[Applause]
>> I'm sorry, children. Only say that if you're preaching, okay?
>> Cuz if the children heard nothing else, the whole sermon, they just heard that. Why? The Bible says Jesus, he said, "Go." And the demons ran over into the pigs. Y'all got to read. I didn't read the all the verses today, but y'all go back and read it. When the demons went into the pigs, what did the pigs do? They ran over the cliff and drowned. And I asked Jesus, "Why would you allow them to go to the pigs in the region?" The Lord spoke to me and says, "Because I wanted you to see what the demon's intentions were >> the whole time. Those were not, you know, the Bible said the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Those weren't stealing demons.
>> Those were killing demons. The mere fact that the man survived as long as he did, it means God was sustaining him before Yeshua showed up in the cemetery. Some of you ought to praise God because you were in the cemetery. You could have been in the plot by now. But I'm so thankful that Jesus showed up in the nick of time. Somebody, this message this morning is the is the Lord coming into your cemetery in the nick of time, telling you, "I've come to get you out now." You got to decide whether you want to leave. But somebody jump on your back feet and shout, "I'm leaving the cemetery." There's a moving truck at the door. I'm moving. I'm moving. I want what God has for me. I refuse to die in the past. I refuse to live in my regret. I refuse to live with guilt and shame over my head." Lift up your hands all over this place.
>> Oh my God.
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Woo.
>> This message today was for a sinner >> who felt like who feels like >> that salvation is unobtainable for you.
>> No, this whole service has been for you. Everything from the communion to this moment >> because the the the the demoniac, the man full of demons did run to Jesus. Jesus came to him. Jesus has come to you. This is for the believer who's been stuck because every time you would hold your head up, anytime you would stand in the confidence that Christ has for you, something always pushes your head back down. And instead of coming boldly before the throne of grace, you come sometimes or not at all because what David says, "My sins are ever >> before me."
>> Peter battled regret
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to the point when Jesus needed Peter the most, Peter denied him. I think we skip over that. So to the point when Jesus got up on the third day, you know what he said? He says, "Go tell the apostles and Peter." Hold on. Peter's one of the apostles. But he knew he knew that Peter was somewhere in regret that the invitation didn't mean him.
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Paul dealt with regret because he went from being a persecutor of the Christians to being an apostle. But it was times looked like he could never come from under the cloak of what he used to be. There's one more example I want to give you. Judas. Judas saw not like the man in the cemetery. He didn't live long enough to respond to the invitation. And his regret took him out. I want to tell somebody in this room, you haven't messed up so bad that you can't recover. Yeah.
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The Bible says, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God." I pray that something was spoken in this message today. It spoke to your heart and spoke to your spirit. It was not by accident that you landed on this video. May it be an expression that God is mindful of you. He sees. He knows and he cares. I want you to stay connected. There are social media pages where you can like and follow and you can stay connected to what we're doing and where we're going to be. And also, if you want to continue to get these messages, make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel. It's free of charge. All it costs is an open heart and an open spirit. If you feel led to sow into our ministry, uh, to connect and sow into what we're doing domestically and internationally, there are ways to give. And remember, when you sow, that seed may leave your hand, but it will never leave your life. This is Bishop Younger saying, "I know what it feels like to want to stop and want to quit. But whatever you do, don't stop here. Keep going."
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