good morning church family and ministry friends i'm pastor stephen brooks welcome today to our online around the world internet church service and i'm so happy that you're here today because i believe that god's word is able to build you up to do everything that god has called you to do and very importantly to be the person that god has called you to be let's take our bibles today and go to the book of exodus chapter 35 and we're going to drop down to verse 4. i'll share something special with you that'll bless your heart verse 4 and moses spoke to all the congregation of the children of israel saying this is the thing which the lord commanded so notice that this is a direct commandment from the lord saying take from among you an offering to the lord whoever is of a willing heart let him bring it as an offering to the lord gold silver and bronze so notice that even though it was a commanded offering it still had to be done willingly with a willing heart in order for the offering to be accepted by the lord praise god we see this very similarly in first corinthians chapter 9 verse 17 where the apostle paul he's writing and says that concerning his assignment from the lord to preach the gospel he says for if i do this willingly i have a reward but if against my will i have been entrusted with stewardship so a quality offering a quality life yielded to god flows from a willing heart and it produces a what a reward that god releases into your life and one more scripture let's go over to deuteronomy chapter 28 we're all familiar with the first 14 verses pertaining to the blessing now look at verse 47 deuteronomy 28 verse 47 because you did not serve the lord your god how with joy and gladness of heart for the abundance of everything therefore you shall serve your enemies so here we have from the lord a very stern warning concerning the attitude of our hearts to do things that god would require to do them in a willingly and joyful manner praise god and i believe that according to this scripture that a lack of willingness and cheerfulness can actually in a sense corrupt our blessings that god wants to bestow upon us and greater and greater degrees excuse me praise the lord so my friends we are doing things with the willing heart and i want to say a big hallelujah and a big thank you to everyone that sowed into the hanger project praise the lord i tell you we were deeply touched here at the ministry by your sacrificial giving and it was done with a willing heart and it was done with a joyful heart praise the lord now you may say pastor stephen did you reach the goal of 400 000 well we did not reach that exact amount but i'll tell you what the giving nevertheless was quite powerful and i was just amazed by the army of the lord and their willingness to give thank you so much now this positions us for several options and i'm going to explore those options with the funds that we have and we will also hold steady and keep this project open until we actually reach that level but my friends i'm going to continue to pray about what the lord would have us do because we have a substantial amount but we want to receive god's best in the sense that we want to not force something but we want to get it just right i'm going to leave the hanger project open praise god because also people are still giving and we're going to endeavor to reach that goal and in the interim let's see what the lord can do praise god because we are in a very good position right now hallelujah and again thank you for your giving because it came from a willing heart and it came from a a heart response to a call to step through an open door of opportunity and i'm excited that as we have also given we have also prayed so let's watch and see what the lord will do and i will keep you updated from this pulpit praise the lord and one thing's for sure it's all good glory to god now let us honor the lord with the tithe the tithe belongs to him let's not give it grudgingly but let's give it with that same heart attitude of joy and also willingness and let us continue to sow seed to honor the lord and also to position ourselves for future harvest praise god now those of you that are mailing in your tithes and offerings please send them to stephen brooks international po box 717 moravian falls north carolina zip code 28654 if you would like to bring your tithes and offerings in online you can do so anywhere in the world day or night please visit the ministry website stevenbrooks.org there on the home page is a link that says give it has a red heart you can click that and it'll take you right to the landing page to bring your tithes and various offerings into the ministry praise god i want to pray for your finances and i want to pray a blessing over everyone that has sowed into the hangar thanksgiving seed offering praise the lord hallelujah i tell you my heart is truly touched by your generosity and i want to pray for you now just lift your hands heavenly father for everybody that sowed their hanger seed into the ministry father god i pray that you release a miracle anointing upon their seed sown oh father god there was such willing giving sacrificial giving and it was all done so joyfully father god bless your people with a mighty harvest father god that would truly come from you and father we thank you that as you give you give through people you give through uh special occasions where you can touch the heart of a person to cause a special blessing to be released of increase and blessing so father god bless your people let the blessing hit them from all angles and we give you all of the praise right now in advance for literally the miracle harvest that are going to come in praise god in jesus name thank you father amen and amen whoa praise the lord amen glory to god now let's take our bibles and i would like for us to go to the book of exodus exodus chapter 14. i want to show you a principle that's very important in scripture and then as we look at this we're going to just briefly look at a principle and then we're going to move right into a real life example that happened with the israelites i believe this message has a prophetic anointing upon it and i believe that it will speak to you in the place that you're at right now in your life heavenly father as we go into your word let your holy spirit come we ask right now and release wisdom and revelation anointing so that the eyes of our heart will be flooded with light so that we may know what to do in christ we thank you father god for the path being brightly illuminated that we are to walk upon and we give you all of the praise and the glory in jesus name we all agree and say amen whoo praise the lord exodus chapter 14. let's go down to verse 13. one of the most well-known stories in the bible and moses said to the people do not be afraid stand still and see the salvation of the lord which he will accomplish for you today for the egyptians whom you see today you shall again you shall see again no more forever the lord will fight for you and you shall hold your peace now verse 15 