Running Through the Paper Wall

Carter Conlon from the historic Times Square Church in New York City. The devil stands at the end of your corridor with a magic marker, and he starts writing on your paper wall. What does he write on your paper wall? You're not strong enough. You're not smart enough. You're a loser.

You've always been a loser. But it's still only paper. That's all it is. There is nothing the devil can put before you that can stop you from being what God's called you to be. Welcome to A Call to the Nation with Pastor Carter Conlon from Times Square Church in New York City. In today's message titled, Running Through the Paper Wall, Carter asks the question, what has the devil written on your paper wall? But in your heart, you know what he writes there is not true.

In your heart, you know the victory is yours. Let's discover more about this important revelation as we join Carter now. Hebrews chapter 12, please, if you'll turn there with me, and you might want to put a marker in your Bible in Psalm 18 as well. Hebrews chapter 12, beginning at verse 1. Therefore, we all, Saul, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him who endured such hostility from sinners against himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. Now, the scripture speaks of a great race that each of us are called to run.

Every one of us, every person here, listen to me. When you came to Christ, and he became your Lord and Savior, the Bible says that God's Holy Spirit came to dwell inside your physical body, and you became the temple of the living God. And at the moment that your name was written down in his book of life, a divine purpose that God had ordained for your life started to be enacted. You were born again by the Spirit of God. The old things in your life that governed you, the old things that hindered you, the old things that blinded you, have all passed away. And now by the Spirit of Almighty God, you have become new. That means you have a new path, you have new strength, you have new thoughts, you have a new heart, you have a new mind. If you are in Christ and Christ is in you, the old things are passed away. They've lost their hold. They've come to an end.

The old defeats, the old boundaries, everything is gone. And a new life of supernatural possibility has opened up, a life that through whom God says, I'm going to glorify my name on the earth through you. That is your purpose on the earth. That is why you're here.

That is why I am here. That is why the Church of Jesus Christ is still here. We are to be an irrefutable living testimony of the reality of God's heart that sent his son to a cross for all of humanity. We're to live in such a way that the breath of people technically is taken away when they hear us speak and they watch how we live. And they see the strength that we have, especially now in this darkened day in which we're living. In a day when morality is falling and failing, civility is quickly becoming a thing relegated to the past. In a day when family breakups are becoming common and teenagers are leaving for their vacations and living in debauchery. In a day when evil has become good and good has become evil.

Unthinkable crimes are almost a daily occurrence now in the news to the point where they don't even make the front page anymore. It's imperative that you and I run this race now set before us. Each person has to run the race. Every one of us. Yes, we're running it together.

It's like a marathon. But I have my part to play and you have your part. And mine is not greater than yours and yours is not greater than mine. We're all called to glorify the name of Jesus Christ by letting him be who he is within us. Jesus made a way for us to run this race.

Consider him. He won the victory. He triumphed over evil.

And possibility became possible because of his victory and resurrection. The devil lost his power. Weakness had to give way to strength, darkness to light, confusion to divine order. An aimless wandering path that you may have been on suddenly was broken. And now there is a clear path that God knows and will reveal it to you and I if we really want to know it.

Usually that path looks impossible in the natural. And indeed in the natural it is that means by our own natural strength, it could never be accomplished. But God never called us to do it in our own strength. He called us to be simply the vessels through whom he will carry his own name to glory. All he requires of you and I is a willingness to believe him. That's all he's ever required of his people throughout the testimony of scripture. Scripture tells us in Hebrews 12 one that there's a countless number of witnesses who have gone before us.

And if you pictured yourself in the stadium today, these are the people in the upper tiers, the upper balconies, the higher parts of the stadium. They see now what we fully don't. They understand things that we have to believe and trust by faith. But I can hear them calling out to us, the saints of all the ages, all since not only from before Christ, but those who have come after, who have gone through battle, they've gone through flood, they've gone through fire, they've known the triumph of God. And now they see the full picture of who God is and what he's able to do. And the scripture says this great cloud of witnesses is around us.

I don't know how that really works. I know that there's a testimony of how God brought them through to victory. But these people are still alive. Don't forget, they're not dead. They're very, very much alive. And I don't know if they can see planet Earth and what we are doing.

