- Well hey everybody, man happy independence day. And I know I'm speaking to people from all over the place. You guys are enjoying vacations and hey, here's the neat thing today. We've got people that are listening to us from all over the world. We have a lot of our G3 partners that are joining us today. So I just want to say happy independence day. I don't want to rain on your celebration by any means but I want to share a message with you today. And not only is this message for our nation here in America but it is for your nation wherever you live as well. And I think the holy spirit has convicted me to share this message so I want to get right into it. And I want to talk to you about some things on how God heals a broken nation. Here's something we can all agree on. Matter of fact, CNN, Fox, Politico, People Magazine, they all recently shared many many stories about this one fact. And here it is, and it's pretty neat that they disagree on so many things, but they all agree on this that our nation America is more divided than it's ever been in our over 200 year history. Everybody agrees with that today in the media world. And I think unless you've been living under a rock you got to agree with that as well. Now, while America, when we look back in just the past few months we have struggled with ongoing racial tension. We, we really are politically divided. I think we all know that. And our world has suffered a pandemic that we're still trying to figure out how to deal with all these kinds of things. These are difficult times and you know a lot of our normal rhythms of life have just been broken. So all of us in a way we feel like we've lost some things that are very dear to us and we're trying to figure out how do we get going again? You know, what's the future look like for our family? What's the future look like for school? What's the future look like for the church? And so we have all these questions on our mind. Well, I would say that God has our future in his hands. You know, when we think about our government today I think our government is actually paralyzed by partisanship. We look around our nation today and economically millions of people have lost their jobs. While at the same times as states have begin to reopen millions of businesses can't find laborers. Sort of crazy. And spiritually, this is the thing that really concerns me most of all, our culture is descending into chaos. So as Christians, as believers today, on this independence today, what does that do to us? I don't know about you, but it causes my heart to break. When we see our world moving away from the teachings of the Bible, that from the very foundation of America has been central to bringing the favor of God on our nation. And it seems like not only are moving away at a pace but it is at a rapid pace where we're embracing more and more a secular worldview. And we in the church, we as God's followers, we ask hey, is there anything we should be doing as followers of Jesus? What's it going to take to turn things around? You know I've thought about this a lot and I thought, well, I could probably teach a whole series on this, but really when you look at the Bible there's a very clear cut answer that God has given. And there is a promise to Christian believers who live in any country, that if you do these things God will actually heal your land. That he will actually heal your nation. And we know this verse, right? But let me just remind you of it today. This is what it says over in second Chronicles chapter seven, look at verse 14, and God says this. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways. This is the path that God says we need to do. Then here's the promise that God will do. Then I will hear from heaven, I'll forgive their sins and I'll heal their land. Now we know with every promise that God gives there are always conditions. There are always requirements that his people must meet. So let's go through these. Alright, let's just look at what God says. There's four of them. Here's the first thing God says. If we want our nation to be healed we have to humbly confess our sins. He says if my people, this is us, who are called by my name will humble themselves. Now, again this is not a promise to everybody. This is just followers of God, followers of Jesus. And the number one cause of all of our problems is really not the pandemic or the political stuff. Or the racial stuff. The really the problem is pride. It's arrogance. It, it happens when we become so prideful in our life we think we don't need God any longer. We don't really need God. We don't even know if God's real or not in our culture today, we become our own God. And so God says hey, you know this is not where I want you to go. We start with humble humility of confessing our sins to God. We have to get out in front of our denial and admit that we're in need every day every hour for his grace and his mercy. Now the question I would ask is this. When you sin as a follower of Jesus, I mean, we all sin, right? When you sin, does it actually break your heart? Does it cause you to think, oh my goodness you know I've just broken the heart of God because it breaks his heart. But does it break your heart? If not, then we become prideful. And God says we got to humble ourselves. Notice here in first John chapter one, look at verse eight. He says if we claim we're not sinning, we deceive ourselves. The truth is not even in us. You know I think today many of us believe that as long as we're doing a little bit better than our neighbors and we're doing better than our buddies, then we're okay. Well, that's how the enemy lulls us to sleep. We excuse ourselves. And we're able to point out the sins of others. And as long as we think we're doing a little bit better we hope God grades on the curve. We'll be okay. But we've not been given the privilege of judging our neighbors, right? That's God's job. We're called to love our neighbors. God's the only one who has the right to judge us. So the first step of any kind of national healing that will actually bring revival is just humble cnfession. James says it like this in chapter five verse 16, he says confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you might be healed. So here at our church, we encourage you to be in a small group of friends where you can regularly meet. You can confess your failings to each other. You can pray for each other. Guys we all need that. I need that help. It changes me. You can't change simply by yourself. If you could, you would, but we don't. So we need other people