Author: Bidemi

SPECIAL SUNDAY SERVICE WITH PASTOR (DR) MENSA OTABIL (GENERAL OVERSEER, INTERNATIONAL CENTRAL GOSPEL CHURCH (ICGC) CHRIST TEMPLE, ACCRA GHANA)

TOPIC: SACRIFICE OF PRAISE – PART 3 (BEFORE GOD’S THRONE)

DATE: 12TH NOVEMBER 2023

BIBLE TEXT: REVELATION 4:2-5

Let us rise up together as we make our “DECLARATION OF GATHERING” in this “YEAR OF GATHERING”.

Are you ready? Say with me:

I Proclaim Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. The Lord is the Shepherd of my Soul, my Shelter by Day, my Light by Night.

In His Name, we Plough our fields, by His Spirit we gather the Harvest, in His Light we seek and find.

In this Year of Gathering, the Lord of the Harvest has commanded: Launch Out into the Deep. At His Words, we cast our Nets, we gather in Souls and Substance for God’s Kingdom.

The Lord is our Reward; in this Season I received God’s Portion set aside for me: Full Measure, Pressed down, Shaking together and running over.

Nothing is Lost and Nothing is wasted in Jesus Name – Amen!

Today I am doing Part 3 of the “Sacrifice of Praise”. And my Subtitle is “Before God’s Throne”.

In Part 1 we spoke about the “Fruit of our Lips”; in Part 2 we said that our Sacrifice of Praise is “Unto the Lord”. And we will take it a little further today to talk about Worship “Before God’s Throne”.

Though we live on Earth, we are Part of a Heavenly Family.

The whole Bible is about Heaven and Earth coming together – We see that right from the beginning of the Bible: “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.”

And Jesus says when you Pray, you say, “Your Kingdom come, Your Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.”

God wants us on Earth to live Life as if it is in Heaven.

True Worship on Earth must mimic; it must replicate what is done in Heaven.

We do not Worship here on Earth to make ourselves happy; we Worship to Honour God before His Throne in Heaven.

Many times when it comes to Praise and Worship we are focused on Songs that make us happy. And we think that it is all about our happiness. But worship is for God’s Pleasure; it is towards God and we have to be Mindful of that.

Revelation 4:2-5 (NKJV)

2 Immediately I was in the Spirit; and behold, a Throne set in Heaven, and One sat on the Throne.

3 And He who sat there was like a Jasper and a Sardius stone in appearance; and there was a Rainbow around the Throne, in appearance like an Emerald.

4 Around the Throne were twenty-four Thrones, and on the Thrones I saw twenty-four Elders sitting, clothed in white robes; and they had crowns of Gold on their heads.

5 And from the Throne Proceeded Lightnings, Thunderings, and voices. Seven lamps of fire were burning before the Throne, which are the seven Spirits of God.

Note that John saw all these things because he was in the Spirit – For us to have an encounter with the Heavenly we have to be in the Spirit. Even though we live in the flesh we have to be Mindful of the Spiritual Realm.

There is one (1) word that runs through the whole of Revelation Chapter 4; and that word is “Throne”

The word “Throne” means a sit of Authority and Rulership.

And that word “Throne” is used fourteen (14) times in Revelation Chapter 4 – It is the key word in that Chapter of Revelation.

That means that Worship is done with the Throne in Mind.

So we must be Throne conscious as we Worship before the Lord. And verything happening in Revelation Chapter 4 is related to Thrones.

There are Three (3) Statements that I want you to Pay attention to:

1. God on his Throne.

The Passage speaks of One Who sits on the Throne – Somebody sitting on the Throne.

This is the Main Throne that the Visioner is talking about. And this Throne represents God’s Rule and Authority. His Throne is the highest Throne in the Universe.

The first thing we see here is a Throne; and God is sitting on it.

2. The Second thing that John sees is Elders – They are around the Throne.

Remember, there is Someine on the Throne and there are People around the Throne – John calls them Elders.

Elders mean People of Stature, People of Rank.

Here the Bible says there are People of Ranks who are around the Throne. And John describes the Elders as Clothed in white – They are Clothed in white.

It is interesting how he describes them – They are Senior in Rank and there are twenty four (24) of them.

The Bible doesn’t clearly states why they are Twenty four (24) but the General Understanding is that it represents Perfectly the Old Testament and the New Testament – In the Old Testament, we have the twelve (12) Tribes of Israel; in the New Testament we have the twelve (12) Apostles of Jesus.

So Twenty four (24) represents the Clarity of the Church – The Fullness of the Church is represented here through the twenty four (24) Elders.

And the Passage also says that these Elders are also sitting on Thrones – So there is a Main Throne of God; there are other Thrones and the Elders are sitting on the Thrones.

There is a Group of People sitting – God is sitting, and the Elders are also sitting.

They are Clothed in white and they are wearing a Crown – That means they have a Place of Honour.

3. The Third thing that John talks about is the Glory of God.

And he says the Glory of God is coming from the Throne in the form of Lightnings, Thunderings and Rumblings; which occur in Voices.

Now you have to understand that the Lightnings and Thunders are in response to Worship given to God – This is very important!

So, One on the Throne, those around the Throne, and what is coming out of the Throne.

There is somebody sitting on the Throne, there are People around the Throne and the Throne is Producing something and what it is Producing a Magnificent.

John also says he saw seven (7) Lamps which represents the seven (7) Spirits of God – Seven (7) is also a Number of Perfection.

So he is basically saying, this is the Fullness of God – This is the setting that John is talking about.

True Worship is focused on God and His Throne; and this is important.

We know God is our Father, but He is also the King of the Universe. And you must know Him as Father but you also must know Him as King.

We love God as our Father, but our Father is also a King:

• And there are times when we love and we have a Casual Relationship with Him, because He is our Father.
• And there is another time when we have a Formal Relationship with Him because He is a King.

The closest I can come to explaining this – I saw it when the former Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth was alive. And she is the mother of then Prince Charles. So Prince Charles is a son to the Queen.

In Private, he calls the Queen Mum. And I am sure they had their mother-son Relationship they had form and all of that.

But when they come to the Public, she is not Mum, she is Queen. And he bows, and addresses her “Your Majesty.”

He doesn’t call her “Your Majesty” at home, he calls her that because he understands – This woman who is my Mum is bigger than just my Mum, she is also Queen.

Remember that God who is your Father is not just a Father to you, He is also the King of the Universe. And you have to learn, when you come before Him in Public – He is not just your Father, He is the King.

You have to know how to relate with Him both as Father and as King.

When we see God as Father, there is no Worship there – Who worships his Father?

Nobody worships his father! You talk to your father, you have conversation with your father, you get advice from your father.

Your father buys food for you, He buys stuff for you. But you Worship the King.

And if you don’t know God is King, Worship will never come to you because you would never see His Majesty. All you see is “my Father.”

Some of us see God as our Friend and that is true. But the One who is your Friend is also a King.

It is like if you are a friend to the President. And maybe in Private, you call him by a Nickname or whatever name you call him.

When there is a State Function, you don’t just go and say hi. But you know everybody will say that is disrespectful. They know He is your friend, but in this forum He is not sitting here as your Friend – He is the Ruler of the Universe.

And that consciousness has to be among Christians – That when we Worship God; we are not just Worshipping Him as our Father, but as the King of the Universe – And as the King of the Universe, He deserves the highest Adoration.

Now if you don’t understand that, then our Worship would be focused on ourselves – Worship is not about you, it is before the Throne of God and we are singing to Him.

Worship is not for Personal Consumption – It is before His Throne: because we are addressing Him not ourselves. Our Worship is for the Lord.

Revelation 4:8-11, The four Living Creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night, saying: “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, Who was and is and is to come!” Whenever the Living Creatures give Glory and Honour and thanks to Him who sits on the Throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before Him who sits on the throne and Worship Him who lives forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying: “You are worthy, O Lord, To receive Glory and Honour and Power; For You created all things, And by Your will they exist and were created.”

John is telling us what happened in this Place – There are Three (3) Forms of Worship in this Passage.

1. Worship is a Proclamation:

And what is a Proclamation? In this, since it is a Public Statement about Who God is.

The Four (4) Living Creatures and the Twenty four (24) Elders say something to God – They make a Proclamation.

It is to God but they also want the Universe to hear it – “This is what we think of God.” So they make a Proclamation.

