How awesome is our God and how
we worship and praise him today. 53 years ago in Paducah, Kentucky
at Southside Baptist Church, where I was speaking that week,
a young lady sang this hymn. In the harvest field now ripened,
there's a work for all to do. Hark, the voice of God is calling
to the harvest calling you. Little is much when God is in
it. Labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown and you can win it if you go in Jesus' name. In the mad rush of the broad
way, in the hurry and the strife, tell of Jesus' love and mercy. Give to them the word of life. Does the place you're called
to labor seem so small and little known? It is great if God is
in it, and he'll not forget his own. Little is much when God
is in it." I hope you learned that lesson today. And, in fact,
more often than not, God is in the little things. where he gets
all the glory and all the praise and all the honor. My glory I'll not give to another
is what God says. And all through the Bible, you
find this declaration that boasting on your part is excluded. Boasting has been totally nullified. Be careful when you think yourself
great at anything. You are what you are by the grace
of God. Be careful about making idols
and bowing down before them. Be careful about thinking more
of yourself than you ought. God is not in it. You're not
a great preacher unless God totally consumes you by the Holy Spirit.
You're not a great singer. You don't have a great voice
unless God gave it to you. And if God gave it to you, you
have no reason to brag. You have no gift, no talent,
no ability separate apart from God. So God is concerned about
this matter of his glory. So many great lessons to learn
from the story of Gideon and this ragtag army of 300 men of
his. The Lord said to Gideon, I can't
give you the Midianites. You can't win the victory over
the Midianites. You've got far too many, 33,000 men. And God said, I can't give you
the victory, because if I did, you would think it was because
you had 33,000 men, and you would vaunt yourself against me. You would brag about what you
did. So you'll find out God began
to cut the army down. This is the craziest story I
have ever read. It is just so crazy, except I
look over my own life and I say, that's just like God to do that. God here has taken the craziest
things and done great things. Who would ever thought we'd raise
33 million pennies, $330,000? pennies. Who would ever thought
my garage was filled with pennies at one point and I didn't know
what to do with them? Who would have ever have thought
that? No one but God. God can take loaves and fishes.
So I want us to look at this story and we'll be using the
Bible a lot and I'll be pointing out passages. The first lesson
that I think is taught here in this story of Gideon and the
Midianites, is that the children of Israel did evil in the sight
of the Lord, and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian
for seven years. You'll notice that in chapter
6 of Judges. Verses one and two. And the children
of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord delivered
them into the hand of Midian seven years. Two observations
here. Number one, you do evil, you
will pay. You follow the wrong path. You
do the opposite from what God has asked you to do. I'm talking
about as a Christian. What you sow, you're going to
reap. And many times, I think people think, and I've heard
people who are having real problems. in life, and they go, why is
God doing this to me? Well, you won't have to look
too far back. And besides that, God is not
directly doing it to you. You are just reaping what you
sowed. We reap what we sow, even as
Christians. As a child of God, born again,
filled with the spirit of God, you cut your hand, you're gonna
bleed. And as a Christian, those the
Lord loves, he chastens. Now, I'm not saying that God
sends judgment and condemnation upon everything you do. He's
a forgiving God. I understand that. But many times,
you are where you are because as a Christian, those the Lord
loves, He chastens. And all the Lord has to do to
chasten His people is just let you do what you want to do. You be in charge of your life.
What liars we are, what connivers we are, how we defend ourselves
when we are just reaping what we have sown. And then to those
of you who are without Christ, you wonder why you have lost
everything? You wonder why you're addicted.
You wonder this. You wonder that. You blame God.
You have an anger problem. You did it to yourself. You were
the captain of your own ship and destroyed your life. Amen. Why is God doing this to me? Why did you do what you do? Amen. Verse 2 says, And the hand of
Midian prevailed against Israel. And because of the Midianites,
the children of Israel made them the dens which are in the mountains,
and caves, and strongholds. Hmm. What a horrible life it
is without Christ. What a horrible life it is to
be living a life. What a horrible life it is to
live hiding in dens, in the mountains, in the caves, in the strongholds,
just running. Are you suffering from fear today?
Do you have fear? Well, it's probably because you
brought it on yourself. Fear. Are you looking over your
shoulder today? Are you hiding out? Are you running? You probably did it to yourself.
