Altars 2025 | Luke LeFevere - Don't Die in Harran

What is it that you want to do? You guys good? You ready? You jump in. I just thank you for what you are doing. Lord, we just honor what you are doing. Lord, we just yield to it. We honor it. Lord, I ask in this moment, Lord, as I bring the word that I feel like you have given me for these people, Lord, I ask that you do what my human zeal cannot. Lord, what intellect cannot, what a creative sermon cannot. Lord, I pray that you would turn hearts toward Christ or that you would elevate the sun, Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit asks that you would come in Jesus name. Amen. I just want to do something really quickly actually before we jump in. My mom and dad are actually here today. And yeah. And we have been talking about the altar of the home. Altars are places to die upon. And there is a cost to raising up a generation that will love Jesus. And I just want to honor them very quickly. And I just want to say, I will see if I can make it through it. If there are two books, I will always remember being on my mom's nightstand growing up. And it would be the word of God in a book called The Power of a Praying Mother. And my mom had a lot of opportunities to do plenty of things, but she chose to actually homeschool my sister and I. I was thinking the other day about that Christmas song that goes, it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas and it's like mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again. My mom never had that. It meant more work. And my mom is like modern day Susanna Wesley. She had this quote on our fridge growing up and it said the next generation is too important to leave it to chance or to expect that someone else will do a good job. You know my dad for 25 years worked a job that burned out men half his age. And if I was lucky enough or determined enough to the few times I would be up early enough in the morning to see my dad before he left for work I would come downstairs in the dark and see my dad in the corner with a lamp on and the Bible open and his face up towards heaven listening to God for our family and for our church. I was on the phone with a pastor who leads a massive network of leaders in Latin America the other day and he actually used to work for my dad. And we were on with another global leader and we're having this conversation and he's like look it's so good to see you. And he tells the other leader he goes his dad is one of my heroes in national Tennessee. And the leader goes oh look I didn't know your dad was in ministry and the other leader goes he's not. He said but he's one of the godliest men I've ever met. In some moment that I just want to honor you today. I'm grateful for you. If you have your Bibles you can open to Genesis chapter 11. I'm going to read this and then we'll dive in. Verse 27 is where we're starting. It says this. This is the account of Tara's family line. Tara became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot. While his father Tara was still alive, Haran died in Er of the Caldeans in the land of his birth. Abram and Nahor both married the name of Abram's wife was Sarai and the name of Nahor's wife was Milka. She was the daughter of Haran the father of both Milka and Iska. Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive. And Tara took his son Abram, his grandson Lot, son of Haran and his daughter in Lot, Sarai, the wife of his son Abram. And together they sent out from Er of the Caldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Haran they settled there. Tara lived 205 years and he died in Haran. The title of today's message is don't die in Haran. And to somebody and say don't die in Haran. This little passage in Genesis chapter 11 has like captivated my attention. You might be like why? Like what do you see in this little passage? But the fascinating piece comes when you realize that there are many commentators who actually think it's highly likely that Tara was the original one that God gave the commission to become the father of many nations too. And you're like where do they get that? Well it says in verse 31 it says, "Tara took his son Abram, his grandson Lot, son of Haran and his daughter in Lot, Sarai, the wife of his son Abram and they set out from the Er of Caldeans to go where to Canaan. But somewhere along the way Tara downgrades the destination. He gets this commission from God to go into the middle of nowhere and he starts moving and something somewhere along the way hits him and the destination goes from Canaan to halfway." And now you know it's like okay well I wish we knew what the reason was, the text doesn't tell us so I guess we'll never know. But actually I think it does. Because where's the city where he stops? It's called Haran. Now what do we see earlier