We will take a close look at Proclamation, and I will break it into Three (3) Parts:

I. Who God is: And so they say “Holy Holy, Holy”.

And it speaks of something that is Clean and Pure; without blemish. And stands on its own.

They are saying, “God You are One of a kind, Set Apart.”

That God is in a Class of by Himself – There is none like Him: God we don’t even have the right word for You. “You are Holy!”

… That is the first Theological Statement about Who God is.

II. How we know God to be: This Holy God, Who is He? “Lord God Almighty.”

There is a Rhythm going on here. Pay attention to this: “Holy, Holy, Holy. Lord God Almighty” – Three (3) words each!

III. How God exist: “Who was and is and is to come!”

So there is a Poetry, Rhythm and Composition – That means that these words are not just being spoken, they have been thought through and have been structured well to give to God.

If you actually read them both Horizontally and Vertically, they say something.

If you read Horizontally:

Holy, Holy, Holy,
Lord God Almighty; Who was and is and is to come!”

If you read it Vertically:

Holy Lord who was, Holy God who is,
Holy Almighty who is to come

Whether you are reading it Horizontally or Vertically, they are making a Statement – So this is not Ordinary thing that is being said.

The Speakers have thought about it to say Lord, whether we look up, look down, turn around, You are the same: You are Holy, You are Almighty, You are the One who was and is and is to come!

What Does It Tell Us About Our Worship?

That means Worship Songs should be thought through – The words of Worship Song should be thought through.

We cannot just come and just threw meaningless words together, and say because it has a nice bit, is Worship. No! We have to think about what we are saying to God.

Just like somebody wants to write to his Girlfriend that he has just found, he will write something like:

“The Brightness of this day has given me the opportunity to pen you these few Missives to you. As the Moon is to the Sun so am I to you!” (Laugher)

… When you are writing to a human being, that’s what you do.

When you are going to give a Speech at the Government House you Prepare. You Structure your words and Phrases because you are going to speak to Dignitaries.

How much so now that you are going to talk to the King of the Universe? You think you should just say anything that comes out of your mouth? No! You have to think through what you are saying.

Have you thought through what you are saying? Is it Theological? Does it has weight? Does it give honour to the Person you are speaking to? Does it tell how much you respect the Person?

That is what the Angels are saying – “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty. Who was and is and is to come!”

The Proclamation has to be well thought through!

And it’s time that when we come to Church we sing Meaningful Songs – A lot of the Songs People are Singing as Worship have no meaning. So there is no Proclamation.

2. Prostration: This is the Second form of Worship.

The Bible says they fell down – Total Surrender of all we are and have to God.

In addition to making a Proclamation, they Prostrated themselves before God.

And there are also Three (3) Things that happened in Prostration:

I. There is Honour – They fell down!

When the Passage opens, the twenty four (24) Elders are sitting on their Thrones – It means there is a time for sitting in the Presence of God.

But when they Worship starts, they say, ‘God is bigger than us! Although we have Thrones, He is Higher.”

So they fall down, they drop down, they get down from their Thrones.

You cannot come to God and still sit on your Throne – There is Honour.

II. Adoration: The Bible says they Worshiped Him. They bowed before Him and they Worshiped.

III. Submission: They cast their Crowns before the Throne.

At the beginning of the Story, they are sitting on Thrones with white robes and with Crowns on their head.

At the end of the Story, they are off their Thrones, the Crown is off their head; and they don’t care whether they wear white or not; they are on the Ground.

Do you see what is happening? – It tells us two (2) Levels of Relationship that we have with God:

I. There are times we sit with God, talk with Him as our Father – We have a Relationship with Him.

II. And then there is a time we know we are not His equal.

And that is what the Twenty four (24) Elders recognised – Although they have their own Thrones, they realised at a certain Point:

• We have to bow to the One who gave us the Throne.
• We have to take the Crown back to the One who gave the Crown to us in the first Place.

And in our Worship, there is a Place of Honour, when we Worship God, Adore Him and Submit to Him.

Submission is deep in Worship – When you say:

• I sit on the Throne because He put me on the Throne.
• I have a Crown because He gave me a Crown.
• And at the end of the day, the Crown, the Glory and Honour all belong to Him.

This Morning, I want us to get this clear: That our Worship is before the Throne of God.

Although we are here on Earth (in our Churches) when Worshipping; we must see ourselves as John saw it in the Spirit – We must say we are before the Throne of God.

And what we are doing is not for our Pleasure, it is for His Honour.

We are not in Church to make ourselves happy; we are in Church to honour God.

And as we keep Him at the centre, then what we Proclaim and how we act Physically, all of that is:

• Directed to show our Reverence to Him Who sits on the Throne;
• Directed to the One who has also given us thrones, Who has made us Powerful and Strong, Who has made us Kings and Priests. Unto God who has redeemed us by His Blood.

… And next week we are going to examine further, the this Level of Worship that goes on in Heaven.

Let’s rise up on her feet as we just Proclaim the Holiness of the Lord.

Lift up your hands to God – He is the King of kings, the Lord of lords, our Maker. He Owns us, we belong to Him.

He is our Father but He is also our Owner. All we have belong to Him. Everything we have in Life – Positions, Thrones, fame, He put us there!

And this Morning, we come and cry Holy, Holy, Holy.

Declare His Glory, His Beauty, His Majesty and Honour Him.

Thank you Lord!

CLOSING PRAYER

Father, this Morning, we Your Creatures whom You have created come before You.

We know You as our Father, and we know You as our Creator and as our King – The Ruler of our lives, the Owner of our lives, the Owner of our days and our breath.

The Owner of our Beginning and End, we yield all that we have and all that we are to You.

Be Magnified in our Praise.

Be Glorified in our Praise.

Let our Praise be towards You.

Let our Mind be centred on You;

And let our thoughts be filled with you LORD.

Thank You for this Knowledge; we acknowledge You as our King.

In Jesus’ Name – Amen.

Thank you so much for staying all through to read.

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COMPILATIONS BY:

MOSES DURODOLA, TITILAYOMI AJAYI AND TOPE BABALOLA

© DISCOVERY MEDIA CREW (DMC) 2023

SPECIAL SUNDAY SERVICE WITH PASTOR (DR) MENSA OTABIL (GENERAL OVERSEER, INTERNATIONAL CENTRAL GOSPEL CHURCH (ICGC) CHRIST TEMPLE, ACCRA GHANA)

TOPIC: SACRIFICE OF PRAISE – PART 2 (UNTO THE LORD)

DATE: 5TH NOVEMBER 2023

BIBLE TEXT: HEBREWS 13:15; PSALMS 29: 1-2 AND EXODUS 30: 8-9

Let us rise up together as we make our “DECLARATION OF GATHERING” in this “YEAR OF GATHERING”.

Are you ready? Say with me:

I Proclaim Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. The Lord is the Shepherd of my Soul, my Shelter by Day, my Light by Night.

In His Name, we Plough our fields, by His Spirit we gather the Harvest, in His Light we seek and find.

In this Year of Gathering, the Lord of the Harvest has commanded: Launch Out into the Deep. At His Words, we cast our Nets, we gather in Souls and Substance for God’s Kingdom.

The Lord is our Reward; in this Season I received God’s Portion set aside for me: Full Measure, Pressed down, Shaking together and running over.

Nothing is Lost and Nothing is wasted in Jesus Name – Amen!

I started a Series called “The Sacrifice of Praise” and this is the Part 2.

In this Part 2, my Subtitle is “Unto the Lord” – In Part 1, we look at “The Fruits of Our Lips”.

One of the most important thing we have to keep in Mind as we Worship, as we come to Church, as we Sing, as we dance, as we Clap; is to know whom to all of this is for!

Because sometimes, if you are not careful, you do something and sometimes you do it for yourself or you do it just to be happy or you do it because it is fun.

A. But our Worship should be unto the Lord:

• When we Clap, we Clap unto the Lord.
• When we Shout, we shout unto the Lord.
• When we Sing, we sing unto the Lord.
• When we dance, we dance unto the Lord.

All of our Praise, is “Unto the Lord” – And it is important that we keep this in focus in all that we do.

So, we will go back to the Bible Text that I started with and that I anchored the Part 1 of the Series on – That is Hebrews 13:15.

Hebrews 13:15:

Therefore by Him let us continually offer the Sacrifice of Praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving Thanks to His Name.

There are two (2) References in this Bible Verse that I want to draw your attention to:

1. “To God” – Let us offer the Fruits of our lips to God.

