Marcus Mecum - The Power of Encouragement - Part 1
Ephesians 4. Let's look at verse 23. "And be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore, put away lying, 'let each one of you speak truth with his neighbor,' for we are members of one body. 'be angry and do not sin'". Just want you to notice that what he's saying is there's some negative things that are going on, there's some difficult things in life that are going on, but he's teaching us how to renew our mind, how to think differently about negative things, things that anger us, things that bring wrath.
In verse 27, it says, "Nor give place to the devil". Everybody say that with me. Say, "Nor give place to the devil". I wanna talk to you about, "The Power of Encouragement". The important power of being an encourager in whatever situations you find yourself. Years ago, I was watching the 700 club, and there was an interview and it just kind of caught my attention. I'm not overly interested in this type of stuff, but there was a man who had recently become a Christian. He had been converted, but before that, he was involved in the satanic occult. He had been involved for many years and had ended up becoming a high priest in the satanic church.
And they were just asking him questions about, "How did you get into that? What was the point? What was the idea? Can you tell us a little bit about it"? And he began to say, "Whether you're into this stuff or not, the occult is real. Satan is real". And he began to say that what they teach you is they teach you how to focus on the negative. And he said, "And the reason they teach you to focus on the negative is because the negative attracts evil spirits". He said, "So, if you wanna attract demonic spirits, you focus on the negative".
And he said, "As a satanic priest, my job was not only to train people how to focus on the negative, but my job was to go one step further, and that was to teach people how to take the positive and turn it into a negative. Because that atmosphere of negativity would attract evil and demonic spirits". And the Bible here says, "Neither give place to the devil".
And so, if a satanic priest is trained on how to teach people how to take something positive and turn it negative, I don't think it's too much of a jump for us to take a minute and say, "Well, as God's people, our job is to learn how to focus on the negative just long enough so we can turn it into the positive". Or the Bible says it like this, "What the enemy meant for evil, God has meant it for your good". Doesn't it say, "He inhabits the praises of his people"? In other words, when we come in with a positive, an encouraging thing about us, a praise, the Bible says it like this, "Whatsoever things are worthy, whatsoever things are of good report, think on these things".
And the idea is that God's Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is attracted to an environment of encouragement and praise and thanksgiving. But the Bible here says, the devil wants a place in our life, because he feeds on the negative. Evil spirits feed on negativity. If you read in the book of Isaiah 1, the prophet is talking about the threatenings and all the horrific things that are happening in the nation of Israel. By the time you get to chapter two, he talks about the wickedness that's taking over the nation.
In chapter three, he talks about calamities that are coming. In chapter four, he begins to talk about distresses that people are going through. By chapter five, he warns of severe judgment, negative, negative, negative, horrible, all things in the natural that were real, all things that circumstantially were obvious that he could see. But in 6:1, he has an encounter. And it says, "In the year that king Uzziah died, I saw the Lord upon his throne," listen to it, "High and lifted up, the train of his robe filled the temple". He comes out of that experience, in chapter seven, he starts prophesying good things. In chapter eight, he starts saying, "God will comfort his people no matter what they're going through".
In chapter nine, he says, "The joy will be restored". In chapter 10, he says, "There's a remnant that will be saved". So, the first five chapters, judgement, wickedness, distresses, terrible, severe judgement, negative, dark, depressing. He has the chapter 6 experience. He sees the Lord high and lifted up, the train of his robe fills the temple. And then the next five chapters are good, comfort, restoration, joy. The remnant is gonna be raised up in those times to make a difference. There's only one thing that took the negative to the positive, and that is God took the prophet, and he said, "I need you to get your eyes off of the situation. Get your eyes on me". And because he focused on God, it turned the situation around. He changed his focus.
Today, I believe that many of us need to change our focus, change what we're focused on, because we're not to give place to the devil. In Bible times, a train, or king's train or his robe, would be designed several ways. But one of the things that they would do is every time a king would go to battle, if he were to win and get victory over an opposing enemy, they would take part of that fallen, defeated king's robe, and they would, a seamstress would sew that piece of the defeated king's robe on the victorious king, and every time he would go win a battle, they would take a little bit more of that garment, a little bit more material, and they would sew it on the king's robe, and then they would do it again, and they would do it again.
And the whole idea was this, that the greater a king's robe was, it represented the greater that king's kingdom was. And so, when you saw a king with a long robe, it just says, "This king has been in many battles. He's been up against many enemies, and he's saw victory after victory after victory". And so, when you saw the train of his robe, it spoke of the greatness of that king. And so, when Isaiah is taken to this place and he sees the Lord high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple, what it was speaking about is even though he was in a defeated place, a discouraged place, when he saw God in his temple, everywhere he looked, all he saw was that the train of that robe, which means that this God that he serves was a God of victory.
