Respecting The Covenant | Pastor John Greiner

Respect the covenant tonight. Moses turned his eyes away from Egypt's wealth and pleasure, choosing instead to focus exclusively on God's promise, and that choice changed everything. That same pattern of respect traces through Scripture, from Moses at the burning bush to the twelve spies at the edge of the promised land, showing how faith always requires turning our gaze away from giants and circumstances and fixing it on the covenant keeper. Along the way, there's a word about wasted power in the church and a challenge to let go of whatever's grown tangled and unnecessary so God can bring what's new. Respecting the covenant isn't passive. It's a choice, made in faith, that opens the door to everything Jesus already paid for.

Transcript

Opening Confession And Scripture

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So uh let's get into the Word of God tonight together and let's lift our Bibles. This is our custom around here at Glorious Way Church. We like to wave our Bibles around. I've got I've got an Amen corner here tonight, and we're glad that they're here. And so let's just uh say this together. Say, Heavenly Father, I give thanks for Wednesday night. It's the right time. I'm hearing the right word of God. The Holy Spirit is here to illuminate the Word and give me faith. The hearing of the Word brings faith. And faith is the victory in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Let's turn in our Bibles to Hebrews 11, please. And look at verse 24. And we're talking about the Hall of Fame of faith tonight. And we're going to look at Moses specifically. It says verse 24, by faith. One version says, by an act of faith. Moses, when he came, was come to years, refused be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, esteeming the approach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt. For he had respect unto the recompense of the reward. Everybody say respect. So by so by faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.

Respecting The Covenant Defined

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And so tonight I wanted to share a message entitled Respecting the Covenant. Respecting the Covenant. You know what power we have available to us. Why? Because of our covenant with Almighty God. You know, Jesus shed his blood once and for all. It's enough. There's nothing else needed. And the Bible is all we need to know in order to operate as sons of God. You know, we the sons of God are rising at this time. I mean, more and more people are getting alive to the word. They're getting alive to God's plan for their life. They're not just trying to check boxes in Christianity, but they're really trying to go on to the next highest place. You know, it's a year, you know, we're almost, in fact, we are halfway through this year. God's got some new things for all of us. And uh if we have the proper respect for the covenant, we'll possess those things that He's got for us. Um, you know, back in uh

Oral Roberts On Wasted Power

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July of 2004, some 22 years ago, Orr Roberts uh had a word for the church. It was a corrective word. I heard it on Christian television the very next month in August. He happened to be on Christian TV and I saw him two different times, and I just uh had such a desire to go and interview him, and God uh brought that about uh the next uh year, January of 2005, just a few months later, I was got to be able to go out to his home and interview him for an hour and a half. We have an hour uh uh photo shoot, uh video shoot of that of that interview. We still have. Um but uh he had a corrective word, you know, which is unusual for Brother Roberts. I know that he's a mighty man of God, and you could say he's a prophet. Uh you could say he's an apostle. I I don't know, he didn't call himself those things, but a mighty healing ministry. Uh he was a first to do a lot of things. I I remember him being on television in a different way. He uh he had he wanted to attract a maximum number of people to give them the good news. I saw him on Johnny Carson. I wasn't even saved. He he was a guest on Johnny Carson show. At one point, Oral Roberts was the fourth uh most known name on the planet. A lot of people don't know that. I mean, that's that's been a lot, long years ago, but that's how popular and how well known he was. And so he was the type that would go to a church and say, you know, God's got something good for you today. So when he had a corrective word, to me, it I felt justified, I felt vindicated because I had a corrective word. God told me to wake up the church, it's asleep. And so that his word kind of, I kept looking for somebody else, uh, maybe uh higher in authority, higher in rank than me. I mean, God does have ranks, you know. I don't try to rank myself, but I know I'm not at the same level as Oral Roberts, that's for sure. And here he was talking about these things, and he said there's a wasting of power in the church. The Lord came to him and said that. A wasting of power in the church. And so I began to think about that as I heard that word, and and uh, and God said, Well, you know, there's two ways that happens. Number one, there's a wasting of power when it's not received. Power has been given and yet not received. And then, secondly, power has been given and received, but misused or not used. And so you've got two ways that there to be a wasting of power in the church. Uh really, it's not respecting the covenant. It's not respecting the blood of Jesus that was shed to enact that covenant. Really, when you talk about covenant, you're talking about blood. Because covenant means to cut, and so it implies blood. So we're, you know, really respecting the blood of Jesus, respecting the covenant, is all tied together, and not respecting that is why many live way below what Jesus bought and paid