That means; for who He is, we declare what we declare – We Sing, we Shout and we make all these Pronouncements and it is to God.

… We offer the Fruits of our lips to God!

And that is basically Thanking God for who He is; not for what He has done but because He is God and because He is who He is!

2. “To His Name”,

That means His Character – Who God is.

And God is not Annonymous – His Name distinguishes Him from other gods.

You know that in the Natural, a Human Being name separates him from other People; although some of us have names that other People have.

However when it comes to God, other People are called gods. But not like a Personal name which He revealed to Moses at the Burning Bush – “I Am”.

He is the only One who is “The Great I Am”.

And He says that when we Praise Him; we don’t just declare Him, but also declare to His Name.

That means we are separating God from all others so that our Praise doesn’t go to the wrong Person but our Praise goes to exactly to whom we want to Praise.

In the Old Testament, the Jews will Worship God and then they said because He is Good and His Mercy endures Forever.

Giving Praise to God and His Name is Experimental.

So, when I say I’m giving Praise to God; I’m giving Praise to His Name – I’m talking about how I have experienced Him!

So, if your Experience of Him is Shallow; your Praise will also be Shallow.

If your Experience of Him is Deep, then your Praise will be Deep.

Because when we give Praise to Him because of His Name, we are talking about how we have experienced God.

So for Example:

I. When we Experienced Him as our Saviour, we Thank Him for our Salvation.

For those who has Experienced Him as their Saviour, He is the Lord our Saviour – That is the Name we gave to Him.

II. When we Experienced Him as our Healer, we Thank Him for our Healings.

And for such People, the Name of the Lord our Healer.

III. If He Provides for us, we know Him as the Lord the Provider.

And I Pray that as you will experience God in all His Names, in the Fullness of His Name; then you will have an Experience of Him that is Deep.

So when you come to Worship God, you draw from the Deep Wells of your Experience of Him.

I remembered when I was very Young as a Child; our family was okay but a Typical Ghanaian family – Always in trouble, broke; especially when my father lost his job.

The family was going through severe Hardship but my mother was a “Woman of Faith” – And many times, we will come and there is Nothing in the house and she will say: God will do it and God will Provide.

And somehow, God will Provide and she will Pray.

And as a Child, I learnt that once my mother says God will Provide, something will show up.

And so, we will be at home and then Somebody will come from somewhere (Maybe a Relative or Friend) and will say: I just came and I brought this. And they will give us maybe some foodstuffs or money – And that will be what we will live on.

So, we get to know that God is not just the Saviour of our Souls; we know His Name as the Great Provider.

If you have never been broke before, you won’t know Him as the Great Provider!

If you have never been Sick before, you won’t know Him as the Great Healer.

But when you experienced Him in your Worship, in your Praise; you will Praise His Name!

And I Pray that you will experience God in Deep ways so that your Worship and your Praise will also be Deep!

B. And we give Praise to the Lord to show who He is to us – This is emphasised in Psalms 29: 1-2:

Psalms 29: 1-2

1 Give unto the Lord, O you Mighty ones,
Give unto the Lord Glory and Strength.

2 Give unto the Lord the Glory due to His Name;
Worship the Lord in the beauty of Holiness.

And what this Verse tells us is that our Worship belongs to God alone!

We did not divide our Worship – Because what I saw going on is that when we were in hardship and Somebody brought something; we Thank the Person but give the Praise to God. Because we know that Human Being brought it but the One who made the Human Being is God.

Our Worship is to God alone – We appreciate People for what they did for us; we appreciate People for their Kindness to us but when we want to ascribe the Worship; it doesn’t go to a Human Being but unto God!

Because if you are not careful, you are going to Worship the People God uses to bless you and there will be Nothing left for God because you have given all the Worship for Human Being.

God can use a Doctor to bring Health to you but your Healing is from God.

He can use Somebody to open a Door for you but your Favour is from God.

And if you are going to be a True Worshipper, you have to learn to distinguish the People God uses from God – He uses People but they are not God.

As long as we are Appreciative and we honour the People, we have to be careful not to give what is due to God to a Human Being.

And in the Bible Text, it says that:

1. We give Him all our Strength and Honour – Our Glory and Strength with all that we have achieved, the thing that makes us Strong.

That means that when I become Strong, when I am blessed, when I become Mighty; when I come before God, I give all of that to Him.

So, if you are a King; you cannot be in His Presence of God and behave like a King.

So, if you are a King and People wait on you and Peoplle bow before you; you cannot come before the Presence of God and tell People to bow to you.

You take your Strength, your Glory and all that God has given to you and say: Lord, it is Yours.

And so, you can’t be arrogant in the Presence of God; you can’t be Proud in the Presence of God; you can’t be conscious of your Status and your Position and who you are in the Presence of God.

And you can’t be Shy in the Presence of God.

When we come to the Presence of God, we are enthusiastic and we give Him our Glory and our Strength – We give all to Him!

2. Not only do we give Him our Strength and Glory; we give Him what is Worthy and Befitting – That is the Glory due to His Name!

That means that we must be Intentional to give God what we considered Worthy of Him.

That is always difficult because God has let us to determine how much He is worth to us.

He says that if you think that I am important to you, then show it; if you believed that I am the One who has given you what you have, show it – He has given us the Freedom!

So, the Question we ask when we are Worshippping God is: Is this befitting? Is this Deserving?

If I dance more at a Party, then I dance before God and then I’m showing who deserves my dance more.

Some of you are Good Dancers but when you come to Church, you won’t dance.

So, what are you saying? You say: Lord, the Party deserves my dance more and not You!

Because we have to give Him the Glory due to Him and there must be something we give to Somebody else that is Greater than what we give to God.

• You cannot Praise something else more than you Praise God.
• You cannot Praise food more than God because for some of us, when it comes to food, we wax eloquent and we begin to speak very Prophetic words about the food. And how the “fufu” (DMC NOTES: “Fufu” is made from Cassava) has been, the soup has been and the meat and the smell and we name the Spices one by one. And when there is a crab there, we describe it.
• Some of us are so fascinated about Football; that we can describe a Goal that a Footballer scored with Superlative words. But when it comes to God, there is no Superlative words.

The word you used to Praise a Goal in Soccer is greater than the word you used to Praise God.

So, you are not giving Him the Glory that is due to His Name.

• Sometimes you have a friend that you love so much because they mean so much to you and then you can say things about them.

Now, do you say such things about God? Do you describe God in those words?

Because sometimes, People say: I don’t even know what to say to Worship God but: You know what to say about Messi’s Goal? You know what to say about the food you just ate? You know what to say about a friend, a Movie/Film you watched or a Song that you listened to?

You say: Oh, this Song move my Heart or it takes me to Places that I have never been before.

If you can say that about Music, then you should say better things about God!

The reason why many of us finds it difficult to Worship God is because we reserved our Best words for something else – For a Girl, for a Man, for a friend or for a food.

It’s like a Ghanaian who has travelled to Spain – Barcelona; or they went on a Cruise to Greece and they give descriptions of the Place.

And the same Person will come to Church and will be Quiet.

By that Action, you are showing who is your God!

So the Psalmist says: Give Him what is due to Him, what He is Worthy of!

• If you think that God is Worthy – He is your Deliverer, then Praise Him as your Deliverer.
• if you think that God is your Provider, then Praise Him as your Provider.
• If you think that God is your Healer, then Praise Him as your Healer.

Give Honour to His Name and do it in a befitting Manner.

All of us are Guilty of it – There are some things we speak more highly of, that we wax more eloquent about than our Praise to God.

But we are all learning and we have to develop the discipline of reserving our Choicest Vocabulary for God.

Our deepest and most Emotional Expressions must be to God!

Our Worship belongs to God alone – We can appreciate People but our Total Devotion only belongs to God!

C. Before in Part 1, we talked about the Worship in the Temple, we talked about the Incense that goes up in the Morning and goes up in the Evening.

And there is something there that I want to use to help us qualify our Worship Properly:

Exodus 30: 8-9

8 And when Aaron lights the Lamps at twilight, he shall burn incense on it, a Perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your Generations.

9 You shall not offer Strange incense on it, or a burnt offering, or a grain offering; nor shall you pour a drink offering on it.

So, this is talking about the “Altar of Increase”.

And it says that Aaron goes both in the Morning and Night. He has to put the Incense because that Incense raises the Prayer, Worship and Praise of the People and it is there throughout the Day and Night.

