Christians must get involved
in politics. I feel your pain. I feel your
resistance. I say it again, and I will keep
on repeating, because to me to say the same things is not grievous.
For you it's safe. Hitler told the church to stay
out of politics and leave governing the nation of Germany to him. They did, and millions of Jews
were killed. And the world went into war.
God never intended for Christian people to stay out of politics. The whole wall of separation
of church and state was not to keep the church out of politics. It was to keep the government
out of the church. Just read history. You've been
sold a bill of goods. The only reason you think that
church and state ought to be separated is because the liberal
devilish bunch has convinced you it's true. This nation was
built and our forefathers came here for freedom of religion. Does anybody know history? Then
you know that's true. They came here escaping from
the Church of England so they could worship freedom and liberty. And I want to tell you, and I've
been telling you for 25 years, actually 33 years, this church,
in October, the Democratic Party voted to take God out of their
platform. You call that a godless platform. When you take God out of something,
it becomes godless. Am I right? Don't be backing
up on me now. If you don't want to hear this,
you need to go somewhere else, because this needs to be heard. A Methodist
bishop on the floor of the Democratic Party convention stood and said,
this is wrong. God should not be taken out of
our platform. They also declared that Jerusalem
was not the capital of Israel. I want to tell you, Jerusalem
is the capital of Israel and it's going to stay that way until
Jesus comes. Just count on that. And so, the
Methodist bishop stood and said, I think we need to put God back
in the platform. And then all of you saw it on
TV, if you watch TV at all. They voted three times. They
had to vote three times. All in favor of putting God back
in the platform say, aye. The aye went up. All opposed
say, nay. The nays outnumbered the ayes. The guy who was moderator was
totally frustrated. He said, he's looking around
like this. OK, we need to try this again.
He did it the second time. He did it the third time, and
then he said, the eyes have it. But the eyes didn't have it.
You saw it on TV. The eyes didn't have it to put
God back in the platform. I'm telling you. I'm not going
to sit by and let this church sit by. The question is, who's
on the Lord's side? That's the question. I'm not
outlawing God in anything. In my life, in my church, in
my world. I want God here. I want God here. After we get it, we get it. If
you really get it, you would not be nearly as quiet as you
are. You'd be saying, you tell them, Pastor. We're behind you,
Pastor. We're for you, Pastor. We're
going to back you up on this. We want God in America again. Yes, we do. That's why we're a powerful nation.
We're nothing without God. Nothing without God. Our nuclear
bombs will not protect us. And without God, you're going
to see things and your kids are going to see things you've never
dreamed of happening in this country without the protection
of God Almighty. And you're going to lose the
rights and the liberties. So I hope you'll show up endowed
by our Creator. Our forefathers said that. In
other words, we have a Creator and He has endowed us with these
privileges. Life, liberty, and the pursuit
of happiness. That's what our forefathers said.
I can't do away with that. Alright, I feel better now. I'm glad you do. I'm glad you
do. I want you to. I want this church on the front
lines. I want you to be on the front lines. You've got to be
on the front lines. And God will honor us being on the front lines.
I'm not afraid of anything if God's with me. Are you? My greatest
fear has always been that I might look around and God not be with
me. In fact, Moses said, I'm not going anywhere unless you
promise you're going with me. That's kind of the way I am.
But if Jesus goes with me, I'll go anywhere. I want you to turn
in your Bibles to the book of Matthew, chapter 16. Matthew,
chapter 16. Let's begin with verse 13. I want to talk about the church.
I mean, really, do you understand? Let me tell you this before I
read these passages. Twenty-five years ago, my thoughts
were this way. First of all, we have this great
inner city church, which nobody believed could happen. We have
a great inner city church where black and white, red and yellow,
where even the chief of sinners, the worst vagabonds in the world,
come to know Jesus Christ, are washed in the blood and are made
new creatures in Christ Jesus. They have a powerful testimony. Because we're losing the drug
war in this country, the only way to win it is to get people
saved. And those people who have been drug addicts get saved.
