The Blessed Life | Pressed Before You're Blessed
Understanding Why God Presses Our Faith Before Blessing Us
Darrell Ingram
Nov 27, 2022 1hr 2m
In this week's message, we learn why God presses our faith before He blesses us. If we give God our troubles, He will handle us, and we won't return to where we started. Change occurs in the midst of conflict. Video recorded at Pineville, Louisiana.
TranscriptionmessageRegarding Grammar:
This is a transcription of the sermon. People speak differently than they write, and there are common colloquialisms in this transcript that sound good when spoken, and look like bad grammar when written.
This is a transcription of the sermon. People speak differently than they write, and there are common colloquialisms in this transcript that sound good when spoken, and look like bad grammar when written.
Darrell Ingram: [00:00:00] Hey, you know, it just talked about being blessed, about being thankful, about having that gratitude. And, you know, we do it when we're singing. But do we do it apart from singing? So I'm going to ask you to do something right now that is very strange. And I don't know why Darrell's going to do it, but y'all stand up for a second and y'all give God all the praise that He deserves. Hey, man, God is good and God has blessed us. So we need to make sure we keep rejoicing in His name for what he has done and what he continues to do. Y'all can be seated. Listen, I want to thank Pastor James for allowing me to preach from his pulpit. You know, he's been letting me come for years and be a part of this ministry. And I just want to thank him. You know, Pastor James has been preaching on how to have a blessed life. He told us last week that we are inadequate, incomplete, and too weak to face life without God. And I believe that's true. I believe that it's true that we are failing. We are following. We are feeling hopeless because we are trying to face this world in our life apart from God. We're trying to do it instead of letting God be God and letting God do it. If you truly believe that He is the way maker, the miracle worker, then you need to let him be that in your life. You see, we sit back and we play church. But are we the church? Are we a part of the church? You see, I want you this morning to sit back and I want the I want you to let the Holy Spirit plow deep into your heart. And I want the Holy Spirit to do what He needs to do in your life. You're here this morning on purpose, and you're here this morning for a purpose. So let the Holy Spirit help you this morning. Let the Holy Spirit feed you this morning. Let the Holy Spirit be what it's supposed to be. The comforter, the one that lifts you up. Let the Holy Spirit be the Holy Spirit in your life and allow God to work in your life this very morning.
Darrell Ingram: [00:02:16] In Genesis 32, there's an extraordinary story of Jacob wrestling with God. Says this in 32, starting in 24. Says, then, Jacob was left alone and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day. Now, when they saw that he had he had not prevailed against him. He touched his hip socket, and the socket of Jacob's hip was out of joint as he wrestled with him and he said, Let me go for the day breaks. And he said, I will not let you go. Unless you bless me. So I said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Your names will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel. For you have struggled with God and with men and you have prevailed. Let's go to Lord in prayer, Father, right now. I'm broken. I'm a broken vessel. Father used this broken vessel right now, this sinner. Lord, that people not see me, but they see you. They see your grace, They see your love. They see your hope. They see that you want to bless this very day, this very moment. So, Father, right now, just bless us, be with us, encourage us. In Jesus name, Amen. I want to talk to you briefly about pressing for the blessing that we can press for the blessing. You know, Jacob, it says that he was in the Bible, that he was afraid.
Darrell Ingram: [00:03:52] He was greatly afraid, greatly distressed because he had a hunt. He had 400 men coming to wipe him out. Y'all remember his brother? He's all right. I remember that story. How, you know, Esau was supposed to get the blessing because he was the first born, and all of a sudden, you know, Jacob, the deceiver that he is, he steps up and he goes in and he asks his dad, ask, Who are you? Salami saw. He even kind of snuck around and got some goat fur and put it on him and walked in and it smelled like he was outside. He smelled like he saw he felt like he saw. And now, some years later, Esau is back and he's finally located his brother and he's with 400 armed men. And he's going not only to wipe out Jacob, but wipe out Jacob's family. He's going to wipe out his children. He has to because he has to destroy the entire bloodline in order to get back into the inheritance once again. The Bible said Jacob was greatly distressed and he was afraid for his family, his future. And things that were going on. And at that moment, Jacob became desperate. And he begins to focus on Esau and he begins to cry out to God at the river. He cries out to God, do something about Esau. My problem, my issue is Esau, God, I need you now. I mean, I'm in a desperate situation and I'm afraid of what's going to happen.
