You're Not Beyond Repair No Matter What You've Done

for some reason have been in a situation like that before. And my message specifically, I would like us to take the message to Matthew 8. I just want to check if this thing is with this electricity. It's not standing correctly. Let me see. So my message entitled, You feel too messed up to be loved. You feel too messed up to be loved. So that is what the message is entitled today. It's still part of the of the Jesus blueprint series. And as you know, Jesus has left us with a lot of blueprint and this lots of blueprint that he left us with is the reason why this message is there today. But I want to start with who the message is for. Is that person that feels they have messed up too much that God will take care of them anymore? Is the same person they have done something, but they have not told anybody what they did. They feel guilty for what they did. This message is for the person that even carry shame for what they did in the past through their bodies. The same person for what they did when they walk in the room. They knew if somebody can know the real who they are. In that room that they went into. They would feel judged by that people. This message is for specifically that somebody. The message is for the person that once made such a big mistake that even if they think of it, when somebody one day will find out. They will chase them if I can say it that way. This message is specifically for a person that somebody have labeled them. If you can say labeled. You you call them divorcee. You call them abuser for that person who has been called an addict. They addicted to something, whether it is pornography, whether it is drugs addiction for this specific person. This is who this message is for. The message is specifically for that person who has been in prison for something that they did do. But are too afraid people must know if they can only know why I was in jail. I know they will not want to be next to me. This is the person I'm talking about. So if you don't fall under any of these categories, you might be having a different way of where you feel that somebody will judge you to come to Jesus. Maybe you've been, I know I've been a drunkard, but still I've thought as much. Just have to keep on pressing even after three minutes or so, because I don't know why it does that. So the reason I'm saying this message is for that person is because of you feel too messed up to be loved. You feel too messed up to be loved. This is who this message is for. You know, sometimes when people want to come to the Lord, the first thing they have to sort themselves out first to clean themselves up before they can come to the Lord. Somebody who says, no, I just have to leave the cigarette before I can get to the Lord, before I can give my heart to the Lord, I first need to clean my failed heart. Is it not? Oh, yeah. I first have to clean my heart for me to go to God. Do you know that God doesn't judge you on how you appear to judge yourself? A lot of times our lives has catch up with us that you know I've been caught. You know I've been caught. So now what will happen? Because you know that you've been caught, now you don't want to go back to the people that actually caught you for the lies that you have been keeping. The world literally taught us that dirty people must stay out of church. The drunkards must not come to church. The conniving, the stealing and the, I don't know, how do you call those? You want us to shift it a little bit back to you so that you don't have to sit like that. Suwanai. That's it. Hopefully. Can you see? Okay. Do you know, Adam, the moment he fell, the first thing he did was hide. He went into hiding. Now my question to you is, why is human reaction the first thing to do when you make a mistake is to go into hiding? It's not your fault. It's Adam's fault. It's a generational thing that comes from Adam. And here you think, Hi Mara, I went into hiding, I ran away. No, it's not your fault. It's the fault of Adam that makes you to run away when things become tough. God is not a God that has been hidden or a God that ran away from you. God is an omnipresent God. He will always be there. Regardless whether you think you run away from him or not, he will still be there. He says even in the depths of the earth, he's there. Even if you go far or wide, he's there. Now, my question to you is, is everywhere. How do you think you can hide? Because you cannot hide. Matthew 8. I want us to read Matthew 8 and I read verse 1. I want you to look at this, look at this scripture. Down from the mountain Greek multitudes followed him, and behold, there came a leper and worshiped him, saying, Lord is thy word. Thou canst make me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him. Did you hear what he said? And touch him, saying, I will be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said unto him, See thou, tell no man, but go thy way, show thyself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded for testimony unto them. There's two things happening here now. And I want you to see, if you read the scripture, this was not a healing story. Can I tell you why I'm saying this was not a healing story? Yes, Jesus did heal this guy. Nice one. Did you hear he says, be thou clean was clean. Nice one. That's a lecher one, that one. But my question to you is, if you take all the healings that Jesus did, did Jesus even went as far put his hands on all of them? He did not. He did not. Huh? He did not. Jesus did not put his hands on this specific leper. Let me ask you something. If you go to the history, leprosy was of such thing that whenever somebody was a leper, they were chased out of the whole village. He was chased out of the village. My question to you is, why were they chased out of the village? Because nobody could touch them. The moment somebody touched them, they get uncleaned. That is why lepers were chased out of the country or out of the village or out of the place where they were. The reason being is that the moment you come in contact