Welcome to the Kerwin Baptist Church broadcast today. Our desire is for the Word of God to be spread throughout the world, so that all may know Christ. Join us now for a portion of one of our services here at Kerwin Baptist Church, located in Kernersville, North Carolina. Look here in Colossians chapter one. We're going to start off with verse number nine.
Look what it says. Paul is talking here to the church. Actually, the church. I believe it's the church of Colossae. And here's what he's saying.
He says, "For this cause also, we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you." And look at these next words right here. Here's the key key word is and to. Here it is. Desire. That she might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom, and spiritual understanding; that she might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might according to his Glorious power.
Notice the word, His glorious power, unto all patience and long suffering, with joyfulness, giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. I want to just speak on this thought just for a little while tonight. On the thought is, I have a desire. I have a desire.
Now I'm going to tell you something. I turned, uh, sixty when I turned sixty-six years old. Everyone, all my preacher friends and people we saw across the country said, "When are you going to retire?" Those are the magic words. When are you going to retire? And I said, "I don't have any plans on retiring ever in my life." Now I understand how some things can be different.
You've worked in a factory, and or you've worked on a particular a skill for your life, and it finally gets to that point where you can retire. And by the way, y'all don't know this, but a lot of people who are retired are busier now than they've ever been in their life. Yeah, I hear it. I hear y'all going, "Yeah, that's right." You need tell my wife that. But anyway.
And it's a fact that that that all comes about. But I get asked that question all the time: When are you going to retire? When are y'all going to settle down? When are you going to travel less? When are you going to stop doing what you?
And I keep telling them this: Listen, I don't see retire in the Word of God. I don't see that in there. And and let me even go this much farther. Not only do I not see it in there, but in my heart, the desire to serve the Lord is stronger than it's ever been before in my life. I have a desire.
I have a desire.
Paul saw what was going on in the church here in Colossi. Actually, a mysticism had kind of moved into the church, and when that had moved into the church, Paul was concerned about that and wrote this letter. And he he wanted them to eliminate that. And what he did is he wanted the church to look at other things that are more important than the things that they were doing. Look what it says for this also.
For this also, we also since the day we heard it do not cease to pray pray for you and to desire. Look what it says: desire to be what filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Every time I read that, I think to myself, you know, we'd have a whole lot less church splits if if if those that are part of a a good Bible believing gospel preaching church would have a desire to do those things right there and not try to get their own way all the time. Can I tell you some?
Some things aren't going to go in our direction all the time.
Some things aren't going to work out the way we think they ought to work out all the time. There's going to be times when there's going to be conflicts, and there's going to be issues, and there's going to be down times and difficult times. But I gotta tell you something: there are parts of this word that are all over the Word of God. It tells us to keep on desiring, to keep on going, to be filled with all wisdom and spiritual understanding. It goes on in verse number ten that you might walk.
Worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing. We were we were in Mississippi. We're in a little little town called Pickney, Mississippi. We're in Pickney, Mississippi. Man, I love those folks down there.
They're some of our dearest friends. But in that town is a church called United Baptist Church. And I got to think, and I wonder if United Baptist Church has ever had a split. I think about that all the time, because you know what? If you stick to the Word of God, and if you go by the principle of God's Word, and if you allow the Holy Spirit, as I said in Sunday school, if you allow the Holy Spirit to become more predominant in your life, everything changes.
Where you're no longer looking at everything you want, you start looking at what He wants to do with you. It's pretty amazing when God can do some things in us, and He does all the time. That you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.
Now that strength with all might, all might according to His glorious power.
Now keep this in mind. What happens with us if we're not careful? We'll get to the point where we'll see God start doing stuff through us, and we'll be like, "Wow." Did you see that? Those people came to church. Wasn't that wonderful?
I'm glad I invited those church those people to church. Oh my goodness! I got up, sang a solo, and oh man, did you see the people? They were tears running down their face, and man, it was such a blessing. And boy, I'm going so glad God used me for those type of things.
