Fix the house

We are now talking about the word of the Lord, we are going to go to the gospel according to Saint Mark, Mark chapter 11, today I am, you have seen those rock climbers, that when one climbs rocks without any type of mooring or security, it is called that one he is climbing alone, alone, that is, taking the risk, today I come with no more scaffolding than the word this morning, I have no notes or anything, so I am going to take a risk here, because it is true that the Lord has put something, it is rather as a testimony that I want to share with you this morning, something that the Lord is doing in my life, which I believe he is also doing in the León de Judá Congregation Church, and that he is calling his entire church through the earth, to assume this position of integrity, Mark chapter 11 verses 12 to 14, although this story continues later, but we are going to leave it there.

Mark 11, 12 to 14 says, this passage has always intrigued me, no, what was going through the mind of the Lord, when this event occurred. He says that the next day, and the Lord passes through Jerusalem on his way to the cross, he is already entering the last stage of his ministry, he is very aware that the crucifixion awaits him in the next few days, he will be crucified by his own compatriots, he will be crucified by the religious authorities, who, forcing and forcing the hand of the Roman civil authorities, are going to cause Him to be crucified, that is part of God's plan, but He knows that these religious hypocrites who lead their people are also involved, to his nation Israel, and I think that was on his mind when he directs this event here, the approaching crucifixion, the entry into Israel, the seat of religious authority, and his crucifixion by those religious who rule his nation .

He says that: "The next day, when they left Bethany, he was hungry, and seeing a fig tree that had leaves in the distance, he went to see if perhaps he could find something on it. But when he got there, he found nothing but leaves, because It was not the time for figs, so Jesus said to the fig tree: never again will anyone eat your fruit, and his disciples heard it". Bless the Lord for his word. Now you will see if later in the account of verse 20, the fig tree did in fact wither up at its roots, it was not immediately evident to the disciples, but they returned later and saw that the curse that the Lord had proffered on that plant, was had manifested itself through the total drying of the plant at its roots, which also caused the total withering of this plant, so let me go back a little bit, because what we see here is the Lord seeking to satisfy a physical hunger that He has but I I think there is more here.

What has motivated me to take this passage, there are many passages that I could have used, but I was sharing with the deacons in our last meeting of deacons, last Tuesday, they asked me to share with them for a while about, I was talking according to what I felt about our congregation, about our church, but periodically they ask me to share some vision with them, that God has spoken to our church and is speaking, at that time during the week I was meditating on their request, and It came to my mind that I have been involved in a construction process in my own house, in recent months along with my entire family, my wife can tell you that it has been an arduous task, including brother Patricio Montenegro who has been one of those who with his time and his skill as a builder in helping us in this time, we have been in a very exhausting, arduous, but very beautiful, very edifying process, worth the redundancy, for our family, for Our home.

If you examine my ministry, my life, I have been under construction for the last 15 years, I have not stopped, I have not stopped, we bought this sanctuary in 1994, at the end of 1993, we started in 1994, finally after hollowing out We rebuilt all of this space here, all four levels completely, and we occupied it, and as soon as we had finished doing this work we were already buying the building next door, and we began an arduous, tearing down and rebuilding process, and already Having barely finished that one, we were already starting the new sanctuary, and before we finished it we had spent 7 years working on designing the building, getting all the permits, going through an arduous neighborhood process, fighting giants, motivating the church, and to start building in the most terrible financial time in the history of this nation when it seemed that the world was going to collapse with all this financial debacle of the year 2008, it was when we had to see nir here to ask the congregation to arm themselves with vision to keep their construction promises.

That is, we have been building, years ago when we were in the church in Cambridge I preached a series of 12 or 14 sermons on Neemiah, I did not know that the Lord was putting me in a process of construction, and I remember that preaching It was very formative in my life and in the life of the congregation, it was not created with any intention or suspicion that God also had a construction process, taking dilapidated and decrepit buildings but with a fairly solid foundation with great potential in the future. center of the city, destroying, demolishing, and rebuilding, and I have always felt that God has had us in a kind of prophetic action, to come to the city, tear down things that are already decrepit, and rebuild them and convert them in beautiful places for God's people to worship, serve, learn and prepare.

