 Matthew chapter 11 and verse 28, 29 and 30. And if you did not bring your Bible with you, just look up to the screen and you will be able to read it with us. Come to me, all of you who labor and who are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Let's say this prayer out loud after me. Say, Lord Jesus, open my heart to your word. Lord Jesus, open my heart to your spirit. Lord Jesus, open my heart to your faith. Amen. I want to speak today a message titled, Get Your Own Goat. And let's give Nazar a round of applause for designing a design. Those of you who are listening or watching, you may not see this, but we have a beautiful design over here of a goat. Now the problem is, but when I had the title of this message, and I usually take time on Wednesday to pray and fast, and so my message was a little bit changed. And so we're going to get to the title in a moment. But before we get to the title, I just wanted to start off with the beginning that we read. What the Bible says, come to me, all of you who are heavy-lead. So Jesus gives an invitation for anyone to come to him. Now I want you to underline if you're taking notes that you don't have to commit to Jesus before you come to Jesus. Sometimes we have this idea in Christianity is that if you're not willing to completely forsake everything in your life, don't you dare to play games with God. But in reality, Jesus makes a bold invitation and he says, come to me. And he doesn't say if you're only going to commit, but he says if you're tired, if you're exhausted, if you are just heavy-lead, if you are just sick, come to me. He doesn't even say come to me if you believe in me. He doesn't say come to me if you're going to follow me or obey me. He says, come to me if you need me. The Lord doesn't only invite those who are ready to commit to him. He invites anyone who needs him. I know sometimes this will look like he's going to waste his power. When I read the story of 10 lepers who Jesus encountered and they cried out for help and Jesus heals 10 lepers and the Bible says that 9, forget to come back and say thanks. Only one comes back. Now I think Jesus knew that 9 will forget about him the moment they get healed and yet Jesus still decided to heal them. Knowing they are not going to come back. They probably will not be part of his disciples. They're not going to be part of the church, but they're just going to get healed and walk away and live their own life without Jesus. Yet Jesus still goes and says, you know what, I am going to be good to you. Why? Because that's what makes me good. The Bible says that he is merciful. He lets the sun shine under good and under bad. He lets the rain come under evil and under good unjust and unjust. I want to let you know today that your God is bigger than you. He is bigger than us and he makes an invitation. He says, come all to me. You don't have to be perfect to come to Jesus. You actually don't even have to believe in Jesus to come to Jesus. I know this is a big step, but we've had few people last few weeks. We prayed for healing. Who did not believe in Jesus? We prayed for them to come to know Jesus and to receive peace. Who said, I don't think I want to trust in Jesus, but I say Jesus loves you and wants to believe in you and change your life. Do you want this? Yes, I want to. And once they receive the touch of Jesus, they say, now I want to know this Jesus. Do not be afraid to come to Jesus, even if you're not willing to commit to Jesus. I'm a member of Gold's Gym. Before I signed up the Gold's Gym, what they did, they had this very unique thing there where you go in and they gave you a seven-day pass. It's for seven days going to the gym for free. So if someone is looking for a free gym to go for seven days, Gold's Gym is the right one for you. And you go there for seven days and the amazing part that I loved is that not every single day you come in and they're like, do you want to be a member? Are you sure? You're wasting our free gym membership. You better be a member. No, I went in there. Nobody wants. They only asked, hey, are you enjoying this? Is this good for you? How is the price? How is everything? Can we do anything to help you? And after seven days, actually nobody even met with me to ask me about membership. The seven days were just for me to come. No strings attached, but they knew if I come for seven days and I like it, I am going to commit to that membership and I'm going to commit to that. And that's exactly what Jesus does. Jesus offers it. He gives you a seven-day pass. Sometimes He gives you more than a seven-day pass. And He says, come anybody, if you are tired, if you are heavy, if you are sick, He says, come to me and I will give you rest. Can somebody say amen? Now, but the amazing part, the second part I want you to write down is that Jesus invites those people who come to Him to commit to Him. Now, Jesus doesn't stop there. Jesus doesn't stop just by inviting you and say, hey, come and just experience my love, experience my grace and my mercy. But once you do come, Jesus takes another step and Jesus gives you another invitation. This invitation, He says, I want you to commit. I want you to come into a relationship with me. I want you to take my yoke, learn from me and you will find rest for your souls. Jesus is not just the one who just comes and says, hey, don't worry about it. I just want to bless you. You know what? I don't really want to be with you and I don't