Welcome to the River Mountain Church Preaching Library. It is our prayer and indeed our hope that this message might inspire your life. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the preaching of God's Word. While I'm calling this message, a river runs through it. How many people saw that movie? Anybody remember that movie? Robert Redford did the narration and direction. But biblically speaking, there is a river that runs all the way from the beginning of the Bible. In the book of Genesis, we're told that there was a river. Ezekiel sees the river flowing to the temple, then out of the temple. And in the book of Revelation, the very last chapter, we're told that there's a river flowing there too. So there is this amazing river from Genesis, Ezekiel, and the book of Revelation, and it is flowing from beginning to end. And so as we look at the first mention of the river, it is right in the very beginning, Genesis 2.10. It says, a river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided into four rivers. Now, what's amazing about this is we don't know everything about these four rivers. We do know about... many people talk about the Jordan as being the ending point. But many have tried to find the location of the Garden of Eden. by trying to track these four rivers, but it's almost impossible. But what's important to know is God establishes rivers, and he does this for a purpose. Rivers are always a symbol of life. And so we see, as we move on to Ezekiel, Ezekiel is brought to the door of the temple and behold he sees water issuing from below the threshold of the temple and it's heading toward the east. This is very significant that the water that is coming from the temple that Ezekiel sees is going toward the east. Now most people don't even pay any attention to the fact that the water is heading to the east, but This word, eastern, actually has another connection. It says, the eastern region, and this word is almost mistranslated. Nobody quite translates it properly because the Greek word for region is a word that means Galilee. So what this is saying is that the temple is going to overflow with water and it's going to go to the region of Galilee. How many people know what came out of Galilee? Jesus came out of Galilee. That's why Jesus came out of Galilee. He was fulfilling the river beginning to flow through him. The same river that was in Genesis 1, out of Eden, is now what Ezekiel sees and it's gonna flow all the way through, listen. This river that Ezekiel saw flowing out of Galilee, here's what he says. Wherever the river goes, every living creature that swarms will live. How many people know Jesus brought life? Everything lived. Then he says, there will be very many fish, for this water goes there and the water of the sea becomes fresh. Couple amazing things about the scriptures. Remember what Jesus said when he went to Galilee and took up some disciples, what did he tell them? He says, come follow me, I will do what? I'll make you fishers. This is sort of the fulfillment of Ezekiel. There's life coming out of Galilee and they're gonna gather fish. That's what they're gonna do. Remember these words. This is Ezekiel 47 10. Fishermen will stand beside the sea, a place for the spreading of nets. Remember Jesus said, you'll throw your nets out and you'll gather many fish. It's fish will be of very many kinds. What does that mean? Very many kinds. Fish are going to be very different from any... He's talking about different kinds of fish in different kinds of places. How many people know that... Let me show this to you because, again, this is a very powerful prophetic fulfillment of Scripture. Here's what it goes on to say. This is Ezekiel. He says, this water flows toward the eastern region, that is to say, Galilee, and then it goes down to Arabob, and that's really the end of Galilee, and then it enters the sea. But remember, it is flowing toward the east. Amazingly, if we were to take a line from, here's Jerusalem, and we were to make a line here, when the gospel goes, and very many fish are gonna be gathered in, it is going from the east. As a matter of fact, this is showing a little bit of the spread of Buddhism. And now I'm going to show you the spread of... There's Judaism right there. But now we're going to see Jesus crucified. And now watch what happens here with Christianity. Watch where it goes. All purple. See that? It's all east. It goes all the way toward the east. Again, it's a fulfillment. And now we're seeing Islam. Where's Islam going? It's going west and we know the orient, but there is something powerful about this river flowing from Galilee, getting very many fish heading east. Wherever the river goes, every living creature that swarms will live. Remember what Jesus said, now Jesus is the river. His disciples are bringing the river. But now he's gonna take it from Ezekiel's vision of the earthly temple, and here he's gonna say this. He says, whoever believes in me, as the scripture says, out of his heart will flow, what? A river. We are now the new temple. The river is now going to flow out of us. You have a river, as the old hymn writer says, flowing out of you. But I want to talk about something else here, because you not only have a river in you, but you have a tree growing in you. As a matter of fact, you are a tree. Because again, what Ezekiel saw was not only a river. Listen what he saw here. He says, this