Transcription
An intimidated person honors what he fears more than he honors God, with or without realizing it. He submits to what intimidates him, and at the same time, he offends God.
[Music] [Applause]
Hey everyone, welcome to lesson five. Now, we're talking about breaking intimidation. Remember, there's a book, and as much fun as it is teaching these eight lessons, I can't cover comprehensively everything that's in this book. Now, I want to make this really clear: I highly recommend the book, but it's not required. You're getting a lot out of the course, but hey, if you, if you want to go deeper, and there's so much more that I talk about in the book, then get the book. But anyway, uh, let me, let me, let me cite some things here to open up this lesson. Intimidation. I'm going to make some declarations. Intimidation paralyzes us in the realm of the spirit. Always remember that. Number two, it causes us to compromise what we know to be right. Number three, it causes us to allow or tolerate what we, or other circumstances, under other circumstances, wouldn't stand for.
Now, the person I want to talk about now is Eli and his sons. Now, let, let me just make this really clear. Eli was one of the judges of Israel, and he was also high priest. He was the 15th judge, and he was the seventh high priest, and he judged Israel for 40 years. So, he was in the ministry for a long time, okay? And Hophni and Phinehas were his two sons, and they were leaders underneath his leadership, alright?
Now, let's talk about the spiritual atmosphere around the time that Eli was judging Israel, around the time he was the high priest. We read in 1st Samuel 3:1, "And the word of the Lord was rare in those days; there was no widespread revelation." Now, what the scripture is saying is, it wasn't saying there wasn't a lot of Bibles around. And at that time, it would have been called Torah. There wasn't a lot of Torah around. The Bible is saying that God wasn't speaking. In other words, God was silent. Remember Jesus said, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God." Not proceeded, okay? A religious spirit always hangs on to what God said, while he resists what God is saying. We are not to refuse Him. The book of Hebrews says, "Who speaks from heaven? God is living. He still speaks." That's what Paul meant when he said to the Corinthian church, "Hey, you guys used to serve those dumb idols." He didn't say the idols were dumb, like, "Oh man, you're stupid." He was saying the idols had no ability to speak. He said, "You're not serving a God who doesn't speak. The God you serve still speaks. He speaks from His throne." But in this time period, the word of the Lord was rare.
Now, the question we've got to ask is, why is the word of the Lord rare when Eli is the head pastor, so to speak? Well, here's why. Eli was, this is 1st Samuel 2:22, "Now Eli was very old, and he heard everything his sons did to all of Israel." What were they doing? They were taking offerings by force. They, uh, wouldn't give the people a choice. There was a certain portion that was for the priest, but they would take the best portion. And they lay with the women who assembled at the door of the Tabernacle. Oh my gosh, these guys had no fear of God. They are sleeping with girls who assemble at the door of the Tabernacle. We're talking about the girls that are coming to see God. They're sleeping with them. So they're using their, their manipulative techniques to get girls into bed with them. I mean, this is bad news, right? So Eli knows what his sons are doing, but he gives them a little weak rebuke. He doesn't remove them from leadership. He just gives them a little, little, little weak rebuke. And, and you'll find that in chapter 2, verses 23 and 24. "Why do you do such things?" Now, this is a little slap on the hand for them. "For I hear of your evil dealings from all the people. Now, my sons, for it is not a good report that I hear; you make the Lord's people transgress."
Let me tell you something. This went on and on until finally God has to send a prophet to speak directly to Eli. And this prophet comes, and he's unnamed, and he says this to Eli, from, this is a direct word from the Lord: "Why do you kick at My sacrifice and My offering, which I have commanded in My dwelling place, and you honor your sons more than Me? For those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me shall be lightly esteemed." So Eli, God said, was honoring his sons over God.
Now, let me read something to you right from the book, because this is important that you get it. When we are intimidated by someone to not obey what God wants, then we honor that person over God. And let me tell you something, it's easier not to offend the person you're looking at than God, who you can't see. I want you to remember that. It is, I actually wrote that next in my notes. It is easier to not offend the person we see rather than God, who we don't see. I think the Holy Spirit wanted me to say that twice, or it's just me.
Anyway, the judgment that resulted on Eli, because God said, "I will never forgive Eli, nor his family." I will never forgive you. You never want to hear God say that. The judgment came, and this is why God judged Eli and his household, because he did not restrain his sons. That's 1st Samuel 3:13.
