What is the Perfect Weight?

[0:00] God bless you good people. I want to say it's a privilege to be here. Give honor to this pastor and his family. And their willingness to have me. And I'm honored to be here.

[0:10] Give honor to Brother and Sister Hanks as well. And for being my chauffeur. And for bringing me here. And so I appreciate their willingness to do that. All of you good people.

[0:21] I rejoice for what God's doing in this place. And for this city. The best is yet to come. Now, Deuteronomy 25 and verse 13.

[0:34] If you would go there with me. Thankful for what we have felt thus far. And I just hope I can deposit something in your spirit to give you strength.

[0:47] On this Sunday evening. Deuteronomy 25 verse 13. The Bible says thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights. A great and a small.

[0:58] Thou shalt not have in thine house divers measures. A great and a small. But thou shalt have a perfect and just weight. A perfect and just measure shalt thou have.

[1:11] Thy days may be lengthened in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. I want to preach on the. This subject. This question for a little while.

[1:23] What is the perfect weight? What is the perfect weight? Would you lift your hands with me right now? Let's go to him in prayer. God, we love you. Thank you for your presence. For your power. Thank you for the anointing that we feel in this place.

[1:35] Strengthen us. Touch us. Help us. God, we can't do this without you. Let your will be done in this place before we leave. God, in the name of Jesus, we pray. And everybody said, amen.

[1:47] You may be seated. I would ask you forefront of this. And this is in no means am I needing to answer.

[2:00] But when you wake up in the morning. And you stand on the scale. Are you at your perfect weight? I can answer that truthfully.

[2:13] Absolutely not. I took time to dig a little bit. Due to my wife's advice studying for this, I never chose to study a lady's weight with good wisdom.

[2:32] But I did choose to study on a man's weight. And I think you can get the gist of foundation through this. But this is what Google. Now, I don't agree with Google at all.

[2:43] I think it's out of the Holy Ghost on this. I feel like some days it's anointed, but it's not on this. But it says that a man of 6'3 should weigh 152 pounds.

[2:57] No, see, I told you all. I told you all. Are up to 192 pounds. And again, I'm just trying to get overweight. Because they say overweight is from 200 to 230.

[3:07] So I'm like, if I'm getting to overweight status, I'll be doing a lot better. But I would say that for all of us, that without a doubt, if we all went to a gym together, we all would do different things different ways.

[3:25] We're all healthy in different areas. We all have different things we would focus upon. We all would excel at some things. Others would fall at other things.

[3:36] We all have our own specialty and our own thing we like. I know from going through the police academy and completing some of that and some of the training there, I absolutely hated running.

[3:51] It was just not my favorite thing to do. But cardio is probably one of the worst things that I hate doing. And then we know if you stay around a gym any length of time or have any knowledge of workout, there is always that one guy that missed leg day.

[4:11] See, I've got to participate. So what he said is we all are different. The Bible even would tell us in the word, it said that we are beautifully and wonderfully made.

[4:27] We know that we all have a different physical sense of abilities. But there is also a spiritual principle out of this. And I want to go to 1 Samuel 17 and 4.

[4:38] The Bible says this. It said, Sunday school even have brought this out for us.

[5:13] But the armor of Goliath weighed 150 pounds. The spear tilt of Goliath that he carried weighed 25 pounds. The sword weighed 16 pounds.

[5:26] And so Goliath would measure out at around 10 feet tall. If you go back through the original Masoretic Scrolls, they'll tell you measurements calculated that he was around 10 feet tall.

[5:37] And so if you measure his weight by that, what you can find is they'll tell you that he weighed somewhere between 380 to 400 pounds. If you add the weight up that he carried, they'll tell you which was around 191 pounds with what he carried with him.

[5:56] And he weighed 400 at least. It would bring you to a total of 591 pounds of force. I don't know about you, but I don't think I could fight anybody with 200 pounds on my back.

