I want to invite your attention
to the book of Judges, chapter 7. Try to give these messages
a title to give you a clue of where we're going. I thought
about calling this message, Why God Doesn't Use Big Shots. But
I want to give you reasons for thinking we're going to be key
players in taking this city for Christ. That'll be the subject.
Much nicer, maybe. Reasons for thinking we're going
to be key players in taking this city for Christ. Judges chapter
7. This is the story of Gideon and
the enemies of God and the people of God, the Midianites. I'm going
to just read one verse for now. Verse 2, And the Lord said unto
Gideon, you have too many folks with you. You have too many. There's too many of you to win
this battle, because if you do with this many soldiers, you
win. You will vaunt yourself, lest
you vaunt yourself, which means to boast in yourself. You will
want yourself against me and you will say, my own hand has
saved me. This city is ours. It's ours. And we will, as the
instrument of God, turn it upside down. I'm sure of that. Clutch cargo will be purchased.
And I suspect soon, a miracle of God's providence is going
to take place. Something I have longed for,
for over 50 years. To see a great manifestation
of the presence and the power of God. Where people couldn't
help but say, this is a God thing. Hundreds of church addicts, drug
addicts, good people, bad people, pimps and prostitutes will come
to know the living Christ. And I'm sure of it and believe
that I will live to see it. Neighbors will be transformed.
Blight removed. Children will play in the streets
of Pontiac again, and neighbors will help neighbors. Commerce
will awaken its sleepy head, and Oakland County's county seat
will live again, and all because of God. Now, with that being said, I
hope You now know I believe it and suspect that we're going
to see some things we've never seen. Wonderful things. Mighty things. Marvelous things.
Miracles. The presence of God. But it's
not in the nature of God to use big shots. So if you're here
in a big shot, You need to get out of our way and go somewhere
else. God doesn't use big shots. And there's a reason God doesn't
use big shots. Because big shots think they
did it. So, if you're here and professing yourself a Christian
and think yourself to be something, God will never use you. Until
first, He takes you down. God never uses anybody He hasn't
first taken down. God's going to take you down.
You can't think more of yourself than you ought. If you're here
today, and a Christian, and you came over to do us a favor by
visiting the inner city church, and you think you're better than
the person you're sitting next to, God isn't going to use you. You say, well, Pastor, that wasn't
very nice to our visitors. It doesn't make any difference
whether you're a visitor or you come here every Sunday. God doesn't
use big shots. Because God has a motive in doing
what He does. And that motive is that He receives
all the glory. If I were you, and wanting to
be used of God, I would stop trying to make myself a big shot.
Let him that thinketh he standeth Take heed lest he fall. I want you to go to the book
of Daniel with me. Keep hold of judges there. But
let's go over to the book of Daniel and. We'll read about
a gentleman who wanted to be a big shot and thought he was
in Daniel, chapter four. Let's begin with verse twenty
nine. And all this came upon King Nebuchadnezzar. At the end of twelve months,
he walked in the palace of the kingdom of Babylon. And the king
spake and said, Is not this great Babylon that I have built for
the house of the kingdom by the might of my power and for the
honor of my majesty? Well, how do you do? While the
word was in the king's mouth, there fell a voice from heaven
saying, O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken, the kingdom
is departed from thee. God giveth and God taketh away.
And he can take it away quick. And they shall drive thee from
men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field.
They shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall
pass over thee, until thou know that the Most High ruleth in
the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will. The
same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar, and he was
driven from men, and did eat grass as oxen." Before God uses
you, He's going to have you quit smoking grass and eat it. And let you know who you are. And his body was wet with the
dew of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagle's feathers,
and his nails like bird claws. And at the end of the days, I,
Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes unto heaven. My understanding
returned unto me. So, if you think you're something
when you're nothing, you're just crazy. That's all. You have no
understanding. And I blessed the Most High.
