Frankie Mazzapica - Come As An Orphan
Thank you for tuning in today. My name is Frankie Mazzapica. The title of the message is "Come as an Orphan," come to the Lord as an orphan. And I want to provoke you. I want to provoke your thought to look at the Lord not just as a God, not as a creator, but to look at him as your Father. All of us here have a birth father, a birth mother, but the Father heart of God, the father position in your life is inexchangeable. It's something that we choose. We say, "God, I'm coming to you. I don't have a Father like you. I will never have a Father like you. Without you I'm lost. Without you I have no hope". And so this message is for the next four categories of people.
Number one, you are sad at heart. Number two, you have a troubled spirit. Naturally I don't know what's going on in your personal life, but you have a sad heart and a troubled spirit. I want to say the third category is for those of you that you have great needs. I don't know what category, but this message is for you. And lastly, I want to speak to the people who you need a miracle. I know it's related to great needs, but a need and a miracle are depending on how great the need is, there are in two very different categories. A need is something that oftentimes will come to you in time, but a miracle is something, it will not happen unless God makes it happen.
So let me just unpack those thoughts because I believe that if we come to him as an orphan, if we come to him and say, "You're my Father and none of these things will ever be put back together. My heart will never move from being sad. It will never move from being desperate unless you, my Father, step into my life and to begin to rearrange the traffic that's going on". He's got to be the great orchestrator. He's got to say, "Enough of this, and let's start bringing in some of this".
The Bible says in Daniel chapter 2, verse 11 that he starts seasons, where he says, "This season in their life is over. Now this season of their life shall begin". This is what God can do, but we have to come to him and say, "You are my Father. I surrender my life, and I need you". This is the message that I want to share with you. This is the passage of Scripture that I want to build the message off of. It's in Psalms chapter 68, verses 4 and 5. If you have the Celebration Church app, all my notes are inside that app. If you haven't downloaded it, you can just type in "Celebration Church TW" and you can find the notes inside of the app. But here's the Scripture. It reads like this. "Sing unto God and his name". Sing loudly.
See, there's a big difference between a casual approach, a cool approach, and an expressive approach. The Bible says to sing loudly to him, I love this part, who rides the clouds. Another verse of the Bible says that clouds are the dust of his feet. When you look up, you're driving in the car. You look through the windshield. Those clouds are the dust of his feet. It says sing loudly; for the Lord is the one that we are worshiping, but it's the Lord's presence that we rejoice within. The next verse in verse 5, it says this. The Father God, he is the Father, listen to this, of the fatherless. He is the defender of the widow. This is God, and it's him who we praise because his dwelling is holy. This is God.
Let me just reiterate the specific parts that I really want to marinate on. That he is a defender of the widow. He is a Father to the fatherless, and here's the reality. We are all fatherless because there is only one great Father. There is only one creator of the world, and we decide individually whether or not we come to him as our Father. Come to him as an orphan and say, "I need you". Let me unpack three categories. The first... not categories. First, I've got three major points. The first major point is an encouragement to those who are hesitant to come to the Lord in that fashion. The second category or the second major point is what do you do when you come to him.
And then number three, what should you expect from God when you do come to him? So the first category is the encouragement for all of us to come to him. And what does come to him look like? Come to him is not thinking about him. Come to him is not coming to church. Come to him is not watching on a screen. That's not coming to him. That's putting your attention on him. Coming to him is a matter of attitude and words. It's a attitude of saying, "You're my Father. I am here to live for you, and I need you and I want to worship you". It's an attitude.
But then the second thing is, is we have to open our mouth and speak to the Lord and praise the Lord. As you live your life the Lord will cross your mind, and oftentimes he'll cross your mind out of the clear blue. You're just doing the dishes, you're driving down the road, you're working and then all of a sudden he'll cross your mind, and I want you to know what's happening at that moment. He's always thinking about you. The Bible says that you are the apple of his eye, you're the center of his focus. But in those moments, he wants you to know that he's thinking about you.
And so he'll cross your mind, and in that moment I want to challenge you to say back, "You just crossed my mind too, and I love you". That's it. You don't have to pray any more than that. You can if you want to. But Smith Wigglesworth shared something that I will never forget. He's one of the greatest men of God that I've ever read about. He says this. "I rarely pray for an hour, but an hour doesn't go by without me praying". This is how we live our life. Can I just tell you, you cannot develop a close relationship with God if you are not praying?