with them, you get uncleaned. Now, why wouldn't Jesus just went and say, you be clean. Why did he go and lay his hands on them? On this guy specifically. The love and healing of the Lord was because the man had not felt human hands in years. So meaning when you get leprosy, you don't feel the contact of others. You cast out. When you become an addict, when you become where they accuse you, you didn't feel like you. You remember there was a time when people were saying to this prostitute, the prostitute must be stoned. And you know what Jesus did? Jesus wrote there on the ground. Jesus was writing there. And the question he said, if thou have any sin, cast a stone. And nobody cast a stone. They left the woman. Imagine if your accusers stand before you and taking Jesus as your judge, what would you say would be the judgment that would come to you? I doubt it will be a bad judgment, even if you feel like you've been bad. The prisoner who went in for rape. The moment somebody is leave the small child next to him. They think this one going to rape him again. But the guy changed his ways. But just because of he went into jail for rape, you can't be letting your kids stay around him. Do you understand? Nobody wants to be next to a prisoner who went in jail for a certain thing. And you think, no, I was telling you, this is not just a healing story. It's a God-come-close story. It's where God comes so close to you that he touch you. The Greek word here for touch is haptou or hapsatou. To fasten onto or to take firm hold of. So not just a brush of a touch, just not just a something like this touch. No, it's to get hold of. That's how Jesus touched the man, the leper. So under the law, when a clean person touch an unclean one, the clean becomes unclean. This is according to Leviticus. If you read Leviticus 13 and you read Leviticus 13, let's read from 8. If you read Leviticus 13 from 8, he says, And if the priest sees that behold the scab spread in the skin, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean. It is a leprosy. When the plague of leprosy is in a man, then he shall be brought unto the priest, and the priest shall see him. And behold, if the rising be white in the skin, and have turned the fair white, and there be a quick raw flesh in rising, it is an old leprosy in the skin of the flesh. And the priest shall pronounce him unclean, and shall not shut him up, for he is unclean. The uncleanseness, the uncleansiness, let me rather say it that way, did not move Jesus. Did not move Jesus at all. Picture that! Although people saw it, at least electricity came on him. So the Bible or the Gospel, let me rather say it this way, the Gospel is one touch, and he did not catch the dirt or the unclean from that leper. So there's a two-way action here. God moved, so he came down from the mountain and touched him, who is the leper, before he was clean. He could have just said, like he said to this guy, what is his friend's name again? The guy who died, Lazarus. He said to Lazarus, come out! He didn't went in to go and touch Lazarus. He said, come out! And Lazarus came out. When the guy with the unclean spirit, you see the one that were saying, Jesus, you come to punish us. He did not even come close, he just spoke to them, and the guys ran to cast us into the waters. It was not a touch. So all the time, why it was not a touch? But suddenly here, where you're on your dirtiest, God touched you. You felt like you have made the biggest mistake. This is where God's touch is even stronger. It's even holding on the longer. So please understand us. God moved. And therefore, when he moved, you need to stop hiding. Because the moment you hide the real thing that is within you, it might be a problem. Can you hear what this guy says? And behold, there came a leper and worshiped him, saying, Lord of thy world, thou can make me clean. Listen to this one. Somebody who is not allowed to be in the crowd. Somebody who is an outcast. He's not allowed to be in the crowd. An outcast, run to Jesus. So whatever your dirt is, run to Jesus. It is time for you to run. Because if you can hear, he says, great multitudes followed him. So there was a great multitude of people that could have stopped him from getting to Jesus because of his leprosy. But he was pushing through the crowd to get to Jesus or just to speak to Jesus. And Jesus didn't move away from him because of the leprosy. He moved towards him. You have been having a lot of leprosy issues in your life where you felt like God was the drug addict. I was that person who was the one that hit the woman. I was that woman abuser. I was the one that when I get into a room, people were running away from me because they're too scared that I will kill them because I am that men's eater. I just say cannibalist. So because you are a cannibalist, you feel like people will run away from you because of that. But yet God touched you today. He will make sure to touch you today. He will make sure to touch you today. He will make sure to touch you today because by his touch, you will be made whole and you will be made clean and you will be made a different person than who you were before his touch. So today his end is here to touch you. I don't want you to think that this is a situation where when you feel like I've been too dirty, this was the touch that the law said don't touch. The move was the touch before the kill. Before the kill. He touched before he killed you. Sometimes he spoke before the kill, but before the kill, but today he touched before the kill. This is not a healing story. This is a touch from God. This is a touch from God. Do you know when you go to Leviticus 13.45, let's read that. Leviticus 13.45. Leviticus 13.45 and 46. Do you know what happened? Let me read. But if the skull spread much in the skin after his cleansing, then the priest shall look on him and behold if the skull be spread in the skin, the priest shall not seek for yellow hair. He is unclean. He is unclean. So everyone else moved back from this man. Jesus moved towards this man. Jesus moved towards this man. Can