really care whether you're going to be with me. I just want to bless you because I'm just so good. I'm a sugared daddy. That is not what Jesus does. He comes, He invites you and after you come, now He gives you an invitation. He says, I want you to step it up. I want you to commit to me. It's important to notice that Jesus does not ask people to commit to Him who first didn't come to Him. We sometimes think Jesus tells everybody, live by my word. Nope. He only tells it to people who walk with Him. The Ten Commandments were not given to the nations. They were given to one nation who was delivered by God. We're trying to push it on our country. Our country wasn't delivered from Egypt. We're trying to, oh, everybody should live by Ten Commandments. God never intended that. Now, it's good if you live by Ten Commandments, but they're not for everyone. The rules in your house to remove the shoes, they don't apply to my house because I'm not in your house. Those rules don't apply to me. The Ten Commandments were not applied to Canaanites, Jebusites, Gibeonites, Amorites, Amalekites, and every otherite that existed in that part of the world. The Ten Commandments were only for one country, Israelites, one light. Imagine that. God delivers a nation, and after He gets them out of Egypt, He shows His power, brings them to the mountain. The Bible says they even saw His feet. They heard His horrible voice. They saw mountains shake, and God says, I am the God who just, you just had seven day pass, ten plagues. You saw all of this free stuff. No strings attached. I just brought you out. This is me. Do you want to be my people? I want to be your God. Deal? They're like, yeah, we love this. God says, good. Now I'm going to give you commandments. God did not ask them to commit in Egypt. He didn't give them commandments in Egypt. He only gave them and asked them to commit once they came, and they tasted who He was. Yes. It will be pointless to give a commandment to a slave, because He will be incapable of living up to it. Why? Because He is in a predicament where He cannot, even if He would want to, live by these commandments, He can. That's why people who are addicted or people who are bound, they cannot live according to these things, until they're first freed from their bondage. And the God who sets you free is the God who says, can you step it up? I want you to commit, because I can give you something else. I can take you higher. Can somebody say amen? Jesus says, I want you to commit. I want you to come into a relationship with me. What is this relationship with Jesus in titles? What does this relationship mean? What does this relationship include? What is this relationship? How can I know if I have it or not? How can I grow deeper and how can I grow further? And how can I get to know Jesus? How can my relationship with Jesus flourish the more? The first thing that I want you to remember about your relationship with Jesus is Jesus said, take my yoke. Now this, let me say that again. If you're not a Christian, maybe you're visiting today, or maybe you've been visiting, and you call yourself not a Christian. Whatever I'm going to speak for the next moments, I want to let you know you have a free pass not to do. You actually are completely cool. You can listen to this thing, you know what? And you can actually take notes. And when we don't do that, rebuke us. Because this is not for everyone. This is for those who made a commitment to follow him. We are surprised many times when non-christians act non-christians. Non-christian people have never subscribed to the commandments of Jesus. They've never subscribed to his Lordship and never be surprised if they live like non-christians. The surprise should be when a non-christian lives like a Christian. But the biggest surprise is when a Christian lives like a non-christian. So this is for Christians. This is for those who came and they said, Jesus, I like the seven-day pass and I want to join in. And this is where Jesus begins to lay it out. He says, first of all, I want you to take my yoke. Now speaks of a covenant, speaks of a relationship with Jesus. A yoke in the Bible was used. A yoke is actually a wooden beam that would connect two oxen together and will cause those two oxen to pull the weight and sometimes to either fertilize the earth or whatever the owner would have fought it. So it was a wooden beam over the neck of both oxen. They would combine them together. The Bible says the anointing breaks the yoke. Yoke can be also a addiction or a sin in someone's life. The Bible says also that we should not be unequally yoked with unbeliever. That means that we should not, you and a non-christian or a non-christian and you should not be connected because you guys are going to have a problem. He's going to go this way and you're going to go that way. And then this yoke is going to suffer. So a yoke speaks of a covenant that you have with someone, a covenant. It's a very old word and it's not used in a today's vocabulary. You don't go to AT&T and say, I want to make a covenant with you. You don't. You don't walk out to your local gym and you just say, Hey, I just really would love to make a covenant with you. They will look at you and say, Shakespeare's, I don't reach Shakespeare's. I don't know what you're talking about because covenant is not a word that is used in our vocabulary. Word covenant comes from the word to cut. In the old times, the way they would