Jentezen Franklin - How God Wants to Use You - Part 1
If you love His presence thank Him for it. Thank Him for it. Praise His name. Open your Bibles with me to 1 Chronicles 4 and then we're gonna quickly go to Ezekiel 27. And I wanna share with you something different and I believe though it is a word that everybody in this room can use. I want God to use me, I don't know about you but I'm still available. Think of Isaiah when God needed somebody he said, "Here am I. Send me".
And so, today, I wanna talk to you about how God wants to use you in two ways that He wants to use you in the church, in your family, in your business, in life in general. These two areas that I'm gonna talk about God using people you may find yourself absolutely being used mightily of God if you'll be open to what I'm gonna share. The first one is in 1 Chronicles 4:23 and this what it says. It says, "There were the potters". Everybody say, "The potters. And they were the ones who dwelled among plants and hedges. There they dwelt with the king for his work".
If you read that verse in its entirety that I wouldn't take time to do but it lists all these important people, these powerful people, these mighty people, things that they were doing that were so incredible, and visible, and notable, and awestruck things that were able to do. And right toward the end of it, I loved that the word of God notices simply the potters. And notice, "They dwelled among plants". They were in the background. You wouldn't even know they were there, you could just see their bald cap working behind the shrubbery or they were among the plants and the hedges, kinda hid. And then the other verse that I wanna share is in Ezekiel 27. "The ancients of Gebal and the wise men thereof were in thee thy caulkers".
And then he starts talking about the ships. Strange that the Bible is so detailed. Many times, when we think about people that God uses, we think about the heroes Abraham, and Isaac, and Samson, and David, the mighty Gideon, the powerful Deborah, and Esther. And there's only one Esther, and one Deborah, and one Abraham. You just don't see multitudes of people like them. Their faith can almost intimidate us. Their achievements can almost make us feel like we could never measure up to the greatness that those men and women have reached. But there are many also unsung heroes in the background in the shadows of scriptures.
As a matter of fact, anytime you see any of these great men or women that I just mentioned in the forefront, in the limelight, on the stage of life doing something that is affecting history and multitudes of people, there's other people who are in the shadows, and in the background, that you may not be aware of. And I thank God that he uses us all to do His will. And in the text that I read, "There is the potters," that are mentioned, "That dwelt with the king". Without the potters, certain things would not have, he was preparing a huge party. He was having the most honored gifts coming from all over the world, but he takes time to mention, the scripture does, the potters, the people who took clay, and water, and formed the vessels that could be used to serve the food, and make basins that would hold the candles to give light to the king's place.
And they made the cups and the chalices that the wine would be poured in. The king would not be able to entertain the guests and change their lives with his presence if it was not for people who did what they could do with their hands in the hedges and among the plants. They were never in the dining room. They were never in the palace. They were never in the bright lights. They were just potters. And then he talks about ships and he's saying that it's the caulkers. You know what a caulker is? Do y'all know what a caulker is? How many of you know what a caulking is? Yeah. One who seals up. Takes sealant and seals up sheet rock, or seals up a boat if it starts to leak. And God says these people are worth mentioning and immortalizing in the scripture.
Every single person is important, and God said, "I want there to be two kinds of people always present in families, in homes, and in churches. I want potters. Potters. Potters who began to take the next generation, your children, your family, and you put your hands on 'em". A potter's job was to find the clay, and once he found the clay, he would begin to mold that clay. He would take water, and he would begin to smooth out the clay, and get the lumps out, and put it on the wheel. And he would begin to work and make that clay into a vessel that could be used at the king's table.
Who are the potters? The potters are youth workers in the church that see young people. And, man, they're moms and dads who still believe in their teenagers when they mess up 'cause they will do dumb things, and they will do it over, and they'll do it over, and they'll do it over and over again. But you just keep putting your hands on them. You're the potter in their life and you keep shaping 'em, and you keep molding 'em, and you keep pouring into 'em, and you keep believing in 'em, and you keep encouraging them. Don't you give up on 'em. You keep loving them. You keep telling them, "You're special. I'm telling you, God's got His hand on your life".
We're called to be potters. I thought about people who work with youth are potters. Parents are potters. I thought about these musicians are potters because a great musician like... all these musicians, they're great musicians. They're not average. They're not normal. They're above the cut. They could be playing anywhere. But a great musician will see another musician, and begin to use that clay, and form that clay, and say, "Now, let me show you how you move from that chord to this and really fatten things up. And that song, that chord right there will fit right beautifully out of that". That's what a man did to me when I started playing the piano. I couldn't play the piano and I learned it one summer.
There was a man in my dad's church who piano and he, he just saw the talent. He saw I could play the sax and he knew I had music in me, and he said, "Let me teach you some chords," and he showed me three chords. And then he showed me one song, and I played that, and he kept pouring in. He said, "Now, take it here. Now, let's go to another key. And let me show you how to do this and show you how," and it's amazing how we can raise up a whole nother generation of singers, a whole nother generation of worshippers, a whole nother generation of musicians. You gotta do it. We gotta do it. We're potters. I thought about businesspeople, that entrepreneur spirit.
