Awakening Through Revelation: The Power of God's Word

Step into the Christmas season with a heart open to transformation and renewal! In this uplifting and thought-provoking video, we explore the powerful theme of *Relentless Pursuit*—a call to passionately chase after God's presence and embrace the spiritual awakening sweeping across America. We take a deep dive into the powerful scripture from Luke 22:45, where the sorrow of the disciples stands in stark contrast to the unwavering faith of Mary of Bethany. 

Through this passage, we uncover valuable lessons about the importance of seeking God’s Word daily and the transformative power it holds to shape our lives. Learn how staying grounded in the Word and keeping a reverent heart can empower us to live with purpose, peace, and unshakable faith. 

This video emphasizes the beautiful harmony between the Word and the Spirit, showing us that when we stay committed in our pursuit of God, we can experience profound spiritual growth and renewal. Whether you're looking for encouragement during this busy holiday season or simply seeking a deeper connection with God, this message will inspire you to stay steadfast, keep seeking, and allow the power of God’s Word to transform you.

Join us for an unforgettable journey of faith, hope, and inspiration, and let this message guide you into a renewed sense of purpose as we celebrate Christmas and the relentless pursuit of God’s love.

Transcript

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What's up, RP family? As you can tell, I'm getting in the Christmas spirit. I'm so excited that you are joining us this week for Relentless Pursuit. I am your host, Nathan, and this is Relentless Pursuit, where we pursue after God as He relentlessly pursues after us. And this word has been in the works for a while now, and I seriously have 15 different directions that I wanted to go. But I believe that God had assigned this specific word. And I just am so grateful and thankful for what God is doing in America. As a whole, because I truly believe that America is on the brink of a combustion of his spirit. And I truly believe that there is an awakening that is coming to America specifically, because I believe we have been enamored. With the world and that God is coming up like a mighty roaring lion that is going to catch the eyes of souls and people that have not given their life to the Lord. And they're going to look and see that mighty roaring lion and they're going to say, I want Jesus. I want the Lord. And with that being said, I have a word today that is going to be a little, it's going to seem like it's off subject. Good. I'm telling you, I'm building something and I believe God is building something through this episode. And let's get started and I'm going to talk about a little bit about the word. And with that, there's these disciples The first subject is the disciples and sorrow in Luke chapter 22 verse 45. This is when Jesus was on the way not on the way, but he was getting ready and preparing himself When he was preparing himself to pray and to usher in The Holy Spirit by giving his life on the cross and see when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping from sorrow and see the disciples were not asleep due to fatigue. They were not asleep due to, To tiredness. They were not asleep because they just ran five miles and they just lifted 50, 000 weights and the man, those are been a strong disciples, but they weren't tired physically. See, the Bible says that they were tired because of sorrow. That mean there was something in there was spirit that was causing their fatigue, which signifies the heaviness that was over their life. And see, the thing is that the internal capacity was not deep enough for what God was going to do and what he was putting on their shoulders. See, their internal capacity was not prepared to handle the external pressure. And see, when the external pressure grows beyond your internal capacity, you begin to shut down physically. And see, this is why Jesus called them to prayer. And he said, you can't even pray with me for an hour. So pray so you don't, and this is the thing, pray so you don't fall into temptation. When the disciples asked Lord, how do we pray? What do we do to pray? He said, first you say, Our Father who art in heaven, acknowledging God, acknowledging that he is holy, acknowledging who you are praying to, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name. You are hallowing the name of Jesus, your kingdom come, your will be done. This is the submission that's coming through the prayer saying, Lord, I yield to you whatever you want, none of what I want. Whatever your desires, none of my desires. And so our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us not of our trespasses, but deliver us from evil. Deliver us from evil. Another version says, Deliver us from the hand of the tempter. This is what Jesus has been building up his disciples so that they can stand on the sturdy ground that Jesus has prepared for them. But if they can't get there, the discipline in order to press through what is externally happening through the chaos of what's put being put pushed on them, Lord Jesus was being pushed on them. Then they will begin to fall into the ways of the world or they will get burnt out and see a lot of America today is becoming burnt out because they haven't built up. up their internal capacity and see God is trying to pour, but there's no room for him to pour in you and see in Luke 21 30 34 it says beyond guards so that your heart are not weighed down and depressed. See the cares of life have a tendency to choke out the word of God. And that's why in the Bible it talks about the three grounds, the fertile ground, the rocky ground, and then the. Thorny ground. And so it says, if you plant your seed on the rocky path, it won't root down because it has no fertilization to root in. If you plant your seed in the thorny path, it will choke out what is trying to root. But if you plant on the good soil, it will take root and flourish. And so it depends what we plant the word in. In our heart or where we plant the word in, whether it's in our heart, whether it's in our mind or whether we just allow it to go in one ear and out the other, it all depends where we allow the word of God to root in or plant in order for us to. Activate that word that God has given us and the word of God, the power of the word in Hebrews 4 12 in the NLT version, it says for the word of God is alive and powerful. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires, and that's it. The word separates and examines the heart revealing its true desires. The one of my biggest prayers lately has been Lord wash me in your word, wash me in your word. And then in acts two 37, Peter was preaching and the, they just were baptized in the Holy spirit and they were speaking other tongues and they were like, these guys are drunk. And Peter was like, no, these not guys aren't drunk the way that you suppose, but we are drunk in the Holy spirit. I'm praying. Paraphrasing, but we're drunk in the Holy Spirit. And then he begins to give this power packed preaching and he says, you need to repent for you are sinners and come to Jesus, essentially what he was saying and 3000 that day gave their life to the Lord because they were. Cut to the heart by the word of God and see the thing that we've so washed away with our opinions or our offenses or our hurts and traumas is that we have downplayed the impact that revelation has. Because revelation is key in our life. Revelation allows the word of God to penetrate the heart and impact lives. Revelation takes head knowledge and makes it and becomes rooted in our heart. See Ephesians 1. 17 in the Amplified Version says, I pray that God may grant you a spirit of wisdom. See the word made flesh and this is where I wanted to lead you to because revelation plants the word. Revelation plants the word because of the lack of revelation. God had to move upon man and he planted the word in good soil. He planted the word seen in the Bible and John's one John one one. It says in the beginning was the word and the word was with God. And the word was God. And see, God planted the word in the earth. In John 1 14 it says, And the word dwelt among us and became flesh. And so God planted that word into the soil and he grew. And the Bible says He grew in favor with God and men. And so Jesus is that word that made, was made flesh. And the thing about Jesus is he says, I am the bread of life and I wanna look back to the Old Testament with them because I want to examine the manna that God provided from heaven. And the Bible says that. Every day you would have to pick up a new manna. You would have to pick up new bread. Because if you allowed, or if you picked up too much bread, to save it for tomorrow, the bread would spoil. Now you have to examine what God is saying in this. It's because you have to pick up bread daily. Meaning, in that prayer, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. Our daily bread. And so what does that look like? Do I have that in there? What does that look like? That looks like if you want to follow me, you must first deny yourself and pick up your cross daily. There is a daily walk that you have to have. There's a daily encounter that you need. There's a daily pushing forward. There's a daily bread that you need to consume. There is it must happen daily. And see the word was made flesh and dwelt among us and became the bread of life manifested in on the earth. And what happened is that as he went As he died and then rose again in heaven, he then made available the helper to come and live within us and we became the temple of the Holy Spirit. And now we have the opportunity to seek and consume the bread of life daily. See, daily provision from God is representing the fresh encounters with Him. And yesterday's encounters, yesterday's bread will spoil because today is a new day. Today, the mercies have met you as soon as you opened your eyelids. Today is a day where you have an opportunity to encounter with God. Yesterday's bread can't sustain you for today. Yesterday's bread can't sustain you for today. And today's bread can't sustain you for tomorrow. See, and this is the problem is that we need to return to the reverence for the word. Because there has been a lack of reverence and which has led people people pleasing and watering down the word. As I said my prayer has been Lord wash me in your word. But the problem is that people like to wash the word. Is that we dilute the word that's coming that God has been speaking and we dilute it with our opinions and our thoughts and our ideas and our will in our way. See my, my son he likes juice and he likes juice so much that we have to limit him on the amount of juice that we give him. Because if he had the choice, he would be drinking juice all day and he would go and then we're trying to potty train him. And so he would let's just say he's in pull ups right now. We would run out of pull ups. And so what we do instead of giving him juice all day is we give him water with juice. Because it lessens the desire of the taste of juice because it's not the same impact Or it doesn't taste the exact same way if it was just juice And The bible is so amazing in psalms 1 2 in the niv version It says whose delight is in the law of the lord who meditates or