I tell you something? The people from church, they have the biggest mistakes that they ever made. They run away from the drunkards. They don't want to be seen in taverns. The church people, they don't want to be seen where the real people that is in need of Jesus is. They judge them. They make them feel like lepers. I don't want to lie to you. Ma, have you ever come to a place where you where you think that according to what the Bible said, the Bible said we must not be having you can almost call we must not be having the same yoke. Bishop, am I correct? Equally yoke. Equally yoke, no. We must not be equally yoked to the one that is not in Christ. That's what the Bible says. I said no. I didn't say it. But how come Jesus, who is the one that is supposed to judge or put judgment on them, were the one that moved towards them. The one that saw leprosy, knowing that the leprosy will be able to give problems, he moved towards them. And here we start judging. Hey, you are a sinner. I both. No, I don't want to be a part of you. My question to you is, if your light would have just shined once for somebody to see, not to read the Bible, but to see the Bible in you, picture that. How many people would have been touched by you? But because you don't want to be yoke equally with them, you run away from them. They can't see the Bible. Am I saying it wrongly? It sounds like I'm judging now. I'm not judging. I'm just saying. This is the part. Bishop, you know, there was there was in 2000. I'm trying to think the time now. Let's call it 2003, 2005, somewhere around then. I was in a church that was having a small hole that they were in like this. The hole was so small, and we were many people in that hole. Then we had to move from that wall to a bigger wall in a schoolyard. And then what happened one day? There was a guy who was a family of Apostle Rene. Apostle Rene and Pastor Kirk at that time came to the funeral or not came to the funeral, came to Pastor Reggie and asked if Pastor Reggie can please help them to do the burial for this person. And because the person didn't go to any church at that time, all the churches refused to bury this guy. Do you see the judgment there, Bishop? Now because of that, now there's a person that is now having an issue who will bury this guy. Then Pastor Reggie says, says, no, bring the leper to me. And he buried the guy with dignity. This is not the end of the story. This is not the end of the story. Somebody didn't go to church, somebody buried them. The story goes on. Do you know what happened? This Apostle Rene who was at that time a great or big property guy, he arranged that the church can get a field and he buried the church. The same guy that was rejected because everybody didn't want to go and bury this family member of him. He now helped them to bury the church because Pastor Reggie took the leprosy on at that time. He touched the leprosy at that time. And I can tell you now, if you go to Rivelli in Nasrack Road next to the Sasul Garage in Nasrack Road, you will find, let's call it, a three to four kilometers away from the F&B Stadium. There's a church standing, a building there standing now who used to be people who were in a classroom because the pastor who was Pastor Reggie at that time took the responsibility to take this leper and actually this person who didn't go to church that nobody wanted to bury, and here he buried them and they built a church. This is the thing that you should understand. This is the thing that you should understand. Somebody feels bad as a leper and you make it even worse for them. Let me give you a story now. I was in grade... I should think about it now. Achman, standard fifth, grade seven. Yeah, so I was in standard fifth. Then what happened is we were writing exams and funny enough today I'm standing on the same kind of place where we were standing. It's a board like this. You do your drawing on a board like this and we were standing in the exam for woodwork exams and I was doing the thing there. I told the teacher, you need to go to the toilet as soon as possible. I am pressed and I had a problem with bedwetting. And when I say bedwetting, standard fifth is that let's call it 13 years old, 12, 13 years old, I was bedwetting. Here I'm standing in front of my whole class asking to go to the toilet. And this brat doesn't want me to go to the toilet. And the unfortunate part is, Bishop, I am stubborn. Now you don't want me to go to the toilet. Let me show you. I stood there. I slapped him in my pants, down in my shoes. The pee went very hot. I'm standing like this. I'm not even ashamed at that moment the way anger or rage was over me because this guy doesn't want to allow me to go to the toilet. When he came and said to me, come, let's go to the toilet, I said, Bishop, I'm not going to use the words, but I swear, I thought it, I might as well say it. I said fuck off. I started writing finish. The moment he said come, I said no, I'm not going. He said, but you are disturbing the class. I said, I'm not going. Let me finish my exam. You said I must finish my exam. I felt so bad afterwards. The rage at that moment made me not to think. But do you know kids are cruel? Kids are cruel. Bishop, they were mocking me for the whole standard five. A, be queer. B, be big. That's how they called me. I didn't care, but I felt unclean for a whole time. You feel like you get treated less because of your mistakes that you made. Leprosy is the problem. And do you know what Jesus did? When he healed him, he sent him back to the priest so that the priest can confirm he has been clean. Jesus did not just clean him. He left him alone outside the camp. He sent him to the priest so that he could be declared clean. The healing was the body, but the restoration was the belonging. God does both. So meaning to say that when he cleansed him, he also took him as one of his children. This is what God wants you to be. He wants to clean you and claim you. So even if you feel how dirty you feel as well, it does not matter. He is here to come and clean you. This is not