But if you look at the Passage, it carries some very Peculiar Instructions – And we will look at two (2) of the thing it addeesses:

1. In Verse 9, it says that: You shall not offer Strange incense on the Altar.

That means that you don’t give God a “Mistaken Offering” – An Offering that is not Approved!

A Strange Incense is an Incense.

But if you look at the Old Testament, an Incense was to be made according to Prescriptions. And there were Specific Spices that must be used and Specific People who Produce the Incense.

And God says: Don’t Present Strange Incense.

In other words, don’t just pick an Incense at all and come and burn on my Altar.

So, God is very Specific about the Worship that we give to Him!

So, God has some Peculiarity about what He is looking for; that the Offering that I’m giving Him has to be done right.

If you know your Bible very well, in the Book of Leviticus, Aaron’s children has brought Strange Incense to put on that Altar – They are Pastors’ kids and they offer Strange Offering.

The Bible says that Fire came from that Altar and Consumed them.

And that shows you how important is it that the Worship we give to God must be right.

Even when we dance before the Lord, it has to be right – You can’t be wriggling your waist back and forth in Praise of God!

You must dance but be careful that you are not dancing and Mindful that it is God that you are dancing to – This is not a “Party Dance”.

Even in Parties, you are a Christian and you belong to God!

But for some of you, your dance must be Godly – You can’t be Standing infront of God and your waist is going up and down. That is a Strange Incense!

It is a dance of course, but it is Strange and so it cannot be offered on the Temple of God!

2. The Second Thing here is called “Misplaced Offering”.

And when you look at the Bible Text, it’s quite interesting – And so I spent a lot of time trying to Understand that Instruction.

So, what is the Bible Text saying: You don’t have to make an Offering in a Wrong Place.

The “Grain Offering” is a Good Offering; the “Burnt Offering” is a Good Offering; but there is a Place for “Grain Offering” and “Burnt Offering”.

He said on my Incense Offering Altar, you don’t make this Offering!

And what God is saying is that: Something may be right for something else; but it may not be appropriate at another Place.

And when it comes to Worship, we have to be very careful – That something may be right, we have to make sure that we are not Offering the right thing at the wrong Place.

Let me give you an Example:

Whatever we do in an Offering and Worship, we give it unto God.

• So, when we Clap; we are Clapping unto the Lord.
• When we Shout, we are Shouting unto the Lord.
• When we lift up our hands, we lift it unto the Lord.

If you Change that and for example, you are Worshipping and Somebody say: Let us Clap and saying we are Clapping at the devil.

It may sound Spiritual but there is a Place for Spiritual Warfare but not on this Altar.

So, on the Altar of Worship, you don’t Clap to stop the devil as the devil is not in the Equation. But on the Altar of Worship, we Clap unto the Lord!

So, what happens is that what is due to God, we forget it and our Worship is no longer unto God but Offering something to ourselves.

Do you know why those Offerings are not supposed to be on the Altar of Incense?

It is because the “Burnt Offering” is for the People – The People has sinned and they go to make Offerings.

The “Grain Offering” is for the People.

But He says that things that are to benefit you, you don’t put on the Altar of Incense because everything on the Altar of Incense is totally to God!

I believe in Spiritual Warfare but our Worship must not be for Spiritual Warfare!

God engages in battles for us when we Worship Him but we don’t engage in Battle with our Worship!

The Israelites went into battle in 2 Chronicles Chapter 20 and the Praise Leaders sang and God sent ambushment. But they didn’t do that to say as we come Worshipping, we are fighting the Enemy.

They Worship God because He is God.

And God says that you Worship me, and I will fight for you.

If we Worship God, He Weaponises and fight for us.

But you don’t say: I am fighting this battle and I’m doing it in Worship because you lose focus of whom you are Worshipping!

You Worship God and He fights your battles – You don’t Worship and fight with your Worship!

The Altar we give our Worship to God must always be done consciously as unto God:

• We don’t Clap to slap the devil.
• We don’t Stamp our feet to crush the devil.

We do all of those as Praise to God and the Lord that we Worship will fight for us and give us the Victory!

Does the Lord fight for us? – Yes! As we Worship the Lord, He fights for us.

But it is not ours to do – The battle is unto the Lord; the Warefare is God’s own. Yours is just to give Him all your Worship!

So, when you come to Worship, don’t think about the devil – Just say: I’m Worshipping God, I’m Praising God, I’m giving Him all that is within me and God knows how to fight your battles!

Is there a Place we do Spiritual Warfare? – Yes, there is a Place we do Spiritual Warfare but not on this Altar. The Altar of Worship is for Worship!

Before we Close – I want us to spend some couples of Minutes to give God Praise and to give God Worship.

Let Us Stand Up – Just for 2 Minutes:

What do you want to tell God?

• Who is He to you?
• This week, what has He done for you?
• In the Past, in the whole of this Year (2023); what has He done for you?

Praise His Name – Lift Up your Holy Hands to God and begin to declare from your lips who He is.

Thank You Lord, Praise and Honour and Adoration to You.

CLOSING PRAYER

You are our Help, You are our Strength, You are our Shield – Everything belongs to You.

Our Praise belongs to You, the Fruits of our lips belongs to You.

You are the Giver – You use People but You are my Giver, You are my Helper, You are my Deliverer.

I have no one except You Lord and my eyes are on You Lord.

Great Lord Almighty; the Great I Am – You are my Sufficiency, there is Nothing I need that You cannot Provide. You make my Life Complete.

I Honour You this Morning, I declare Your Majesty, Beauty and Power,

I Celebrate You for who You are, for what You have done, for what You are doing and for what You will do.

The Kingdom is Yours, the Glory is Yours, the Praise is Yours – With no Strings attached, we Honour You Lord.

We declare Your Praise Lord.

In Jesus Name – Amen!

And we will do something else before I sit down:

There are many ways to Praise God:

I. And one of them is with a Shout.

When we Shout, we are not disturbing the devil but we are shouting unto God,

II. And we Clap our hands.

Not slapping the devil but we are hailing God – We say that we Celebrate You Lord.

So, give Him a Shout and a Clap unto the Lord!

IT IS UNTO YOU LORD!!!

It is time for us to take our eyes off the devil and our Enemies and Spiritual Attacks.

And when we come to Worship God; Pure Incense must go to God – Pure Incense of Gratitude must go the Lord!

God Bless You – Amen!!!

Thank you so much for staying all through to read.

Kindly Order for the Audio of Year 2022 RCCG Programs covering all Programs, Inclusive Weekly Messages of Pastor Mensah Otabil, Apostle Joshua Selman and Bro Gbile on a 16GB Flash from our Stable – Call/Text/WhatsApp 08023604721/08066497178/08059821748

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Discovery Media Crew … Reaching out to the World through the Power of the Gospel!!!

COMPILATIONS BY:

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© DISCOVERY MEDIA CREW (DMC) 2023

SPECIAL SUNDAY SERVICE WITH PASTOR (DR) MENSA OTABIL (GENERAL OVERSEER, INTERNATIONAL CENTRAL GOSPEL CHURCH (ICGC) CHRIST TEMPLE, ACCRA GHANA)

TOPIC: SACRIFICE OF PRAISE – PART 1 (FRUIT OF OUR LIPS).

DATE: 22ND OCTOBER 2023

BIBLE TEXT: HEBREWS 13:15

Let us rise up together as we make our “DECLARATION OF GATHERING” in this “YEAR OF GATHERING”.

Are you ready? Say with me:

I Proclaim Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. The Lord is the Shepherd of my Soul, my Shelter by Day, my Light by Night.

In His Name, we Plough our fields, by His Spirit we gather the Harvest, in His Light we seek and find.

In this Year of Gathering, the Lord of the Harvest has commanded: Launch Out into the Deep. At His Words, we cast our Nets, we gather in Souls and Substance for God’s Kingdom.

The Lord is our Reward; in this Season I receive God’s Portion set aside for me: Full Measure, Pressed down, Shaken together and running over.

Nothing is Lost and Nothing is wasted in Jesus Name – Amen!

One of the features of the Christian Church is the offering of Thanksgiving, Praise and Worship.

Different Churches do it differently, but in every Christian Church, as Part of the liturgy there is the offering of Praise, Adoration and Thanksgiving to God (in words and in song).

The only Problem there is that some People come to Church after all of that have taken Place. And then they come just to Participate Probably in the Preaching. And some People just come for the Benediction.