[6:13] I don't think I could do it. And the only principle that I would draw from all of that is this. Goliath was physically big enough to carry the weight that was upon him.

[6:29] But carrying that much weight did not help him win. David won with less. And so, and Pastor, I don't know the history of this thing and how long this has been going and all that.

[6:44] But, and I know it's a smaller group, so I'm going to talk through this. I'm not trying to spit to the back door if you'll, if you'll, excuse me. I just want to tell you this. I know it may not seem like we're carrying a whole lot.

[6:56] But you've got enough to have revival with right now. Come on, I know we like the big things and win all that. But can I tell you, I want to learn how to win with what we have right now.

[7:09] I want to learn how to praise God and pray and pre-service prayer and do all that we do with what we have right now. I said it today, but if God be for us, who can be against us?

[7:22] All we need is God. Come on, thank God for taking this whole world. But give me Jesus. As long as I've got God, I've got enough to win with.

[7:36] David, David understood the concept when he would go into Saul's tent, when they brought him in there. Now, I've always preached this until some time ago that David was a new kid on the block.

[7:48] But you've got to pause that because if you read back a chapter before, Goliath shows on the scene, Saul makes David his armor bearer. Jesse sends wine and stuff to Saul to totally thank him and appreciate because David becomes something to Saul before he ever showed up on the battlefield in Goliath.

[8:11] And not only that, Saul names him his armor bearer. Have you ever studied that? That literally means that David would sharpen the sword and the armor of Goliath.

[8:24] Or not Goliath, of Saul. Forgive me. So what are you saying is in the process of this, I believe with all my heart, Brother Hanks, that when David walked in the tent and they put the armor on him, that was not the first time that he had felt that and had put that on.

[8:38] I just believe as a young boy, he had already shined it enough. He knew exactly how much it would weigh. And when he assayed it, it don't mean that it didn't fit. It really meant the weight was off if you put it in perspective.

[8:51] So what do you say is I don't want what this world would give me to have revival. Come on. I don't want to look at what's going on in the nominal worlds and all of these other 13 churches around me.

[9:01] I want to focus on what works. And that's Jesus. And that's prayer. And that's a move of the Holy Ghost. Come on. All this city needs is a one God church.

[9:11] What this city needs is a church that says, all I've got is Jesus. And that's enough. And if you'll find it, and I think it's cool enough to think, it may not be the focus point here, but if you find that this is what's so interesting, David would go back years later, a time later, and get the sword of Goliath and go fight with it.

[9:35] What do you say is just because I won with a slingshot right now. Come on. Don't mistake the day of small beginnings and small things. What do you say is I may win with this right now, but if I learn to win with this, God will give me what I refuse to pick up.

[9:51] Come on. I'm trying to help somebody. If we learn how to have revival in a Methodist church, God will give us the facility that we want and we need. Come on. Come on. I feel the Holy Ghost right now.

[10:02] God will give us what we want if we fight with what we have. Hallelujah. Amen. Praise God. Praise God. Praise God. Praise God.

[10:14] I said I wasn't going to get fired up. But it's so true that if I'm not careful, I'll talk about me, I'm always looking at what's coming.

[10:27] Instead of what God's doing right now. And somehow or another, we have got this mindset that the more that I carry makes me stronger.

[10:41] But honestly, I think it's the trick of the enemy. And I'm talking to me. I'll put this on me, not you. It's like if I pick up enough stuff, I feel like I'm more spiritually or I'm doing more.

[10:57] When honestly, it's a trick of the enemy. Because the more that I wait, that I'm carrying, the less mobile I can be and the less effective I can be. And the less things I can do.

[11:07] Yeah, I'm packing more, but I'm useless in where God's placed me and where God's put me. Can I help anybody right now? I want to have enough to win with.

[11:18] What do you say? Is the perfect weight is Jesus. That's where I'm going with all of this. All I need is Jesus. Amen. We all have that theology.

