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God most often gives me direction in what to preach by placing a scripture or two into my head, and then it is as I begin to read and study those verses that the message comes. My message this morning (entitled "God's Tattoo" - 1/04) came that way. Occasionally, He will give me my entire sermon outline and thought in one fell swoop, and when He does that it is very easy to get ready to preach! (If He would give me my sermon like that all the time, then I could play golf a lot more than once a week -- and that is probably the reason that He doesn't!) Every once in a while, God gives me direction by simply placing a word or a phrase in my mind during prayer. I then have to spend a great deal of study and prayer trying to find out exactly the significance of that word or phrase. If the title of my sermon was a phrase included within the text verses, that usually means that God spoke to me in this way.

In praying for this sermon, the phrase "Holy Ground" was given to me, and all I knew for sure was that God wanted to me to preach about "Holy Ground." The term or it's equivalent is only used in scripture 3 times: twice referring to the call of Moses, and once when the angel appeared unto Joshua. There are, of course, many things in scripture that are referred to as "holy." God is holy. The Tabernacle of Moses and all of the furniture that was used for sacrifice was considered "holy." The Word of God is called "holy." As the Apostolic Church, we are to be "holy."

The word "holy" is very familiar to us, but is not an easy word to define. It literally means "separated, unique, set a part for God's use, anointed, sacred, and pure." To be holy, something or somebody must be all of these things at once. The altar in the temple was called holy because it was only to be used for sacrifices for God, and it was to be respected and revered, and kept pure, and kept special. It was "holy." It was anointed by God to be "the" spot where Israel could obey God's law of blood sacrifice. It was anointed and set apart by God as THE spot where a lamb would be offered once a year that could roll Israel's sins ahead for one year. We understand that; it's very obvious why the altar was called "holy."

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that Exodus 3:5 that we read in our text is the first time that the word "holy" is used in scripture. God told Moses "you are standing on holy ground." And that was the first time He or anybody else had ever called anything "holy." The first thing designated "holy," then, was not an altar or temple. It was not a sacrifice or offering. It was not even God Himself. The first thing that God called "holy" was a special patch of ground upon which Moses found himself standing on the side of a mountain called "Horeb" or more commonly "Sinai."

There are two questions that I would like to propose tonight that must be answered for this to be a message from God: 1.) Is there still holy ground today? 2.) What exactly is "holy ground" and what does it represent in our lives?

To the first let me say that I firmly believe that there is "holy ground" today. Not that there is a patch of dirt that is any more special than another. But just as Moses reached a place in his life where he no longer was treading upon the normal and the routine, I believe that there is a place in our life where we can reach where it becomes obvious that we are upon "holy ground." And that statement leads us directly into the answer of the second question. The ground that Moses was standing upon was holy because to be there meant that you were in the presence of God, but there is more to it than just that. If the ground was truly holy, then it means that Moses had reached a place in his life where things had gone beyond "just average life" and where he now had the opportunity to walk in the supernatural; into the promises of God; to be anointed like he had never been anointed before; to walk in power and see miracles that he had never experienced. It meant that he had reached a place of decision where if he chose to follow God's will, his life would never be the same again! A place where the windows of heaven would open and manna would fall. A place where unfulfilled promises were about to come to pass so fast that he would scarcely have time to think about it. All of that is where Moses found himself when he found himself standing upon "holy ground."

For forty years, Moses had lived in Egypt. He knew that he had a special call of God upon his life. He had tried to "make things happen" by becoming a ruler of Israel and even killing an Egyptian who was abusing a Jewish man. Just as things always do when we rely upon our own ability, everything fell apart and Moses found himself running into the wilderness of Midian. There he married and there he had spent 40 lonely, boring years herding sheep. History tells us that there were many tribes in this area that were sheepherders and indeed even the scriptures point out in the second chapter of Exodus that it was a clash over the scarce water that introduced Moses to his wife. It was hard being a shepherd in this county and Moses had to continually compete with the others to find good pasture for his sheep.