You don't have to be in the tribe of Judah to be a potter, but what about entrepreneurs? What about people out there who have made it? What about people out there who have built businesses that are astounding, and you've got hundreds of employees and God has done great things in your life? But you also ought to be looking, and maybe it's in your own family, use that gift. That amazing, you think different. You know things that somebody else, you just know it instinctively. Communicate that, use that, become a potter and pour into them and then tell 'em your story and don't forget, don't forget, "The only reason I made it was because I started giving and tithing and honoring God and He began to open the windows of heaven and He blessed me, and He favored me".
Oh, this isn't a commercial for money. I'm not asking, we're gonna take an offering. You have to give it if you wanna give it. I'm telling you, that's how you shape the next generation for greatness. It's a potter. Potters brought light to the king's house. The potter didn't seem very important, but without the position of the potter, there would be no party in the king's house. And somebody said, "I don't have to have the limelight. I work behind the hedges, but I don't want the party to go out in the king's house. Too many people need to eat from his table, the bread and the wine, the body of Christ. I want that party to keep going".
You know, when you get my age, I don't even care if I preach some big conference. I get invites all the time, but I'd rather raise up two or three anointed preachers like Jevaughn and different ones, And I'd rather see them get up before 20,000 people and preach more than me. Why? Because I've done it and I get more joy out of seeing them do it. Hallelujah. I don't know where I'm going with this sermon, but I feel like shouting right now. Does anybody believe in the next generation? Does anybody believe God has His hand on the next generation? Does anybody believe the young men will see visions, and the old men will dream dreams, and together they will begin to make vessels of honor meet for the master's use.
You see, they'll do dumb things, but we can't afford to lose one of our young people. And if we're not gonna lose them we're gonna have to have some people that can't just come and hear from the preacher on the sermon, and then go away, somebody is gotta be touching their life all week long, shaping their mentality, and shaping their spirit, shaping and molding their way of thinking. Potters get involved. Potters get involved in the life of the youth in the next generation, mold them. God's looking for potters dads. God's looking for potters mom. God's looking for potters.
A potter says, "I can't let you go out in that. Let me shape you a little bit in that area. Let me help you a little bit. You know, those friends, let me, I wanna know who... let me look at your phone. Let me see your phone. You ain't got nothing to hide, do you"? What are you doing? You're shaping a holy vessel. And then he said in Ezekiel he started talking about beautiful ships. I didn't have time to read it. But it said they were expensive, and gorgeous, and beautiful ships. We'd call 'em yachts. He said the sail was worth, so expensive they were made out of the material, the best material from Egypt. And the boards of the ship were the cedars from Lebanon that'd been imported, and all of these gorgeous ships. And he's talking about the captain and he's talking about the pilot which is the captain, talking about all these powerful important people.
And then he says, "But he also appointed caulkers". Down in the hull of the ship. Nobody sees them. They're not up there with the wheel doing Instagram pictures. They're down in bottom of the ship and they're caulkers. Y'all know what a caulker is? Now, they told me. I had never used one of these and I was trying so hard to get that part off. I wanted to illustrate. I was gonna shoot it if it would shoot. I didn't know what it would do. And they said, "You cannot do that because if you wanna ruin your outfit". I said, "Oh, no, Cherise would kill me. Don't do that".
And this is what we're supposed to be too. Because it doesn't matter how beautiful the ship is, it doesn't matter how beautiful the marriage is, it doesn't matter how beautiful the home is, it doesn't matter how beautiful of a life you have built, you better learn that you have to have caulking. Because they understood the ship is beautiful and it's, "What we build is incredible, but it has to be maintained". And so, they had people down in the bottom of the ship, and all they did was look at the cedars of Lebanon, and they looked at those boards and every once in a while, it would begin to seep with water and they would caulk it, seal it. They would seal it up from leaking. They would seal it up because they understood that if the ship starts taking on water it doesn't matter how beautiful it looks outwardly, if it's leaking on the inside, it's a matter of time before it goes down.
The caulkers were men, wise men in the ship. And they said, "Oh, no. This ship is going somewhere. And so, I need to stop the seeping of things from coming in". That's what happened to Noah. God told him to pitch it, called it pitch it. Pitch the ark on the outside and the inside. In other words, "I want you to pitch it. I want you to caulk it on the outside to keep some bad stuff from coming in. But I also want you to caulk it on the inside to keep the good stuff from going out". We ought to have each other's back. We ought not to sit down and be okay with hearing what everybody's saying, and it ought to be true with words and it ought to be true online.
I wanna tell you something, you need to be careful what you say, and you need to be careful what you listen to. Some of you have some haters on Instagram or on Reddit, or whatever. And you need to get you a Holy Ghost caulking gun and you need to just say, "You know what, I'm beautiful. I look good. I don't care what they're saying about me. They may be bringing up my past but I'mma caulk it". Hallelujah. "And I'mma say, 'Thanks be unto God I don't have to give myself to that.'" Don't listen to it. Don't read it. You're a new creation in Christ. The old things had passed away. Caulk it.
Somebody shout and say, "It's the truth". Turn to somebody and say, "You need to caulk what God's given you in this revival". I'm not gonna lose it. You can lose the worship if you want to. You can lose the consciousness of God if you want to. Those of you who got touched in this revival, it can just, you'll just seep it out if you let it, but if you get you a good word, and you get you some desire you can caulk it and you can keep what God gave you.