And that is why the word says that we have a call to rebuild ruins, build ruins, and I have felt that one of the prophetic calls of this ministry is to try to build things that are ruined and fallen, our communities, for example, our youth, the Latino family, the area of the city, an eminently urban area like this, God has now also called us to build a ministry in English to have another entrance to the Afro-American, Anglo-Saxon community, because God has called us to be builders of ruins, not only physical ruins, the physical ruins are the least, it is the spiritual ruins that God wants to rebuild, God wants to raise those fallen walls, when Neemiah wanted to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, actually the walls did have an important role of physical protection, but the walls had a symbolic value, they were the symbol of the solidity of their nation, and of the glory and the shame that they felt to be his wall torn down, that caused Neemias to fall down crying because he saw his people in shame, and he wanted to rebuild those walls again.

I believe that we are involved in a prophetic process, God has led us through these years to build these things in anticipation, and also parallel to a spiritual reconstruction in which we are being called to participate, do you understand?, is that I always see God speaking to my life, to my ministry, to this congregation in prophetic terms. I don't necessarily see God in every little thing that happens, even though He is involved, but there are things that He tells me to pay attention to because this it is for you, and this is something that I am calling you to participate in. And this construction of this house, our house, I am going to say my because I want to be economical, put it there, do not think that I am macho, I do not have time to be politically correct, you understand what I mean, right?, so do any necessary corrections please.

This work in our house has been a work that I believe that God has led us through, now let me tell you one more thing to mount all this reason for this meditation, this is nothing new, God takes his prophets, and puts through the bible, to involve his own experience with messages that He is giving. We are living messengers, how many think that, we have our lives to exemplify and declare spiritual truths, spiritual principles, that he who has eyes to see can see, and he who has ears to hear can hear, and he who has a heart to interpret them he can interpret them, and understanding, took Ezekiel, you remember the prophet Ezekiel, one of the strangest and most symbolic books of Scripture, and poor Ezekiel was taken by God as a living messenger of many of the topics that God was dealing with. living your own heart with respect to the nation of Israel, you remember this case, today much is said about Ezekiel bread, how many of you have eaten Ezekiel's bread, brother do not be ashamed, you have to be a young adult, right, our daughter Sonia, the eldest, is a fan of Ezequiel bread, nowadays they have made a lot of money out of this bread, because it is biblical, and supposedly, and although they omit one of the most important elements s important Ezekiel bread.

God put the prophet Ezekiel, for example, to participate in many prophetic actions, then look there in chapter 4 and 5 of Ezekiel, but look at one of them, it says: "And you, Ezekiel, take wheat, barley, lentils, miyo and oats, and put them in a vessel, and make bread of them, the number of days that you lie on your side, 390 days you will eat of it." God put Ezequiel to sleep on one side, uncomfortable. "The food that you will eat will be of the weight of 20 cycles a day, from time to time you will eat it, and you will drink the measured water, the sixth part of a hin, a measure, and from time to time you will drink it, and you will eat barley bread cooked under the ashes, and you will cook it in their sight in the fire of human excrement" and at that moment Ezekiel said of what?, everything was going well until God said you are going to cook it in the fire of human excrement. And Jehovah said: "This is how the children of Israel will eat their unclean bread" because it was human excrement that was going to serve as fuel, "among the nations where I will throw them, and I said, oh Jehovah, behold, my soul is not unclean , neither from my youth until this time have I eaten anything dead and torn to pieces, nor has unclean meat ever entered my mouth. And the Lord said, Behold, I allow you to use oxen dung instead of human excrement." Oh thank you Lord, thanks, all that already solves the problem.

But come here, if you realize, you see that God put all that experience to live in a prophetic sense, an action that He had for the times, and I believe that many times God speaks to us, what happens is that the People are rude, and we are not paying attention when God speaks to us in symbolic ways throughout life, I am benefited throughout my life when God kind of stops me and says hm, pay attention to what is happening fleetingly, because I have something for you in that. Why does God speak that way? I believe that for the reasons of this world, sin and many other things, God makes an effort to speak indirectly to men. I believe that there are times when God speaks to us through a clear, audible word, sometimes through a vision, a revelation, but many times God uses the daily elements of life, so have eyes to see, and ears to go, because many times life will be speaking to you, God will be speaking to you through things, and ask Him to allow you to be alert to the things that He is telling you, that He is instructing you, and not necessarily an angel or an audible voice from heaven, but uses the elements of life because that is the way He has chosen for a time to speak to humanity.