[11:32] Because just because we don't think we can do as much as someone else doesn't mean we can't kill the giant. If I could preach like Brother Hanks, I could do more.

[11:44] You know what I'm talking? I'm using it. If I could preach like your pastor, I would be doing more. I could do so much more. But God didn't call me to be them. God didn't call you to be me.

[11:55] But we all have a purpose and beautifully and wonderfully made individually. And I'm cheating my own self if I try to pack what he's packing. And I try to preach like he's preaching.

[12:06] And I try to worship or sing like she would. He said, I've got to be all that God created me to be. I'm in my own weight class. Come on. I'm in my own place that God can use me.

[12:17] Amen. It was later. That you can even find as I begin to study through this. I should let Brother Hanks preach all this.

[12:28] He's the workout dude. But the rule that the American College of Sports tells you is that there is a recommended two for two rule.

[12:41] It says if we're consistently hitting the top end of the recommended repetition range in a well-designed workout program, only then is it time that we add more weight.

[12:58] It said if you can do two more reps more than the target. Then we add more weight. And so my perception of that for me is this.

[13:13] I know I mean. Now, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about me. If I'm and you just get to listen as I preach to me. But if I'm asking God for more.

[13:25] And I'm not exceeding in what I'm doing now. I'm guilty at times of saying, God, I need this.

[13:36] And God, I want this. And God, give me that. But in my own personal walk with God, am I exceeding in everything that God has given me to do now?

[13:50] I want to be able to exceed where I am. Here's why they'll tell you. And if you read through this more, Google got back in the Holy Ghost. They got done talking about physical weight.

[14:01] I felt anointed again when I read through all this. But this is what it tells you. This is why they say that. They say they will not add more weight unless you're exceeding where you are. Because even though you may pick it up once or twice.

[14:14] You are more likely to pull something. Tear something. And it will set you back for months. Because even though you did it once, it hurt you.

[14:28] Am I making sense? It hurts you that you can't do it again. And you have to go back down. What are you saying? I don't want more. Sometimes God, the Bible says he won't put nothing more on us that we could bear.

[14:42] And I know we use that for trials and situations. But can I tell you, I believe we could flip that every once in a while. And God won't put nothing on us more than that would hurt us. There's things that our kids won't.

[14:55] My 11-year-old thinks he can drive. And if we're in a field and I'm in my old truck that's got 280,000 miles on it, I'll let him.

[15:08] I'm not putting him on I-10 in Los Angeles. Because there's a limitation to that. Can I help you? Just because God don't give me something right now don't mean I can't have it later.

[15:19] There's a process to this. And as you begin to, you can read through this, you can find even that in the Olympics, when the Olympics are training and going and doing, the swimmers will swim with weights around their ankles when they're training.

[15:40] They'll swim with little weights around their wrists sometimes when they're training. The runners, when they run in for relay races, they'll run training with weights around their ankles.

[15:52] The Bible says, lay aside every weight and every sin which does so easily beset us. But when they're training, they're running with weights. But when they get to the point to run the race, the weights come off.

[16:04] Can I tell you, there are certain seas that God puts us in that he weighs us down with things. And then there's other times that when we come out of that, but we have to take off the very thing that built us.

[16:15] Can I tell you, just because you're carrying something right now don't mean you're always going to carry it. I'm just going to be real with you. There's some relationship, living for God, some relationships that are with you for a season, and then they're gone.

[16:28] There's some people, and there's jobs, and there's situations, and there's locations like this that God puts in places and moves us in. But we don't always stay with that. I want to know when I need it and when I need to let it go.

[16:41] I don't want to hold on to a weight because it's a badge of honor, but I want to know when I've got to let that go and run the race that God wanted me to run. I don't know who I'm preaching to right now, but there's a season coming where the weight's going to come off, and God's going to put you in a place to run.

[16:58] No wonder even Jesus would even say, Matthew 16 and 24, he said, then said, Jesus unto his disciples, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.