When I got understanding, I blessed the Most High. And I praised
and honored Him that liveth forever. whose dominion is an everlasting
dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation,
and all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. And he doeth according to his
will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of this
earth, and none can stay his hand or say unto him, What doest
thou? At the same time, my reason returned
unto me." Understanding and reason. And for the glory of my kingdom,
my honor and brightness returned unto me, and my counselors and
my lords sought unto me, and I was established in my kingdom,
and excellent majesty was added unto me. Now I, Nebuchadnezzar,
praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, all whose works
are truth, and his ways judgment, and those that walk in pride
he is able to abase. God is concerned about this thing
of vaunting, of self-glory, of self-praise. The true child of
God who has been taught the message of the Bible says this, I am
what I am by the grace of God. I had nothing to do with it.
It was God and God alone. More wannabes in religion than
any place I know. You want to be a reverend. You
know, I told you before, we have 420 churches here in Pontiac. This ought to be the most holy
city in the world. And about one out of every 10
is a bishop, a preacher, a reverend, a right reverend, wearing their
collar backwards and their black robes and driving the black Lincoln
and have a Stetson on their head. Here in our city, in Pontiac,
we have the most honorable right reverends, the bishops. And then I come to find out that
the bishop has done nothing but got a little storefront building
And he and his wife and five kids and aunt, 85 years old,
and two uncles start playing church. Does anybody know what
I'm talking about here? Oh, you're the right Reverend
Bishop. You have the storefront building and just you and your
family. You don't want to be. Say, well,
Pastor, what are you doing? You seem pretty negative. All
I'm saying is this. If you want to be something,
God's never going to use you. You have to be nothing. You have to be nothing. You see,
God uses nothing and does something. Wannabes. Wannabes have never eaten grass. You got to eat grass. If you
eat grass, I mean, have you been brought down? Some of you are
in the process of being brought down. You just don't get it yet.
In order to bring you down, you got to using drugs and then you
got arrested and went to prison. And since you got out, you're
still a wannabe. Only now you've got out and you've
found some religion, and you're always quoting Scripture, and
your desire is now to be a reverend. Get you a little group together.
Does anybody in here know what I'm talking about? And then the
next thing you know, it's, uh, I'm Reverend so-and-so, and this
is the First Lady. How many people are you talking
to? Well, let's see, there's Aunt Susie and there's the five
kids that we had together. And then, you know, those are
wannabes. I can kind of feel the tension
in here a little bit because everybody in here knows a wannabe. You're well acquainted with religion.
Bible thumpers. People who just want the spotlight.
The reason you want to be a reverend and the first lady or whatever
you're doing in religion is because you want some attention. You
want to be somebody. Many of you look up here and
you see me or one of the elders speaking and all eyes are glued
on the preacher except those who've gone to sleep. And you're
thinking something like this, man, that's for me. Next thing
I know, you've got your doctorate sent to you from California in
religious education. And you paid $50 for somebody
to ordain you. That's a wannabe. You haven't
eaten grass. God's going to take you to the
pastor before he makes you a pastor. Because people in the pulpit
must know that they're nothing but a hammer in the hand of God. The hammer never takes any praise
or glory. And I'm going to tell you this
too. The person I'm afraid of the most is me. I don't trust
me. I don't believe in me. But I do trust God. And I believe
in God. And then there's wannabes who
I believe are Christians, but they're like Jack in the box.
God shuts the box, and for a little while it's like, give God all
the glory and all the praise. Then the next thing you know,
Jack is out of the box again. Always wanting to fill that empty
spot with some praise and glory. If you want to be used of God,
be honest about yourself. Be truthful about yourself. Look
at yourself. You can't be somebody unless
you're a nobody. If you don't stay a nobody, you'll
never be a somebody. There was a lady in the Gospel
of Luke, the eighth chapter, and for twelve years, she had
an issue of blood and she'd gone to all the doctors. And she'd
spent all the money she had, and she was none the better.
And she heard about Jesus. She was at her rope's end. She
was a nobody. And through the power of the
Spirit of God, she heard about Jesus. And she said to herself,
I will sneak up on Him. And I will touch the hem of His
garment. If I can just touch the hem of
His garment, I'll be made whole. And so, she began to seek Him
out. She found Him in a crowd of people.