to help us. And we confess our sins. We confess our faults to God and he heals us. So first step humbly confess our sins. Here's the second thing God says. We must pray sincerely. The actual Hebrew translation is, is not just pray, but this is sincere prayer. Says if my people who are called by my name shall humble themselves and sincerely earnestly pray, just not half-hearted praying. You know, it's not, you know, spare time praying but this is sincerely praying from a conviction of burden in your heart. Sincere prayer is real. It's got some passion in it and I don't know about you but I just think when I hear all this stuff, the chaos in our world and where we are spiritually, I mean guys for the shape our world is in, I think it's desperate pray. I think God's calling us to desperately pray. So I'm like, God, you got to help us now. We're in deep trouble. And we're done without you. We need healing now. I think if we spent just, I don't know probably 25% of the time sincerely praying to our God as we do on Facebook or Instagram or Snapchat or whatever those kinds of crazy social media things are we'd have revival in America. Hands down. My buddy, Ronnie Owens. Who's going to be with us on August the eighth says hey, we don't need to spend time on Facebook. We need to get our face in the book, right? And God will heal and bring healing to our land. You say, okay, how do I get, how do I become more sincere in my prayer life? I mean, how do I do that? Well, you got to get specific in your prayer life. Most of us wouldn't have got answered our prayers or not right? I mean, it's so, it's so chaotic. How we pray, how do you get specific? You write your prayer requests down to God. We ask you to do this every week. And you, you know, you guys are amazing. You give us prayer requests and we're praying for you. Well, you do that in your personal life as well. And here's a little homework for you. Okay. You know I know you don't have anything to do on July 4th. So how about this week sometime that you might sit down and spend some time with God and just write down some of the requests you're asking of God for yourself, for your family, for our nation, for our church. And just ask God to do these things. And as you do this you'll see God begin to move in your prayer life. Here's the third thing God says. We have to seek him intensely. WE have to seek him intensely. This is what the Bible says. If my people which are called by my name shall humble themselves and confess and pray, and then he says and seek my face. So we confess our sins. It brings humility in us right? And then we pray sincerely. And he says, then we are to seek God with some intensity about us. And this kind of seeking God is not, you know, casual pastime stuff. It's not a pursuit of God on your spare time. It's not low priority. Well, you know, preacher if I get the time I'll try to seek God a little bit this week. And I'm pretty busy with all this other stuff I got going on. No, it's serious pursuit. God wants to be the primary focus of your life as one of his followers. Now, why should I make God first and foremost in my life? Why shouldn't God be the primary in my life? Well, notice what Hebrews 11:6 says. God rewards those who earnestly, this is what God says, who sincerely seek him. These are not spare time seekers, but earnestly sincerely seek God. With some intensity seek the Lord. Now we know this, right? I mean, we get this in every other way of our life. Any significant life change that you encounter is not going to happen in your spare time. It just doesn't. It only happens when you make it a priority, right? Now you're not going to lose weight in your spare time, right? It's not going to happen. You don't decide that you're gonna run a marathon one day. Because you see a few folks on TV doing it, no. You got to train for that race, right? It doesn't happen overnight. These Olympic athletes they've given their life to it. Now, when you think about earnestly seeking God, seeking God with intensity, I mean guys, let's just be honest. It becomes priority for you. You have to seek him above everything else. So how do I seek God with intensity? You just do it by making the knowing of God the first and foremost priority of your daily passion. You know, I promise you guys if you'll just spend some time with God first thing, when you roll out of bed, get your coffee, get God's Bible and just begin to read and begin to listen and begin to pray. And your time with God will be so, so much more. And then the last thing God says is you got to turn from your sins. You got to turn from your sins. Now notice, let's look at the verse again. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face. And then he says this, and turn from their wicked ways. This is interesting isn't it, that if we do those four things and God says hey this is what I'll do. Then I'll hear from heaven and I'll forgive their sins. And I'll heal their land. Now God's always made good on his promises, right? God's never made a promise he hasn't kept. And I want you to think about this because the way the devil works in our life is he tries to lull us into thinking that really it's more of a political platform that can solve our problems in America. You know, it's more something that we can do with injustice in America that can really solve our problems. And all those things are okay. You know, all those things are fine, but what will truly solve our problem is when we do these four things that God says because we want our land to be healed. And when we turn from our wicked ways man, God moves on that. Well, how do you turn from your wicked ways? Well you just simply make a U-turn right? You just simply understand there are some things you're doing in your life that God doesn't want you to do. You just stop those things. You say, well it's not that easy. It's not that easy. You know, I've been, some of you have been battling with these same things over and over. We got programs to help you just step by step, day by day. And we put some people in your life to keep you accountable man. Check out CR at our Bristol campus. It's an amazing ministry. Now, when I say that phrase wicked ways, because you know I think this happens in my life life too. I, you know, I'm always with you guys. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, well you know there are some wicked people out there. Yeah, you know, we see them on the news. These crazy wicked people that do crazy stupid things but there's also some good people. And I align myself, I'm a good guy. You know I think I'm a little bit better. Hey, it is a mistake when you categorize people in wicked and good. It just is. Why? Well, because reality is we all have wicked ways in us. It's oh, you know, you've insulted me today. Hey, I got wicked ways in me. I'll own it. You have wicked ways in you. That's the reason we all need a savior. And guess what guys, I'm wicked, you're wicked. We're on the same boat. Now here's the problem. We just don't see our own wicked ways. We don't. Now we can clearly point out the wicked ways and people around us. You know, we can point them out really quickly but it's so hard for us to see our wicked ways, to admit that we got some wickedness that is so far from God in our own life. You got to turn from your wicked ways in order for God to heal our land. You know, so many of you, this is so good pertinent in all your emails to me. And so many of us are burdened about our nation today. And rightly so. And you've asked me, I'm telling you hundreds of times do you think we're living in the last days? So obviously every theologian believes we're living in the last days, but here's the truth. Most theologians believe that we're in the last days of the last days. In other words, most people who've studied the word of God and given their life to it believe that Jesus Christ could come for his church in the rapture at any moment. Now I don't want to scare you on that. That's just the truth. And the scripture gives a, it actually gives a pretty clear reasoning of what the land will look like in the last of the last days. And here it is, here's what it says. The Bible says this. Then in the last of the last days people will be self absorbed, loving only themselves. They will be greedy for money. They will be boastful and arrogant, sound like where we are? They will be insulting to God, rude, disrespectful. Even their parents. They will consider nothing sacred. They will be unkind and unforgiving. They will enjoy slandering others. They'll have no self control. They'll love violence. They'll be cynical, despising anyone and anything that's good. They'll betray those loyal to them. There'll be reckless and rash. There'll be inflated with self conceit. They will love pleasure more than God, they'll claim to be spiritual, but they will reject the true power that can make them godly. Now honestly, as I look over that list that was written over 2,000 years ago I'm amazed at how accurately it describes our culture today, right now. How it describes our own hearts and how it describes problems that we're facing in our nation America, that has been blessed beyond measure. We've had the favor of God in this nation. And again, all of us are thinking, well this is a solution. This is what we need to do. There's only one solution. It's not political. It's not economic. It's not educational. It's not even psychological. The solution is a spiritual solution. Our hearts must be changed by God. And God's the only one that can change hearts, right? He's the only one. So what I want to ask you to do today, whether you're at home, you're on vacation. Hey, take just a minute with me. In all of our other locations, out in chapel country, all of our cafes, here's what we're going to do. And here in elevate, I want you to do this today. You've heard these four things. Hey, would you just simply humbly confess your sins to God? Could we just seek God earnestly for a couple of minutes today? Can we ask God as the holy spirit will bring things up within us to forgive us of our wicked ways so that we could be the catalyst of God being able to heal our communities here in Southwest Virginia, upper east Tennessee, and may what God does through us begin to spread across in all of you that are listening all over the world. God wants to heal our land but he starts with his followers in Jesus. So let's pray. Let's just ask God let's do some serious business on this independence day. Would you pray with me? I'm going to give you just a minute to seek God. And then I'll wrap up our time together. Would you pray right now? Pray for our nation specifically, if you're a follower of Jesus in America. Father today, we pray for our country. We know that God your hand of favor has been on America from its inception. We are grateful for our founding fathers that sought you with their whole heart. And God they were amazing men and women. And you blessed our nation to where we became the most wealthiest nation in the world. And yet at the same time God, in these past few years it seems like we have rapidly, rapidly descended from your teaching. And pretty much everybody agrees with this. All, all of us agree with with this. And Lord, I just pray today that, that I think your word teaches that you're just looking for some of your followers. Your eyes are searching to and fro across the land for some followers of you that will humbly confess their sins. That will pray sincerely. That will seek you with intensity and God that we will actually turn. We'll make the turn from our wicked ways. And then God you promise that you will forgive our sins And you will heal our land. And you've never gone back on one of your promises. I love our church God, it's amazing. I'm so humbled God to be a part of the family that we call Highlands. It's really home to us and God, I pray for our church. I pray that we might be a light in the darkness that we will be a hope dispenser. I know today that the message is challenging but at the same time God we believe the best in people. And we ask God for all of us to consistently seek you because to the core of our being we believe when you experience life with Jesus. Your life is going to be better. It's just going to be better. And if you're here today or you're watching online or you're on vacation or you're at one of our other locations, you've never trusted in Jesus, hey, on this independence day July 4th, 2021, just surrender your heart to him. And just ask him to forgive you. These things we've talked about today, to come into your life and to save you. And join his family. It will be the greatest decision you ever made. We'd love to know about it. If you watch it online hey just click that raised hand button and let us know. Lord, I pray that our families will have an incredible day celebrating the freedom and the independence we have that ultimately has been given to us from you. May we depart this place, knowing that Jesus, you are our hope. You God are our future and you hold our future in your hands. We love you today Lord. Thank you for loving us. Your name we pray. Amen.