Today I am starting a Series and will not be doing it Sequentially – I will pick it at various times this year (2023) and Part of next year (2024).

I will be Teaching on “SACRIFICE OF PRAISE.” This is Part 1 of Sacrifice of Praise; and my Subtitle is: Fruit of our Lips.

Hebrews 13:15 (NKJV):

Therefore by Him let us continually offer the Sacrifice of Praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving Thanks to His Name.

… The Passage says we must do it continually.

In other words, you don’t do it one moment and get tired and say, “at this time I will offer my Sacrifice of Praise. But I will wait another time to do it.”

To understand the Phrase: “The Sacrifice of Praise”; we have to go to the Old Testament – Sacrifices were given continually in the Old Testament.

The Old Testament had a lot of Sacrifices, especially when you read the Books of Exodus, Leviticus and a bit of Deuteronomy – You will find that there were lots of Sacrifices that God gave to the children of Israel and most of them were occasional Sacrifices.

So when it is a Passover, there would be a Sacrifice made.

When it is the Feast of the First Fruit, there would be a Sacrifice made.

When it is the Feast of Tabernacles of the Day of Atonement, there would be a Sacrifice made.

And then when they Harvest their crops, there would be a Sacrifice made.

Most of these Sacrifices were done Annually – They were not daily. But there were Particular Sacrifices that were made that are continuous. And God told them to do it continually and never stop.

There were two (2) of them:

I. The first one is in Exodus 29:38-39

“Now this is what you shall offer on the Altar: two lambs of the first year, day by day continually. One Lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other Lamb you shall offer at twilight.”

They were going to offer the Sacrifices in the morning and in the evening. And He said, it is going to be a Lamb that is one (1) year old.

So every day, under the Old Testament; a one-year-old Lamb would be sacrificed in the morning and in the evening and they did it continually it never stop.

… So this is a continuous Sacrifice, it never stops.

2. The second one is in Exodus 30:7-8

“Aaron shall burn on it sweet incense every morning; when he tends the Lamps, he shall burn incense on it. And when Aaron lights the Lamps at twilight, he shall burn incense on it, a Perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your Generations”

… The three (3) words used there are: Morning, Evening and continually.

If you lived in Israel at that time, every Morning, Evening and throughout your existence – In the Morning, there will be a Sacrifice of Lamb and Incense in the Morning and in the Evening – These two occurred continually.

So let’s break it down a little;

I. The Lamb, what did it Signify?

A Lamb is a Life Sacrifice. It is a Sacrifice of Life offered on the Altar.

• It means Israel were giving themselves to God; they were giving their lives to God.
• The offering of the Lamb was also to make way for the People to have access to God. Because the blood of the Lamb made Atonement for the People.

And so every Morning, they had to have access to God. And every Morning they declared, “our lives belong to God.”

That is the Sacrifice they made of the Lamb; declaring that their lives belong to God day and night.

So your Life does not belong to God on Sunday and then on Monday you will take it and say “it belongs to me.” And then you wait till next Sunday when you will say your Life then belongs to God.

Or maybe on 31st December Night when we are entering the New Year, that is when your Life belongs to God: “O LORD, I give my Life to You.” And then on 1st January you w will take it back.

But for Israel, their lives belonged to God day and night, continually.

… So that is what the Lamb represented.

II. Then the Incense:

The Incense was a sweet-smelling Sacrifice.

And so the Priests will put the Incense on the Incense Altar. In every Morning, the Place will smell beautiful and every Evening they would do the same thing.

So when you went to your the Temple area or you went to the Tabernacle, you will see a Lamb offered in the Morning, you will see an Incense burning in the Morning and in the Evening, the same thing.

These were the two (2) continuous Sacrifices. The other offerings were continual but they were not daily. Some of them were Yearly, some Monthly. But this was daily – Morning, Evening, and continually.

So keep that in Mind as we go back to our Bible Text (Hebrew 13:15) – Therefore by Him let us continually offer the Sacrifice of Praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His Name.

When Hebrews says “let us offer a continuous Sacrifice to God” it does something in Mind. It doesn’t want us to guess, because much of the Hebrews is interpreting the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament.

Now it says, what they used to do in the Morning and in the Evening – The Lamb and the Incense, you must do it

And it tells us different ways of doing it:

1. It says “Let us do it by Him”

Who is ‘Him?’

Him there means Jesus Christ. You do it by Him not the Lamb, not the Sacrifice, but through Jesus Christ: Who He is and what He has done for us. We offer it by Him.

2. The second thing you would note in the Passage says, “Let us offer”.

We Present our Sacrifice in the New Testament by ourselves.

Now what is the Significance of that Phrase – “Let us offer?” It means we don’t go and Sacrifice by ourselves.

In the Old Testament you bring your Lamb, you give it to the Priest and the Priest will Sacrifice it for you.

If you have Incense you want to burn, you have to give it to the Priests and they will do it for you.

But in the New Testament it says, let us offer it ourselves.

So in the New Testament, Worship is not offered by the Priests on behalf of the People. It is the People themselves offering it to the Lord.

Now most of you would like it when Pastors speak things into your Life;

Like when I say, Breakthrough is coming your way – Amen.

Healing is coming your way – Amen.

You are very happy! It is good for your Pastor to say that.

But in the New Testament really, we don’t relate with God through Pastors – We come by Jesus Christ, and we offer it ourselves.

So if I want to Worship in the New Testament, I don’t leave it to the Priesthood. In the Old Testament the Praise and Worship was led by the Priests (the Levites).

They would come and sing, “Because He is Good and His Mercies endure forever”; and the People would be quiet, watching. Because the People who offered the Sacrifice are the Priests. But in the New Testament we offer it ourselves.

So you don’t come to Church during Praise and Worship, listen to the Choir sing and you are watching them -That is Old Testament behaviour!

In the New Testament, when the Priest are offering; we also offer ourselves – By Jesus Christ, we offer our Sacrifice ourselves and it is not done on our behalf.

And it goes even beyond Praise and Worship; it goes beyond our Prayers – We offer it ourselves, by Jesus Christ.

WHAT IS THIS SACRIFICE?

In the Old Testament there is a Lamb and the Incense.

What is the Sacrifice in the New Testament?

The Passage (Hebrews 13:15) answers it – It says the fruit of our lips.

That is the words we speak and the words we sing – That is what we bring to Church.

Whereas in the Old Testament, they went with their Lamb on their shoulders; they went with Incense in their containers.

In the New Testament, we come with words in our mouth because we offer the Fruit of our Lips.

So you cannot be quiet when you are in the Presence of the Lord – You worship! You have to offer.

And how do you offer? Through the fruit of your lips.

A lot of us come to Church, when a Song is going on; you feel your voice is bad. Maybe your Music Teacher told you “don’t sing again, you are spoiling the Music” (Laughter)

But you see, when we are Worshipping Congregationally, we are not just trying to sing artistically; we are offering a Sacrifice to God. And God knows your voice, He created you, He knows you cannot carry a tune (Laugher).

But He says, when you come to my Presence, don’t say “because my voice is bad I will not offer the fruit of my lips.”

Because if you don’t offer the fruit of my lips, then you came to Church and you went back without Sacrificing your word – You brought your Lamb and Incense to Church and you took the back.

But God says, when you bring your words of Gratitude and Thanksgiving; you don’t go back with it. You have to offer it.

This is a Sacrifice in the New Testament – It is not a Lamb, it’s not Incense, it is the fruit of our lips!

How many of you know how to speak?

Even if you don’t have the Physical ability to speak you can use Sign Language because that is how you Communicate.

God says, when you come to His Presence through Christ; you offer by yourself.

One reason why we put the lyrics of our Songs on the Screen is so that, if you cannot sing it, you can speak it.

Because a Song drags a Note. And some of you don’t have the Vocal ability to drag a Note.

If all you can say is: “I love You Lord, I Worship You Lord” – That is the Sacrifice of your lips.

It may not be in the form of Music, but it is word coming out of your lips – It is a Sacrifice of the fruit of your lips.

HOW DO WE DO THAT?

… Three ways:

1. We Sacrifice by using Word from God’s Word:

We say God’s Word back to Him or we sing God’s Word back to Him.

A lot of the Songs of Praise are taken directly from The Bible.

For Example, when we sing: “As the deer Pants after the water so my Soul pants after You….”