and the lord said to moses why do you cry to me tell the children of israel to go forward well that is the principle that i want us to briefly take a look at that god always has a way for you to continue to move forward sometimes it's step by step sometimes there can be what we would call big jumps or big leaps ahead but when you look at certain uh corporations particularly the ones that would be in the top 100 uh profitable corporations here within our nation you know that every year they have their directors meeting and when they get all of the directors together and they sit down and they talk about uh their profit and their loss statement and you know how they're doing they always plan for the next year with ideas and principles that they are going to incorporate to do what to make more money they never sit there they never do in any director's meeting and say you know what we had a good year last year and this year let's just uh let's just do the best we can but we'll never be able to top last year or the year before they never do that they always formulate plans of how they can move forward and have new levels of increase now the good news is that god is with his children his believers and he is able to work with you in the natural and put his super upon your natural so that you can supernaturally go forward even though you may be standing in a place where you feel hemmed in and in the natural there is no way that's why it's such a necessity to have a good understanding to know that the god that we serve is not limited by what would be going on in our country what would be going on in society what would be especially going on in the economy because with the lord he doesn't have an off day and the covenant doesn't have an off day with the lord if we walk closely with him he will always have a way for us to go forward and he did for moses we see that in verse 21 then moses stretched out his hand over the sea and the lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night and made the sea into dry land and the waters were divided so the children of israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground and the waters were walled to them on their right and on their left and my friends they went through to the other side now we already know the story the egyptians uh in their army trying to do so they all drowned because the lord caused the waters to come back as moses had stretched his staff out again and they were all of the egyptians were drowned praise the lord and now the israelites are on the other side and they do a lot of dancing a lot of praising a lot of shouting they were very very happy but of course you know doing all of that shouting and dancing out in the desert kind of creates quite a thirst so it wasn't long that the shouts of victory and the shouts of hallelujah were replaced with um where's where's the water going to come from did god bring us out here to kill us all of thirst and so began a long journey of grumbling and mumbling and complaining and things like that and then god would do a miracle and they'd shout some more and praise the lord and they had this situation of temporary memory loss where they would see god do a great miracle they would get delivered and then they'd go a little bit further and they would completely forget about such things as the red sea crossing water coming out of a rock just all kinds of miracles that god was constantly doing with the cloud the supernatural cloud over them during the day providing a means of air conditioning out in the middle of the uh hot blazing sinai desert so they had protection of that they had fire at night they had miracles all around them but my friends we are going to continue to go forward not look back to egypt we don't want to be like you know a good example would be lot's wife who looked back and she was turned into a pillar of salt what a mess my friends we're not looking back we're not saying that uh this is as far as we can go and god can't do any more no we're going to continue to move forward in the plan of god the plan that god has for us as a church in the earth and the gates of hell shall not prevail against the lord's church and also in our personal lives even with respected callings and assignments from the lord remember there is always a way forward even if it requires divine supernatural intervention praise god so that is the principle to go forward god said it and they did it now let's jump now into this principle walked out especially when uh it's actually working and you're going forward into new things new places new areas and i think it's good to prepare our hearts for this as we're stepping further and further into the canaan land some perhaps getting into the canaan land for the first time let's talk about that today as we now move into our key text and we're going to go forward and we're going to dive into the torah we're going to go into the book of deuteronomy chapter 12 and what i'm going to share with you today i don't know if you have ever heard this message preached before or these scriptures that we're going to cover now if you're a torah fan and you read your bible regularly i'm sure you have worked your way through this but also we are instructed to study god's word not just read it and breeze across it on the surface because we'll miss the gold that's lying beneath and we're going to take a look at this golden text today that we're working our way towards we're going to start in deuteronomy chapter 12 verse 1 where the scripture says these are the statutes and judgments which you shall be careful to observe in the land which the lord god of your fathers is giving you to possess all the days that you live on the earth now let's talk about the law just for a moment because that in essence is what we're looking at the unveiling of the law the law is the moral code the social code for the children of god the israelites the hebrew children and it is the foundation of society matter of fact all of the good laws that we have today all originate from the testament their testimony which would be the ten commandments and the law itself praise the lord but here's the catch um for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years men lived back in those olden days not really knowing about god and before god had revealed himself and god has always had his voices his prophets in the earth even as abraham was a friend of god but abraham was also a prophet but it was not until the giving of the law at mount sinai that people really knew what god actually required because think of it back in primitive days you were if you were walking around and you had no instruction book and you had no knowledge of god you would be wondering what is going on there's floods there's hurricanes there's tornadoes there's sickness there's disease and primitive man would think well the the gods must be angry we're having a famine right now so the rain gods must not be happy what do we need to do to appease them i don't know maybe they want some fruit and so they would sit out a