Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2: I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 2: I wanted to thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 1: Hope this inspires you.
Speaker 3: Hope it builds your faith.
Speaker 2: Hope it gives your perspective to see God is moving
Speaker 2: in your life.
Speaker 3: Enjoy the message.
Speaker 4: Isaiah forty three, Isaiah Chapter forty three, Isaiah Chapter forty.
Speaker 5: Three, Verse number nineteen, nineteenth Anniversary.
Speaker 1: The nineteenth verse.
Speaker 4: Of Isaiah Isaiah forty three, Verse nineteen.
Speaker 1: See I am doing a new thing.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 4: Pastor Holly already told you we're entering our twentieth year
Speaker 4: of ministry today, but before we go to year twenty,
Speaker 4: the Lord wants to give us something from verse nineteen. See,
Speaker 4: I am doing a new thing. Everybody shout the next word.
Speaker 4: Now it springs up. Do you not perceive it? I
Speaker 4: am making a way in the wilderness and streams in
Speaker 4: the wasteland.
Speaker 1: Today.
Speaker 4: I want to talk to you from a formal sounding topic,
Speaker 4: but I'm going to make it really plain in just
Speaker 4: a few moments I have. I want to talk to
Speaker 4: you on our nineteenth church anniversary at Elevation as we
Speaker 4: enter our twentieth year of ministry about our future and
Speaker 4: our former, our future and our former. And I don't
Speaker 4: know if that title is going to hit like I
Speaker 4: wanted to, So let me give you title number two.
Speaker 1: New number, same name, new number, same name. Father. I
Speaker 1: thank you for your word.
Speaker 4: As it goes forth, May it go forth with penetrating
Speaker 4: insight with Holy Spirit power. May it go forth with
Speaker 4: healing medicine to those who need it, who are standing
Speaker 4: on the brink in the precipice of the new season
Speaker 4: of their life, asking you what's next, and feeling nervous.
Speaker 4: Perhaps they're concerned for one of their friends, one of
Speaker 4: their children. Perhaps they're concerned for their mother, their father,
Speaker 4: someone who's not in this room with them. Perhaps they're
Speaker 4: concerned about their own health. Perhaps they're thinking about this
Speaker 4: job that they've just taken and whether it was the
Speaker 4: right one, or whether they're going to get the call back.
Speaker 4: Perhaps they're praying their way through a season of loneliness
Speaker 4: those needs. But from this place, this pulpit that you
Speaker 4: have entrusted to me for these moments, I decree and
Speaker 4: declare that the eternal wisdom of Almighty God will go
Speaker 4: for it. It will not be checked by a demon
Speaker 4: it will not be hindered by Satan. It will break
Speaker 4: through and penetrate the life that it was intended to effect.
Speaker 4: And I give you the glory in advance because it
Speaker 4: is your word, and it is your work, and it
Speaker 4: is your church, and so it is your praise in Jesus' name.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 4: Amen, you may be seated. Of all of the questions
Speaker 4: people ask me before a church anniversary, this has to
Speaker 4: be the dumbest. I say that lovingly when they say,
Speaker 4: if you could go back and start all over.
Speaker 1: Again, would you do it?
Speaker 4: No? And sometimes they say it even more extreme than that.
Speaker 4: Don't you just sometimes want to go back to the
Speaker 4: early days and start the church all over again. No,
Speaker 4: don't want to do that again, back to those days
Speaker 4: when you weren't here. It was terrible before you got here.
Speaker 4: Let me tell you, it's terrible before you got here.
Speaker 4: Till a person next to you, This church sucked before
Speaker 4: you showed up. Tell them that on every location Riverwalk
Speaker 4: University City. One of the things that I always aim
Speaker 4: to do as I stand before you, and I hope
Speaker 4: that you sense this.
Speaker 1: Is give you a good grounding in.
Speaker 4: The context of this scripture before moving to the application
Speaker 4: because I understand that you can pretty much make the
Speaker 4: Bible say something that it never really meant to.
Speaker 1: Say or was intended to say.
Speaker 4: And although I read you that verse about I'm doing
Speaker 4: a new thing for verse nineteen, and I am going
Speaker 4: to preach that verse today.
Speaker 1: I thought'd be.