make covenants, they didn't have peace treaties as much as they had covenants. What they would do is they would take an animal and cut the animal in the half. So this word covenant comes from the word to cut. They will cut the animal in the half and both parties. So if I and you want to make a covenant, both of us would walk. I first, you first, or doesn't matter who, we both walk through the animal that has been cut in the half. And after that we, you know, have a meal, we celebrate. And this is what it means. Now we are in a covenant. This is not like you sign with a paper. Hey, here's the paper. I mean, this is the death of them. This is how serious this is. The difference between a covenant and a contract is this, is that a contract is written in ink. A covenant is always made in blood. That's why marriage is a covenant. And when two people, you know, they live holy and they live pure, when they get married on the wedding night, there is a breaking of blood and there is a blood that is released and it seals the marriage covenant. Contract is made in ink. Covenant is made in blood. A contract requires a part of you. A covenant takes all of you. So if you have a contract with someone, or let's say you are leasing an apartment or let's say you are renting a house, contract involves, you are taking a part of the landlord's possession, his house, and you're renting it. You're not taking his heart. You're not taking his emotions. You probably don't even know where he lives and you don't care because you are in contract. A covenant takes all of you. It's like marriage. All of her, all of him is exchanged. A contract expires. It's a six month when you live in a certain place or a year or it could be two years if you are with some kind of phone company, but a covenant never expires. Why did I put these transitions? From the beginning, God never made contracts. With Noah, God made a covenant. With Abraham, God made a covenant. With Israel, God made a covenant. Jesus drinks the grape juice and the last supper and he says this is the blood of the covenant. Our God has no idea what contract is. When he thinks of relationship, his worldview is a covenant, but our worldview is a contract because we don't make covenants with people, but a marriage is the best example of what covenant looks like. When you are living with a contract mindset and you take that mindset to church, guess what happens? Your word is based on emotion. You come in and it's only once a week and other times I don't do anything else. Like there are some people right now who are not present with us, who are not home relaxing, but who after they work, they went, these pews were not made by Gabriel and Michael Archangel. They were made by people who are in a covenant with this church, who after they finished their work and they could relax, they go to this certain place and they work their butt off so that these pews are done. A contract mindset is when I come to church and I say no, I'm going to come here until the Lord moves me, means until somebody starts to push on my soft spots or somebody bursts my bubble or I don't get fed no more, nobody cares about me no more, then I will go to another place. God wants us to break a contract mindset. Take my yoke, means God says I want you to think in a covenant, not in a contract. When you think about God in a way of a contract, it will reveal itself because that's exactly how you will treat your marriage. When it gets hard, you will say, well, we grew apart, irreconcilable differences, whatever that means. You did not know you married a female? You did not marry a male, you married the opposite. I mean, there will be differences and they need to be reconciled. If your mama or grandma could reconcile them after 60 or 50 years of marriage, you can reconcile too. And so people come and they say expires, people come and they say, well, this is just an ingot, it's just a contract, I can get a divorce 12 months, you have to take a yoke. Relationship with Jesus indicates you approach Jesus with a view. He's not looking for a date, he's looking for a bride. You approach Jesus with this view He wants me to be yoked with him. He wants me to be in a relationship where there is commitment and I love what Jesus said. He said, my yoke is easy. I believe he had to say that because most of us, that is in somewhere in our subconscious. Many people are afraid to commit to God because of this. They think committing to God means my life is going to be so hard. And therefore, we all want to commit to God. When we do all the parting, all the sex, lose our lysis, virginity, and then when we're sick and tired and then we will definitely commit, why? Because we then are ready to do the hard stuff. But until then, we just want to take it easy. You know what? Let me give you a news flash. The same man who says, I will die and three days later, we'll rise from the dead means his words have power. He says, my yoke is easy. A yoke of sin is hard. A yoke of addiction is hard. His yoke is easy. If whatever you are wearing is not easy, you might be wearing something else than his yoke. A relationship with Jesus is easy. The relationship he has with you, now that's a different story. It's as though Jesus is telling us, he says, for you to be connected to me, piece of cake. For me to put up with you, well, let's not get started. Because for me to get into your life, I hang on nails. And for me to get you through life, you