What The Ticket Already Includes

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for. You know, I think I've told the story many times, but I think about the man that was on an Atlantic passage back before they had airplanes that could fly across Atlantic. So if you wanted to go from America to England or the continent, you had to you had to take a ship a steamship, you know, the Queen Mary or something like that. And so these these Atlantic passages would take four to five days, and and so you bought that ticket. It was not a cheap ticket. I mean, it cost a lot of money to go. And uh one of the passengers was out on the deck and he saw this man kind of huddled by the lifeboats, and he was eating crackers, peanut butter and crackers. And uh said, Sir, what are you doing here? He said, Well, I'm just eating my lunch. He said, Well, you don't you know they've got a wonderful meal in there, you know. Why don't you go inside and eat? He said, Oh, I can't afford that. I I just I spent all my money on the ticket, and uh this is all I can do is just have peanut butter and crackers. He said, The food comes with a it comes with a ticket. You know, it's it comes with a ticket. And uh, you know, we've got so many things that come with the blood. There's so many things that Jesus has bought and paid for. And uh tonight I'm talking about respecting the covenant. So here in Hebrews 11 27, uh it says that Moses' faith is noted, his faith uh saw him who is invisible. His he had the vision of faith, he saw God. You know, he's he's not he's not like us, he doesn't have the Spirit of God living on the inside of him. Uh and yet, you know, he saw God, he he saw him by his faith. And uh in verse 26 he said it steemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt, for he had respect. He had respect under the recompense

Focus Exclusively On The Covenant

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of reward. He had respect. See, we're talking about respecting the covenant. So that Greek word uh translated respect is a Greek word apoplepo, which means in the Thayer's Greek dictionary, to turn your eyes away from uh from uh other things and fix them on one thing. To turn your eyes away from other things and fix them on one thing. In other words, then we could say focus exclusively. Let's just say that out loud. Focus exclusively. See, I mean your faith is going to require you to quit looking at all the things that are you think are impossible, things that are too big, things that are too difficult, things that are too convoluted, too complex, and start focusing exclusively on your covenant with Almighty God that was put in fact it was put into effect by the precious blood of Christ. Oh man, I tell you what, we're we're in covenant with Almighty God. There's nothing too hard for him. So then Moses turned his eyes away from his education. You know, he was highly educated, from his royal privilege. He was counted as a son of Pharaoh's daughter, even, you know. And he he turned his his attention away from the pleasures of sin. I mean, he had all kinds of opportunities to sin. I mean, probably one day after another after another. I mean, he's got everybody looking at him. All the women are chasing him, you know, uh, all the ways to get wealthy are chasing him. I mean, you know, he's got all kinds of opportunities, and he turned his attention away from those things. And he focused exclusively on the recompense of reward for serving God. In verse 26, he embraced the sufferings of Christ. You know, even though Christ wasn't born yet, it's a picture of us Christians. We've we've got to turn our eyes away from this world, and we've got to focus exclusively on Christ, and that's going to mean what are we going to suffer? Cancer? No, we're going to suffer persecution. We're going to suffer, you know, people uh holding that against us, especially right now. You've got a whole uh group of people that are being elected in the primaries of the Democrat primary that hate us. They hate Christianity, they hate God, they hate Jesus specifically. And so, you know, if they go any further uh in their career, if they're somehow they get in the Congress and all of that, I mean, it's gonna complicate things for the Church of Jesus Christ in America. Wouldn't that be a horrible thing? I tell you, we need to turn out coming up, this election coming up here. We've got to turn out. We can't make any excuses. So he embraced suffering for Christ's sake. He was covenant-minded, and he looked to the invisible God, the covenant maker, the covenant keeper. He knew that he could he could trust him. Now, so that's from Moses'

Choosing Christ Amid Pushback

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side. He had respect. Now let's look at at this from God's side because a covenant is two ways, you know. It's the covenant, it's the covenant maker, the covenant keeper. Who's that? That's God. And then it's the person that he's uh covenant with, which is Moses, we're talking about. Now let's talk about from God's side. Let's look