It's not a God problem. Verse three says, They hidden
our two says they hidden dens constant fear when Israel had
sown Verse 3 says the enemy came up against them and destroyed
all of their crops You ever been Have mass in your life and it
just seems like you're starting to get ahead things are going
good and And lo and behold, out of nowhere,
it almost seems. I have seen hundreds come through
Grace Centers of Hope who seemingly were about there. I don't know
exactly what happened, but they sabotaged. Listen, the devil's not for you
having a little heaven on the way to heaven. Only God is for
that. And if you're here as a Christian and you're down and messed up
and screwed up and just life is the pits, there's something
wrong with that. There is something wrong with
that. Christians shouldn't be hiding
in dens, in strongholds, in the mountains, and everything destroyed. I have nothing. I have nothing
to look forward to. I have no sustenance. Everything's
gone. Why? There's a reason why. This is the truth. You can be
as poor as Job's turkey and be happy. This is true. Their enemies were overwhelming.
I would say this to both Christian and non-Christian here. You have
a ton of enemy. They're like grasshoppers. Verse
five says, the Midianites were like grasshoppers. They had camels
without number and they had come to destroy the land. Your enemies
are out to destroy you. Your enemy is out to destroy
you. Crack is not your friend. Heroin
is not your friend. Drugs are not your friend. Amen. Somebody say amen. Satan is out
to destroy you. Jesus said, hallelujah. I am
come that you might have life and have it more abundantly. Verse seven says, Israel was
greatly impoverished. You shouldn't be feeling that
way today. How about this? I'm a child of the King. I'm
a child of the King. With Jesus, my Savior, I'm a
child of the King. He put you in the will. He'll
never take you out of the will. You have everlasting life. All
things are yours. The attitude of a Christian must
be this, because of the might of our God. I can do all things
through Christ that strengtheneth me. I am an overcomer. We say, what should I do if I'm
in a mess like you're talking about, Pastor? Both Christian
and non-Christian should do what Israel did, verses 8 through
10. And Israel cried unto the Lord. That's what you ought to do,
cry to the Lord. He's your only hope. And when
Israel cried unto the Lord because of the Midianites, the Lord sent
a prophet. The Lord sent a preacher. A second lesson that we could
learn would be the call of Gideon. I love the story of the call
of Gideon. It's found in verses 11 through
17. Let's read just a few passages here. Verse 11, Judges 6. And there came an angel of the
Lord and sat under an oak. I was reading this yesterday,
and I said, and the angel of the Lord came and sat under an
oak tree. What does that have to do with
anything, I said to myself? I said, how wonderful. The Lord
came, and by the way, the angel of the Lord is Jesus Christ in
the Old Testament. So Jesus comes, and he's sitting
under the oak tree. the latter part of that verse
said and Gideon was there By the winepress to hide from the
Midianites so Gideon is there near the winepress and he's hiding
out and there's an oak tree real close and so Jesus comes and
sits and And the angel of the Lord, verse
12, said unto him, the Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of
valor. What? I know Gideon must have
said something like this. You talking to me? Thou mighty man of valor. He's hiding out. He's scared
to death. And Gideon said unto him, O my
Lord, if thou be with us, why then is all this befallen us? Sounds just like us. Where be
all his miracles, which our fathers told us, saying, did not the
Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord hath forsaken
us. How about this? You have forsaken
the Lord. The Lord never forsakes his people.
It was the prodigal son that left home. It was the prodigal
son that went into a foreign land. It was the prodigal son
that found himself in the hog pen. The father didn't forsake
the prodigal. The prodigal forsook the father. Is that right? The Lord hath
forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the many knights.
