(This transcript was generated by AI. Apologies for any inacuracies)

We are in a season of 21 days of prayer and fasting, and this weekend we're bringing what we've been doing as a church here at Valorous to a close through this 21 days of prayer and fasting.

But we don't want it to be the end of what God is doing in your life and through your life.

And you know, lots of times 21 days of prayer and fasting of focus on God can begin to get our attention, can begin to prepare our hearts for God to do a work in our life and through our life.

And I do believe that he does want to supernaturally do a work in your life, in your family's life.

He wants to do a work in the community of faith, in our church.

And I do believe that this 21 days of prayer and fasting is just some of the beginning of what God wants to do, not the end.

And oftentimes what happens is whenever people go through a fast or they go to a conference or go through some weeks of revival or go to a retreat, they'll get on fire for God for a few days, sometimes a few months.

And then that fire begins to dim and it kind of begins to fade and it begins to go out.

And that is not what God desires to happen in your life.

Whenever you go to a conference or go to a retreat or go to a revival service or experience something like we've experienced over the last 21 days.

And today, what I want to talk about is retaining the flame, retaining the flame and the flame being the working power of God in our lives and the working power of God through our lives.

The Bible says that God is like a consuming fire.

And the question is, what does that really mean?

And I'm going to talk a little bit about that today.

But if we go back and we look in the Old Testament in the book of Leviticus, as God was setting up a tent of meeting, a tabernacle and eventually a temple where his presence would be and where he would be worshiped.

He had some people assigned to tend to that particular tent of meeting or that tabernacle or that temple.

And those people were called priests and the priests had responsibility.

And I want you to know today that those who have believed in Jesus Christ in this day and age, the Bible calls us a priesthood of believers.

And so what does that mean?

That means that we have a responsibility as believers in Jesus Christ.

And we have a responsibility to design and create a space for God's presence to come into so it can begin to feel not only our lives, but begin to feel our communities.

And the priest in the Old Testament had responsibilities to do a certain task.

But one of those responsibilities was to keep a fire burning continuously, always, day and night.

And that fire was at an altar where people of that day would bring offerings of animals and things for their sin.

And what would happen is whenever they would bring that offering to this particular altar, the fire would consume that offering.

But the priest was told, though, they had to deal with their own garments.

They had to deal with the ashes of the fire.

One of the things that they were never to do was to let that fire go out.

It had to continuously be a burning.

I want to show it to you in your Bible in Leviticus chapter 6, verses 12 and 13.

It says here, meanwhile, as you're basically priest tending to your other responsibilities, the fire on the altar must keep burning.

It must never go out.

Each morning, the priest will add fresh wood to the fire and arrange the burnt offering on it.

He will then burn the fat of the peace offering on it.

But he says again in verse 13, remember, the fire must be kept burning on the altar at all times.

It must never go out.

So what did the fire represent?

The fire was a representation of God's everlasting power, God's transforming power, God's consuming nature, His ability to take whatever consumes us, whatever sin is making us miss the mark.

He can take that and He can consume it.

He can refine us and He can purify us in any situation, underneath any circumstance.

And today, what I want to talk about is God being this all-consuming fire in your life.

Because God don't want to just be your God over a 21-day period where you're going to Him on a regular basis in prayer, where you're just fasting for 21 days.

No, God wants to be the God of your life and He wants to offer His forgiveness and His love and His mercy and His transforming power, His refining power in your life on a daily basis.

But you have to be willing to work with God as God works with you.

Remember, we are a priesthood of believers and we have a responsibility in God's family and that responsibility is to create space and place for the transforming power of God to come in a place and shine and shine brightly.

Come on, somebody.

But we have to be willing, willing to walk with God.

The book of Hebrews chapter 12, verses 28 and 29 says this, since we are receiving a kingdom that is unashakable, says let us be thankful and please God by worshiping him with holy fear and awe.

It goes on to say this, for our God is a what?

A devouring fire.

