Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message,
Speaker 1: y'all be seated. I want to tell you a story today,
Speaker 1: story from the Bible from Second Kings chapter eight. And
Speaker 1: you might not have heard this one before. It's really good.
Speaker 1: It's really good. In Second King's chapter eight, there's a
Speaker 1: little story like you said that already. I'm just stalling
Speaker 1: while I find my scripture. The scripture records this. Now
Speaker 1: Elisha had said to the woman who's son he had
Speaker 1: restored to life, go away with your family and stay
Speaker 1: for a while. Put that in the chat. Stay for
Speaker 1: a while, I feel God on the first verse of
Speaker 1: the passage, and we've got five more to go past
Speaker 1: her keenan stay for a while. But here's the bad part.
Speaker 1: Stay for a while wherever you can, not necessarily where
Speaker 1: you want, because the Lord has decreed a famine in
Speaker 1: the land that will last seven years. And the woman
Speaker 1: proceeded to do as the Man of God said, she
Speaker 1: and her family went away and stayed in the land
Speaker 1: of the Philistines seven years. At the end of the
Speaker 1: seven years, she came back from the land of the
Speaker 1: Philistines and went to appeal to the king for her
Speaker 1: house and land. The King was talking to Geheesi, the
Speaker 1: servant of the Man of God, and had said, tell
Speaker 1: me all about the great things Elisha has done. Just
Speaker 1: as gehes I was telling the king how Elisha had
Speaker 1: restored the dead to life, the woman whose son Elisha
Speaker 1: had brought back to life, came to appeal to the
Speaker 1: king for her house and land. Wow, gahees I said,
Speaker 1: this is the woman, my lord the King, and that's
Speaker 1: her son whom Elisha restored to life. The king asked
Speaker 1: the woman about it, and she told him, then you're
Speaker 1: ready for this. He assigned an official to her case
Speaker 1: and said to him, give back everything that belonged to her.
Speaker 1: I need to know who's with me today because it
Speaker 1: feels like a funeral in the room. But it's really
Speaker 1: a great opportunity for you to shout say give back everything.
Speaker 1: In the chat, give back everything. This is not a
Speaker 1: time for lowercase. This is a time for all cats.
Speaker 1: Give back everything. Say it again, give back everything that
Speaker 1: belonged to her, including all the income from her land,
Speaker 1: from the day she left the country until now. So
Speaker 1: this is your sermon. You're the one that I the
Speaker 1: devil to get this message for well good, because the
Speaker 1: Lord told me to talk to you today about timing
Speaker 1: your testimony. Do you know what I mean when I
Speaker 1: say testimony put the word testimony in the chat. For
Speaker 1: some of you, this will bring up a courtroom image,
Speaker 1: depending on the path that your life has taken, or
Speaker 1: what you're watching or whatever you're aware of. For others,
Speaker 1: it will put us back in a church during the
Speaker 1: scariest time of the church service. And how many know
Speaker 1: what I'm talking about when I say a testimony service
Speaker 1: in a church because it's totally ad lived and there
Speaker 1: are no gutters in case the balls go right off.
Speaker 1: You know, you never know if it's going to hit
Speaker 1: any pins or if somebody's gonna stand up and monopolize.
Speaker 1: The time, Pastor Mickey used to do the testimony service,
Speaker 1: and he used to have people come up and say stuff.
Speaker 1: When I started this church, I had had people share
Speaker 1: their testimonies, but I always had a rule, and this
Speaker 1: was my rule, and I think it's a pretty good rule.
Speaker 1: They could share their testimony, but I always had to
Speaker 1: hold the mic. Is that true? And I trained our
Speaker 1: campus fastors. This is this true, Campus Fastors. I said,
Speaker 1: when you bring somebody up on stage that you can't trust,
Speaker 1: and let me tell you who to trust the least,
Speaker 1: the one who is the most excited to come up
Speaker 1: and share when you offer the opportunity. So that's our rule.
Speaker 1: You hold the mic, and I'll tell you why. Just
Speaker 1: because there's one story that stands out of my mind.
Speaker 1: I've seen some testimonies services go really bad, and maybe
Speaker 1: you have to one that I heard about. I didn't
Speaker 1: see this with my own eyes, but my friend Carl,
Speaker 1: he had this incident where he was playing piano behind
Speaker 1: the pastor and during testimony service there was a man
Speaker 1: who stood up and said, I called him this morning
Speaker 1: to confirm this was true. Do you remember the story?
Speaker 1: He was playing piano and a man stood up and said,
Speaker 1: I just need to confess to the Lord that I've
Speaker 1: been having some really bad thoughts about people. And yes,
Speaker 1: I mean you, big boy, And he turns in points
Speaker 1: to my friend Carl's dad, And so Carl's dad, do
Speaker 1: you know the story? And Carl's dad stood up right.
Speaker 1: I barely remembered it too, but he said, and I
Speaker 1: mean you, big boy. I'm talking about you, big boy
Speaker 1: in testimony service. And Carl's dad stood up, comes to
Speaker 1: the front of the church. This is a little church,
Speaker 1: there's no security, comes to the front of the church
Speaker 1: with his chest out and says, well, how about we
Speaker 1: move this to the parking lot. You're talking about me?
Speaker 1: So what's my number one rule for testimony service? You
Speaker 1: hold the mic because I can't trust you yet. And
Speaker 1: trust takes time, and there are certain things that you
Speaker 1: need to hold on to until you've had enough relational
Speaker 1: time to develop trust. That's not being paranoid. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: just the wisdom of experience. So another thing that I
Speaker 1: would teach is kind of like a countdown timer, like
Speaker 1: after sixty seconds, take it back. Take the mic back
Speaker 1: after about sixty seconds, that's all it takes. If they
Speaker 1: start with my great grandmother, get the mic, start pulling
Speaker 1: it back, pull it back slowly, so it doesn't happen
Speaker 1: all at once, It just kind of slowly. And the
Speaker 1: truth of the matter is, you never really get to
Speaker 1: share the truth story of what God is doing in
Speaker 1: your life. As it is, you don't really have time
Speaker 1: to tell everything, and you really don't have trust to
Speaker 1: tell everything. What I called it in a recent sermon
Speaker 1: was a time lapse testimony where you edit out the
Speaker 1: scenes that you don't want other people to see. And
Speaker 1: I think that's wise. I don't think you should just
Speaker 1: trust anybody talking about the things that God has done
Speaker 1: in your life. What I wonder is, have you even
Speaker 1: told yourself your true testimony? When I read the scripture
Speaker 1: in Two Kings, chapter eight, it kind of came alive
Speaker 1: in me to realize that, I guess, depending on how
Speaker 1: you look at it, God either has really terrible timing
Speaker 1: or really impeccable timing. You could make the case from
Speaker 1: certain scriptures that God has terrible timing. And I know
Speaker 1: that makes me sound like a heretic, and they could
Speaker 1: probably clip this and put it on YouTube or something
Speaker 1: like that and say all my false teachings. But four
Speaker 1: days after Lazarus dies is bad timing to show up
Speaker 1: and help, Or the fourth watch of the night, just
Speaker 1: before dawn is a terrible time to step in and
Speaker 1: stop the storm. In this scripture, though it brought to
Speaker 1: my memory all the times that God was waiting for
Speaker 1: the exact right moment in my life where He could
Speaker 1: achieve the most glory out of my situation to step in.