river. has banks, and on both sides of the river, there grows all kinds of trees for food, and their leaves will not wither, their fruit will not fail. This is speaking of the church, speaking of us, and it says, they will bear fresh fruit every month. Now, how do I know that we are the river and we are also these trees? Because we know because the Bible tells us so, because Jesus, now here's another powerful scripture. Jesus came to fulfill the planting of what he called the righteous trees. We have the righteous river, but we also have these amazing righteous trees. Did I get stuck here? What happened? Oh, there we go. Can you guys see that? Oh, I'm going to go back one and see if this works. What happened here with my screen? All right. Remember Jesus saying these words? In the beginning of his ministry, he goes to a place called Capernaum. And he says, the spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted. We know this scripture. And then he says, after this scripture is read, as he reads it in the temple, he goes and he sits down and he says, today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. But here's the most amazing part. Not only does it read Isaiah 1 and 2, but the following verse is 3. And here's what 3 says. He has appointed me unto those who mourn in Zion. To give unto them three things, he says. I'm going to give them beauty for ashes. I'm going to give them the oil of joy for mourning. I'm going to give them the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. Why? Listen. That they might be called, what? trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified. You have within you the same thing that was in the garden, which is a river, and you are the planting of the Lord, you are the trees of the Lord. As a matter of fact, we see this In Psalm, we totally fulfill this. If we meditate on the Word of God day and night, and we can, but we also have the Spirit within us. Listen, it says, it says, you shall be like trees planted by rivers of water. That's what we are. We are like trees planted by the Holy Spirit, the river of living water flowing through us. And listen, this is our calling, to bring forth fruit in season. and our leaves, that is to say our words, will not wither and whatever we do will prosper. If we are in the river and we are allowing our trees to take deep root, this is our future. We are both the tree of righteousness and we have a river running through it. This is our spiritual life, a tree that bears fruit beside a river. Both of those things were established in Jesus. He sent forth the river, it was gonna flow out of our heart, and then this is the reality that every Christian should be living in. How many people know there's an amazing contrast between something that is beautiful and a pile of ashes? Has anybody ever looked at ashes and said, wow, look at these beautiful ashes? Ashes are about the least beautiful thing you can think about. Dust to dust, ashes to ashes, this is our life. Without God, you live a stupid life, and you die a stupid death. The fool says in his heart there is no God. He lives a stupid life, and then he dies a stupid death. Ashes. God says, no, no, no, no, no. No more ashes. Purity. I will make these trees beautiful. And if you go to this word beauty, the one primary time that it's used in the New Testament in a very powerful way, spiritual beauty, where Peter's talking about women who spend a lot of time trying to look beautiful with their hair and their apparel, and God knows we appreciate it as men that the women are trying to look beautiful for us and for themselves, it's okay. But he says there's a better beauty. He says, if you'll get down to the hidden man of the heart and you will develop a quiet and meek spirit, that will be beauty. Meekness and quietness is beautiful to God. And we'll talk a little bit about that because God loves it when we live out our faith rather than talk about our faith. I'll say it again, he loves it when we live out our faith more so than when we talk about it. Because it says of this woman who lives out being subjective to her husband, it says this, that without the word, the person is won by the lifestyle or the conversation of the wife. The conversation here means her lifestyle. Beauty is when we're meek and quiet and we're living out God's word. That is the reality. We're not about talking. We're about living the beauty. But he also gave us the oil of joy for mourning. The contrast is here that a person who is mourning is far from joy. And God says, no, no, no, no, no. I am going to give you extreme joy. How do we get extreme joy? First of all, Jesus said, don't get too excited even about spiritual power. Get excited about the fact that your names are written down in the Lamb's Book of Life. Whether you know it or fully understand it, you are going to live for all of eternity in bliss. If you are a believer. And that is worth celebrating. I don't care how bad your life gets. I don't care how many tragedies you have. At the end of your life, you will live eternally in bliss. See, the only thing God says is that there is joy in salvation. There is joy in being saved. There's joy in understanding your name is written down. When life gets bad, understand that life is temporal. Your eternity is blissful. Spiritual joy comes from salvation and understanding. I'm not a professional golfer, but if I was, I could hit a drive like