in the passage? It says well his father Tara was still alive. His son Haran died in Er of the Caldeans in the land of his birth. Now in our Bibles the son's name is H-A-R-A-N. The name of the place where he stopped is H-A-R-R-A-N in the original language it's the same name. So Tara stops in this place it's named after the son who died. Now we know that Haran dies while Tara is still alive. We don't know if Haran makes the journey with, you know we know he doesn't make the journey with him. We don't know if he dies before Tara sets out or we don't know if he dies along the way. But I think it's likely because it puts in that little thing that says Haran died while Tara was still alive. I think Tara sets out to go to Canaan with a commission from God and somewhere along the line he gets word back from Er of the Caldeans hey your son has died. And whether Tara realized it or not in that moment when he takes his son in his heart and he buries him in the ground he buries his assignment along with him. Somewhere along the line in his pain his disappointment his disillusionment fear enters his heart and he takes what has been assigned to him and he buries it. And it takes an entire other generation when God will find Abraham who will set out from his family. That was cultural taboo you don't leave your father's house. Abraham leaves his father's house this place of fear and he becomes the father of faith. But what is the test that God takes Abraham through? If you lose your son are you going to stop halfway to? And Abraham goes everything in my life you gave me. And even if Isaac dies I believe you will raise him from the dead faith not fear. And the word that I was sensing from many of us in the room as I think you came in today and I think there are many of you who when God sent you to your church when God sent you to your city when God sent you to your ministry you know the destination with an outpouring of the spirit of God. You know it was revival. You know it was awakening but somewhere along the way you got smacked by something. Pain, heartache, heartbreak, betrayal and somewhere along the way you told God I'll go this far but no farther. And the word of the Lord that I feel for many of you today is if God calls you to canine don't die in Iran. If God calls you to canine don't die in Iran. See but here's the thing is that fear. is not just an emotion, fear is not just a feeling, fear is a spirit. Paul, when he's writing to his son Timothy, and second Timothy won, he says, Timothy, he goes, "You have not been given a spirit of fear." Now you might go, "How do we know he's talking about a demonic spirit there? Couldn't be just referring to like a pervasive mood, like the spirit of Christmas or something like that." Right? It's just like the spirit of melancholy, like fell over the place, right? It's like this pervasive mood. Well, he says, "You have not been given a Numa of Fear." Numa is used 387 times in the New Testament, and of those 387 times only two times, could it maybe be inferred that it's not referencing one of these four things, the spirit of God, the spirit of a person, an angelic spirit or a demonic spirit every time? This is a spirit of fear. This is a demonic spirit. And what does it do? What is Paul telling Timothy in context? He goes, "Hey, Timothy, stir up the gift of God that's within you by the laying on of my hands." Because what does the spirit of fear trying to do? It will try to suppress your anointing. It is trying to come in like a wet blanket and shove it to the ground and go, "Bari it, barri it, barri it." And Paul is telling Timothy, he goes, "Get that thing off of you. Get it off. Fear is a spirit." Going into my junior year of college, don't share this story with anybody, just between you and me. During my junior year of college, I was in a time of prayer and I was coming into my junior year from the summer. And I saw a picture, and as I was praying, I saw a picture of college students from all over our city in Nashville where I live, and they were on their knees crying out for revival, and I knew the Lord was asking me to call this prayer meeting. Like I said at the beginning, I was homeschooled, right? Like, I don't have connections, okay? (audience laughing) And so I'm like, I'm excited. Like, let's go, we're gonna do this. I just book a space. I start getting the word out. Like, the best thing to just kind of post it on social media, trying to figure out a way to get people to come. And so we're getting closer to the day, closer to the day, closer to the day, and the Lord had told me, he goes, "Out of this prayer gathering, three things will happen." He said, "You're gonna host a conference." And I was like, "Awesome, I've always wanted to do that." Sounds great. And he goes, "The conference needs to be about