God's heart for your home

Let's go to the Book of First Kings Chapter 9 and today I would like to talk to you about this topic: 'The heart of God for his house'.

Listen to that: God's heart for his house. You know very well that many times, when I speak, or have spoken with you here these nights, every time I refer to church, I am not only talking about a structural building, but rather we are talking about what each one of you does. …. that?

If they are remembered well, each one of us does… what? The…? Church. Each one of us makes the church. When you come out of these doors and you come home, you are still what? Church. If you go to the supermarket to buy milk, cheese, ham and bread for breakfast, even in the grocery store, you are still what? church.

When you're in traffic and you're about to bring heaven's blessings down to the person who cut you off in front of you… what is there? No, you are you. You are the church, too. You are you but you are being the church too.

Brothers, if we as a Church understand that if a structural building becomes a house, it becomes the house of God, but under the understanding of what Jesus has done in us, this body also becomes the house of God. And therefore this body when it unites with other people, when we arrive here all of us make a larger body and that larger body continues to be the house of God.

That is why I have directed myself to meditate on this subject, which seems very particular to me: God's heart for his house. In other words, when we talk about the heart, the heart is where you have desires that no one else knows about. In your heart are your most intimate and deepest thoughts.

In your heart are your desires that perhaps are secrets to many but are not secrets to you and are not secrets to God. And many times in his heart we can put up with these grudges and hatred towards other people, but that is a heart that has not been dealt with by God.

But also part of that desire of the heart is to be able to make known precisely those desires, the way in which we have been created, the way in which God assembled those wires in our brain. It has formed us with that feeling of being able to share what is in my heart with another person. That is why there are these connections between human beings, that God has made us to live in community, to live in connection with others, with others around us.

That is why marriages are formed, that is why families are formed, that is why groups of friends are formed where I can share with a group of friends and we connect because there is something that identifies us, there is something that unites us. . And when we are in that connection dynamic, there is something that moves me and drives me to be able to share what is in my heart with another person.

In the context of marriage, a husband, a wife are going to share the longings and desires they have for each other, why? Because it is part of your desire that your partner can grow and build together. In a family, a father or a mother shares what desire they have in their hearts with their son or daughter, why? Because they yearn and wish that they can also grow up to what they, as parents, want for them.

When you are with a group of friends or brothers or sisters - think maybe a cell - when you are part of a cell; In fact, I am going to say it like this: when you arrive new or new to a cell, obviously you are not going to take out all your history there for the whole world to know, but little by little you get to know the people, you get to know how genuine or people are hypocritical and I say it that way, because sometimes we think that way, but one thinks about all those things and as one gets to know people, well, one goes little by little, opening up what one has in his heart.

Until one has a level of trust with that person that at the most opportune moment, you open your heart with that person and you say: "Look, this is what is in my heart. These are my desires, these are my You struggle, these are my desires, these are my life traumas and you share them with that person because you know that that person is not going to trample you, but rather that person is going to, what?, lift up and build your life and will He will pray for you, give you a word of advice, or direct you to someone who can help you if that person doesn't know how to work or deal with you.

But the point is that in the heart is the desire to share what is inside. Of being able to expose it to another or another and when we talk about the heart of God, this is no exception. In the heart of God is the desire to share everything he has, everything that is inside him, everything that forms his character, his essence. God's desire is to be able to share it with each and every one of us, who are his sons, his daughters, creation, the workmanship of his hands.

He wants to share all those things with each one of us.

That is why when I am talking about this subject, God's heart for his house is because there is an intention that God has in his heart to share with his body, with his church and more in these days in which we live that we know and understand like this. that God is bringing something different to the environment, to the culture, to the ethos, to the atmosphere of what the León de Judá Congregation is.

Because? Because there is something in the heart of God that He wants to share with us. There has already been or has occurred an affinity between the Lion of Judah Congregation and the heart of God that God has said as: "I want to go to another level with this part of my body. I want to make something new known about this part of my body ".

And this interaction begins to take place. But for that interaction to stop there have to be some things that have to be in the parameter. There are a few things that have to be in place. And this is where I direct you to the text.