But if they could, they'd be up in that upper balcony. And they would be encouraging us to run. Don't stop, don't give up. You have a great call of God on your life. Don't give in to the lies of the enemy. Don't give in to the strategies of evil. Don't give in to the threatenings of darkness. Don't be silent in a time when God has put the power of speaking his words into your voice. Don't cower under the darkness of this world, which is soon to pass away.

Remember everyone who threatens you, everyone who threatens the testimony of God in you, one day their knee will bow and their tongue will confess also that Jesus Christ is Lord. We know these things, but it's hard to run this race. It's hard for all of us. I have days that are tough, even though I know all this. I know all the scripture.

I know the history, but there's still hard days, still difficult days that all of us have. I want you to consider King David for a moment. This man is appointed by God to be a king and to be a ruler. Picture for a moment, David being called into his father's house and the prophet Samuel, a great and feared prophet in that generation is standing in his father's house. And when he walks in, Samuel looks upon him with the eyes of God as only God can look upon a person and calls him over to his side and uncaps the flask of oil that he was carrying that David would have known represented that holy setting apart for the purposes of God. And Samuel poured that oil on his head. It would have run down his garments right to his feet and obviously spoke words to him about his future, that he was the man that God, at this point he's a boy, but he's the one that God had seen and had appointed to lead his people Israel.

How incredible that must have been. And then just from that moment where that promise came into his heart to be sent out to look after his father's sheep again. And you and I come into the house of God and there are times that God begins to speak to our hearts. These are whispers of God. Sometimes they're the shoutings of God. And he begins to tell us he wants to do something through our lives, but in our present condition it looks so preposterous, it's so out of reach.

How could this be? Well, it can't be apart from him. There has to be a measure of rest in my heart and in your heart that says, God, if this is going to be, then you're going to have to do it.

I can't do it. There's no way David could have been king. There would have to be a whole journey ahead of him and it would have to be a sovereign journey, a supernatural journey. And I can see David now leaving that place of anointing and going out and back to his father's sheep and suddenly a lion comes into this little flock of sheep he's protecting and grabs a lamb in its mouth. And for the first time in his life, he knows something he never knew before. The Holy Spirit comes on him and he's given the power to do something that he could not do in his own strength. How stunning it must have been, that hidden victory as it was.

It was not a public. Nobody would have known if he wouldn't have told anybody. But the ability God gave him to grab a lion by its mane technically and kill it with only a slingshot in his hand. The same thing happened when a bear came against him. And then later on, he was sent by his father into the camp when Israel was in a battle with the Philistines and he heard a giant called Goliath step out and mock the armies of God and the testimony of God. And that same Holy Spirit came on him again. And with the courage that only could be given by God and that divine enablement of God, he headed down into that valley armed with what looked to be stupidity in the sight of a natural world that lives by its natural strength and its natural wisdom. And he won a marvelous victory.

It must have looked at that point that it was just going to be up and up all the way only to find himself at a certain point in his life pursued. How many of you know that feeling? You started out and there were victories won and you know that God is with you because you couldn't have won them without God. Certain things in your life that were broken, bondages were broken.

Relationships God gave you the power to walk away from. He gave you the power to be honest when everyone else was not telling the truth about certain things. And he gave you the power to stand in the midst of all this and it looked like, wow, this promise can't be that far away from my life and start to really believe that there is a supernatural call of God in my life. I am going to amount to something for his glory only to find himself in a place where he's being pursued like a partridge in the mountains, as he said, where he has no strength anymore.

He doesn't know what to do. In Psalm 18, let me just read it to you. Verse four, he starts out by saying the pangs of death surrounded me. In other words, my own inability to finish what I felt called to do was in every direction that I looked. I couldn't see a way out. I couldn't see a way forward. I didn't know how this thing in my life was ever going to be accomplished.

And he goes on and says in the floods of ungodliness made me afraid. In other words, there was so much opposition that I was afraid that I could not ever overcome it. And that's something people are starting to feel in this generation. How in the world are we ever going to be a testimony? The opposition is building and increasing so powerfully, so strongly. It seems to be on every side.