revival too." And he said, "In three, you need to bring in the speakers that inspired you to reach your campus with the gospel, and you need to see a generation in the city inspired to do the same thing." He said, "This is gonna come out of this prayer gathering." I said, "Okay." So about two, three weeks before, I am being just like way down by thought after thought who the heck is going to listen to me? Who's going to listen to me? Like, it's even if they come, which I don't even know if anybody's gonna come, it's gonna suck anyway. Like nobody's gonna like it, they're gonna think it's weird. And then I started thinking, maybe I'm not doing this for God. Maybe I'm just doing this for me, maybe this is selfish ambition. And I thought, I think I'm just gonna call it off. I'm just gonna call it off. And that night I go to sleep and I have a dream. And in the dream, I am being followed by this black panther through the streets. And this panther walks up to me, it gets on its hind legs, it puts one paw on each of my shoulders and it opens its mouth like it's gonna bite my head off. And in the dream, I can feel its breath on my face. And all of a sudden, I wake up and I am pinned to my bed. And I just go get off of me in Jesus name. I rebuke you, get out of my room. And this thing gets up and leaves. And sitting there in the dark, I hear the voice of the Holy Spirit. And he goes, tell it to come back and ask it why it's here. And I was like, heck no. (congregation laughing) I just got it to leave, thank you. I don't even know what's happening to me. But the Holy Spirit didn't say anything else, He was just like, you heard me? And so just kinda into the ether, I'm like, come back. (congregation laughing) And this thing slinks into the corner of my room. And it's like I can see it, sitting there. And I go, why are you here? I honestly didn't expect it to answer, I'm not gonna lie. (congregation laughing) And I hear a voice, and it's like the voice of the Holy Spirit, but it's a different source, obviously. And it goes, it's crazy, it's just, I'm a spirit of fear that was sent to intimidate you and stop you from taking action. And I hear the Holy Spirit, and in that moment, all the thoughts I've been having start flashing through my head, who's gonna listen to me? This is selfish ambition. And it goes, and all of a sudden I go, that wasn't me. That was that thing. And the Holy Spirit goes, you can tell it to leave now. And I said, you can leave, and it left. (congregation laughing) Well, we get to the night of the prayer gathering, right? And you're like, well, we're not calling this thing off now. So we get there. And my worst fears are like realized. Note, like hardly anybody shows up. I'm hoping 300 people were gonna be there so we could launch the conference out of this event. Maybe 50 people showed up. I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. And I just hear the Holy Spirit go just obey. So I get up, I preach, we start praying. It was power, it was good, it was good prayer meeting. We pray for God to move on our campuses. And I think there's no way we're doing this conference now. I miss her. I walk down off the steps and these two students walk up to me from a different university in our city. And they said, hey, we're from this university. Could we go get coffee some time? And I'm like, I'm looking for as many other college students in the city who are hungry for God as I can find. So yeah, let's go do it. We go sit down at the coffee shop a couple weeks later and they said, hey, so we heard about this prayer gathering on social media and we felt like God told us we were supposed to come. No idea who you are. And they said, so we're on student government at this university here in the city and the university has given us $30,000 to do whatever we want with. And they said, we felt like God told us we're supposed to host a conference. And I was like, okay, what's it called? They said it's called revival conference. And they said, we've already booked all the speakers and I'm like, who are they? And they start listing them and some of the people that had the biggest impact on my life, major leaders from the body of Christ had some of the biggest impact on my early walk with Christ. And they said, we heard about the gathering we came and they said, you were preaching out of the same passage that God spoke to us when he said, we were supposed to have this conference. We think God's given you the vision and us the money and we're supposed to team up and do this together. (audience cheering) We get to the night of the conference in 800 college students show up and 200 give their lives to Christ on the first night. It started a ground swell of hunger for God on the campuses in our city. This thing is trying to get you to bury your assignment in