First Kings Chapter 9. I am going to start with verse 1 and it says like this: “When Solomon had finished the work of the house of Jehovah and the royal house and everything that Solomon wanted to do, Jehovah appeared to Solomon for the second time as it had appeared to him at Gibeon. And Jehovah said to him: I have heard your prayer and you pray that you have done in my presence. And I have sanctified this house that you have built, to put my name in it forever; and in her will be my eyes and my heart every day.

Let's read that last part together. Where I am? Oh! "And in her will be my eyes and my heart every day." Eyes and heart. Have you ever made this gesture of... to someone?

[BODY GESTURES]... it seems that one's fingers get confused, and he pokes his finger in his eye. But that's what I understand, it's as if God said...

There is something that I see happening here because there is a whole drama behind these words that we are reading. In the previous chapter, Solomon, after having been elected King and after having taken this challenge from his father David to build a house, build a temple where he could inhabit the presence of God; after it was finished Solomon made this exemplary prayer of how he begins to intercede before God for his people.

And these verses that we read were God's answer to that prayer.

But there is something key that is here when God says: "I am going to put my name on it forever and my eyes and my heart will be on it every day." When you are talking about that specific place.

Look, that means that God is in that specific place. Don't go looking for it in the tree behind the corner, don't go looking for it in that other's store, it's there in that place. There is something when God says he is paying attention to a specific place that brings a sense of coverage.

There is something when God says intentionally -because look, obviously, God nothing and nobody can contain it. Solomon himself in chapter 8, look at this, how interesting: Solomon himself begins to pray before God, he himself tells him: "Is it true that God will dwell on the earth? Behold, the heavens, and the heavens of the Heavens can't contain you."

Solomon himself recognizes that nothing and no one can contain what God is, what God means. But when God -knowing that he surpasses all things- says that his eyes and his heart are going to be in a specific place, then he is insinuating that God has an "intentional" intention-forgive the redundancy; God has a direct intention with that specific place and whoever wants to enjoy what is in the heart of God has to be in that specific place. If you get out of there, there are problems.

Let me give you this illustration. I imagine that you already imagine that I am going to talk about Lucas, right? I always talk a lot about Lucas. I say that children are so interesting. In these last two weeks I have known such interesting dynamics with children like this, two years old, one year and a half.

Check this out. When Elle and I go out with Lucas how are we walking in the mall or something, Lucas has a tendency that he likes to run in front of us and we started calling him: "Lucas, don't go too far" and people thus running between us. But Lucas, even though he runs like that, he always has the tendency to look back to see if we're still there, to see if he hasn't lost sight of us. He keeps running but looking back and comes back. After he sees me and knows we're there, he keeps running.

And that caught my attention because although he likes to take his freedom, he still has in his mind that sense that: "Okay, I can't get too far away from daddy and mommy. At least I have to see them to know that they they are there".

This past week that we were in Puerto Rico, my sister has her youngest son who is four years old -my nephew- and I tell myself that this is where the dynamics with children are seen, the influence that one child exerts on another. When we go out to the Mall to walk my nephew decides to run in front but he is one of those who runs in front and he goes, and he goes, and he goes and one: 'Hey, boy!' and you call him and he doesn't listen and keeps running, running, running.

And the thing is, Lucas runs after him too. So I call Lucas and when Lucas is alone if I call him he answers and goes back but this time he kept going and going and running after my nephew. And you had to run after them in order to catch up with them.

I said to myself: "Look how interesting influence is." And for the record, I'm not speaking ill of my nephew, my nephew is an angel and I love him to death, too. But I'm saying what the influence of another about a person.

Because I imagine, we are under this cover that God has over us and there are times that we ourselves like -as they say- to push the limits that God has with us.

And there are times when God says: "Hey! My eyes and my heart are on this universe, you already know what your parameters are" and one says "really? but are we going to try it or can I go?" and we ran out and looked back. Okay, you're still there and if you call me, okay, I'll come back.

It makes me want to run the other way but looking back. Are you there? Okay, I'm going back. But there are times when there are things around us that begin to exert a type of influence and we see those things running away and one kind of goes after them and there the other calls: "Look, boy, come back here" and one continues running in that direction and forgets about this other thing that exists here.

Am I speaking truth or am I making up a story that I am taking it out of my sleeve here now?