Speaker 1: Some sermons that I preach are like a lesson. This one,
Speaker 1: to me in my spirit, feels more like a lifeline
Speaker 1: that God gave me to give to somebody as you
Speaker 1: were waiting for the restoration of something that you lost.
Speaker 1: And if we can look at this scripture for a
Speaker 1: moment today, I think we can see some things to
Speaker 1: help us. Especially in verse one, it says that Elisha
Speaker 1: had said to the woman whose son he had restored.
Speaker 1: Everybody say the word restored. I love that word. I
Speaker 1: think we need to use it more in church, restored,
Speaker 1: restored to life. And he told that woman go away
Speaker 1: with your family and stay for a while wherever you can,
Speaker 1: because the Lord has to create a famine in the
Speaker 1: land that will last seven years. Now here's what will
Speaker 1: get you about the story. In verse two, the woman
Speaker 1: proceeded to do as the Man of God said, and
Speaker 1: then when she came back seven years later, she lost
Speaker 1: what she had. So I can understand characters like Jonah,
Speaker 1: who God says, go to Nineveh but you want to
Speaker 1: go to Tarsish, and because you want to go to Tarsish,
Speaker 1: you end up on the seaweed Mediterranean diet. You end
Speaker 1: up having to spend the night the fish. That's understandable.
Speaker 1: This scripture suggests that you can do exactly what God
Speaker 1: tells you, that you can go exactly where He sends you,
Speaker 1: that you can act on God's word and not see
Speaker 1: the results that you imagine. You can do everything right.
Speaker 1: And see, this is where we get in trouble because
Speaker 1: sometimes we become convinced that the famine is our fault.
Speaker 1: Notice in the passage, the Lord decreed the famine, and
Speaker 1: the Lord told the woman to leave. But when she left,
Speaker 1: in the process of going where God sent her to survive,
Speaker 1: she lost something that she had before she left. And
Speaker 1: the famine wasn't her fault. And there's no disobedience. I mean,
Speaker 1: this woman, you don't know much about her, maybe, but
Speaker 1: she's absolutely a man because she had a very generous heart.
Speaker 1: And we kind of know this woman. We know a
Speaker 1: lot about this woman, and to me, she's familiar because
Speaker 1: I've preached a lot about her story. But see things
Speaker 1: have changed for her. You know, one day you can
Speaker 1: stand up and share where you're at in your life
Speaker 1: and is so amazing and you're so blessed. One of
Speaker 1: the reasons that I don't teach parenting sermons is because
Speaker 1: mine's still live with me, and I don't want to
Speaker 1: tempt God. Do you understand what I mean? To get
Speaker 1: up and preach seven ways to raise an amazing kid?
Speaker 1: And then God sends seven demons in my kid so
Speaker 1: that I can see that sometimes you can do all
Speaker 1: the right things as a parent. It'll keep you from
Speaker 1: getting judgmental. To realize that this is the same woman
Speaker 1: when the prophet asked her what do you want? Because
Speaker 1: see she had done a great thing for Elisha, And
Speaker 1: when the prophet said what do you want? She said
Speaker 1: something interesting. I don't need anything. I've got a home
Speaker 1: among my own people. And the woman who needed nothing
Speaker 1: in Second King's chapter four now has nothing in Second
Speaker 1: King's Chapter eight. What is the point of that for
Speaker 1: me to bring it up? Don't be arrogant in seasons
Speaker 1: of blessings, don't be arrogant, And by the same token,
Speaker 1: in seasons of struggle, don't despair. And you would love
Speaker 1: to convince you that it's all your fault, even the
Speaker 1: things that people did to you, that there was something
Speaker 1: wrong with you that made them do it. But the
Speaker 1: famine wasn't her fault. The famine wasn't her fault. Now
Speaker 1: I hesitate to preach this because we live in a
Speaker 1: time where people kind of don't want to take responsibility
Speaker 1: for anything. So by saying this, the famine isn't their fault,
Speaker 1: I'm afraid that my sermon will be misapplied. Okay, the
Speaker 1: famine wasn't her fault, but she still had a responsibility,
Speaker 1: right right, So she walks back into the presence of
Speaker 1: the king to ask him to give back what she
Speaker 1: lost when she left, what you lost when you left,
Speaker 1: what you lost when you left. Okay, I'm gonna share
Speaker 1: something with you. This is kind of personal, But about
Speaker 1: two and a half years ago, I realized there were
Speaker 1: some things in my life that God wanted to give me,
Speaker 1: and that indeed he had promised me that I had
Speaker 1: given up on. And I'll tell you exactly what it was.
Speaker 1: It's not some deep, dark secret. I just, you know,
Speaker 1: never really thought to share it with you till I
Speaker 1: read this passage. Pretty much I had made up my
Speaker 1: mind that I was some kind of machine that God
Speaker 1: wanted to use to do ministry, and I thought that
Speaker 1: my greatest value to God was what he could use
Speaker 1: me to do. I don't think I would have said
Speaker 1: it like that. I certainly preached the opposite of that.
Speaker 1: You're a child of God, you're the righteousness of God.
Speaker 1: You're not a human doing, You're a human being. But
Speaker 1: you can say all kinds of stuff with your mouth,
Speaker 1: and I believe it in your heart. I promise you
Speaker 1: you can all day long have the right answers and
Speaker 1: then deep down in your heart have some really dark questions.