have no idea how much you're going to put me through. And so Jesus says, you got the easy part. For me, it's the hard part. And most of us, we got it out of the way around. We're like, oh, it's so easy for God. I'm so wonderful. But it's so hard for me. God is so holy, so demanding, professionalist, always one step further. I mean, I'm just so, it is just so hard. I'm so glad we're going to heaven as just a blessing for this hard relationship I endured. Jesus said, no, my yoke is easy. It's easy. Somebody say amen. In marriage, the beauty of marriage is that when you get married, whatever you have, she has. And whatever she has, you have. So if she comes with debt, well, you got debt. If she comes with a Mercedes and it's paid off, you got a Mercedes. You can put your Honda Civic in the garage and delete the pictures on our Facebook and pretend you never knew the Honda Civic existed and drive a Mercedes and don't ever say it was your wife's. It's our Mercedes. And that's what happened when you got to know Jesus. He took your sin and you just took his righteousness. He took all the junk and you took all the good. But then there comes a point where you have no more sin for Jesus to take. But then you got some good stuff that you start to hide in a special safe. You're like Lord, I love the fact you set me free from pornography and smoking. Amazing. And you gave me this beautiful freedom. But this idea that I have, like I have some extra money that I saved up. I have like a fifth car in my garage. And Lord, but this other thing that I have, I, let's not, let's leave that alone. That is mine. And then the same kind of people who have certain areas that are mine come to the Lord and reach their hand into his pocket. And they recognize acts as denied. When the things you want from the Lord become inaccessible, you're like, hmm, and we begin to rebuke the devil after that. But sometimes you must understand, you cannot just expect the Lord to let everything be accessible to you if your life is not accessible to him. Now you can daydream, well, that is not true. God said it. God's word settles it. But when you are married, you know the contract says you can have anything your wife has. Her body is your body and your body is hers. But if you offend that woman, you're not going to touch her. You're not going to come near her and you will be praying before you eat that soup, hoping in Almighty God that if there is any poison, the Lord will neutralize it in Jesus' name. Because you will know, you can't just take your hands into her pocket, figuratively speaking, and when you deny her access. I love the testimony of Ephra. This is a lady from Vancouver, BC, from Canada. And there was a time, she was addicted for 16 years of smoking. And she prayed with Prophet TB Joshua and God completely set her free, completely. She was completely free from smoking. Now she can live longer. She's so happy. But what I love is not the fact that in her relationship with Jesus, she was free. It's that few months later, she gives access to God in the areas of her life. Most of us have that under a password. She takes $7,000 and brings it to church a few months later after her deliverance. And supposedly this was the money that she was able to save up after she was freed from smoking. So every month she started to save the money. And she said, Lord, you took my smoking, but Lord Jesus, here's a password to my finances also. But some of us are afraid. We're like, God can take $7,000? Yeah, and he owns the universe. If he takes a hand into your little small pocket that has holes in it and you can then reach your hand into his pocket that has no holes. And she comes a month after that with $3,000 again. And she was such an inspiration to me, such an example. Don't stop with giving God access to your junk. Give God access to your treasure. And somebody say amen. Don't stop giving God access to your junk. Give God access to your treasure. And when you give God access to your treasure, something will begin to happen. I know in the beginning it will seem like nothing is happening. You know, remember when I was going to high school and in a walk waking up in the morning at 5, 5.30 and coming to church to pray, almost my whole senior and half of my junior year. And it continued afterwards. And it seemed like nothing was happening. You know, hours of every day of prayer, but even the youth ministry was not taking off. My personal life seemed like everything was stagnant. But reality? Anytime God has an access to your schedule. Anytime God has an access on Sunday morning for you to wake up and come to church and Wednesday night wake up to come to church and you say, you know what, 10% of my income goes to God and you give God a free access. Say, Lord, my life, I'm not Bill Gates, but even if I will be Bill Gates, it's nothing compared with what's hiding in your pocket. Go ahead, Lord, whatever you want, you can have. Then you have the boldness like Solomon, who offered many sacrifices and God comes at night and says, Solomon, what do you want? See, most of us were like, reading the scripture, we're like, well, the Lord is asking me what I want. He asked Solomon, not you. And Solomon brought a thousand bulls to God. He didn't just brought a Washington and slipped it into the offering basket. And the Lord says, what do you want? And he says, Lord, I just want to have wisdom and God says, I'll make you the wealthiest man, the wisest