Speaker 4: Helpful if we establish a little bit of context and
Speaker 4: go back to the top of this to get a
Speaker 4: sense of who is Isaiah and why is he saying this,
Speaker 4: and who is he saying it to. So I want
Speaker 4: to back up to verse sixteen. I gave you to
Speaker 4: verse fifteen in the back, but I'm going to go
Speaker 4: to verse sixteen for now. And this first sentence, this
Speaker 4: is something I really feel strongly about. He said, This
Speaker 4: is what the Lord says. Now, I think you should
Speaker 4: circle that in your Bible or highlight it or something,
Speaker 4: because that's what we're trying to get to every time
Speaker 4: we come together as a church. This is what the
Speaker 4: Lord says. I don't know if you've noticed, but it's
Speaker 4: never been harder to hear from God, not because we
Speaker 4: don't have access to his word, but because we have
Speaker 4: so many voices attacking his voice, to the point where
Speaker 4: many of us are confused and we can't tell what's
Speaker 4: God and what's the algorithm. Sometimes we can't tell what's
Speaker 4: God and what's just us worrying and calling it prayer.
Speaker 4: The biggest wrestling match of my life standing before you
Speaker 4: each and every week, is to figure out what comes
Speaker 4: after this phrase.
Speaker 1: This is what the Lord says.
Speaker 4: Notice that the text doesn't remark this is what the
Speaker 4: Lord said.
Speaker 1: It would be one thing.
Speaker 4: For us to just gather together weekly, have a short
Speaker 4: history lesson on people who lived in the past that
Speaker 4: is designed in order to keep us from ever feeling
Speaker 4: challenged to bring the Word of God into our everyday life,
Speaker 4: so that God just remains a mere superstition in our life,
Speaker 4: someone that Grandma used to talk about that we run
Speaker 4: to for comfort when our lives feel unstable. But the
Speaker 4: cutting edge ministry of gospel preaching is to come with
Speaker 4: the Word of God, timeless and eternal, written in the
Speaker 4: pages of Scripture, not to be altered, taken away from,
Speaker 4: or added to. Not one jot nor one tittle from
Speaker 4: this thing is supposed to be altered, and to bring
Speaker 4: it into the contemporary experience of a diversity of personalities ethnicities.
Speaker 4: This is what the Lord says, and I never feel
Speaker 4: ready to preach just because I have three points. I
Speaker 4: never feel ready to preach just because I have a story.
Speaker 4: I never feel ready to preach just because my voice
Speaker 4: feels strong. I only feel ready to preach when I
Speaker 4: can feel you getting what you need from your God.
Speaker 4: When that happens, get out of my way. Get out
Speaker 4: of my way, because once I sense that God has
Speaker 4: given me what he wants you to have, Once I
Speaker 4: sense that God has put something in my hear it
Speaker 4: for your situation. This is what the Lord says, and
Speaker 4: Isaiah goes on. We're going to follow his thought pattern
Speaker 4: for a moment before we come to my main point today.
Speaker 4: This is what the Lord says, he who made a
Speaker 4: way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters,
Speaker 4: who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and
Speaker 4: reinforcements together, and they lay there, never to rise again, extinguished.
Speaker 1: Snuffed out like a whit.
Speaker 4: Now we've gone two verses and we still haven't gotten
Speaker 4: to what God says. Think of Isaiah as someone who
Speaker 4: is introducing a guest speaker. If on our anniversary today
Speaker 4: I was coming to bring up a guest speaker, I
Speaker 4: would come before you, and I would begin to give
Speaker 4: background information on that speaker. The reason for giving background
Speaker 4: information on the speaker you might lean in to hear
Speaker 4: what they have to say, especially if you don't know
Speaker 4: who they are, because I want you to know, Hey, no,
Speaker 4: Pastor Steven's definitely my favorite preacher. Pastor Holly's my second.
Speaker 4: I'm saying this facetiously. By the way, I don't care
Speaker 4: who your favorite preacher is. It matters what God says.
Speaker 4: Anybody God wants to use in your life, that's fine
Speaker 4: with me. But I would want to build credibility for
Speaker 4: a speaker that you were not familiar with. So I
Speaker 4: might say they've written three best selling books, or they've
Speaker 4: done amazing work with the homeless community in their city,
Speaker 4: or they have been recognized and regarded as one of
Speaker 4: the premier experts on or they've pastored their church thirty
Speaker 4: seven years and they've been married thirty four years, happily
Speaker 4: married for thirty two of those thirty four years. And
Speaker 4: I would begin to build your interest and your confidence
Speaker 4: in the speaker by giving you a bit of their background.
