Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Welcome to the Crema Taj podcast.
[00:00:10] It's funny how you remember different things. Juliet's talking about her first house.
[00:00:15] And one of the gifts that Juliet has is she can see the finished article.
[00:00:20] I remember moving into that house. Someone had died there, and I remember lifting the carpets up and they disintegrated into black soot.
[00:00:30] And it took a week just to get the soot out of the house. So she is absolutely correct.
[00:00:40] It was beautiful when we'd finished. I don't remember it being beautiful when we moved in, but it is the Lord's provision.
[00:00:51] So, a couple of weeks ago, I taught on tithing.
[00:00:56] Now, apparently, I got into a lot of trouble online.
[00:01:02] Okay? There are many people online that don't like me. I know it's hard to believe they didn't like what I said. Now, let me tell you, if you're going to insult me, you're going to have to do it to my face. I mean, even text doesn't work, okay? You're just going to have to tell me.
[00:01:20] And if they didn't like what I said last time, they're going to hate what I say this time. Okay? But we'll see. But let me just be clear. God is good. Psalm 107.
[00:01:33] God loves us so much, he sent his son Jesus to die on the cross for us. John 3:16.
[00:01:41] Jesus came into the world so we could have abundant life. John 10:10. This abundance comes from knowing him. Philippians 3:10. Having rivers of living water flow flowing in our lives. John 7:38. Yes, God is good.
[00:02:04] You see, Jesus came to preach the gospel to the poor.
[00:02:09] Luke 4. The gospel is good news to the poor. Why? Because they don't stay poor.
[00:02:16] 2 Corinthians 9, 8. Jesus breaks the spirit of poverty, and he replaces it with the unsearchable riches of poverty. Christ.
[00:02:27] Ephesians 3:8.
[00:02:30] So why is it in the UK we are unable to talk about money and giving and receiving from God without people getting angry?
[00:02:41] So I bought a T shirt.
[00:02:51] Well, come here.
[00:02:53] Just put this on a moment.
[00:02:56] Just put it. Just quickly. Just put. There. You can hold it up. Okay. So if I say anything that upsets you, just shoot him.
[00:03:03] Okay? Don't shoot the messenger.
[00:03:06] You can sit down now. Thank you, Will.
[00:03:10] So let's read from one of the more joyful prophets. His name's Jeremiah.
[00:03:20] He's prophesying 70 years of exile in Babylon because of the sin of Israel.
[00:03:28] Okay. And this is the command he gives to the people. So where's my glasses? We need My glasses. Right. Okay. Find Jeremiah, chapter 29.
[00:03:38] And we're going to read verse four. Why don't you stand up? We stand to read the Bible.
[00:03:46] Here we go.
[00:03:49] Jeremiah 29. 4. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all who were carried away captive, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon. He's talking about the exile. Okay. This is what he tells them to do. Verse 5. Build houses and dwelling them.
[00:04:12] Plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters.
[00:04:17] And take wives for your sons. And give your daughters to husbands so that they may bear sons and daughters. That you may be increased there and not diminished. And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive. And pray to the Lord for it, for in its peace, you will have peace.
[00:04:44] Grab a seat.
[00:04:47] I love these verses. The niv Translate. That was the new King James version. The NIV is a little bit more direct. The NIV says, also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you, you too will prosper.
[00:05:07] There is a. What the Lord is saying, I want you to prosper. Wherever God's people are, there is prosperity even when they're in exile. Why? Because God is good.
[00:05:21] That's why.
[00:05:23] And wherever we find his people and wherever his people find themselves, we are to build houses and to live in them.
[00:05:34] Okay. We're to plant gardens and to eat their fruit.
[00:05:38] We're to find husbands and wives who love the Lord, and we're to produce children.
[00:05:46] That you may be increased there and not diminished, or the NIV is again even stronger. Increase in number there. Do not decrease.
[00:05:58] So even in exile, you are not to decrease. You're not to be diminished.
[00:06:04] You know, we have a lot of people coming to faith and a lot of youngsters around, and one of the most common reasons I hear, well, we just can't get married yet because we can't afford it.