In other words, he's doing just like many of us do. This is your
fault. I'm down here in this mess, it's
your fault. Listen, if you find yourself
in the hog pen, it wasn't because the Lord put you there. He let
you go there. He permitted you to go there
and you did. And the Lord looked upon him
and said, go in this thy might and thou shalt save Israel from
the hand of the Midianites. Have not I sent thee? How we need a consciousness of
the presence of the Lord That the Lord has sent me This preacher
needs that I need to know that every single day Because I'm
prone to wander Lord. I feel it prone to leave the
God I love prone to be a coward prone to turn around The Lord
himself is our strength if you don't go with us Lord. We don't
go up Moses said I Sent you the Lord told Gideon So that's a
great lesson to learn that when God calls you by the way, I Keep
waiting and watching for God to call some of you men to preach
the gospel. Oh Oh, but but but you know You
know my past wouldn't permit that. I Don't know anybody that
doesn't have a past. I Was telling somebody this week
and you're gonna hear more and more about this We didn't plant
this church here because Pontiac needs more churches. We have
435 churches in Pontiac and We've had for 30 years that I've been
here and one of the worst cities in the state of Michigan So we
don't obviously it's not more churches. It's people getting
saved and giving back The mission Amen. Grace Centers of Hope is
not the main ministry here. This church is the main ministry
where we proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and addicts and
people who totally lost their life come to know Jesus Christ
in the free pardon of sin and become preachers and pastors
and ministers and politicians and people who are involved. Amen. I want you to know, I don't
know how many years I have left, but this is the most important
part of my life, building a church where people are being converted,
and those being converted are new creatures in Christ Jesus,
and they are giving back! Gideon begins to try to manipulate
God. Now, that's just like us. In
verse 13, he says, if you're with us, if you're with us, well, he's
just told him he's with the Israelites. I'm with you. I'm going to deliver
you. If you haven't forsaken us, deliver us. So the Lord in
verse 14 commissions He commissions Gideon Let me look at it. Go in this thy might and thou
shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites Gideon makes
all the common excuses of one who does not understand the grace
of God Look at him in verse 15 well now I don't understand how
that could be that I could go in your might because my family
is poor. Yeah, but your God is King of
Kings and Lord of Lords. And I'm the least in my father's
house. Some of you right now have been
called by God and you're talking this way, just like Moses. I
stutter. And God said to him, yeah, but
I made your mouth. If God calls you, He will provide
for you. If God calls you, He will use
you. If God has saved you, it's for
a purpose, on purpose. Verse 16, And the Lord said unto
him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites
as one man. Little is much if God's in it.
God can take one man and turn things upside down. God doesn't
need 33,000 Israelite men. God doesn't need 10,000. And
we'll see in the story where he keeps cutting that number
down. Common excuses. Jesus said where
I read in the gospel of Matthew Jesus said surely I will be with
thee and thou shalt smite the Midianites But in the in the
book of Matthew, he said have them sit down because this is
no problem with the 5,000 God is a miracle worker surely
surely those of us who have been here any time at all have seen
the most awesome things and In Livingston County, I was supposed
to speak for about 30 minutes, and you know what happened. Anyway,
you know what? To tell the stories of what God
has done at this place excites people. There's about 300 people
there, and I began to tell the stories of how God had provided
for Grace Gospel Fellowship and Grace Centers of Hope. They did
the most amazing thing. They stood on their feet and
clapped and clapped and clapped and clapped and clapped. I was telling Miss Pam when I
got home, I went up there in a snowstorm. So I got up there
and I was thinking, trying to think all day and writing myself
little notes. And I left my notes in the car
in the snowstorm. And when it was time for me to
speak, I was looking around, looking around for a few notes,
no notes. Little as much when God's in
it. Woo. I brought one of the most powerful
messages I think I've ever brought up there with no notes. I'm not bragging on me, I'm just
telling you. Little is much when God is in it, and every one of
us in here need to learn that. Joshua 23 10 says, One man of
you shall chase a thousand, for the Lord your God, he fighteth
for you. You know the Lord's on your side?
You know all things work together for your good? If God be for
us, who can be against us? That ought to be our attitude.
Not, I can't do this. Even your struggles with, those
of you who struggle with addiction and relapse and all of that mess,
you're gonna make it, Christian. You're gonna make it. Oh, you're
gonna look pretty rough. You're gonna look pretty rough,
but you're gonna make it. In verse 17, Gideon begins to
learn the grace of God. And he does this. Well, I think I need a sign.
Listen, let me tell you this. If God tells you something, you
don't need a sign. Just believe God. And by the
way, our God is so very, very patient. He's so patient with
us. and said, if now I have found
grace in thy sight. Wait a minute, Jesus just got
through telling you under the oak tree that you're a mighty
man of valor, you're a warrior, you're a conqueror. Well, I think
I need a sign. Let me tell you this, if Jesus
talks to you, you've got a sign. If Jesus comes visiting you,
you have a sign. After he asked for this sign
in verses 22 through 23, he begins to realize that he's seen God.