i'm, sorry. I don't think that's let me Let me bring it up But his delight is in the law of the Lord and his law. He meditates day and night. See God is changing desires. God is changing taste buds. God is changing hungers. God is changing appetites because he doesn't want you to dull or lack the reverence for his word. And so he is elevating the people that can be the examples who are Delight themselves in the word he wants the people he wants the remnant that's willing to say no I'm willing to read my Bible for hours out of day I'm willing to read my Bible longer than I did yesterday because I know that there is revelation that I need for today See God desires for us to delight in his word and not just make excuses to not go to it See, I get bored when I read it or I get distracted when I read it. There, the good thing is that you could press play and it will read to you. And this is the part where we lack the reverence for the word of God, because we can read the same chapter after or over and over again. And we can have a different perspective each time. And I want to, there is these two people in the Bible that I feel are perfect examples. Mary and Martha choosing the good part. And see in Luke 10, 38 through 42, I want to read it all. Here it is. In the AMP version, now while they were on their way, Jesus entered a village called Bethany. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary who seated herself at the Lord's feet and was continually listening to his teaching. But Martha was very busy and distracted with all her servings, serving responsibilities. And she approached him and said, Lord, is it of no concern to you that my sister has left me to do the serving alone? Tell her to help me and do her part, but the Lord replied to her Martha, you are worried and bothered and anxious about so many things, but only one thing is necessary for Mary. For Mary has chosen to do the good part, that which is to her advantage, which will not be taken away from her. See, the Bible says that Martha was, yeah, let's go with this, Martha. Jesus said, was anxious about many things. And there are so many times where we can be serving in the house of God. We can be serving God's people. We can be serving God's vessels. And what happens is we take the Holy Spirit out of the serving. So we burn out and so we complain and so we murmur and so we have these excuses why we don't show up into God's house because we don't want to serve anymore and we have these built up resentment for the people around us because they view them in an evil perspective saying, Oh, but they can get an encounter. Oh, but they can go up to the altar. Oh, but they can get prayed for. But I have to be back here, ushering or in the parking lot or serving on the media team, the serving, when the serving loses the Holy spirit, there's no point in serving. And so Mary had the right idea and the right understanding that when Whatever Jesus is in the room, I need to get to his feet. See there were three part, three times roughly around where Mary was mentioned in the Bible. And one of those is when she, obviously right here, was listening to his teaching. She went to his feet. Another time is when there was an alabaster jar and she poured it on the feet of our Savior. See, the last, or I guess the middle time that I want to emphasize is in John chapter 11. When Mary was mourning her brother Lazarus. See there was a man named Lazarus who was, who died and they sent a message to Jesus and he waited for two days to, to even make his way towards Bethany. And he waited, so he died and in the waiting for Jesus. They were almost hit with a depression even and so mary and martha were like yo jesus You're good. You can leave. He's already dead But what's crazy to me is that there are people that are unbelievers There are people that are first coming into the faith There are people that just gave their life to the lord will have this immediately encounter with god an immediate miracle that heals their body There was a woman with the issue of blood who touched jesus and immediately she was cured There was a man that had blind eyes and Jesus touched him and immediately he was healed. There, there was so many stories in the Bible that people just have one encounter with God and immediately it's changed and transformed. But Mary, And Martha, they both were spending time with the Lord. We see Mary at the feet of Jesus constantly. We see Mary that pushes past and pushes into the presence of God. And we're like but God, I'm spending time with you on a constant and consistent basis. Why is it my miracle here? Why didn't you come when I asked? Why didn't your hand reach? Why didn't you give the say so from where you were to bring my, My, my brother back to full health. Why didn't you say it like you commanded the centurion servant? Why didn't you say it like you did for them? Why didn't you do it for me? And we get into this moment where we think the word of God lessens its impact because he didn't do it for me. See but Jesus. Let's go to that. I like that story. Jesus in John chapter 11. I like what he says, it says, it says, when Jesus heard the message that Lazarus was sick, he said, the sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, the son of God may be glorified through it. He's saying that this story isn't going to end in death. He's saying that this story isn't going to end with sorrow. He's saying this story isn't going to end here. But this story is going to give glory to God. This story is not over yet. In fact, it's just the beginning. This story is going to impact future stories for this family. This story is going to begin and branch off to spark new miracles