The disciples were there. He was bumping shoulders with
a massive crowd. She slipped through the crowd.
Got down real low. Put her hand through the crowd.
and touched the hem of his garment. And she was made whole. Now watch
this. And Jesus said, Somebody touch
me! And Simon Peter, the wannabe,
said, Now let me explain this to you, Lord. You're in a massive
crowd here. Everybody's bumping up against
you. Do you get it, Lord? And you say, Somebody touch me. Isn't it wonderful to have a
Simon Peter around who knows more than the Lord? And Jesus said it again, somebody
touched me. He was calling her out. Where
are you, somebody? And so the nobody became a somebody. And that's the way it works.
And that's the way it is. 1 Corinthians 1 and verse 26 says,
you see how that not many mighty, not many noble are called or
chosen. See, God has chosen the nobodies
of this world. God has chosen people that the
world never even recognized. They'd never know if you died. Those are the people that God
uses in a mighty way. In a mighty way. I'm going somewhere.
I'll get there in a minute. The base ones, the weak ones,
the low born ones, even the despised ones. People of wealth and education
and people who have the things of this world look at some other
folks and go, how sickening. Those are the ones God uses.
The ones that make other people sick. He's a mighty God. Here's a wannabe. I don't think
the devil wants me to preach this today. God, I'm so grateful
to you. And, of course, me. The Bible
says he prayed with himself, this guy. I thank thee, God,
that I'm not as other men are. Never smoked any crack. Never
used any drugs. I thank thee that I'm not as
And, you know, Lord, I tithe. I give you money. I've never committed adultery.
This guy's stuck on himself. And the Bible says that the somebody
was the publican who stood afar off and wouldn't even raise his
head and said, God, be merciful to
me, the sinner. Those are the kind of people
God saves. People who are not wanting what they deserve, but
mercy. Amen. Anybody here know you are a scuzzbag,
scumbag, no good for nothing? And you need mercy. You know,
I think if you know that, God's revealed it to you. And I suspect
God is going to use you in a mighty way. Because that's the kind
of folks God uses. You see, little is much when
God is in it. Actually, here's my whole point. And I suspect if God was going
to use a church in Oakland County, I mean, if He is looking for
a bunch of nobodies, He might just come over here. Because nobody is suspecting
that this church is going to turn the city upside down. How'd they get that clutch cargo?
That bunch of pimps, prostitutes, and church addicts, and drunks. That's right. That's right. Think about it. Think about it.
This would be just like God. to come in here in all of our
mess. There are no giant Christians
in this church, including the pastor. We're all just a bunch
of mess-ups. You see, there'll be no vaunting
before God. Now, let's go back over there
to the book of Judges, because I want to tell you this story.
I think it kind of drives home what I'm trying to say. God had
permitted Gideon to get up a big army, a whole big army together
to fight the Medianites and the Amalekites. And God said, you
know, you just got too many men. You just got too many. If you
read this whole chapter, you'll find out that the Midianites
and the Amalekites, the Bible says that their army was like
grasshoppers in a field. That means there was a whole
lot of them. And their camels couldn't be numbered. So that's what Gideon was facing. So he got him up, you know, a
pretty good army. And God said, no, we're going
to have to cut your army down. Because if you go in there with
this army and per adventure you win, you'll think you did it.