Speaker 1: He says. This is what the Lord says.
Speaker 4: Go back to verse sixteen briefly for me, please, I
Speaker 4: want to break this down. And he proceeds not to
Speaker 4: give the direct word of God, but indirectly he begins
Speaker 4: to describe the works of God at a time that
Speaker 4: was at least seven hundred years in the past. Now
Speaker 4: every Bible student will know that this is a flashback
Speaker 4: to an event in the scripture called the Exodus. This
Speaker 4: is when God brought his people out of Egypt. They
Speaker 4: did not get all the way to the Promised Land.
Speaker 4: Their unbelief blocked them from that. But God brought them
Speaker 4: through raging waters the Red Sea. He drowned the chariots
Speaker 4: of the Egyptian pharaoh, and all of those chariots lay there,
Speaker 4: never to rise again. It's as if Isaiah is bringing
Speaker 4: God into the frame for the people to hear from
Speaker 4: and he says to them, the Lord has a message
Speaker 4: for you. And before I tell you what he says,
Speaker 4: let me remind you what he does. This is not
Speaker 4: one of the gods of Babylonia who was crafted by
Speaker 4: human hands. This is not one of the gods of
Speaker 4: Assyria that was dreamt up by a human imagination. This
Speaker 4: is the God who's about to speak to you, who
Speaker 4: made a way through the sea a path through the
Speaker 4: mighty waters.
Speaker 1: I'm about to preach, who drew.
Speaker 4: Out the chariots and horses, the army and reinforcements together,
Speaker 4: and they lay there, never to rise again. So before
Speaker 4: you hear what God is about to say to his people,
Speaker 4: remember what he did to their enemies, so that you
Speaker 4: have confidence that the God that is fighting your battles
Speaker 4: today has been here before. God has been here before.
Speaker 4: Even if you haven't been here before, God goes ahead
Speaker 4: of you into everything you call today. In fact, when
Speaker 4: you talk about the future, God doesn't have a word
Speaker 4: in his vocabulary for that. That's in your dictionary, not his.
Speaker 4: God doesn't talk about future. God talks about eternity. And God,
Speaker 4: who sits out of time, gives you a box called
Speaker 4: time so you don't go crazy.
Speaker 1: And he allows you to think about.
Speaker 4: The future because you cannot compartmentalize well, and so he
Speaker 4: allows you to think of something called tomorrow, even though
Speaker 4: to him God, tomorrow is already history.
Speaker 1: Let me remind you that God.
Speaker 4: Who has already been into your future, has proven himself
Speaker 4: faithful in your past. And that's what you'd expect me
Speaker 4: to preach about on an anniversary Sunday, right, Look what
Speaker 4: the Lord has done. Right, that's what I want to
Speaker 4: preach on an anniversary Sunday, because what he's done is
Speaker 4: comfortable and comforting. What he's done, I have a frame
Speaker 4: of reference for I never understood why people shouted over
Speaker 4: Isaiah forty three nineteen. In verse nineteen, he says, see,
Speaker 4: I am doing a new thing, and everybody shouts, And
Speaker 4: I think that's strange. In a couple of weeks, we're
Speaker 4: going on elevation nights and we'll be sharing in different
Speaker 4: cities the Love of Jesus and the Gospel of Jesus,
Speaker 4: and we'll.
Speaker 1: Be sharing songs.
Speaker 4: And you know how to really lose a crowd in
Speaker 4: an arena like that, Just tell them we want to
Speaker 4: share a new song with you, the one you never
Speaker 4: heard before.
Speaker 1: If they cheer for that, they're being polite. They don't
Speaker 1: want a new song. I even see y'all do it
Speaker 1: on Sundays. Poor Chris.
Speaker 4: Can we give it up for Chris, the real Chris Brown,
Speaker 4: Our Chris Brown. I'm just getting to the point in
Speaker 4: my life where I thank God for consistent people.
Speaker 1: And Chris is so consistent.
Speaker 4: Every week I'll watch him out here and and he
Speaker 4: has the hard line, the hardest line, to say, you know,
Speaker 4: we just finished singing.
Speaker 1: Graves into gardens or gyra or.
Speaker 4: Something like that, and now he has to look you
Speaker 4: right in your eyes and say, are you all.
