God is about to narrow things down in your life

In this message, Melissa encourages listeners to not be afraid and to always seek God. She uses the story of Gideon from the book of Judges to illustrate this point. Gideon was hiding in fear, but the angel of the Lord appeared to him and called him a mighty man of valor. Despite Gideon's doubts, God assured him that He would be with him and that he would defeat the enemy. Melissa emphasizes that God is always with us, even in our fears and struggles, and that we are called to be mighty men and women of valor. She ends the message by inviting listeners to accept Jesus into their lives and to start reading the Gospels to understand His love and sacrifice. Good morning, everyone. It is 10 a.m., October 18, 2023, and your sister Melissa is back with another message from the Lord. This message is going to encourage you to not be afraid, to always seek God, and to know that when God is fighting your battles for you, it is because He is and always will win every single battle we face. When we leave every battle in the hands of God, we are sure to come out with a victory. I'm excited because the Word of God today comes from the book of Judges, chapter 6, starting with verse 11, and here we go. The Word of God says, Now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the turban of a tree, which was an oprah, which belonged to Joash the Abesarite, while his son Gideon threshed wheat in the winepress in order to hide from the Midianites. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, The Lord is with you, you mighty man of the Lord. Gideon said to him, O my Lord, if the Lord is with us, then why has all this happened to us? And where are all the miracles which our fathers told us about? Saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. Then the Lord turned to him and said, Go in this might of yours. You shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites. Have I not sent you? So he said to him, O my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house. And the Lord said to him, Surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man. Father God, in this moment, I thank you. I thank you because your goodness and your grace follows us all the days of our lives. I thank you, Lord, Father God, because even though we must go through certain things in this life, we are not without hope. We are not without love. We are surrounded by your presence daily. You are the reason why, Father God, we are able to get up each morning and declare the goodness of your name, because you are faithful. When we are faithless, you are faithful. When we cannot, you can, Lord. And so I declare that everyone, Lord Father God, who hears this podcast, that you will touch their hearts and draw them near to your presence, Lord, so they may know that you are the God who saves, you are the God who restores, and you are the God who makes all things new. I pray this in Jesus' mighty name. Amen. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. So as I was reading here in the book of Judges chapter 6, starting with verse 11, we see that the angel of the Lord came and sat under the turban of tree in Ophrah. Okay? And we see that he just comes and sits under the tree. The Bible doesn't say that he sat under the tree and then made himself manifest quickly. No. The Bible says that the angel of the Lord came and sat down under the turban of tree. Then we see here that Gideon is threshing wheat in the winepress. So this only means that the angel of the Lord who was sitting under the turban of tree, he was watching as Gideon was threshing wheat in the winepress. So the Bible says, and the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, the Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor. Hallelujah. This can only mean one thing, that the angel of the Lord sat under the turban of tree watching as Gideon in and out of fear was threshing wheat in the winepress. And so when he saw this, he decided to manifest himself and to come and say to Gideon, the Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor. And the reason why the angel of the Lord decided to disguise himself in the beginning was because he wanted Gideon, hallelujah, to not see him in that moment that he appeared under the turban of tree. So that when he did appear, he would say to Gideon that you are a mighty man of valor. And I want you to know that God is with you even in the winepress where you are and have been threshing wheat. Come on now somebody, how many of us out of fear from the enemy have gone into secret places and instead of going and doing what God has called us to do, and that is to be mighty men and mighty women of valor, we tend to hide in the very place where we are not supposed to be and what should be done should be done in the open. But out of fear we begin to hide and to do everything hiding when God wants us to go out and he wants us to preach the gospel and he wants us to speak with boldness and he wants us to know and understand that he is watching us every single moment. He knows what we are doing, he knows what we are saying, he knows what we are going through and he will sit there in disguise and not manifest himself until the time comes when even though we've been in that place for far too long, he will come and he will always speak truth into our spirits because that is who our God is. Hallelujah. And so we see here that when Gideon was threshing wheat in the wine press and the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said, you mighty men of valor, the Lord is with you. Gideon says to him, oh my Lord, if the Lord is with us, then why are all these things happening to us? And where are all his miracles which our fathers told us about, saying, did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. Let us get one thing straight. When God spoke to Gideon, Gideon made it seem like God was talking to everybody in that conversation. But God said to him, the Lord is with you, you mighty men of valor. So why does Gideon come and say, if the Lord is with us, when God was saying it singular, then he wasn't saying it plural. He was saying that I am with you and I am going to use you because just like you're hiding in the wine press threshing wheat out of fear, there's something I'm going to do so that in the end, you will know that I am the God who saves, I am the God who rescues. But just like you're in the wine press in fear, I'm going to have to give you an army of 32, but I'm going to narrow it down to 300, because the same way Gideon went in is the same way Gideon was going to come out. Because for fear of the Midianites, God was going to show Gideon that this has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with trusting in the one true living God, that although we are sinners, although we fail, although we sin against God and we try to hide, God calls us from whom he formed us to be, and that is mighty men and women of valor. So God is saying to us today, I'm calling you out of the wine press, and I'm telling you that you are a mighty woman, a mighty man of valor, and I am with you, and I am going to lift you up and even though it may seem like you have nothing, and even though it seems like you may have few, or from the much that you may be had, I am going to allow you to see my hand working in all of this. And when I get through, you are going to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I don't need an army to defeat the enemy, because he's already defeated by one man, and that one man is Jesus Christ. Hallelujah, who conquered the grave for all. Hallelujah, who comes to the knowledge of the cross and repents of their sins and believes in the crucifixion of Christ and the resurrection of Christ. Nature will have, hallelujah, eternal life in Jesus Christ. Hallelujah, and we notice here at the end that the angel of the Lord, he turns to him and he says, go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the hands of the Midianites. Have I not sent you? And in the end, the angel of the Lord says, and the Lord said to him, meaning Gideon, surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man. Come on, this is none other than Jesus Christ. One man, hallelujah, defeated Satan at the cross. Hallelujah, and if God says to us today, I need you to rise up from where you are, because I am about to use you, and you're not going to have to fight, because where you are right now, I am going to take you out, and whatever you think you have, whatever you think you're going to win the war with, you can just toss it aside, because I'm about to narrow things down, but it's so that my name will be glorified in the end, hallelujah. You don't have to fear the enemy. All you have to do is trust that God has already declared over your life and over my life that we are great women and men of valor in the hands of God Almighty. I pray that this message has blessed you, and I also cannot leave this podcast without inviting you to be a part of the kingdom of God. It is only a prayer away, and when we release our lives, and we open our hearts to the Creator, and we receive Jesus into our hearts, we become a new creature in Christ Jesus, and we no longer have to walk in fear, but we can walk knowing that Jesus paved the way for us to inherit salvation, and here on this earth, we can experience the kingdom of God. So repeat after me, Jesus, I come to you in this moment. I open my heart, and I make you Lord and Savior of my life. I understand fully that I have sinned against you, and only against you, and I need you to wash me clean in your blood. I need you to transform my life, because I believe that over 2,000 years ago, you died on Calvary's cross to save my life, and to give me eternal salvation into the kingdom of heaven, and so Father, I thank you for making me a child of God. From here on out, I will follow you, and believe that my name is written in the Lamb's book of life. In Jesus' name, amen. If you said that prayer, welcome to the family of God. I pray that this has blessed you immensely, and I also want to encourage you to start reading the books of the gospel in the New Testament in the Bible, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. This will help you to get closer to Jesus, and know and fully understand just how much Jesus truly loves you, and what he went through just to fully rescue you, and give you eternal life. Until the next time, bye-bye for today.