Speaker 1: And for me, I was starting to wonder, like, do
Speaker 1: I matter apart from what I do? Now that's a
Speaker 1: tender thing to say to you, because some of it
Speaker 1: I'm still undoing. Let me tell you a little bit
Speaker 1: of my testimony. I started preaching when I was sixteen,
Speaker 1: So for me, that was really early for me to
Speaker 1: become acquainted with the fact that when you stand up
Speaker 1: and talk, you're representing God. Right. I'm thankful that God
Speaker 1: called me at that stage of my life. I really
Speaker 1: wouldn't change any of it, you know, but what it
Speaker 1: did in me it started to kind of conflate my
Speaker 1: identity with my contribution, or I could say it another way.
Speaker 1: It kind of started to confuse my identity with my gift.
Speaker 1: That happens to a lot of pastors. And about two
Speaker 1: and a half years ago I found myself in the
Speaker 1: position of this woman. Now here's how I relate to her.
Speaker 1: Not that I'm a widow. There's a lot I don't.
Speaker 1: She's a woman, I'm a man. This woman, as a
Speaker 1: matter of fact, has seen a physical resurrection of her child.
Speaker 1: What I can relate to her in this way is
Speaker 1: that God wanted to give her something that she didn't
Speaker 1: even know to ask for, and that in the process
Speaker 1: of surviving a famine, she had lost something. I think
Speaker 1: in the process in chunks I never talked to you
Speaker 1: about this, but in the process of building this church,
Speaker 1: which I believe God called me to do as a leader,
Speaker 1: as a preacher, I think there are some things that
Speaker 1: while I was doing what it required to do, that
Speaker 1: I kind of left myself out of it. Y'all are
Speaker 1: like God was he? What drug was he on? It
Speaker 1: wasn't like all that, because it doesn't always have to
Speaker 1: be like all of that. All I know is I
Speaker 1: would find myself many times wondering if I couldn't do
Speaker 1: what I did, would I have any right to be here?
Speaker 1: And basically I thought that the only way for me
Speaker 1: to belong was to bring something external to myself for others.
Speaker 1: And there came a point because sometimes you have to
Speaker 1: go low enough, and I experienced several moments that God
Speaker 1: gave me. I really see it now as a gift.
Speaker 1: I and see it as a gift at the time.
Speaker 1: But God let me get low enough that I had
Speaker 1: to make a decision and I did that if this
Speaker 1: is what it cost to succeed in ministry, I would
Speaker 1: rather fail in people's eyes but have joy inside myself
Speaker 1: then achieve everything that the world offers and feel empty.
Speaker 1: And the reason that I'm telling you this is because
Speaker 1: I think this happens to all of us from time
Speaker 1: to time, that we have to do certain things in
Speaker 1: certain seasons, right like being a mom. If you've ever
Speaker 1: been a mom, or you're considering being a mom, you
Speaker 1: should know or testify to the fact. If you've experienced it,
Speaker 1: you can say amen to this. If you haven't experienced it,
Speaker 1: you can consider it in the contract of becoming a
Speaker 1: mom that you become a hostage to another human in
Speaker 1: the process, and it's not just for moms. Like sometimes
Speaker 1: as a man, to build your career, sometimes you find
Speaker 1: yourself in the process of making a living, you lose
Speaker 1: a sense of yourself and what's important. So the prophet said,
Speaker 1: you've got to get out of here, and she did
Speaker 1: what the prophet said. She wasn't running from God, she
Speaker 1: wasn't disobeying God. She was doing what she had to
Speaker 1: do to survive. Can you own the fact that some
Speaker 1: of the things that you did in your life, you
Speaker 1: were doing what you had to do, and the devils
Speaker 1: beats you up with it at night, like, how could
Speaker 1: you do that? That was the best I could do
Speaker 1: in that season. I was doing the best I could.
Speaker 1: I was balancing on Oh, I was balancing so much.
Speaker 1: It was all I could do to stand up stream.
Speaker 1: And then the enemy will come along and subtract all
Speaker 1: of those all of those factors of survival. She didn't
Speaker 1: run from God. The prophet told her to go away,
Speaker 1: and she lost what was hers in the process of
Speaker 1: being obedient to God. Because I kind of felt like
Speaker 1: a hypocrite when I was struggling emotionally. And here's how
Speaker 1: it wou be. You come out to preach. The worship
Speaker 1: team is going into, you know, something very powerful and anthemic.
Speaker 1: And sometimes it was a song I wrote and I
Speaker 1: wouldn't feel the lyrics to the song I wrote, and
Speaker 1: I'd be coming out here. But I have a job
Speaker 1: to do and I want to be responsible. I mean,
Speaker 1: good God, if I'm a plumber, I don't get to feel,
Speaker 1: you know, putting a wrench on a pipe. You got
Speaker 1: to just fix something. So I've got a job to do.
Speaker 1: So I'll come up here and inspire faith. Not every time,
Speaker 1: but a lot of times. And I would feel guilty.
Speaker 1: What it took out of me to build the ministry
Speaker 1: put me in a place where I could not receive
Speaker 1: ministry myself, and it scared me. It scared me that
Speaker 1: I could become a shell. And I had to have
Speaker 1: a moment. And I had a moment that reminds me
Speaker 1: of this woman boldly going to the King and saying,
Speaker 1: I want it back. I want it. I don't want
Speaker 1: to just build something or survive something. I want it back.
Speaker 1: I want it. That you're scared to say that because
Speaker 1: we are taught that if God wants us to have it,
Speaker 1: he'll just give it. And he will. But the other day,
Speaker 1: we were driving in this rainstorm and we were coming
Speaker 1: home from the mountains and it was raining so hard
Speaker 1: there was a flash flood warning on all of our phones.
Speaker 1: And I was just driving. I could barely see out
Speaker 1: of the windshield. I was just driving. And Graham is
Speaker 1: the kid in our family who will say the most
Speaker 1: with the least words. And he said, is no one
Speaker 1: else scared about this other than me? Am I the
Speaker 1: only one that's concerned about this? And I said, I
Speaker 1: was just playing around. But I said, son, God's hand
Speaker 1: is on our vehicle, and God will see us through
Speaker 1: this storm. And the boy says, there's only so much
Speaker 1: God can do. Maybe we should pull over. How does
Speaker 1: he get this at thirteen and we don't at thirty.
Speaker 1: At the risk of running you out of this church,
Speaker 1: let me say something theologically deep. There is only so
Speaker 1: much God can do. No, no, no, God can do anything.