So instead of 10, 15,000, here's what we're going to do. We're
going to make the army really thirsty. And when they go to
drink, everyone that laps like a dog, you can read it when you
get home today, we'll take them in the army. I don't know what
that laughing like. God uses dogs, doesn't he? Not
real sophisticated. Three hundred of them. Three
hundred of them. Now, watch this. And God said,
now, I want you to take those three hundred and give them all
a pitcher. and a trumpet and a candle. Now, wait a minute. Medianites
are like grasshoppers. They have innumerable camels. They're men of war. You cut my
army down to 300, and then you tell me you're going to fight
them with a pitcher, a candle, and a trumpet. That's right. Okay. So, the story goes that
Gideon divided these 300 men into three companies and they
surrounded the Midianites. That'd be about the number that's
in here. And they all have this trumpet and the pitcher and the
candle. And Gideon says, now when I tell
you, light the candle and blow the trumpet and scream. And you know what happened? The
Midianites took off. All of them took off. And the
victory was won by the silliest means. So that Israel would not
vaunt itself. You know, people can't explain
this church. Now, wait a minute. People cannot
explain Charles Cooper. Duane and Vanessa. People can't
explain that. How did that happen? The devil
has, or Wanda, thank you. People cannot explain that. How did that happen? Oh, with
a picture and a candle and a trumpet. How did that happen? Oh, it was
through the person of Christ dying on a cross, shedding His
blood. It was that gory bloodshedding
of Jesus Christ that bought me, sought me, and caught me. It
was to God be the glory. Even you say, only God could
have done this to me. I was as crazy as a June bug
in July. Let me tell you just a little bit
of history about this place. That's why this preacher. Is God glory every day. I want
to tell you a little bit about this place. Our numbers cannot
compare with larger churches. I mean, there's some big churches
around. This is Oakland County, you know. There's some big churches. There are bigger churches in
the city of Pontiac. We can't compare with them. And
there are big churches who are now coming to Pontiac. They sense
something's going on, so they're moving in. And that's fine with
me. That's perfectly fine with me for them to come into Pontiac
if they preach the gospel. If they don't preach the gospel,
I wish they'd stay out. But if they preach the gospel,
they're welcome to come in. You know, 26 years ago. There
was no Grace Gospel Fellowship in this city. We were over in
Sterling Heights. Meeting in a school building.
We're about 33 years old, but I remember how God We started
in a little family room of the Jumps, about 10 or 12 of us meeting
there. Then we got bigger and bigger,
and then we had a fuss and split, and then some of us moved over
here, about 20 of us. And we started meeting in the
chapel over at Grace Centers of Hope, which was Pontiac Rescue
Mission then. As time went along, we tried
to buy this building, we bought this building, and we were going
to turn it into a women and children's shelter. Still no church, no
church here, no church building. And the city fought us and denied
us a permit to put a women and children's shelter in this building,
which was, we fought and fought and fought and fought and fought,
and they denied it. And the church came in here.
Grace Gospel Fellowship. And we were a scrawny little
bunch meeting in here. I mean, you would have never
have thought. There was no carpet. And the floor squeaked like a
funeral home. Like a, you know, it was a scary
place. Dirty. Dirty place. And we met
and had church in here. Some church had church upstairs.
And another church had church downstairs. There was like three
churches in here at one time. But, God bless, we began to grow. And, of course, you know that
they raided the mission during all that time. All kinds of trouble
in this city. We tried to keep the old church
building, which is now clutch cargo, from becoming a bar. It
was sanctum back in those days. They call it sanctum. Sanctum
bar. And I was trying to stop it. I was getting death threats and,
you know, I was going to be taken down and they'd call the center.
All kinds of mess. But I'm still here and sanctum's
gone. The city raided Grace Centers
of Hope. But we're still here and the
city went bankrupt. You can't explain this place
outside. It's a God thing going on here.
It's a God thing going on here. Been a wonderful 26 years. And I'll tell you what we've
done, I'm going to tell you, our success. Is because of this,
we take no glory. When we get clutch cargo, when
we have 7,000 in attendance, or build a new building after
clutch cargo, or whatever happens, we must never forget where God
found us. And that this is a work of God. You know how I know we're going
to see marvelous things in the future? Well, I know because
we're nothing. And it's just like God to do
some things that's going to blow your mind. I was thinking last
night about our kids. You know, we had that little
daycare downstairs where we're taking care of the kids and doing
a good job. It was our daycare. And then
Oakland Press gets on our back. The state comes in and says,
you can't have a daycare here. At least you can't have a daycare
for moms who are living on Seneca Street. They can't bring their
kids over here. So that eliminated, I don't know
how many kids. But guess what? We have a daycare. And it's a
nice daycare. And the building is paid for.