Darrell Ingram: [00:05:30] Can you handle Esau? Esau is. Come and get me. Ethan is coming to kill me. God. Do something. Have you ever cried out before asking God to do something because it felt like it was a hopeless situation? It felt like the world was crashing down on you. But God knew what the real issue was. He knew what his real issue is. He knows what our real problems are. There's too much Jacob in his life. There's too much me in my life. Sometimes we need we think the real problem is not really the problem at all. Sometimes the problem is you. Sometimes the problem is me. And I need to get more of me out and let Jesus come in. But yet we allow our lives to get overrun by the world. And we allow the world to take control. Which allows me then to take control rather than God can take control. God can handle your source. He can handle your ISO. God can handle whatever is trying to stop or hinder you. God is saying you don't have to sit back that problem. I can handle it. The issue here is not too much Esau. The issue is too much, Jacob. The issue is not all the problems that we're going through. The issue is me. Why? Because I give it to God, but then I pick it right back up. This is not with God.
Darrell Ingram: [00:07:12] This is not my problems, my situation, my finances, my relationship. The issue is me. Until I let God transform me, until I let God mold me into who He wants me to be, then it's going to continually be me. And it's going to be you. It's time to get the Jacob out of our lives. You're going to leave here? He said you're going to leave here this morning. Not like the way you came in. Not with your struggles, not with the same issues, not with those same things that are going in your life. I'm going to touch you. God's going to touch you. And I'm going to transform you. God says something powerful in the next statement. He says, I'm going to change your name. You're no longer going to be called Jacob, but you're going to be called Israel, which means prince, which means prince no longer. You see, God has a plan and a purpose for everyone, whether you're online, whether you're on TV, whether you're here. He's got something for you. And he wants a plan and a purpose for you. And every person that is listening, God wants to use you. He wants you to be useful. He wants you to be influential. He wants to be powerful in your life and through your life. He wants to bless you today. Oh, me or oh, no? Do you want that blessing? Yes? No? Listen, if y'all don't want to say amen or omo or how whatever, or shut up, I'm just going to keep preaching.
Darrell Ingram: [00:08:51] And it might be 12:30 or 1:00. So the faster y'all say amen, the faster we go, because I get fired up. Yes. Yes. But God wants to bless you today to such a degree that even people that curse you when the haters start hating on you, if these people start on you, God has blessed your life and he will take care of them. He will take care of them. He's going to bless you. He's going to bless you beyond what you can even imagine. God wants to bless you. The Bible says in Hosea 12:4, says that he was weeping and wrestling, that he was weeping and wrestling. He was a desperate man. It's time for us. It's time for us, you and me. The world is in a situation today. Our lives are in a situation today. It's time for us to become desperate, desperate for God, desperate for the blessing, desperate for that hope that He gives in Jesus Christ. We need to be desperate for God. We need to be seeking God, and we need to wrestle with God. You know, he went up, he wept and he was broken and he was desperate. You know what a desperate man can do? What a desperate woman can do. He was even able to wrestle an angel. To wrestle an angel until it was a draw. And that's crazy. That's crazy. They're not even in the same weight division.
Darrell Ingram: [00:10:23] They're not. I wouldn't be in the same weight division as an angel. And I'm a pretty big guy. Psalms 85 says that he made man a little lower than the Angels. The Bible says that one angel slew 185,000 men, yet he is so desperate that he wrestles and he weeps. And with the angel. And because he weeps and he wrestles, he says, I want you to change me and I want you to stop the attack on me in my family. God, I need a change. I need you to do something in my life that will forever change. And I won't let you go until you bless me. Wrestled until it was a draw. Jacob's heart wasn't was not wrestling for fun. He wasn't wrestling for bragging rights like like I would probably do. He was a desperate man. And desperate men and desperate women were capable of doing anything. Especially when it comes to our family or we would desperately step in and do something for him. What I'm trying to tell you is that when you want God to change you, you have to go deeper than just the surface. You see, we just want God to take the surface. It's much more than the happy clappy thing. If that's all you're going to do is come to church and you're going to be happy clappy, you're going to go right back to who you were and where you were. You see, God wants to go deeper than the happy clappy of your life.
Darrell Ingram: [00:12:13] You know, the fear, the depression, the sin, whatever it may be. Jacob lost his calm state of mind that Angel closely monitored the fight. He could have killed him. I believe that that angel could have killed him in any time. Oh, yeah. But he was desperate, and he. He wanted him to do something. God, I want you to do something in my life. Listen, God is not interested in destroying or hurting you. He's interested in changing you. For the better. For the good. For His honor. For his glory. If we say. That we praise him. Then let's praise them with everything we've got. Let's go out there and let's be desperate for God and desperate that God would use us to change a world that is lost. If you want to change, you have to lose your casual state of mind and you got to get desperate and say you need to get desperate. I'm talking country. You've got to get desperate. You've got to get desperate. You've got to get down and dirty. You got to take off your shoes. Be willing to kick up the dust and you've got to wrestle with an angel all night. He focused on one thing he wanted to change, Jacob. He wanted to change Jacob. He could have killed him, but instead he just held on to him. A fight. He. He was holding on to him so Jacob would fight until there was no more Jacob.