Speaker 1: He can make the stars, he can make the sun,
Speaker 1: he can move the mountains. But you got to speak
Speaker 1: the word. So so it starts with me being honest
Speaker 1: about the fact that, in the process of surviving of
Speaker 1: famine that I didn't cause like some of you were
Speaker 1: doing the best you could. You didn't have an example
Speaker 1: for it. You were doing the best you could. You
Speaker 1: didn't have a frame of reference for it. You were
Speaker 1: doing the best you could. You had never been this
Speaker 1: way before. And the Lord sent her to the land
Speaker 1: of the Philistines. What do you know about the Philistines?
Speaker 1: In the Bible? Good guys are bad guys. Good place
Speaker 1: to be, a bad place to be. She had to
Speaker 1: go into an enemy occupied place to survive a famine,
Speaker 1: and so have some of us. Some of us that's
Speaker 1: where our addictions came from. In order to keep ourselves
Speaker 1: on the planet, we had to do something to numb
Speaker 1: the pain. I love this sermon because it takes the
Speaker 1: shame out of where I've been. It helps me to
Speaker 1: understand there comes a time where you have to appreciate
Speaker 1: where God fed you during the famine, but be willing
Speaker 1: to leave and go back to the place where you
Speaker 1: really belong. You know, I said this was like a lifeline.
Speaker 1: You've convinced yourself that you can never have it. You've
Speaker 1: convinced yourself that you can never be happy, and you
Speaker 1: quote Bible verses. God wants you to be holy, not happy.
Speaker 1: That's in the first version of you. That's not a
Speaker 1: Bible verse. That's the book of your dumb cousin's opinion.
Speaker 1: You ever read that? Now, in cases, seems like a
Speaker 1: stretch to compare us to this woman. Let me tell
Speaker 1: you a little bit more about our story. She wasn't
Speaker 1: really looking to get something from God. She was looking
Speaker 1: to give something to God. She had a Well, you
Speaker 1: can go watch the sermon online. I preached it to
Speaker 1: Holly called just the two of us. I preached it
Speaker 1: in the whole empty room. That was just her on
Speaker 1: the front row and a few people that stuck in
Speaker 1: the back. But it was just the two of us,
Speaker 1: and I used it to talk about this woman and
Speaker 1: her husband. Did y'all hear this sermon? Yeah, is most
Speaker 1: awkward sermon I ever preached because it was just two
Speaker 1: of us in the room. It's very big room. And
Speaker 1: this woman was just determined to use what she had
Speaker 1: for God, really expecting nothing in return. Now, when I
Speaker 1: say timing your testimony, and I use these examples about
Speaker 1: taking the mic away and all of this, what I
Speaker 1: really mean by timing your testimony is about trusting God
Speaker 1: to obey him before he has shown you exactly why
Speaker 1: he's calling you to do it, okay, Like it's really
Speaker 1: easy to say after the fact that God connected this
Speaker 1: and that and the other. But the trick of it
Speaker 1: is that she made a room for the prophet to
Speaker 1: come and stay before she knew what God was going
Speaker 1: to do through her act of obedience. And isn't that
Speaker 1: the hardest thing, Like the author said, to believe in
Speaker 1: advance what will only make sense in reverse. That's the
Speaker 1: hardest thing in the world. To let down the nets
Speaker 1: for the catch before you have any clue that this
Speaker 1: carpenter knows where they are. That's the hard part. And
Speaker 1: after she did that, the prophet said, you've gone to
Speaker 1: all this trouble for us, Now what can we do
Speaker 1: for you? She had something in her heart that she
Speaker 1: wanted God to do, like you have something in your
Speaker 1: heart that you want God to do, a freedom that
Speaker 1: you want to experience, a gift that you want to
Speaker 1: see God develop, a state of meaning than just survival.
Speaker 1: She had it in her heart, but she had learned
Speaker 1: how to hide it. And when the prophet said what
Speaker 1: can I do for you? The woman said, I have
Speaker 1: a home among my own people. Because she did then
Speaker 1: what she didn't have was a son, And the Bible
Speaker 1: tells us her husband was old. I told you, God
Speaker 1: has terrible dyming. He waits till this man is shriveled up.
Speaker 1: Can I say it like that? And he brought her
Speaker 1: what she had stopped asking for. It was so painful
Speaker 1: for her to consider the potential that it could be
Speaker 1: any different that she said, stop messing with me. Do
Speaker 1: not mislead your servant, man of God. And she pushed
Speaker 1: away the promise of God. She pushed away the promise
Speaker 1: of God. She pushed away the possibility of something different.
Speaker 1: She pushed away. That's what you've been doing to everything
Speaker 1: that God has been sending into your life to mature
Speaker 1: you and restore you. She is pushing away the very
Speaker 1: thing that came from the mouth of the one that
Speaker 1: she made a room for. She is pushing away the
Speaker 1: promise that God has sent her. But God did it anyway.
Speaker 1: The prophet looked at her and said, about this time
Speaker 1: next year, you will hold a son in your arms.
Speaker 1: And she did, and she did. There is no record
Speaker 1: that she believed it. There is no record that she
Speaker 1: had faith for it. There is no record that she
Speaker 1: all of a sudden came into a scripture quotation. Phase
Speaker 1: of her study did a Bible more Bible study on
Speaker 1: pillars of faith. There is no record of that. But
Speaker 1: she held a son and one day, unexpected to her
Speaker 1: as son died unexpectedly. So let's recap. I didn't ask
Speaker 1: you for a son. You gave it to me anyway,
Speaker 1: and then you let it die. She takes the boy.
Speaker 1: Can I tell you the story? This is such a
Speaker 1: great story, brings the boy, puts it on the bed
Speaker 1: of the prophet. She went to Ikea and picked this
Speaker 1: bed out her self, put it together herself, and she said,
Speaker 1: I'm going to put this back on the place that
Speaker 1: you were laying when you told me God would give
Speaker 1: it to me. And Elisha restored the boy to life.
Speaker 1: That boy is the boy that standing in the King's
Speaker 1: court at least seven years later in Second King's eight Boy.
Speaker 1: That she didn't ask God to give her the boy
Speaker 1: that died, even after God gave the boy to her
Speaker 1: and came back to life. And what got me about
Speaker 1: this text was realizing that the thing that died in
Speaker 1: one season of her life was the thing that stood
Speaker 1: beside her in the moment of her greatest need. So
Speaker 1: you got to imagine it. Gehesi is the servant of Elisha,
Speaker 1: and the king calls Gehesi and says, tell me some
Speaker 1: stories about Elisha, and Geheesi has many. Well, there was
Speaker 1: one time, one time he took his cloak and he
Speaker 1: struck the Jordan with it, and the water's parted, and
Speaker 1: the people were waiting to see is he really a
Speaker 1: man of God? And the water's parted. And then one
Speaker 1: time there was a spring in the town and the
Speaker 1: water was poisonous, but Elisha put some salt in the
Speaker 1: water and he purified it. And he said, your water
Speaker 1: will never be cursed again, and you can drink from it.