watermelon and some cantaloupe or cabbage or stuff like that you know anything to do what try to make these gods happy because it seems like they're angry all the time and so you're always walking around back in those times you would be walking around wondering uh is god or whoever these gods are is this is this supernatural realm of gods or whatever mad at me or anger at me why is my child sick why did i get in the wreck why did i break my leg or whatever it might be and if they are mad at me what are their requirements so i can appease their anger and we can get along and good things happen to me and not bad things so you have to understand that's the way it was for the nations of the world and before really god revealed himself through what we know as the word of god or the torah which were the instructions of what of how to please god of who he is what his commandments are and you know what he did he spelled them all out he said here they are here's 10 of them you got to keep these 10. and here's other areas that you're going to have to focus on these two these statutes and judgments and so forth you have to keep those two and finally you have a people the hebrews that say oh okay now we know what to do while all the other nations of the world are still wandering around in spiritual darkness trying to uh to do whatever it takes to please a god even even if they think it means burning their own child then the fire giving your own child is an altar and you know you see the uh the history of some of the south american nations uh with the aztecs and so forth or the incas where they would they would take their child up on the ziggurat up on the pyramid and then you know kill the child and take the heart out and all kinds of perversion this is all stuff where people are actually man was trying to please the so-called gods and really what they're trying to do is they're trying to appease the cravings of demons so just gross spiritual darkness so so god is now talking to his people god is revealing to them what he expects of them how they are to live how they are to conduct their lives these are the statutes and judgments which you shall be careful to observe in the land which the lord your god of your fathers is giving you to possess all the days that you live on the earth okay so now you know what to do you know what god requires and there are rewards for obedience many many rewards for obedience praise god now verse 2 you shall utterly destroy all the places where the nations which you shall dispossess served their gods on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree so these pagan worshipers thought well if we get up a little higher perhaps the gods will like that or if we go beneath the green tree perhaps the gods of the trees were like that and so they had all kinds of spots and all types of locations where they would do their acts of pagan worship verse 3 and you shall destroy their altars break their sacred pillars and burn their wooden images with fire you shall cut down the carved images of their gods and destroy their names from that place you shall not worship the lord your god with such things instructions instructions instructions of how to please the lord all spelled out so that anybody can obey them praise the lord so now we know what to do verse 5. but you shall seek the place where the lord your god chooses out of all of your tribes to put his name for his dwelling place and there you shall go wow praise the lord this is very very interesting because we're about to see a major shift take place with the israelites that has not happened before again we see verse 5 but you shall seek the place where the lord your god chooses out of all your tribes now we know that that place ultimately is going to be jerusalem and all worship is going to be done there in jerusalem but guess what they have been out wandering around in the wilderness way down south in the negev even further south than that many even thinking uh what are some uh modern-day areas of saudi arabia they also wandered around in that area so they were wandering all over that place and of course when they were wondering they're all wondering together they are a very close-knit cohesive group and when they would camp everything is in a structured order you have the tabernacle in the center you've got tribes here tribes there north south east and west everybody is in their spot and if you have to go to the bathroom you go outside of the camp and there's even instructions about how you're supposed to use the bathroom and what you're supposed to do with your excrement because god knew about disease and sickness before people even had microscopes so the lord had it all figured out all you have to do is follow the instructions that he outlined for them so they've been going through the wilderness all very closely knit together they would all camp together they were all very well acquainted with each other because we all went together all three million of them all moving about together going from desert oasis to desert oasis praise the lord but you're about to see my friends here in the bible a major change why well it's about time to get across that jordan river and then things will happen very differently why once they get across the jordan river these 12 tribes are no longer going to be joined together in one little spot in one in one encampment they're going to begin to spread out and they're going to begin to each take or endeavor to take their own allotment of land so you'll have some tribes way up north you'll have some down south you'll even have some on the other side of the jordan river and then you'll have some over here by the mediterranean oh wow that's a pretty large land mass area yeah it sure is and it's going to change many of the dynamics of how worship took place among the israelites and also something that god was trying to teach them in the wilderness that they are now supposed to walk in that understanding with their newfound freedoms in the canaan land glory to god i think when you get into your canaan land and you have a new level of expansion that you haven't had before you're going to be able to look back and say ah now i see the wisdom of god of why there were certain constrictions and why there were certain difficulties that i don't have now so i want you to pay careful attention because we're not just talking history although this is very real history we're talking prophetic understanding of our lives and the journey that god has for us as followers of christ and the processes that we go through in order for god to bring us into maturity can you say amen thank you jesus all right well of course this spreading out is going to is going to greatly affect them you have some way up north some on the other side of the river as i just said so they're going to they're going to all begin to start thinking this question hey um moses where are we supposed to worship at when we get over there into the canaan land and by the way moses um not only the act of worshiping the lord and so