So God has been speaking to me, for a long time since I felt in my spirit that God told me, fix your house, put your house in order, physically, we are talking about physically, fix it in everything you can, put it in order, beautify it, no He is talking to me about luxuries, neither about extraordinary things nor about striking things, no, order your house so that it is a house of order, it is a house that is well presented, that it is beautiful, that it adorns the neighborhood, that people respect it, in 100 deer of God live in that house and a servant of God lives and that house has to represent me well, I have felt that in my spirit, above all an urgency to fix my house, and God has always provided generous people, through the years, brother Alberto Naranjo, Mario Ulloa, throughout this time Patricio Montenegro, have been very generous people who have helped us in many ways, and I pay them by dying dreaming, throwing beans and other things, and they very generously have offered in a way that It makes me feel very humble, many times, and glory to God for that.

I believe that they do it because they feel that they are participating, they also do not realize it, in a spiritual process, amen, glory to God, it takes a long time to explain, but this is the point, brothers. I've been tidying up our house for years now, my poor wife trembles every time I tell her no, this is only going to take a couple of weeks, and I can see her getting neurotic and knowing that she's getting into something much more complicated than expected. that I am ringing a bell for you, but the fact is that something has happened especially during this time, and I am going to tell you why so that you understand, I believe that God is calling his people, listen to this well, he is calling me to me, the senior pastor of this church, and he is calling you, and he is calling his people, the church of Jesus Christ to prepare his house, and specifically prepare you. Because we have done a lot of repairs in our house, God has allowed us to expand it, embellish some spaces, many things of that type, new floors, many very nice things, but the basement of the house was a disaster.

When we bought the house, the basement floor was undone, there was a very thin layer of cement left and it had already cracked and split into several parts, the earth was visible in some places, when it rained the earth often got into some places, no flooding it in a flood-like way, but yes always and also, I'm going to be frank with you, it didn't smell totally pleasant to me, and the basement was like the cell, the dungeon where one lived, it was the storage place, more like, no It was like there were dragons or dinosaurs walking around the area, but it was not a place that we or I felt proud of, and I felt in contradiction between everything that was on the first floor and what was below, where All the systems in the house were there, where the heating systems were, the water systems, the electrical boxes, the floor, the foundation, the water pipes, they weren't there, and I didn't know until I broke the floor. I realized that there was a water leak that was under the ground, and it was not the best water, I want to tell you.

And all this was when we began to dig the foundation, and the spine that supported the house had decayed a bit over time, it's a hundred-year-old house, just in case those who believe that I live in a palace, someone he told him over there once, listen to your pastor, he must have a lot of money and this and that, that person doesn't know what he's talking about, but this is the case, that backbone of the house had been decaying with the passage of time over the years, and the weight of the house had caused it to sag a little, so we started with something very modest, brother Patricio was willing to help us break the floor, but how do these things happen, right?, one sees the possibilities and it begins, we dug the floor 5 inches of earth, therefore we compromised the foundation of the house, we had to make a new cement foundation with rod, the fact is that the last 5 and a half months, our house below the basement has been completely transformed. The foundation that was also quite compromised with seeping water and other things has been strengthened, that house in terms of foundation is now ten times stronger than it was when it was built I would say, hard work. The floor all decrepit, destroyed, has been replaced with a solid floor, and tons and tons of dirt have been taken out of it. At once we took the opportunity to remove the water heaters. I am telling you here the intimacies of my house, you are going to know my house better than I do at the end of this sermon. We put new heaters. We turned on the heating and took advantage of it at once, we took a chimney that had been there probably since the house was founded, and a crazy Brazilian climbed on the roof, on top of the house, and was destroying the chimney, and descending according to the bricks kept falling to the bottom, to the basement, until we completely destroyed the chimney.