If you are not praying, this is going to be a hard statement to hear, but I love you too much not to say it. If you are not praying throughout your life, at the end of your life you will not have reached your full potential. You will not even come close. You won't even come close to fulfilling God's assignment for your life. You will be an underachiever in the eyes, in the assignment, the eyes of God, the assignment of heaven if you are not praying. You may make a lot of money, you may have a big house, you may be rolling in a Benzo; but let me just tell you, you will be an underachiever if you are not talking to the Lord.
The Bible says this in Ephesians chapter 3, verse 20. He says this, "I am able to do exceedingly abundantly more than you can ask or imagine". Now, that's very easy to get excited about, but if you're not careful you'll overlook some very important words. It says, "I am able". It doesn't say, "I will". It says, "I am able. I am able. I am able to blow your imagination to smithereens. I am able". So what's the difference between him doing it and him just being able to do it? We already know in Romans chapter 2, verse 11 that he has no favorites. So what's the difference between him saying, "I'm able," and, "I will"? It's talking to him. It's being in relationship with him. Can I just... can I provoke you? Can I provoke you just to talk to him, talk to him, talk to him? And that's how an orphan comes before him.
The second thing is, and it sounds very similar to the first point and in many ways it is, but it's just a different way of looking at it. An encouragement on what to do when we approach him. There's a fascinating passage in the Bible in which it doesn't matter how many times you read it. Every time you read it, you see a different part of the heart of God. It's in John chapter 15, verse 11. It reads like this, "A certain man had two sons. The younger son came to the father and said, 'I want my share of the inheritance, your inherit my inheritance now before you die.'" The father agreed to split his inheritance between his youngest son and his oldest son.
A few days later, the youngest son took all of the money and wasted it on wild living. It says that he packed up all of his belongings and moved to a distant land. And then the youngest son says, "I'm going to go back to my father and say, 'I am no longer worthy of being your son. Take me in as a hired servant, for I have sinned against heaven and you.'" And the father says this. I want you to hear his heart. He says quickly, in other words, "Now that you said that, it's as if it never happened. Quickly bring the finest robe out of the house and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet". All of a sudden he is walking as a son, as if nothing ever happened before.
The answer to the question, or the continuation of the first point... of the second point of the sermon is, what do we do? We come to him and we say to him what is in our heart, and the whole passage gives the impression that the father was waiting on the son. It was as if at night, or during the day he was waiting, he was looking, he was staring out the window; and then at night he had a candle, sitting on the windowsill. I don't know if you guys remember this, but years ago, it still may be happening. I don't know. But there was a motel that had an incredible advertisement, an incredible marketing plan. It was Motel 6.
Does anyone here remember their theme? Tell the person next to you if you remember it. It says, "We'll leave the light on for you". I'll never forget that. If they've changed their slogan, they need to go back and change it back to that. "We'll leave the light on for you". I remember when I was growing up, my father was an evangelist. And so basically he would travel around the country from church to church and preach for them and then go to the next church. So as we traveled from church to church, you know, we would look for motels and... we didn't look for hotels. We couldn't afford hotels. If there was a room on the second floor, we already knew, or the third or if it had an elevator, we couldn't afford it.
And so you know, we would look for a Motel 6 or something at that level. And I think back as we would look up and we'd see the sign flickering and... we'd go, "Oh, that place is open. I'm sure they have rooms". And then as I got older, I became aware of their marketing and I think back, "Yeah, I remember those days". "We'll leave the light on for you". Can I just say that the prodigal son when he was coming back to the father, the father's, "I left the light on for you. I've been waiting for you". The father heart of God says this in John chapter 14, verse 18. It says this: "I will not leave you as an orphan. I will come to you. I've left the light on for you. I just want you to talk to me". Let's let bygones be bygones. Come on, encourage me this morning. Let's let bygones be bygones. It's over. It's done. Let's just move on. Let's just move on.
Number three and... again, point number one, the first major point is an encouragement for those of us who want to pursue God who's able to. Number two is an encouragement on exactly what to do; and then number three, and exactly what should we expect from God. This is very troubling to wrestle with. All of us, every single one of us that have been praying throughout our life have had prayers that we were praying for not happen and to this day we don't understand why it didn't happen the way we wanted it to. We cannot wrap our head around it, and I've come to the conclusion that I've got a little bucket list on the things I'm going to talk about when I get to heaven and say, "Why didn't these things happen"? But I think you and I both know that when I get there and when you get there it's not going to matter anyway. Are you with me?