Speaker 1: And then well, one time there were these boys who
Speaker 1: called him Baldy, and he called some bears out of
Speaker 1: the woods tomorrow. But let's skip that one, you know,
Speaker 1: you say selective stories. One time there was this there
Speaker 1: was this confederation of kings and they were in the
Speaker 1: middle of a drought, and Elisha came out to him.
Speaker 1: He said, I don't even want to talk to you,
Speaker 1: because you follow the wicked gods of your ancestors. And
Speaker 1: if I didn't have respect for johash Fat, I wouldn't
Speaker 1: even speak to you. But now bring me a minstrel,
Speaker 1: and the minstrel started playing, and Elisha started prophesying in
Speaker 1: the dry valley, and he told him dig your own
Speaker 1: ditches and prepare for the rain that you can't see.
Speaker 1: And the rain came from a direction that it wasn't expected.
Speaker 1: It didn't come from the sky like normal rain does.
Speaker 1: It came from somewhere else. It's just the way Elisha was.
Speaker 1: And you can picture Geheza. He's getting fired off telling
Speaker 1: these stories. You know, he's remembering, he's rehearsing the things
Speaker 1: that God did in a previous season. He's rehearsing the
Speaker 1: things that God did in a previous season. Because one
Speaker 1: time we went to this widow's house and she had
Speaker 1: a little bit of oil, and she thought she had
Speaker 1: no oil, but Elisha told her go back and check
Speaker 1: the thing that you called nothing again, because what you
Speaker 1: call nothing is exactly what God needs to do something
Speaker 1: that you So so he's telling the stories, right, And
Speaker 1: there's there's one that he skipped with Naman because Nayman
Speaker 1: was a leper who came to be healed, and when
Speaker 1: Elishah pronounced healing over him by dipping seven times in
Speaker 1: the Jordan, which is a ridiculous thing to do, because
Speaker 1: the Jordan is a little dirty body of water, and
Speaker 1: Nayman was a great commander, and he could have bathed
Speaker 1: in the waters of Obna and far Far, but he
Speaker 1: had to come all the way to the prophet and
Speaker 1: dip in the Jordan seven times for his flesh to
Speaker 1: be restored like a young boy. And he was so
Speaker 1: excited about his miracle that he tried to give some
Speaker 1: gifts to Elishah, and Electra said, I don't want your gifts.
Speaker 1: I didn't do it for that, and gahes I chased
Speaker 1: down Nayman and said, hey, my master changed his mind,
Speaker 1: so whatever you have, I'll take it back to him.
Speaker 1: And he kept it for himself. And Elishah, the man
Speaker 1: of God, knew about it, and he called him out.
Speaker 1: And gaheze I had leprosy, So what was he doing
Speaker 1: in the court of the king. A leper can't be
Speaker 1: in the court of the king. It looks like the
Speaker 1: little boy isn't the only one that God restored. I
Speaker 1: have to put this in because if I don't, you'll
Speaker 1: think that only if you're like the woman and you
Speaker 1: do what God told you to do, that you can
Speaker 1: ask God to restore what you lost. But Gahesi is
Speaker 1: standing in the presence of the King. Watch this to
Speaker 1: let you know that even if you did it, even
Speaker 1: if it was your fault, even if it was your selfishness,
Speaker 1: even if you were the one who let go, even
Speaker 1: if it was your irresponsibility, you can stand in the
Speaker 1: presence of God under the blood of Jesus and say,
Speaker 1: I want it back in the name of Jesus. I
Speaker 1: want back everything that SAME's stripped from and stole from
Speaker 1: me and took from me. So he's telling her the stories.
Speaker 1: He's telling the king the stories, and he gets to
Speaker 1: the one about the woman and she built us a
Speaker 1: room and she put a bed in it, and she
Speaker 1: didn't have a son, and Elisha said, you're gonna have
Speaker 1: a son, and she's like, I don't even want a son.
Speaker 1: I've given up on it. And Elijah prophesied the sun
Speaker 1: and she shows up pregnant, and then the kid dies
Speaker 1: and he's in the field and he starts screaming about
Speaker 1: his head, and then they put him on the bed
Speaker 1: and I was gonna go try to heal him with
Speaker 1: my staff, but Elijah said, no, this is a job
Speaker 1: for me, and he came in, and I don't know
Speaker 1: what he did in that room because it was just
Speaker 1: him and the boy in there, but they both came
Speaker 1: out ass he is talking the woman walks in the room.
Speaker 1: Do you understand the statistical improbability that at the exact
Speaker 1: moment there are so many stories to be told about Elisha.
Speaker 1: I didn't even give you half of them. But God
Speaker 1: knew the exact moment that Gahesi would be talking about
Speaker 1: that woman. I don't know if she hit traffic on
Speaker 1: the way so that she was late, or whether she
Speaker 1: caught every green light so that she got there right
Speaker 1: on time. But I have learned something about God. You
Speaker 1: can trust his timing. You can give him the mic,
Speaker 1: you can let him speak what he wants to speak
Speaker 1: over your life, and in the appointed time, it will
Speaker 1: come to pass. I've seen it in my own life.
Speaker 1: I've seen it in my own life that God knows
Speaker 1: exactly what, who, where, when, what? Oh, this is the
Speaker 1: best scripture. Do y'all want the best scripture in the Bible.
Speaker 1: Here's the best scripture in the Bible, Psalm one thirty nine.
Speaker 1: Now this is the best scripture today. I'll have a
Speaker 1: different one tomorrow. But this is the best scripture I've
Speaker 1: ever read in my life. Right now, Okay, Because God,
Speaker 1: I'll give you a certain word at a certain time.
Speaker 1: And here's what he gave me. Here's what he gave me. Boy,
Speaker 1: you ready, Psalm one thirty nine one five. I know
Speaker 1: that one twenty five doesn't sound like a verse number,
Speaker 1: but it is. There's a there's one hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: five in this verse, and I'm glad I took time
Speaker 1: to find it because it said something really powerful to me.
Speaker 1: I am thy servant. Give me understanding that I may
Speaker 1: know thy testimonies. Here's the part to hit me. Hold
Speaker 1: on before I read it. Who is this for? It
Speaker 1: is time for the Lord to work, not for me,
Speaker 1: for thee. And I want you to come into the
Speaker 1: presence of the King, not the King of Israel. I
Speaker 1: want you to come into the presence of the King.