It is real, my brothers, it is real. In one way or another, each and every one of us, whether it was yesterday, today or tomorrow, that is going to happen to us: that we are going to run after something that we think is very conspicuous, but God is like: "Hey! What is it? I am watching, I am watching. Come here, stay under this cover, under this place."

you know? When I think about this my brothers, I say to myself: 'Wow! If only there were people who could understand that mystery.' People who could truly understand what is in the heart of God. What God really wants to do with that creation of his hands.

But there are people who are so, so confused that even if God kills himself by calling, calling and calling, they will continue running in his direction and they will not pay attention to him because they are already hypnotized by this influence that -be it the world, be it society, whether it is the boyfriend or the girlfriend, the husband or the wife, the job, the car, the lack of money or the lot of money, whatever it is.

It has already hypnotized them and it is difficult for them to discern when God is calling and saying: "Hey! Do you want to experience my Blessing? Do you want to experience my coverage? Well look make sure you are in this place. Make sure that you are in my house so that in my house you can know what are the desires that I have for your heart".

And I have to say it, brothers, there are times that if we have ailments in this life it is because we have brought them on ourselves. We ourselves by our own stubbornness have sought the ailments that we have today. And unfortunately that mystery of the word of God that: our sins visit the third, the fourth, the fifth generation; Look, there are times when the ailments of our children or our children's children fall on them because of the blunders that we make these days too.

And you know what? I say that but at the same time I ask for God's coverage and protection over all those generations. ish! God free the generation that is coming out of me now! I do not want the faults of my sins to fall on the generation that is coming from me. And I ask for God's coverage on that.

About it and I ask for God's coverage on your coverage, too. Because? Because I believe that God's intention is a good intention that all of us should enjoy it.

Now, but what's up? What if we keep running and running and running and dad is calling and we don't listen? Look how interesting. This is where I want to point out different things and I'm going to be -Okay 5 minutes- brief.

Some of the things that Solomon did in his prayer, I'm reading in Chapter 8, he says in verse 29: "let your eyes be open night and day on this house, on this place of which you have said: My name shall be there, and hear the prayer that your servant prays in this place. Hear therefore the prayer of your servant, and of your people Israel, when they pray in this place, you also shall hear it in the place of your dwelling, in the heavens; - and what does he say next? Listen and forgive."

Mark those words there: listen and forgive.

Verse 31: "If anyone sins against his neighbor, and they take an oath by making him swear, and the oath comes before your altar in this house; you will hear from heaven and act, and judge your servants, condemning the wicked and causing them to relapse." his conduct on his head, and justifying the just to give him according to his righteousness."

Jump with me to verse 38: "Every prayer and supplication that any man makes, or all your people Israel, when anyone feels the plague in his heart – and plague meaning sickness-, and stretches out his hands to this house"- that is if the person is outside the house-, look at that the insurance coverage goes to outside the house.

Today that insurance coverage is kind of rare, God's insurance coverage goes a little further than insurance today and is cheaper. This costs grace and mercy costs this insurance. It's not like the others. Hear me what a brave thing, you have to pray for today's insurance.

I make a parenthesis, because I have heard on the news, that the truth is that I am left with my mouth open. A family complained - I'm making a parenthesis - on National TV about this medical plan insurer because they did not want to insure their 2-year-old son, because he was overweight, because the child was overweight, in a very minimal percentage.

I say to myself: Wow! They are not going to cover a 2-year-old child who is supposedly overweight and maybe in the next 6 months that weight is going to go through the floor. So, are they going to wait for him to get skinnier before they give him coverage? But don't go too far because the other day another family came out who was complaining that the insurance didn't want to insure their son because he was very skinny. The system of this world, my brothers, we must continue to pray for that. I close the parenthesis.

OK. "You will hear in heaven, in the place of your dwelling, and you will forgive, and you will act, and you will give to each one according to his ways, whose heart you know because - look at this parenthesis, I like it, I marked it there in red - "(because only you know the heart of all the sons of men)" Case closed.

"You alone know the hearts of all the sons of men." Brothers, I tell you: there is something very particular about the heart of God and it is the mere fact that in the heart of God, as we have heard a lot in our doctrine and theology here in León de Judá; In other words, we are not that type of church that wants to be very nice, very nice to people, like: "Ah! Forget about those issues that are kind of conflicting. Don't pay attention to that. God loves you no matter what. ".