The Jewish Historian Josephus tells us that the Mount Horeb (or Mount Sinai as we tend to call it) was the highest mountain in those parts. Upon it the grass grew lush and thick, and yet the area shepherds were afraid to take their sheep upon it because they believed that "God lived there." And there were reports of fantastic and "different" things that were happening there! (Antiquities, 2.12.1)

But we find Moses wasn't spooked by the rumors that God moved mightily upon this mountain, and that one day he willingly drove his sheep upon the mountain to feed. He quickly discovered that the rumors were true when to his surprise, he looked over and saw a thorn bush burning with an intense blaze, and yet the fire was not actually consuming the limbs and flowers and thorns. He was so surprised by this sight, that he turned off of the path to get a closer look when suddenly a voice called out to him from the bush and called him by name! Moses shakily replied "yes, Lord." And was told "take off your sandals, you are standing on holy ground."

So why was the ground holy? Because Moses was standing upon a spot from which his life would never be the same again. The weariness from going through the motions of everyday life in a monotonous routine was about to vanish! He was about to walk from that mountain into the throne room of Pharaoh and see the hand of God sweep through the land of Egypt in an unprecedented manner. He was about to see God perform miracle after miracle in taking 2 million people to the promised land. He was about to receive instruction to once again return to this very spot where God would reveal to him the laws that would set up history and mankind for the Messiah to be able to come! It would be upon this mountain that God would show Himself to Moses and that Jehovah God would talk face to face with this former shepherd boy. The "holy ground" then represented the entrance to the supernatural; into an all-powerful, move of God within His life!

That's exactly what it represented to Joshua in our other text. Joshua had assumed command of the children of Israel yet another 40 years later. They had crossed the Jordan River and had camped for the first time inside the borders of the promised land! That same night, the manna had stopped falling from heaven. The large, foreboding walls of Jericho loomed in front of them as a terrific obstacle. Joshua sought the Lord for guidance and suddenly an angel appeared to him carrying a sword. Joshua looked at him in astonishment and asked "are you friendly or enemy." To which the angel said "take off your shoes, Joshua for the ground that you are standing upon is holy!" For 40 years, Joshua had wandered in the wilderness with the children of Israel that had doubted, waiting for them to die off so that he could come to this place. And now Joshua stood at a place in his life where nothing would ever be the same again. If he chose to follow the Lord, he would see things that even Moses had never seen. He was about to operate in the spiritual realm in ways that had not even been dreamed about! God was about to release His divine power to remove every obstacle, barrier, and giant that stood between His people and complete victory! And so that is why the ground under Joshua's feet was called "holy." It represented the entrance into the unprecedented supernatural move of the Spirit of God within their lives. God was about to move and nothing would ever be the same again in Joshua's life.

Can I preach to us tonight? Some of us feel just as Moses and Joshua did in those days before our texts. We may not have been in our situations or at our spiritual level for 40 years, but it feels like it in within our spirit. Hear the message from God for this church tonight: It's time to get to Holy Ground! There IS Holy Ground still available. God is no respecter of persons. I am preaching to a bunch of people tonight that you are fast approaching a place in your life that is a point of no return. If you step out in faith and obey God, you are about to see the supernatural released in your life unlike you have ever dreamed. You are about to see the Spirit of God move in a mighty way through your situations and through your hands! It is the will of God for a mighty revival to erupt within this place tonight. It is the will of God for us to find ourselves on Holy Ground, and not just stay there but walk through the open door into the promised place of God! God wants to bring us to a place where we have never been before. A place that takes away the monotony of normal routine. A place that most people in this world have only heard rumors and are sort of afraid of. A place where we are no longer trying to "make something happen" but where our bodies become the vessel through which the deep river of the Holy Ghost pours out into our world. A place that brings freedom and liberty in the Holy Ghost! A place where the miraculous and the wonderful returns!

Somebody needs to respond to the Word of the Lord tonight! Do you want to stand upon Holy Ground? Do you want to leave this place with your life never the same again!? Do you want to reach that place in Jesus Christ!? God's going to do it if you want it. You've got to want to go there. You can't be afraid and content to scrounge for whatever you can find in your normal routine! I can't answer for you tonight, but I've already made up my mind: I desire to stand upon Holy Ground more than anything else in my life! I'm ready for the supernatural! I'm ready for the Spirit of the Lord to shake my life and this city! I'm ready to stand as Moses stood! I'm ready to here the commandment of the Lord: take off your shoes, because you are standing on Holy Ground! It's time to climb the mountain of the Lord to a level that we've never been before!

