Heed, Hold, Run - Pastor Crystal Rasmussen

Proverbs ten seventeen says whoever heeds instruction is on the path to life. This path to life is not a sprint, it's a marathon and it's won by those who show up day and day and day after day after day. It's the one that puts in the work. And sometimes obedience means saying no to the good things to protect the best things. Come on. Yeah. Yes. Obedience means sometimes saying no to the good things to protect the best things. And when we say best, it's not in a worldly way, it's his best. What he has for us. How many of you wanna say no to the good things? No? Nobody? Okay. [01:20:04] (53 seconds)  #MarathonOfObedience

Sometimes that happens. Sometimes even though he says he'll never leave us nor forsake us, sometimes it feels like he has left. Sometimes can we admit that sometimes we feel like, where are you, God? Yes. Let's be real. Let's be real. But he's trying to teach us something in that. Yeah. Yeah. He's trying to teach us to seek him more indifferently, more consistently, to go to deeper levels, to throw off things that may be standing in the way. It's like I I wanna speak to you, but but you have your phone in front of you. It's blocking the the direct line. You have this person speaking into you. Yeah. It's good. So I I can't there's no like three way here. It's blocking. He's calling us into that deeper intimacy with him. [01:19:07] (57 seconds)  #PursueHisPresence

Moses wasn't asking them to believe in any type of philosophy or any type of external thing. He was asking them to believe in the things that they had seen with their own eyes and experienced. And that is what the Lord is asking us to do. He's not asking us to to believe the things that the world is saying, he's saying what what am I saying? What have I showed you? How have I been faithful in your life? He pointed out the things that their eyes had seen, plagues, the parting waters, the pillars of fire, manna. This wasn't just some theory. It wasn't just some theory that God is faithful. No. It was the evident truth of his faithfulness time and time and time again. [01:07:06] (45 seconds)  #RememberHisFaithfulness

Again, I even encourage the body this morning. Let's not be caught up in what social media has to say. Let's not be caught up in what, other people have to say about what is going on in the world because we can get distracted. We can get caught up. We can get fearful. God has mandated us to do something. He says, remember what I have done and teach your children and your children's children because the time is short and the time is at hand. He's saying, heed, listen, pay attention. Be careful. Guard your heart. It's not casual advice. Be diligent guarding your heart. [01:04:02] (44 seconds)  #GuardYourHeart

And I was thinking as I was worshiping and just praying to the Lord of that declaration of saying I am available and and what does that what does that mean? It means at all costs. It means withholding nothing. When you say you are available to the Lord, you literally are stripping off the weight. You literally are stripping off everything. Our own desires, our own wants, our own everything that we could perceive in our natural mind, we say and put it to the side and say, no, I'm available for whatever it is that you've called me to. Lord, [00:54:12] (41 seconds)  #AllInForGod

What are those gods that we have put up before? What are some things that stand in the way from us allowing God to be the ultimate and on the throne? He says, you will be scattered. Don't forget, you will be scattered. Don't have spiritual amnesia. Don't forget the things that the Lord has done as we're preparing to move forward. There's a promise. If you keep reading in in Deuteronomy four, there's a promise. But if but if from here you seek the Lord your God, you will find him. If you seek him with all your heart and all your soul, you will find him. There's a promise there. There's a promise for us. [01:26:10] (47 seconds)  #SeekHimWithAllYourHeart

And I love that she doesn't ask permission to do what she's doing. She doesn't need to. There's no religious thing that needs to stop her from going out and saying, hey, I was lost but now I'm found. I was set free. But are we set free? It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. And I said this on Wednesday, why does it need to say that? Why do we need to say it's for freedom? If he's if it's for free and that he set us free, like, that should be obvious, but we're not all free. But it's saying, it was for freedom. Yeah. So be free. Yeah. Be free. Walk in it. Yeah. Yeah. [01:17:03] (50 seconds)  #WalkInFreedom

Moses was standing before and and talking. He was talking to the Israelites. He was encouraging them to remember the things that God had taught them. He was we know about the Israelites, the the grumbling, the complaining, them being, you know, in the wilderness for as long as they were. And and that's a a word to us as Christians, as believers of God to understand that we don't wanna be circling and circling and circling. God has called us, he's mandated us to be able to remember the things that he has done, to be able to declare his goodness, to be able to to teach our children and our children's children in generations to come. [01:02:57] (43 seconds)  #PassOnFaith