Darrell Ingram: [00:13:54] You see, Jacob means liar, deceiver. He sold his brother's birthright. And he came out of the womb as a twin. And as he was coming out of the womb, he was holding on to Esau Hill. He wanted the birthright from the very get go. He was a liar, a deceiver. There was something in him that he was always lying and deceiving, you know, just kind of shady, you know, just kind of a shady guy. You remember that kid in school that when you were around and, you know, wasn't just quite some things weren't quite right about him. And if y’all are trying to think who that is and you haven't found out, that might be you. Because when I was preparing this message, I started thinking, God, who? Who was that? Who was that? As I went to school and no one's name came up. And God began to impress on me. Darrell, that was you. You were the shady guy. You were the guy that was a sinful person. You were the guy that. That I ultimately changed. And then I thank God that I'm not the person that I used to be, but I'm the person that he wants me to be. This was Jacob. And Jacob needed to get Jacob out of Jacob. He God wanted him to reach his full potential. He wanted him to to go beyond what Jacob could have done on Jacob's own. He wants me and you to go beyond what we can do on our own and get it through him so that we can ultimately give him the honor and the glory.
Darrell Ingram: [00:15:34] And know that someone like me that was able to graduate college. And he used my wife, but. For someone like me that is now a librarian. I'm supposed to be all this intelligent person. I look up a lot of words before I go into school so that I can act like I'm very intelligent. But the reason why God allow struggles and the reason why God allows us to have pressure weeping Wrestling is not to kill us. It's not to crush us. It's not to destroy us. But it's to change us. To change us into the person he wants us to be. Not who I want to be, but who he wants us to be. We're not going to change sitting in comfort. We're not going to change when we're on top of the world and everything is going good. Hunky dory. Everything's all right, baby. Are y’all right? Oh, everything's good. We're not going to change when things are going our way. You see, God is interested in your character more than He is interested in your comfort. He's more interested in his will and his plan. And he wants you and me to quit playing games with our life, playing games with our relationship with Jesus Christ. We throw his name out. We even sing Jesus.
Darrell Ingram: [00:17:06] But do you know Jesus? You see, I can throw Jesus’ name out everywhere. My parents were Christians. My grandparents are Christians. But does that make me a follower of Jesus? Just because my parents came to church. Doesn't mean. I'm a saved sinner. Just because they came to church and they did what they did to honor God doesn't make me the person that I need to be. It's the relationship that I have with Jesus that makes me the person that I need to be. He said, God wants to get the Jacob out of you. He wants to get the Jacob out of me. He wants us to emerge as a new creation with a new name, and that we can have favor with God and we can have favor with men. God says, I want to pour out blessings on your life. And I want to do it because I want you to give me all the honor and all the glory. God wants to see you reach your full potential. Jacob knew that this was his moment, his one opportunity. This reminded me of a song that I like that a rapper sings. Eminem one. I was going to rap it for you, but. I'm not very good at slinging those rhymes out. I would hack it all up, but you only have one opportunity in your life. And he said to the angel, I will not let you go until you bless me. You have one opportunity to ask Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior, to ask Jesus Christ to bless you.
Darrell Ingram: [00:18:54] You have one opportunity, one moment. God doesn't promise you. The next moment He promises you right now. So where are you? Where are you? In your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ? You see, God wants to trans be wants us. So transform that. There's no more Jacob. And there's no more me in my life. He wants us to become prince and princesses, you know, He wants us to know that we are a child of a king. We're a child of the king. You have to become people who have favor with God. This is your moment. This is your opportunity. The Holy Spirit is saying, I'm ready to change you and bring you to a whole nother level. Do you want to go to that level or not? Oh, me. Amen. Yes. You see, here's the key to this whole story. If you don't get anything, make sure you get this. The angel asked him. What's your name? What's your name? Why is that so significant? Why is that so important? You see, the last time he was asked what his name was at his dad's deathbed. And he told him, a line said. My name is Esau. And because he deceived his father, his father blessed him with a double portion of a blessing. And then he laughed. You see, now God is asking him, What's your name? It's very important. Now, I don't want to rush through this, but what's your name? God is going to deal with who He is, who he truly is.
