Sunday night. I think I should be on. I'm ready to go then. Amen. Amen. You guys pray for us. We've had a busy 2022, and we've got a busy 2023 coming up. And I'm thankful for it, and I'm thankful for the Lord keeping us busy. And I love what we get to do. That's absolutely the greatest blessing in the world. We'll be home through January, February, and then we'll head out in March. We're going to get to see some of the country in March and April. Then we'll be back. We bounce back and forth. So I'm just thankful. Thankful for the calling on my life and on my family's life. And you pray that the devil would not love nothing more, understand this, and young people listen to me, that the devil would not love nothing more than to destroy what God's doing in your life. and a lot of your family, and the life of this church, and I've seen it. We've been keeping up with what's going on here, and it's absolutely amazing. I love to see God working and moving, and I wanna see it continue here and in your family and your life and in my family as well, so you pray for us, amen. Matthew chapter number 16, look with me in verse number 24. Matthew 16, 24, look what Jesus is speaking here to his disciples. It says, then said Jesus unto his disciples, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it. And whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange? for his soul. Let's pray and ask God to bless in the message tonight. Lord, we love you. Thank you for this opportunity. Thank you for brother Brian and his dear family. Lord, thank you for this wonderful church. I pray your blessings upon them this new year. God, I pray souls would be saved. Lives would be changed. Lord, marriages would be strengthened. Children would come to know Jesus as their savior. Lord, please do a work in this in this town and in this community. And Lord, thank you for what you've called my family to do. Lord, I pray that you would use us in a great and mighty way this year. And Lord, I just want to be completely, totally surrendered to you. That's my heart's desire, Lord. We love you. Thank you for tonight. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Well, I believe the single greatest event in a person's life is the day that someone gets saved and comes to know Christ as their Savior. I believe that's the greatest day. I know in my life, Brother Brian, that was the greatest day of my life. Some of my greatest days have been marrying my lovely wife, having our children, watching God work in our ministry. But listen, the greatest day, the greatest day in my life has been the day that I got saved and knew Jesus as my Savior. But I believe the second greatest day in a Christian's life is the day that they completely give it all to God. The day that they say, Lord, it's not my life anymore. It's your life. Lord, it's not my car. It's not my house. It's not my bank account. It's not anything. Anything that I have is not mine anymore. It's all yours, God. And whatever you want to do with it, that's fine by me. I believe that's the second greatest day. So I'm going to reach on this thought for just the next few minutes. Don't touch my thermostat. Amen. You know, surrendering is hard to do, brother. It's hard to do. I mean, we look at it in this flesh and in this world, we look at surrendering as losing. When we wave the white flag, we look at it as we're losing. But I promise you tonight, as Christians, if we'll surrender to God, I promise you this, you will never lose. And the younger you do that, the greater your life will be. Oh, I wish how I could have went back, Brother Brian, and in my teenage years, although I was saved, I was not surrendered. I wish I could have went back all those years ago and surrendered my life to the Lord Jesus Christ back then. Completely and totally surrendered to Him. I can't imagine what God might have done in my life. and what he'll do in your life. Here's what the word surrender means. It means to yield to the power of another. We don't like it. Our flesh doesn't like it, but I promise you this, it is the second greatest day in your life as a Christian if you'll surrender and yield your power to him and give him everything. Now, I want to tell you a few things in these verses that Jesus is talking about. But before I do that, I want to tell you about the day that I surrendered everything to the Lord. I remember it. Brother, I was going to Bible college. The Lord was dealing with me about the call to preach. And I remember the day that I said, God, I will go anywhere and I will do anything that you want me to do. And in my mind, the furthest place in my mind I could think of was New Zealand. I thought, well, that's a pretty good distance from Keene, North Carolina. And I said, Lord, if you want my family to go to New Zealand, I said, I'll go. And I meant it. If God had called my family to New Zealand, we would have packed up everything we had, we would have made preparation, and we hopefully would be in New Zealand by now. But now understand this, tomorrow if I wake up and the Lord says, Jesse, I want you in New Zealand, then our family's gonna start packing up and we're gonna start making preparations because this thing of surrender never stops in your life. Understand that it is a daily progressive sanctification to become more like him every day of our lives and that takes total surrender every day. So let's look at what Jesus told his disciples in these verses about surrendering. Look what it says in verse number 24. Then said Jesus unto