[00:06:17] What?
[00:06:19] Well, we're not having more children because we can't afford to have more children.
[00:06:24] Ask the Lord. That's what we're going to talk about. Ask the Lord.
[00:06:28] You're not asking the Lord for the provision. Look, if the wicked have houses, gardens and families, how much more does God want to bless? The righteous?
[00:06:44] Think about it.
[00:06:45] Look at what's happening all around you. How much more does God want to bless?
[00:06:50] Okay, we're gonna. We're gonna read Find Matthew, chapter seven. We're gonna come can you stand up again? It's just that it's the Bible. This is really important.
[00:07:04] Okay. Matthew, chapter seven, verse seven. Here we go. Here. Where is chapter seven? There it is. Ah, there. Right?
[00:07:13] This is Jesus speaking, so it must be right. Okay.
[00:07:19] Ask and it will be given to you.
[00:07:21] Seek and you will find.
[00:07:24] Knock and it will be open to you. For everyone who asks receives. And he who seeks, finds. And to him who knocks, it will be opened. Or what man is there among you? If his son asks for bread, will give him a stone. Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent. If you then being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children. And how much more will your father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?
[00:07:52] Is this the Bible?
[00:07:55] This is the book, right? Grab a seat.
[00:07:59] We were in Colombia last week weekend with Pastors Ricardo and Patricia. And I love it so much. One, because it's just wonderful being in church and seeing full blown revival.
[00:08:13] But two, I just learned so much from them. So I was chatting to Pastor Patricia at the end and I said, yeah, you know, we're just sorting buildings out and we may need to raise £4 million. Do you know what she did? She just goes, just because she doesn't have English, she's embraced.
[00:08:32] So what? It's God.
[00:08:35] So what?
[00:08:37] I just laughed. Pastor Ricardo showed me a little bit more pain. But then he just started. We were having lunch and he just started teaching over dinner. We were talking about what we wanted to do. Do you want to know what he said?
[00:08:55] He just started. Oh, all right, we'll talk about something else.
[00:09:00] This is someone who's led a revival for 33 years.
[00:09:05] And just over lunch, he just started teaching. I don't know for how long. It was like we got a sermon, didn't we? It was just as well with finished food.
[00:09:14] You know, the Internet is going to hate this, okay? But to the righteous, he gives the keys to the kingdom and will has the T shirt. So if you don't like it.
[00:09:24] 2 Corinthians 9, 10. Now may he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness while you are enriched in everything for all liberality, which causes thanksgiving through us to God. We've been talking about sowing and reaping.
[00:09:46] The first thing he said was, don't forget God is the source.
[00:09:53] God is the source of everything.
[00:09:56] You know, there are some essentials we need to live in the United Kingdom. You need a job.
[00:10:04] That's not like an optional extra. It's not a luxury. You need a job.
[00:10:10] You need a car to get to wherever you need to go. You need a house to live in. You need food to eat. These are not luxuries.
[00:10:23] These are what you need. If the wicked have these things, would God not give them to the kids he loves?
[00:10:32] Okay, so we're dialing up our thinking. Do you know, look, some of you have got cars that can't even make it to the other side of the city without breaking down. Now, I know I'm one to talk.
[00:10:43] I still haven't got my car back.
[00:10:47] Jesus says, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and. And it will be opened up to you.
[00:10:58] And you go, yeah, but I have been asking and nothing's happened. But that's only the first thing he says.
[00:11:07] He says, seek, and the word there means plot, plan, and then knock.
[00:11:15] And so it's not just the asking, but it's the understanding that you are asking for a car, that he won't give you a scooter.
[00:11:26] Lord, I need a car. Oh, thank you, Lord, for giving me a scooter.
[00:11:30] That's not what he's talking about.
[00:11:34] If you ask for a house, he won't give you a tent.
[00:11:38] Now, it's good to have a tent if you're in a hot country, but you don't want a tent in England because it's going to get washed away or blown away so you can plot and prepare for what God will give you.
[00:11:56] But we need to ask, seek and knock.