And they're used of God to get other folks saved. And I'm going
to tell you, if this church, if this church is not doing that,
we need to shut our doors. If you got delivered from the
demon and you're not out there proclaiming how you got out of
the bondage of the demon to other possessed folks. You're nothing. You're nothing. You know, you're
just a sitting Christian. Or something. Inactive. Here we don't have
an inactive role. Somebody used to ask me years
ago when I was pastor in suburban high churches, how many do you
have on the active role and how many are in the inactive role?
I always said, we don't have an inactive role. Either active
or you're not. Okay, I've got to read Scripture.
Matthew 16. Are you there? Verse 13, When
Jesus came into the coast of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His
disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am? You've got to have the right
answer on that question. That's the most important question in
the world. Who is Jesus? If you get the right answer,
you get to go to heaven. If you don't, you go to hell. That's
how important that question is. Do you know who Jesus is? Yes. And they said, Some say that
thou art John the Baptist. Wrong. Some said Elias. Wrong.
Others said you're Jeremiah. Wrong. Or one of the prophets.
Wrong. He saith unto them, But whom
say ye that I am? And Simon Peter, loud mouth that
he was, answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the
living God. Right answer. And Jesus answered and said unto
him, You are blessed. Blessed art thou, Simon bar Jonah,
for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee." You didn't
come to know who Jesus was by yourself. In fact, you had no
part in it. You was lost and got found. You
were blind and got eyesight. Everybody who knows Christ, God
has revealed Him to you. All truth is revealed truth.
How happy everybody in here ought to be. How excited everybody
in here ought to be. I know who Jesus is. And God
revealed it to me. I could have never known it. I was deaf and blind and could
not see. And God, in the power of the
Holy Spirit, borne me again, regenerated me. The scales fell
off. And I saw that Jesus was the
Christ, the Son of the living God. Now, take note. Flesh and blood hath not revealed
it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say unto
you that thou art a little stone, Peter. By the way, You are absolutely
foolish if you want your church to be built on Simon Peter. You
know, there are people who believe that their church was built on
Simon Peter. You don't want that. He was a
loud mouth. He denied the Lord. He cursed
and swore. I never knew him. But upon this
rock, upon your confession, upon what you said, I'm the Christ,
the Son of the living God that should come into the world. I
will build my church. My church. The Lord has a church. The church is not completely
assembled now. The church meets all over the
world this morning in Africa and Ethiopia England and Germany,
different places, the churches are meeting. All it means is
there is an assembly, a group of people that comes together.
One of these days, the universal church, all of the saved, the
church will be complete. All of God's elect will be brought
together. And we will assemble around the
throne of Jesus Christ. But right now, the church meets
like this church meets. We are an ecclesia. There's nothing
holy about the word church. You know, for years, people,
all my life, as long as I can remember, whether you're Baptist
or Catholic or whatever you are, you almost say the church with
some kind of sacredness. The church. Look at the person
next to you. Everybody in here knows probably
the person sitting close to you. What a ragtag bunch is here. What a mess! Every husband in
here, sitting next to his wife, knows her fault. And every wife
knows her husband's fault. There are no perfect people in
here. So when we talk about the church... By the way, you know,
when they were going to raid the mission, I called Dave Gorsica,
who was prosecutor at that time of Oakland County, and I said,
Dave, they're going to raid our mission. He said, they can't do that without
my permission, unless you have felons in there. I said, Dave, this place is full
of felons. This is the only church you'll
ever come to that's full of felons. Don't leave. Former drunks, drug
addicts, prostitutes, all sinners saved by the grace of God. We were all lost, but now we've
been found. We were all blind, but now we
see. Watch it, I'm starting to get happy by myself. This is Jesus' church. We're
all in here saying, He saved me. He washed me in His blood. I'm heaven-bound. I'm more than
a conqueror. I can do all things through Christ. You know, my dream 25 years ago,
and if any of you were here, I used to put this out a lot.
And I'm going to start putting it out. Darren and I and the
elders, we're going to start putting this out again. You know,
my dream was to rehab blocks of houses. And that our nobodies
come to be homeowners. They've been saved by the grace
of God. And now they mow their grass and paint their house.
