Jentezen Franklin - God's Law of Attraction
We thank you, Jesus. We thank you, Lord. We love you, Lord. We're just people. We need you. We're desperate for your help. We all have fears, and we all have needs, and we all, we don't know what to do, but our eyes are upon you. We lift up our eyes unto the hills, from which comes our help. If you don't help us, but I know you will, because I put my trust in you, and I build on this firm foundation of your love. You really do love me! You really do love these people! You really did die on a cross to show and manifest that love! And we build our lives on that foundation!
Give the Lord a mighty praise if you feel that way, if that's expressing your heart today. Praise God! Praise God, praise God, praise God. Isn't God good? Boy, there's a sweet presence of the Lord here today. Thank you, Jesus! "Thus says the Lord, make this valley full of ditches". And then turn left and go to the Book of Deuteronomy, some of my favorite verses. In Verse 7, "For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks, of water, of fountains, of springs that flow out of valleys and hills". It's time for you to get your flow back. "A land of wheat and barley, a land of olive oil and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity. You will lack nothing".
It's good news, isn't it? Oh, God was just, you will lack nothing. "A land whose stones are iron and out of the hills you'll dig copper". Verse 10, "When you have eaten and you are full", everybody say full, "then you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land that He has given you. Beware you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments, His judgments that I have commanded you, lest when you have eaten and are", say it everybody, "full, and when you have built beautiful houses"...
How many of you could say that God's blessed you with a beautiful home? Can I see your hand? Are you thankful for it? How many of you are believing for your beautiful home? Let me see your hand. Good, keep that... raise that hand even higher. You're the ones God's attracted to this morning. And it's good, it starts with hope, faith is the substance of things hoped for. The evidence of things not seen. That's the initial spark of faith is, and I may be giving you that spark right now. A beautiful home is in the Bible for you. And God gives them to His people. "And when you have built beautiful houses" turn to somebody and say, I'm going to build one, or I'm going to buy one, "and you dwell in them".
Verse 14, "When your heart is lifted up, don't forget the Lord your God, who has brought you out of the land of Egypt". Don't you dare say, in Verse 17, "that my power and my might, my hand, has gained me this wealth. You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you the power to get wealth, that He may establish His covenant, which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day". for just a few moments on God is not attracted to full. God is attracted to empty. God is attracted to need. All you have is a need.
There is an invisible law called the law of attraction. There's a New York Times bestselling book that one man wrote on the law of attraction, and he uses secular things, and I want to give you God's law of attraction today. God is driven by a need. God is attracted to a need. God says, fill my house with problems and I'll fill that house with presence. The more problems, and boy, we've got a lot of them here today. How many of you, every one of you, have some kind of problem in your life? Let me see your hand. God says the reason that there's going to be heavy presence is because people bring problems, and they don't keep them inside, but they give them to Me.
I'm saying to you today that when God told the prophet in 2 Kings, in the middle of his need, to dig a ditch, God was saying, I want you to make this valley full of ditches, and when the rain comes, you won't see clouds, you won't see rains, but you won't hear it coming, you won't see it coming, but it's going to rain, and all I need you to do is when you create a need, watch me come with the miraculous. Dig a ditch. Create a need. Ask Me for more. Step out from the safety and dig a ditch. I am never put off by your need. I like it when you are needy, concerning Me.
One thing God Himself cannot have that He requires every one of us to have, is a need. And listen to me. Our security, I think, our own self-security and our own blessing, when we get full, can be the very thing that locks God's miraculous power out of our life, because we become self-sufficient instead of having a need, digging a ditch, and saying I still need you. I don't think it ever has to end. I don't think the increase ever has to stop. I think it stops when we stop digging ditches. I think it stops, like the woman who had one little pot of oil, go fill the house, borrow vessels, borrow not a few.
And the Bible said she filled every vessel with oil, and the Scripture said, they said there is not another vessel, listen, and so, the oil ceased. Why? The moment you say I'm full, the moment you say I don't need anything, the moment you sit in church without any hunger, the moment that you say, hey, I've got everything I need, I'm kind of good, no thanks, then God says, my oil, which is my anointing, my Holy Spirit, it will find somebody else who has dug a ditch and still has a need, and they go from glory unto glory, from faith unto faith. But we are never to get so comfortable that our security locks God out of our lives, because we can do it, because we've learned how to do it without Him. God is not an American.
What does that mean? What do you mean by that? In America, everybody wants freedom and independence. Independence. But, God is wanting you to be dependent upon Him in everything that you do, and you better dig a ditch. I don't know what you're trying to reach for. I don't know what your dreams, and aspirations, and vision is for your life, but you better dig a ditch and say, now God, it's so big that it's impossible for me to do it unless you come and pour yourself out on me. And there will be this unexplainable thing and dynamic in my life that I really can't explain to people. All I can say is I gave what I had to God, and I did what I could do, and then God did what I couldn't do when I dug a ditch.