a healing story. It's a story of acceptance. To accept you. You have been keeping your distances from God a long time. You've been keeping your distance from God for a long time. But I want you to take this moment today and say even if I was at my dirtiest, I felt like people were judging me as a leper. But today I come to you Lord and accept that I'm dirty. I'm coming to you to clean me. For far too long I've been written off. I don't know my father. I don't know my mother. I've been written off. I've been chased out of my house. For far too long I've tried to just have some sort of a relationship with my father. But my father went to go and buy soap. Not like that. You know how it is to grow up with a stepfather and everything you do, you feel like you make a mistake all the time. Yet it's hard man. They keep on picking on you as if you are the one that is at fault. It's not your fault. It's just that the fact of the matter is you felt that way because it's like almost as if you don't belong there. You feel like leprosy belong outside. You know when my stepdad, when he comes inside the house, it's like this. He comes in, I go out. Because we couldn't stay in one room for too long without having a fight. I felt like a leper in my own house. There's something that you should understand. You don't feel like you belong. This is the person I'm talking about today. God is here to touch you, not just to say a word to you, but to hold you, to squeeze you, to make you feel like wow, you belong there. This is the person I'm talking about today. This is the person I'm saying to you that stop hiding. Stop pushing away. Reach out. I just want you to do for this week only. Just only this week. Reach out to God with the real thing. Don't tell him you are sick. Tell him you have leprosy. Be straight. Tell him, you know what, I have a problem. When I look at people, I feel like I just want to hit them. Tell the real story. Don't come hide. You have this anger. Reach out to Jesus. And as you reach out, don't wait to be keen. Just reach out. Don't wait to feel better. Just reach out. You will never feel better if you're not allowing God to enter into you. There was a time where I thought that my dad didn't love me. You know, voila. The moment when I... Do you know when you were young, a lot of things happened in this head. In between these years, you think a lot of things at the same time. And the unfortunate part is rejection is the worst thing that kids can go through. I was about, I think, three years of age. And I literally thought my mom's sister's... What do you mean? My mom's sister's wife. Husband. My mom's sister's husband. What do you mean? Your uncle. I thought my uncle was my father. Because the guy treated me like his own. When he hugged me, it was 70-something odd when he died. Bishop, when we come and meet him, we don't greet like men touching hands like this. Nah. It's kiss like I kiss a woman. On the lips, not by the cheeks. Man to man, kiss. The way the guy made me feel like his own, I thought he was my father. As I realized he's not my father, the leprosy turned into me. It was hitting so deep that I felt the pain. As I'm speaking to you today, when he died, I can tell you I wasn't by his funeral. Do you know how painful that is? But yet I know I've been forgiven. Because when Christ came into my life, a lot of things made more sense to me then than what it used to be before. Bishop. We are over time. One last point. Reach out to a person that you felt distanced from. It's my dad's birthday on the 29th of June. I've been feeling so much hurt for the things he did to me in the past. But every year when it's his birthday, I make sure to make him feel special. I make sure to make him feel special. Reach out to that person. Reach out to somebody that nobody wants to touch. Do you know the guy on the street? When they smell like that, nobody wants to even touch their hand. Nobody wants to even hug them. And all they need is somebody to hug them. If you can, do that to one person. And see the difference you will make in their lives. Just one visit. Just one touch on the shoulder. That's it. You don't need to do a lot. Just one touch on the shoulder. Move towards them. Don't move away from them. Next week is Father's Day. And I'm coming for two people next week. The one who's still waiting for a father to turn around and run towards them. And the one who is a father right now, doing the exact same thing his own father did to him. And he does not even know it. Your kids don't want your money or your wallet. They want something else. Next week, I'm going to show you the father who ran the whole distance so you would never be left behind again. You do not want to miss this one. You literally don't want to miss this one. Heavenly Father, I come to you in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. I want to take this opportunity today, Father God, and ask for forgiveness where we felt too far away from you, that we couldn't reach out to you so that you can clean us from the inside out. I want to take this opportunity today as well, Father God, and ask you, Lord Jesus, if there's anyone today that has never felt your touch today, Father God, touch them with such a great touch that by the grace of your life that is in their lives, they will feel it today, Father God. I pray in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, anybody who felt too far away from you because they've made so many big mistakes, I pray in the mighty name of Jesus, let them come closer to you. Let them come closer to you. Let them feel your touch today, Father God, not just a word from you, but a touch from you. In Jesus' mighty name we pray, amen and amen. Amen. Gratiate the benediction. Now, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the sweet fellowship of the Holy Spirit, rest and abide with us all until Jesus comes. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives, and we shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever and ever, in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.