And not only are they right with God on the inside, they're right
with the city and government and laws on the outside. And
that house over there is a perfect example on Fairgrove Street of
what's taking place here. That old broken down, boarded
up mess. When Don Woodward was going to
take the representative, Carl Bloom, from beautiful Savior
Lutheran Church over there to see it, because they wanted to
rehab a house, I told Don, take the smelling sauce. Because when
he sees it, he's going to pass out. I mean, it was that bad. It was absolutely horrible. If
you haven't driven by, you ought to go by and see. You ought to
see pictures. I got plenty of pictures up here
if you want to take a look of what that house was like. That
represents our lives. That's what our lives were like
before Jesus came. And He made something beautiful. And now we are the church of
the Lord Jesus Christ. established this church according
to Ephesians 3, verse 21. I took longer with the first
group because we had a little more time here. But Ephesians
3, verse 21 says, unto him be glory in the church. You know
what the purpose of this church is? Give him glory. Give him
glory. That's why we're here. And didn't
we do that this morning when we sang, How Great Thou Art?
Didn't you sense that the presence of God came into this place as
we sang praises unto the Lord? He inhabits the praise of His
people. That's our purpose. This church
was purchased by His own blood. Right? That's what Acts 20, 28
says. That the church was purchased
with His own blood. Look at us. We are the purchased
of God, born of His Spirit, washed in His blood. We're heaven-bound. You are not redeemed with corruptible
things such as silver and gold. We're not fancy around here.
Look at what some of these folks are going to be baptized in today.
I don't know where we got those gowns. Somebody must have gave
us gowns. But Orla got on Bermudas and flip-flops. This is not holy water up here.
You know, the Lord gave to the church two ordinances. One is baptism. And everybody
that's getting baptized today, this leaky water is not going
to wash away anybody's sins. We're going to dunk these folks
under. They're going to come up. Their mascara is going to be
all over their faces. The women. And, you know, it's
really not a pretty sight. But it is saying to everybody,
who watches these folks go into the water, I believe that Jesus
died for me. I believe He was buried for me
and rose again for me. And I want everybody to know
it. And that's our message. And then He gave to the church
the Lord's Supper where we take the grape juice and the unleavened
bread. If you were to eat all of the
unleavened bread that we bring in here for the Lord's Supper,
you'd just be a glutton. It won't take you to heaven.
It's just a tight. You don't get Jesus in you by
digesting him with gastric juices. And by the way, just so you know,
what goes in comes out. I was trying to be nice about
that, but that's a fact of life. So if you get Jesus in you by
digesting him, it would seem that you could also get rid of
him. But we know that's not true. I won't labor that point. I think
you understand what I'm talking about. Two ordinances. The importance
of the church. In Acts 13, Paul and Barnabas
were in the church in verses 1-3. Paul and Barnabas were in
the church at Antioch. And the Holy Spirit came down
into the church and said to the church, separate me, Paul and
Barnabas, for the work whereinto I have called them. Said to the
church. When I was a young boy, 13, 14, 15 years old, I knew
God had called me to preach at a very young age. I knew exactly
what God wanted me to do. But I had been raised in a preacher's
home. Didn't want to be a preacher. I wanted to be a football player
and made all my plans. And I even told God things like,
you know what? Just let me be an all-star football
kind of guy and make a professional team, and I'll preach on the
side." You know, I was telling God things like, you make me
real popular and a good athlete, and, you know, I'll do this preaching
thing you want me to do. I mean, let's work together here,
God. And so that was my secret. I
can remember being on the Lincoln High School football field at
a ball game in a four-point stance with a guy across from me cussing
me and hearing God saying, you're going to preach, boy. He said,
well, that's weird. Yeah, no. I know. But that's the kind of things
that I experienced with regard to preaching. When I went forward
at 19 years of age at Grace Baptist Church on a Sunday evening and
told them that God had called me to preach People went like,
we've been waiting on you for years. We already knew God had
called you to preach. It was no secret to us. Do you
get my point? God said to the church, separate
me, Paul and Barnabas. We will find people come into
our congregation. This is the way God does it.