[17:14] Mark 8 and 34, he said, when he had called the people unto him with the disciples, also he said unto them, whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

[17:26] Mark 10 and 21, then Jesus beholding him, loved him, and said unto him, one thing thou lackest, go thy way, sell whatever thou hast, give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come, and take up the cross, and follow me.

[17:41] Into your New Testament even more, Ephesians 6 and 11 says, put on the whole armor of God. Talking about weight, that ye may be able to withstand against the wiles of the devil, and for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, spiritual weakness in high places.

[18:01] Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand, stand therefore. Having your loins girt about with truth, having on the breastplate of righteousness, and your feet shod with the preparation of peace, and above all, taking the shield of faith.

[18:18] What he said is, all of this stuff, there is a spiritual weight, too. Preparation of the gospel of peace, above all, taking the shield of faith, where ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked, and take the helmet of salvation.

[18:30] The sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. Praying always, with all prayer and supplication of the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints.

[18:42] So obviously, there is a perfect weight. So studying through this, I begin to ask myself the question, God, what is the perfect weight?

[18:53] What do you, I understand that it's you. I understand that you are that perfect weight, but give me a type and shadow to work with here, and this is where I was led to, and this is what I can tell you.

[19:05] A perfect weight that we would put in our mind would be a counterweight. A counterweight is a weight that, by applying an opposite force, provides balance and stability of a mechanical system.

[19:20] The purpose of the counterweight is to make lifting the load faster and more efficient, which saves energy and causes less wear and tear on the one lifting.

[19:34] What do you say it is, even in first responding and being in law enforcement, that background that I served in, I remember so many times, rescue things and all of this stuff, fire trucks would pull up, and we would have wrecks and ditches and over little cliffs and things or buildings on fire, what have you.

[19:53] It didn't matter the circumstance. When the emergency teams would pull up, they got the big trucks out, and they got to doing all their stuff, but the first thing they'd done, as pastor, was they started putting out weights, and they started stabilizing this thing.

[20:08] Because they knew, before I can reach 30 foot with a ladder that way, something has to be stabilizing me on this end.

[20:20] Something, what do you say, is before I can reach my world, I've got to make sure I've got something stabilizing me. Maybe you're in this house today.

[20:31] Can I tell you, you've got to have a weight in your life. You've got to have a perfect and a just weight. You've got to have a God that is behind you and standing in the middle of where you are and saying, before I can save my family, I've got to have something in my life grounding me.

[20:48] Before I can be a better preacher, I've got to have a God that's grounding me. God's not worried about anybody that's anointed. God's worried about, or the devil's not worried about anybody that's anointed.

[21:00] The devil's worried about somebody that's grounded. Because when there's something anchoring you to God, there's nothing that can deter you. I'm preaching to this church. Thank God for a pastor and a family that is grounded in the word of God.

[21:14] It was back 20, 2023 now, probably, I think, years ago and move real fast now.

[21:31] And I was in a deer stand in Freer, Texas. The other side of San Antonio. I was in a deer stand in Freer, Texas, and hunting with more preachers. And my phone went to ringing.

[21:42] It was right at prime time. And my brother was calling me. And he said, you've got to get home. I'm like, what are you talking about?

[21:53] Get home. I'm on a deer stand. He said, Dad, just got airlifted. He had an accident. You've got to get to the house. And so I'm 11 hours home.

[22:06] So I jumped down out of the tree and ran to my truck and throwed my bow and everything I had with me in the back seat. I didn't even stop at the camp. I just drove straight, started driving straight toward Louisiana.

[22:19] And he had been recently, in 2023, they had had the opportunity. It was a God thing, blessing for them.

[22:30] But they had had an opportunity to buy 15 acres of land on the lakefront. It was all lakefront property, 15 acres. Had an older house on it. And they had been trying to remodel some of that and fix it up.