We also changed the electricity, we're changing the plumbing, that beam that was compromised was replaced by a completely solid steel beam. And there are still things that are missing, that basement that was a place of horror, thank God it is becoming a respectable, solid place, which reflects the solidity that I believe a house where God's people live deserves. Now, during all these weeks, even when I hear the hammering, and the fatigue of all this work overwhelms us, I have felt God, and I have made this process, I have not even shared that with brother Patricio, I have made this whole process a process of spiritual meditation, I have turned this project, you know that in the Buddhist, Hindu religion, there are what are called mandalas, they are drawings that are made and sometimes those who make these drawings with sand and all of that takes years and turns them into an object of meditation.

There are objects and there are acts that when you carry them out allow you to enter the interior of your spirit while you specify them, they are ways of identifying spiritual truths, that is what the great religions and even in Christianity with the whole question of cathedrals, many cathedrals were built precisely to be objects that remind you of spiritual truths. You inside a cathedral in Spain. in Italy, in France, in England, and those cathedrals were built by people who knew the power of the symbol, and when you enter a cathedral you only see the ceiling that points towards infinity, it reminds you of heaven, you see the stained glass windows, the sculptures, we with modern superficial buildings do not understand these things much, but those medieval structures understood the power of a symbol, the power of objects, and I have made this construction throughout these weeks to remind myself, we cannot depend in our life of what is seen for our relationship with God.

I could not let our house, simply settle for what was visible, the upper floors, what people see, there was the most important part of the house below, the foundation, the systems that feed it, the cables, the spine that sustains the home, the basement of a house is the source of its life, heat comes from there, water comes from there, hot water comes from there that allows us to bathe, it is sustained through the foundation, life of the house, the driving force of a house is what is underneath, what is not seen, the cosmetic part, sometimes we spend a lot of time on it, but what happens when we go downstairs, how is the foundation, how is the electricity . And I feel that through this whole process, God has been speaking to me.

And what I have felt is an urgency to prepare this house, prepare my house as a symbolic act that the house of the Lord must be prepared, the church must be prepared, and also the most important thing is that God has been speaking to me about of my life, that I have to dedicate a lot of time and a lot of energy to preparing my character, my heart, recently I spoke about the importance of the heart, God has been speaking to me about cleansing myself completely, sanctifying myself, searching deeply within myself for all those areas that are not to the liking of the Lord, examine deeply in the light of the word and the Holy Spirit my heart, my character, my way of treating others, my way of speaking, my intimate, mental life, all those things , and God has been telling me fix everything, order everything, work in the foundation, the intimate part of you, and make sure that what people do not see, do not hear, cannot perceive because it is an intimate part of your being, that that be so recommended and so nice e to me like what you preach when people listen on a sunday morning. Let there be consonance, let there be integrity, today I am not so interested in even talking about holiness, as I am about integrity, because unfortunately we evangelicals are experts in spiritualizing things, we talk about holiness and we believe, as a missionary sister of mine said, that we are speaking only of what happens from the waist down, holiness is total, it is everything.

Holiness is the heart, the mind, the emotions. I see a lot of lack of integrity today in God's people. I see many people, including our own church, let me be very frank, that we talk a lot, we say a lot, we are very fiery, we speak more languages than any Pentecostal to the letter, but our life is a disaster, our behavior is a disaster, our character, we lack integrity, we lack when, the Lord comes hungry, to find fruit in our life what he finds is leaves, do you understand this moment, why did I choose that passage?, because God wants men and women of integrity, God wants men and women who are not so limited to a spirituality, here when they are singing, reading a portion of the bible in public, or doing all the things that we like to do in the service, no, God wants that also when are in the depths of your home, when you are in the depths of that vault that is your mind, and your inner thoughts, which also constitutes a place of worship, a temple, which builds the name of the Lord.

And as never in this time of my life it has become clear to me, God is not interested in people with a lot of spirituality, people with a lot of talking, jumping, a lot of body, many things, what God is interested in is men and women who live a life of integrity, that the basement, of its inner house, find things clean, and that is what we are dealing with in our life every day, that is what does not let me sleep peacefully, because I know that many things in the basement interior need to be arranged, to be prepared. Because here we see in this passage, the Lord is approaching his crucifixion, and He is aware of this nation that God has dealt so much with it. The bible compares Israel many times with a fig tree, which often gives sour fruit instead of sweet fruit, so the fig tree is a tremendously symbolic tree in spiritual terms, the bible has compared itself to Israel, and not necessarily in positive terms .