It was a God that had faced battle after battle after battle. God is not, let me put it like this, God is not naive that you and I are in a struggle today. God's not naive to the fact that we face some significant very real, even nightmare level battles in life. God knows that. But we gotta take a moment and get a picture of him, and the train of his robe fills the temple. In other words, there is nowhere that you can look that God has not faced a battle, faced a struggle, faced an enemy, and not in some way in the end, got the victory. The Bible even says, "Even in death, where is your sting, and where is your victory"?
In the end, everywhere we look with God, he's got victory in mind for you. It's not this poor me. We all got things that bum us out. We all got things that are depressing, but if you focus on it, it attracts the wrong spirit. It's not talking about that you are to live in some type of fairytale land, it's just taking the discipline that God has given you in your mind and saying, "I have a choice what I'm going to focus on. I have a choice which spirit I'm going to try to attract into my life, and I need encouragement in my own soul and in my own life so I can focus on the positives and the good things in life".
You see, the Bible says we are the temple of the Holy Spirit. So, the same God that Isaiah saw high and lifted up and the train of his robe filled the temple, that same God lives on the inside of you. I don't think you heard what I said. You are the temple. And everywhere you look on the inside, because he lives on the inside of you, you are to see the source of victory. Yes, you're in a battle, but it's not your battle. The Bible says the battle belongs to God. And your job is to say, "I don't get it right now. If I look with my natural eyes, I see limits, but if I look with the eyes of my heart, the eyes of my spirit, I can see victory somewhere out in front. And my job is to say, 'okay, God, I believe that you have victory in mind whatever I'm up against".
In Romans 8, there are seven questions that it says, a conquer asks. The first one was, "what shall we say in response to these things"? Referring to so much suffering. The second question was, "Who can be against us"? The third one was, "If God has given us his son, will he not graciously give us all things"? The fourth was, "Who will bring charge against those whom God has chosen"? The fifth question was, "Who then is the one who condemns"? The sixth question is, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ"? The seventh question is, "Shall trouble, hardship, persecution, famine or nakedness or danger or sort, any of that separate us from the love of God"?
And there's one response to all seven questions. And it's not limited to those seven questions. In one way or another, the author here, Paul, is trying to explain to us whatever your question is, whatever your concern, whatever your worry, whatever your battle, whatever your struggle, the answer is found in verse 37, and it begins with a no. "No, all those things that are coming against you don't have the final say".
It says, "No one or nothing shall have the final say. In all things, you are more than a conqueror through him who loved you. And I am convinced neither death nor life, angels nor demons, present or future, nor any powers, neither height nor death, nor anything else in all creation," if it's been created, he's saying, "God, at the end, want you to know none of that. If you can see it, touch it, feel it, understand it, none of it, not one thing, no demon in hell can separate you from the love of God". Why? "'cause we're more than conquerors". Whatever you're facing, whatever's going on, whatever the circumstance looks like, the answer is always victory for you. If God before you, who can be against you? Give no place to the devil. In Jesus' name.
David was being attacked by king Saul, so he ended up banished from the palace. He's living on the run, and he ends up going to this cave that became his home. So, he's in a dark, lonely, isolated place in life. He's lost pretty much everything. And while he's in this place of discouragement and depression, the Bible says 400 men are attracted to him. Now, notice the kind of men that were attracted to David in that place. It says, "They were discouraged, discontent, in debt and in distress". They're drawn to David. All these people that had a negative vibe about them, they're drawn to David in this place of his life where he is defeated in many ways.
Now, David we know was anointed. We know David was a Psalmist. He was a worshiper. He was a singer. We know David loved God. We know he had a heart after God. We know that David is a giant killer. No question about it, David is an amazing person. But life has turned in a negative direction, and these people come into his life, and instead of David turning them, they begin to influence David. And David, the Bible says five chapters after this, begins to say things in discouragement like, "I'm gonna die by the hand of Saul. I'm not gonna make it. There's no way I'm gonna survive this. There's no way I'm ever gonna make it out of this. This is the end. This is it. It's over. It's done. It's finished".
And then in the next chapter, chapter 30, he rides into Ziklag. His house is being burned down. His wife, Abigail, in the Hebrew, that means "Joy," has been kidnapped. So, someone's kidnapped his wife. His joy is gone. In verse six of that chapter, "David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and his daughters". In other words, in the end, watch this, these discouraged people, these negative people that David thought, "Well, you know what? I'm just gonna hang out with them. What's the big deal? No big thing. It's, you know, they're just, those are my friends. You know, that's my group. That's my crew. I understand they're a little messed up, but that's my crew".