forth but also the worshipping of our animal sacrifices are we supposed to bring them there too so give us some more information and that my friends is what's going to take place wow this is amazing look at verse 8 you shall not at all do as we are doing here today every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes i'm going to come back to that in just a moment and explain that in just a minute for as yet you have not come to the rest and the inheritance which the lord your god is giving you but when you cross over the jordan and dwell in the land which the lord your god is giving you to inherit and he gives you rest from all your enemies round about so that you dwell in safety then there will be the place where the lord your god chooses to make his name abide there you shall bring all that i command you your burnt offerings your sacrifices your tithes the heave offerings of your hand and all your choice offerings which you vow to the lord now remember before before this it was different they were out in the wilderness together oh yes they would move from place to place but also there were times where they encamped together the whole nation and in the center was the tabernacle and so if if you want to bring a sacrifice to the lord well oh you can see the tabernacle just right over there it's got the beautiful curtain around it and the priest and the levites would be working there and on the inside you had the brazen altar and then you had the brazen laver and then you had the holy place and then you had the most holy place you had that beautiful system of worship set up to please the lord according to his instructions and so if you wanted to make your sacrifice well maybe you walked 200 yards and there you are but what do you do well now maybe uh you're in northern israel maybe you're the tribe of manasseh and you're way up there and now the place of worship is way down here what do you do with all of your animals that you would like to sacrifice what about what about the tithes that you're supposed to bring to uh to honor the lord with the tithe how do you do all of this now so a major change is taking place and it's unfolding right before their eyes verse 12 and you shall rejoice before the lord your god you and your sons and your daughters see we talked about that during the the time of tides and offerings that this is something that we do of serving the lord with a joyful heart praise god okay and the levite who was within your gates since he has no portion nor inheritance with you now verse 13 again another stern warning take heed to yourself that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every place that you see but in the place which the lord chooses in one of your tribes there you shall offer your burnt offerings in there you shall do all that i command you however and here we go verse 15. however get ready major change major change from what they have been doing earlier and god's about to really free them up and i believe for many of you god's about to free you up and you're going to come into some new levels of freedom in the holy spirit and it's been something that has been planned by the lord because the lord loves you cares for you and even though you may not have even known it has always been working behind the scenes so that you live the best life that he has planned for you excuse me just a moment while i'll take a drink of water however you may slaughter and eat meat within all your gates whatever your heart desires according to the blessing of the lord your god which he has given you the unclean and the clean may eat of it of the of the gazelle and deer alike only you shall not eat the blood you shall pour it on the earth like water praise the lord now they are preparing for life in the promised land where they may not be close to the place of worship where they may not be able to bring all of these animals with them because now they live so far away so here comes the new instructions they are now permitted to eat meat without the meat first having been required to be offered as a sacrifice think about the major difference that we're dealing with right here previously if any israelite no exceptions if any israelite wanted to have a barbecue you have to understand that that that animal and these by the way god only accept it for offerings domestic animals uh he did allow them to eat other kosher meats we see here mention gazelle and deer but remember you're out in the wilderness you're way out in the desert so it's not very often that maybe you would even have a chance to kill a deer or somehow shoot an arrow and catch a gazelle that would be extremely rare so the only way that you would probably have more of an opportunity to eat meat is that if you had an animal if you had a cow or something like that and you want to have a barbecue but remember you can't just kill it start eating it you have to take that animal and first do what take it to the wilderness tabernacle you'd have to bring it to the priest and present it to them and then they would kill that animal it's a sacrifice it would kill the animal and a portion of the meat goes to the lord it's going to be burned a portion of the meat goes to the priest and levites and then with whatever is left and sometimes it might not be much you got to take that that belonged to you and you might think well this is great but see here's what you have to remember back in those days there's no refrigeration and while they did know how to make beef jerky uh this is still a rare experience to slaughter a big animal like this you know i was talking to my my son-in-law and we were having a fun conversation because he really enjoys these survivor-type shows and he watches these uh men and women that get put out in remote locations and they're just told to basically survive and they have a means of hunting perhaps as bow and arrow and uh they have to find their own food they have to build their own shelter and they have to do it in very very harsh living conditions now here's a misconception that people think they think well that's not that hard just get a bow and arrow and go out and shoot an elk or go out and shoot uh you know like a a deer or something like that and then just now and then now that you've shot it and you kill it then just you know take the meat you know skin the animal and uh and take the meat and now you have plenty of meat but it doesn't work like that in real life in real life especially if you're one person and you kill one of those animals it takes all day just to skin it and clean it and do all of that and it's extremely messy you're going to end up being covered with blood and what if you don't have running water and so that's something they have to have all of that there for the priest to set up because all of this sacrificing had to be done in a very prescribed way all of the blood had to be drained and poured on the ground that all had to be done in what we would call a kosher way which was also a very humane way of killing an animal so that the animal goes unconscious very