Darrell Ingram: [00:20:51] I didn't tell you the truth. I didn't tell the truth the last time that I was asked this question. And in God asks, When God asks you, who do you say you are? Who do you say? Or What are you telling? What do you tell him? God was asking. Are you still plagued with a lack of character? Are you still plagued with that old nature? Are you still plagued with Jacob? Are you still plagued with the sin in your life? Jacob said, I'm Jacob. Oh, he could have lied. He could have tried to say something else, but God wanted him to get to this place. Then he came to. He wanted him to face who he was. You see, God brought you here this morning. For a purpose, for a reason. He wants you to face who you really are this morning. Can you truly say I'm a child of the king? Can you truly say I know Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior? Or are you just playing? Like, you know, Jesus. See, there comes a time in everybody's life. That you've got to make that decision. You've got to make that choice. And you only have one opportunity. When Jacob walked away, he had a different name, he had a different nature, and he had a different future. He didn't walk the same.
Darrell Ingram: [00:22:31] I had a different name before I met Jesus. It was Darrell. But it was Darrell known as the the bad guy, the guy that people didn't want to hang around with. And if they gave me lip, I just punch them in the mouth. I thought fighting was the way to get over on everything. I thought being mean and cruel was the way that I needed to be. I needed to be tough. I need to be a man. But when God got through with Jacob, Jacob walked with a limp. He wasn't the person he used to be. You see, when God got through with me, I was a different person. When God gets through with you. You're a different person. He so transformed him that he pronounced a blessing on his life that we still talk about his transformation today. Inside every Jacob is in Israel waiting to be renamed inside of. Every Saul of Tarsus is a Paul the apostle wanting to be renamed inside every drug and drug addict, inside every alcoholic, every person who's got an issue going on your own in your life. There is someone that God wants to rename and he wants to rename you this very day. It's urgent. God is saying I'm ready to pronounce on you this morning. That there is no Jacob, no more Jacob in your life. That you are a new creation. You see, the Bible says Behold. We have become new. Are you new? Or are you still walking around with that old leather? Are you still walking around all sad sack and.
Darrell Ingram: [00:24:20] Oh, listen, you're blessed today. You got out of bed. You're alive and you're in church today. You're blessed. I'm blessed. So what do we have to do? We've got to make sure that we're totally a new creation, that we're transformed. Are you willing to hold on to the Lord until He blesses you? Are you willing to? You know, there has been times in my life that that I prayed for my family and prayed for my boys. You know, I prayed and I didn't know. You know, they thought I was brave and they would see this tough shell outside. But inside I was I was a wreck. And I had to get along with God and I had to wrestle and weep with him over my boys and over my family. And God is beginning to answer some prayers. He brought my youngest had great young lady in his life. They brought my oldest. He even brought me cinnamon rolls yesterday. He gave someone to him. That is truly. So blessing. And to see my boy happy. And joyful. I can go today and be at peace. Because I know that God is working in his life, in my life and my wife's life and my other son's life. I know that God is stirring their souls, and I know that God is stirring your soul. And I know God wants to do something in your life today.
Darrell Ingram: [00:26:09] But are you willing to cry out and let him know that you're going to keep pressing until you get that blessing? Are you going to still fight for it? Are you going to let it go? Are you going to let it up? Or say, God, I need it and I need it this very moment. I need it now. You see, when you're broken before God. He asks your name, and that's the time for you and me, to be honest. It's a time for you and me to quit playing games. It's time for us to quit pretending. Quit being the great pretenders that who we are. How I come to church and I come to church Sundays and Wednesdays. And I'm a godly person. Are you truly godly? Quit playing those games. I'll be honest before God. Be honest before. Jesus. Quit pretending. Quit pretending. You see, Jesus wants to come into your life. You see, we all are born sinners. But I remember a song that I was growing up, and I didn't go to church much. But it says, What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. If you've come to God in any other way. Because there's no other way. Jesus said, I am the way. I am the truth and I'm the light. And no one comes to the Father but by me. Have you accessed the Father through Jesus Christ? Have you given your life to Jesus Christ? Have you given the problems and the situations, the heartaches, the hiccups, the whatever you're going through? Have you truly given them to Jesus? You see, if you've given them to Jesus, then don't pick them back up.
Darrell Ingram: [00:28:16] Trust God that God will be God and that He will be your Heavenly Father and that He will be there to rescue you and change you. No matter what. So let me ask you a question as you stand and as you buy your heads. Everybody's eyes are closed and heads are bowed. Let me ask you a question. Are you 100% certain? That if you died this very moment, that you would go to Jesus, that you would go to Heaven. You see, in order for me to get to Heaven, I had to ask Christ to be my Lord and Savior and forgive me of my sins. Have you done that? Or maybe your commitment to the Lord hasn't been all there and you need to step out and you need to say, Hey, I need, I need you, I need you to transform me. I need you to cleanse me. I need you to make me right. I'm broken and I'm a sinner. Maybe that's you this morning. Now, Pastor Richie and I got these men and ladies up here that want to pray with you, that want to encourage you, that want to be there for you. We have the altar open. Open. God wants to be here for you.
