Purifying Vessels of Honour

THE CITY GATE CHURCH

-Welcome to Sunday Service-

SUNDAY SERVICE

MINISTERING: Pst. Oladimeji Elugbadebo

REFERENCE ID: TCGC/SUN-MS-2018-05-13-2

TITLE ID: Purifying Vessels of Honour

God demands that we live a life of holiness. Holiness is not a spiritual concept, it is an expression of Godly living, so every believer is mandated to live holy. Holiness is the life of the Godhead. God is holy and He commands us to live holy. It is not a wish in the mind of God but a command to live holy. This means that it is possible to live holy by the grace that God gives. He wants us to live a life of purity, in our thoughts, relationships, gatherings. He has called us to live a life of purity. As believers, we are to depart from things that defile. Paul was telling Timothy to flee all appearances of evil.

But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness.

- 2 Timothy 2:16 (kjv)

We have to stand as God's holy people, consecrated unto God, lifting up a standard in this generation. Holiness and purity are not movements, they are commandments from God, and they should determine every aspect of our life.

God has a standard for our living; there is a way to talk, live and walk.

And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus; Who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some. Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.

- 2 Timothy 2:17-19 (kjv)

There is nothing that we can do that can counter the integrity of God’s standard. The standard of God cannot be compromised. A believer can be in iniquity; you can name the name of Christ and be in iniquity (vs 19). It is possible to be churchy when in church and worldly when outside the church. So there are certain standards in your life that must be consistent.

That we are a church that pushes present truth does not cover for you; you can be in our midst and not upholding the standard, every word received must be personally applied. Are you pressing on to the saving of your soul? The working of God in your life must be individual. God leads and visits us corporately but changes us personally. Every man will be judged on the account of the word that he receives.

But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour.

- 2 Timothy 2:20 (kjv)

This great house represents the Lord’s body and it can also represent the Church. In Zion, there is greatness. Greatness is a life that describes the Godlife. The house of God is a great house, because it is God’s house. So there is a way to behave in the God house.

In the Lord’s house there are vessels. God wants us to be a vessel unto honour. Every believer has a calling to be honourable, you have to be a vessel in the Hands of the Lord. There are vessels unto honor and some to dishonour. It is sad to know that in the same house there can be vessels unto dishonour. So we can change from a dishonourable vessel to a honourable one. What changes a vessel from being a vessel of dishonour to an honourable one is purification. It is fire that purifies. The house of God must be a house of fire, without fire we will all be dishonorable vessels. God wants to purify the Church. So every person has the responsibility to undergo a purifying process. So as you come to church, you go through the process of dropping dishonorable things.

If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work.

- 2 Timothy 2:21 (kjv)

The word ‘sanctify’ is from the word sanctuary. In the sanctuary, you are cleansed. So the house of God must be a house of cleansing. You must make yourself available for cleansing. How does sanctification happen? Truth is the tool for sanctification. If everyone will allow truth to take course in their life, they will be going through sanctification.

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

- John 17:17 (kjv)

It is your responsibility to allow the word have free course in your life. If I walk in truth, truth sanctifies my vessel and makes me an honourable believer, meet for the master’s use. I used to think being meet for the master’s use is for you to preach, heal the sick, raise the dead and all but that is not all to it. There is a level of master's use that you cannot get if your vessel is not sanctified and  honourable. We must understand what good works are. It is in the process of sanctification that you can do good works. The word of God must have free course in your life, don't take the word casually.

Most of the issues in your life will not be resolved except you engage the word. You do not change by wishing to change, you have the personal responsibility to see that you are changing, nothing will change you outside the word.

People will pray and fast when they do not have money but when it comes to issues that involves Christ, many do not engage such processes. We must consciously go to God for issues of change in our lives. Changing is deliberate; there are times that you must tell God that you want to change and be deliberate about it.

For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;

- Colossians 1:9 (kjv)

We need to pray this scriptures continually. Do not get too familiar with the word; you get dull of hearing when you have gotten familiar with the word and your life is not changing or subjected to the word you know. If your heart is not engaging and open to the word, you will not be transformed.

That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;

- Colossians 1:10 (kjv)

Good work is revealed in fruitfulness. When a believer begins to bear fruit, he is involved in good works.

And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ; Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.

- Philippians 1:9-11 (kjv)

Being fruitful is to abound in love. When you engage truth, you will abound. Glory, praise and honour go together; so when speaking of a vessel unto honour, it is a vessel unto praise and also unto glory.