Speaker 1: The Lord told me to tell you it's time for
Speaker 1: him to work. It's time. You've done everything you can
Speaker 1: do about it. You have manipulated it so much that
Speaker 1: you've messed it up. Even worse. There comes a time
Speaker 1: where Holly tells us get out of the kitchen. You
Speaker 1: are not helping and I heard the Lord saying, to somebody,
Speaker 1: get out of the kitchen and let me work. It
Speaker 1: is time for thee O Lord to work. For they
Speaker 1: have made void thy law. It is time for thee
Speaker 1: to do something about what they did. This woman left
Speaker 1: a homeowner, and while she was gone surviving the famine,
Speaker 1: somebody else took her home. The king said, go back
Speaker 1: to second King's chapter eight. This is so annointed I
Speaker 1: can barely I can barely get it out of my mouth.
Speaker 1: There's so much jumping up in my spirit while I
Speaker 1: preach to you. Because the Lord said, this is a
Speaker 1: lifeline for somebody. It is time for thee O Lord
Speaker 1: to work. She comes into the presence of the King
Speaker 1: to ask back for what she lost when she left.
Speaker 1: At the exact moment that she walks in Ghyes, I
Speaker 1: was telling the king her story. Does God not have
Speaker 1: the craziest timing? And geheze I said, that's that woman,
Speaker 1: the one who put the table in the lamp, in
Speaker 1: the bed in the room, the one who gave us
Speaker 1: a place to stay. That's her. The one whose son
Speaker 1: Elisha restored to life. And there's the boy. Now you
Speaker 1: have got to drag what God did in your past
Speaker 1: into the room and show the thing that you are
Speaker 1: facing today what God did for you yesterday. That's what
Speaker 1: you gotta do. It is time for you to work Lord.
Speaker 1: So just like you gave me this back, I need
Speaker 1: that back. Just like you restored this that I thought
Speaker 1: was gone forever, and God did that for me. There
Speaker 1: are some things that I know that I know that
Speaker 1: I don't have to prove it to you. You don't
Speaker 1: have to agree with it. God did that for me.
Speaker 1: Nobody else. It wasn't a human. God might have used somebody,
Speaker 1: but only God could bring the dead back to life.
Speaker 1: So the God who did this, I need him to
Speaker 1: do that. And verse six SSS something very interesting. This
Speaker 1: is the last verse I want to give you because
Speaker 1: the king asked a woman about it, and she told
Speaker 1: him and then read it again. She told him what
Speaker 1: God had done for her, and then he assigned an
Speaker 1: official to her case. So she only got back what
Speaker 1: she needed. When she told the story of what God
Speaker 1: had done. You follow the sequence she could have told herself.
Speaker 1: Any story. Life isn't fair, This isn't right. I tried
Speaker 1: to obey God, and now look at me. But she
Speaker 1: told the story of what God had done, And so
Speaker 1: God wants to know why have you stopped telling the story,
Speaker 1: not to others, to yourself, why have you stopped telling
Speaker 1: the story of what I did for you and replaced
Speaker 1: it with a story of fear of what might happen next.
Speaker 1: So while you are telling yourself these hypothetical stories of
Speaker 1: what might happen, or these shameful stories of what did happen,
Speaker 1: you are standing next to a story, a living, breathing, walking,
Speaker 1: talking miracle, a product of nothing but the grace of God.
Speaker 1: That's why April Carter told me. She said, God did
Speaker 1: this for me. And I said, well, why didn't he
Speaker 1: do that? And she said, in all fairness, it's not
Speaker 1: your story. Never stopped telling herself the story. You stop
Speaker 1: telling yourself the story of God's faithfulness, and you start
Speaker 1: telling yourself the story of fear. She told him what
Speaker 1: God had done. And then everybody say, then in the chat,
Speaker 1: I'm telling you right now that one word, or let
Speaker 1: me give you another word. Yet ye Yet I don't
Speaker 1: have it yet. I haven't found a way to get
Speaker 1: set free from this yet. I don't see how it's
Speaker 1: going to work out yet. See timing your testimony, don't
Speaker 1: tell it too early because you don't know what God
Speaker 1: is going to do. In chapter eighth, see, it's like
Speaker 1: the timing of God is so amazing. And every time
Speaker 1: you tell yourself a story about the things that God
Speaker 1: did then and you bring it into the presence of
Speaker 1: what you need him to do now, he said, give
Speaker 1: her back what belongs to her. Say it out loud.
Speaker 1: Peace belongs to me. I am a child of God.
Speaker 1: Joy belongs to me. I am a child of God.
Speaker 1: Freedom is my inheritance. I am a child of God.
Speaker 1: I belong because I believe I am a child of God.
Speaker 1: Tell yourself that story. Preach the gospel to yourself. If
Speaker 1: GAHESI can rehearse the great things that God has done?
Speaker 1: Who was a leper and a scoundrel? Can't you? And
Speaker 1: can you trust God's timing enough to give him the
Speaker 1: mic and believe what he speaks? That though the visionary
Speaker 1: wait for it, for it has an appointed time is
Speaker 1: taking me a while to understand that God's timing is
Speaker 1: created to increase my trust in Him, whether that's the
Speaker 1: fourth watch of the night or whether that's the fourth
Speaker 1: day after I have lost something that I love. And
Speaker 1: God gives you these little gifts? What are yours? Have
Speaker 1: you told anybody that part of your story? Or are
Speaker 1: you so consumed with your present struggle that you have
Speaker 1: stopped rehearsing your past victories? Thank you. I know I've
Speaker 1: told you this before, but can I tell you one
Speaker 1: thing that happened to me? Stand up, it'll pressure me
Speaker 1: to close. I can't tell you all of these things,
Speaker 1: but do you remember me telling you in twenty sixteen
Speaker 1: how I was on vacation with the family near Charleston
Speaker 1: went over to the farmer's market there at Yeah, you
Speaker 1: know this story? All right, Well, I'm gonna tell it
Speaker 1: for somebody else. It's too good not to tell you.
Speaker 1: I'm at the farmer's market. You want the whole story.
Speaker 1: I'm at the farmer's market with Holly because she dragged
Speaker 1: me there. I don't go to farmers markets of my
Speaker 1: own volition. I OneD a farmer's market, but I went,
Speaker 1: not knowing why. But I got there, and you were there.