Darrell Ingram: [00:29:45] But the choice is yours. Let me ask you one more question. Nobody's looking. Everybody's eyes are closed. Are you 100% certain you'd go to Heaven if you died? If you don't know real fast. No one's looking. Just raise your hand. Amen. Amen. Listen, I'm just going to say this prayer right now, and you repeat it after me with the Lord in your heart. And I'm going to ask you to come down and to let one of these counselors know that you gave your life to Jesus. Just say after me. Say, Dear Jesus, come into my life. I ask you to forgive me for I'm a sinner. Father, be the Lord of my life and take me to Heaven when I die. Thank you for saving me. Father, right now I just ask you to be with each and every one of us. Father, that our hearts would be open to your movement, to the Holy Spirit, touching our hearts, Lord. And Lord, let us grab ahold of you and not let you go until you've truly blessed us. Lord, help each and every one of us. Father, I ask you to continue to be with Pastor James and Miss Debbie as they're away. Father, you continue to bless them. You continue to watch over them. And, Father, I do have to throw out my family. You bless them. You continue. And Father, for my church family, you continue to work in their lives and bless them. In Jesus' name. Amen.
Recorded in Pineville, Louisiana.
Darrell Ingram: [00:02:16] In Genesis 32, there's an extraordinary story of Jacob wrestling with God. Says this in 32, starting in 24. Says, then, Jacob was left alone and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day. Now, when they saw that he had he had not prevailed against him. He touched his hip socket, and the socket of Jacob's hip was out of joint as he wrestled with him and he said, Let me go for the day breaks. And he said, I will not let you go. Unless you bless me. So I said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Your names will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel. For you have struggled with God and with men and you have prevailed. Let's go to Lord in prayer, Father, right now. I'm broken. I'm a broken vessel. Father used this broken vessel right now, this sinner. Lord, that people not see me, but they see you. They see your grace, They see your love. They see your hope. They see that you want to bless this very day, this very moment. So, Father, right now, just bless us, be with us, encourage us. In Jesus name, Amen. I want to talk to you briefly about pressing for the blessing that we can press for the blessing. You know, Jacob, it says that he was in the Bible, that he was afraid.
Darrell Ingram: [00:03:52] He was greatly afraid, greatly distressed because he had a hunt. He had 400 men coming to wipe him out. Y'all remember his brother? He's all right. I remember that story. How, you know, Esau was supposed to get the blessing because he was the first born, and all of a sudden, you know, Jacob, the deceiver that he is, he steps up and he goes in and he asks his dad, ask, Who are you? Salami saw. He even kind of snuck around and got some goat fur and put it on him and walked in and it smelled like he was outside. He smelled like he saw he felt like he saw. And now, some years later, Esau is back and he's finally located his brother and he's with 400 armed men. And he's going not only to wipe out Jacob, but wipe out Jacob's family. He's going to wipe out his children. He has to because he has to destroy the entire bloodline in order to get back into the inheritance once again. The Bible said Jacob was greatly distressed and he was afraid for his family, his future. And things that were going on. And at that moment, Jacob became desperate. And he begins to focus on Esau and he begins to cry out to God at the river. He cries out to God, do something about Esau. My problem, my issue is Esau, God, I need you now. I mean, I'm in a desperate situation and I'm afraid of what's going to happen.
Darrell Ingram: [00:05:30] Can you handle Esau? Esau is. Come and get me. Ethan is coming to kill me. God. Do something. Have you ever cried out before asking God to do something because it felt like it was a hopeless situation? It felt like the world was crashing down on you. But God knew what the real issue was. He knew what his real issue is. He knows what our real problems are. There's too much Jacob in his life. There's too much me in my life. Sometimes we need we think the real problem is not really the problem at all. Sometimes the problem is you. Sometimes the problem is me. And I need to get more of me out and let Jesus come in. But yet we allow our lives to get overrun by the world. And we allow the world to take control. Which allows me then to take control rather than God can take control. God can handle your source. He can handle your ISO. God can handle whatever is trying to stop or hinder you. God is saying you don't have to sit back that problem. I can handle it. The issue here is not too much Esau. The issue is too much, Jacob. The issue is not all the problems that we're going through. The issue is me. Why? Because I give it to God, but then I pick it right back up. This is not with God.