Have you ever had an encounter with the Lord Jesus and then
after it was over, You've heard something like it, I'm gonna
die. I mean, I think I've seen the Lord. He's gonna kill me. He knows all about me. And that's
what happened to Gideon. Gideon said, I need a sign. And so he begins to tell God
what he's going to do and what God has to do so Gideon will
be sure that he can know he's talked to God. He said, the first
thing I want you to, this is called bargaining with God. You know, God is very patient
with us, isn't he? God doesn't have, listen, when
you start this thing of bargaining with God, I know many of us in
here have said to God, I'm gonna put out a fleece. If you really
mean this God then you've got to do this God is not in the
bargain basement stuff Really? He's not but he's patient with
us. So Gideon says now here's what I want I'm gonna put out
this fleece and I want it to be totally wet With dew but I
don't want there to be dew anywhere else So sure enough he gets up
the next day and And the fleece is filled with dew. Hallelujah. But I'm still not real sure. So now what I want, God, I'm
gonna put the fleece back out, but I want it to be dry, and
I want there to be dew everywhere. Some of you've thought that is
very spiritual, but it's really not. To me, it's like, You know,
when you say to God, God is so gracious. Look, I just told you,
my child, I love you. Yeah, but I don't think you do.
I just told you. I was very calmly sitting under
the oak tree and I told you, you're a great man. I'm gonna
make you a great man. I'm gonna deliver the Midianites. Have you been there? Should you ask for, listen, first
of all, it was the Lord Jesus who took the initiative to find
him, hiding out there in the mountains, making wine. Hiding out, probably drinking
a little of it too. Hiding out there, and the Lord
visited him. You've not called me, but I've
called you. You haven't chosen me, but I've chosen you. What
an awesome thing it is to really get a hold of grace. And when
you grow in grace, you know there's nothing happening in you except
what God does in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure. So don't use the fleece deal
too often. It would be much better if God
comes and says something, just believe him. You know, 15 years
ago, God told me he was going to give me this building. I believed
it for 15 years. 15 years ago, God told me or longer
that we were going to have Seneca Street and turn this city upside
down and revitalize neighborhoods. We're doing it. It's happening.
You say, well, Pastor, you're a great
man of faith. No. You know, my one prayer is
this, I believe, help my unbelief. If God would grant one prayer,
it would be that I could believe him more, that I could trust
him more, that my faith was increased. Do you know what would happen
if you and I would just believe God? The most awesome things. Without faith, it's impossible
to please God. Faith is the victory. Trusting
God. Do you understand how big this
thing of faith is? faith It shuts you up where you
have no confidence in yourself, and it's trusting trusting Not
yourself. Not your works. Not your church.
Not your preacher. Not your life Not your money.
Not your car. Not your house. Not your nothing
It's trusting God Totally trusting God. Well, what I've been working
toward is this. The last lesson to be learned
this morning is the message that salvation is of the Lord. Salvation
is of the Lord. Not my own hand hath saved me.
Turn loose of that, all of it. The chief end of man is to glorify
God, as I have said. Whether you eat or drink or whatsoever
you do, do to the glory of God. Glorifying God. We did that this
morning in our song service. The great trump of the gospel.
Uh-oh, I just used trump. Honestly, that's in my notes.
That was not on purpose. The great trump of the gospel
is to God be the glory. So, what you do is this. Every song, your preacher, those
of you who are visiting with us when you go back to your church,
This is the way you look at your pastor. Is he powerfully exalting
Jesus Christ? Is he giving Jesus Christ all
the glory and all the... That's how you judge every message
and every testimony. That's the acid test. The acid
test is who gets the glory. That's why when you get to thinking
you're something, and that can happen to those of you in recovery,
I've been clean six months. Not by yourself you haven't.
And you haven't been that clean anyway. But you can begin to
think of yourself more than you ought. And you know how God,
I'm gonna say it, you know how God will let the air out of your
bubble? Just let you use. Just permit you to get your eyes
off of God. Stop looking at yourself. Amen. What ought to happen if you've
been clean two days? You ought to fall on your face
and thank God. To God be the glory. Gideon, you're going to defeat
the Midianites, but not by your power. Not by your strength,
not by your might. There's no one in here that's
going to win this victory of salvation and glory. Whether
it's with drug battle or pornography, you're not going to win any victory
except it be through the power of your God, the power of this
God. So, Chapter 7 verse 2 he said
you have too many for me to give the Midianites to you Lest you
want yourself against me saying my own hand has saved me. So
we're gonna cut the army down from 33,000 to 10,000 Now remember
the Midianites are like grasshoppers You know, when I played high
school football, the night of the game when we'd go, I would
look to see how big the opposing team was. Can you imagine when
God said, I got to cut your army? Just too big for me to give you
the victory. He said, so take all the 33,000 down to the river and 10,000
down to the river and those that lap like a dog Got them out those
who cup their hands Those are the ones well, there was only
300 now. Wait a minute. We've gone from
33,000 to 300 who don't lap like a dog Doesn't seem like an army
to me And then God says Okay, we're
ready now. I'm gonna give you the victory.