man and the most famous man the world has ever seen. A man who gave God an access to his pocket and God says, I want you to have an access to mine. You know, a few weeks ago, in my wife, we gave some money away and it's been kind of every month it's been like that. And even a life of prayer, I have been dedicated to that life of prayer and to the life of fasting. And this is not to brag in any way, but to just encourage that God truly knows how to let you have an access. When we started this year with those kind of commitments, I was afraid we're not going to make it. I was afraid. This is just going to go crazy. I'm like, I am losing it. But honestly, God has ways of opening access to your life. Like, even last Saturday, I was at the conference in Seattle and somebody came up to me and he invited me to speak at the other conference or retreat in August. On Monday, I get a call from a church that I kind of know about, but I've never had an opportunity to speak there. And they asked me to come and speak on their youth service at the end of the month. Yesterday, I get an invitation to go speak in California in the church that I know about too, never been to. Today, I get an invitation to lead a conference in Vancouver and to go preach in Mexico with the complete another group. And I'm like, I'm telling my wife, I'm texting her, I'm like, this is ridiculous. This is like, it just comes on me. It's weird. But this is what I realized. Give God an access to your life. And if God lifts the code for your life, you will be amazed. And no, it might not be the money he'll roll in, but he might open opportunities that otherwise you wouldn't have, as somebody say, man. I want you, what does it mean to be committed to Jesus? Take his yoke, his presence. Number two is that we get his purpose. Jesus says that my burden, it's light. Because oxen, two oxens, when they carry a yoke, they don't carry the yoke for a show. This is not a romantic walk. This is an assignment. This is to carry a burden together. And when you are in the covenant with God, you are carrying a burden with God. As Christians, we believe we have one burden. The burden is not to be sick. The burden is not to suffer. But the burden is to bring other people to Jesus Christ. What does this mean practically? What I think means practically is that I want us to know that this means to live our life with an intent to see other people come to Jesus Christ. Live your life with an intention to see other people saved. This doesn't necessarily mean that you have to go sell everything you have and move to India. This doesn't necessarily mean unless the Lord tells you to sell everything you have and move to China. This doesn't necessarily mean, okay, during summer I have to go to Mexico and I'm going to be a missionary there. Well, look it around you because your assignment is people around you. Live with an intention. You can be in the same place that you are at right now with an intention and see people save. And see people give their lives to Jesus. Last Sunday, a lady came to our church who saw a newspaper article about house divided. How me and my wife are divided because she's Russian and I'm Ukrainian. And she came to church. An article, we went on that article with intention. We have sometimes people I meet in the airport in the mall in the store who watch our TV show and they said, man, it blessed me so much and it's good. And as a pastor, I preached the gospel and I invite people to receive Jesus. Last Saturday when I was there as Friday, two people gave their lives to Jesus and I live with that as a pastor. A TV show does the job. A newspaper did the job and flyers do the job, but I want you personally to live with an intent to bring people to Jesus because sometimes it's easy to get up here and be as a pastor or to say, you know what, I come to church, I pay my tithe, the pastor goes and preaches another places. He's on TV and he's bringing people to Jesus. And I am just putting my lot by bringing my tithe and coming, bringing myself here. But I want you to do that with intention personally. I want to do that personally myself. My good mentor Vladimir Muntian in Ukraine who I look up to and he has a big church. He preached to a lot of people. Many churches are started and he mentioned a testimony where a few months ago he drove his car at one in the morning and sees a hitchhiker walking by and the next distance was miles and miles away from the city, one in the morning. And you know, it's not the wisest thing to pull over and pick a person who's walking one in the morning. He pulls over, picks him up. He says, hey, who are you? He says, I just got released from like 20 something years prison sentence. Well, this is a good moment to say, bye, bye brother. And Vladimir Muntian who preaches to people on the stage, he could say, I don't need to witness to people. Let my people do that. He begins to lead him to Jesus and that guy doesn't recognize that he's actually been watching Vladimir Muntian in jail and he like shakes himself. He says, I'm sleeping, I'm dreaming. He said, wake me up, wake me up because it's not true that I'm actually in your car one in the morning when I'm just walking out from my prison sentence. Nothing is impossible to God because somebody say amen. Live with an intention to see people saved. But I want you to notice what this means is also make room for interruptions in your schedule and in your budget. The problem