[22:43] And the bank of the lake there, it was pretty dropped off. It was about 28, 30 feet down to the water level. And it just needed dressing up.

[22:55] And so Dad had brought in a bunch of dirt and had took his tractor. And for several days, he had been working, dumping dirt over on the side of the bank to build it up and make it pretty and make Mama happy.

[23:09] Amen. And so that evening, he was doing this. And he had worked all day long, but he had got close to the house. And it wasn't much room behind the house to the bank of the water.

[23:23] Maybe just a few feet. Not much there. And so he decided that, I'm going to take the bush hog off the tractor.

[23:34] Which is about an eight-foot bush hog cutter, mower behind the tractor. And he went back to his shed and shop and he took that off. And he come back and got another big bucket front end loader, big bucket load of dirt.

[23:49] And come back to behind the house. And he got into the area that he wanted to get to. But the cost of that was, is he lost his counterweight.

[24:03] And so when he took this big load of dirt and began to dump it over the edge of that bank embankment there, you already know what happened. The back wheels come up and they just kept coming up.

[24:15] And he went head first over that bank with the tractor. Landed 30 feet, the bottom. Big deal. Air lifted him. He stayed in rehab for almost three months to get to walk again and different problems.

[24:29] He's like a cat with nine lives. But he's okay now. But it was, and he'll tell you, he said, I did not even think when I went back to the shop and I pulled that mower off the back.

[24:47] I drove right back out and hooked the, got the dirt and come right back. He said, it didn't even dawn on me that the whole reason I could do everything I had done was because I had something behind me that seemed to be a hindrance when I wanted to get right there.

[25:06] It was just a few more feet. But he took the bush hog off to just go maybe 10 more feet. And it cost him almost his life.

[25:17] What are you saying? Is in our personal lives. I don't know if you want to call this devotion or preaching, whatever. But I feel like that it's important that every one of us, it don't matter where I want to get to.

[25:31] If I have to let go of God and what's grounding me and weighing me back, it's not worth going there. I'm talking to us personally.

[25:43] I'm not talking to us corporately right now. I'm talking to us personally in our own lives. If I've got to have that relationship, but I've got to let go of God to do it, I don't need it. If I, if I, and I'll talk, if I've got to go into that area, but God's not approving of it.

[25:58] I'm, it's not worth losing. It don't matter how great the mission is. I mean, I watched them guys with them fire department trucks pull up and like we knew the person in the ditch was fixing to die.

[26:10] If they didn't get down there and stop something. But they took their time. Because what good am I saving somebody if I'm putting my own self at risk?

[26:31] Now we got two people in the hall. And so my, my, my, my, my point today is this. The perfect weight is Jesus.

[26:44] I don't know where you are in your life today. I don't know what you've been going through, but I do know this. I need the perfect weight in my life. I need Jesus at the center of my world.

[26:57] No wonder David would say in first Samuel 17 and 45, this is what David said to the man that was 10 feet tall and 400 pounds. And he named all the weights. Thou comest to me with a sword, the spear, the shield.

[27:10] David said, I come to thee. With one thing. Jesus. I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God.

[27:22] The armies of Israel whom thou hast to fight. With confidence. You can have all, take this whole world. But give me Jesus. I can kill giants with God.

[27:35] Would we lift up our hands right now all over this place? Have your way right now, God. Help us, Jesus. Strengthen us, God. Help us to keep you first. Help us, God, to keep you at the center.

[27:47] Why don't we stand all over this house right now? Come on, I feel the Holy Ghost trying to help us. If they sit, whatever they feel, if they want to, we close. Let's do that right now.

[27:58] But come on, I wonder if we could just pray for a few minutes. God, help me to keep you at the center of my world. Help me to keep you at the center of my life. Help me, God, to keep you at the center of my ministry. The center of my marriage.

[28:09] The center with my kids, God. At my job, God. I need you at the center of it, God. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus.

[28:20] You're worthy to be praised. Come on, let's pray as pastor comes right now.