If we're not careful, some of those things will start going to our head. And we'll start thinking, boy. I'll tell you what that choir guy—he needs to go ahead and have me get up and sing that solo again, so people can be blessed again. Boy, I'll tell you what—they need to get me out there, inviting folks to church and put me on the welcoming committee. Because I'll tell you, when people come to church and they see me, boy, it makes a big difference in their lives.
Gotta tell you something: we are nothing without God. We are nothing. We are nobody without God. Every place we go, the McCluskeys get up and sing a song. Every chance we have, an opportunity to open up our mouths and sing a song like the promise, or sing a song like there's something about that name, or sing a song like Jesus never fails, and how awesome it is when you look around and you realize people are being blessed, but they're not being blessed because of you.
They're being blessed because. Because of the goodness of God in you, He's the one that makes it all happen. I get up every morning. I get up every Sunday morning, especially. Early, early in the morning, and I just get alone with God, and I got to have that time where yes, I'm looking over notes and I'm trying to get an idea of the direction we're supposed to go and what God wants us to do.
But can I tell you something? Every time I get up behind the pulpit, I'll tell the Lord, Lord, I can't do this without you. I don't want to even attempt to do it without you. I want you to use the McCluskeys in a way that's so supernatural we stop and look and see it ain't us, because that's the way God does it inside. And when we get to those desires in our life where we look and see what God can do inside of us, it changes our whole perspective because we can look and say, "Oh, but but but to God be the glory!" Great things He has done.
He's done great things. You know what I'll do? I got a prayer list. I pray every night, and sometimes I I pray at night. I pray just I pray just as I'm ready to go to bed.
Sometimes I begin to go through my prayer list and I fall asleep, and then I wake up at one or two or three or four o'clock in the morning, and I think I didn't get through my prayer list. And then I'll have somebody call up. I have a good friend of mine by the name of Brian Carter. Been praying for Brian Carter every day. He's got brain cancer.
I've been praying for for Brian. And I called him up. I said, "Hey Brian, I've been just thinking about you. Been praying for you. Pray for you every day, man.
How are things going?" And he said. Pat, I'm going to tell you something, man. God's just doing some wonderful things. I got good news. A lot of this is, a lot of these tumors are reducing and they're kind of going away, and things are kind kind of coming back.
Some things I can do again, and I'm just amazing. God's answering your prayers. You know what will happen? If I'm not careful, I'll start walking around thinking to myself, "I am something, man." I prayed for Brian every night. Brian needs to be thankful for me.
Because every night I pray for him, Brian. You need to be grateful for your friend Pat because he prayed. Hey, who do I think I am? But by the grace of God, we get to do anything. Let's not forget to do that when it comes to our desires.
Paul was concerned about the church. He was concerned about the mysticism, the strange things coming in. A lot of times, those strange things come into the church because what we do, we get full of pride. We think we're somebody. Relinquish those things and just trust in Him with some of the things that He does inside of us.
And then I love the last verse that says, "Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet together to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." I got to thinking, this is so simple. And it's. I'll try to make it as quick as I can. This is so practical, but I'm going to go through this tonight. There are three things that I desire.
Number one, I desire to see people come to Jesus as their Savior. I've been saved for 67 years, or 60 years. I've known Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior. I trusted him, and and and I mean, immediately I wanted to see people come to Christ. And then I began to see some things as we moved on through this journey.
It was kind of like somebody gets saved, and I go, "Oh, that's nice. Yeah, I'm so glad you got saved. That's good.
Okay, let's go to eat." And somebody would come up and give a testimony. Pat, I want you to meet so and so. Man, they trusted Christ, and I go, Oh, great! That's great! That's wonderful!
That's wonderful! What restaurant are we going to go to? And if we're not careful, what will happen? Is our desire to see people saved begins to diminish? Come on, you've been there.
He's go. I know what we're going to do. We're going to sit here and we're going to like this. Oh come on, brother! That never happens to me, man.
I mean, I'm thinking about it all the time. No, we're not.
Well, all of a sudden, God will in. We were in in New York City, just visiting, and we were down there by Wall Street, and it was amazing to me. But when we were down there by Wall Street, it was right around five o'clock, and all of a sudden, they let out. And all of these men with brief men with briefcases, ladies' briefcases, and suits were walking on out there. And I'm walking and going, "Oh, look!