And so God's power isn't just available sometimes.

God's power in your life is available all the time.

And again, oftentimes we kind of let this fire that it gets ignited, the power of God that gets ignited in our life in seasons like this, we tend to sometimes let it fade.

But we must understand that God isn't just powerful, sometimes he's powerful all the time.

We just let the amazing presence of God fade away from us.

So here's my question for you, as we move beyond the 21 days of prayer and fasting, as we prepare to move into life after this particular season of prayer and fasting, what in your life really needs to be removed so that God can begin to be an all-consuming fire?

And I have to ask myself that same question, because my heart's desire is this, is the consuming fire, the power of God that is ignited in my heart, in my life, I don't want it to go away.

I don't want it to fade in my life.

And guess what?

I don't want it to fade in your life either.

But the reality of it is, if we're not careful, we'll be like people down through the ages.

We'll just get on fire because we just did something remarkable as a church.

We'll get on fire because we went to the latest conference, the latest retreat.

And as we come back from those particular things, oftentimes people are ready to go out and make a difference with God's present in their life and let it work through their life.

But as life begins to come at them, then they begin to fade.

And I just got a proposal to you for 2026 Valorous Church.

What if we made a decision to come out of this prayer and fasting moment and begin to live a lifestyle like God is truly who he says he is, that he is an all consuming fire and he will take anything in my life, any sin that's causing me to miss the mark.

And he will consume that sin.

He will refine my life.

He will purify my spirit so that I can be an all consuming presence of him in this world.

And my friend, he's not just calling me to it.

He's not just calling you to it.

He's calling us to it because I need you to know today what God's going to do in the world.

He's not going to do through an individual.

He's going to do through a group of called out people.

It's known as the local church.

That's what the church is.

It's people called out of darkness into the wonderful light of Christ and living with his presence in their life, working through their life.

And we talk about this a lot here at Valorous Church, that the presence of God is way too heavy and way too big for one of us to carry by ourself.

In other words, that word glory in our Bible, it means whenever we're going to bring God glory, we need to understand that term glory is a term of weightiness.

It's a term of heaviness.

And you need to understand the heaviness and the weightiness of an all-powerful, all-knowing, everywhere-consuming God is way too big for you to accomplish by yourself to shine it into the world.

That's why God calls us out of sin and calls us together to work together, sharpen one another, and build one another up in our faith so that we can begin to present him to the world around us.

So today I want to talk about how to keep the flame going in our life.

How to, as I titled it today, how to retain the flame.

So you may want to jot down a few notes.

And the first thing I wrote down is this.

If I'm going to retain the flame, if we're going to retain the flame, we have to live a lifestyle of devotion.

Because Because devotion positions us to hear clearly from our great God.

Devotion positions you to hear clearly from the God who created you through the power of His Spirit.

And you know, in the book of Acts, as the Spirit, the fire of God fell on the people in the early church in the book of Acts.

The Bible says that the Holy Spirit fell on the people and then as they began to manifest the presence of God in the region around them, the Bible says, as the fire began to work in them and work through them, other people became devoted to God.

It says in Acts chapter 2 verses 42 and 43, that the people devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to those sent by God's teaching, to fellowship and to prayer.

And the Bible goes on to say, because they devoted themselves, that all the people around them in verse 43, Acts 2 43, it says the awe of God was among them.

The very presence, the all-powerful, the majesty of God was among them, why?

Because they were devoted.

They were devoted people, understand a lifestyle of devotion to God, His mission and His purpose allows you to clearly hear from God.

The Bible says that God is not the author of confusion.

In other words, God speaks clearly.

He speaks clearly to His people and He wants you to understand exactly who you are and what He's created you to do in this earth.

And the Bible goes on to tell us as you study the book of Acts, in case you're new to the church world, the book of Acts is simply the Acts of the apostles.

It's the early church start.

It's how the early church began after Christ arose from a grave and ascended into heaven and poured His spirit out on men and women alike.