Speaker 1: Whole family was there. This girl comes walking over to
Speaker 1: us from she had a what do you call it?
Speaker 1: Confection cupcakes and stuff bakery, a bakery stand at the
Speaker 1: farmer's market. She was so nice, her name was Addie May.
Speaker 1: She came up and said, I want I want to
Speaker 1: give your family some sugar kids hyper but she said,
Speaker 1: I love your podcasts. Can I get a picture? I
Speaker 1: was more than happy to do that, but you know,
Speaker 1: at the same time, I looked like a bomb. I
Speaker 1: was just so I was kind of worried that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't look too good in the selfie. She said something
Speaker 1: that I thought was kind of where she said, my
Speaker 1: pastor is going to be so jealous, and I said
Speaker 1: for me that we met. She said, yeah, he loves you.
Speaker 1: I said, tell your pastor. I said, Hi, what's his name?
Speaker 1: She said his name? I said, that's great, tell him,
Speaker 1: I said hi. She said, I'm going to go tell
Speaker 1: him right now. I'm going to go call him, and
Speaker 1: she called him. She came back over with the cupcakes
Speaker 1: because we're about to leave. She said, my pastor said
Speaker 1: that we actually invited you to preach at our church
Speaker 1: this week about a year ago, and your office declined
Speaker 1: because they said that you were on family vacation. And
Speaker 1: so I was like, well, they weren't lying. I'm right
Speaker 1: here on family vacation. And she said, but all the same,
Speaker 1: you should come over to uh, you should come over
Speaker 1: to our holy convocation this week. I said no, I
Speaker 1: said vacation, not com vocation. It's a whole. This is
Speaker 1: the Holy vacation. It's a whole different, this a whole while.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you it's a whole different rhythm. And
Speaker 1: but just to be polite or whatever, I took the dates.
Speaker 1: She wrote it out on in the car to church,
Speaker 1: saying all this stuff. And I'm telling you a story
Speaker 1: for a reason, I promise I am. The Lord told
Speaker 1: me to tell you this story. And sometimes I have
Speaker 1: to do this just to remember, because I have moments
Speaker 1: where I wonder, is God really ordering my steps or
Speaker 1: is this random? So I have to tell myself these
Speaker 1: stories of times where God made like at the right moment.
Speaker 1: Can you remember one where God brought at the right moment?
Speaker 1: Raise your hand if you can remember one, just even one, right,
Speaker 1: that's a testimony. And we overcome the enemy by the
Speaker 1: blood of the Lamb. That's what Jesus has done and
Speaker 1: the word of our testimony. Now, now remember what Graham said,
Speaker 1: There is only so much God can do. Yes, he
Speaker 1: can do anything, but he will not tell your testimony
Speaker 1: for you. That is your story. That is your test, Simoni,
Speaker 1: that is your choice, cavolific. So, so she writes down
Speaker 1: the name of the church, and she says, on this
Speaker 1: night so and so speaking, on that night so and
Speaker 1: so speaking, and this night so and so speaking. The
Speaker 1: last one that she put on my card. I think
Speaker 1: on the Friday night she said, this guy's speaking, and
Speaker 1: I had always wanted to hear him preach. So all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I'm like, well, maybe I will go
Speaker 1: over there. And I'm kind of glad I met her.
Speaker 1: And I had somebody in my office call over to
Speaker 1: the church and see if that pastor was coming on
Speaker 1: that night, and he was. And the pastor said he
Speaker 1: wanted to wanted us to meet and hang out. Whatever.
Speaker 1: That's not the point, okay, So let me get to
Speaker 1: the point. So the day of the I'm going to
Speaker 1: go over to the church comes and I get a
Speaker 1: text from my assistant says, the pastor who was going
Speaker 1: to come, he can't come. He had a back injury.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, the voice of God is much louder
Speaker 1: than a shout, because a shout you can put some
Speaker 1: AirPods in and noise cancel. But when God speaks to you,
Speaker 1: you can't. You can't do anything with it, either obey
Speaker 1: it or be miserable. So so in that moment, I
Speaker 1: knew you need to call that pastor that Addie may
Speaker 1: gave you the card and offer to go over there
Speaker 1: and preach tonight. And so I'm going through my mind
Speaker 1: like it's been two or three weeks that since I've
Speaker 1: been in my own pulpit. I'm like, I don't know
Speaker 1: that I remember any Bible versus be cause I always
Speaker 1: read the Bible every day on vacation. And and so
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, I'll call, and you know it'll be
Speaker 1: like uh uh, Like I'll just put out a fleece
Speaker 1: like Gideon, Lord, and and and in fact, the first
Speaker 1: thing I was I said, I'll get my assistant to call,
Speaker 1: and the Lord is like, no, you do it. So
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, I don't. I don't know the number
Speaker 1: of the church. I just know the name. And the
Speaker 1: Lord Lord said google, I call the church. The pastor
Speaker 1: doesn't answer, nobody answers. I leave some message, and I'm like, okay, Lord,
Speaker 1: So I offered Isaac on the altar, and you didn't
Speaker 1: want to going back to the beach. I leave this
Speaker 1: weird message on the phone. I say, hey, this is
Speaker 1: Stephen Verdick, the pastor of Elevation Church. I'm out here
Speaker 1: on vacation. I met a girl named Addie May, and
Speaker 1: I heard your speaker cancel tonight, and I was just
Speaker 1: calling to see if you needed a preacher or whatever.
Speaker 1: But I'm sure you don't, so have a nice day
Speaker 1: and God bless him Ephesians three twenty. So I hang
Speaker 1: up about the time I can get my beach attire
Speaker 1: back on. I'm headed out to the phone rings and
Speaker 1: it's the pastor. He said, this is Stephen Verdick. I said, yes, sir.
Speaker 1: He said his name, and he said, you really will
Speaker 1: come preach for us tonight. I said, yeah, I guess,
Speaker 1: I said, but I would tell you I have no
Speaker 1: convocation clothes. I'm out here on vacation with my family.
Speaker 1: I look like Tom Hanks Ond eighty one with Wilson
Speaker 1: out here, so so so it's just gonna have to be.
Speaker 1: I said, I only have all I had. The dressiest
Speaker 1: thing I have is yeasies. He said, I'll wear my
Speaker 1: easies too, if you'll come. I said, I'll come. I
Speaker 1: don't I don't know what I'll preach but I'll come.