[00:12:03] So God is the source of everything we have.
[00:12:08] Number two, we must sow.
[00:12:12] So Paul tells us. Now may he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for supply and multiply the seed you have sown.
[00:12:23] And some of you are saying, I can't get married because I can't afford it. We can't afford children. We don't have room for a large family.
[00:12:32] Read the passage again.
[00:12:33] You have to sow seed.
[00:12:36] But see, Steve, that's what I'm trying to tell you. I don't have any seed.
[00:12:42] Where does the seed come from?
[00:12:46] That's right.
[00:12:47] The seed comes from the Lord. Now may he who supplies seed to the sower, it comes from the Lord, so we need to ask him for some seed.
[00:13:01] Let me break this down.
[00:13:04] You need a car, so you need to sow some seed, but you haven't got any, otherwise you would probably have a car.
[00:13:14] So you ask the provider, Jehovah, jireh for seed.
[00:13:19] So a check comes through the post and you're way.
[00:13:25] But you need to sow it, not eat it. Where's my grass? Bring my grass over. Come on. Look, I.
[00:13:33] Look at this. Do you remember when you used to be able to get a real sack? I wanted a sack just down there. It's fine. I wanted a sack of seed. But they look at you in the shops as if you're stupid. No, it's all plastic now, you remember sack races, you know, So I, I'm just trying to buy, buy seed, you know, so here, you know, I, I. Every year I have, because I've got a dog, I have to sow seed on my, on my grass because all winter he's running up and down, he just churns it up, ploughs it. And then, so I have to, to, to. So I have to go and sow seed and I'm throwing the seed around.
[00:14:11] But if I eat this one, it's not good for me.
[00:14:15] It might be okay for him and it might be okay for cattle and sheep, but if you eat this, it's not going to be good. But if I sow it, I'm going to get a crop.
[00:14:23] Who's got gardens? Here, hold it. Here, have some seed. Have some seed. Hold it.
[00:14:30] In fact, Will, come here, come here. You're needed, right, Take some seed.
[00:14:36] Look, I want you to take some seed to some gardens with people that have got gardens. All right? Here we're gonna go. We're so smooth here. You can see how planned this is.
[00:14:47] I'm just like, go on, take some seed and you can get some of. Go and take some more. Who's got gardens? Oh, look, there's one, there's one. Enthusiastic there. Simon, look. Here you go, have some seed. Look. Okay, now what I want you to do is I want you to take this seed and sow it in your garden. Make sure you know where you put it. Come on. There's some over here. Will, you've got to move faster. Run, run. Otherwise you're going to put that T shirt back on.
[00:15:18] There you go. And you can come and get some at the end. Look, there's some over there. Gone. There's Helen all over there. Take some. What I want you to do is I want you to take this seed home. Don't spill it in your car, okay? I want you to take it home and I want you to sow it, okay? And the Lord said to me, before it starts growing, you're going to start to see A harvest from heaven start to come, okay? Because the Lord wants to teach us his ways.
[00:15:47] So this is like a prophetic act.
[00:15:50] Okay? And you're going to take your grass seed, and it's about the right time of the year, and you can put it, sprinkle it in the garden. And he said to me, he said, by the time it starts growing, you will have some seed.
[00:16:03] You can come and get some at the end. I'm just going to leave it there. Save some for 11, 30.
[00:16:10] And the Lord of the harvest will multiply what you. Thanks will. Will multiply what you sow. Thirty, sixty, and a hundred, so you have what you need.
[00:16:28] We've been doing the decorations over better jobs and paying off debts.
[00:16:34] And what happens is God has been providing. But now what he wants to teach you is how to sow.
[00:16:42] He's been paying off the bills, but now you need to sow for a harvest. And it's getting higher. See, they're doing a good job.
[00:16:51] You see, you want a husband or wife?
[00:16:54] Well, ask the Lord.
[00:16:57] And then sow your offerings in faith. You mean I'm paying for a wife?
[00:17:02] Do you know how expensive they are?
[00:17:07] Trust me, your sowing is nothing compared with the expense. It's going to be over the rest of your life.