God Remembers And Acts On Covenant

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at uh Exodus chapter 2. And I want you to see the background here in Exodus 2, verse 23. It came to pass in process of time that the king of Egypt died and the children of Israel sighed. The king died, and Israel sighed. That's a song. That's a country song. All right, so the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto them. See? He had respect unto them. He turned his full attention, he focused exclusively on his covenant children, his covenant partners, Israel. Why? Because he had he remembered Abraham. Remember is not just suddenly I remember somebody. Remember is a covenant term. It's what you apply to covenant, and respect is a covenant term. He had, he focused exclusively on his covenant partners. And uh that's when he appeared to Moses at the burning bush and called him. He called Moses. He said, I've I've seen the suffering of my people, I've heard their cries, I know their sorrows, and I am come down to deliver them out of bondage and into a land that flows with milk and honey. So it wasn't just getting rid of the problem, it was uh completing a covenant promise that he made to Abraham. He told Abraham, All this land I'm going to give your descendants. And he's talking about present-day Israel. In fact, he's talking about a lot of Lebanon and a lot of land that's present-day Israel. I mean, it's not theirs, but it ought to be. It ought to be a lot bigger piece of property than what it is. But God swore, and God could not swear by any higher, so he swore by himself, saying, Surely, blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee. Said that to Abraham, and so all these years later, here, 400 and so odd years later, here's Moses. And God had spoken, not, he didn't name Moses by name, but he spoke what he was gonna do in Moses' day. He said, I, and there's gonna come a king that's gonna know not, uh, you know, is not uh not gonna know Joseph. He's gonna forget about it, and I'm gonna deliver. They're gonna uh wickedly entreat my people, and I'm gonna deliver them. You see, so he was speaking to Abraham about the day that Moses has been visited on, all because Moses turned his attention. He focused exclusively on the covenant. Glory to God. Come on, lift your hand right now. I tell you, God never forgets. He never, he doesn't, you know, he is faithful over his word to perform it. So uh this covenant respect, see, apoplepo, this covenant respect, the the turning away of our attention from all the negative, all the circumstances, and focusing exclusively on the covenant maker and the covenant keeper. See, that's what that's what faith does. Faith turns away from all the negative stuff and focuses on God Himself and His promise. So this covenant respect now, when we talk about uh later on when Moses said yes and he became the deliverer and he brought the children of Israel out of Egypt and crossed the Red Sea and they get over in the journey toward the promised land.

Spies, Giants, And Covenant Vision

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Remember, he's he sent twelve spies to spy out the land and bring a report. And so uh the twelve spies came back. They said, Boy, it's just like God said. It's a land that flows with milk and honey, it's a wonderful land. Here's the fruit of it. They had all this cart full of fruit. He said, Nevertheless, there be giants in the land. They've got wall cities, and we'd be not able. So ten of the twelve spies had no respect for the covenant. They did not turn their eyes away from the trouble. Their eyes were focused really exclusively on the giants of the land and on the wall cities. That's, I mean, they they gave all the credit to the devil, they gave all the credit to flesh and forgot about who they were in covenant with. But two, two had respect, and that was Joshua and Caleb. They said, oh no, they, you know, God's given us favor. Let's go up at once. Let's go up at once. Let's not delay any longer. Let's go up at once. See the difference between having respect under the covenant. See, that's what I'm talking about tonight, having respect. We've got a better covenant than Abraham did. And we have a better covenant than Joshua did. I'm telling you, they had the blood of bulls and goats that was shed for them, that was the guarantor of their covenant. Guess what? We've got the blood of Jesus that's our guarantor. Hallelujah. So Joshua and Caleb looked beyond the circumstances and they focused exclusively on the promise and the promise keeper. You know, Israel, if you if you read