Every man should see that he is being purged or purified on the inside by being deliberate. The end of the activity of Christ in a soul is for the soul to become glorious. It is possible for a soul to be adorned with eternal glory. The glory of God is the beauty of a believer which is the end of the New Testament. Fire is the one that prepares and makes you ready for glory. Becoming glorious means that there are things in your life that must give way to incorruption.

Therefore the New Testament is to purify and set apart. One of the things that must happen in the New Testament Church is that we must be taught to endure the heat of life. If there is no heat, there is a problem somewhere, because every believer must be engaging change. When building stops, it means the conscious deliberate action to change has stopped. There was a time in Jerusalem when the building of the temple stopped and the people were building their own personal things. Your walk with God is intentional, your walk of change is deliberate. Your destination is the glory of God; everyday there are steps to take.

Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste? Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.

- Haggai 1:4-5 (kjv)

The house of God was not being built and people were building their own houses and other things. They made no attempt or deliberate effort to build the house of God. The reason why you go through crisis sometimes is because of disobedience to the faith, and not changing. There are times when the only way God can get your attention is to put crisis in your life and at these moments, He will even permit the enemy to afflict you, just to get your attention.

Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

- Haggai 1:6 (kjv)

What people live for is what they eat, drink and wear; this is what drives most believers. However, these things that they seek has not satisfied them, it never satisfies them. You can keep living and keep getting more; the more a man increases financially, the more his lust increases.

Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the LORD.

- Haggai 1:7-8 (kjv)

Consider your ways! You must always be in a situation in your life where you consider your ways. The mountain represents the place of the speakings of God, where you can access truth. When you go up, you want to touch truth and by engaging truth, you are taken up. At times, what you need is not for God to solve your problem but for God to take you up.

It is tedious to climb the mountain; when climbing the mountain you are climbing against gravity. So climbing the mountain of the Lord will be against your need and how you feel. It is good to serve God when you feel good or to give when you have, but that is little. David said, he won’t give to God what cost him nothing. If you keep praying when you feel like praying, you won't grow. As believers praying is your life. To get God, you must be die hard. This is the time to go up.

The word I am teaching is giving you grace to go up. You don't want to live your life the way you lived it in 2017; go up and step into something new. You are always complaining, have you done what you have not done before, have you gone to a place you have not gone to before? God wants you to go up and do something new.

To get materials for building the house of the Lord (you are the temple of the Living God), you have to go up. The journey of going up is a journey of faith. Faith is necessary to go up.

But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

- Hebrews 11:6 (kjv)

When God takes pleasure in your life, it means that your life has been engaging faith. God will not take pleasure in your life if your life is not engaging faith. Sometimes you pursue your purposes as the expense of God’s purpose or eternal destiny. God’s overall purpose in you would suffer loss when you commit yourself to your own course.

In the seventh month, in the one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the LORD by the prophet Haggai, saying, Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and to the residue of the people, saying, Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the LORD; and be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, saith the LORD, and work: for I am with you, saith the LORD of hosts:
- Haggai 2:1-4 (kjv)

What is your work as a believer? Your work is to do eternal life. Every believer must be working.

According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.

- 1 Corinthians 3:10 (kjv)

All of us are builders. How do you build? You build by applying the Word. You are not a builder if you are a hearer only and not a doer.

For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.

- 1 Corinthians 3:11-13 (kjv)

What is your work? Every believer must have a work, which is to ‘flesh out’ God’s Word.

In the book of Haggai, the spirit of the people were stirred to build.

And the LORD stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of the LORD of hosts, their God,

- Haggai 1:14 (kjv)

God stirred up the heart of the leaders and the followers of Israel to build His house. In the New Testament, your work is to apply yourself to truth. The house of the Lord will not be built if you do not apply yourself to truth. When you make assumptions about your change, you are telling yourself that you have become what God wants you to be already. You must never get to a stage where you stop listening to the word. In doing the work of the Lord, you are not the one assessing yourself (you don’t set the exams neither are you the one that will mark it), so you do not even know how well you have worked until Heaven comes to assess you.

Your primary work, including the Pastor’s is not preaching but to become like Christ. Your primary work is not also Banking or any occupation you find yourself in. The primary work is to become conformed to the image of the Son, that is what you were created to be. You were predestined to become like Christ; before you were formed, you were created to be like Christ. Your work is to be conformed to the Son.

Our work daily is to see Him clearly, follow Him nearly and love Him dearly. There is a reward for eternal life and you do not need to lose sight of the reward. The sight of the reward is a motivating factor. God is our reward. If knowing that God is your reward is not enough as a motivation for you, then only God knows what will motivate you.

But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.