we have is that to live with an intention requires making room for interruptions. Interruptions is when Jesus is preaching a sermon they break through the roof and all the dust begins to fall and they bring a man in the middle of his second point and this man is healing. An interruption is Jesus is really rushing into this house where the daughter is sick and she's about to die and the woman pulls on his garment and stops him. An interruption is when Jesus goes in and there's a kiosk and he stops and he looks at the kiosk. Interruption is when a hurting man laying and the priest, man, I'm so busy, I'm running late, I'm always late, I'm not punctual. Next time I'll do better and I'll come and stop. I don't have time for you. One of the reasons why it's hard to live with an intention is because when you live with an intention you have to make room for interruptions. You don't plan for these things. You have your schedule planned, you have your budget planned and then boom it happens. I remember when I was going to lunch a long time ago in our church this particular event stands out in my mind and I already had a meeting with somebody I needed to meet with them and I was running late and as I drive off the parking lot we had a basketball hoop in our parking lot and I see a young boy playing basketball there and I already drove off of the parking lot and I hear this little whisper it's Wednesday night you gotta live with intention you gotta go tell him about Jesus and you gotta bring him to church plus he's already on the church parking lot. How hard does it get? But I'm like I'm running late. Once I come back I'll tell him but another voice told me he won't be here. I'm like well I'll find him where he lives but I just knew it I'm just playing games with God and I just gotta stop. I pull over my car and then I was like Lord I'm gonna shy. I mean just the guy playing that I don't want to interrupt him but I make an interruption in my schedule making an interruption in his playing basketball. I invite him over. He comes that night gives his life to Jesus and few months later I got a chance to baptize him. His name was Curtis Smith. He moved eventually to Louisiana to help his dad with some business some other things but I'm so glad that that day I took a minute of my schedule and allowed interruption because the third thing and that's the most important is when you do that God will reward you with an impact. See when we allow interruptions God will reward us with an impact. When you allow an interruption God will reward you with an impact. There was a guy I showed this testimony many times in our church it's about a Muslim man Kamal and he moved to United States as a missionary. He came to United States to do a cultural jihad on the culture means he came into the Bible belt to the like the Texas area Louisiana area where he wanted to find the poorest people and wanted to just start telling him about Allah and started to bring them to Islam faith and one particular time this young man when he moved to United States he was driving in the car he got into a severe car accident and the car accident was so severe he actually landed flew off of his car and landed on his neck and broke his neck in two places they took him immediately to the emergency room and the first doctor that came in started to pay so much attention to him and they started to you know put all kinds of things on him another guy came in another guy came in and after the surgeries he was not able to be by himself and he had to be on a little wheelchair and he had no friends in that place who would take him in and the doctor who was a Christian says I'll make an interruption in my schedule and in my life I'll take you in this man was a Muslim he was a cultural terrorist means he was coming here not with the bomb or with the gun but he was coming here to just just begin to infiltrate the culture with Islam he takes him into his house until this man recovers completely they take care of him they begin to give him money he begins to just you know kind of recover and after all of this is done the doctor gives him the keys to a new car and says you're gonna go and here I just wanted to bless you this man now comes into his apartment where you know he was committed to his god they taught him Christians are evil Christians are bad and now he says what I what I do I'm a mess he got on his knees and he says Allah these people they're not bad they told us these people are evil they want to kill us they want to help us these doctor he gave me a car they helped me they paid for my medical bills these Christians they're not as bad as they they tell us about them and he says what do I do and next thing he realized he just doubted Allah and he doubted Quran he took his gun and he wanted to shoot himself and at that moment the voice of Jesus came into the room and Jesus walked into the room he felt his presence and he said who are you Lord and Jesus says I am that I am I'm the alpha and the omega I'm beginning and the end and he says you don't have to die because I died for you but see what I want you to notice is the doctor made an intent to bring people to Jesus a doctor made an interruption in his life to see him and then God stepped in and says I will do the impact so many times we want God to do the impact because we pray but praying enough is not enough you have to live with an intent live with the motive do what you do but just do it for God