his disciples, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. See, Jesus is talking to his disciples, so we know that he's talking to believers here. He said, if any man will come after me, he gives him three things. He said, number one, deny himself. Number two, take up his cross. And number three, follow me. Listen, if every Christian in this building tonight would do those three things, it'd be amazing what would happen, not only at this church, but in this community, maybe even in this state and in this nation. If every Christian would surrender everything. So what in the world does that have to do with a thermostat? I'm glad you asked me, amen. You know, nobody wants their thermostat touched with a bribe. Nobody. Nobody wants to listen. I don't want you coming in my house and touching my thermostat. Now I am a 69 to 70 degree guy. Amen. Amen. Raise your hand if you're a 69 to 70 degree person. Y'all my people. Amen. I like you. Now my dad, on the other hand, you'll go to his house and it'll be 75 degrees. Raise your hand if you're a 75 degree person in here. Listen. Listen. I just saw it. Listen. They didn't want to admit it, but they raised their hand, and good job for being honest and cherished. Oh, but then, listen, if I go to my mother-in-law's house, which I try to avoid at all costs, my mother-in-law, brother, she doesn't even touch her thermostat. It might be 100 degrees outside, and she never touches it. It might be 85 or 90 degrees in her house. Raise your hand if you're that person. Oh, ain't nobody, listen, nobody sees it in the nursery tonight and she wouldn't even admit it, amen? But I want you to understand this, nobody likes the thermostat to be touched. Listen, thermostats are, at many places, are even locked. This one's not locked, but I guarantee you, only a certain few amount of people are able to touch that one up there. You know what would happen if everybody could touch the thermostat in this room? Listen, it would be going up and down constantly. Constantly from 65 to 75. 65 to 75. Because nobody wants to be uncomfortable in their life. I want you to understand today that if we're going to give God everything, number one, it's going to make us uncomfortable at times. Understand that. You know one degree makes a big difference? But when I can walk into my house and if it is 71, I go, whoa! Who touched the thermostat? Or I can walk into my house and if it's 68, I know it. Because one degree will make a big difference. Listen, Jesus said here, let him deny himself. Listen, I wrote this down. I said, when we fully surrender to God, we deny ourselves, and we forget about our comfort, and we start thinking about other people's comforts. Amen. That's what Jesus is talking about here, when we deny ourselves and give him everything. Listen, it might make us uncomfortable. Oh, but it might make somebody else's life really comfortable. Understand that. I wrote this down, too. I said, surrendering to God is the most comfortable, uncomfortable place you will ever be. Young person, it is uncomfortable to be in the will of God many times. Oh, but at the same time, it is the most comfortable place that you will ever find yourself. Young person, it is some of the most anxiety-ridden times of your life to find yourself in the will of God. because he's trying to mold you and make you into what he wants to be. But I promise you, when he starts working on you, remember that song we used to teach our kids? He's still working on me to make me what I ought to be. It took him just a week to make the moon and the stars, the sun and the earth and Jupiter and Mars. How lovely and patient he must be, because he's still working on me. Listen, when God is moving in your life and you deny yourself, it will make you uncomfortable. I thought about our life, honey. I wrote these things down. We've been in 40-some different states. We've been in Dallas one day. It was 115. Drove two days and went to Buffalo, Wyoming. It was 38 with snow on the ground. Listen, when you go from 115 to 38 with snow on the ground, that is uncomfortable. We've seen it snow in June in Utah. Driving down the road, June, the middle of June, in the summertime, and it's snowing on us. I said, that's weird, y'all. That's just weird. I wrote this down. I said, we've broken down more times than I'd like to think about. We've been hurt in ministry, Brother Brian. But can I tell you tonight, there is no greater place to be than in the will of God. Deny ourselves. taking up our cross. And then I wrote this down. I wouldn't trade it for the world. So number one, when somebody touches our thermostat, it makes us uncomfortable. But number two, when somebody touches our thermostat, it comes with a cost. Amen. Listen, every time my kids, if they touch the thermostat, all I hear is cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching. That's all I hear. You know, Jesus said, and you know it's right because she's laughing. She knows it's right. He said there, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross. You know, that always pictures a cost. When you take up a cross, it means taking up a burden, taking up a calling, taking up what God wants you to do. It always comes with a cost. Always. A price paid. You know, it cost Jesus dearly for his cross, but it benefited us greatly. Think about that. God may wanna turn your thermostat up, or turn it down today. What are you gonna do? Are you gonna say, God, it's mine, it's mine, it's my thermostat. It's my thermostat, it's