very quickly and dies uh almost a pain-free type death praise the lord but my friends uh it's very difficult to just kill an animal and think oh we got plenty of meat no you don't have a lot of meat because it's gonna spoil within two days so you've got to eat all of it and if you're by yourself that's not possible so what do you do with all this meat well now you have you have neighbors you can give your neighbors some meat but there's other requirements of why even though the animal's already been given as a sacrifice and you've got some of it back for yourself there's still other requirements that may not allow other israelites to eat that meat i'll get into that in just a minute so i want you to see that something that was previously almost like a restriction and very very rare god's now saying this is different now you don't have to do all of that anymore he says in verse 15 however you may slaughter and eat meat within all your gates why they're spread out all over the place now in the land of canaan whatever your heart desires according to the blessing of the lord your god which he has given you meet my friends back in this time was a very very rare experience and let's talk a little bit more about this um why did god make it so hard for them to eat meat in the wilderness why did god make it where if you look at everything that he's requiring it's like a huge inconvenience to actually have a barbecue think about it for a moment what if you want to go to the tabernacle and you want to give an offering of an animal to the lord but you go to the tabernacle and there's a line maybe a long line well you've only got so much time and not only could there be this weight that delays you but also there's not that many priests and levites that are working there and they're working in a relatively small area so you've only got so many knives and you've only got you know this altar over here where the animal's going to be burned at there's only so much of an operation that they could run through here so you're limited in time scope and space but here's something that's very very important if you were ritually unclean you were richly unclean let's say you had a scab maybe the scab was kind of like not formed yet well you couldn't even go to the temple well not temple tabernacle the temple had not yet been developed but you could not go to the tabernacle if you were a lady and you were having your menstrual cycle you could not go to the tabernacle what does that mean it means that if you were richly unclean not only can you not go to the tabernacle well if you can't go to the tabernacle you can't eat meat that's exactly what that means it's it's almost like god is making it incredibly incredibly hard for them to have a barbecue and don't forget they craved meat oh they wanted meat oh so bad they wanted meat so bad well pastor stephen why is god making it so hard well there could be those random moments where maybe an israelite shot a gazelle okay that's kosher okay so they could uh kill it the proper way and they could eat that but you could not take those type of animals and offer them as a sacrifice they it was only domesticated animals that got authorized that could be sacrificed so you could possibly get some meat if maybe you were a good hunter but remember you're still out in the middle of a hot desert it's not like there's deer just walking all over the place and i've been down into the negev and uh it's just it's just desert and you know some rolling hills and baron barren area well pastor stephen there's rabbits well you can't eat rabbits not kosher the rabbit does chew the cud but the rabbit does not have a split hoof so he's he's not good to go so i remember when i grew up in mississippi it's like anything that moved was fair game but so we had no knowledge of the word of god so my grandparents said everything they'd ate they possum uh i don't think they ate skunk although i think they had tried it one time and it wasn't good well i i could imagine it wasn't but any type of bird just about they would eat uh even an uh what we would call an unclean bird uh they didn't eat vultures but they they ate some other things that uh you know creepy stuff so we ate squirrels and uh you know i used to catch them too not when i say catch them i'd shoot them and i'd bring them to my grandmother and uh she would cook it but sometimes i'd have to do all the skinning and if i shot it with buckshot get all the little buckshot pieces out of it and uh you know get it all cleaned up and throw away the part you're not going to use and keep the meat and then she'd go cook it and fry it or something like that and all of those non-kosher items i never did like anyhow because they never tasted good no matter how much um no matter how deep fried they were or how much seasoning was put on them uh it never tasted good to me but uh we we just didn't know these types of things that god designed for a higher quality of living and long-term health praise the lord nevertheless nevertheless we did have uh various things that we could hunt you know we had a lot of deer and we had a lot of fish and so we lived off a lot of that praise the lord but my friends the israelites it was tough it was tough there's hardly any meat anywhere except for their own animals and yet it's now god's made it so hard for us to have a barbecue we have to go through all these rules and regulations and it's blocking us from eating meat the thing they craved hmm it's very very interesting praise god why was god making it so hard for them to have a barbecue it was it because god's not happy is it because god's in a bad mood it's because god doesn't want them to have their hearts desire no here's the reason why here's the main reason he's trying to keep them from decimating their flocks because the little animals they have if they just start eating them because they love meat so much they're gonna they're gonna consume all of their livestock and it's the animals that are producing uh you know you have goats goats produce all kinds of things you could even make clothing out of their their hair and some of the items in the temple that were woven were woven with goat's hair and others with other types of uh animals hair but you know goats also make really good cheese all kinds of things they're producing so you don't want to kill your your goats because you need them and you don't want to kill your cows you've only got so many of them and you know of course every now and then you know you can kill one but it's not like we've got a lot of them so god is trying to hold them back hold them back why because he knows later they're going to have plenty of freedom plenty of expansion and then they can be free but right now there has to be a very high level of self-control because we are in areas where god is preparing us and teaching us to walk in the fruit of the holy spirit now they didn't know about what we would call the fruit of the holy spirit of love joy peace patience kindness goodness gentleness faithfulness and self-control but god