It's the development of the early church as you read through the book of Acts.

And the Bible says this in Acts chapter 13, verses two through four.

It says one day there was a group of believers, a group of men, they were gathered together.

And it says, as these men were worshiping the Lord and fasting, come on, it says one day as these men were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, spoke, was clear.

He said, appoint Barnabas and Saul for the special work which, to which I have called them, of which I have assigned them.

So after more fasting and prayer, look what the Bible says, the men, they laid their hands on them and they sent them on their way.

So Barnabas and Saul, who is later named Paul in your scripture, the Bible says they were sent out by the Holy Spirit.

How did these men know exactly what God had called them to do?

It's simply they were devoted, not to just a one-time fast.

What this passage helps us understand is fasting was already a part of their normal rhythm.

In other words, they didn't just go on a once a year fast.

Fasting and prayer was regular worship for them.

They knew that fasting and prayer positioned them in a place where they could begin to hear clearly from God about their assignment for their life.

The Bible says one day as they're gathering together fully devoted to God through their fasting, through their prayer, in this spiritual rhythm of worship, that the clear direction of God came into their life.

Understand that direction for your life flows from devotion of your life.

It doesn't flow out of just your desperation.

And the question is, are you truly devoted to who God has called you to be, whether you're a man, woman, boy, or girl in this room?

Are you fully devoted to who God says that you are?

Are you simply desperate to just get a word from God?

Because the Bible teaches you clear that you shouldn't live just in desperation.

But if you live in devotion to your God, God will begin to clearly speak to your heart about who he is and who you are and what your exact assignment is.

Notice Paul and Barnabas had a clear assignment.

Paul was what we know as the first apostle, the first sent one to all of those people who weren't of the Hebrew descent, who weren't Jewish.

He was the first person to begin to take the good news and the presence of God to what we call the Gentile world.

And that's people who weren't Jewish of that particular time.

In other words, Paul had a calling on his life.

He had an assignment on his life.

And here, his counterpart, or one of his counterpartners is a man named Barnabas.

But the result of them being devoted to God, not just making fasting a one-time thing, but fasting and prayer part of their regular worship.

The result was direction, was calling, was assignment, and it was mission.

Listening church, God speaks clearly to a listening church.

God speaks clearly to a listening church.

Are we too busy just talking?

Or are we truly listening for the clear assignment that God has for our life?

Understand, being devoted is kind of like saying, you know what God, I'm tuning in on a continual basis to your purpose and your plan for my life.

Think of it as like a 24-hour radio station that it's always being broadcast.

The problem isn't the radio station isn't, or the signal isn't always present.

The problem is the receiver isn't in the right position.

So oftentimes whenever something is broadcasting 24 hours a day, it doesn't have to do whether the signal is there.

It's just the positioning of the receiver.

And it's a lot like that with your life.

You need to understand that.

It's not that God ain't speaking.

It's not God ain't talking to men, women, boys, and girls.

It's not that the Holy Spirit is not at work.

But the problem is, are we devoted to hear from an all-powerful, all-knowing, everywhere-at-one-time God?

And are we willing, through that devotion, to go on assignment and do what He's asking us to do?

Because God has a plan for our life.

Deliberate devotion helps keep the fire burning.

And so, again, if we don't want the fire to fade after this 21 days of prayer and fasting, we have to be deliberately devoted to our great God.

Because what we discover through the book of Acts is devoted people regularly, not just sometimes, regularly heard from the Spirit of the living God in their life.

In other words, they weren't fading.

They weren't just hanging out with God sometimes.

The signal was always there.

They just positioned themselves to be able to hear clearly from God.

I want to read to you what the Bible says or what Jesus says in John 10, verse 27.

He says, my sheep listen to my voice.

He says, I know them and they follow me.

God speaks loud and clear and he speaks through his Spirit.

And it doesn't come so much as an audible voice.

It comes as a whisper to your spirit from his Spirit.