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That's all well and good, but how do we get there? How do we get to Holy Ground?

We get there the same way that Moses and Joshua got there. If there is still Holy Ground today, then the way to get to it has not changed either. What it took for them to stand in such a hallowed place is exactly what it will take for us to reach the same spot. For those of you who want to stand upon Holy Ground, this is how Moses (and Joshua, for that matter) got there in our text:

For Moses to get to Holy Ground:

Maybe that doesn't mean anything to you immediately, but you probably don't know that "Midian" means "strife." "Strife" means "an argument, a vying for selfish positions, a place of unrest, a lack of peace, a disagreeable situation." Moses lived in Midian for 40 years! For 40 years he had to listen to people argue with each other and quarrel and fight and gripe and complain and wound each other with their tongues. For 40 years, he lived in a "hell-hole" of bitterness and was surrounded by people who were mean and cared less about the love and spirit of God.

Joshua was no exception. For 40 years he had to live with a bunch of grumbling and mumbling losers that had absolutely NO faith in God's ability to do anything. He had to put up with some of them rebelling against God and the man of God. He had to constantly hear their doubts and complaints and negativity while he was just simply waiting for them to die!

But understand something: If Moses had not gone to Midian, he would have never been able to stand upon Holy Ground! If Joshua had not endured the complaining, He would have never had the angel to tell him "take off your shoes" in the promised land. To get to holy ground, you and I will have to travel -- probably longer than we ever wanted to -- through the land of strife!

Don't be disheartened if you feel as if you live your life around a bunch of faithless, scornful and mean people. The devil would try to tell you that strife within your life means that you are a long way from the perfect place in God, but I've got some good new for you: "strife" in your life means that you are well ON YOUR WAY to standing on Holy Ground! Stay faithful to God! Don't let the critics and complainers get you down. The path that leads to holy ground goes through Midian!

We've had some people walk through our doors that did not desire the true presence of God. We've had some that continually caused strife and debate and seemed to bring pain. Hallelujah for them! They've come and they've gone, but don't get down or depressed or anything if you've been hurt by somebody in the church that was less than sincere. Instead praise God for them: You are on the same path that Moses and Joshua had to take! They were used of God to get us to a place where we can walk through the door of opportunity like we have never even imagined! They have been stepping stones to get us to a place where true Apostolic revival can break forth in this city and church. Don't get bitter or hurt: keep on being faithful to God; you've got to walk through a land of strife to get to the promised place of God. It's just a part of getting to Holy Ground!

That's maybe not what you were expecting, but it's Bible. Look how else Moses and Joshua got to "holy ground:"

It's not a popular message but it is truth. Our text plainly says that the mountain of God where the Holy Ground was located was on the "backside" of the desert. To get there, Moses had to travel through some dry country. It was the same for Joshua. His Holy Ground was beyond the Jordan river on the "backside" of a bunch of desolate wilderness.

To get into the supernatural realm of the Spirit of God, you've first got to be faithful to God in some "dry" times. You are going to have to keep serving Him even when your praise and your spiritual man doesn't feel as if they are getting anywhere. You are going to have come to church when your body tells you something else. You're not lost. You've not gone astray. The desert is there on the way to the holy ground.

Even before Jesus saw the first miracle, He had to pass through the wilderness. He had to overcome the temptations that come with hunger and loneliness. The desert is dry. The desert is dusty. The desert is lonely. The desert is depressing. The desert is monotonous. But God wants to see if you will be faithful. Someone who is faithful in dry times will certainly be faithful when the miracles start to happen. When the presence of God seems so close. Those who will be faithful to God through the desert will cheerfully and with their whole heart worship and thank God for the rain of the Spirit! They will not take for granted the blessings and dew of heaven. And because of that, God sends the desert country, the wilderness in our lives before the promised place.

If you feel as if you have been going through a dry spell. If you feel that your life has been devoid of peace. Then rejoice! You're already well on your way to standing on Holy Ground. You've already taken the first steps to experiencing a powerful move of the Spirit in your life tonight that will forever transform you!