was trying to get them to get control of their passions and get control of their appetites even though god wanted them to have good meals but these were times where god is training them and trying to teach them certain things that are very very very important for them to understand let's move forward verse 19 take heed to yourself that you do not forsake the levite as long as you live in your land the levite back in that those days you of course would work at the at the tabernacle system doing all kinds of tours and stuff like that and they would basically assist the priest the priests were the only ones allowed to actually carry out the sacrifices and those specific acts of worship but it's basically saying here incense from the new testament looking back the same take care of the ministers take care of the ministers because we have to make sure they are taken care of because that's their whole focus now a major shift is happening god is going to move them from being almost like bedouins walking through the desert and he's going to move them into an agricultural society and that's part of god's plan he already has got it mapped out for them there's the seven feast the seven feasts all revolve around the growing and producing of crops and all of this beautiful agriculture so that's what god is setting them up for but he's got to get them into the canaan land to experience that so this whole measure of dialing things down is done on purpose so they don't eat all of their animals now they're walking around in the desert and there's no milk there's no cheese or anything like that restrictions of all sorts god's trying to help them just as much as possible but my friends during times like this you have to praise the lord hallelujah you might not always be at the five-star steakhouse and if you're a vegetarian you might not always be able to get the organic gourmet veggie meals you might not always have access to certain things well i'll tell you one thing pastor steve but if i don't get it there's going to be some noise around here no that's what god is trying to work out of you he's trying to work self-control in you because he knows where you're going he's taking you to a place of abundance and the last thing he wants you to do is when you get into the place of abundance it's just to throw off all restraint because now that you're here and have access to it you're going to go hog wild praise the lord so the lord is working for our good every day of our lives verse 20 when the lord your god enlarges your border as he has promised you now he's going to do that just like he promised them these are all types and shadows the apostle paul said these are all experiences that are for our learning our betterment we can look at their lives because we were following a spiritual course and the lord was going to enlarge their border he's going to do the same thing for you whoa he's going to do the same thing for you just as he promised when the lord your god enlarges your border as he has promised you and you say let me eat meat because you long to eat meat you may eat as much meat as your heart desires when's the last time you ever heard a preacher preach a service or a message on you can have just as much meat as your heart desires brethren sisters in the lord after the sermon i encourage you to go and just wipe out the steak buffet go and have two filet mignons and then for dinner later tonight have three cheeseburgers well this is fascinating the lord says if you say let me eat meat because you long to eat meat the lord says you may eat as much meat as your heart desires wow pastor stephen watch out i've got the green light from the lord i'm about to go totally out of control well remember you are going into the canaan land now when you come into the blessing when you come into the canaan land and you begin to take your land possessing the promises of god through faith and patience what you're going to begin to experience some of you it's going to be brand new you're going to begin to experience what i would call breathing room hallelujah you're going to start to have extra you're going to start to have strength you're going to start to have these new levels of creativity that you can express because now you have extra money you have extra resources and you have extra help and so now you're like now you're able to live hallelujah so what do you do in places like that well you want to exercise self-control and i know that even those that would be out in the world that do not profess christ as their savior yet the lord has worked through certain individuals to accomplish certain things to bring certain technologies into the earth that were in harmony with the will of god think about bill gates just for a moment who brought us the you know laptop computer and microsoft word and many other contributions to the realm of computers i saw an interview one time when bill gates was asked mr gates what's it like being a multi-billionaire at that time he was the wealthiest man in the world of course he's not anymore but they asked him what's it like being a multi-billionaire and you know the interviewer was kind of like asking like he has no idea no concept of what it must be like to have all this money have all of this freedom to do anything literally let you want and so he asked him what's it like to be a multi-billionaire you know what bill gates said he said it's just another hamburger now stop and think about that just for a moment there's a lot of wisdom in that even though he does not profess christ is lord there's a lot of wisdom in that answer pastor stephen i crave meat maybe i'm jewish and i don't know it maybe i'm an israelite i've never known it i crave meat okay now i want to show you something that will help you turn back to verse 8. i told you we'd come back to this verse 8 you shall not at all do as we are doing here today every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes here is the problem god had previously told them if you want to eat meat previously if you wanted to have your barbecue first bring the animal to the tabernacle let the priest take it through the ritual sacrifice that i require to be done the proper way the priest will take their portion because they do this full time they have to eat also they're going to get some of the meat then another part of that meat is going to go onto the altar the holy altar it will be burnt by fire then what's left comes back to you but you had those that still wouldn't obey that they're like well that's too much trouble look at that line i can't wait in a line like that to get to the tabernacle i'm going to take my cow out behind this rock and i'm going to kill it and i'm going to eat it myself and that's what many of them did they did their own thing and the lord says we can't be doing this type of thing anymore all of you need to stop doing that and it was wrong that you did it but you're coming into a new place where you must get control of your cravings praise the lord nothing wrong with meat we clearly see here that