The law of attraction is God is not drawn to full. There is a difference between loving God, and wanting God, and needing God. And God is not attracted to full. Listen to this. The law of attraction is not what's right in your life, but what's wrong. The law of God's attraction to your life is not what's fixed in your life, but what is broken. The very thing that you want to hide and cover up, and you don't want anybody to know about your business, because you've got all of these problems, and you put on a plastic Christian face and come to church every Sunday, and sit there and, Hallelujah, Hallelujah.
The very thing that you're keeping concealed and you don't want to have nobody know is the very thing, not what's fixed, what's broken is what attracts God! Why is it we've created such a culture of shame? If your life is broken, it's almost like, oh, well, there's another one walking down now. It ought to be the more God blesses us, the more we need Paul said three times, fix me, fix me, fix me. I've got a thorn in my flesh. Take it away, take it away, take it away. And God said, my grace is sufficient for you.
I kind of like you like that, because you don't get the big head, and you don't get, so I'm going to keep you in a little need. If I can keep you in a little need, if I can keep you digging a ditch, and you know you don't have enough to fill the ditch, and you've done all of this but you can't There's a reason why the cloud moved and the Israelites followed it. Well, they just liked the glory. No, they liked the food. Wherever the cloud moved, the Bible said the food only lasted for a day and then worms got in it, and you had to have some more food the next day.
And so, when the cloud moved, they said, I need Him because He is my source. And, that's the law of God's attraction. Do you know what'll stop you from getting your miracle today, more than anything else? Peer fear. What people think. Well, somebody might say. One of the greatest miracles in the Bible illustrates this perfectly. stretch forth your hand, who had a withered hand, he had to make a choice. Am I going to stretch forth my good, manicured hand, or am I going to give God my withered hand?
And all of the people were watching. The moment he decided to expose the withered part of his life If he'd have raised the good hand, God would have found somebody else to give a miracle to. But the moment that he got real and said, I know everybody thinks I'm this, but in reality, my life looks like this, God sees our needs. Today He's saying, bring to Me the withered places, the addiction, the bondage, the fear, the dysfunction. Bring it all to Me! Bring it to Me. The abuse, the hurt, the fear, bring it to Me.
God is attracted to darkness, and to pain, and to emptiness. That's why the Bible said that blind Bartimaeus was crying out, and all of the people Why? Did he get a miracle because he had great faith? Did he get a miracle because he was so spiritual? in his life so loud that Jesus couldn't pass him by. Dig a ditch. Listen to this. You can't have the miraculous and keep playing it safe. Why are we doing another church in Atlanta? We're digging a ditch. What? Why? Why? Because the moment that Free Chapel says, we're full...
Do you know what the terrible sin in Revelation 3, of the layout of sin in church? Do you know what the terrible sin was? Do you know why God said, I'll spew them out of my mouth? He said, they said we are rich and increased with goods. Oh, they had too much money. That wasn't the problem. They said, we're rich, we're increased with goods, and then this line is what got them. can find, at this point in my life, I'd rather see you blessed than me blessed. When you first start out, you know, you ain't got nothing. You pray. God, help me, bless me. There is a phase in life, I'm 55 now. I've got everything I'll ever need. I don't care.
But boy, what I long to see is every one of these young couples, and every business, and every person under the sound of my voice, I'm telling you, I long to see, I long to see God bless you. But the danger is when we say I'm rich, I'm increased with goods, and I have need of nothing. God says, uh-oh, stop the oil, let it cease. May we as a church never get like that. Who am I preaching to today? What do you mean? What do you mean you don't need this stuff? What do you mean that it's a little beneath you to wait in a line to have hands laid on you like the Bible said do?
Rich, increased with goods, and have need of nothing. That's the law of attraction, is stay empty, dig ditches. As long as there's a vessel that's to be filled, the oil will keep pouring. But when we say I'm full, it ceases. Trust God with a fresh need. Don't let anybody shut you up, tell you that what you are going through doesn't matter. He's drawn to your sorrow. He's drawn to your sickness. He's drawn to your brokenness. He's drawn to your emptiness. He's drawn to your hurt, your affliction, your suffering, your desperate need. He's drawn to it.
I close with this. Mistakes never drive God away. He's actually attracted to you because of the mistakes that you've made. I said this a couple of weeks ago. You might have made a mistake, but you're not one. And God will never define you by your worst mistake. That's actually the thing that will cause His power, the very thing we want to cover up is the thing that God says will cause My anointing to come greater on your life. The greater the need, the greater the grace!