And he goes and he starts hanging out with them. And the very people that he thinks he can hang out with that are negative about everything in life, now they turn on him, which is normally what will happen, by the way, in case you wanna know. That person that's negative about everybody else, they're gonna turn on you too. They're turning on David, and David looks everywhere. He can find no hope. And so, the Bible says he encourages himself in the Lord. His home is burned to the ground, nothing but discouraging people are around him. So negative, they've got rocks in their hands about to kill David. His joy is gone. His wife has been kidnapped. He can't find encouragement anywhere.
And so, he learns a valuable lesson, he learns to encourage himself in the Lord, because there's power in encouragement. And you and I have to learn to do the same thing. Why? Because if we don't, we give place to the devil. And the Bible says as you who has a renewed mind, you are a new person, you put on that new mindset that's in Christ, you and I are to not live in a place where we're just focused on the negative, we're supposed to turn our eyes to him and realize that God, in some way, in some form, is working all things together for your good. And many of us, we come into church like this and you're hearing sermons like this. And I already know the feeling. I already know the sense of it.
I already know what's going on in your mind because you're hurting. It's not a figurative hurting. It's not like, a little, you know, a little bit of hurt here. You are overwhelmed, you are broken. I understand. I sometimes preach sermons and on the inside I'm so broken and sad, and "God, I'm trying to help them". And I don't know why I can't get help. I have been in so many dark places myself where I'm having to be on the front row and say, "God, I'm just gonna encourage myself. I'm gonna encourage myself. Don't nobody else know, but you know, and I'm gonna encourage myself". And I just showed up to talk to some of you who came in today, and you think that you're an isolated situation, and you think, "Why is this happening to me"? Don't give place to the devil. If you can do nothing else, learn to encourage yourself.
That's why the Bible says you put on the garment of praise. You have to put it on. It's a choice you make to roll outta the bed and say, "I'm gonna put on the garment of praise. I'm gonna focus on the good. I'm gonna focus on him. I'm gonna get a vision of victory even in this situation". And the Bible says you do all that because it combats the spirit of heaviness. It makes the decision to say, "I'm gonna praise God in spite of what I'm up against. I'm gonna worship him anyhow. I'm gonna praise him, not because I see the victory, but because I know in my heart that it's on the way". And somebody here just needed to hear from me today to learn how to encourage yourself. It's changing. It's shifting. It's not gonna stay that way. The sun's gonna rise again. You're gonna have some good days again. You're gonna laugh again. You're gonna dream again in Jesus' name. You're gonna love again. Encourage yourself in the Lord.
The Bible says David, after that, goes to his men and he says, "If we will pursue, we will recover all". Notice, because David became encouraged, his men became encouraged. Which says that if I'll get encouraged in my soul, that even those who seem discouraged around me, I can turn things, they don't have to turn me, I can turn them. If you the leader of your home, listen, you have the power of encouragement. Think about this. I love they call Barnabas, "The son of constellation," or "The son of encouragement". In other words, he's the offspring, if you look upline and you ask, "Who's his daddy"? His name is, "Encouragement". He's the son of it.
All of us are the offspring of something and somebody. And if you look up, are you the son and the daughters of "Encouragement" or are you the son and daughters of "It's never gonna work out. It's always gonna be bad. It's always gonna be messed up"? And I'm not being hard on you. I'm just saying, you gotta have something on the inside of you, that when you look up, you say, "God is my father, and God knows, and God is on my side". And you know what the Bible says? That David and his men, they got their families back. David got Abigail back. He got his joy back. The enemy was whispering, "It's over. It's done. You're finished. Give up. What's the use of going on"? But the Bible says, he ended up getting it all back. And I just want someone here today to know, that weeping may endure for the night, but joy is coming in the morning.
I get the tears, I get the heartbreak, but joy is coming to your home again. This is what I want you to see. In God's church, he made sure there was no place for the devil. No matter how you came in... How down it was, how discouraged you were, everywhere you turn, you got a message of victory. A message that God is giving. He's gracious, he's strong when I'm weak, he's alive, even when I don't feel it or sense it. He knows my deepest, darkest, most desperate things that I wish that weren't a part of who I am. He knows, and in spite of all that, he's my friend. He sticks closer than a brother. What are you talking about? And he will provide. You don't know my need. God knows your need and he will provide, and he is able.