Don’t Minimize Me

Yo, what's up? So I'm Tim Pratt Jr. and I want to spend a little time today, uh, unpacking the message. I got this concept from, uh, Tim and Juliet Ross, kind of when they— when I first seen it, of unpack the vows. And so, uh, just being a communicator of the gospel, a teacher, preacher of the gospel, uh, I want to just spend, like I say, anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes, give or take, uh, just unpacking the message on Sunday. Because a lot of times for me when I'm, you know, studying and things like that and transition to coming out of more so a personal devotional into like more of cultivating a message for the flock. A lot of times when I'm up there, I have my notes and I have, you know, things and I like to walk and pace. And sometimes I really kind of try to stay in the outline of the notes because I truly believe this is what God wanted to get because it's a fine line from us getting in self and being Spirit-led. And so, but There are moments where I'm like, oh man, when I kind of go back and reflect, I truly believe in that moment, that's how God wanted it to come out, but I am human, he works through us. And so we can forget, we can be like, oh man, I wish I would have said it this way and that way. And so that's what this is for. So going forward with me, I want to spend time unpacking the message when I'm permitted the opportunity to speak, especially at my, at my home, my local church I'm a membership of. And so, uh, so the title of the text that I had, um, that I believe God gave me, that I chose to teach on, uh, this past Sunday was Don't Minimize Me. Uh, in other words, don't minimize God. So just see this as God is speaking to you and saying, don't minimize me. And I chose to use Genesis 22, um, kind of— we're very familiar with that passage of scripture with, you know, God testing Abraham. And, uh, and then also tied it in with Joshua 1 like the first 2 verses and then verse 6. And so, so what I did is that oftentimes in life we are very aware when, you know, things like fornication, adultery, if we're alcoholic, gossiping, lying on people, stealing, murdering, all these type of things that we just feel that are bad, or especially some things are just morally bad. Like even if the Bible didn't call them bad or sin, we just kind of know, like, oh man, that seems like a bad thing. Uh, but for the most part, as a believer, it's just certain things that, uh, we know that this is not good, even if the world says okay, like, this is corrupt, this is sin, and this is bad, and we have to stay with that. And so being a believer or being a Christian, whatever terminology you want to use, um, we know that, okay, like, I can identify that this is hindering me. And so it's easy to come to the altar, it's easier to come to the altar and like lay those things down, should I say, and be like, man, okay, I'm really struggling with this area, this area is really struggling with me, and so I want to stay submitted in this area, I want to give this area to God. So, but on the other hand, it's like, what about those things that are good, like that God created, intended to be good in our lives? With those things, we often find it harder to surrender and fully submit to God because there are good things in our life that we have, whether it's people, whether it's jobs or whatever our preferences, and so on. And so within these two passages of scripture, I wanted to show how good things can become bad when it gets in the way of God. And what I used here is Isaac and Moses. Neither one of them were bad people, like they represented good people, good things within the context of this message. And so I'm not going to read it, I'm going to encourage you to go back and read it, but I started with Genesis 22 and I read from the NIV. You know, dealing with how Abraham would be tested to sacrifice his son Isaac. And, uh, and how in that, uh, passage of scripture, um, one more— I'll read this, you know. Verse 3 is one of the first ones I made a note of, is that early the next morning Abraham got up, loaded his donkey, and took with him his two servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out to the place God had told him about. The reason why that verse was important to me in the message to really focus on, and for the overall context, I encourage you to go to Willow Chapel Ministries page and just check out the message in its entirety. But, uh, in, in this context, um, basically Abraham had got instructions from God, and it says, the Bible says, early the next morning, uh, Abraham got up. And what that showed me, one of the things that I was telling the ministry that I really believe Like I said, season and seasons, but honestly, truthfully, this should be our posture like no matter what for the rest of our life. Like we shouldn't move out of a season where we are slower with obeying God. And so one of the things I said is that we are in a