It's been emboldened like we've never seen in our lifetime. How will this call of God in my life, this promise ever be fulfilled? In Psalm 18 verse five, he says the sorrows of Shale surrounded me. In other words, the hopelessness of what I perceived my situation to be began to overwhelm me. It felt hopeless. Have you ever been there where it just feels hopeless? It's hopeless and you start to entertain the lies of unbelief.

He says in the second half of verse five, the snares of death confronted me. I was brought in other words to a standstill. I felt trapped. What was I to do?

I didn't know how to go forward from here. Now you and I know that at some point historically David, when he was faced with this situation, he abandoned the testimony of that which he already knew. He abandoned it. He walked away. He started in the supernatural, but he turned to his natural reasoning. He tried to craft a plan to save himself. He forgot about the lion, the bear, Samuel and Goliath.

And he ran in another direction. In first Samuel 27 verses one and two, here's what David said. And David said in his heart, now I shall perish someday by the hand of Saul. False reasoning.

That wasn't true. Remember the promise of God is that he was going to be the next ruler of Israel. There's nothing better for me than I should speedily escape to the land of the Philistines. You see, David started out by running a race that he was convinced in his heart would bring honor to the name of God. I know for sure that's true because when he faced Goliath, he was inwardly enraged that the name of God was being held in such poor reputation by allowing this man to speak the things that he was speaking. And so at that point in his life, he ran down into the valley with weaponry that looked to be foolish to face a giant because in his heart, he was saying the name of God has to be honored. And there had to be something inside of him that knew this calling that was on his life. Not fully understanding it, none of us really do, but knowing that there is a calling.

There's something God has given me to do to glorify his name. It's hard to fathom that this young man at a certain point in his life is now running in another direction. And for those who have seen a football game, I've seen a few, they come out of the dressing room and they've been trained and they've been taught and they've practiced and they have their armor on and they're coming up with confidence and they come down a long corridor and there's cement walls on either side and at the end of the corridor, there's a paper wall. And at the beginning of an NFL game and college games, they have to break through that paper wall and they can't see the field until they get through the paper wall. Can you just imagine how incredulous it would be if an NFL team came out of their dressing room, they're coming into the end of the season as it is, and they're running with confidence down this corridor as we do when you run out of this church today and you go out into the lobby and you head out into the streets and you run down the corridor and stop at the paper wall.

Don't believe somehow that it can be breached. How foolish that would look. And we would be crying from the balcony.

It's only paper. But they stop like Keystone cops all banging into each other and look at the paper wall and they somehow get it in their minds, I can't get through this. Imagine if you were in the crowd, if you had tickets to the Super Bowl and one of the New York teams happened to be there. Can you imagine if you're in the crowd and you watched your home team coming out of the dressing room and they all stopped at the paper wall in unbelief.

Can you imagine how you'd be shouting, go forward, go forward. Just like in Hebrews 12 one, we have a great cloud of witnesses that that know that the victory is ours, that know that whatever the devil says before us is only paper. It can't stop us. So you and I have the witness of scripture now and the witness of history. And we read Numbers 13, for example, where the people of God having come out of Egypt, having seen the miracles of the parting of the Red Sea, God sovereignly leading them to the shores of the sea.

And they suddenly stop at the very border of the promised land before them is a paper wall. We know the history. We're here later than they were.

And if we could shout to them down through history, we'd say, go, it's yours. The defenses have departed from them. They will oppose you, but they will not overcome you. But you can see the people of God standing at their own paper wall at the very shores of the promised land, saying we are not able. They are stronger. We are puny. They are giants. And they didn't go in.

They forfeited the race and they lived in the wilderness instead for the rest of their lives. And when people don't go in, I want you to hear me on this when you don't go in to the plan of God for your life, you will live in the wilderness all of your days. Heaven may be your home at the end of your journey, but you will not know the miracle power of God.

You will never know the satisfaction of walking with him through places that only he could carry you. You'll go from church to church throughout New York City or whatever state you happen to be from. You will blame the preachers. You'll blame the choirs.

You'll blame the people. But the reality is you wouldn't go through your own paper wall. You wouldn't walk in that place of the miraculous that God had set before you. And so the question that God put on my heart for you is what has the devil written on your paper wall?

