So this month we were in Machanga, Mozambique. While there, we had the opportunity to do a LOT of teaching. Apparently, almost none of the villagers had a Bible and the pastor, though he had a heart for God, didn’t know the Bible all that well. So they were super hungry for the word of God and teaching. They wanted to get as much Holy Ghost goodness from us as they could. In fact, they wanted us to do up to 5 messages a day. Now granted, we were only AT our ministry site for 7 days, one of which being the Sabbath, but that’s still a lot of preaching.
Almost everyone got to go once. I did one of the first messages of the week on what it means to be a living sacrafice. I thought I was done for a while, thinking I may have to do another one later on in the week after everyone else had gone. However, God spoke to me Saturday evening, saying that I was going to do another one on Monday.
So I signed up for the slot Monday morning and asked God what He wanted me to speak on. And He laid on my heart that alot of accidental false teaching had taken place in the form of being “saved by works”. So I spent about 3 or 4 hours gathering scriptures and putting together ideas on “saved by grace”, Christ’s rebuking the Pharisees, and even planned a cute object lesson. I had a pretty good sermon put together, or so I thought.
Monday came and I sat up in the front row with my dozen scripture references, my logical spiritual babel, and my object lesson and waited for my time to preach. As I waited, I realized I had not yet prayed over the message. So I bowed my head real quick and said, “God, obviously you have something to say to this church about works. These people can not afford to receive any more false teaching, so if I put something in here that you don’t agree with or I’ve forgotten to cover something, change it. These people deserve Your wisdom, not mine. So feel free to tweak.”
Instantly God told me to take an empty Nalgene (water bottle) up with me and give a full one to Noah (sitting in the back.) So I did that really quick and just in time for my cue. We started and God totally shredded my sermon and rebuilt it on the spot. He added two scriptures, on top of the 12 or so I already had. (Hey, if they’re hungry, I’m bringing a buffet!) He tossed out about 7 sentences and added probably 16! He was doin’ work! After talking for a half hour on receiving righteousness only by grace, it was time for the Nalgene example.
So I put 2 and 2 together and figured if He’s talking on not being able to fill ourself with righteousness, the emptiness represented sin and the water was righteousness. It was amazing. God led me through the whole thing that if we need a full Nalgene to get to heaven, an empty Nalgene cannot accomplish that on it’s own. It needs water from outside itself. Enter Noah and the Jesus Nalgene. Full of water, no emptiness. That is when Jesus pours out His righteousness into us, filling us and emptying Himself. So Noah began to pour the water, and it was perfect. A better stream could not have been manufactured in Hollywood. And you could feel the Holy Spirit pour through the building as the water poured into the Nalgene. The presence was so strong I started tearing up. Amazing. Not by works, but grace.