Look, Amen. God loves you no matter what. But God also has this side that looks like a cool guy that when he hits you, he will remove whatever scab you have. He's going to take it from you, because he's going to take it from you. That is the beauty of grace. Grace may be a word that sounds like a poem to our ears but grace has a side that is pretty rough as well. Because that's how God deals with us. That's the kind of dad that God is to us.

As the Scripture says: "God whom he loves, disciplines, punishes", as you like.

Look at this other verse that caught my attention. Verse 41, right there in chapter 48 says: "Likewise the foreigner, who is not of your people Israel, who comes from distant lands because of your name -and it says in parentheses- (because they will hear of your great name, of your strong hand and your outstretched arm.) If this foreign man or foreign woman comes to pray in this house, you will hear in heaven in the place of your dwelling and you will do according to everything for which the foreigner has cried out to you so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, like your people Israel, and understand that your name is called upon this house that I have built."

Let me close here my brothers. This is part one, so to speak, of this message.

I understand that what God is doing in the midst of his Church, I am talking about the Church with a capital "I", its larger body, around the world. I believe that there is something that God is giving in the midst of his body, in the midst of his Church, in the midst of his house. There is something that God is saying to you: "Look, I have sanctified that house. In other words, I have separated that house where you gather to worship me. My eyes are on that place, my heart is on that place."

When someone speaks with that level of intentionality, you have to pay attention because there is something that is going to happen in that place; there is something that is going to happen in that house that is going to change the course of the history of that body, of that house. Something is going to happen that is going to change the course of things. And therefore that means that as we are under that covering of God's eyes and heart, being under that umbrella when that something happens in some way or another something is going to have to happen in your life.

Amen. At least brother Roberto is paying attention.

Let me give it rewind. OK. If you are under that cover, under that umbrella, when that something that God intends to happen, therefore something is going to happen in you. Amen. Okay, at least now...

Brothers, I am telling you, yes in a humorous tone, but I hope you are understanding the seriousness that I am saying here. Today more than ever, my brothers, each word that comes from the heart of God has an intention and if we want to experience the fruit of what that word that comes from the heart of God produces, we are going to have to keep our ears wide open. and well tuned.

Because I believe that times are approaching where the patience of God is leaving, like, exhausting more and more, and more and more and more. To this day we are many, and I am saying it like this, we are many who have lived under a sense of cheap grace.

What do we think - as some churches that focus on that aspect of being a nice church say - we think that just by preaching a grace from a good God who has compassion on us, a God who does not ask or require anything from us except that we come before Him as we are and leave it there. That kind of God is coming to a final term.

I believe that the type of God that is going to begin to be revealed today is going to be a much more serious God. And believe me that when I say this my knees tremble, my brothers, because I know that not even I am going to get rid of the things that I have done in front of him.

And I am listening to that word that God is saying. I am listening to that word that God has his eyes on this place and that God has his heart on this place and whatever comes out of the heart of God, I want to enjoy even a crumb of it. Because even if it is a crumb, it will be able to build in me the intention that God has for my life and how I can develop that in the different areas that I move.

Be it at home with my wife, with my son, here in the church as Pastor with you, with my circle of friends, with my extended family; Whatever comes out of the heart of God, I know it will make me a better man, a better person so that I can carry out what God has for me.

Person who maintains a rebellious perspective, a hardened heart, a heart that believes that it knows everything when it knows nothing; a person who holds that kind of perspective, look, you know what? I'm not going to say what's going to happen but I don't think I'm going to receive much. And if you receive something, believe me, God's mercy will be confirmed even more.

My human mind thinks that this person is not going to deserve anything, but the mind of God transcends mine and if I understand that this person deserves not to receive anything, God tells me: "Who are you to judge if I want to do something do?". Fine, have your way and do what you want, but do it. Are my brothers understanding where I am going with this?

Look, I invite you to read that chapter 8 and chapter 9 of First Kings. I invite you to read that. Look - I'm going to end here, I promise you - what God says to Solomon: "My eyes and my heart will be on her all the days" and then look at what he says: "If you walked before me as David walked your Father, in integrity of heart, in equity, doing all that I have commanded you and keeping my statutes and my decrees, I will establish the throne of your kingdom over Israel forever."