And God is supporting that. Think about that zoo walk. You
think about 120,000. We got another 1,000 this past
week. So it's over 122,000 now, I think,
that has come in to move that little daycare, support that
little daycare and take care of our kids. That's a God thing. I remember when we bought the
first house in what is Little Grace Village. And by the way,
while all of this is going on, people are saying to me, you
can't have an inner city church that suburbanites will come to.
And I thought, you know, you give sheep sheep food and they'll
come. Yes. I don't long for organization.
I long for God. If we can get God in here, we
don't have to put $100 bills under the seat to get people
to come to church. If God's in here, God's people
are going to come over here. And not only that, but God's
people are a compassionate people. They are a merciful people and
a gracious people. Listen, if God saved you, you
ornery skunk, if God has saved you, there's not a man or woman
that you can look at that He cannot save. Isn't that right?
There's not a man or woman I cannot put my arm around and say, if
God saved me, He can save you. Unless you think yourself to
be somebody, to be something. You think about Little Grace
Village. I was told time and time again, it'll never happen. Would you like to tour down Seneca
Street and see what God has done there? Would you like to see
what God is doing in this city with a bunch of ragtag folks
like us? God's doing something. We own
over a hundred properties now. Think about this. Some of you
in here are homeowners. There wasn't a chance in hell
or out of hell of you being a homeowner. When our first homeowner came
here, Rick, he had only the clothes on his back. He didn't have a
driver's license. He'd never owned anything in
his life. I mean, think about it. Think about what God is doing. And I hope that maybe you're
just coming in. Maybe you've just come to know
the Lord. I hope you get excited about, you know, if God did that
for so-and-so, He could do that for me too. This is a good place
for you to be. Well, I'm going back to Birmingham. Well, you were in Birmingham
when you got in trouble. Right? Think about this. What happened
when you went over there? Well, I'll tell you what happened.
This crazy guy that can't even, you know, he screams so much
he doesn't have much of a voice anymore. He got up there and
talked about The blood. Do you know what? He even said that
God came to earth. And he said it over and over
and over. People, I hear this quite often. Maybe it would be better if you
would just teach us verse by verse. Well, that's good. Darren can do that. I'm going to scream and yell
that God has come to earth. And you need to believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. I've done that now for 33 years
here. It's worked pretty good. It's
worked pretty good. Just the old gospel over and
over. And I know people say this. And
the fact is, it's true. If you've heard Clark once, you've
heard him. He just says the same old thing over and over. Last
Sunday I preached on who's going to hell and who's not. All I
did is just took another round around Calvary, around Christ. I just took another route and
ran straight to Christ. If you notice, that's what happens
every Sunday. I may take a different approach.
Today, I'm just talking about how God uses nobodies. You got
to be a grass eaters, not smokers, eaters. See, all of you grass smokers
have to come to know that you're crazy. I mean, that is enough. That ought to be enough to convince
you something's wrong with you. Well, well, I mean, something's
wrong because I want to alter the way my mind thinks, right?
God's not enough. I don't know about God, but this
hemp is really something. You know, they make ropes out
of... You might as well go to Hardware and buy your rope. Oh, I'm way out of my notes now,
way out of my notes now. I just want to drive this home
over and over again. The sooner you become nothing
and Christ becomes all, the more heaven you're going to have on
the way to him. And not only that, you see, God inhabits the
praise of His people. If this city is going to be turned
around, God's going to have to do it. Let me just tell you,
this is the way my thinking goes. When we got that old Sears building,
I thought it was going to put a, you know, we're going to use
it, tear down houses and we're going to use it as a thrift store
and this and that. But all the way along, God didn't
have any intentions of doing that. He had intentions of making
it a place of commerce. And so, this guy comes along
that I met eight years ago at Bose. Isn't that what they called
it? Yeah. Well, anyway, it used to
be called that. I met that guy in there. That was Kyle Westberg.