So when the Lord approaches this fig tree, that's why I say that the world is full of symbolism and things that God is speaking to us, then when the Lord approaches this fig tree, it had many leaves, the Lord reached in on that fig tree whose leaves promised fruit, now there is something interesting here, it says that it was not the time for figs, it says that, I believe that what the Lord did was not so much due to the fact that this fig tree was not doing what it was supposed to do , the poor thing that was her fault, it was not time to give figs, why did the Lord have to curse her, no, but I believe that at that moment, the Lord said who knows if there is something there, but also at that moment it was like his hunger, the lack of fruit, the abundance of leaves, the connection with Israel, his imminent crucifixion, all of that came together and the Lord understood this fig tree represents what my nation is, there is a lot of leaf but there is no fruit on it .

There is nothing that fills my thirst, my hunger for blessing. Israel had a very lush spirituality, it had the temple, it had all the rites of Judaism, it had all the laws and stipulations of care and worship. It had a tremendous religious display, but that fig tree did not bear fruit, there was no understanding of the things of God, on the contrary, there was hostility from God, which Jesus embodied and represented. So at that moment it was like Jesus was working more in a symbolic prophetic way, and that is why he said never again be born fruit of you, He was involved on a symbolic spiritual level, and he was cursing that failed spirituality, because what is it that It happens, when we are satisfied only with the external apparatus of religion, the rooms and what the visitors see, and we do not worry about what is below, we will never bear fruit there, God says to the one who has, more will be given but from those who do not have it will be taken away. At this time God is calling the León de Judá church and all the faithful of this congregation, listen to me carefully, to put our house in order.

This is what I told the deacons that God has been speaking to me at this time, God is already tired of a vain, superficial spirituality, the starving people of this nation and of many other nations, we have a lot of claims to spirituality, we believe even better than other nations, but what God comes looking for in this time, finds a decrepit church, God comes to look at its foundations, and put the house in order. A great visitation from God is coming to earth, and the church of Jesus Christ has to be ready and prepare the way. I have been preparing the remodeling of our house, precisely because I feel that God is telling me, I come to visit you, I come to visit this house, and I come to visit my church, I need this place to represent me well. Since I need you to represent me well, that the foundation be as solid as the cosmetic. God wants the external and the form to be in harmony, that is going to take more work, you see?, because it is much easier to simply work on the external, on the outside, but the most difficult thing is the man, the woman, the church, work deep, and prepare the way for the Lord.

I am going to finish but do remember that when Christ comes to visit, you always have to prepare the way first, you have to prepare the house, in Isaiah chapter 40, God tells the people of Israel: "Voice that cries in the desert, prepare the way to the Lord, make straight a highway in the desert of our God, every valley is raised, and every mountain and hill is lowered, and the crooked is made straight, and the rough is smoothed, and all the glory of the Lord and all flesh will see it together, because the mouth of the LORD has spoken." God is speaking to us, a visitation from his Spirit is coming, and we had better lose that baby fat fast. I was telling the deacons this past week, one of the things that distinguishes this congregation, I say that we have so many imperfect things, we have so much to fix, we are no better than any other congregation in this city, sometimes people ask me pastor, what is your vision, I have told you so many times, we have even put it out there in a more notorious way, but one of the things that God always said, even if it takes as long as it takes us, I do not want to fabricate nothing, not even a revival, I don't want to fabricate a superficial spirituality in León de Judá, I don't want to fabricate miracles that won't stand up to the scrutiny of the most convinced atheist, today there are many people who what we are doing is talking to ourselves, and what that we tell ourselves can only bear scrutiny from ourselves, but when they look at us from outside with that hostile, phosphorescent lens of reason, our supposed miracles and our supposed superiority spiritual does not stand the objective examination, but collapses, we talk to each other, we understand each other, and we laugh at our own jokes.