What is he written there? Because you come running out of this church and in your heart, you know it's true. In your heart you know you're more than a conqueror. In your heart you know that the victory is yours. You know it. There is no doubt about it in your heart whatsoever. And so you come running down that corridor of faith, getting ready to go into that stadium where there's great battle for the souls of men and for the glory of God is waged in every generation. And the devil stands at the end of your corridor with a magic marker and he starts writing on your paper wall.

And what does he write on your paper wall? You're not strong enough. You're not smart enough. You're a loser.

You've always been a loser. You'll never be anything other than what your father was, your mother was. In some people's walls he just draws bricks and makes it look like a brick wall.

But it's still only paper. That's all it is. There is nothing the devil can put before you that can stop you from being what God's called you to be. Nothing. Hallelujah.

But he will write these things on your wall and he will do everything in his power to get you to agree with it. Even though there's this shout coming from the upper tiers of the stadium, you can't see the people there yet, but you can somehow hear it in the distance. There's one crowd on the lower tiers, the hometown crowd, may I call it that, of the unregenerate.

They seem to have the best seats and they seem to have all of the power and they're telling you to stay behind your paper wall. Don't come out. Don't challenge us. You don't have the strength.

You don't have the power. But above them, there's another crowd. Above them are those who have faced the same taunts throughout history, but they have found them to be false and powerless and they're telling you and I, go through that paper wall, go through whatever you have to go through. Don't stop at this place of unbelief. And no matter what the devil writes on your wall, he's a liar. He's the father of lies. All he knows how to do is lie. All he can write is lies. And his only power over you is to get you to walk in agreement with him. I believe that's why Jesus said, agree with your adversary when you're in the way lest he cast you into prison. Agree with him.

And just so agree with him. He writes on your wall. Yes, I am weak. Yes, my father was a drunk if that's the case.

Yes, I do come from a dysfunctional family. Yes, I don't have any connections anywhere. I have no money, no resources. I have no power. But I'm going to tell you what I do have. I have the living God living inside of this vessel. I have a promise of new life. The Bible tells me that I can condemn your tongue, Satan, and you have no power over me any longer.

You can't stop me. Whatever God has called me to be. That's what I'm going to be. Whatever he's asked me to do.

That's what I'm going to do. Listen to the words of the Apostle Paul and first Corinthians chapter one, verse 26 to the end. For you see your calling brethren.

You see your calling. Not many wise according to the flesh. Not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise. And God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty and the base things of the world and things which are despised. God has chosen and the things which are nothing or not to bring to nothing the things that are that no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are you in Christ Jesus who became for us wisdom from God and righteousness and sanctification and redemption as it is written, he who glories, let him glory in the Lord. You see your calling brethren. Let the devil write on your paper wall anything he wants. But he's not keeping us out of this end time game.

There is no way. Not only are we going in, we're going into fight, we're going in to win. Why we're going in believing God every word he's told us everything he's trained and taught us to do we will do. Remember, we started with David when he said the pangs of death surrounded me the floods of ungodliness made me afraid. The sorrows of shale surrounded me and the snares of death confronted me. Now David could have stayed there.

And yes, he did take a detour. And it did bring distress into his heart. But he says in verse six of Psalm 18, in my distress, I called upon the Lord and cried out to my God. And he heard my voice from his temple. And my cry came before him even into his ears.

In my distress I cried out to God. It's time for all of us to put on the armor of God and head down that corridor and breach that paper wall. Because until you go through the paper wall, you can't even see the arena.

You don't even know what the game's about. You don't even know what it looks like because you're still behind a paper wall. It's time to breach that paper wall. And whatever the devil wrote on it, whatever it is that stops you from becoming everything that God has called you to be. It's time to get up as David said, by God I can run through it. Go through that paper wall. Go through whatever you have to go through.

Don't stop at this place of unbelief. Thank you for joining us this week for A Call to the Nation with Carter Conlon from Times Square Church in New York City. For more information, log on to tsc.nyc. That's tsc.nyc. You can count on a powerful message each week on A Call to the Nation with Carter Conlon.