[00:17:13] And then you reap.
[00:17:16] You reap a harvest.
[00:17:20] Jesus ties the asking and the seeking, the plotting and knocking the petition together.
[00:17:29] You know, we have. Where's it gone?
[00:17:31] Yeah. You know, we have these prayer request cards.
[00:17:36] You can write your petitions, your requests of God on. On them, and we bring them to the Lord.
[00:17:45] And, you know, every morning, every Monday morning, we pray over them all. All the staff pray over them all. And so there's a sense as you sow, you bring your petition to the Lord. And some of you, you know, where's the T shirt, Will? Hold it up. What do you mean? You mean we're paying God for something? No, it's not that. You're sowing seed.
[00:18:05] You're sowing and the Lord blesses it and multiplies it.
[00:18:12] This is a good God. Any farmer understands this analogy. And Jesus is saying, this is how the kingdom works.
[00:18:20] So you write down your petitions.
[00:18:24] We had dinner with a family in this church. They may be here today, I don't know.
[00:18:29] And they were telling me, because we were having dinner, and they said. And we said, oh, this is a beautiful house. And they said, oh, yeah, we sowed to get this house. Hey, what do you mean? And they said, well, we just couldn't afford anything like this. So the Lord told us to sow £10,000, and they're now living in a beautiful home. We hadn't even taught this yet, and they said that's what the Holy Spirit told us to do. So we sowed it, and now here it is.
[00:18:55] So what do you need?
[00:18:57] Then Isaac sowed in the land and reaped the same year a hundredfold. And the Lord blessed him. You know, last year we were sowing, we need 4 million. So we sowed. If it's a hundredfold, we just gave £40,000 away.
[00:19:13] And, you know, it was exciting. The first 10 and the second 10th. And Julius said, but we're giving another 10 away.
[00:19:21] We're sowing, what do you need? So sow in faith, and then we will reap a harvest of righteousness, including homes, gardens and family, because God wants to prosper his people, not diminish them.
[00:19:45] And whether we're in exile or in the promised lands, flowing with milk and honey, the Lord wants to bless his people.
[00:19:57] Let's get back to dinner with Pastor Ricardo.
[00:20:01] You see, he was a sinner. He said, you have to understand, when we started this thing, this church, there was just poverty everywhere.
[00:20:12] Nobody had anything.
[00:20:15] And as our people learnt to sow and reap that the blessing of God came on them. And he said, now they have seen so much blessing and that they did it last week because they're building this amazing, amazing place. People were running forward to bring their offerings.
[00:20:36] Why? Because they know they'll reap a harvest of righteousness. And he said to us over dinner, he said, we've got a lot of staff.
[00:20:44] And he said, most of them now have homes that are completely paid for, not mortgaged, paid for because of the blessing of God. And I've been there, I've heard story after story of the miraculous provision. And you see, some of you are like King David. You have built your house and received his blessing. Now it's time to build his house.
[00:21:13] Some of you don't yet have a house. And by sowing into his house, you will reap your own house.
[00:21:20] These are not luxuries, they are necessities. It is a necessity to build the Lord's house. It is a necessity to have a home, a garden and a family, even when we are in excess.
[00:21:36] According to Jeremiah, I know he's not one of the most up prophets.
[00:21:43] If you have seed, take it and sow it. If you don't have seed, ask the Lord for it and he will give you the seed.
[00:21:54] And if you want to do a prophetic act this morning. Take some of the seed, take it home and say, lord, I need seed and pour it on your garden, and if you ask, you will receive.
[00:22:08] If you seek and you knock, it will be opened unto you. Jesus said, paul says, now may he who applies seed to the sower and bread for food supply and multiply the seeds you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness while you are enriched in everything for all liberality or generosity which causes thanksgiving through us to God.
[00:22:35] Amen. Why don't you stand up?
[00:22:39] Thanks for listening to the Cromer Church Podcast. If you enjoyed this message, you can like and subscribe. You can also join us in person or online every Sunday at Cromer Church. For more information about us, including our ministries, events, worship and how to donate, visit our website at Chroma Church.