happening all over. This story is going to be used to elevate the platform of Jesus. And so Jesus goes to Lazarus and says, Lazarus, come out. That is the word going forth, declaring to everything that's in the way of the word, and in the way of Lazarus, and it is breaking. It is that double edged sword that comes out of the mouth of God, and it breaks through the tomb, and it breaks through the tomb. It breaks through the principalities and it breaks through the darkness and it breaks through death in order to touch the heart of a man named Lazarus. And he said, Lazarus, come out. And he comes out from his cave. And the Bible says that Jesus said that to the cloths, not even to Lazarus, to the cloths, come off of him. Come off of him. Here. I'm getting excited. This is why I don't stand up. I'm getting excited. Thank you, Jesus. And he walks out fully healed, fully alive. And in the very next chapter, a little bit more expanded in Matthew 26. But John 12 works for us in this story. The very next chapter, Jesus is having dinner with Pharisees and this woman breaks in and she's rustling around and she goes straight to the feet of Jesus. And she breaks out a jar of oil and she pours the jar of oil at the feet of our Savior. And she anoints his feet and then she begins to cry and weep on his feet and wipe the tears away with her hair. That woman's name is Mary. Mary, the one who just went through the pressure. Of death, the one who just went through the heaviness that he went through that she went through the one who didn't allow the sorrow to determine. Didn't allow the sorrow to determine their intimacy with God. See, this is where we go back to the top of the, this is where we go back to the top of the message, to the lesson. See, the disciples were so sorrowful that they fell asleep. Mary was, had sorrow, but did not allow the heaviness of sorrow to weigh her down. Down to the point of weariness, she outtook that sorrow and gave gratitude for what God has done in her life. And so she went to the feet of the savior and did what she had to do. She positioned herself at the feet, which, which symbolizes the humility, the worship and intimacy and dependence, full reliance on him. See she was living marked by the word in Galatians 6 17 Say it like this I got to bring it up because I want to From now on let no one trouble me by making it necessary For me to justify my authority as apostle and the absolute truth of the gospel for I bear on my body the Branding marks of Jesus the wounds scars and others and other outward evidence of persecutions These may testify to his ownership of me See when we go through these hard times Seasons when we go through stories where we can become down or when we go through troubles and tribulations, when we go through these trials and storms, we have to understand we are branded with the name of God and his marks are on us. We have been marked by his word. And so that mark then enable us, enables us to overcome anything that's coming at us that we do not have to live in sorry or us. And sorrow, but we can walk in the joy that God has provided for us. And the crazy part about this is that joy, when we allow joy into our life, the Bible says, joy of the Lord is our strength. And so we what was it? The fruit of the spirit. Might as well go there too. We're going through the Bible today. Amen. Oops. But the fruit of the spirit is love. Joy, peace. I'm going to stop right there because there's a whole list, but first love, love the Lord God with all your heart. First is love. God is love. The first is love. Pursue after God with an unwavering love for him, love. Then we have joy. So in order to love or in order to have joy, you need to love God. And so in order to have all the rest, the peace that you need in order to overcome the storms, in order to have the long suffering that you need to sustain you through the midst of the trials, in order to have the gentleness, the kindness, the goodness, the faithfulness, the self control, and all these fruit of the spirit, you first need to have love and then you need to have joy. Why? Because your joy is your strength to overcome the Devil and what he's speaking into your ear and he's gonna speak the that you can't have peace through this that you're gonna Be overcome by this you're he's saying that you can't have patience through this you need to have it now You can't wait for God for four days. You need to have Lazarus be healed now The word is going to say, you don't need to be kind to these people. They're the ones that hurt you. You don't need to show them kindness. You don't need to have self control in this situation. You're justified. You don't need to show discipline. You don't need to show the good characteristics, but let me tell you something, when you have the joy of the Lord, you can say, get behind me, Satan. For I know who I am. I am a child of the most high God, and he sits me on the throne and he has created it in me. A clean heart. I've been marked by the word. So I have a couple final thoughts and I'm done here. The word and the spirit are always in harmony. And so when God gives a word, it's in harmony with the spirit to activate that word. And through the Holy Spirit we will gain clarity of the truth. In the Word. So I want to thank you guys for joining me this day, or today. I want to thank you guys for joining Relentless Pursuit. Please make sure you like, share, follow, and subscribe to all our social media platforms. I know you had an amazing time today, and I, so did I. I, it was, I was extremely grateful. And Merry Christmas. This is the reason for the season is the Word becoming flesh. Thank you guys so much. I'll see you guys next week.