It's just not going to matter. But then we've had God do things for us that we didn't even ask for. He surprised us. He blessed us in a way that we were not anticipating. And then there's always that category where we did pray for something and he came triumphantly through. And so we're all kind of discombobulated and we kind of walk tenderly whenever we put our faith out there because we don't know where the prayer is going to land. We don't know if we're going to get a yes. We don't know if we're going to get a no. We're going to get... we don't know if we're going to get a yes but not right now. We don't know if God's going to change other people or if he's just going to change us and not change other people. Naturally we want the former and not the latter. We don't know, but this is what we do know.
This is what we do know, is how he is going to respond. We don't know how he's going to answer, but we do know how he's going to respond. We do know how he's going to respond to every single person here when we come to him desperate. See, sometimes we're desperate, but we don't come to him in desperation. We just remain desperate. We think we need to pray, but we don't actually pray. And so how does he respond? This is, the Scripture that we started off with is that he's a Father to the fatherless and he defends the widow. But how does he respond? And this is how I want to make this point. Every single day there are orphans that are adopted, and I want you to just give me some creative liberty and jump on with me because it happens every day where a young girl or a young boy is adopted into a family.
And I just want you to just imagine what that moment is like. All of a sudden whoever's running the orphanage goes and tells the child, "Hey, there's a family here that wants you". And that child's like, "A family that wants me. How am I supposed to feel about that? I'm glad I have a family, but I don't know who these people are. I don't know who these strangers are. Where are they going to take me? What do they look like? What do they like? And all of a sudden, they have complete control my entire life. They picked me. I don't know if I even want to pick them". They get in the backseat of a car; a car they've never seen, people they don't know. Maybe just an individual they don't know. Maybe it's not a husband or a wife. Maybe it's just a lady, maybe it's just a man, but either way the child is sitting in the backseat going, "Where are we going? What are we doing? Who are you"?
Again, a car they don't know, they've never seen. They're sitting in the backseat. They're riding. They go to a house they've never seen before. They walk into a house, and all of a sudden they say, "This is home". They're like, "What do you mean this...okay". "This is your room. This is where you're going to sleep". What is that orphan hoping for? The orphan is hoping that he or she is no longer an orphan. They're hoping that this lady is going to become his mother. They're hoping that this man is going to become a father. They're hoping that all of their previous experiences is not going to even come close to how wonderful this experience is about to be. They're guarded. They're unsure. They're being careful. They're not letting their emotions go into a place where they could be disappointed. They're being very careful.
And if it takes them a day, unlikely, if it takes them a day, if it takes them a week; if it takes them a month to feel safe, to begin to bring their walls down, to embrace the love that is going in their direction, then at that moment and only that moment do they get to experience the full blessings that the family has to offer. They get to receive the love. They get to be as a child. They get to be a part of the family. They get to experience all of the benefits that that family has to offer.
However, if that child does not embrace it, they keep the walls up, "I don't know you. I can't trust you," and that goes on for a month, 2 months, 3 months, 4 months, 7 months, 8 months, a year and then all of a sudden the walls come down and the relationship begins to happen, then a year later the child gets to experience all the things that were available on hello, on hello. But the girl, the boy had to wait a whole year went by and they missed out on experiencing the full love because they couldn't completely trust. Can I say this? That the Lord is trustworthy. The Lord is kind. If you keep him away and you say, "I don't know if I can trust you. I feel like an orphan without a father, but I don't know if I can trust you".
Can I just say, the longer you keep your hands up, the longer it's going to take to experience all the things that he has for you. The minute you drop it, and I pray it's today, the minute you drop those walls and say, "I need you. I have no other options. I'm desperate for you. I can't control her. I can't control him. I can't unlock the door of opportunity. If you don't help me, I'm done". That's when you come to him as an orphan and say, "You're my only Father and you cannot be replaced, and I have to have you". That's when you begin to experience all the benefits that we get to have as a child of God. Do you receive that today?
Come on. There's a Scripture in Psalms 139, verse 1. It says this. Keep hoping, keep trusting, keep waiting; for our God is trustworthy, kind, and forgiving. And this is my favorite part. And he has a thousand ways to take care of you, a thousand ways to set you free from the stress; to deliver you from all those worries, all those concerns, all those, a thousand ways. You have one idea, one possibility. "Lord, if you just do this, everything would be okay. If you would just do that, everything..."
'Cause that's as far as our imagination can go. But the Scriptures, if you look back on it when the Bible says that he has a thousand ways to set you free, that's actually translated innumerable ways; that he has endless ways, but the deciding factor is whether or not we come to him and we whisper our desire for him and we surrender our life and we come to him as an orphan saying, "You are my only Father, my only deliverer, my only hope". Do you receive that today? Come on.