not yours. Or are you gonna say, God, everything I have is yours, and I want you to have it. You know sometimes we have light bulb moments and it's not been too long ago I had a light bulb moment and everything I have brother Brian is because of God. The marriage that I have, listen to me young people, listen to me, the marriage that I have is because of God. Is it a perfect marriage? No, because she's perfect and I'm not. Do we argue sometimes? Yes, until I get smart enough to say, yes, dear. Learn that, guys. Learn it. Yes, dear. Two words. Sounds simple, but it's not. Do we have a perfect marriage? No, we don't. Do we have perfect kids? Absolutely not. But everything that I have is from God. My wonderful wife and our wonderful kids. The ministry that God has put us in. Our van that just on the way up here, get this, on the way up here today, clicked 250,000 miles. Yeah! And it's still running. That's what I'm, I'm excited about that, guys. That's what I'm excited about. Listen, the house that we live in, little bitty house built in 1940. Listen, God gave us that house. When COVID hit, we had four months of meetings canceled, just gone, gone. I thought, Lord, what are we going to do? Like I'm telling him, what are we going to do? He knows what we're going to do. I thought, what am I going to do, Lord? How in the world am I going to pay bills? How in the world is my family going to make it? How in the world are we even going to live through this thing? And the Lord spoke to my heart. He said, that's not your responsibility. Your responsibility, Jesse, is to be faithful to me. That I, myself, take up my cross. And guess what? Through those four months, God took care of us. Because God is always faithful. Always faithful. I even thought about this, the grass that grows in my yard is a gift from God. And I hate to mow, guys. I'm just telling you, I hate to mow. But the grass that's growing in my yard is a gift from God. See, when we view everything as His and nothing as ours, then it makes it real easy to go up here on the wall and rip it off. I'm not going to, brother. Rip it off and say, God, It's yours. Everything I have is yours. So you do with it what you want. So when somebody touches our thermostat, it makes us uncomfortable. When somebody touches our thermostat, it comes with a cost. But lastly, when somebody touches our thermostat, it affects our communion. See, he said there, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. Those three things, take up his cross, deny himself, take up his cross, and then follow him. You know there's sweet communion when we follow God. Sweet communion. Now some of you younger folks will not have any idea what I'm talking about when I say this, but I lived in a time when there was, get it, get ready, no air conditioning. I know what you're saying, how can he look so young and be so old? I know, I know what you're thinking. But listen, you know how we judge time with like A.D., B.C., A.D. That's how, you know, in the year of our Lord, A.D. That's how we judge time. Listen, I'm a B.A.C. kid. I'm a before air conditioning kid. That's when I grew up. And I remember we had an attic fan. Does anybody remember attic fans? Hallelujah. We need to bring them things back. Listen, it was a big hole in the wall, a big vent in the ceiling. You open all of the windows, turned it on, it sucked every, every bug and every piece of dirt from miles around through your house. But it was the best feeling in the world when that air come through that house. But I remember the day. that my mom and dad bought the first window unit air conditioner. My mom worked second shift. My dad would come home, we'd come home in the afternoon, and we'd shut every door to the living room. It's set just above the TV. Hallelujah. We'd shut every door to the living room. We'd crank that baby up as high as it would go, and we'd get under covers and just shiver. It was the greatest thing ever! Ever! Understand this, this is what I've been told, that before air conditioning, before air conditioning happened, Brother Brian, neighbors used to go to their neighbor's house, sit on the porch and commune with one another. Does anybody remember that? Yeah. People would actually go to their neighbor's house, sit on the front porch because it was hot anyway, you might as well go commune with your neighbors. But then air conditioning came, guess what happened? People started closing the doors, closing the windows, staying inside because it was nice and cool under that blanket. Guess what it did? It affected their communion. Understand this, when we don't deny ourselves and when we don't take up our cross and follow Jesus Christ, it affects our communion. I would love to sit here or stand here and tell you tonight That if you follow God all your days, listen, your life's gonna be perfect. Everything's gonna go your way. Listen, you're gonna have millions in the bank, the biggest house, the nicest car. You're gonna have the best marriage. You're gonna have perfect kids that never make any mistakes. Hallelujah. I'd love to tell you that. But it's not true. But can I tell you what you will have? You'll have something that most people in this world are dying for. They're dying for peace and joy and contentment. And listen, they're trying to find it in everything else. But we've got the answer. I'd rather have Jesus than silver or gold. I'd rather be his than have riches untold. I'd rather have Jesus than worldwide fame. I'd rather be true to his holy name. That's what