season or seasons where the time in between God speaking and our obedience must be shorter. We are in a season where the time in between God speaking and our obedience must be shorter. But like I say, you know, what I wish I would have kind of said there is truthfully like, this is a way of life. We should never come to a state where when God speak and then our obedience is delayed, because delayed obedience is disobedience. And so we'll see that in the text here. So with Abraham, the Bible says early the next morning he got up. Now with me, although the Bible doesn't give record of this Um, if God tells me to sacrifice something that's near and dear to my heart, especially my son, uh, there are going to be some things in my humanity, my— just my flesh, like, okay, God, wait a minute, like, this right here, like, you want me to give this up? You want me to do what? And so our humanity, the sacrifice— even Isaac's son, you know, when he asks Abraham a question, you know, what does Abraham do when your sacrifice starts speaking back to you? What do you do on top of that when your own humanity now is, uh, questioning it. But Abraham chose to trust God anyway. And we know Abraham had already had encounters with God when he literally left his whole lineage. Like, he gave up everything to totally rest in the security of God. So this is not Abraham's first rodeo with God. And so the faith that he demonstrated, like, no matter what his humanity felt, even when the sacrifice his potential sacrifice started talking back to him, he still stayed committed to the voice of God. And that's something we can ask ourselves, like, what do we do when our sacrifice speaks back to us in the context of basically, hey, what are you doing? Where's, where's the sacrifice? Like, am I the sacrifice? So what do we do? And so Abraham, his timing, um, when God spoke, and his obedience was just— it was boom boom, like, okay, God, I hear you, I'm going. He didn't minimize God, he, he maximized God's voice in his life.. And so the second point that I wanted to focus on was 12. So verse 12 in Genesis 22, when it said, do not lay a hand on the boy, he said, do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son. So Abraham— I'll go ahead and read 13. Abraham looked up there in the thicket. He saw a ram caught by his horns. That's very important, caught by his horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. Within the message, I chose to, uh, through the power of God, focus in on verse 12 when God said, now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from me your son. So this is not God all of a sudden figuring out that Abraham— this— anytime you see in the scripture regards asking questions or scriptures like this, God is literally saying he's either asking that person a question for their own discovery, like we as coaches do, whether like you're a leadership or business coach. We ask people and we're at self-discovery for the most part. So this is more of a self-discovery thing. Like Abraham now knows that he truly fears God, and so it's in alignment. So Abraham's actions is in alignment with what God already knew. And so now Abraham has that revelation, and that's the beauty in revelation throughout scripture. It's nothing like when God brings you face to face with Revelation. And so now that we see this alignment, one of the things that, um, I noticed— not— and I heard another preacher preaching on this as well— but one thing that I like is that I don't believe— and I totally agree with this— that it was never about killing, um, Isaac in a natural sense. This was about a spiritual thing. This was about making sure that Abraham didn't minimize God in his life, that he stayed maximized in his life, that he stayed first in his life. Uh, so Isaac to me represented a good thing that could have become a bad thing if he would have became an idol in the heart of Abraham. And so whatever our Isaac is, you know, like our Isaac could be our spouse, our kids, it could be our favorite preacher, our favorite teacher, it could be our favorite worship team, uh, they don't say your song so you don't engage in it, uh, it could be our own family, extended family, it could be our job and a host of other things like things that God— our health, our, like, our wealth, just a bunch of things. Like, we can literally start idolizing these things in our heart that truthfully God intended to be good. And so now we are in error, and it's a sin because we are worshiping these things more than we are worshiping God. And so I believe God was— within the, in the context of this scripture, uh, God did not want to be minimized. He did not want to take a back seat. To being first and on the throne of Abraham's heart. And so what it was, it was about more so killing the, the spiritual, uh, part of that is basically like, hey, don't idolize him. Like, this is your greatest productivity, this is a son that I gave you, uh, but at the