this, 300 yards straight down the fairway. How many people know we are far from perfect? In perfection, we see a certain amount of frustration, because let's just say you hit that drive 300 yards down a fairway, and you, and by the way, that was Phil Mickelson's drive, he gets up, he's got a beautiful drive, over 300 yards, he takes his club, he hits the ball, and he lands just short of the green, and everybody says, man, he blew that. The commentators, oh, he could have been a lot closer. He's got to be disappointed with that shot. He's not on the green, and he was only 100 yards out. You see, this joy, this abundance comes from a contrast. You see, most of us live our Christian life like a golf game that looks like this. This is my golf game, military golf. I'm either going left, right, left, right, left, right. Okay. I'm in the woods most of the time. Jay, you'll back me up on that, right? Thank you. Yeah. I'm with you. Okay. So, this is the life we live. These are horrible golf shots. We live, in a way, we live inconsistent lives. Golf is a great example of the inconsistency. This is where we usually end up. Now, I'm gonna show you what salvation is, okay? This is our lives. You know, we are in a mess. We deserve nothing good coming out of this. Look at all these trees. I got trees hanging everywhere, right? And I cry out to God, and God comes, and I'm gonna put this in the term of a golf shot, and I'm like, God, please, just save me. And something comes upon me. I take my club. I close my eyes. I swing and say, go God be with me. And the ball goes right through the opening. And then it goes out and it bounces right before the green, the same spot. But you understand what I'm saying to you here. In a sense, the glory And by the way, if I ever made a shot like that, if I was 190 yards away from the green, and I was in that kind of position, and somehow supernaturally I hit the ball through the trees and it landed next to me, it would be the greatest shot I've ever made. And God is saying that to us. He says, you are really miserable failures, really. And let me put it to you in a biblical context, because you've got to see it in a biblical context, because this is how it is. On our best effort, in our best effort in life, this is what the Bible says. The best day of your life, you are wearing a spirit of heaviness. This is the continuality. It says, but we are all unclean things. And all of our righteousness, not the evil things we do, but when we're trying to be good, when we're trying to hit the perfect shot, when we're trying, it's as filthy rags. Our best is as filthy rags. And God says, I'm gonna take and come to you, and I'm gonna give you a garment of salvation. I'm gonna put on you a robe that is pure and white. In other words, you've made a mess of everything, but I'm gonna take that mess, and I am going to bring you to a place of glory. And not only that, but even when you do fail, I'm not gonna condemn you. because you were in Christ Jesus. The mission of God was to put an inner river in us. Oh, look at that. That's why I like these two photos, right? That's what it looks like. He put a superman in you. He did. The spiritual man that he put in you, the new creation that is in Christ, the spiritual river is a superman. It is the inner man of your heart. It is quite different. That's why the beauty is found in meekness and in a sense of quietness. Remember Clark Kent? He was Superman. But how was he described? He was mild-mannered. He was a mild-mannered person. Where did he come from? Smallsville. I don't think that was an accident that the originator looked at this as a divine figure. We come from small places. This is Smallsville. You probably walked in and go, yeah, this is Smallsville right here. I'm in Smallsville. We're meek and we're mild. We can be because... We have a river in us. There is power in us. Jesus says, whoever believes in me, as the scriptures say, out of his heart will flow, not may flow, not could flow, not should flow, it will flow. It'll be a river of living water. He spoke this of the spirit. Most believers do not let loose this river. They do not bathe in it. They do not understand it. Let me try to clarify it. According to Genesis and according to Revelation, this river that flows through your heart comes from the throne of God. I said this river that is flowing through your heart is coming from the throne room of God. It's a passageway of life, and it's also a passageway, how do we transport goods? How does the kingdom of heaven come to earth? It comes on rivers, and if you will allow it, the river will flow from the throne of God through your heart. In a reality, we are playing a game of thrones. And guess what throne is the highest throne? Guess what throne is connected to my heart? Guess who wins the game? The power of God, the river of God is flowing from the very throne room of heaven and it's flowing through your heart. Jesus said, my spirit will ride on this. My spirit is this. But I wanna show you exactly when Jesus shared these words because it is very significant. Jesus never said anything out of time or out of place. When he says these words, most of us don't even understand why he said them or when he said them, but here's the context. It says, on the last day of the great feast, that's when Jesus says these words, the last day of the great feast, Jesus stood up and he cried out and he said