It is not we making up words; the Song is the Word of God – We take the Word of God, put it in our mouth and Sacrifice it to Him.

When we sing: “Immortal, Invincible, God only wise…”

When you sing it, you are offering the fruit of your lips as a Sacrifice to God.

2. We use Words from God to us:

There are things in His Word which He speaks to us – “Be still and know that I am God.”

We didn’t invent it; it is God’s Assurance to us which we now put in our mouth and offer Him – To assure us that God is with us always.

Or words like, “I am the Lord that heals you.” And when we sing that, it is God’s Word to us.

So there are two (2) Parts – God’s Word that we sing to Him and God’s Word to us.

Both are Sacrifices of Praise – The Fruit of our Lips given to the Lord.

3. Words from us to God:

Sometimes we make up our own words and will sing it to God – “The Lord is Good, I will lift Him up Higher; everywhere I go I will lift Him up Higher.”

You won’t find it in the Bible, but we are saying Lord, we have experienced You that You are higher. And we put that experience as a Sacrifice and offered to You.

He is so wide you cannot get around Him; He is so high you cannot get over Him; He is so low you cannot get under Him.”

It is not Biblical, it is our Sacrifice to say Lord, we have experienced You as the High One, as the Big One, as the One that Nothing can get around.

And when we come to Church with those words, they become our Sacrifice of Praise – It can be a simple Chorus, it can be a sophisticated one. Those songs are not in the Bible, it is our knowledge of God. We say Lord, when I look at Your Creation this is what it says to me.

So I am going to Church this Sunday and this is my Lamb in my mouth; this is my Incense in my mouth. And when I get to Church I am going to sing, I am going to offer Your Praise to You.

For each one of us, you cannot come to Church and a Song is being sung and you are offering Nothing.

Now some of you may say, “I don’t know the Song.” I know! But you know the words, so read the words with Passion.

Maybe you go to a Church for the first time, you are not familiar with their Songs, but you can see the lyrics. Then read it – That is all you should do. Because you are offering the Fruit of your Lips.

This is the sacrifice of the New Testament, it is out Incense – This is our Lamb: do it by day and by night. We do it at home,we do it in the Congregation of the Righteous.

When we gather together, we come with one voice and we Present our Sacrifices of Praise.

That is why one of the most important Segments in a Church Service is the time when we are offering our Sacrifices to God – We bring the Sacrifice of Praise to the House of our God.

You don’t come to Church when the Sacrifice is over, you come ready to Sacrifice.

We wonder many times when we come to Church and you say, “I didn’t get much; Nothing Ministered to me” – That is because you came with Nothing!

The Good thing about the Sacrifice of Praise is that even if you don’t have money you can offer it.

If you are broke on the 22nd of October 2023; you don’t even have Transportation fare but you have lips and you have the Fruit of your Lips; you can offer it unto God. And you can offer it enthusiastically, with Commitment and with the Joy of the Lord.

And this is a Sacrifice He wants us to offer day and night, continually.

Every day you get up, you offer your Sacrifice to God. And before you go to bed you offer your Sacrifice to God. And then you get up the next day you offer your Sacrifice to God. And before you go to bed the next day you offer your Sacrifice to God.

And when you go to Church on Sunday, you offer your Sacrifice with all the Sacrifices of others – You say come, let’s do it together; let God hear our voices together. Let Him receive our Sacrifices of Praise and Thanksgiving.

That is the New Testament Worship – It is not animal.

Final Scripture – The final thought:

If you want your Sacrifice to be Sweet Smelling and Acceptable to God as in James 3:9-11 – It is talking about the tongue which Produces the fruit of our lips.

With it, we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth Proceed blessing and cursing. My Brethren, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening?

WHAT IS JAMES SAYING?

Lips used to bless God should not be used to curse People.

Why is that important?

Under the Old Testament, the Sacrifice has to be Sweet Smelling.

And a curse is calling evil on somebody; calling doom on somebody. And it is not Sweet Smelling.

So if you want your lips to continually bring Sacrifices of Praise, then you cannot intermittently interrupt what your lips Provide to God.

And James said, you cannot use your lips to bless God and at the same time curse People.

James says, it cannot be so. Because we offer Sweet Smelling Sacrifice continually, and daily.

Sometimes there are people you can’t bless.

I used to have a friend (years ago), one day we saw at a Place and he was very angry. He said to me, “I feel like cursing this Place and the People who live there.” So he held his own mouth and walked past that Place.

If you can’t bless, hold your mouth: because Blessings and curses cannot come from the same Spring water.

Our lips are for the Praise of God, declaring Blessing, Favor, Healing, Abundance – They are not for declaring the opposite.

And in the New Testament, God warns us that our Sacrifice of Praise would be Sweet Smelling; and it would be continuous.

Just before we close I want to give you few Minutes to offer the Fruit of your Lips to God.

… Do you want to do that? Yes!

So let’s rise up to God:

I want you to lift up Holy hands to God and the Sacrifices you have inside of you offer it to God, what He has done for you:

The Favour He has given to you; the Breakthrough He has given to you; the week that He navigated you through – Things may not have been be Perfect but see what the Lord has done: what you waited for has come to pass.

So offer out of your mouth the Sacrifice of Praise – Declare His Praise, declare His Glory, His wonderful works.

There is no god like You, there is none who is like You Lord. You are God all by Yourself. From the rising of the Sun to the setting of the same I will Praise You Lord.

I hallow Your Name. I Declare Your Goodness and Your Majesty – You are my King, You are my Deliverer, You are the Ancient of Days, You are the Lord who is More Than Sufficient.

How Excellent is Your Name! Great are You Lord, and Greatly to be Praised.

In Jesus’ Name we Worship – Amen.

CLOSING PRAYER

We Honour Your Father!

We’ve come with the Fruit of our Lips, we’ve come to offer our Lamb and our Incense.

As we declare Your Praise, we declare Your Wonderful works, we declare our knowledge of You through our mouth.

May our Sacrifices be Acceptable to You this Morning.

May You be Please Lord, to receive all our offer to You.

May You be Please to dwell in our midst.

And may You show Yourself forth over us throughout this week.

And let us experience Supernatural Assistance in all that we do.

In Jesus’ Name – Amen and Amen!

Let’s give the Lord Praise!

Celebrate Him – do it with the Fruit of your Lips.

Hallelujah – Amen

If you want a Place where you keep your mouth shut go to the Library.

The Church is not a Library – it is a Place where you come with the Fruit of your Lips.

Great are You Lord and Greatly to be Praised!!!

Thank you so much for staying all through to read.

Kindly Order for the Audio of Year 2022 RCCG Programs covering all Programs, Inclusive Weekly Messages of Pastor Mensah Otabil, Apostle Joshua Selman and Bro Gbile on a 16GB Flash from our Stable – Call/Text/WhatsApp 08023604721/08066497178/08059821748

To Support DMC: https://discoverymediacrew.com/donate/

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Discovery Media Crew … Reaching out to the World through the Power of the Gospel!!!

COMPILATIONS BY:

MOSES DURODOLA, TITILAYOMI AJAYI AND TOPE BABALOLA

© DISCOVERY MEDIA CREW (DMC) 2023

SPECIAL SUNDAY SERVICE WITH PASTOR (DR) MENSA OTABIL (GENERAL OVERSEER, INTERNATIONAL CENTRAL GOSPEL CHURCH (ICGC) CHRIST TEMPLE, ACCRA GHANA)

TOPIC: WHO TOUCHED ME – PART 2 (THOSE WHO GIVE OF THEMSELVES)

DATE: 15TH OCTOBER 2023

BIBLE TEXT: LUKE 8: 43-47

Let us rise up together as we make our “DECLARATION OF GATHERING” in this “YEAR OF GATHERING”.

Are you ready? Say with me:

I Proclaim Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. The Lord is the Shepherd of my Soul, my Shelter by Day, my Light by Night.

In His Name, we Plough our fields, by His Spirit we gather the Harvest, in His Light we seek and find.

In this Year of Gathering, the Lord of the Harvest has commanded: Launch Out into the Deep. At His Words, we cast our Nets, we gather in Souls and Substance for God’s Kingdom.

The Lord is our Reward; in this Season I received God’s Portion set aside for me: Full Measure, Pressed down, Shaking together and running over.

Nothing is Lost and Nothing is wasted in Jesus Name – Amen!

Last week, I started a 2-Part Message and this is Part 2.