same time, he still doesn't come before me. And so, uh, and this is what was killed. They're like, so when Abraham was about to do it, we see Basically, hey, you know, God spoke. Do not lay a hand on the boy, he said. And that's when Abraham looked up. And so one of the beauties in verse 12 and 13 is that because of Abraham's obedience— because I'm a firm believer that, um, revelation follows obedience. Like, I don't believe that you can truly have revelation from God if you're not obeying his word, if you're not praying in communion, if you're not just truly committed to his word. I don't believe that you can have the we can't have the level of relationship that God desires us to have. And so in this, we see the obedience. Like, he's about to do it— wait, it's a ram caught in the thicket— by his horns. Remember we said, I was like, follow, pay attention, that's a very important part. I believe this is timing. I believe that if Abraham would have delayed his obedience in any type of way, that sacrifice would have got away. And I don't want to speculate anything, but You know, God probably would have done something else, but the principle of this— I believe that the sacrifice that God had that was already there— I don't believe that the ram just appeared. I believe it was time, and God had an appointed time. Okay, like, this ram is here, it's already there, I'm testing you to see if you're going to be obedient. And everything was boom boom boom. And a lot of times I believe that it can't work that way in our life because we like to engage in debate and go round-robin with God and challenge him in this area and, you know, make these empty promises and try to strong-arm God and so on and so on. And so we have to be very, very careful with that, very careful with that, with making sure that the voice of God is maximized and not minimizing our voice. So as the title of the text, Don't Minimize Me. So in the closing or second part of that message, um, as you know, we work through unpacking this, I chose to focus on, like I say, Joshua 1. Joshua 1:1-2, and using verse 6 as like kind of to tie everything off together. But the reason why I believe God led me to this one is because, uh, we all know— if you know the story of Moses, if you studied Moses, most of you would agree Moses was that dude. Like, Moses was that guy, man, from mediating things to— I mean, you know, the staff through the power of God, the parting of the Red Sea, uh, just the battle with Pharaoh, all these type of things, man. Like, truthfully Moses could have been idolized by a lot of people, but at the end of the day, he was a servant of God. You know, all the up the, uh, the mountain experience, man, knowing that he was just truly in the presence of God, it was evidence that he was in the presence of God. And so he was a great leader, and his inadequacy and all of that, through the power of God, he was a great leader called by God and served— served God. Excuse me. And so here it is that at the end of Deuteronomy, you know, the handoff is starting, that Moses dies, and we pick up in Joshua where now God is giving Joshua instructions. And so now Joshua, he can either maximize God's voice, he can minimize it. And so in that context, now we hear God speaking directly to them, speaking directly to Joshua, because he would take over as the leader and pick up where Moses left off. But like I say, Moses was such a great mentor, a great coach. And a lot of times in our life, we have great people in our life. Once again, whether it be our parents, whether it be our pastors, whether it be a great friend, a great coach, a great mentor, uh, whatever, a teacher— like, whatever that person is to you, they become a very strong voice, especially when they are like connected with God. But what's interesting in this is that although Moses was a great man because of God, uh, God wanted to now deal directly with Joshua. So, you know, the people have mourned, and I believe when I was studying this in this context, um, it was customary for like 7 days of mourning and stuff, but these people went like 30 days. But God is like, okay, enough, like it's time to get going. And one of the things that I had said, I'm gonna just read this to you, is that it wasn't until Joshua could let the voice of of Moses go so that he could hear God directly and fully live out what God gifted him to do. And so in other words, it's like what God was teaching me in this passage of scripture, as well as to relate to the people, is that a lot of times when we lose people that's near and dear to our heart, uh, that God could have placed there, or I believe that God placed there, um, our hearts a lot of times we're more attuned to the frequency. A broken heart is more attuned to the frequency of God. It's like we're searching. In most cases, uh, I do believe we are. Now, some people, they take offense to that because we live in a broken world and God gave us