Speaker 1: Ready to sing a new song? Church?
Speaker 4: And y'all are faking it too, because you're you're.
Speaker 1: Polite and nice.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we want to sing a new song. New doesn't
Speaker 4: always feel improved at first, does it? New doesn't always
Speaker 4: feel improved at first. One of the things about God's
Speaker 4: word that is so wonderful to me is that although
Speaker 4: it's foundational and does not change, it is always fresh.
Speaker 1: Therefore, it's always relevant.
Speaker 4: When God gets ready to speak to you about a
Speaker 4: situation in your life, he will remind you of some
Speaker 4: of the roads that He's already led you through.
Speaker 1: But he doesn't stop there.
Speaker 4: Because after Isaiah reads the resume of this God we've
Speaker 4: come to worship and serve, mentioning the central event in
Speaker 4: Israel's history, the one that they couldn't stop celebrating about
Speaker 4: seven centuries later. The first time that he speaks on
Speaker 4: behalf of God, because that's what prophets did. He says
Speaker 4: a word we would not expect to hear in this context.
Speaker 4: For after he says, God drew your enemies out into
Speaker 4: the water, killed the horses and chariots of those who
Speaker 4: were chasing you, gave you a great and mighty deliverance,
Speaker 4: made your way through clean so you could praise him today.
Speaker 1: Right after he says that, in verse.
Speaker 4: Eighteen, he gives the first instruction from God. And it
Speaker 4: is counterintuitive, and you are forgiven. If it's surprising to
Speaker 4: you forget, well, then why are you mentioning it? Why
Speaker 4: are you mentioning what I'm meant to forget? And that's strange.
Speaker 4: I love studying the Bible with y'all because we would
Speaker 4: just read write over this right.
Speaker 6: God is doing a new thing. I'm gonna have a
Speaker 6: new wife. I'm gonna have a new kid when I
Speaker 6: get home. I read a book one time. It was
Speaker 6: called how to have a new Husband in twenty one days. Hey, y'
Speaker 6: to talking about taking the same husband.
Speaker 4: And if you do this, you can change him, and
Speaker 4: you can manipulate him and just compliment him when he
Speaker 4: carries the groceries in, and he'll think he's strong and
Speaker 4: he'll carry the groceries more.
Speaker 1: How to have a new husband in.
Speaker 4: Twenty one days, that is not Isaiah's message. In fact,
Speaker 4: Isaiah is saying, now that I have reminded you of
Speaker 4: all of these former things that God has done, Forget
Speaker 4: the former things.
Speaker 1: Say that real quick.
Speaker 4: Forget the former, Forget the former Forget the dress you
Speaker 4: used to fit into, the people you used to want
Speaker 4: to see at the party. Forget the drugs that you
Speaker 4: used to get high on. Right, that's what he's talking about. No,
Speaker 4: he's talking about things God did. Now, I get it
Speaker 4: if he's saying, forget the things that you used to
Speaker 4: sin with.
Speaker 1: But he's actually.
Speaker 4: Saying, forget the things that you used to celebrate. And
Speaker 4: I studied it, and I studied it, and I said, well, Lord,
Speaker 4: should we not celebrate the anniversary? Should we not put
Speaker 4: up all the old pictures of when you made a way?
Speaker 4: We had no money and we had no.
Speaker 1: Connections and you built this church? Is it a sin
Speaker 1: to celebrate what you did?
Speaker 4: And so as I read it, it became clear to
Speaker 4: me why so many of us stay stuck in the
Speaker 4: past and we cannot grow. By the way, there is
Speaker 4: one thing that you can do that God can't do.
Speaker 4: Grow grow you do, Graham said to me one time recently,
Speaker 4: He said, corn dogs fell off.
Speaker 1: I said, what does that even mean?
Speaker 4: Can you say that in English? He said, corn dogs
Speaker 4: used to be so big. Remember when corn dogs were
Speaker 4: big they fell off.
Speaker 1: And I told them they didn't. Corn dogs didn't fall off.
Speaker 1: You grew up. See the difference. He thinks corn dogs changed.
Speaker 1: Corn dogs don't change. Corn day dogs. This is the
Speaker 1: Bible says it. Corn dogs are the same yesterday, today,
Speaker 1: and forever. But you changed. You changed. And as we
Speaker 1: are being.
