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Transcript

Tell God Yes! · Bible Tract Echoes Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, friend.
• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Mike McCurrey.
• 0:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is Bible Tract Echoes, and I'm so thankful for the opportunity I have to speak to you today.
• 0:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to ask you to grab your Bibles.
• 0:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Need you to turn to the book of First Kings chapter 18.
• 0:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm actually going to turn there myself.
• 0:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: First Kings chapter 18.
• 0:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: We've been talking all this week about God's best.
• 0:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: The choice we are all confronted with to either go with God's best or a myriad of other choices, all of which are wrong, relatively to how good God's best is.
• 0:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think back to Monday, as it told you about a choice I was confronted with as a young man.
• 0:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: I chose wisely accidentally, I picked the right item off the menu.
• 0:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: I picked Prime, Rib, it's probably if I picked just about anything now.
• 0:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: I enjoy a good prime rib slather some horse radish on there.
• 1:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh my I'm getting a little hungry Just thinking about it.
• 1:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know where you are if it whether it's a good morning a good afternoon or a good evening for you But regardless, I think I could probably survive with prime rib, but just prime rib today
• 1:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I thought I was getting something different.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: I did not know.
• 1:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was eight or nine years old.
• 1:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: My father, whether foolishly or not, let me order that prime rib.
• 1:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: I thought I was getting ribs.
• 1:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: I thought I was getting a slab of ribs with a meat in between each bone, a pork ribs there.
• 1:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was wrong.
• 1:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: I had accidentally ordered the best item on the menu and yet somehow I was still disappointed with the best because I thought I was getting something different.
• 1:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: How often do we allow ourselves to be disappointed when God gives us the best?
• 1:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: these things ought not so to be.
• 1:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to ask you if you would to turn your Bible's first Kings chapter 18.
• 1:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: We've talked this week.
• 2:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: If I can remember all of them, we've talked about how there are some in the Bible.
• 2:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: Adam and Eve chose sin.
• 2:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: This obeying God over God's best.
• 2:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: King Saul chose self.
• 2:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, Judas chose silver.
• 2:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: Children of Israel chose skepticism.
• 2:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let's see, Cain chose a substitute in place of God's will.
• 2:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: And today, we look at Elijah's people, still the children of Israel, but the crowd that was assembled in first King's 18.
• 2:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're going to read a few verses here, first King's 18 and verse number 20.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, I have sent unto all the children of Israel and gathered the prophets together unto Mount Carmel and Elijah came unto all the people and said, how long, halt, ye between two opinions.
• 2:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord be God, follow Him.
• 2:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: But if Bale then follow Him, and the people answered Him not a word.
• 3:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Today, we ask, can answer the question, for each of us ourselves, will you choose God's best or silence?
• 3:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: I can tell you, friend, I've already expressed a few times.
• 3:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: I can understand, I can wrap my head around when I myself choose
• 3:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sen. Over God's best.
• 3:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's really easy to do.
• 3:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sen is there is pleasure in Sen for a season.
• 3:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's a fun thing, quote unquote.
• 3:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's an easy thing.
• 3:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's always like sensious.
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, it makes us feel good.
• 3:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, the pleasure of all, but
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: We know at the end of the day, it'll hurt us, it'll kill us, it'll bother us, it'll cause scars.
• 3:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: But still, I understand it when people choose sin or even step to cism or self will silver, sure, but this one, this one might be the most insidious of all, because so many of God's people.
• 4:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is their problem.
• 4:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: Instead of God's best, we choose silence.
• 4:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: The people,
• 4:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: answered him not a word.
• 4:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: They've been challenged by God's man by Elijah.
• 4:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: On one hand, you have a have.
• 4:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: You have his prophets bail.
• 4:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're leaping about, cutting themselves, opening their veins, bleeding all over the altar, trying to call down fire from their false God.
• 4:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And on the other hand, we have God's man who prays some 63 words or they're about, and fire comes down.
• 4:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then
• 4:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, they answer them not a word.
• 4:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Why is it that God has to figuratively speaking stand on His head or allow fire to fall or open up a red sea or why is it that we cannot understand the message without a miracle?
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: friend, we can fuse the two, we can flate the two, we think God only works in big, loud, expensive, and impressive things, but he is so often in this still small voice.
• 5:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I ask you,
• 5:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: as you sit where you are.
• 5:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: Wherever you might be, if you have earbuds in and you're walking or jogging, if you are just listening in the quiet and solitude of your own home, maybe the radio is playing at a restaurant or maybe it's at your work, maybe you're out in the barn, working on a project, wherever you may be, how do you answer this challenge, friend, how long
• 5:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: him.
• 5:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: I ask you today.
• 5:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you're listening right now and you say I've never actually made God the Lord of my life.
• 6:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's never actually become king.
• 6:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Never once because I've never allowed him to.
• 6:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: I am king of my life foolishly.
• 6:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know I've chosen to be the boss.
• 6:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I'm tired of it.
• 6:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm ready to give it up.
• 6:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, friend, I love to help you.
• 6:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd love to tell you what Romans 323 and Romans 310 and Romans 623 say.
• 6:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Romans 5 8, but God commended this love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.
• 6:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: Romans 10 9 and Romans 10 13, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, the Lord Jesus, and shall believe that heart that God had raised him from the dead, thou shall be saved.
• 6:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: you do not approach him necessarily with silence.
• 6:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Your approach him calling upon his name, believing in your heart.