Crying In Faith Like Bartimaeus

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your Bible, you see that they often cried out, but they weren't crying in faith. They were crying with, it was more like murmuring and having a pity party. It wasn't a cry of faith. You know, the cry of faith, you know, that you're lifting your voice in faith, you know, like the blind Bartimaeus. He lifted his his voice and he had the voice of faith. He said, uh, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. I'm saying that without screaming. I don't want to scream into the microphone, but he screamed it. And uh the religious crowd said, Shut up. You know, you're gonna bother the master. Don't trouble him. And he cried all the louder, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus came and stopped in his tracks. I mean, he stopped right there. And uh and blind Bartimaeus threw his cloak off, which is the beggar's cloak. This this is the cloak he had to wear to beg to qualify for alms. And he threw it off. What do you want? He said, I in order that I might receive my sight. See, I mean, God, Jesus could have given him some money, Jesus could have done anything, but he said, What do you want? He made him make the demand on his covenant. What do you want? He asked for something huge. I mean, where did he know and that just delighted Jesus? He said, you know, praise God. He ref he his faith has made him whole. Go your way. Your faith has made you whole. Glory to God. And so he went seeing. So, but Israel often cried out, you know, and it really was reduced to murmuring and complaining instead of the faith and the vision and having respect for the covenant.

Letting Go To Embrace The New

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So, I mean, tonight it's just a simple message to get you to think about uh your life, think about your challenges, because we're halfway through this year of God doing, behold, I make all things new. There's new things headed your way, but we've got to lighten the ship. We've got to get rid of some of the things that are now uh, you know, obsolete, maybe in your life. There's some things, some relationships uh, you know, with now I'm not talking about your marriage now. I'm talking about that's covenant. But I'm talking about sometimes we have associations and friendships that have no godly purpose in our lives. And it's time for us to maybe, you know, step away from those and start to let those begin to be less important and maybe in some cases just let them go away totally. And uh, and you know, there's all kinds of things, things that we need to respond to. I told you at the beginning of the year, ask, seek, and knock about these things. Find out what things you need to let go of so that God can bring you the new things to embrace and to take hold of. And that's all part of respecting the covenant. That's all about uh taking your eyes off of that which is no longer necessary, taking your eyes off of uh taking your time away from things that you're spending time on that is no longer necessary, and focusing exclusively on what God's plan is for you. Like, come on, lift your hand right now. Glory to God. I mean, that evidence is respecting the covenant is not just just thinking. I mean, it's acting, it's moving, it's doing. Praise God. So uh, what are you exclusively focused on? I mean, is that is that is that a possibility, despair, hopelessness? You can't focus on that. Number one, that's wrong. There's nothing too hard for God. There's nothing too hard for the Lord. And I just read that in Genesis, my normal reading, you know, where he he appeared to Moses and Abraham and Sarah at the heat of the day, it was a hot day, you know, and there were three men, and one of them was the Lord, you know. And uh, and and so, you know, uh Abraham got busy and said, Oh, come on in, let's wash your feet. Come on, let's uh let's stay for dinner. And and they killed a calf and dressed it, and and he told uh Sarah, hey, just get some meal, get some flour tortillas, we're gonna have fajitas tonight. And uh praise God. And they ate. They ate. I mean, they ate, and then, and then you know, well, it wasn't, it was the pre incarnate Jesus. Jesus said, I'm gonna visit you, sir, about this time, and you're gonna have a son. Oh, hoo, hoo, hoo! She laughed. She laughed. Oh, my age, oh, you're Laughing. Oh, I didn't laugh. Yes, you did. No, I didn't. But uh, you know, just see the the faithfulness of God. I mean, He the seed of Abraham. We're all the seed of Abraham through faith in Christ. He's a covenant-keeping God. I mean, his He dotes on His children. I mean, that's how much He loves you. He dotes on you. Don't you dote on your children? I mean, maybe some of you might be spoiling your children, but I'm not about spoiling them. I just mean nothing gets past you. You you don't, when they when they achieve things, you're so full of praise and you brag on them, and that's the way it ought to be. It's the way it ought to be. We ought to brag on our kids