the lord said you can have as much as your heart desires but let's not limit it to barbecue or meat because perhaps a vegetarian is listening to me and they're thinking this doesn't really pertain to me pastor stephen i don't crave meat well it doesn't matter whether it's a hamburger or a filet mignon or pair of shoes um remember the lady that was the uh the wife of the prime minister of the philippines some decades back and uh you know you had many uh many people in the country that were starving didn't have enough food but yet when that lady was kicked out of office they found out that she had something like uh like 50 000 pairs of shoes pastor steven that's a serious craving for shoes yeah and you can only wear one or two pairs a day but yet she had thousands and thousands and thousands of pairs of shoes and just had a craving craving for shoes what what are shoes they're they're just shoes it's like bill gates said it's just it's just another hamburger my friends you have to look at life from an eternal perspective you're only here for a while and that it passes very very quickly and even if you are a multi-billionaire and you get a big big yacht that's you know longer than a football field and costs 500 million dollars well you're only going to live what what 30 more years if you're 60 you've only got what maybe 22 or 25 more years and then your whole life is over and then you step into eternity it all goes very very quickly and not only that you get on the yacht you get seasick it's just people do all kinds of crazy things they think this is it meat and the israelites it's all about meat we want meat we crave meat and god's like look i don't have any problem with meat and when you get into the canaan land you can have all of the meat you want you don't have to go to the tabernacle anymore you can eat it right there in your own house and somebody says i'm gonna develop a barbecue grill i'm gonna make a fortune and people are still making money today by developing different types of grills and cooking methods and cookbooks and stuff like that and it's all good it's all fine but it's also all what it's just all it's still just all meat there there is a certain level of a ceiling a maximum level you can just only have so much fun with meat or anything else that's why you need god that's why you need god don't go wild over meat don't go wild over shoes nothing wrong with shoes have as much meat have as many shoes as you want but really when your heart is totally into god and keeping his commandments you realize i don't need fifty thousand pairs of fuse unless you're wanting to sow what if that lady would have said i've got all these shoes i i didn't know the lord and i went crazy and lusted and craved shoes now she gets saved boy i could i could just so i could sow like 40 000 of them and still have 10 000 for myself you know i'm just saying that we have to look at this from the way the lord develops us i want my freedom pastor stephen i want to get in that land of canaan because i've got some things to do that's good god's going to take you there and when you're there and you start to conquer and you start to have this new freedom and you start to have this new uh prosperity and you have the ability now to have all the meat you want remember to put the lord first and remember that it's not just about freedom i can do this now i can do that you can do anything you want in a sense no as long as it's not going against the word of god and so you have a very wide latitude of liberty and freedom in christ but you want to watch out for cravings you want to watch out for things that will just engulf your time and steer your heart away from the lord praise you lord jesus thank you lord so the lord loved his people the children of israel when they went through the wilderness and the land of snakes and scorpions and blistering heat and he protected them from all of that now they had some problems with their rebellion where the snakes came out and did a whole lot of biting and a bunch of people died but outside of that all the lord was trying to do was take care of them reveal himself to them and that's what some of them caught they caught a god that they could actually know when i say caught i'm talking about caught the revelation god i can know you how through obeying your commandments the walking in the light of your word and now that the holy spirit lives on the inside of us as believers in christ we have the word of god written upon the fleshly tablets of our heart not written on hard stone and so many of their hearts were like stone they never understood the uh the love of god it was all about craving and satisfying those cravings and it grieved the lord's heart and then for so many of them they didn't understand how to please the lord by faith in his word not just a blind random faith a faith in what god said god will take care of us god is a good god and as we walk with him and obey him his blessings overtake us and that sin is dangerous stay away from it praise the lord my friends you're coming into your promised land when you get there and you have those freedoms watch out for cravings that would try to pull you into a place of excess where now it's no longer a freedom or liberty now watch out it's a bondage [Music] praise the lord glory to the lord glory to the lord now this is why you must move forward this is why you need to cross the jordan river why because of the expansive freedom of the wide open areas of your ability now to develop into the fullness of what god has for you you i mean they're coming now into land ownership they're going to have their own homes they're going to have their own vineyards they're going to have all of this stuff they've never had before it's like they were like i had said earlier bedouins just walking around from oasis to oasis and just wandering and wandering look they're coming to the place all of that's over and it's all because of the goodness of the lord so you must move forward you must not let a spirit of contentment just hold you back where you don't get into the promised canaan land glory to the lord so keep moving keep moving today keep moving right now and as it opens up this expansion in the canaan land honor the lord stay close to the lord you'll see all kinds of forms of idolatry and the breaking of god's commandments all around you by those in the world you see it every day you hear it every day but you stay close to the lord because this is a lot more this is a lot more than just having freedom or just the ability to go out and eat a steak anytime you want this is the freedom to serve the lord to worship the lord and god took them into the seven feast and how out of those seven feasts three of them all males aged 20 and over are all required to go to jerusalem and god again made it so good because he loves them so much and he knows their humanity knows what they're dealing with he said look if you've got too many cattle and the journey is too far sell the cattle and take the money take the tithe out of the money and bring