I had an opportunity to meet two girls last weekend who are originally from Iraq and they're immigrated here because their mom met a person there and they immigrated here their mom got saved they're from muslim family but they never really believed in the islam faith but they were completely oblivious and rejecting the christian faith and the amazing part was that they came to a christian church in seattle very large christian russian church that doesn't have services in english and three years ago on a valentine's banquet they gave their life to jesus in the russian church i mean not this kind of russian church russian church that is completely different that is mainly to preserve the culture and to help the russian people not for the english speaking they get saved or they get baptized and it's been three years and they're there every single service and you know and a lot of these people from the church they told me they're like oh this is how awesome but i said this is really awesome i'm so happy but what saddens me is that the church does not live with the intent to see people saved this happened forgive me if i'm gonna use that word an accident this was not their intent they want to see people saved but it's not the intent of the services it's not the intent of their lives i want us to be different jesus says take my yoke but he says also you carry a burden with me means live for a purpose live with an intent bring people to jesus bring your co-workers and makes it so easy carry a flyer in your wallet carry a touch card in your pocket carry a touch card in your car when i was getting coffee for my wife today and the person in the drive through in starbucks on 395 a girl recognized me from high school and she says i remember you went to youth on fire in high school and you preached there that was before no i was born okay i was like what youth on what i was like oh that was like 10 years ago i'm like i didn't change you didn't change or you're stalking me on facebook but and the good thing is you start talking about she's a christian and start telling her about our church and everything and the good thing i had a flyer and i was like hey you gotta come to our church because i want to live my life not just preaching jesus went pulpit and i'm not talking about preaching jesus to everybody who comes but living with an intent to see people come to jesus guys because somebody say amen so that jesus says take my yoke and he says his burden and the last thing is jesus says you have to take you have to learn from me and this speaks of progress you have to learn from me what is the relationship of jesus it means that i am connected to him through a covenant it means i live my life with an intent and it also means i never stop learning god doesn't want you to go through life god wants you to grow through life and god does not want you to become a scholar he wants you to remain a student when i was at 14 years of age and i thought i had god figured out i went to a very big church it's a over probably a thousand and a half or two thousand member church a very big church and i i don't think i've read the whole bible through i read the new testament many times but when we came to united states i knew i had god figured out and i knew what god wanted i knew that god did not want people to raise hands during worship because that's how we grew up and is that during worship well there was no worship just singing hymns and you were not allowed to raise your hands your clapping was not allowed in the church so i knew this is what god is god doesn't do clapping and the hopping i mean this is complete hiddenism and paganism this is wrong and when you have drums i mean this is the next thing to like witchcraft and like this is clubbing and when you have lights this is really bad and women do not if women wear earrings i mean it's it's bad and when you wear a tie it's an arrow point straight to hell and i knew i had god figured out when we come and some of you don't know what i'm talking about because you did not grow up like that and praise god for you but for me when we came to united states and my pastor comes and he begins to instate the worship means we have three songs and we sing and we we can raise our hands and i was so bottled up by that because in my mind i already 14 years of age and i have gotten god figured out i was able to fit an ocean into a cup and i remember debating with ilia my cousin and i was proving to him that god hates people who dance i didn't have a scripture for it but i knew it and ilia brings the scripture opens up and says there's calves the people will dance like calves i was like that's for animals not for humans and i remember fighting with babusus clap all to clap your hands all your people shout to god with the voice of triumph and i'm like no it's wrong and i'm listening to myself i am saying no to the bible and i say the bible is wrong because my problem is that i became a scholar at 14 years of age i've gotten god figured out some of you you were scholars until you came to our church you knew how the service is supposed to be that and you knew how people supposed to be delivered you've never seen one but you knew how they're supposed to be delivered you knew what the church supposed to be like and what's not supposed to be like until the first prayer line you're like what is that ah you became a scholar and jesus says if you want to grow in me you'll never graduate