And we took an unusual detour in looking at a familiar Passage of the Scripture and try to learn something a little differently from what we have been learning in that Scripture.

So, I’m doing Part 2 of: “WHO TOUCHED ME”. And my Subtitle is: “THOSE WHO GIVE OF THEMSELVES”.

Last Week, we talked about “Those who take from Us” and this week, we are looking at “Those who give of Themselves”.

In Part 1, we focused on the woman who touched Jesus. We looked at the Attitudes she exercised and yet He commends her Faith that she was a Woman of Faith – A very Bold and Audacious Faith.

But there was an aspect of her Attitude that was wrong – In that she just wanted to take Silently from Jesus without acknowledging the Source of the Blessings.

We may be bold to receive from God but we must always have a Thankful and Grateful Heart towards God.

And not only towards God, but also towards the People that are a Blessing to us.

… There are no Silent Receivers in the House of the Lord!

But in this Part 2, we will be focusing on Jesus – And we will look at “Those who Give of Themselves” and “Those who helped Others”.

And sometimes People who are Generous and “Give Up” themselves are just taken for granted.

You know: You are kind, you are Good, everybody likes you because when they touched you; they received something.

When they come to your house or they have a Conversation with you; they know that their lives will be better.

And sometimes, you can give and give and give until you become very dry.

And so, we are going to learn from Jesus Christ and we are going to look at how He responded to this woman and a couple of other things we are going to learn from the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are going to look at Luke’s Account of the incident – Luke 8: 43-47.

Remember that Last week, we looked at Mark’s Account – DMC NOTES: Mark 5: 25-31.

And the reason why I shifted from Mark to Luke is because there is a detail in Luke’s Account that helps us to grasp the Story from Jesus’ Perspectives a little better.

And it says: Luke 8: 43-47 (NKJV)

43. Now a woman, having a flow of blood for twelve years, who had spent all her livelihood on Physicians and could not be healed by any,

44. Came from behind and touched the border of His garment. And immediately her flow of blood stopped.

45. And Jesus said, “Who touched Me?” When all denied it, Peter and those with him said, “Master, the Multitudes throng and Press You, and You say, ‘Who touched Me?’ ”

46. But Jesus said, “Somebody touched Me, for I Perceived Power going out from Me.”

47. Now when the woman saw that she was not hidden, she came trembling; and falling down before Him, she declared to Him in the Presence of all the People the reason she had touched Him and how she was healed immediately.

So this is a very interesting encounter between Jesus and this woman.

I mean this is the first time that the Bible is directly Personalising the incident of Somebody touching Jesus and receiving the Healing – Most of the times, Jesus will be the one touching People.

But this time, this woman comes and she takes the Intiatives and she takes a Miracle from Jesus.

And she does it without Jesus’ Permission.

And she fully intends to go home without telling anybody what has happened to her but Jesus caught her and then the Story came out.

So when God does something for you, don’t hide it – We must hear what God has done for you. It must be seen, and it must be heard so that others will be inspired by your Faith.

… So, don’t be Selfish in your Breakthrough!

So, let us consider the Statement that Jesus made – I’m just going to just put three (3) of those Statements:

1. Who touched Me?

This is a Question.

2. Somebody touched me?

Jesus said that I know it and the Disciples were saying how can you tell? He said there is Somebody here who has made a Withdrawal from me.

3. I Perceived Power going out of me.

The tense is a Present Tense – Jesus said not only did He Perceived it, at the time when the woman touched Him, He was still Perceiving it.

So it happened at a time and it is still happening because when the Power is gone, then it is gone. And Jesus felt that something had left Him.

So this woman touch wasn’t an Innocent touch, it wasn’t a Simple touch,, it wasn’t even something she could have thought of getting away with because a touch, touches Jesus and something about what she did had an impact on the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we are going to use this to just give you an idea of the Person of the Lord Jesus!

Because this Statement reveals an important aspect of Jesus Personality.

You know, many times when we think about Jesus, we think that He has no feelings, He has no thoughts – He is just Big out there, Nothing touches Him and Nothing affects Him.

But Jesus shows us from this Verse some aspects of His Personality.

And there are three (3) aspects of His Personality that I’m going to focus on:

1. Jesus has “Self Awareness” – He knew Himself.

If you are going to be a Blessing to the world, you have to know yourself and you have to have Self Awareness!

And how did Jesus show his Self Awareness – He knew who He was.

Throughout the New Testament, we encountered with Jesus in ways that shows that He has a Clear sense of who He was.

I. He knows both His Divinity and His Humanity – He was a Son of God and then a Son of Man,

II. He knew who He was Spiritually and He knew who He was Naturally.

And that is what we are also to develop – A Key sense of who we are!

III. He knew the Power that He had.

Power is the ability to get things done!

… And Jesus knew the Power that He carries.

Though many times, People have Power and they don’t know that they had Power.

You know, there are a lot of People who carries so much Power and they are not aware of the Power they had.

If for example, you have Somebody who has a very Strong grasp and when they shake your hands, they squeezed your hands. But they didn’t know that they had that Power.

So, what is going to happen is that they are going to end up hurting People without knowing that they are hurting People because they are not aware of the Power they had.

And it is dangerous to have Power and you don’t know that you have it because you are going to mess up People’s lives.

And then, there are some People who don’t have Power and think that they have Power. And they talk about how much Power and Influence they have but it is zero.

Jesus was one of those – He has Power and He knew that He has Power!

And if you are going to be a Person who is really going to be in Charge of your Life, then you must know the Power you have and understand how it works.

Because if you don’t; it is like a woman whose words are Powerful and she begins to exchange her words with her husband and cannot grasp the impact of her words on her husband because the woman can destroy a man with her words.

2. Jesus had Situation Awareness – He was aware of where He was at every Point in Time.

Jesus Ministry took Him to many Places and situations – He went to Wedding Party, Funeral Parties, Religious Services and He met all kinds of People.

But Jesus had Situation Awareness – At every Point in Time, He knew where He was.

Because if you don’t have Situation Awareness, you can go into Places and behave wrongly.

In the midst of the crowd, surrounded by the People, Jesus did not become Part of the crowd Physically.

This tells us that when People are in a Mob/Group; they tend to be very bold – That’s why People like Demonstration.

Because they miss up with the Group and they are Screaming; but when you isolate them; then you find out that they don’t have the Courage because many People take their Strength from the crowd.

Jesus was in the midst of the crowd but He was aware of who He was, He was aware of where He was and He was aware of the situation He is in.

And we must constantly develop not only Self Awareness but also Situational Awareness!

You know, each one of us behave differently based on situations we are in.

For example, if I come to Church and I sit in my chair and Praises are going on; I Praise with you – I lift up my hands and I show that I am Worshipping God.

Because I’m the Pastor of the Church and I knew that in this situation, People are watching me – Is Pastor Worshipping?

If I come to Church on Sunday and I just look at you as Praise and Worship and Prayer going on everytime; then People will think Praise and Worship is not important.

But because I’m aware of the situation I’m in, I have to Praise God because my Praise encourages you to Praise God.

I have to come in early when Praise and Worship is going on to show you it’s importance – It is called Situational Awareness.

Now, whilst I’m there Praising and Worshipping, most of you just do it because I’m noting everything:

• I know the Light; when wrong Light is on.
• I can tell when the Sound has Changed and sometimes I looked back and they understood my body Language.

It is called Situational Awareness!

Now, most of you may be here and not take Note of anything happening in the Service except what you are doing. But I must be aware of the situation.

When I was Young in Primary School, we had a Teacher that we thought was Supernatural because she was there marking our Scripts and she will say: Otabil kept quiet.

Then I will say: How did she knew that Otabil is talking?

That was how Jesus was where He was in the crowd – Just followed the crowd.

He didn’t just follow the crowd, He was aware there was a crowd and He also know that among the crowd there are People and the People are doing things in the crowd.

Now, you can tell the big difference between Jesus and Peter:

Peter says everybody is touching you – In other words, all the touches are the same. All touches are touch.

Jesus said: No, No, No; something is happening here and I am aware of it because at this moment Present Mindset; Somebody has touched me.

But Peter couldn’t feel anything but Jesus could feel it.

Do you have Situations and Awareness?

Do you tell the wrong Story to the wrong crowd?

Maybe you are sitting with People; are you aware of the People who are there?

Are you aware of the People who will carry Stories from this Place to the next Place so that the Story you are telling now fake?

Are you aware that you are broadcasting it to the whole world?