Verse 6, what does it say? Of course, I cannot remove this part of the Bible but it says: "More if obstinately", can someone please define the word obstinate for me? Foolishly. Any other synonym? stubbornly. Stubbornly messy. Is there a thesaurus out there that can give me more words? Assignment: they look for it for later.

"But if obstinately - in other words this means: if knowing that you are going to do evil you are going to turn away from me and with all that you do it, what does it say?: "you and your children will turn away from me and you shall not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them.

“Then I will cut off Israel from off the face of the land which I have given them; and this house that I have hallowed to my name, I will drive it out before me, and Israel will be a proverb and proverb to all peoples and this house was in esteem, anyone who passes by it will be astonished, and will mock and say: Why has Jehovah done so against this land and this house?"

No, God is serious. I can't hide it, I can't ignore it.

Just as God has that sweet, loving side that goes and pulls us out of the miry mud, so also God has that strong side. God has that hard side, a side that I'm afraid of but I can't hide from that side. Sooner or later my spanking is going to come. But I would rather receive a spanking from God than receive a spanking from one of you. At least from my mother, I do accept it from her, there weren't so many she gave me but the ones she gave me were enough.

My brothers, I want to leave you there. I am sharing this word rather to follow this line of messages that God is bringing in our midst my brothers. There is an intention that God has with us as a Church. There is an intention that God has with this part of his universal body that I know, and as I tell you: each one of us has a role to play in that part of the body.

God willing that each one of us can keep ourselves under the covering of God's eyes and heart. What when God makes us: 'Hey!', that we can say: [BODY LANGUAGE]

Follow me? They understand me?

We are going to stand up and we are going to pray. Father, I thank you because your word is alive, your word is true and there is nothing and no one that can stand in the way of the plans and intentions that you have in your heart for each of your sons and daughters.

And Lord, likewise, as Solomon said in that prayer so many years ago: that whoever in this house directs his prayers to you, asking forgiveness for his sins, that you will listen to him from the place of your dwelling and you will act according to what what that person deserves. But what that person deserves is not measured by our own criteria, but rather by yours.

Father, it is beautiful and beautiful to be able to hear word of the great things that you want to do with this León de Judá Congregation church. It's exciting, at least for me it's exciting Lord, it encourages me, it excites me. But at the same time, Lord Jesus, I ask that we too can open our hearts to the treatment that you have with us because in order to reach that high level there will also be those things that you want to correct in us.

There will be areas in which we are going to have to be disciplined. Lord help us to recognize that when you discipline it is because you love us and that if you discipline us, Lord, I also declare what your word says: that you will not give us a test that is much stronger or too great that we cannot bear.

You know what is the yoke that You put on us because that yoke is put on with grace, with mercy, with love. It is a yoke that will not last for a lifetime but for the time that you have determined so that we can truly grow and form ourselves into the type of man, the type of woman that you want us to be to better serve in your kingdom.

Lord, I ask that the intentions and the desire that you have in your heart, which are good, without a doubt we know that they are good, they are interesting, they are good intentions. Adventurous but they are also great challenges and very strong to face. This church, Lord, each one of us, my person, expose ourselves to you, Lord. Deal with us.

That when You call -because perhaps we are going too far from your coverage, Lord-, that we are not stubborn, that we are not obstinate, but that we can return to you and turn our eyes and our hearts to you Lord to be able to continue living under that cover that You have for our lives in these important days that we are having to live.

I ask Your blessing on each one of my brothers and sisters who are here, Lord. I declare your peace, I declare your good over them, I declare your encouragement, Lord. At no time has this word been to cause discouragement, but on the contrary, it is to pamper them, to motivate them in the purposes that You have for their lives.

That when they walk out this door, my God, may this word continue to echo in their minds, in their hearts, in their spirit and may this word help us align even more with the intentions of your heart for us, the intentions of your heart for this church and how this church can serve together with others in the purpose that You have worldwide.

Bless my brothers and my sisters. May they leave here in peace, give them a deep, calm, restful sleep, my God. Speak to them, reveal to them in their dreams, Lord, and that with those dreams comes the ability to remember, to retain, and to be able to interpret the things that you are revealing to your sons and daughters, and that tomorrow -if you allow it- we can achieve great things for your glory and your honor.

We ask this in the name of your son Jesus to whom we give all the glory, all the honor forever and ever. Amen and amen.