Darrell Ingram: [00:07:12] This is not my problems, my situation, my finances, my relationship. The issue is me. Until I let God transform me, until I let God mold me into who He wants me to be, then it's going to continually be me. And it's going to be you. It's time to get the Jacob out of our lives. You're going to leave here? He said you're going to leave here this morning. Not like the way you came in. Not with your struggles, not with the same issues, not with those same things that are going in your life. I'm going to touch you. God's going to touch you. And I'm going to transform you. God says something powerful in the next statement. He says, I'm going to change your name. You're no longer going to be called Jacob, but you're going to be called Israel, which means prince, which means prince no longer. You see, God has a plan and a purpose for everyone, whether you're online, whether you're on TV, whether you're here. He's got something for you. And he wants a plan and a purpose for you. And every person that is listening, God wants to use you. He wants you to be useful. He wants you to be influential. He wants to be powerful in your life and through your life. He wants to bless you today. Oh, me or oh, no? Do you want that blessing? Yes? No? Listen, if y'all don't want to say amen or omo or how whatever, or shut up, I'm just going to keep preaching.
Darrell Ingram: [00:08:51] And it might be 12:30 or 1:00. So the faster y'all say amen, the faster we go, because I get fired up. Yes. Yes. But God wants to bless you today to such a degree that even people that curse you when the haters start hating on you, if these people start on you, God has blessed your life and he will take care of them. He will take care of them. He's going to bless you. He's going to bless you beyond what you can even imagine. God wants to bless you. The Bible says in Hosea 12:4, says that he was weeping and wrestling, that he was weeping and wrestling. He was a desperate man. It's time for us. It's time for us, you and me. The world is in a situation today. Our lives are in a situation today. It's time for us to become desperate, desperate for God, desperate for the blessing, desperate for that hope that He gives in Jesus Christ. We need to be desperate for God. We need to be seeking God, and we need to wrestle with God. You know, he went up, he wept and he was broken and he was desperate. You know what a desperate man can do? What a desperate woman can do. He was even able to wrestle an angel. To wrestle an angel until it was a draw. And that's crazy. That's crazy. They're not even in the same weight division.
Darrell Ingram: [00:10:23] They're not. I wouldn't be in the same weight division as an angel. And I'm a pretty big guy. Psalms 85 says that he made man a little lower than the Angels. The Bible says that one angel slew 185,000 men, yet he is so desperate that he wrestles and he weeps. And with the angel. And because he weeps and he wrestles, he says, I want you to change me and I want you to stop the attack on me in my family. God, I need a change. I need you to do something in my life that will forever change. And I won't let you go until you bless me. Wrestled until it was a draw. Jacob's heart wasn't was not wrestling for fun. He wasn't wrestling for bragging rights like like I would probably do. He was a desperate man. And desperate men and desperate women were capable of doing anything. Especially when it comes to our family or we would desperately step in and do something for him. What I'm trying to tell you is that when you want God to change you, you have to go deeper than just the surface. You see, we just want God to take the surface. It's much more than the happy clappy thing. If that's all you're going to do is come to church and you're going to be happy clappy, you're going to go right back to who you were and where you were. You see, God wants to go deeper than the happy clappy of your life.
Darrell Ingram: [00:12:13] You know, the fear, the depression, the sin, whatever it may be. Jacob lost his calm state of mind that Angel closely monitored the fight. He could have killed him. I believe that that angel could have killed him in any time. Oh, yeah. But he was desperate, and he. He wanted him to do something. God, I want you to do something in my life. Listen, God is not interested in destroying or hurting you. He's interested in changing you. For the better. For the good. For His honor. For his glory. If we say. That we praise him. Then let's praise them with everything we've got. Let's go out there and let's be desperate for God and desperate that God would use us to change a world that is lost. If you want to change, you have to lose your casual state of mind and you got to get desperate and say you need to get desperate. I'm talking country. You've got to get desperate. You've got to get desperate. You've got to get down and dirty. You got to take off your shoes. Be willing to kick up the dust and you've got to wrestle with an angel all night. He focused on one thing he wanted to change, Jacob. He wanted to change Jacob. He could have killed him, but instead he just held on to him. A fight. He. He was holding on to him so Jacob would fight until there was no more Jacob.
Darrell Ingram: [00:13:54] You see, Jacob means liar, deceiver. He sold his brother's birthright. And he came out of the womb as a twin. And as he was coming out of the womb, he was holding on to Esau Hill. He wanted the birthright from the very get go. He was a liar, a deceiver. There was something in him that he was always lying and deceiving, you know, just kind of shady, you know, just kind of a shady guy. You remember that kid in school that when you were around and, you know, wasn't just quite some things weren't quite right about him. And if y’all are trying to think who that is and you haven't found out, that might be you. Because when I was preparing this message, I started thinking, God, who? Who was that? Who was that? As I went to school and no one's name came up. And God began to impress on me. Darrell, that was you. You were the shady guy. You were the guy that was a sinful person. You were the guy that. That I ultimately changed. And then I thank God that I'm not the person that I used to be, but I'm the person that he wants me to be. This was Jacob. And Jacob needed to get Jacob out of Jacob. He God wanted him to reach his full potential. He wanted him to to go beyond what Jacob could have done on Jacob's own. He wants me and you to go beyond what we can do on our own and get it through him so that we can ultimately give him the honor and the glory.