Because many of us has no Situational Awareness – We get into a Place, we just talk freely and later say there are Gossips.

But who gave them the fellas? You are the one!

You have no Situational Awareness – You didn’t know that this Person sitting here, this Story they will Multiply it ten times by the time we leave here.

So when next you sit in your Family Gathering, know everybody and know their Abilities and Disabilities.

Because if you don’t do that and you are a Generous Person like Jesus Christ, who has so much to give; People will take Advantage of you.

3. Jesus has Spiritual Awareness – He was aware of the impact He had on People!

Now, when it comes to Spiritual Awareness, there are People who has Extra Spiritual Senses in a Negative Way.

A cockroach is on a Wall; I rebuke you in the Name of Jesus.

Or they are in a Room and they saw a Wall Gecko; it becomes a Prayer Meeting.

Or they go out and they are buying food and they look at the woman selling the food and they believes other things; they had to have Full Prayer Meeting before they eat.

That is not Spiritual Awareness I’m talking about – That is Extra.

And also there are some People who are on the opposite end who don’t believe in anything Spiritual – They will walk through Life as if there is no Spiritual Dimension to Life.

But there is a real Spiritual Dimension to Life – Things happen that are Spiritual.

Jesus had a balance of both – He understood what was Natural, and He understood what was Spiritual. But He had Spiritual Awareness.

He knew the impact He had on People – He knew that He carry Healing, He knew that He could heal People. But not only that, He knew the impact that People had on Him.

Can you imagine that this woman had impact on Jesus? – She touched Jesus and Jesus felt it.

And Jesus said that I Perceived that Power has gone out of me.

And you must be in a Place then the People are draining you and you can sense it.

When they are constantly draining you, taking Advantage of your Time, taking Advantage of your Money, taking Advantage of your Patience, Love, Generousity and you just let them take Advantage of you; then you don’t know the impact the People are having on you!

There are some People that comes into your Presence and when they touched you, you just feel discouraged.

You just go to visit them at home and by the time you get to your home; you are depressed because every Stories they tell you is a Depressive Story.

But there are some People that makes you Paranoid – They tell you about all kinds of Enemies.

By the time you leave their Presence, you are so Paranoid.

They are not giving to you but they are draining from you!

So in Life, you have to know those that Impact Power to you and those who take Power from you!

And Jesus knew that and He could tell this woman – She is draining me because what is of benefit come out of me.

I. To her (Woman with Issue of Blood), it is Healing; to me (Jesus), something had gone out.

II. For her, it is a Breakthrough; to me, something had gone out.

And there are a lot of you like that – You are Good-Hearted People, you are Generous People; you are Kind and People are just draining you.

And because you have no Self Awareness, no Situational Awareness and Spiritual Awareness; you don’t even know that People are draining you!

Listen to me – When People are draining you, they will drain you until you are Dry.

And then the same People will say: Before, he used to have a lot but now he doesn’t have anything again.

So, what do we learn from this Encounter about Jesus? – That we have to maintain our Internal Power Balance!

Sometimes, you have to call “Time Out”.

Some of you who go for Meetings that everybody is asking you for Money.

You go somewhere and everybody is demanding for your Time because they knew that you are Generous.

At a Point, you start feeling tired, drained and weak and you have Problems to say “No” to People: I want to give but not now; I want to help but not now because I need to Preserve my Internal Power Balance, otherwise I will be so drained that I can’t survive.

Because if you don’t know how to do that, you are going to learn shortly that Time will always fly.

When I became a Pastor at a Young Age, I didn’t understand those things – And one of the People that are really drained are the Pastor.

Because in our Part of the world, the Pastor is not just a Spiritual Leader; he doesn’t only need to come and teach in the Church; he is also a Marriage Counsellor, a Financial Adviser, He is Contractor – He is everything.

Somebody run to a Pastor, very desperate and the Pastor said, what is wrong and he said I chew gum and I swallowed it.

… You swallowed your chewing gum and you come to the Pastor? Why don’t you go to the Hospital?

Because in this Part of the world, when Somebody is sick, they call the Pastor – The Pastor is the First Aid Officer.

In my early days of Pastoring; I used to live in a 3-Bedroom house – I live in one room, another Pastor live in another room and another Pastor live in another room with his wife and children. And the Boy’s Quarters was full of People.

In those days, my wife used to be upset because when there is food in the fridge and she thought that there was food there; next Morning, she goes and People had been led by the Spirit.

And not just filling their Stomach, it was giving my Marriage Problems because my wife is upset that we can’t keep food in the fridge.

At at one Point, you are Ministering to Somebody and at the other Point, it is creating tension for you – You have to know the Balance

So People will come to the house early in the Morning at Night and at a Point; I say: Listen you have to come and see me in the Church Office and book Appointment.

And some People were Upset – Pastor has now become very arrogant – Did Jesus keep Appointments or have Secretary?

You know we don’t know much about Jesus but Jesus keeps Appointments.

Read the Bible, if you want to see Jesus; you will tell Somebody and Somebody will tell Somebody – You don’t just go!

They went through Philip or Andrew – Andrew was the PA (Personal Assistant) of Jesus.

But eventually, People learnt how to come to the Church Office before they see the Pastor.

What am I doing?

Trying to manage my Internal Power Balance.

What you are giving out to People is also draining you

And Jesus is teaching us – What the Woman calls “A Healing”; it costs Him something and so He said that I Perceived Power going out of me.

Listen to me – If Power is going out of you, it is a Good Thing for the one receiving the Power but for you, something is going out of you called Virtues!

Now, a lot of you; Virtues go out of you all the time and Pretty soon; you are tired, you are frustrated and some of you can let External Pressure Collapse your Marriage.

People who demands Money from you; also demands attention from you and begins to put Pressure on your Marriage and before you know it; your Marriage is having Problems or your children are having Problems with you because you have no time for them because everybody can touch you and take something from you.

Jesus said: Don’t allow that to be so!

Don’t take yourself for granted because sometimes we take ourselves for granted – You can do it but you do it at the expense of something

And it doesn’t mean: Don’t help People; but be aware especially if you have “Growing Children” and has a lot of Needs and you are helping People.

And sometimes, the Pressure is so much that you may find out that your own children are deprived, your home is deprived and you are going through Needs.

And if you don’t manage that Power Balance well, you get drained!

It is not for Nothing that Jesus spent a lot of Time alone Praying early in the Morning because People were taking Stuffs from Him and He has to get Himself sorted out with the Father.

Don’t take yourself for granted and don’t allow anyone take you for granted.

Help People, be Kind to People, be Generous to People but don’t allow People to put guilt on you.

Be a Good Person, be a Good friend, be Good Neighbours, be a Good Relative.

Be Good, help People but you have to maintain the Right Balance because if you don’t maintain the Right Balance, People are going to draw so much from you and not even appreciate that you are giving to them!

• You give them something, they think that you could have done better.
• You spend 10 Minutes with them, they said that you should have spent an hour.

And they forgot that in a Day, we only have 24 Hours – 8 Hours for Sleeping and here in Ghana, about 3 Hours spent in Traffic.

So before the Time that you settled down, then you don’t have much time left.

If you have to give Someone 1 Hour out of your Time, it is a lot that you have given away.

Once a while, you can do that but there are times that you find out you have so many things to do and you don’t allow anybody to take you for granted.

Learn to tell People that I have only 15 Minutes and after that, say nice seeing you, we meet again and then move on.

Will everybody be happy?

No, but Pretty soon, everybody will adjust and when they are coming to see you, they rehearse everything in 15 Minutes.

So, for those of us who “Give Up” ourselves all the time, this is how we learnt from Jesus how to manage the Power we have so that we don’t become weak, for the People to take Advantage of us, drained us down to the Ground and sometimes make us just loss everything.

And you don’t need to seek Approval from People to be Kind and Generous!

Don’t try to buy Favour or Approval.

You need to have Self Awareness, and you must be yourself so that you don’t need other People to say that you are a Good Man for you to feel that you are Good!

• You are Good all by yourself.
• You are Kind all by yourself.
• You are a Good Person and you don’t need to Prove it.

So, from the 2-Parts^:

1. We have learnt that those who take Silently – No Acknowledgement.
2. But we also have to learn to manage what we have so that those who take Silently don’t weary us to the Point where we became so dry; that we can’t do any Good again because we didn’t know how to manage the Power that we have.

Thank you so much for staying all through to read.

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