Sunday Morning 1st Service | Fire Within: Starting the Year with Holy Momentum #2

This deliberate stillness is not passive resignation. Well, it is what it is. That's life. Guys, we weren't called to passive resignation. What he's calling us to is active trust. Positioning ourselves to freshly know. He said, be still. Let's keep that scripture up there. Be still and know. The word know is the word yada, and it means to experience intimately that he alone is God. Be still, unclench your fist, relax, and experience intimately that he alone is God. He is God. I am not. [01:22:24] (52 seconds)  #BeStillAndKnow

So spiritual habits, daily prayer, scripture meditation, fasting, worship, Guys, these are our spiritual gymnasium today. This is where we build ourselves up. There are places where our our faith muscles are built. Our spiritual endurance is developed in these places, and the freshly rekindled inner fire is protected and fueled and burns because of these moments. So just as an athlete doesn't train once and expect to stay fit forever, you can't rely on a moment. Maybe for you, it was last Sunday service. You can't rely on one altar moment alone to sustain you and to keep the fire burning within you. [01:00:04] (49 seconds)  #FaithGymDaily

Fasting I'm I'm sorry. Facing certain death in the lion's den, Daniel doesn't panic. He doesn't compromise. He continued as usual in his daily disciplines before the lord. He fixed his he had this this fixed rhythm of prayer, this habit. He had practiced it probably for decades, and it's become, by this point, an unbreakable backbone of his life. [01:05:44] (34 seconds)  #DisciplinedFaith

And he's opening his windows toward Jerusalem, and he's seeking God three times a day when there would normally be the the the sacrifices going on at the tabernacle. And so his habit was this was this quiet, but courageous resistance that was declaring before all people that his ultimate allegiance his ultimate allegiance was to Yahweh. It wasn't to a king. It was to Yahweh even at the cost of his very own life. [01:04:18] (32 seconds)  #AllegianceToGod

They hear this prophetic word from God. Well, how did they respond? More fasting and prayer. And now what it says? Then when they had fasted again and prayed till they fasted and prayed some more. When they had done that, they laid hands on the two men, and it shows how fasting not only opened their ears to hear god, but also fueled their bold action to release that fire outward. [01:14:05] (29 seconds)  #FastPrayAct

So we see now fasting, especially during seasons like this, as during our twenty one days, it unclutters the soul, it sharpens our hunger for God, it invites him to amplify the fire within us with breakthrough power, but fasting reaches its fullest potential when it's paired with another habit that I wanna talk about for a moment. And this is stepping away from the constant noise of life to meet God in the quiet, in the solitude and in the silence. [01:19:17] (31 seconds)  #FastAndSilence

It's interesting when you look at it. The Hebrew word, when it says be still, the Hebrew word, and it means to let go, to slacken, to release your grip. It carries a sense of of of releasing tense muscles or releasing a clenched fist. It's imagery that evokes surrendering control in the face of chaos. How many of you would agree that life is chaotic? [01:20:38] (28 seconds)  #LetGoBeStill

Holy habits protect and intensify the flame. We hear people say, man, they're all so on fire. Forgot. I remember being a youth pastor for years. Then we take the the teenagers to camp, and they come back and be so on fire for God. And two and three weeks later, you you pastors, we're still trying to stir it up. Keep going, guys. Keep going. Keep going. As we see the how have you have experienced the roller coaster of the fire for God in your heart sometimes? The ups and the downs, the highs and the lows. Well, guys, holy habits protect and intensify that fire within you. [00:55:21] (33 seconds)  #SustainTheFire

And so in this moment, in the midst of this ongoing worship, it says they were ministering to the Lord. This is they they they guys, they were worshiping. They were praying. They were pressing in. They were practicing the habits that we're talking about today. As they're doing that, as they're corporately fasting, what they did is they created an atmosphere of undivided focus on God rather than self. And the what happened was this intentional act of humility and spiritual hunger, it heightened their spiritual sensitivity to the holy spirit. [01:12:41] (39 seconds)  #UndividedFocus

Guys, you wanna bring this right up to today? Some of you guys worried just watching the news in the past week. If the American church could just grasp this guys, you weren't meant to fix the things that are happening on the news. Doesn't mean passive resignation. You do what the Bible says. You get on your knees and you pray. However, we tend to be so worried about what's going on. You were called to be still and know that he is God. [01:23:45] (31 seconds)  #PrayDontPanic

He says it's just slightly beneficial, but why does he say that? He guys, because here's the deal. It is important we take care of our bodies because we can't do anything for god without our bodies in this life. Amen? But he says, discipline yourself, and he's talking about our spiritual self. And he talks about godliness, and he was saying how it carries the promise for this present life. So greater peace and wisdom and resilience and faithfulness and all these different things and joy even in trials. It carries that even in this present life, but also in the life to come. [01:01:20] (35 seconds)  #DisciplineForGodliness

He established a nonnegotiable habit of extended scripture reading and prayer each morning, not only before class, even before checking his phone when he would wake up in the morning. Within weeks, he reported deeper peace, clearer guidance from the spirit, and a sustained hunger for God that carried into his relationships and into his ministry. It was a steady fuel turning the spark of his heart from that chapel encounter into a constant blaze that he that influenced those around him. [01:07:09] (30 seconds)  #MorningDevotion

And these twenty one days, as I said last week, guys, this is not just a program. This is not just a tradition here at harvest. This is, a sacred season that we set apart. We set ourselves apart, to pursue God, with intentionality, to unclutter our lives, to develop, steady, rhythms that will, sustain us with momentum. We're talking about the word momentum. Sustain us with holy momentum all year long to carry us through 2026 and far beyond. [00:53:31] (32 seconds)  #21DayMomentum

And so we've talked about that, and now we gotta talk about tending the fire. How many you know it's important to tend a fire? Now you've built a campfire maybe before, and you can get it up and you can get it blazing in just a few minutes with a little bit of kindling. But what happens if you just use kindling? Doesn't blaze too long, does it? You can get it to build up. Throw some dry leaves on top and stuff, and it'll smoke, and it'll you'll get some flames, but it's gonna burn down pretty quickly. [00:52:44] (26 seconds)  #TendTheFire

He says, stop your fan frantic striving and your self reliant efforts to fix or fight the turmoil. Guys, your place is not in the middle of the chaos. Your place is not to fix all the chaos. Your place is to be still and then know that he is god and that he's in control. [01:21:50] (23 seconds)  #BeStillNotBusy

Instead, it says that God spoke to him in a gentle whisper. The Hebrew word for whisper means a voice of thin silence, a sound of gentle stillness. Guys, holy renewal, revival often comes not in overwhelming noise but in quiet intimacy with god. [01:25:42] (30 seconds)  #QuietRevival

When we deny the bodily demands, the things our flesh is asking of us, is demanding of us, it heightens our hunger for God. We what we do is we unclutter our soul, and we create a fresh space for the holy spirit to come in and to amplify that flame into a breakthrough. [01:08:35] (23 seconds)  #UnclutterYourSoul

You know, we see the same thing in in Mark chapter chapter one. We actually see Jesus himself in this busy season of ministry. We see him rising before dawn and going away to solitary places to pray, a habit that sustained him in his perfect communion with the father. [01:06:18] (23 seconds)  #RiseAndPray