But those aren't the only two things that got Moses and Joshua onto Holy Ground. There's more to it than just being faithful in the desert:

Moses had been to some mountains, but never this far. Joshua had been in the area, but never really this far before. Their "holy ground" stood just beyond what was the normal limit for them. If you are ready to see the supernatural explode in your life, then you must be willing to go beyond the normal place that you always reach. You've got to be willing to praise God more sincere than you ever have. You've got to be willing to respond to the Spirit and surrender more of yourself than you have ever done. You can't be satisfied with your spiritual level and what you experienced last month or year or season. There has to be a hunger within you that causes you to step out into the unknown and get beyond the fears of uncharted territory and allow the Spirit to do something new in your life!

I'm preaching to us tonight! If the shepherds of the area talked about the fact that "strange things were going on upon the mountain where God lived" then God had been there a long time. God had been wanting to talk to Moses a long time. It was not God that kept Moses from Holy Ground, but rather the fact that Moses for so long listened to the fear around him and refused to go further! God waiting on you! Are you willing to push aside the doubts and fears of the unknown and go beyond anything you have ever experienced?!

Not only did he go further, but he had to get off the path that he had before planned to take. For the supernatural to work in our lives, we must be willing to alter our schedule. We must be willing to be "inconvenience ourselves" to the plan and will of God. Moses had already laid out a path that he was going to follow but he had to "turn aside" to get to the holy ground! He had to be willing to surrender his direction and life to get to that sacred place in God.

You've got the planned route in your head: you go to church tonight, then you go right back to your routine tomorrow morning. If the sermon or worship was exceptionally good tonight, you might think about it tomorrow. But probably by mid-day the feeling will have passed, and you will be living your life this week just as you have the umpteen weeks before. But if you want the supernatural, then you are going to have "turn aside" from what you've always done. Last weeks level and effort of prayer is not going to bring the supernatural. Your coveted routine is more of a hindrance than a help to the plan of God!

Or maybe, you've got the planned route in your head: the preacher preaches and then you come and pray for five minutes and then you return to your seat while everybody else finishes and then you shake everybody's hand and then go home. If you want to experience something special, something supernatural, something powerful that forever changes your life tonight, then you've got to "turn aside" from that. Do you know why it seems that God moves so spectacularly at men's conference or women's conference or youth camp? It's because for those days, the people there have laid aside their set routine. They have "turned aside" to look closer at what God wants to do in their life.

Don't tell me that the same God of those places is not here tonight. The location is not what is different. God cares less about time tonight than you think. I know we have work tomorrow. We have to get home and get to sleep. Moses had his sheep with him. But notice that you never hear about the sheep ever again in the story. That doesn't mean that he left them there; I'm sure that he herded them up and returned them back to home. They are not mentioned because when you "turn aside" and step onto holy ground, everything else pales in comparison with what God is doing!

We'll "turn aside" from work to do whatever we want to do. If we want to go fishing, then we'll find time to "turn aside." God is wanting to do something special in this place tonight. Why don't you respond by raising your expectations!?

The direction you turn is also important in getting to Holy Ground! The only way to get to Holy Ground is to desire to examine the fire a little closer! The thorn bush was burned and yet still lived! It represented Jesus Christ who also wore thorns and burned brightly with the fire of the Holy Ghost and yet was not consumed by either of those things! When the 120 received the Holy Ghost on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2), "fire" fell upon each of them. God is a "consuming fire." When you receive the Holy Ghost, the same thing that happened to that bush happens to you. You become ablaze with the fire of the Holy Ghost yet still live! You still walk around and go to work and church and sleep! The fire consumes us but does not destroy us!

To get to Holy Ground, you've got to desire to get closer to that experience again! If you've never received the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues as they did in the Early Church, then you've got to desire to get closer to that. If you've had the Holy Ghost for 30 years, then to get to Holy Ground, you've got to desire to get back to that experience. You need to be fascinated with the fire again! You've got to draw closer to the fire again! You've got to focus on the fire again!

God spoke to Moses from the fire. To get to the Holy Ground, he had to answer it! There's a tremendous lesson to be learned in the call of Moses here. Moses was already walking toward the flames, why did God call out to him? The answer lies in the fact that upon walking upon Holy Ground, God was about to take Moses to a new level in the Spirit. God wanted to make sure that Moses recognized that this was no ordinary encounter. God wanted to make sure that Moses recognized that God was about to do something great!

