Untitled Sermon (12)
Check Their Spirit
For God has not given us the spirit of fear.
(2 Timothy 1:7)
You don’t need a lot of people in your life; you just need the right people. Let God pick your friends! Gideon was greatly outnumbered by the Midianites, so he chose 32,000 men to fight. God kept 300 and sent the rest home because they didn’t have the “right spirit.” Listen: “Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return and depart from Mount Gilead” (Judges 7:3). Fear is a “spirit,” and it’s contagious.
God told Moses He would take “the spirit that was upon him” and put it upon seventy others so that they could carry the load with him. (See Numbers 11:17.) Just because somebody is gifted doesn’t mean they’re called. Bill O’Neill points out, “If the gifts are the standard by which we measure, Balaam’s donkey goes to the top of the list, because he prophesied.”
Don’t worry about numbers—God can still do more with less! Just get ready to lose some friends, for where God is taking you, they can’t go. They don’t have the right spirit! They will tell you you’re too young, too old, too uneducated, it’ll cost too much, it’ll take too long. You’ll have to love them and leave them.
DON’T ARGUE; SIMPLY TELL THEM, “THE JUST SHALL LIVE
Check Their Spirit
For God has not given us the spirit of fear.
(2 Timothy 1:7)
You don’t need a lot of people in your life; you just need the right people. Let God pick your friends! Gideon was greatly outnumbered by the Midianites, so he chose 32,000 men to fight. God kept 300 and sent the rest home because they didn’t have the “right spirit.” Listen: “Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return and depart from Mount Gilead” (Judges 7:3). Fear is a “spirit,” and it’s contagious.
God told Moses He would take “the spirit that was upon him” and put it upon seventy others so that they could carry the load with him. (See Numbers 11:17.) Just because somebody is gifted doesn’t mean they’re called. Bill O’Neill points out, “If the gifts are the standard by which we measure, Balaam’s donkey goes to the top of the list, because he prophesied.”
Don’t worry about numbers—God can still do more with less! Just get ready to lose some friends, for where God is taking you, they can’t go. They don’t have the right spirit! They will tell you you’re too young, too old, too uneducated, it’ll cost too much, it’ll take too long. You’ll have to love them and leave them.
DON’T ARGUE; SIMPLY TELL THEM, “THE JUST SHALL LIVE