Those must be all the guy with the stock exchange and all that kind of stuff on Wall Street." There, check it out and everything. And then all of a sudden, the Holy Spirit smote me, and He said, "A lot of those people don't know me as their personal Lord and Savior." And I began to look around that city. And I began to see all the people everywhere that didn't know Christ. They didn't have what you have. There are people all over this area, Winston Salem, here in Kernersville, all over the place that don't know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior.
Man, we need to have a desire to see people saved. Finally, got to the point in my life where I remember we were in a church in Maryland, and all of a sudden, the pastor's wife came out at the end of the service, and she had a young lady, teenage girl, and she said, "Brother Pat, Miss Kyle, I want to introduce you to so and so. I can't even remember her name. I wish I could. I want you.
She just trusted Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior. I looked at her. I said, 'Are you kidding me?'" And she said, "No, I did." I said, "You ask Jesus in your heart." She said, "Yeah." I said, "Do you know what that means?" She goes, "Well, I'm working on it." I said, "That means you're going to spend eternity in heaven with Jesus. You're saved, and when you got saved, you got saved forever." Hey, what a wonderful thing! Hey, this young lady got saved.
I don't ever want to lose that feeling. I have a desire to see people saved. Number two, I have a desire to be used. Of God. I have a desire to be used of God, man.
It just listen to me, church. It burns inside of me. I don't know how to explain it. I can't put it into words. The only thing I know is that it burns in my heart.
I remember we were involved in ministry in Michigan, and while we were there, I I was working with teenagers, a youth pastor, and so forth, doing that kind of thing with with young people. Loved it, absolutely loved it. Worked with some of the music in the ministry there as well. And and then the pastors came back to preach out town. He said, "Listen, I want to start a Christian radio station." And we're sitting in the meeting with the preacher.
I'm going, oh, oh, cool! That's awesome, man! Start a Christian radio station. He said, McCluskey, I want you to be the one to put that together. And I'm like, what?
I don't want to do a Christian radio station. I don't have any push or any desire to do a Christian radio station. Man, that bothered me. I didn't want to get up there and go. Good morning, Northern Michigan.
It's joy to be with you on this already Monday morning. Pat McCluskey behind the microphone here at eighty-eight point one. We got a lot of music coming your way. We're going to encourage you in the Lord. The clock says it's about seven fifteen right now.
Why, if you're driving out there, be careful. Keep your eyes on the road. But let this song speak to your heart as you're tuned into Family Christian Radio. I didn't want to do that. I remember going to a camp meeting down in Gainesville, Georgia.
We were part of that camp meeting.
Some of the music for the camp meeting, and so forth. I would get on the platform, play the bass. One of the preachers that got up to preach that night, I was sitting out out front and front row. He got up there and preached about. What does God have for you?
Oh, are you trusting the hand of God? I remember I'm preaching that, and I'm like sitting there. He says, "You're not going to believe this," and I don't know if this actually happened. I believe it did. He was outside.
He said, "I was outside by one of these doors here in the auditorium, and I was standing there looking at my sermon. I was praying and asking God to help us tonight." He said, "And as I was standing out there, he said, I saw this little bird just kind of walking along the little piece of concrete that was there, and he thought to himself, 'He said, I wonder if I reach down, what that bird will do.' And he said, I reached down, and that bird jumped inside of my hand." And I'm sitting there on the front. I'm sitting there like you, and I'm going, "Wow, that's amazing." Then he said, "You know, if I wanted to, I could have crushed that bird." He said, "But I didn't." He said, "Because that bird trusted me." I'm sitting there on the front row as he would preach trust. The hand of God in whatever area He's pointing you in. The invitation came about.
I went ahead and slipped up on the platform to play the bass as part of the invitation, and I had to put the bass down, brother. I had to get down there on the front row and get on my knees, and I had to ask God just to use me, in spite of what I wanted and what I didn't want. I just wanted to please Him. We started that Christian radio station. Get ready to go up there.
in In next month, we'll be up there for their twenty fifth anniversary. To be able to be part of that twenty fifth anniversary, and I didn't even know this, but the Lord allowed us to be able to help several radio stations across the country get started, and then we would begin to help raise funds at different radio station. One over here at WKJV in Asheville, North Carolina, with Brother Wendell Runyon, we got to go over there and sing and help them raise some funds so they could keep on broadcasting the gospel of Jesus Christ. Oh, I had the things I wanted. I didn't want to do a radio station, but God puts you sometimes in a position where you just have to trust the hand of God.