We know this because God called out to him by calling his name twice. "Moses, Moses" God said. There are seven times in scripture when God called someone by repeating their name twice like that and EVERY time it is to see if the person recognizes that God is about to do an extraordinary thing in their life and that God was wanting to forever change something within their life! To show you what I mean, I'll quickly go through the list of God calling out to people by repeating their names twice:

1. Abraham, Abraham Genesis 22:11

God was about to spare his son's life and fulfill all of the promises now that He realized that Abraham was willing to give Him everything.

2. Jacob, Jacob Genesis 46:2

God was about to reintroduce him to his son, Joseph and he would never be hungry again and would instead spend the rest of his days in the fertile land of Goshen.

3. Moses, Moses Exodus 3:4

Our subject in this sermon!

4. Samuel, Samuel I Samuel 3:10

God was about to bring judgment upon the house of Eli and exalt Samuel to the spiritual leader of all of Israel!

5. Martha, Martha Luke 10:41

God wanted Martha to get a revelation of the importance and life changing power of sitting at Jesus' feet!

6. Simon, Simon Luke 22:31

He was about to deny Jesus Christ three times, and go through the darkest days of his life, but in the end, He would preach the day of Pentecost and become the backbone of the Early Church, Holy Ghost revival!

7. Saul, Saul Acts 9:4

God was about to take the church's worst enemy and turn him into the greatest theologian, missionary, and preacher that ever lived!

If we could hear in the Spirit tonight, I think that God would be calling you by your name in a similar manner! God is wanting someone to realize that tonight is not just a normal service night, but tonight God is wanting someone to step onto Holy Ground!

There was good reason for why both Moses and Joshua had to remove their shoes to stand upon Holy Ground, and it goes well beyond reverence. The shoes of the day were sandals; literally just a sole with straps. As they walked, dirt and rocks often became entrapped between the sole and the foot which is why the first thing that someone did when they entered a home in Jesus' time was to remove their shoes and wash their feet so as not to soil the floor. Not only that, but the soles of the shoes kept Moses and Joshua from having direct contact with the Holy Ground.

To get onto the Holy Ground, we've got to remove every bit of trash and debris that would keep us from God. We've got to repent and truly get the sin out of our lives. When we do that, we are "taking off our shoes" in the spirit. Sin separates us from God. It keeps us from stepping onto the Holy Ground that God has ordained for us to stand upon! God was saying "it doesn't matter how small or insignificant you think the contamination, take them off!" Sin, no matter how big or small to you, is a big deal to God. To stand upon the Holy Ground that He has for us, we must remove "every weight" that would cause us to miss the moving of the Spirit of God! You can experience somewhat of a move of God with sin in your life, but you won't get to Holy Ground. To get there, everything must be submitted to God. Take off your shoes. It's not a request, it' a command! You are on the verge of stepping into the supernatural like never before. Take off your shoes!

I've preached to you with everything in me tonight. And the best is yet to come. God is waiting and watching from His mountain of blessings to see if anyone will turn aside and do what it takes to get to the Holy Ground. The last thing that both Moses and Joshua had to do to get there was this:

Moses got so close, that God had to tell him "whoa, don't come any further." "You can't handle all that I have for you quite yet!" I speak about all of us including myself when I say "why don't we live that way in God?" Why are we content with just a little touch, instead of setting our minds to receive everything that God has for us this service? Why do people so often content themselves to nibble at the edges of God's blessing in the Spirit when God has a banquet prepared? We should learn a lesson from Moses: he was so zealous for the things of God in the Spirit, that God had to tell him to slow down! So many of us are so scared of "being out of line" or of not "being in order" that we don't even get close to the limit of what God has for us to experience in the Spirit! Why don't you forget about what other people think and what other people say and stop worrying about what is "normal" or not and let the Holy Ghost move through you and in you like you have never felt before!? Somebody get the attitude of Moses and say, God I want everything that you have for me!

How long has it been since you left a service and you said "Wow, I'm so spiritually full that I don't think I could hold another blessing!?" It's time to stop being satisfied with just a little touch. Get everything that you can here tonight! Don't stop until you cannot receive another thing from God! When you do so, you will have stepped into a sacred place. You will be able to leave this place saying "I was on Holy Ground." There is still a Holy Ground available and now you know how to get to it. Is anyone willing to make the effort?