Here's what I want you to do. Get a pitcher. Huh? And also get a candle. And get a trumpet. And we're
gonna go out and beat up on the Midianites. You know what I would
have thought? Are you cotton-picking crazy? Now, but if you just look at
us here, I say, you take a bunch of former drug addicts, a bunch
of religious people who were lost in religion, and a bunch
of messed up folks like we all are here. There's not just drug
addicts here. There's guys like me who was self-righteous, religious
as all get out. I'll bet in my lifetime, I haven't
missed church many times. So what? Well, you know, religious
people, you know what? Oftentimes religious people say
this, well, God bless you over there in Pontiac. The Lord bless you. We're praying
for you, pastor. You know, you've got a hard job
with that bunch you have. There is no difference. All have sinned and missed the
mark, right? You think about how God, what
God has done here with candles and a pitcher and a trumpet.
Victory after victory, after victory, after victory, after
victory. Some of you don't know all the
stories here. That's why I tell them people are starving to hear
of a God visitation, and that's what we're having here, a God
visitation. You think how foolish the gospel
is. Like some of you here today,
you think you're here by accident, or maybe you're here because
they ran you out of that building and said, you have to go to church
over there if you're gonna stay over here. So you're here you
weren't even happy about it. And then you come over here and
hear about this guy Named Gideon and that Jesus sat
under an oak tree and Told him he was going to be a great general
and deliver Israel and then and then I get up and say that salvations
by faith alone it's not by your sprint being sprinkled as a baby
and It's not by your church going it's not by your works. It's
not by what you do You are totally what you have no gifts of your
own whatever. You're good at that's good a Lot of people are good at a lot
of bad things, but whatever you're good At God put that in you it's a gift
from God every good and perfect gift comes down from God. So
I have I have stripped you of of any righteousness of your
own, I have said this, you have to trust in the one who bled
and died on the tree of the cross in your room, in your stead,
and in your place. And again, I have said to those
of you who are Christian, the reason things are out of sort
in your life is because you won't upchuck it. If we confess our sins, he's
faithful and just to forgive us our sins People are always
talking about letting me down. Let me tell you something. Let
me tell you something In word thought or deed. I let you down
every single day. I And let me tell you this too. I do not have great aspirations
for you. I look right past you to God. I say things like this, Lord,
if you don't keep me, I won't be kept. I say things like this,
Lord, if you don't keep Sue, she's gonna be an absolute mess.
She's gonna go back to the streets. She's gonna go back to drugs.
She's gonna continue to leave her children. The guys, the guys
are wild men. I know that. So if there is a
slip, if there is a back step in this church, all you have
to do is say this, first of all to the Lord, forgive me. The
Lord will always say to his kids, I forgive you. It's all taken
care of. There's no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus.
To me, if you come and say, pastor, I used, or pastor, I'm having
a, I slipped up, man, I cheated on my wife. Pastor, I, there's
accountability. Yeah, I need help with accountability. Accountability. That's okay. The devil's here,
too. Just hang on. We're good. Some of you guys
may be needed back there in the back. Okay. Hey, you need to
expect outbreaks. Amen. Okay. All right. We're good. Thank you If you've messed up
you say to us who are mess-ups I want you to forgive me and
You know what? We'll do I forgive you Let him
that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall That's what
needs to happen here And we're going to have things like we've
just had. It's going to happen. This is
not a church. We are proclaiming the gospel
of Jesus Christ. We are. Actually, before I left
home, I said to the Lord, I had a sense. Protect us today. Protect
us today. Protect our church today. Amen. and work in and through us today.
And I wanna just say this, I wanna say this. And I don't often do
this. You know, we don't have the general-like
invitation that many churches have. But I want to do this today. I want to say, if you're here
and you've got something between you and the Savior, something
that's blocking your joy, your fellowship, something that's
just holding you captive in the mountains, in the cave, why don't
you just confess it today? And we'll make it this simple.
All you do, just want to come forward as a Christian and say,
I've sinned against God. It's right between me and the
Lord now. We used to call it rededication in the old church.
You want to rededicate your life. I've sinned against you and I've
sinned against this church by not living my life as an example. And I want to get it right. And
then if you're here and today, for the first time, you're saying
something like that, this was the craziest message I have ever
heard in my life, but it brought such joy and peace. I trusted
Jesus Christ today as my Lord and Savior. You can come and
confess it. Let's stand and praise our God.