this, if any man is thirsty, let him come. They understood it better than we did because they understood what the feast was about. The feast, the seven day feast was about celebrating this. How many people know what this is? This is when the glory of God dwelt with the children of Israel in the desert. That's the fire of the glory. And what are they all doing? They're all in tents. They have tents. and they're all camped out around the presence of God. That's what they were celebrating. And they all were in these little huts, little tents. Everybody had a tent. So when they came to Israel to celebrate the great feast in Jesus' day, everybody had one of these. Now, these are more contemporary, but everybody was dwelling at the temple, outside the temple, in these little tents. They were covered with palm branches. The idea was we're going to recreate camping out around the presence of God in the temple. It's a beautiful feast. As a matter of fact, they still celebrate it today. There's a table set. There's a covering. You go inside. It's the feast of tabernacle. You're tabernacling with God. He's in the main tabernacle. You're in a smaller tabernacle. But his presence will come here. Here's another modern setting. You put leaves because you were a tree. You were a tree. So you had to have leaves and branches because you were a tree. And the water was going to come to the trees. The water was going to come to the trees. The water came on the last day of the feast. And here's the way it worked. All the trees were camped out. the Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles. It's a season of joy because the trees are now planted around the presence of God. And now on the last day, water is coming. And so the priest made a big deal about the water, and here it is. I'm gonna show it to you. There's the temple. That's where the priest stood. Everybody's camped out all over Jerusalem. The priest, on the last day of the feast, would then make a procession from the temple all the way down to a pool. The pool of Shalom. And let me go back here to this. He would get to the pool. And there at the pool, he would take this water pitcher. He would fill it with water. It would be great. you know, joy and enthusiasm because he's bringing water to the temple. And as he would come back, everybody would understand what this was symbolic of. As the trees were planted and they had no water, Moses took the staff and he brought forth water out of what? A rock. A rock is gonna burst forth and water is gonna come out of it. And by the way, if you're in the desert, With no water, you're in a bad place. And the fact that a river was birthed out of nothing in the desert, and now they could live. And so as they gathered in the tents, they're gonna recreate the rock. And they're gonna recreate the water. And the priest would hold this pitcher up high, the horns would blow, and everybody would say, show us the water! The trees are thirsty. The trees need water. We need water from the temple. Water, water, water, water, water. And the priest would then turn the picture over and water would flow. And everybody would go, whoa. Water. The trees need water. And now the trees have water from the temple. And it was at the precise time, the last day of the feast, as the priest is pouring the water, Jesus stands up. I am thirsty. Sorry, that was too loud, wasn't it? I forgot. My mic is too loud. Way too loud. Sorry about that. Somebody blew their hearing aid out. It's horrible. Thirsty. Oh, relax. Is anyone thirsty? Don't go to the temple anymore. Come to me. Come to me. I am the new temple. I am the new source. I am the new water. You want this? Jesus cried out. And that's the only reason why he screamed. It said he had to stand up and cry out. Are you thirsty? I'm here. Come. Trees, come. We know that he went on to say, whoever believes in me out of his heart, will flow the river. I'm not only telling you if you come to me, I will give you water immediately. I am telling you that if you come to me, you will always have water. The water will always flow because the spirit will one day be in you. He said this because the spirit was coming. Do you understand what you have in you? The woman at the well, the reason why she had five husbands, the reason why she didn't know where to worship is because she didn't have water. And so Jesus tells her about water. He says, listen, you're always thirsty. You're always looking for satisfaction. Come to me, I will give you water and you will never thirst again. I will give you water without payment. In the book of Revelation, we see it again. I'm the alpha, the omega, I'm the beginning and the end. To the thirsty. Are you thirsty? See, this is the key to getting water. You've got to be thirsty. I know about you, I'm very thirsty. I could use some water right now, actually. My mouth is dry. That's good. When you're thirsty, water. The thirstier you are, the better water tastes. If you're on a hot day, 120 degrees, you've walked five miles, nothing, nothing, nothing is more satisfying than water. Are you thirsty? Because when you are, you'll know how good water is. The problem with the church today is we are self-satisfied. We have given up water for broken cisterns that don't hold water. We are losing our way because we have lost our thirst for God. I want to live a life that's like this. I want to be in the water. I want to be in the water all