- James 1:25 (kjv)

The first thing you need to do with the perfect law of liberty is to look into it.

But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

- 2 Corinthians 3:18 (kjv)

This means that I must constantly look at the law. That is, nothing must take your attention. The thing that should take your attention the most is the word or the law. The story of Martha and Mary illustrates this also; Mary gave herself to what mattered the most. So ask yourself, “what matters the most to me?”.

But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.
- Luke 10:42 (kjv)

You should focus on engaging the Word of God for a change in your soul, let this be what you do on a daily basis.

But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.

- James 1:25 (kjv)

You must be looking into the word daily by focusing on the word of God and continuing in the word. One of the things about change is that it involves being steadfast. Have you ever noticed that one of the greatest attack you have in your Christian journey is to be steadfast; whereby you do certain things but you are not consistent in doing them. The truth is you cannot be consistent by yourself; God is giving us grace to stop unfruitful habits. You should engage the words you hear. Some things are not gifts but portions in God handed to men after a season of paying prices. Some of our fathers have this, they paid the price and certain things have been given them and when they speak, they speak as one with authority in those things.

From James 1:25, you have to do the following:

1. You need to look on the Word.
2.  
3. You need to continue in the Word.
4.  
5. You should not forget the Word.
6.  

It is the consistent hearing of the word that makes you not forget it. If you are not given to consistent hearing, you will forget the word. Forgetting can play out in many ways, one of the ways we forget is by being presumptuous. One of the things that God told the children of Israel is to tie the law around their neck. You must daily engage the word by listening to the word. Your spirit man can hear the word, even while you are sleeping, so you can play a message before and while you sleep. Anytime you wake up breaking out into singing, you were singing that song in the Spirit and your mind woke up and continued what your spirit was engaging.

Learn to create an atmosphere of the word and worship around you. Play the word, play the scriptures; this is a way for you not to forget. Don't be casual about the word, consciously give yourself to hearing the word. Our life and destiny is tied to the word, this is why the fathers taught us about confessing the word regularly.

I consciously hear the word; I do not deal with the word with assumption.

To look on the word, you must first hear and see the word. You need to keep hearing to see. God must empower us to do the work.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life;

- 1 John 1:1 (kjv)

If I do not do the work, ‘the blessing’ will not come. For every work done, there is a blessing. The work being done, attracts the blessing.

ALEPH. Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the LORD.

- Psalms 119:1 (kjv)

To walk in the law of the Lord is to engage the word. Your walk generates a work in you. My daily walk is building an heavenly work.

Blessed are they that keep his testimonies, and that seek him with the whole heart.

- Psalms 119:2 (kjv)

You keep his testimony by walking, if you are not walking you cannot keep His testimony. When you are walking in his testimony, you are keeping it.

They also do no iniquity: they walk in his ways. Thou hast commanded us to keep thy precepts diligently.

- Psalms 119:3-4 (kjv)

Commandments given to us by the Lord is that we keep His precepts diligently.

O that my ways were directed to keep thy statutes! Then shall I not be ashamed, when I have respect unto all thy commandments. I will praise thee with uprightness of heart, when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments. I will keep thy statutes: O forsake me not utterly.

- Psalms 119:5-8 (kjv)

Being ashamed does not just talk about your natural life, it also speaks of your eternal destiny. If you do not keep God’s commandments, you will be ashamed when you fall short of the reward. The way to not being ashamed is by keeping His word. There has to be a commitment to keeping the statutes of God.

If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work.

- 2 Timothy 2:21 (kjv)

The scriptures are full of commandments for us to keep and do because there are eternal rewards attached to them.

Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

- 2 Timothy 2:22 (kjv)

There are things that we should flee from in keeping the commandments of the Lord. Flee youthful lust; this does not apply only to teenagers but even those in their 40’s.

The book of Timothy is a Pastoral Epistle that applies not only to leaders but also to believers.

As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned:

- 1 Timothy 1:3-5 (kjv)

There is a commandment in the New Testament, it is the commandment of Christ. Faith, hope and love are commandments in the New Testament. The end of the commandment is the end of the work we are to do; what the law of the Lord should be producing in you daily is love or charity out of a pure heart. For charity to come forth from you, a pure heart is needed.

Charity or love is a product of a pure heart. When your heart is getting pure, you generate fruits of love and faith that is undefiled and you will have a good conscience. When you have a good conscience, you cannot sin and be comfortable in it. When you have a good conscience, God can easily reach you but when your conscience is seared, God cannot easily reach you; most times it's a powerful encounter that can wake such a person up.