the ground. But here's the thing. If you succumb to the spirit of fear, it will cause you to forfeit your assignment. We see this in the life of Elijah. Right, we all know the story. I'm gonna go through it quickly. Right, Elijah, best ministry day in history until Jesus shows up on the scene, calls down fire, kills the prophets of bail, and fearless, fearless. And then all of a sudden, Jezebel catches wind of it and she says, hey, I'm gonna kill you and he freaks out. And it's like, what's going on? Well, I think the key is when it says this, it says in first Kings in 19, it says, and Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah. I don't think that was a physical messenger. Why? Because if she knew where Elijah was and she had the ability to get a messenger to him, why warn him? Why not just send an assassin? Why not send an army? Why not kill him? Why warn him? Because I don't think it was a physical messenger. Because the word that's used is the same word that it's when God sends an angelic messenger, same word. And out of the mouth of this witch, a spirit hits Elijah and he crumbles. He wants to die. And what happens Elijah goes into the wilderness and what's the question that God asks him, what are you doing here Elijah? What are you doing here? And he gives this long, wimpy answer. I'm all alone. You're not looking out for me. They're coming for me. I can't do this. They've killed everybody else. None of it's true. God has compassion on him that moment. He feeds him right, sustains him. And then he goes into the wilderness and he goes up into the cave. You know, there's a wind, there's a fire, there's the earthquake and then the voice of God and what does he ask him again? Elijah. And I think this was God giving Elijah the chance to change his tune. Give me a different answer. Answer in faith, not fear. And Elijah gives the same answer. And what does God say? Go annoying to Leisha in your place. He removes it. It was Elijah's shot to tear down that dynasty. It was his destiny to tear down Jezebel and Ahab, to bring that down on the nation. And he crumples in fear and God asks that send it to somebody else who won't. He goes anoint him in your place. In Matthew chapter 25, two days before his crucifixion, Jesus tells his disciples, "Appeirable, the one we all know." He says, "The kingdom of heaven is like a man going on a long journey and he entrusts his wealth to three of his servants. The verse he gives five talents, the second he gives two, the third he gives one." We know the one with five immediately puts it to work, gains five more. Second does the same thing. But the third, buries his talent in the ground. And it says, "After a long while, the master comes back and he calls him to give an account of their stewardship, which we all will have to do." First comes, he goes, "My five talents gained five more and the famous words well done, good and faithful servant." Same thing with the second and then comes the third given account. And out of all these things that we can get from the parable of the talents, like he gives this long spiel of an answer, the third servant right, but the key is down in the first three words of his answer. He says, "Why'd you bury it?" And he goes, "I was afraid." Fear. But here's the thing that we learn. If we learn any things from the parable of the talents, all the beautiful things that we can pull out of that is that one day, when we stand before Jesus and give an account for our lives, fear will not be a valid excuse for burying our talent in the ground. Well, how does the master respond? Wicked. Lazy. See, stewardship, good stewardship isn't maintaining what you've got. It's multiplying it. He didn't lose a penny of what he'd been given. Not a cent. That's wickedness. You've been entrusted with something. What are you doing with it? He goes, "I buried it in the ground." I've been reading through the Pilgrim's progress. It's just been feeding my soul right now. And John Bunyan who wrote that book, best-selling book of all time in English outside of the Bible, spent 12 years in a prison cell because they told him he couldn't preach outside, couldn't preach in certain contexts in the state church in prison. But they told him they said, "John, if you will stop preaching, we'll let you out." And this is what he said. He said, "God never intended for men who have been given such gifts to bury them in the ground." He essentially told the spirit of fear, "If you let me out, I will keep preaching." And then he writes what becomes the Pilgrim's progress in jail. And he goes, "If you let me out, I will keep preaching. And if you imprison me, I'll pen words that'll shake a nation." But do this one thing I will not bury what has been entrusted to me. See, we have seemed to have adopted this idea in the Western