Come on somebody.

And what he will do in moments like that is he will, if you're devoted, he will begin to give you clarity on your assignment.

He'll begin to give you clarity on what he's called you to, what he's called you to be.

And I do believe a church that continually strives to listen to God, the fire doesn't burn out, it just gets stronger and stronger and stronger.

Let's be a church.

Let's be a people.

Let's be families that hear from God.

Let's be devoted to him and watch the all-consuming fire of God purify us, build something great in us and work his power through us.

The second thing I wrote down about this, about not just letting the flame fade, is I have to be consistent with my prayer.

See consistent prayer, that's talking to God in case you don't know what it is.

Consisting prayer, simply talking to God, even if you're not sure that you believe it yet, simple consistent prayer begins to strengthen our faith.

Throughout this particular last episode with my back surgery, I've been going to physical therapy over the last few months.

And that physical therapy is there to strengthen me, just like God is there and he's there to strengthen you and he's there to strengthen me, but this therapy is there to strengthen me.

And you know what I've discovered?

That it's not the intensity.

I go to therapy and participate.

It's not that, hey, you know, I'm just go there and you know what today I'm going to be intense and I'm going to get it all done and I'm going to be all this in a bag of chips.

No, no, no.

That's not what makes me stronger.

What makes me stronger is consistency.

And so I want you to know today that, that, you know, in moments like this, we'll see the supernatural hand of God work through a 21 days of prayer and of fasting.

And we'll feel like, you know, I've got to continually do these intense moments to really see the hand of God.

No, no, no.

All you have to do is consistently go to God on a regular basis and watch God work.

I would invite you to begin to understand consistency matters more than intensity.

It's not how hard I pray.

Come on.

It's not how loud I pray, but it's the heart I pray with and the consistency I pray with.

Listen to what the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, verses 17 and 18.

Never stop praying is what Paul tells the church at Thessalonica.

He says, be thankful in all circumstances for this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.

Jesus told a remarkable story about consistency.

I want to share it with you today because I think that this will speak to some of our hearts because I think sometimes some of us think, well, it's the intensity I'm doing it with instead of the consistency I'm doing it with.

Do you consistently, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, do you consistently continually talk to God?

Do you continually let him keep that fire, that spirit, that consuming nature of him?

Do you consistently let him keep that poked up because you're consistently going to him?

Listen to this story Jesus told to his disciples in Luke 18 verses one through eight.

Bible says one day Jesus told his disciples a story.

Come on.

And the story he says was to show that they should always pray and never give up.

Did you catch that?

He told them a story so that they would always pray and never give up.

And this is the story.

He says there was a judge in a certain city, he said, who neither feared God nor cared about people.

A widow of that city came to him repeatedly saying, give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.

Notice that a widow came to that judge repeatedly.

The Bible says the judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, I don't fear God or I don't care about people, but this woman is driving me crazy.

I'm going to see that she gets justice because she is wearing me out with her constant request.

Then the Lord said, learn a lesson from this unjust judge.

Even he rendered a just decision in the end.

So don't you think God will surely give justice to those chosen people who cry out to him day and night?

Will he keep putting them off?

I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly, but when the son of man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have a faith, faith that keeps praying until God gives answers?

Come on, somebody.

I need you to know that our good God is a whole lot better than the unjust judge.

And if an unjust judge finally gave in to a woman who was persistent and consistent with her request, what Jesus is saying of people of faith who are consistent and keep on asking until God's answers, how much more greater is he going to be in your situation or your circumstance?

I need you to know today that consistent prayer, consistently talking to your heavenly father is one of the great ways to keep the flame burning in your heart and in your life.

You want to see God do things.

He's doing miracles all around you.

You just got to keep asking.

You got to just keep believing.

You got to just keep trusting.

God don't just show up once in a while.

He's showing up daily, you know, and again, some of us were like, I need to come to church and see a manifestation of God, a miracle of God.

I need you to know something today.