I want to be used of God. I want to be used of God. I want to see people saved. I want to be used of God, and last but not least, I don't want to fail. I don't want to fail.
The devil would like to see you fail. That's his goal, man. He wants to put something in your way that's going to stop you from doing what you need to do for the glory and honor of God. He tried to do it in the Church of Colossi when when Paul's telling them you need to get things back on the Lord, you need to get your mind back on Christ, you need to let the Holy Spirit lead you, you need to be filled with His knowledge and wisdom, you need to do those things. Then and sometimes what will happen is we'll fail because we don't have those principles and those things that are built up in our lives.
We got to get back to doing something for the Lord without us failing. I remember first time I went snow skiing. Anybody in here ever snow ski? Oh my goodness, we got a bunch of snow skiers. I didn't want to snow ski.
All my teenagers were snow skiing. We were in Michigan. I didn't want to snow ski. No way in the world I was going to go down a hill one hundred and fifty miles an hour with two little skinny boards on the bottom of my feet.
Well, I remember going in there, and I had one of my teenagers. He looked at me and he said, "Brother McCloskey, I'll tell you what. You just stick with me. You trust me. I help you out learning how to ski." I'm thinking to myself, "You little pipsqueak teen, you're gonna kill me." Is what you're gonna do?
But I trusted him. Remember going through the line, get my snow boots, my ski boots. We went and put those ski boots on, and these were the kind that would close from the back. I don't know if some of y'all remember those, but it would close from the back, and then it would strap on, and then you had a little crank that you would crank down inside of the boot, and it would go ahead and close in on your ankle. And I remember him cranking down on that thing, and I'm like, hey, hey, hey, hey.
It's it's tight. It's really tight. Why are you doing it that tight? He said.
So your ankles don't break when you fall. Oh, that helped me. I felt real good then. I remember us going outside. He said, "Now here's what you got to do.
There's bindings on these skis, and what you do, you take your boot and you put the front, you put the front toe in the front binding, and you." Click down on the back like that, and then the snow's on. And then what you do is you do it with the other one.
So I did it with the other one, and so I got the one ski on, and I got my ski poles over here, and I'm putting the other one on. And I went to push down and click it in, and when I did, my body went poof, right in the snow. And I had two skis on. Try to get up with snow skis on. You know, those of you who know who skied before, you know what I'm talking about.
You just don't do that, so I'm just laying there. Sure enough, this little pipsqueak, eleven, twelve year old kid came skiing next to me, and he looked at me, and he went, and I'm thinking to myself, if I could get my ski pole, buddy. We went over for the ski lift, and he told me. He said, "Now, here's what happens when you get on the ski lift. What you have to do, you have to take your skis, put them in your left hand, and then you turn around, and the the chairlift is going to come around.
You grab hold of the chairlift, and you sit down on the chairlift. And as you begin to go up, make sure your ski tips are pointing up." I'm like, okay.
So sure enough, came around, grab hold, sat down on the chair, started heading up, but I forgot about the ski tips. And as we were going up, one of the ski tips got caught on the chairlift as we're going up, and it popped one of the one of the skis off.
So now I'm going up a chairlift for the first time in my life with my teenager next to me and with only one ski on. I remember looking over to him and saying, "Hey, my ski came off. What do we do now?" And he looked at me and he goes, "I have no idea." He says, "Here's what we'll do. When we get up to the top of the hill, what I want you to do, I want you to stand on that one ski." Whoa! If you fell asleep, that just woke you up, didn't it?
Got me. I'll tell you what. It's the Lord saying you're not telling the truth. No, I am. I promise, I am.
He said, "Stand on that one ski and just kind of work your way down that little ramp they got there." I'll have the guy slow the ramp. Sure enough, man, got up to the top. He slowed the ski lift down. I stood up on that one ski and I started going down the little ramp. And boom!