Okay, what's the key point? Listen carefully. An intimidated person honors what he fears more than he honors God. I want you, I want that one to really settle in. I'm going to read it again. An intimidated person honors what he fears more than he honors God. With or without realizing it, he submits to what intimidates him, and at the same time, he offends God. That's strong, but it's true.
If you look at our homes, many of our homes are chaotic. Why are they chaotic? I was a youth pastor for years, and I'm going to tell you why they were chaotic: because parents wouldn't confront their children, because parents tried to love their children out of their problems instead of disciplining them. And the Bible says, "When you spare the rod of discipline, you hate your child." And I'll never forget the time I had a family. The husband took time off of work. They're sitting right in front of me in my office. And I remember that girl, she talked to her parents so disrespectfully. And I said to the father, I said, "Hey, aren't you going to address the way she just spoke to both you and your wife?" And he said, "Well, we have a policy in our house that we love our children out of their difficulties." And I remember looking at him and saying, "This interview, this, this, this counseling session, it's over." And the father was like, "I, I took off work to come here. We've only been here for 10 minutes." I said, "I can't help you because you know more than God." And I remember he looked at me. I said, "God says, 'You spare the rod, you hate your child.'" And I said, "This is why your daughter has no respect for you." It was an interesting moment, but I'm going to tell you, I'm hoping that family heard the message.
You know, if you look at Moses, Moses went through the same thing. You know, I remember the first time God showed me this in the Bible, I, I about fell over. And what I'm about to share with you really happened. I mean, let's, let's just paint the picture here. Moses on the back side of the desert for 40 years, right? He's watching his father-in-law's sheep. And God appears on Mount Sinai in a burning bush. And Moses says, "I will turn aside and see this great sight." Moses comes up. God says, "Take off your sandals; it's holy ground." And God says, "Hey, I've had it with my people being oppressed. I have come to deliver them, and you, Moses, are the deliverer." Wow. What the people had been waiting for for over 400 years. Moses is pronounced to be the deliverer. So God gives the covenant to Moses. He reestablishes the covenant of Abraham on that mountain. Moses comes down from the mountain, and he's got that look on his face, right? Like, "I have just been with God." Right? And his wife, Zipporah, she sees it. Zipporah sees it, right? And she says, "Moses, what's going on?" And Moses said, "Honey, God has met with me. He has come to deliver our people, and he said I'm the deliverer." And Zipporah looks at her husband, goes, "Babe, that's amazing. I'm with you. I'm with you." And he said, "Oh, and one other thing. He reviewed the Abrahamic covenant with me, and we need to circumcise our two sons." So she said, "Circumcise? What's that mean?" He said, "Well, we got to cut off the foreskin of their penises." So she gives him the oldest son, right?
Now, when our son, our third-born son, Alec, got circumcised, I happened to be there. And the doctor looked at Alec and said, "You're going to see him scream, and you'll never see him scream like he's going to scream again." And when that doctor clamped down on the foreskin, I'm telling you what, every fiber of his being was screaming. And I wanted to go hide. And I remember thinking, "I'm glad they did that to me when I was eight days old or 10 days old or whatever it was." Painful. I mean, do you remember? Listen, listen. Do you remember when Joshua was going to bring the men across the river Jordan, and God said, "Circumcise all the men"? They laid on the hill for three days. Listen, they were not waiting on God. They were in pain. Do you understand pain? Because there's a lot of nerve endings there. So listen, Mama is watching her boy scream, right? And she's like, "What, what are you doing, Moses?" And she like grabs the youngest son, said, "You ain't doing that to him." And Moses says, "Honey, we got to do this. God said do it. This is part of the covenant." She goes, "Oh, no, we're not." And so she screams at him, right? And then she says, "You see if you ever get a meal. You touch him. You ever, you see if you ever get a meal from me again." And then she gives him the silent treatment. And then she screams, and then she threatens him, and then she gives the silent treatment. And Moses is going, "You know what? I got to call him. My life, I got to deliver Israel." So Moses and his wife, and the one circumcised son, and the other one that's not, start on the road to Egypt.