God's manifesting His greatness and His goodness and His justice in this room every single weekend.

People are giving their life to Christ to have eternal life with Jesus because God speaks into their heart.

And I need you to know God's working.

God's working in His people and He's working through His people.

It don't have to be something that is greater than what you see.

There is nothing greater than a person surrendering their life to the Lordship and leadership of the forgiveness of God.

And that's a miracle.

Come on, somebody.

God is who He says He is.

And He's not looking for you just to experience Him when you go to a retreat.

It's a great booster.

He's not just looking for, you know what, the next revival for you to experience Him.

It's a great booster.

But I need you to know, God is a God who will work day in, day out.

He's a God who works in the dark.

He's a God who works in the light.

He's a God who works on the mountains.

He's a God who works in the valleys.

But you got to trust Him and you got to consistently go to your heavenly Father.

He's a good heavenly Father and He gives good gifts all the time.

Consistency matters more than intensity.

See, if we really want to keep the fire burning, we want what God's already been doing in these 21 days of prayer and fasting to keep on going and not go out.

We need to be a people, not just me, not just you, but people who are devoted to God and His purpose and His mission for our life.

And we must be consistently going to Him all the time.

And then the last thing I wrote down about keeping the flame going, keeping the flame burning, is understand that a clean heart helps the fire stay lit.

A clean heart helps the fire stay lit.

You see, there's a great King in our Bible known as King David, and King David drifted from his creator and his purpose.

The Bible says that King David sinned greatly against his great God, missed the mark, did something that was not of God, failed miserably, as we would say it today.

But the Bible says that he goes to God.

And Psalm 51 is, if you go and read the whole Psalm when you have time, Psalm 51 is David's repented heart.

And I want to read to you what it says in Psalm 51 verse 10, because it's really important for us to understand how God does great and mighty things to those who begin to let him clean their heart.

God's not looking for perfection.

He's just looking for willingness.

Psalm 51 verse 10, David says, create in me a clean heart, O God.

Renew a loyal spirit within me.

You see fasting and prayer often reveals attitudes and habits we need to change.

But renewal doesn't last if we ignore what God shows us.

And oftentimes what God shows us is, you know what, there's something that I am willing to forgive, and I'm willing to turn it to ashes.

But what you need to do instead of letting the ashes and letting the sin that I forgive just keep piling up and snuffing out my fire, you need to put it out of the fireplace, let's call it.

You need to understand, you need to quit revisiting that sin if God has forgiven you.

Come on.

You need to understand that his forgiveness he offered through Christ's blood was forgiveness that was enough for your past, your present, and your future sin.

But what a lot of us do is we lay in the ashes of the forgive sin, and we got all this forgive sin without getting the sin, Bible says, if God's forgiven you, he's forgotten it as far as the east is from the west.

Without just getting it out of the way, instead of revisiting that sin and keep doing the sin over and over, living in the ashes of that sin, I want you to know it's kind of like cleaning out a fireplace.

You ever had a fire for days?

Maybe some of you are not old enough to live by the, or didn't live in an environment where you had to live by a fireplace.

But back in the day when it got real cold, we didn't have central air and heat.

And we had a fireplace.

And what you had to do, you had to cut wood and somebody had to go outside and get the wood and put it on the fire to keep the family warm.

But as days and weeks went by, that ash would begin to pile up in that fireplace.

And if you just kind of continued to put wood in the midst of all that ash, the ash would begin to overrun the fire and the flame and it would begin to snuff it out.

What am I trying to say here today?

What I'm trying to say is God will give you a clean heart and God will renew a loyal spirit.

But you got to keep that heart clean.

And you need to put all that past, all that stuff, clear it out so that God can begin to do great and mighty things, sin, bitterness, and compromise.

You know what?

They can all begin to work on our spiritual life.

But God is looking for us to be a people of obedience.

And when He forgives you and shows you you have missed the mark, put it out of your life, get a clean heart, get a loyal spirit, and watch God work.