Darrell Ingram: [00:15:34] And know that someone like me that was able to graduate college. And he used my wife, but. For someone like me that is now a librarian. I'm supposed to be all this intelligent person. I look up a lot of words before I go into school so that I can act like I'm very intelligent. But the reason why God allow struggles and the reason why God allows us to have pressure weeping Wrestling is not to kill us. It's not to crush us. It's not to destroy us. But it's to change us. To change us into the person he wants us to be. Not who I want to be, but who he wants us to be. We're not going to change sitting in comfort. We're not going to change when we're on top of the world and everything is going good. Hunky dory. Everything's all right, baby. Are y’all right? Oh, everything's good. We're not going to change when things are going our way. You see, God is interested in your character more than He is interested in your comfort. He's more interested in his will and his plan. And he wants you and me to quit playing games with our life, playing games with our relationship with Jesus Christ. We throw his name out. We even sing Jesus.
Darrell Ingram: [00:17:06] But do you know Jesus? You see, I can throw Jesus’ name out everywhere. My parents were Christians. My grandparents are Christians. But does that make me a follower of Jesus? Just because my parents came to church. Doesn't mean. I'm a saved sinner. Just because they came to church and they did what they did to honor God doesn't make me the person that I need to be. It's the relationship that I have with Jesus that makes me the person that I need to be. He said, God wants to get the Jacob out of you. He wants to get the Jacob out of me. He wants us to emerge as a new creation with a new name, and that we can have favor with God and we can have favor with men. God says, I want to pour out blessings on your life. And I want to do it because I want you to give me all the honor and all the glory. God wants to see you reach your full potential. Jacob knew that this was his moment, his one opportunity. This reminded me of a song that I like that a rapper sings. Eminem one. I was going to rap it for you, but. I'm not very good at slinging those rhymes out. I would hack it all up, but you only have one opportunity in your life. And he said to the angel, I will not let you go until you bless me. You have one opportunity to ask Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior, to ask Jesus Christ to bless you.
Darrell Ingram: [00:18:54] You have one opportunity, one moment. God doesn't promise you. The next moment He promises you right now. So where are you? Where are you? In your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ? You see, God wants to trans be wants us. So transform that. There's no more Jacob. And there's no more me in my life. He wants us to become prince and princesses, you know, He wants us to know that we are a child of a king. We're a child of the king. You have to become people who have favor with God. This is your moment. This is your opportunity. The Holy Spirit is saying, I'm ready to change you and bring you to a whole nother level. Do you want to go to that level or not? Oh, me. Amen. Yes. You see, here's the key to this whole story. If you don't get anything, make sure you get this. The angel asked him. What's your name? What's your name? Why is that so significant? Why is that so important? You see, the last time he was asked what his name was at his dad's deathbed. And he told him, a line said. My name is Esau. And because he deceived his father, his father blessed him with a double portion of a blessing. And then he laughed. You see, now God is asking him, What's your name? It's very important. Now, I don't want to rush through this, but what's your name? God is going to deal with who He is, who he truly is.
Darrell Ingram: [00:20:51] I didn't tell you the truth. I didn't tell the truth the last time that I was asked this question. And in God asks, When God asks you, who do you say you are? Who do you say? Or What are you telling? What do you tell him? God was asking. Are you still plagued with a lack of character? Are you still plagued with that old nature? Are you still plagued with Jacob? Are you still plagued with the sin in your life? Jacob said, I'm Jacob. Oh, he could have lied. He could have tried to say something else, but God wanted him to get to this place. Then he came to. He wanted him to face who he was. You see, God brought you here this morning. For a purpose, for a reason. He wants you to face who you really are this morning. Can you truly say I'm a child of the king? Can you truly say I know Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior? Or are you just playing? Like, you know, Jesus. See, there comes a time in everybody's life. That you've got to make that decision. You've got to make that choice. And you only have one opportunity. When Jacob walked away, he had a different name, he had a different nature, and he had a different future. He didn't walk the same.
Darrell Ingram: [00:22:31] I had a different name before I met Jesus. It was Darrell. But it was Darrell known as the the bad guy, the guy that people didn't want to hang around with. And if they gave me lip, I just punch them in the mouth. I thought fighting was the way to get over on everything. I thought being mean and cruel was the way that I needed to be. I needed to be tough. I need to be a man. But when God got through with Jacob, Jacob walked with a limp. He wasn't the person he used to be. You see, when God got through with me, I was a different person. When God gets through with you. You're a different person. He so transformed him that he pronounced a blessing on his life that we still talk about his transformation today. Inside every Jacob is in Israel waiting to be renamed inside of. Every Saul of Tarsus is a Paul the apostle wanting to be renamed inside every drug and drug addict, inside every alcoholic, every person who's got an issue going on your own in your life. There is someone that God wants to rename and he wants to rename you this very day. It's urgent. God is saying I'm ready to pronounce on you this morning. That there is no Jacob, no more Jacob in your life. That you are a new creation. You see, the Bible says Behold. We have become new. Are you new? Or are you still walking around with that old leather? Are you still walking around all sad sack and.