But our life is not capable of withstanding outside scrutiny. And that is why I have said, I am not interested in whether anyone thinks that I am anointed or not anointed. I am interested in living in integrity before God. I don't have to be pushing anyone to make them fall, I don't have to be proving my prayer life to anyone, I don't have to be telling anyone if I am a super spiritual man, God and I know that. And I want a church that lives in integrity, and if it takes God ten more years or whatever, that's His business, because He has promised, I want to be like Elijah who poured water on the tar to make it evident that when fire fell from heaven it was not that he was doing some kind of charismatic magic to artificially light the altar, that is what many of us are doing today, creating congregations and manipulating people artificially, creating a language artificial and false to produce fruits that do not come from God, they are magic, and they are human manipulation, but it is not the truth, it is not the integrity of God, I have told you, Lord, I want this church to be a combination of what is outside and inside, the visible and the invisible, I want the Sunday service and the intimacy of the church in its most intimate moments to reflect the values of your kingdom.

And I am not interested in the fact that the Lion of Judah is a Pentecostal church, no, I am interested in the fact that God's truth is manifested, if God wants to manifest miracles He does and will do it, my house has to be built on the rock, not on sand. There are many houses that are built on the sand, and while all is quiet, all is well, but when the test comes, as it is built on the sand, man's forms, man's habits, man's conventions and religion collapse. , because they are not built on the rock, building on the rock always takes much longer, it is always more difficult, people will always be telling you you are crazy, why are you taking so much time to build, no, I I want to build until Christ comes. We want a spirituality as a church that stands the test, and that is why you and I have to work, there is a lot to dig, a lot to dig, this building has reminded me of one thing, and that is that the foundations take a lot of time, and if the foundation is solid, and if the measurements are square and solid then the rest can go up solidly, and it has to.

This is the time that God is speaking to humanity, he is speaking to the church, and he is telling them not to come to me with leaves, I am not interested in leaves, I want integrity, I want your married life to reflect the values of my kingdom, I want your mental, thinking life, the fantasies that you maintain glorify me, that the things you see on television glorify me, that your conversation honors me, pleases me, that the feelings that you that you harbor in your spirit are consonant with the values of my kingdom, that the jokes that you tell reflect the principles of my word, and when you are driving around, if you have to stop to preach to the one in front, to the one who is behind you can do it freely, because you have behaved properly. That is what God is looking for at this time, a town that truly bears fruit, a town whose basement is as beautiful and tidy as the other rooms in his house, may the Lord bless us, and may that day be ours. feel brothers.

We are going to serve the Lord, deeply and externally, superficially. We are going to stand up, and now in the name of Jesus receive this call of God in your life, and shout, and cry before God and moan, and do not be comfortable or calm until your life reflects what you confess with your mouth, I am going to say Lord, I am going to start, I am not going to be happy, I am not going to sleep peacefully, until my life is ordered according to what You say, ask the Lord to have mercy on your pastor, when I I preach these messages I am filled with fear because I say Father, if I fall from here I am going to break my head, please pray that the Lord will keep me, protect me, because I ardently desire to walk in integrity before God in this time of my life , and God wants the same for you, God wants the same for this congregation, God wants the same for his church throughout the earth, at this time, his visitation is at hand, his coming is ready, but before that there is a time that God wants to have with his church in the world and needs a pu eblo with purified lips, with a heart burned by the fire of his Spirit, who can announce what he has for this creation at this time.

So ask the Lord to clean the foundations of your life, tell him Lord clean the basement of my life, fix the foundation Lord, fix the column that supports my house, Father, the electrical systems, your spirit that has good and clean channels to run, the pipes Lord, through which the water that heats comes out, and gives capacity to eat and to quench thirst in all the rest of the house, that its foundation, its origins are adequate, and that everything that is seen and that is not seen speak of the God of coherence, the God of integrity, the God of holiness. So Father is what I ask in the name of Jesus, through this sermon that is a passionate prayer before you, every word Lord that has been uttered, that is part of that prayer Lord, this cry before you, We want to prepare the house, so that You can live in it comfortably, we want our inner, personal, physical, ecclesiastical, universal house to be a propitious room for the abode of Your holiness Lord, begin with us, cleanse us and wash us Lord, cleanse us and wash us, thank you Lord, we adore you and we bless you.

Say goodbye to us from here with an expectation that You are going to work on us, do not stop working on us, do not take Your gaze from us, do not get tired, sometimes we almost fill your patience, but do not get tired of working on us, please don't leave us, don't leave us, we love you, and we love your room Lord, glory to Your name, glory to Your name, thank you Lord Jesus.