• 6:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: Would you like to do that today?
• 6:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd love.
• 6:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: I would love you to do so.
• 6:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let me tell you, friend, if you are done with silence, if you're done with just being someone agnostic and apathetic to what God has to say, maybe you believed in God, but you didn't
• 7:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you'd like to change that right now.
• 7:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: How long hold you between two opinions, maybe you're tired of two opinions, you want to choose God.
• 7:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: You could pray a prayer like this.
• 7:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Pray with me.
• 7:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: Your God.
• 7:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know I'm a sinner.
• 7:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know there's a penalty for my sin.
• 7:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know that because of my sin, I'll have to spend forever in hell without you.
• 7:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I don't want that.
• 7:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: God, please save me, take me to heaven when I die.
• 7:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: I repent of my sin.
• 7:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know I can't work to get to heaven, but I put it all on you.
• 7:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: Save me now, a man.
• 7:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you pray to prayer like that, friend, I'd love to hear from you.
• 7:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to give you my cell number.
• 7:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: I want you to text me.
• 7:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let me know that you can text me at 309.
• 8:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: three, one, six, seven, two, four, zero.
• 8:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's three, zero, nine, three, one, six, seven, two, four, zero and Christian friend.
• 8:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you're done with silence.
• 8:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you're done with just being not just not necessarily ignorant.
• 8:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know what right is, but you're done with being apathetic to what right is.
• 8:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're done with silence.
• 8:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: You want to move forward.
• 8:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: Friend would you please would you please do so make a decision today that could very well affect the rest of your life Now, I want to end with this and account a short story of as I sat there.
• 8:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was sitting on a
• 8:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: chair, a rickety chair, uncomfortable chair, in a dining hall of a camp that had just been started just a few years before.
• 8:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: They didn't have all the niceties, I don't think they had air conditioning all that much.
• 9:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: The showers could be suspected times.
• 9:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's a camp in Kansas, northeast Kansas, thereabouts, and there we were listening to preaching.
• 9:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: They didn't have the
• 9:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: A man named Terry Angel, still a dear friend and mentor of mine, many years later, he was preaching.
• 9:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember looking down at the concrete for, while God was stirring my heart, because God was calling me to preach, and I was not yielded.
• 9:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: I was silent.
• 9:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: I sat there with my hands clutching my knees, my hands clutching the underside of my chair thinking I can't go.
• 9:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not sure.
• 9:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: God doesn't really want me.
• 9:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not, this is not my life's calling is it?
• 9:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, but friend, it was.
• 9:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: And is.
• 9:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: To God be the glory.
• 9:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: I finally answered with something besides silence.
• 10:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: I told God, yes.
• 10:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: What a great and glorious day it was.
• 10:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Came forward and knelt there with one of the counselors.
• 10:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd leave it with my pastor and
• 10:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: I remember the tears dripping from both of our eyes and mangling there on the concrete.
• 10:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was I believe sealed concrete.
• 10:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: It didn't soak any immediately.
• 10:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: I still remember looking down while kneeling.
• 10:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm thinking what a day this is that I finally said yes.
• 10:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: God had been working in my heart probably portion of the week, but it really fell like an animal, like a piano out of a 20th story building.
• 10:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: And hit me.
• 10:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: God wanted me as a preacher.
• 10:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: God wanted me to serve him with my life if he would allow it in full-time ministry.
• 10:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so he has for the past 10 plus years to God be the glory I did not just sit there.
• 11:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: What if I had?
• 11:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: Where would I be?
• 11:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: What I be talking to you?
• 11:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: I am most sure not.
• 11:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: But what if friend I answered with silence?
• 11:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: What if I had said or worse no?
• 11:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: You realize silence is the same thing as saying no.
• 11:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're making a choice.
• 11:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you're not saying yes to God's best, you're saying yes to something else, whether you realize it or not.
• 11:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: don't sit there today, don't sit there another day.
• 11:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you're listening right now and you say I know for a fact God wants me to do something, maybe I can't even put a name on it, maybe I'm not even sure.
• 11:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: But he's stirring me up, I'd love to hear from you, not just about salvation but about service or even sanctification.
• 11:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd love to hear from you.
• 11:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: You can text me as well at 309-316-724-0.
• 11:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: Again, that's 309-316-724-0.
• 12:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what it is that you're choosing instead of God's best.
• 12:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe if the skepticism is the doubt.
• 12:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it's the silver, maybe it's money calling your name, maybe it's just sand or self-will, maybe it's substitution, or maybe just maybe it's silence, gripping you, chaining you to where you are, and you can't go forward.
• 12:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: Don't let it stop you another day.
• 12:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Choose God's best.
• 12:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to thank you so much for listening and tuning in next week The Bible track deck goes on.
• 12:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so excited about what we have to share with you on a future additions of this broadcast Have a wonderful day for his glory.
• 12:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Michael McCurray and we will plan on talking to you soon.
• 12:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for listening.
• 12:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: God bless
• 13:12
  [UNKNOWN]: Thank you.
• 13:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tuning in to Bible Tract Echoes, the radio ministry of Bible Tracts Incorporated.
• 13:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Want to see our gospel tracks and other resources?
• 13:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Visit us online at BibleTracksInk.org that's BibleTracksInk.org or follow us on social media to learn how you can partner with this ministry.
• 13:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks again for listening.
• 13:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: May the Lord richly bless you as you live for Him.