Repentance is something that we all need to participate in.

But what I need to say to you today is when you repent, that literally means turn away from it, turn your heart to God, trust God, and begin to let God do the work of purging the old stuff out.

A good pastor friend of mine spoke a word into his church for 2026, and this is the word, instant obedience releases God's best.

You want God's best in your life?

The real question for you, not for you to ask about me, not for you to ask about your wife or your husband or your kids or your parents, but when God shows you something personally, are you willing to put it behind you and be instantly, not delayed obedience, instantly obedient to the new direction He's calling you to?

Because instant obedience releases your Creator's best on your life.

Understand He's wanting to continually, He's not looking for perfection, but what He's looking for is are you willing to put the old stuff out and let the new spirit make you alive in Christ Jesus and keep that flame punched up, keep it burning and keep it moving in this world.

And my friend, I'm going to say to every Christ follower in this room today, one of the things that God is calling many of you to be instant obedient about is your participation.

Oh, how are you participating in the local church?

Because God makes it crystal clear is when you come to Christ Jesus for the forgiveness of your sin, He has an assignment for you.

He has a calling for you and He has a part for you to play in the local church.

Why are you being disobedient in what God's calling you to?

And God is telling some of you in this room on the internet, it's time, you know what, for you to step up and let the God of the universe work, not only in you, but work through us so that His glory and His presence can fill the earth.

He is an all-consuming fire waiting to change the world, but it is you and me and our obedience that begins to allow that to happen.

What part is God calling you to play?

I would ask you to consider that, and when He speaks to you, don't you sit on it, okay?

Don't sit on your duff and do no stuff, because God's called you to get up, come on, and get under the spout where the glory comes out and do something remarkable with your life.

I do believe clearly that this is a season of prayer and fasting here at Valorous Church where God has lit a fire, but my heart is that we keep the flame burning.

We stay devoted, we stay consistent, and we're instantly obedient, and we live a life with a clean heart.

Isn't that what you want for your life?

Isn't that what you want for your family?

Isn't that what you want for your kids and your grandkids?

Isn't that what you want for your neighbors and those who live around you?

Well, I need you to know today, it starts with us.

It starts with you and me.

The question is, are we willing to let the all-consuming fire of God shine in our hearts and through our hearts and change the world?

Can you bow your head, please?

God, I pray we would be a people of faith.

We would trust the remarkable power of your Holy Spirit in our life, that God, we would be people who are on assignment.

God, we would be fully devoted to you and your purpose in this earth.

God, you are calling us to live life and live it to the full.

As Jesus speaks to his people, God, I pray that we would listen and we would begin to follow him with our life.

God, if there's one here today that don't know you and they've never trusted Christ as their Savior, God, I pray today would be the day they understand who Jesus is.

My friend, I need you to know that the reason Christ came and he gave his life on that cross was to give you and me God's unmerited favor, to give us his amazing grace.

The Bible says that Jesus was perfect in every way, but he died a criminal's death on a cross because humanity deserved that death.

But Jesus took that penalty for you and he took that penalty for me through his blood.

And the question is, have you received by faith what the gift of God is through the blood of Christ?

And if you haven't, just say today, today, God, I admit I'm a sinner in need of a savior.

And I trust what Christ did on that cross to forgive me of my sin.

Tell God you believe that Jesus defeated sin, death, and the grave, and he rose three days later from the grave.

And my friend, the Bible says, if you confess with your mouth and you believe in your heart that Jesus is who he says he is, in that moment, you will be saved.

So I believe that God is still saving people every single week, every single day.

I believe in the miracles of an all powerful, all knowing, everywhere at one time God.

I believe that God is touching men, women, boys, and girls on the shoulder.

I believe he's helping people in this room and right now on the internet know that they are made for so much more.

My friend, if that is you today, just tell God, thank you for that gift.

You believe, you trust, and I invite you to stand and begin to worship with us today during this last song.