Speaker 1: And when I got there that night and showed up
Speaker 1: the preacher, I got to see Addie May and then
Speaker 1: I got to see the pastor. And when I saw him,
Speaker 1: he was he had tears his eyes. He said. After
Speaker 1: so many years in the ministry, several decades, he said,
Speaker 1: I never had the Lord answer a prayer as directly
Speaker 1: as he did today. He said, you were our first
Speaker 1: choice to come preach tonight, and I've done three funerals
Speaker 1: this week when you called. The reason nobody answered the
Speaker 1: phone was because we were in a prayer meeting asking
Speaker 1: for God to send us a preacher to you. And
Speaker 1: I preached, and I don't know if it was any good.
Speaker 1: It didn't matter. The point was obedience. Point was obedience,
Speaker 1: Oh not my obedience at amys think about God at
Speaker 1: just the time the verdicts are getting to the farmer's
Speaker 1: market thirty more minu. She would have packed up those
Speaker 1: cupcakes at just that moment, he said. The pastor said,
Speaker 1: you were my ram in the bush talking about Genesis
Speaker 1: with Abraham and Isaac. I like to tell that story
Speaker 1: to remind myself that God is going to bring things
Speaker 1: together in the right time, and I can trust them
Speaker 1: in that. I can trust them in that. But I
Speaker 1: want to tell you something that I never told my
Speaker 1: church before. About two years ago, I sent Chris Brown
Speaker 1: out to do some music with this amazing worship team
Speaker 1: called Maverick City Music. I said, you got to go
Speaker 1: out there, and when he came back, I wanted to
Speaker 1: know everything because there's such a great annoying on this ministry.
Speaker 1: I said, what is God doing? I said, it feels
Speaker 1: punk rock to me? Is it punk rock? He said,
Speaker 1: it's so punk rock for the Lord? And he said,
Speaker 1: but do you know about Chandler. It's Chandler back there?
Speaker 1: He said, do you know about Chandler? I said, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the guy. He's amazing. What about him? He said?
Speaker 1: He said that was his dad's church. His dad was
Speaker 1: the pastor that you went and preached for in twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen when Adam may In dided and God gives you
Speaker 1: these moments. God gives you these moments or something that
Speaker 1: seems so small to you in one season. And I
Speaker 1: find myself last year sitting in a room with Chandler
Speaker 1: and Naomi and Chris and writing a song called Jirah,
Speaker 1: a song that we weren't even trying to write. He
Speaker 1: was sitting at the piano and he just sang sirah.
Speaker 1: I said, did you just say girah? He goes and
Speaker 1: I said, if you ever said that in a song before?
Speaker 1: He said, I said, we're gonna say it in this one.
Speaker 1: Shirah means we'll see to it. Jehovah jirah. That's what
Speaker 1: Abraham called the place where the Lord gave him a
Speaker 1: ram so he wouldn't have to sacrifice his son. And
Speaker 1: sometimes I need to remember and tell these stories to
Speaker 1: myself for when I'm wondering if God's going to come
Speaker 1: through for me. If you've been feeling that lately, just
Speaker 1: lift your hands, because sometimes I need to remember that
Speaker 1: the same God who brought me to the farmer's market
Speaker 1: Jesu to meet Dady May so I could preach in
Speaker 1: my ye'sies at a holy convocation for a pastor I
Speaker 1: didn't know, whose son was a songwriter that I would
Speaker 1: later collaborate with to release a song that God would
Speaker 1: send into the hearts of millions of people. That God
Speaker 1: can be trusted and at the right time, if you
Speaker 1: humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, in due time,
Speaker 1: he will lift you up, and he may is not
Speaker 1: here anymore on the earth. She was Chandler's nanny and
Speaker 1: he lost her, but she brought us together, so she's
Speaker 1: right here. Some of the things that you've lost in
Speaker 1: your life, I feel God's presence. Give me one moment.
Speaker 1: The things that you've lost in your life. God is
Speaker 1: not going to bring them back in the exact same way.
Speaker 1: He is going to restore them to you in a
Speaker 1: greater way than you have ever seen them before. And
Speaker 1: your only job in this is to look for the
Speaker 1: ram in the bush. Father. We've come into your presence
Speaker 1: today not entitled, no, not at all, not thinking that
Speaker 1: we've been so good, or so worthy or so perfect
Speaker 1: that we just deserve the blessings that you've given us.
Speaker 1: But we come to you on the merit of your
Speaker 1: grace toward us and our position in your heart as
Speaker 1: your children. Thank you, Lord. Our times are in your hands,
Speaker 1: and now it's time for THEE to work. It is
Speaker 1: time for THEE to work. It is taught for THEE
Speaker 1: to work. We were in the land of the Philistines
Speaker 1: for seven years, but we are coming back into your presence,
Speaker 1: the presence of the King of Kings. And the Lord
Speaker 1: of lords, to receive back that which you have spoken
Speaker 1: over our lives with interest. Lord, I thank you that
Speaker 1: even in this moment, you are restoring the hopes and
Speaker 1: the dreams, and the sanity and the peace and the
Speaker 1: right mind of your children, restoring the years that the
Speaker 1: locusts have eaten, restoring the years that we wasted. We
Speaker 1: thank you, Lord that you are bringing it all back,
Speaker 1: and that little by little, day by day, we will
Speaker 1: see the goodness of the Lord in the Let's time
Speaker 1: for THEE to work. O Lord, We've done all we can,
Speaker 1: We've done all we know. It is time for THEE.
Speaker 1: We want it back. We want your glory back, we
Speaker 1: want your joy back. We want our purpose back, we
Speaker 1: want our focus back, our passing back. We want it back.
Speaker 1: In the presence of a God who will freely give
Speaker 1: us all things in the name of Jesus, we receive it.
Speaker 1: We receive it. We receive it. Though atarry wait for it, thoitarry,
Speaker 1: wait for it. Though it's been seven years. Bring every
Speaker 1: expectation into his presence. And now unto him who is
Speaker 1: able to do immeasurably more than you ask or imagine,
Speaker 1: according to his power, that works mightily in you. To
Speaker 1: Him be glory through Christ Jesus in the Church. Now
Speaker 1: and forever. Come on, give God a great shout of prase,
Speaker 1: my God. Long thank you for joining us. Special thanks
Speaker 1: to those of you who give generously to this ministry.
Speaker 1: Is because of you that this ministry is possible. You
Speaker 1: can click the link in the description to give now
Speaker 1: or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more information
Speaker 1: and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You
Speaker 1: can share it with your friends. You can click the
Speaker 1: share button, take a screenshot and share it on your
Speaker 1: social stories and tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again
Speaker 1: for listening. God bless you.