the time. I want to be like that. Doesn't he look refreshed? You see, the idea is that the water is in us, but the water is also upon us. The life that is full of water is full of the Spirit. So, in closing, steps to fullness. One of the things, if you've never been water baptized as an adult, I would encourage you to be water baptized. Although this is an ordinance of the church, what it's symbolic of is this life of water. It says we are buried with him in baptism. We go down to a water grave, and it's interesting because water is a symbol of dying to ourselves, but when we rise out of the water, we are living a life that is now full of water, full of the life of God. Secondly, daily be filled with the Holy Spirit. I would love to tell you that you get filled with the Spirit once and then you're good to go, but you're not. You have to daily. See, people get drunk with wine because they want a sensation. They want a feeling. They want a sense of, ooh, this feels good. I like this feeling. I feel relaxed. So the writer of Ephesians says, you want that feeling? Don't get drunk with wine. Get filled with the spirit. You'll get the same thing. It'll only be better. And then when you're filled with the Spirit, then you'll wanna go break out in Psalms. You'll wanna sing hymns. You'll wanna make melody to the Lord. Most of us don't want this because we're not filled with the Spirit. If you don't go home and sing spiritual songs, there's probably a reason why. Do you understand this? When you're filled, you begin to minister. When Jesus was baptized in water, He was then filled with the Spirit. The Bible says the Spirit of God descended upon Him And he heard a voice. So there's water, begins the new life, and now the Spirit comes and fills the new life. And now you can be led of God by water. He was filled with the Holy Spirit and returned from the Jordan. And he was led by the Spirit. People say, I'd like to be led by the Spirit. Well, I'm going to tell you, you get filled with water. Finally, I want to close by talking about the mission of this church. Because when we established it, the Lord said a bunch of stuff, and I've shared it ad nauseum. One of the things is that I want you to start a small church. It can't be any bigger than 70. And we're doing good with that, aren't we? I'm going to get to heaven and say, Lord, I was faithful. And people always say, what if we get over 70? Don't worry about it. My preaching will guarantee we won't get over 70. I got no smoke machines up here. Listen, the mission of RMC, besides from being small, is, he says, you're going to be a mission church. That means, you ever notice, you look around our church and you don't see a lot of people. But let me say this, most of the people are involved in ministry. Because we're not about, we come together, but we're all about doing ministry, mission, mission. We're not a bunch of spectators. We don't come on Sunday to hear a message. We come to be filled so we can go out and do our mission. Listen. This is the church. This is the river church. Most people live a life like this. They go to church, but they're not really in the church. They got a chair that's propped up over the water. And so getting back, so the Lord says, I want you to have a small church. I want to keep it very small. And he says, I'm going to give you a vision. I want to show you what people are like in church. And here's your job. And he showed me a bunch of people, and this was the vision, people on chairs floating down a river. And he says, now people think there's another guy. This guy is high and mighty. And so I see these people on chairs floating down a river, and the Lord showed me a waterfall that these guys were heading for. And he says, they don't know it, but there's a waterfall up ahead. And what's going to happen is they're going to get to the waterfall, and they're going to plummet. And I saw down there a lake of fire. They thought they were in the river, but they were on the river and they weren't in it. And the Lord says, here's the mission of your church. I said, all right, this should be fun. He says, I want you to put a line across there and knock them off the chair. So when they come, they're knocked off of their chair of religiosity or being in religion. And where do you end up? In the water. In the water. He says people are riding on the water, they need to be baptized in the water, filled with the water. Do you understand this? And then the Lord says, I have placed a net in the water that is gonna catch all these fish that are falling off their chairs into the water. The net catches them before they go to their destruction. If they don't go in the water, they go over the falls. Do you understand that? How many people know there's a lot of people think they're going to heaven? And they go to church every Sunday. But they're not in the water. They're on the water. There's a difference. Baptism begins by you going what? In the water. Baptismo, immersed, is the word. Covered in water. Filled with water. Do you understand this? Let me put it to you simply. You go down to go up. You must go down into the water to come up out of the water. If you're on the high chair, if you refuse to go down into the water, you're going to go down all the way down. Thanks for listening to this message from River Mountain Church. If you'd like some more information, visit our website, rivermountainchurch.org.