that to the place where you're supposed to worship me at in other words the lord's not trying to say now bring your 300 cattle and take them through the desert and get them over here somehow and if you don't you're in big trouble he made all kinds of concessions for them to make it as easy as possible to come why so they can engage in worship and obey the lord praise god because the feasts were festivals it's all about rejoicing diving into the word of god coming up to jerusalem having the priest teach you just a time to rejoice in the lord have a nice meal have some more barbecue praise god but it's all about getting closer to the lord because we're only on this planet for a short period of time hallelujah we must not be distracted even by good old barbecue praise the lord we all have our things that we can be passionate about but make sure that nothing ever would supplant the place of the lord jesus and your worship and devotion to him first we live in the culture and society where there's options all over the place just like for them like barbecue stores start barbecue restaurants start popping up all over the place and they're probably thinking this is the greatest thing we we knew that moses said the land of canaan would be good we never knew that there were barbecue restaurants here wow and that's all good that's all fine but watch out for cravings that would try to get you into places of excess that actually ensnare you and then trap you and it's not a freedom anymore but now it's a bondage lift your hands father i pray for your people freedom and the fullness of the canaan land experience where lord they can have as much meat as you want lord that's what you said you could have as much meat as you want so father i thank you for freedom i thank you for joy i thank you for these various expressions of liberty whether it's now a big barbecue or whatever it might be let your people prosper and flourish but let them always keep you first lest we end up like the pagans worshiping under some green tree or on top of a hill somewhere and going back into darkness and spiritual death father we choose life we thank you and father we thank you that your spirit writes your words your instructions upon our hearts so everywhere we go 24 7 we are endeavoring to please you and bring you honor and glory father we thank you that even as paul said life is the kingdom of god is not about food and drink it's about righteousness peace and joy in the holy spirit so father help us always see the bigger picture which is christ father bless your people in jesus name we pray amen glory to god [Laughter] now if you're watching this program this message and you don't know christ is your lord and savior i know perhaps that you think this was a message on barbecue but this is a message on walking with christ if you don't know him it begins with the salvation experience by being born again if you would like to receive jesus as your lord and savior and receive deliverance from sin spiritual death and a place that's called hell more horrible than any person could ever imagine receive christ right now into your heart pray this prayer say jesus i give my life to you come into my heart save me now create a clean heart a new heart in me a soft heart thank you jesus write my name in your book of life thank you for saving me in your name i pray amen and amen praise god welcome to the family of god those of you that have prayed that prayer for the first time now as a church family let's take holy communion together praise the lord i'd like to encourage you to grab some unleavened bread i use these little wafers if you don't have one of these you can get a little cracker something like that something similar and here i have grape juice if you don't have grape juice until you get some you can use something else to temporarily suffice praise the lord let's pray heavenly father we thank you for jesus and his mighty sacrifice upon calvary for the full redemption of our sins as we have put our faith and trust in him father we now bless the bread the juice and through this prayer we set it apart as being holy we thank you that this is now the flesh and the blood of our savior the lord jesus christ the messiah the mashiach the savior of the world and father as we receive the flesh of the lord jesus we thank you that to the pure all things are pure and to the ungodly everything's perverted but oh god we're going on with you walking in truth and righteousness father let us beware of cravings even good cravings and and let the fruit of the spirit of self-control be exercised in our lives in a way that brings you glory thank you father father we that many times that means letting others go first thank you father god we give you praise we thank you we receive the flesh of the lord jesus now and his name amen let's receive say i'm going forward and to my canaan land heavenly father thank you for the blood of jesus we thank you for cleansing from all sin and all unrighteousness and father we have sinned against anyone we ask that you would forgive us and if anybody has sinned against us we forgive them father in christ's name hallelujah and father we thank you for the blood of jesus we thank you father god for the crucifixion of the adamic self nature that would try to rise up and get us to crave excessively but father we give you praise we thank you that even even through the wilderness you loved your people and you were with them but father so many died because of their unbelief and they perished never seen the promised land but father we just thank you for taking us in by your grace we thank you there's grace for grace we thank you o god for your goodness upon our lives we give you all of the praise in jesus name amen let's receive the blood of christ praise the lord well pastor stephen what should i do now after having heard the word of god well perhaps you want to go have a nice steak praise the lord or whatever your heart would desire long as it glorifies god long as is within the parameters of scripture and enjoy yourself jesus said my yoke is easy my burden is light hallelujah and as you're enjoying your life and enjoying the wonderful journey always remember we're only here for a very fleeting period of time you know um before my father passed away he said stephen he said it just seemed like yesterday now he told me this when he was in his late 70s he said it just seemed like yesterday when i was a little boy carving my initials into the tree with a little pocket knife and i i know that where that tree is at my dad and his brother two other brothers my dad uh has two brothers so i've got two uncles they they all carved their initials into the tree and he said it just seems like yesterday but yet it was over 70 plus years and now he's gone on to be with the lord my friend's life is very fleeting live for the lord jesus christ enjoy life but never forget life is a lot more than just a good barbecue hallelujah father bless your people we give you praise in jesus great name amen and amen i'll see you back next time