from student you're always a student you're anointed worldwide ministry people are falling under the power of god remain a student why because the moment you stop being a student you become a critic every moment in christianity that stopped being a student and became a scholar became the movement that picked up the stone and says we know how god's supposed to do and that is not god every movement and we are personally in danger of that because right now we are used to what we see here and jesus says never stop learning your life supposed to be a constant progress your life supposed to be a constant growth don't go through life grow through life life is a classroom life is a university where you have to learn who he is and who you are in him can somebody say amen it's amazing that there are some things jesus says come to me i give you rest but then he says walk with me let's carry the load together grow through me and you will find rest i want you to notice this is that there are some things in life you are going to get by coming to jesus but there are other things that you're going to get in life by growing through jesus now it's very amazing that jesus says come to me and you will find rest then he says stay with me and you will find rest there's things we get by coming to jesus but there are some things only we get by growing in jesus the illustration of the palm tree always fascinates me when some of you know the palm tree when it's young you can put a chain around it to keep it grows straight and unlike other trees palm tree will not allow the rope to get inside of the palm tree when the palm tree grows up actually as the palm tree begins to grow any rope around the palm tree regardless of how strong and powerful they are they actually will snap and break other trees will allow the ropes to grow inside as the tree is growing and the point of the bible says that you and i are like a palm tree that means that there are things you are not going to get when you come to jesus only will get when you grow in him many of us think when i come to jesus i get everything it is true you get rest but he says grow in me because there are things that only come into your life when you grow with him in him not when you come to him you get some things when you come to him but there are things that only come when you grow through him there are deliverances you can achieve by coming to prayer line but there are certain things in your life that only come when you grow that's why disciples were casting out a demon and jesus says this is different kind of thing he says this only comes through prayer and fasting means this comes when you grow this comes when you pray this comes when you come into the bible this doesn't come through prayer line he said this doesn't come differently he says there is certain things that will only come when you grow in me learn from me and then you will find rest the same rest i promise to give you when you come to me is the same rest now you can find when you grow in me jesus says you will know the truth and the truth will set you free what that means is this is that as you grow in your knowledge there is a freedom that exists when you know jesus we all are used to well i just want the pastor to lay hands on me i just want jesus to set me free but there is a certain level of freedom that only exists when you grow in jesus if you ever seen and i use this illustration the church if you ever seen how little chickens are born you found a very interesting picture when a little chicken is inside of the egg and the mother has a very unique way of causing the little chicken to come out and she sits on those eggs for 21 days and causes the warmth of her body to fill that place and those little chickens inside of the egg they begin to form and they begin to grow a little bit bigger and bigger and bigger until you can actually take an egg and you can already almost see inside a little chicken and at that time you would think the mama would look at the egg and see the little chick is inside wanting to get out and the mama will help kind of like at least with the mouth or with the foot but the mama never helps a little chicken get out of the egg it's rude harsh evil unhumane sometimes you want to take a hammer like when i was younger that's what i wanted to do i wanted to until my parents stop me i want to take a hammer and go just crack it just help him poor little children but the mama knows one thing if i keep sitting on them they keep growing bigger and bigger and bigger and one day they will outgrow their shell and their shell will crack on their own and mama never helps them she helps them with other things she helps them to be conceived she helps them with other things but she doesn't help there's certain shells in your life god is going to let you be in him and so you can grow out of it amen you can get a gift from your parents you can get a car from your parents but you cannot get a gift a license license only comes at a certain age they can give you a house they can give you a mansion they can give you an airplane if they can afford it but they cannot give you a license at five why you have to grow into it there are things in life only come when you grow and jesus says you just have to grow into it when you grow into jesus you get to know who he is and you find out who you are because god wants us to carry his yoke carry his burden and god wants us to grow because somebody say amen