Darrell Ingram: [00:24:20] Oh, listen, you're blessed today. You got out of bed. You're alive and you're in church today. You're blessed. I'm blessed. So what do we have to do? We've got to make sure that we're totally a new creation, that we're transformed. Are you willing to hold on to the Lord until He blesses you? Are you willing to? You know, there has been times in my life that that I prayed for my family and prayed for my boys. You know, I prayed and I didn't know. You know, they thought I was brave and they would see this tough shell outside. But inside I was I was a wreck. And I had to get along with God and I had to wrestle and weep with him over my boys and over my family. And God is beginning to answer some prayers. He brought my youngest had great young lady in his life. They brought my oldest. He even brought me cinnamon rolls yesterday. He gave someone to him. That is truly. So blessing. And to see my boy happy. And joyful. I can go today and be at peace. Because I know that God is working in his life, in my life and my wife's life and my other son's life. I know that God is stirring their souls, and I know that God is stirring your soul. And I know God wants to do something in your life today.
Darrell Ingram: [00:26:09] But are you willing to cry out and let him know that you're going to keep pressing until you get that blessing? Are you going to still fight for it? Are you going to let it go? Are you going to let it up? Or say, God, I need it and I need it this very moment. I need it now. You see, when you're broken before God. He asks your name, and that's the time for you and me, to be honest. It's a time for you and me to quit playing games. It's time for us to quit pretending. Quit being the great pretenders that who we are. How I come to church and I come to church Sundays and Wednesdays. And I'm a godly person. Are you truly godly? Quit playing those games. I'll be honest before God. Be honest before. Jesus. Quit pretending. Quit pretending. You see, Jesus wants to come into your life. You see, we all are born sinners. But I remember a song that I was growing up, and I didn't go to church much. But it says, What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. If you've come to God in any other way. Because there's no other way. Jesus said, I am the way. I am the truth and I'm the light. And no one comes to the Father but by me. Have you accessed the Father through Jesus Christ? Have you given your life to Jesus Christ? Have you given the problems and the situations, the heartaches, the hiccups, the whatever you're going through? Have you truly given them to Jesus? You see, if you've given them to Jesus, then don't pick them back up.
Darrell Ingram: [00:28:16] Trust God that God will be God and that He will be your Heavenly Father and that He will be there to rescue you and change you. No matter what. So let me ask you a question as you stand and as you buy your heads. Everybody's eyes are closed and heads are bowed. Let me ask you a question. Are you 100% certain? That if you died this very moment, that you would go to Jesus, that you would go to Heaven. You see, in order for me to get to Heaven, I had to ask Christ to be my Lord and Savior and forgive me of my sins. Have you done that? Or maybe your commitment to the Lord hasn't been all there and you need to step out and you need to say, Hey, I need, I need you, I need you to transform me. I need you to cleanse me. I need you to make me right. I'm broken and I'm a sinner. Maybe that's you this morning. Now, Pastor Richie and I got these men and ladies up here that want to pray with you, that want to encourage you, that want to be there for you. We have the altar open. Open. God wants to be here for you.
Darrell Ingram: [00:29:45] But the choice is yours. Let me ask you one more question. Nobody's looking. Everybody's eyes are closed. Are you 100% certain you'd go to Heaven if you died? If you don't know real fast. No one's looking. Just raise your hand. Amen. Amen. Listen, I'm just going to say this prayer right now, and you repeat it after me with the Lord in your heart. And I'm going to ask you to come down and to let one of these counselors know that you gave your life to Jesus. Just say after me. Say, Dear Jesus, come into my life. I ask you to forgive me for I'm a sinner. Father, be the Lord of my life and take me to Heaven when I die. Thank you for saving me. Father, right now I just ask you to be with each and every one of us. Father, that our hearts would be open to your movement, to the Holy Spirit, touching our hearts, Lord. And Lord, let us grab ahold of you and not let you go until you've truly blessed us. Lord, help each and every one of us. Father, I ask you to continue to be with Pastor James and Miss Debbie as they're away. Father, you continue to bless them. You continue to watch over them. And, Father, I do have to throw out my family. You bless them. You continue. And Father, for my church family, you continue to work in their lives and bless them. In Jesus' name. Amen.
Recorded in Pineville, Louisiana.
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