Church that disobedience to the Holy Spirit is unacceptable in any circumstance except if you're afraid. We're like, I felt prompted by God to do this thing, but I was kind of afraid of what so-and-so might think. Or maybe you don't use the word fear. You use a different word to take the teeth out. I was worried what the congregation their perception might be. I was worried about what these people, you know, I was concerned. I was -- I was afraid. I was afraid. Listen, succumbing to fear is not simply unadvisable, according to the parable of the talents. It's sinful. Because whatever controls your decisions is your master. So if Jesus told you to do something and you tell him no, you have removed Jesus Christ from the throne of your life and you have suddenly yet not so suddenly enthroned fear in his place. And that's called idolatry. So coming to fear is not unadvisable. It is sinful. But what do we see in the story of Elijah? God will raise up one who won't cower to fear. And I love -- in first Kings -- well, this is second Kings now -- when Elijah has forfeited his mantle because he succumbed to fear and you have a light -- when Elijah is about to be taken up into heaven and Elijah and Elijah walking along together. And in that culture, you have -- think of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob this blessing that would be imparted from a father to a son. And you have to know that Elijah knows a moment like that's coming. His spiritual father is walking along with him. And they are walking together. And Elijah looks at Elijah and he goes, "What do you want me to do for you?" And Elijah has an immediate answer. He goes, "I want a double portion of your anointing." And Elijah gives this really strange answer. He goes, "You've asked a difficult thing." And I look at that and go, "Why? Why was that difficult?" It wasn't difficult to ask God for and it wasn't difficult for God to do. I think what Elijah was going to Elijah as he was going, I don't know if you know the cost I've paid to carry this assignment. You want twice? That's a hard thing. And then he goes, "But if you see me, when I'm taken up, you'll have it." Again, a weird thing, but I think this was Elijah giving Elijah a chance to go, "If you change your mind and you want to tap out, stay back." And what do we see? Elijah from that moment will not leave his side. He's like, "I'm getting that thing." And he starts following him. And all of a sudden, Elijah, the chariots of fire, come, they take him up into heaven and the mantle falls to the ground. Now, I think Elijah probably spent, took a long hard look at that mantle before he picked it up. There were no naive misconceptions in Elijah's mind as to what the cost would be for him to grab that thing and lay it on him. But what do we see? He grabs it. And he walks to the river Jordan. He strikes the waters and he goes, "Where now is the Lord that God of Elijah and the water splits." And my sense is that the Lord today and for our generation is not, this isn't a question, this isn't even a command, I believe it's an opportunity. And God is looking at us with intensity and he's going, "I'm looking for a generation that will pay the price and pick up the mantle." Pay the price and pick up the mantle. Where's the generation that's going to go? Where now is the Lord that God of Finney? Where's the God of Graham and Bunky? Where now is the God of Wesley and Whitfield? Where is he? Somebody's got to pay the price and pick up the mantle. I'll pay the cost. I think of the words of the famous missionary to China, and he was glad as allward. And she did this great work for God in China and they said, "How did you do this?" And she said, "I wasn't God's first choice for what I've done for China. I don't know who it was. It must have been a man, a well-educated man. I don't know what happened. Perhaps he died. Perhaps he wasn't willing. But listen, and God looked down and saw Gladys Allward and said, "Well, she's willing. Pay the price and pick up the mantle." Listen, the eyes of the Lord are still searching. They have not stopped. The voice from heaven still cries, "Who will go for us? Who can I send? Pay the price and pick up the mantle." Listen, I'm yet to bleed from my nose, crying out for my nation, but I have wept. I said, "God, give me America." Roland Bingham, the missionary to Africa, once said, "I will open Africa to the gospel or I will die trying. I will live to open America to the gospel, and I won't have to die trying." We're going to see it. This is the hour. Listen, the window has opened to us in the west. It's opening. We've been looking at a wakening, like a door frame out in the distance, and it's like we can see it. It's like I think it's out there, and we're drawing closer, and we're closer and we're closer. We've