I I I fell in the I fell in the snow. I promise you, the next person coming up with my ski. Was that little twelve-year-old kid coming up next to me? He looked at me and he goes, "He threw his ski there." I put the skis on and he told me. He says, "What you need to do, you need to learn how to snowplow." And snowplowing is when you got your feet kind of pigeon-toed like that, and he says you use the edges.
On your on your skis to slow you down. I'm like okay, and then he says when you want to turn to the left, you put more pressure on your right leg, and when you want to turn to the right, you put more pressure on your left leg. I'm like okay, so I started going down the hill and I'm moving real slow. I put a little pressure on my left leg and I started going off to the right. And then I put a little pressure on my right leg, and I went around, and I started going to the left.
I probably might have done that two times, and he's looking at me and going, "You're a natural. You're a natural." And I'm thinking to myself, "You're a liar. You're a liar." Started going down that hill, and I started going faster. And I started going faster, and I started going faster, and I started going faster. And the next thing you know, I was flying down that hill.
I said, "What do I do?" He said, "Fall, fall." And I remember falling. Oh my goodness, there was snow everywhere. But I got back up, did it again, got on that ski lift. This time, my ski didn't come off. I was able to make it around the corner.
I started snow plowing back and forth on that hill, and I would get going pretty good. And then all of a sudden, I'd start panicking, and I would fall. And then I'd get back up, and I'd go again. And then I would fall, and I'd get back up, and I'd go again. And I would fall, and I'd get back up, and go again.
And can I tell you something, church? We don't need to fail. We don't need to quit. We don't need to give up. There might be times when it might be difficult.
It might be hard. But when you get down, you get back up, and you go again. And when you fall, You get back up and you go again, and you get back up and you go again, and you go again, and you go again. Can I tell you something? I've got a desire not to fail.
I don't want to fail. I don't want to fail. For this cause, also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to desire. Let me ask you this question: What are your desires? Tonight, what are your desires?
Do you have a desire? We got some young people in here. Be great if we could have some young people walk up here and say, "I got a desire to serve God. I don't care what anybody thinks about it. I got a desire to be used of the Lord." Others of us, I got a desire to see people saved.
Others of us, I got a desire. I got a desire not to fail. I just want to keep on going. Could we do that tonight? Let's stand together, please.
Our heads are bowed, our eyes are closed. Our pianist is coming up, making her way to the piano. Maybe there's been some struggles in your life. I don't know, but can I tell you something? I I don't want to allow room for the devil to put me in a spot where all of a sudden I regret some things.
I wonder, for a few moments, we can kind of come up here at this altar and kneel down and say, "Lord, I don't know what you have for me, but I'm willing to go where you want me to go and do what you want me to do." Father, I'm willing to say what you want me to say to those that need the gospel. Heavenly Father, I'm willing to be that person. Would you work in me? Would you let me do that? For your honor and for your glory, Heavenly Father, I pray that you'll use this invitation, use this time for us to build those desires to go farther—not for us, but for your glory.
I pray that in Jesus' name. If you need to come for a while, folks have already started coming. Why don't you slip out of your seat and come on up? I want God to use me. I don't know how.
I don't know what He wants, but I'm willing to go and do whatever He wants me to do. I love it when some young people come up. That blesses my heart, man. I like that. What is it God wants?
We're all right tonight. We're all right. I love it. Yeah. While these are up here, why don't we sing that song?
Have thine own way, Lord. Have thine own way. Thou art the Potter; I am the clay. Sing it with me. Have thine own way, Lord.
Have thine own way. Thou art the Potter; I am the clay. Mould me. Me and make me after Thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still. I'm going to turn it over to whoever needs to close the service.
Thank. Thank you for listening today. We hope you received a blessing from our broadcast. The Kerwin Baptist Church is located at 4520 Old Hollow Road in Kernersville, North Carolina. You may also contact us by phone at 336-993-5192 or via the web at kerwinbaptistchurch.com.
Enjoy our services live and all our media on our website and church app. Thank you for listening to the Kerwin broadcast today. God bless you.