Now, listen. You ready for this? Straight from the Bible. "On the way to Egypt, at the place where Moses and his family had stopped for the night, the Lord confronted him and was about to kill Moses." Is God schizophrenic? He just said he's the deliverer, yet he's come to kill Moses? No. But God is saying, "Moses, you choose your wife or Me. You're intimidated by your own wife." But Moses' wife, Zipporah, she got smart. She took a flint knife and circumcised her youngest son. She touched his feet with the foreskin, Moses' feet, with that, that son's foreskin, and she said, "Now you're a bridegroom of blood to me." When she said, "A bridegroom of blood," she was referring to the circumcision. After that, the Lord left him alone.
One day, God spoke to me and he said, "John, did I come to kill Moses or did I come to kill his wife?" I said, "You came to kill Moses." He said, "That's right, because I put him in charge of that family, and he was intimidated by his own wife." So now, isn't this interesting? Eli is intimidated by his sons. Moses is intimidated by his wife. This is why Jesus said, "I didn't come to bring peace, I came to bring a division. From now on, a man's enemies will be those of his own household." See, when we honor the person we're looking at, and we know that we're disobeying God, we are honoring that person at the expense of offending God. And God will sometimes say, "Time to choose." I know this is a strong statement. I know this is a very, very riveting statement, but I think it's something we need to consider.
So I'm going to, I'm going to leave you with an example. I'll never, ever forget. I was in the South part of the United States, and I was ministering at a church. And I'll never forget, my words were going out about 12 inches, hitting like a wall, and coming back and hitting me in the face. I mean, it was crazy. And, and, and before I got up to minister, that pastor, I met him and his wife. Two of the sweetest human beings I've ever met, seriously. I mean, you talk about, they were your model Southern hospitality people, kind, gentle, sweet. I loved meeting them. But I'm sitting there going, "Why is there no anointing in this church? Why can't you even preach in this church?"
So we go out to lunch, and then the pastor sits down and talks to me in the car. And he said, "John, um, my head usher in my church," he said, "um, he divorced his wife, and they both come to the church. He sits on one side, he sits on the other. And he said, then this guy met a young girl in the church, and now," he said, "they're living together." He said, "Now, I've removed him from being head usher. Have I done enough?" And I said, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. You mean the guy is still a member of the church?" And he said, "Well, yeah." And I read to him out of 1st Corinthians chapter 5, where Paul said, "A man was committing sexual immorality, and he said to the whole church, 'You're full of pride.'" Why was the church full of pride? Because the church thought that they could discipline the man better than God's word said. Because Paul said four times in those 13 verses of 1st Corinthians chapter 5, "Why haven't you removed him from the church?" This guy in 1st Corinthians was living with his stepmother, sleeping with her, and would not repent. He refused to repent. This is why Paul said, "Remove him." This same man in this church was sleeping with that young girl and refused to let her go. So we are not talking about somebody that falls into sin, gets confronted, sees the error of their way, and repents. We are talking about somebody who knows they're sinning, is confronted, but still continues and doesn't want to quit. This man in this church was very influential, and the pastor removed him from being head usher, but he was still in the church. Do you know later, the amount of sin that was in that church was mind-blowing? It got revealed later. And I, but I remember this, when I talked to that pastor and his wife for one hour in their car about this situation, and I showed what Paul said in 1st Corinthians chapter 5, the pastor's wife said to me, "I don't know that I want to be in ministry anymore. She said, 'I just want to love people.'" And I looked at her and I said, "You want to love people, but here's the situation: it's not real love. I said, because love not only feeds, love protects. You only want to feed them, you don't want to protect them." And she went, "Wow." Again, two of the sweetest people, but there was no power of God in that church. There was no presence of God in that church, and they were struggling in ministry because they were intimidated by a wealthy man in their church who had divorced his wife and now was living with a young girl in the church. This is what intimidation does. You don't want to offend the person you're looking at, so we do it at the expense of offending God, who we don't look at. I know I'm ending this lesson a little heavy, but it's important that we understand that.
So there is a really, really good ending on this particular story. I kept in touch with that pastor and his wife because they were so precious. And do you know he confronted the man, and do you know the man repented when the pastor confronted him, and the man moved out? He moved out. And do you know what's wonderful? That man was spared from a lot of bad repercussions from that sin that he was in. And I'm sure the church experienced a much greater measure of the presence of God because of what the pastor did. So great ending. Confrontation, though it is uncomfortable many times, ends very well.
In the next lesson, we're going to discuss how to finally awaken the gifts of God, how to stir those babies up, and operate in, uh, the power and the authority that God has placed on our lives. I hope you're getting something out of this.
[Music] Oh.