choice, uh, and we chose to, to break that. Um, like, they take it out on God, uh, but it shouldn't be that way because through Christ, you know, we will see these people again if they died in Christ as well as ourselves and truly accept him as the Lord and Savior. And so, uh, but now we're in, in a place as Joshua where he could get Joshua's authentic attention. And so he didn't wait till the emotions aligned, you know. Like I say, I truly believe God respects our humanity, like he understands that, but at the same time, he's not sitting up here waiting on us to say, okay, uh, I'm ready now, God, it's time for me to move forward. No, like, our emotions have to line up with what God speaks and what he desires us to do. Uh, that's just the way it is. And so, uh, it's not— if I go into a state of mourning, and no matter how great that person is, you know, like if somebody I truly love, uh, and they were close to me die, once mourning gets in the place of me walking in delayed obedience, delayed obedience, I'm now disobedient. So I'm walking in disobedience, I'm walking in slothfulness, I'm— because I'm not doing, uh, the things that God wants me to do because I'm so focused on this figure that was in my life that at the end of the day was still a servant of God. And so this is where Joshua and the Israelites are because they were about to deal with some battles, man, that were like, you know, you can get into like the walls of Jericho, the Ai, and all of that, winning battles that, uh, they should have lost, and they lost the battle they should have won because it was some stuff there. They didn't stay committed into the instruction, the voice of God, uh, not necessarily Joshua, but acting in the text. But I don't want to go there, I don't want to go there. But nevertheless, um, they were about to go through some battles and conquer things step by step. And so, um, it was very important for Joshua to maximize the voice of God. Like, he could have held on to Moses and the teachings and everything he saw in Moses, but he would not have been successful if he would have just done it with everything that he had learned from Moses without the direction and the voice of God, being connected to God, maximizing the voice of God. And so one of the other notes I made is that even the Israelites didn't hear God's voice for themselves until they lost a voice that was often louder than God's within their heart. It's that simple. God's voice has to be first. And so as we tied this up, like I said, I chose to use verse 6 within the text when, um, when God told Joshua to be strong and courageous because you will lead these people to inherit the land I God, I swore to the ancestors to give them. So in other words, is that what I take from that verse is that we want to make sure that we don't allow the enemy or nothing, like people, even great good people in our life, uh, we don't want to allow them to minimize the impact and the calling on our life. Because in the text, God didn't tell Joshua to be gifted, anointed, or none of that. Like, he didn't go on about the talents and calling that I gave you. He told him to be strong and courageous in him. Uh, so in other words, what that means to me is that it doesn't matter how anointed or what we've been called to do, uh, if we don't do what God said do, if we don't have the courage, um, to, to live out what God said and be strong and stand on the promises of the Lord. What happens is if we don't put them to use, we minimize what God wants to do through us. We minimize what he wants to do through us. He's going to do what he desires to do, like his will is going to be fulfilled. But I believe as a believer, he also desires to maximize our potential on this earth in order to carry out the things that he wants to do. So it's a choice. It's him wanting to work through us because of what our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ did and through the power of the Holy Spirit. So don't allow the enemy to minimize you. And so I want to ask you, what is God saying now? Like in that text, when I had the opportunity to teach and preach, what is God saying now? Not tomorrow, not by the end of this week. What— today is the 30th, not January 1st. But what is he saying do right now? Not by the end of next year, but right now in this moment. Because God does not want to be minimized in your life. Do not allow the enemy or anything to minimize the impact that God wants to have on your life. So I want to encourage you, man. I hope you enjoyed that. Like I said, I plan on doing these every time I have the opportunity to preach or teach the word of God and just kind of unpack the text where I'm kind of up there for about 35-40 minutes and try to just give us some substance for like, say, 15 to 20 minutes. So be blessed, man. Love you all. Uh, have a great New Year, and, uh, if you are doing any New Year's service, man, be safe, uh, and just pray and trust in the Lord.