When Life Feels Like Spaghetti

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when they achieve. And yeah, we need to correct them, but we don't have to, you know, be hard on them. So what are you exclusively focused on? Are you turning your gaze away from those circumstances? Are you turning your gaze away? You know, a couple of weeks ago on a Sunday night, I had a vision of a bowl of spaghetti, and I thought, God, what does that mean? But I just sat there, I didn't know whether to say it or not. It was just so foolish. I mean, sometimes God just leads me out to the end of the pier, you know. The sharks are right there, and I'm wondering, am I going to walk off the end of the pier or what? But uh, and I said, Lord, what does this mean? He said, you know, some things are just tangled up. Like you take, you dive into that spaghetti and you pull it out of there and you make a big mess, and you you try to roll it on your fork. I'm still not really very adept at rolling it on my fork. I get it all over my face, all over my all over my clothes, all over the place. And what he was talking about things that are difficult in your life that that seem to be problematic, and the more you dig into it, the worse it gets, and you don't ever get to the end of it. And I mean, I just I just gave that as a word of knowledge, and the whole front of the church filled up on a Sunday night. I laid hands on a lot of people that had a lot of trouble, and they got encouraged. They got encouraged that God was gonna, you know, bring them to the end of that, and and you know, to take their eyes off the dysfunction and put it on God who's able to straighten everything out. There's nothing too hard. There's no nothing. God's never afraid of a mess. He's never afraid of dysfunction. Hallelujah. Doesn't matter how messed up it is. Uh so are you turning your gaze away from the circumstances and fixing your eyes on the covenant?

Choose Life And Fix Your Gaze

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Moses chose. And he chose. He had to choose. Joshua and Caleb, they chose. The ten chose. They didn't turn out so hot, they died right there. You know, sometimes when you choose wrong, when you choose to abide in the trouble and don't let your faith take over and start to lift your eyes to the God of the covenant, I mean, it can it can make life miserable for you. It can shorten your life, it can end your life, it can it can rob you of finances. I mean, there's all kinds of negative things when you focus on the trouble. But when you lift your eyes and you have respect under the covenant, now the covenant-keeping God is able to provide you everything you need to get through it. Praise God, no matter how much trouble there is. So you have to choose, and I challenge you to choose life. Choose the word of God, choose faith, choose the reward, choose the rewarder. Respect the covenant. Come on, lift your hands tonight. Praise God. Little encouragement. Hallelujah. Glory to God. Are you encouraged tonight? Praise the Lord. Well, God told me to preach what I take for granted, just a simple message. I think about Brother Osteen. He just preached so simple. And didn't it didn't take a doctorate degree to understand him. He'd just get up there and he said, now, John, he'd grab me my lapels like this. He said, now John never preached more than 30 minutes. So I feel I fulfilled tonight. I didn't preach that long. But there have been times when I preached an hour and 30 minutes and I'm looking for him. I'm wondering if he's coming back. Grab him my lapels. One time in the Philippines, I preached three hours, and I was really looking for him outside.

Prayer And Turning From Distraction

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They wouldn't let me go home. They just kept on pulling. Oh, praise God. Let's just lift our hands. Father, we thank you for the covenant. We thank you for the blood. And we have respect for the blood. We have respect for the one who shed the blood. We have respect for Father, the one, you were the one that gave your son for us. And you doted on us, and you know we had nothing, and you gave us everything. We were owed nothing, and you gave us uh, we're just joint heirs with Christ. You gave us everything you gave Jesus. Thank you. Thank you. And we keep our eyes glued upon you. We're not moved by what Satan brings. We're moved by what you have brought already. Hallelujah. In Jesus' name. Well, I don't see anybody calling for uh prayer, so we're gonna pray. Is there anybody here that needs prayer? Would you just stand up and we will pray over you tonight? Maybe you need help turning your eyes away from some things that are going on. You know, everybody goes through things, and it's you know, the devil, that's kind of his modus operandi. He lights a dumpster fire, you know. He gets you to look at the dumpster fire. It's called a diversionary tactic. If he can divert your attention away from the Lord and from the word long enough to get, you know, have your eyes on the fire, you know, uh, that he set, then he can sneak around the edge and do something and steal, kill, and destroy. So, Father, right now, uh for Sheree, Lord, we just pray over her and also all those that are watching by live stream. And Father, we thank you that tonight she's turning her eyes away from the trouble and fixing them firmly upon the covenant-keeping God, the covenant-giving God, the promise maker, the promise keeper. And Father, we thank you that you have uh a way of escape. And Father, you always supply that way of escape. Lord, nothing goes by you. Uh if we're going through it, then you've already said no, they've got the power to overcome this. And Lord, that's our signal. That that's our signal. Whatever we're going through, that's a signal that yes, where I'm hit, it's hit me, and I have power to get through it and overcome it. And if I can't go over it, I'm gonna go under it. If I can't go over under it, I'll go around it. If I can't go around it, I just go through it. I'm gonna go get to the other side. And Father, we thank you for that. We give you praise in Jesus' name. Amen. We all agree. Hallelujah.