Then they put me on the downtown development group there. I'm having these private meetings
and guess who shows up? He bought the old funeral home.
And one day I'm leaving there, we're trying to get rid of the
old Sears building because it's caving in, right? It's just literally
caving in. And Kyle says to me, you know,
I'd really like that building. In fact, the next day we were
going to sign a contract to sell that building to the scary Halloween
guys that run that thing over there. And the church is going
to get $25,000 for it. Anyway, Kyle said, you know,
I've always dreamed of having a big warehouse like that and
turning it into lofts and having a market and this and that. He
said, Kent, do you think there's any possibility? I said, well,
we're going to sell it tomorrow. He said, let me call the guy
that holds the land contract, Jack Burkett, who's a major donor.
You think all of that is an accident now? Why, no way. And now Kyle
and those folks down there, they hire some of you to work there. And wonderful things are happening. You say, well, Pastor, you don't
think that... Oh, yes, I do. Oh, yes, I do. Pontiac's going to come back.
And we're going to be a key player in that. As long as we know who
we are. As long as we know who we are. And that God has done a miracle
and we give Him the glory and the praise and the honor for
it. You know that you even believe
the gospel is a miracle. You ever had anybody say this
to you? Let me get this straight. You're saying that God, who is
Spirit, took a body, came to earth. We hated Him. We nailed Him to a cross. We
killed Him. God raised Him. He's in heaven
making intercession for us. That's right. Isn't that the
craziest story you've ever heard? Or how about this one? God came
to earth and was born of a virgin. Pastor, pastor, you can't believe
that with all of my heart. What is today? What's the date?
Ninth. When you go home, write it on
your calendar. Pastor Clark said, great things are going to happen
in the coming months. Mark it on your calendar. And
then when it begins to happen, jump about 10 feet high and praise
God. Will you do that? Just give him
praise and glory. I often hear this, too. You know,
Pastor, you know, you could buy a piece of property and build
a church for what it's going to cost you to go in that old
clutch cargo building. That's probably true. But people
wouldn't be shocked. I'd rather spend a million dollars
and people go, what? How? God must have done that. You know, that crazy preacher's
been saying they're going to turn the city upside down. God's
going to do something. They're going to get that clutch
cargo building. You know, I'm writing this book, The Poverty
Pimp. I've only been writing it all my life, I think. But
anyway, Miss Pam said something to me. Why can't I end this thing? Why can't I get this book done? And she said something like,
because it's not the end yet. There's more things to put in
the book. Yeah. And, you know, I've come to believe
that. I think some things are just out there, out there, ready
and poised to bless this place like you've never been blessed
before. I hope you just do this today, too. In the Psalms, Israel
goes like this. The Lord hath done great things
for us. And the heathen said, the Lord
has done great things for them. And then Israel replied, the
Lord has done great things for us whereof we're glad. I can
tell you this. If you would just look back over
the history, those of you who have been here, Don knows this. Some of you have been here. Wanda's
seen this. Many of you. Dwayne Vanessa. Some of you have been around
here for a while. You have seen the most awesome things. happened
that could never have happened. I hope that you began to take
men of grace. I mean, you think about Pepsi
sponsoring them for years and years and years and years. Pepsi. Because we don't do Coke, right? I was working it in. Yeah. Think about that. Think about
the first CD. Think how God blessed that. It
wasn't their best, but it was their first. Something like $500,000
came through that. Pepsi bought $60,000 of that
CD and gave it to their employees around the world. I mean, you've
got to scratch your head and say, how on earth? Or 330,000
pennies. A million pennies, 33 million
pennies, $330,000 in pennies come in for our learning center
and decorating that place. You know, a hundred, think about
this. We paid $275,000 for this building
and paid with quarters, raised quarters in 13 months and paid
cash. You say, well, you know, I've
heard you say that before. I'm getting a little tired of
it. I never get tired of that story. I don't get tired of those
because those are miracles. That's God's blessings. He inhabits the praise of His
people. We've got to keep praising Him.
We've got to keep praising Him.