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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Carlos Moretta

The Secret to Power

They tell me that we're going to be challenged with acoustics this morning, which you can hear me, right?

I didn't know I was going to be on camera this morning.

We're celebrating in our household, amen?

It's been a long road, but God is faithful.

And so the week went on with some discouraging news.

But as the week went on, I had a few emergencies during the middle of the night.

I had to go help a friend from bleeding out to death that I had operated on.

And it was pretty scary, but God blessed, and he's okay.

And Angie had asked me to prepare kind of a message.

Most of you know that my wife and I will be moving on to Ohio in a couple weeks.

And it's kind of like she's going, but I'm kind of staying because I don't have my license.

So if I say that I'm leaving and you'll never see me again, and then you see me the following Sabbath and the following Sabbath and you're like, Carlos, weren't you leaving?

It's because I'm waiting for my license in Ohio.

So don't be surprised if you see me here over and over again.

But I'd like to think that when I speak to you this morning, among other things, that I'm among family, right?

And she asked me to share with you kind of my experience here at Advent Hope.

And I said, well, you know, I don't have that smashing conversion experience that just ransacks you and leaves you, you know, dumbfounded in your seat.

But I probably have 1 that most of you can identify with.

And so I hope that what I share with you this morning resonates with you.

You didn't think I was going to move around that much, did you?

I'm going to keep you working, Ed, this morning.

I want to have a word of prayer first, if you'd bow your heads with me.

Father in heaven, this morning, my emotions are so wiped out over the last week that I didn't even muster up enough emotion to be nervous about this moment.

Lord, but I pray that as I present what you very quickly put on my heart to present, that the name of Jesus Christ should be lifted.

Turn with me in your Bibles to Psalm 119.

Now generally when I speak, I'm a very practical Christianity type of a speaker.

And so an in-depth Bible study is probably not what you're gonna get this morning.

But that's all right because I know most of you are starting your own Bible studies.

Today I'm going to share with you my experience and what I have learned in Advent Hope over the past few years.

Psalm 119 verse 9 says, Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking or thereto according to thy word.

Faith I live by, chapter 18, verse 2, or page 18, second paragraph, It says, It is 1 thing to treat the Bible as a book of good moral instruction, to be heeded so far as is consistent with the spirit of the times and our position in the world.

It is another thing to regard it as it really is, the word of the living God, the word that is our life, the word that is to mold our actions, our words, and our thoughts.

To hold God's word to Anything less than this is to reject it.

I don't know if you heard that last part.

It says, to hold God's Word, anything less than this is to reject it.

How many of you guys reject the Bible as the Word of God?

That's 1 of those rhetorical questions that in your head you know the real answer.

Because If we're honest, we're rejecting every day.

Now, it shouldn't be any surprise to you that the enemy's modus operandi these days seeks to distract you from the Word of God.

These days the devil has more devices than ever to draw away souls from the only book that reveals God's will to you for your life.

God's plan for your life is revealed in the Bible.

I'm not standing here before you today as someone who's got it worked out.

Just sharing with you as family what I struggle with.

Psalm 119 Verse 11 says, Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not, what?

I remember when I was in the fourth grade.

Fourth grade, I had a teacher, her name was Jackie Collins Martinez.

She's the 1 that taught me long division.

So you know, if you're going to teach a kid long division, you've got to be a little bit hard.

She also had a little thing that she did on the side, and that was that she had all of her students, second, third, and fourth grade participate in a scripture choir.

And so what we would do is we would stand up in front of the church in 3 rows and we would recite volumes of scripture.

Volumes, like to this day, the cadence that we had, I still identify when I read the Bible.

Revelation 21, The whole chapter, boom, boom, the cadence is all there.

And wouldn't you know that the parents of all of us got together and had her stop doing what she was doing, because we were acting like little robots.

And God doesn't want robots in his service.

It shouldn't surprise you that the Word of God is under attack.

To this day, I'm not kidding, the cadence, the scriptures are locked in here.

So David said, hid in my heart that I might not sin.

Now we know that with sin comes separation, and with separation, death.

God showed us this principle and how to deal with it, with what?

What concept in the Bible, what establishment in the Bible did God show us in the Bible how to deal with sin?

And growing up, I've often tried, as probably many of you have, to eliminate sinful behaviors from my own life.

Instead of just going to God's Word, I just tried ceasing the behavior instead of reading what God had for me.

Is it just me or have you noticed this as well, that when you're immersing yourself in spiritual things daily, such as God's Word, you tend to avoid cherished sinful habits.

You find that like when you're going to the gym to lose a few pounds and you're putting in that effort and you're sweating and it hurts and all that, you think twice about eating that food that you know is going to kind of counter rest your effort, right?

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The Secret to Power

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