I'm talking about tonight, guys. Listen, I don't care if you're eight or if you're 108. Listen, I want you fully surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ this year. I want you to deny yourself and start thinking about other people. I want you to take up your cross, whatever burden that may be, whatever calling that may be, and say, God, I don't know how I'm going to do it, but with your help, I'm going to. And then you follow him all of your days. God, it's your thermostat. Will it make you uncomfortable? You better leave it. Will it come with a cost? Absolutely. I had no idea what the cost would be when we started on this journey, honey. And the cost has been great. There's been a lot of dark days in my life and my family's life. But I want to follow with everything I am. Honey, I want you to come to the piano tonight. Let me read this last verse as my wife comes, verse number 26. It says, for what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? For what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? There's a lot of people in this world tonight. They are giving up everything. They're giving up their joy and their peace and their contentment for the things of this world. When if they would just come to an altar and say, Jesus, I want you as my Savior, forgive me of my sins, they would have the greatest life in all the world. But I'm afraid, and I know this because I've been there. There's a lot of Christians sitting in churches on Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. They're saved and they're on their way to heaven, but they're not fully surrendered. They've not ripped the thermostat off the wall and given it to God yet. But I promise you this, if you want the greatest year of your life spiritually, you do what Jesus said in those verses. And 2023 might have a lot of heartaches and a lot of problems, but it'll be one of the best years of your life. Let's all stand tonight. Every head bowed, every eye closed, you said, Jesse, I know I'm on my way to heaven. I know I am. But I've not fully surrendered. I've not ripped the thermostat off the wall and give it to God. Nobody looking around tonight. Would you just be honest with yourself and honest with God and raise your hand. Let me pray for you. Now, nobody's looking around, but can I tell you something tonight? There's a lot of hands being raised. You can put your hands down. Thank you for that. A lot of hands. Tonight, if you raise your hand, or maybe you didn't raise your hand, but you know you're not fully surrendered, I would beg you tonight to come to this altar and say, God, I give it to you. Do with it what you will. One more question. Say, Jesse, if I died tonight, I don't know that heaven would be my home. I don't know that I'm saved. Would you raise your hand tonight? Nobody looking around. Let me pray for you. Anybody like that tonight? As my wife prays, some are already coming to the altar. If you need this altar, why don't you come tonight? Give it all to Him. Give it everything you've got. Give it to him, young person, give it to him tonight. Say, God, I don't know who you want me to marry, but Lord, whoever it is, you bring that young man or that young woman into my life. You say, God, I'm scared of being uncomfortable. Remember what I said, it's the most uncomfortable, comfortable place you'll ever find yourself. Maybe you say, God, it's going to cost me too much. I've got a good job. I've got, I've got stability in where I work at in my career. But Lord, I know you want more from me. I promise you this, you might not be as rich monetarily, all but spiritually. And in the things that God can give you, you'll be much richer than you could have ever imagined. I'm encouraged tonight to see these young people around this altar. Young person, give it all to him right now. Say, Lord, here's my spiritual thermostat. And God, whatever uncomfortable places you may put me in, God, I'm gonna trust you through that. God, no matter what it costs me, Lord, I'm willing to pay the cost, because God, I just want sweet communion with you. If you've ever walked with him, you've ever communed with him, you know what I'm talking about. Surrender all tonight. If you need somebody to pray with you, you get in my attention, or Brian's attention, somebody, listen, we'll be glad to pray with you tonight. Take your time at the altar tonight. I remember a time several years ago, we had surrendered it all, living in a little house, a two-bedroom, one-bath house. We didn't have any money. We didn't have hardly any food in the cabinets. But can I tell you what we had? We had love in our house. We had peace in our hearts. And I'm not trying to sound like the best Christian in the world, because I've done my share of complaining. Oh, but I've seen that the things of this world never satisfy me. But Jesus always, always sat for us. Memories are flooding my mind as I'm standing right here about things that God's done in our life. Times I didn't know how we were gonna pay bills. God just send somebody by the house, knock on the door, hand us money. They didn't know. Get a check in the mail at just the right time. Listen, they didn't know. God knew. I want to be fully surrendered this year to the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever he wants, that's what I want. Whatever God wants for your life, That's what I want for you. Amen. Thank you so much for being here. Brother Brian, thank you for having us, brother. Just a sweet, sweet, sweet ending to the day.