Into this church. By the way, God saved you not
to sit and not to be a sponge. When the meeting's over, the
service begins. God saved you to serve, to be active. Let me
tell you this. If I was going to say that there
was a third ordinance in the Bible, it would be washing people's
feet. Foot washing. In fact, the old
church used to have foot washing. They'd have foot washing Sunday,
where people would actually have a bowl of water and a basin,
and in humility, people would go and wash one another's feet
as a sign of servanthood. Oh, I know you're not going to
wash anybody's feet. Oh, no, you're too good for that, aren't
you? Oh, no. No, we're not going to serve
anybody. You were saved to serve. I'm going to tell you something
else. I'm an old guy now and I've been in this a long time,
50 years. Years ago, people used to come to me and say, you know,
Reverend or Pastor or whatever they call me, will you come and
tell Johnny about the Lord? And I'd go like this, no! You're his mother. You tell Johnny
about the Lord. Why are you coming to me? I did
that a little harsh. I wouldn't do it that way now.
I would say, well, mother, you have the most influence over
Johnny. You have more influence than a pastor he may be afraid
of or a pastor that he doesn't know very well. Do you pray with
your kids? Do you ask God to save them?
Do you point out that they're little rattlesnakes and need
the Lord? When they lie, do you point out,
that shows you're a sinner? Lying is wrong. Johnny, you need
a Savior. How am I talking? Do you understand what I'm saying?
You weren't saved to come in here on Sunday morning and me
just pump you up and make you happy until you get home. And
you and Dad get in World War III and you slap the kids and
kick the dogs. We're saved to serve. Everybody
in here, let me tell you, every member of this church, I don't
know, we have about 40, 50. I think we had 380 people here
counting the first service today. We will have had 380 people. We have about 45 members. About
45. You know what? And everybody
who's here today, you are so welcome to be here. You are so
welcome. And I'm telling you, you 45 or
50, you're my target. You're my target. There's a lot
expected of you that you be here, that you find out where God wants
you to serve in this church. You can come and eat our food
and rejoice in our gospel and say hallelujah. You are just
so very, very welcome. But if you join up, I have biblical
expectations of you. And they ought to flow not from
legalism, but I joined that church because that's my church. That's
my pastor. Those are my elders. I believe
what's going on on Seneca Street. That rescue mission over there,
Grace Centers of Hope, does not belong to Grace Centers of Hope.
It belongs to the 50 people who are members of this church. We
carry the big stick. Do you know they can't fire me
as CEO over there without asking our elders? I have job security. I'm telling you, I also have
a sense that this church has to step up. Our little elder
board, we've got to have more elders. We need deacons. This
church needs to be on fire if we're going to change this community.
Twenty-five years ago, I used to say this. What we're going
to do is we're going to buy blocks. We're going to restore houses.
We're going to sell our church members on a land contract because
their credit is so bad they've destroyed their lives. They can
live the American dream under God in a community that's safe
and houses are being restored. And we're going to put an elder
on every street. A biblical elder on every street. That's what
I used to say. You're going to hear that a lot
now. I believe elders ought to be called out of this church.
I'm going to put it flat on you that God ought to be calling
you into eldership. Not necessarily pulpit eldership,
but to be an elder on Seneca Street, to be an elder on Moreland
Street, to be an elder on Fairgrove. In case you don't know, there
are drug addicts on those three streets. And let me say this while I'm
just unloading on you, and it's only because I love you, and
I want to see this church turn this city upside down. For 50
years I've wanted to be pastor of a church that turned this
city upside down. I read it in the book of Acts. I have no desire
to pastor a church of sitting people. I don't. I want some people that are excited
about, boy, if you knew me five years ago, You would have crossed
the street and got on the other side. You would have ran from me. You
wouldn't have spoke to me. We really need to be targeting
people. I told the first crowd this.
Are you picking people out to win to Christ? You know, I go
in Big Boy about almost every morning and have breakfast. I
don't go in there just to have breakfast. I'm after those girls
in there who don't know Christ, those waitresses. Some of them have been waiting
on me a long, long time. You know what? I tip them good.
I tip them good. I do that on purpose. I do that
on purpose. Last week, I was in there and
this girl had been waiting on me for a long, long time whose
son is in trouble, in trouble with the law. And look how God works. Guess
who the judge is her son goes before? Judge Warren, that I
talk to every week. What a coincidence. Anyway, so
she's telling me about her son, but he just keeps getting in
trouble. She came to me and she goes,
You've got to tell me how to have faith. I don't have any
faith. I don't believe. I don't know about this God thing. Now, do you think that's a coincidence?