just gone through the threshold. I think we're in it. Trickles of testimonies are turning into mighty tremors of awakening. But he's got to find a generation that'll pay the price and pick up the mantle. We'll not succumb to the spirit of fear. Today is the day to dethrone the spirit of fear from your life. Dethrone it. The missionary to China Hudson Taylor once said, "If I had a thousand lives, he said I would give them all for China." I remember I read that and I was sitting at my desk and I wept and I said, "God, if I have a thousand lives, I will give them all to see America turn to God." That sentence of Hudson Taylor, that is consecration and a sentence. "If I had a thousand lives, I would give them all for this. My life is set apart for this thing. What's your assignment? What did God call you to?" And if we could even just have the worship team come up, I just feel like there is a moment for us to respond here. That I really do believe the word of the Lord to many in the room is if I called you to Canaan, don't die in Iran. Where did he call you to? What was the destination? Don't downgrade it. So coming to that spirit of fear is not like I said, it is not unadvisable, it's sinful and sin requires repentance. So what we need to do in this moment is not just go, "Yeah, okay, I'm going to keep going." There needs to be a grieving in our hearts of going, "I've grieved the spirit of God by burying what He gave me." And if that's you, what I want to call us to do, just really simply in this moment, if you're saying, "You can feel just the Holy Spirit. Your heart is being tenderized." There's an ache and there's a grieving, you're just going, "I have stopped halfway. I just want you to raise your hand in the air." Come on. Just you to the Lord, just go, "Lord, I repent of that." Lord, grieve my heart. I'd rather be grieved by God, because listen, you may have settled there, just don't die there. You may have settled there, don't die there. You can dig that thing back up and keep going. Keep going. If you would just stand to your feet. If you raise your hand and that's you, I do think there is just a moment you're saying, "I'm repenting. God, I'm sorry for walking into the spirit of fear." Would you just begin to come down? If you're up in the balcony, just come down. So, "Lord, forgive me for succumbing to the spirit of fear." I need forgiveness. Wash me. Cleanse me. Break my heart over it. [Music] Just begin to communicate that to God. In your own words, say, "Lord, I'm sorry. Forgive me. I give you permission to rend my heart, Lord, to tear my heart." Listen, the word says it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. And I think so many times we talk about that. It's like, "God's just so nice that you'll want to say, like you'll want to repent." And I think it's God's going, "It's my kindness to bring the fear of God that will bring you to a place of repentance." It's not like, "God's just so happy, slappy that I just want to say I'm sorry." It's like, "No, in my kindness, when the fear of God descends on a heart to go, I have sinned against God. I have buried a talent. I'm heading for a day when I will stand before the Lamb's lane." And I don't want to go. I don't want to stand before the Lamb's lane with no blood, shed. [Music] So just begin to communicate that to the Lord in your own words. Just say, "Lord, I'm sorry. Please forgive me. Reveal any places in my heart that I have succumbed to fear. Just begin to lift your voice and do that." [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Lord, we just give you permission. Grieve our hearts. We'd rather be grieved than bury the assignment. [Music] And God is offering an opportunity right now. He's handing it out to you and he's going, "Pay the price and pick up the mantle. Lay hold of it. Say, "God, I'll pay it." If there's some of you in the room you're just even sensing, "Lord, I want to pay the price and pick up the mantle. Just fill in where you can." Maybe you're just setting out on the destination, right? Maybe you haven't had a chance to stop halfway, but you're going, "Lord, I will pay the price and pick up the mantle. I might not even know what the full price may be." But I'll pay it. [Music] And Lord, I just pray for a fresh outpouring of power for the assignment. Power for the assignment. We've not been given a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power. And of love and of a sound mind. Power, Lord. A fresh outpouring of your power for the assignment, God. We re-enthrone you over our lives. We do not allow anything on the throne that we say we have to check with Him before we obey Jesus. We de-throne feared now. We said, "Jesus, Nick." Just de-throne it from your life. Just say, "You're done. I de-throne you." Speak to that thing and say, "You're done."