But I'll tell you this, my plot and plan and scheme started nearly
eight years ago. Any of you quail hunt? A covey
of quail come up. I don't shoot amongst them. I pick one out. Bam! Here's the
way most of us pray. Lord, save those who are lost. You know the Lord must go, who?
Who do you want me to save? Start naming somebody you want.
And by the way, all of you moms and dads who are here, junior
is not outside of God's scope. You say, I've just lost all hope.
Well, look to God. How many of you are a miracle
of Almighty God? I am too. We all are. God is able to do exceedingly
abundantly above all that we ask or think. Amen. I want you 50, 45, 50 members. I want you to jump in. I don't
want this to be a Sunday morning church. This is not a pep rally. This is serious business. And
I'm going to tell all 50 of you, if we have that many, I'm going
to tell all 50 of you. If God's put it on your heart
to come under the authority of this church and the eldership
of this church and the leadership of this church, if God's put
that on your heart, and God has added you to this
church, He's given you a gift that I need. I said to Wanda,
who is sitting here in the first service, Wanda, I need you so
much. Your emails every week. Your
honesty about what God is doing in your life. You're raising
that little boy. She sent me a picture this week
of his little study she has in the apartment. It's called his
study. And she had written under it, look out Pastor Clark, this
guy's going to be a preacher. William. Yeah, William. That so blesses me. See these
young families come in here, bringing those little kids in
here. And they haven't always been a family. They got married
here. They've had babies and they bring
them in here. And I remember when it wasn't
well with your soul, but now God's done something for you.
And I want to say this. People are always saying to me,
and I understand some of this, but people are always saying
to me things like this. You know, Pastor, you're always
reminding us that we were addicts. Don't you ever forget what you
were? I don't forget what I was. There's
no difference in me and an addict. I've never used drugs. But I've
used a lot of other stuff that's just as bad. Amen? There's nobody in here any better
than anybody else. I'm going to always remind you,
once you was lost, now you're found. But when I remind you,
when it comes to mine, I was a crackhead. Remember this, there are thousands
of crackheads out there that you must bring. I don't know
anything about getting high. I don't know anything about how
all that works. other than what you've taught
me. I came home yesterday with a
broken heart. After that over there, I went over to the mission,
dealt with relapse and all that mess. Do you know how many times
a week I hear this? Are you dirty? You can drop me
right now, Pastor. I heard that five times yesterday.
You can drop me anytime you want. I went like this yesterday. Okay,
go drop. You want me to go drop? I'll
go drop. And every time it came back this
way, Pastor, he's dirty. No! You know what? We're wrestling
with the devil here. We have to have a church that's anointed.
We have to have a church with people in it that God's power
and gifts are resting upon. It's not easy, humanly speaking,
to bring an addict over the line to Jesus. Do you understand what
I'm saying? It's a wrestle. It's a fight.
I stood up yesterday with one young man. He was on the streets
last night. I stood up after he lied and barefaced lied and
lied and lied and lied. And after we got there and I
hugged him and I said, I truly love you and you're going to
die out there. Four times I've been in Boze
this week because there's a young lady working up there that's
going to die. She's going to die on the street
using heroin. She could barely serve me my
meal. And me talking to her. I know
some of you pastors shouldn't talk out. You know, he shouldn't
tell. How should we go around like
this? Shh, don't tell anybody. That person's about to die of
OD. Don't say anything. All I want to do is challenge
you. I want to be kind of like a coach today. Coaching a team
of 50. Let's go get them. We've got
God on our side. And let me tell you this too,
as Darren gets ready here. You know, we had the biggest
crowd in the morning service that we've ever had here this morning
in the first service. Largest crowd. You know what
that says to me? In spite of all the negativity,
God's bringing people here. We have nearly 270 people in
here this morning before the kids left and everybody began
to leave. You know, I can remember when
there's 25 sitting in here. There's something going on here.
There's something going on here. Some woman hugged me after talking
to Pam this morning. She told me outside in the first
service, she said, I've been on the waiting list three months.
I've been coming to this church for three months. And I've been
on the waiting list to get in the program. She said, I've never
been in a church like this before. I have so much hope. I have so
much hope. I've got to get in the program.
I want to be over at Grace Centers of Hope. It's a very unique place
that God's doing something with. He really is doing something
here. I hope you want to be in on it.