Speaker 4: Changed by the glory of the Lord, we see more
Speaker 4: of his glory as we are changed by him, and
Speaker 4: we begin to realize that a lot of what we
Speaker 4: call growth is forgetting what we thought we knew. So
Speaker 4: a lot of what we call going forward we will
Speaker 4: forget what we thought God had promised as we learn
Speaker 4: what he really promised. A lot of our problem is
Speaker 4: when we overlay our preferences on God's promises. And I'm
Speaker 4: going to take that further, so you better let that
Speaker 4: one sink in. When you overlay your preference over God's promise.
Speaker 4: But here's the even worst part. You lay your preference
Speaker 4: over God's promise and then you attach God's promise to
Speaker 4: your plan.
Speaker 1: And that's not how this works.
Speaker 4: So Isaiah is speaking to people about the exodus, which
Speaker 4: happened seven hundred years ago, and he's speaking to them
Speaker 4: about their exile, which they're currently in because they're in
Speaker 4: a place called Babylonia and they were taken there by Nebekinezer,
Speaker 4: but they're going to be led.
Speaker 1: Out by Cyrus.
Speaker 4: And he says, I'm doing a new thing, but I
Speaker 4: want to remind you of the old thing. But no
Speaker 4: sooner does he remind them of who is speaking than
Speaker 4: he says, this is what the Lord says, forget.
Speaker 1: The former.
Speaker 4: And I don't think this means that we can't go
Speaker 4: shopping for Iron Maiden t shirts, as some of us
Speaker 4: are wont to do. I don't think that God is
Speaker 4: against nostalgia. I don't think that God is against memory.
Speaker 4: But I'm very conflicted about those of us who are
Speaker 4: staying stuck in a stage of our spiritual growth and
Speaker 4: calling it our whole story. Remember, the Red Sea was
Speaker 4: not the finish line for the people of God.
Speaker 1: It was the foundation.
Speaker 4: And is it possible that you've been taking something in
Speaker 4: your life that was meant to be a foundation and
Speaker 4: treating it as a finish line. And I'll tell you
Speaker 4: some of the things that we say when we're trying
Speaker 4: to take foundations. Nobody sees a foundation of a house
Speaker 4: and then pays the builder.
Speaker 1: The full amount, unless you're a fool.
Speaker 4: If you're building a house and they put up the foundation,
Speaker 4: keep a little of that money back.
Speaker 1: Because they've got still more to do.
Speaker 4: And when God lays a foundation in your life and
Speaker 4: you call it finished, you end up crossing the Red Sea,
Speaker 4: getting through the waters, and spending forty years in a wilderness.
Speaker 1: So I hear.
Speaker 4: Christians often say things like I'm just a sinner saved
Speaker 4: by grace. I saw a bumper sticker one time that
Speaker 4: said Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven. Now I understand the
Speaker 4: heart of that. We're saying we're not better than you.
Speaker 4: It's not like we don't cuss our kids out, we
Speaker 4: just don't do it in church.
Speaker 1: This is the praise in church. I forgot.
Speaker 4: But when you say Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven, if
Speaker 4: that helps you to receive God's grace for where you're at,
Speaker 4: that is a wonderful truth.
Speaker 1: But if it causes you to.
Speaker 4: Remain or the way the prophet Isaiah put it, he said,
Speaker 4: don't dwell on it. Don't dwell on the past. Let
Speaker 4: me show you this in verse eighteen. It's right there
Speaker 4: in the text. He says, forget the former things.
Speaker 1: Do not dwell on the past.
Speaker 4: Then why did you spend two verses telling me about
Speaker 4: the past if you don't want me to dwell on it?
Speaker 4: So God says, I gave you those experiences to draw from,
Speaker 4: not to dwell on. The difference, I gave you those
Speaker 4: experiences to.
Speaker 1: Draw from, not to dwell on.
Speaker 4: To dwell in it is to live in something that
Speaker 4: God intended to be temporary.
Speaker 1: Okay, when there is.
Speaker 4: A truth spoken over your life concerning what God has
Speaker 4: given you, concerning who God has called you, concerning who
Speaker 4: He has, who He has made you to be, let's
Speaker 4: get that phrase embedded. Who He has made you to be.
Speaker 4: When God has planted that truth inside of you, that
Speaker 4: is a foundational truth. But the foundation is not meant
Speaker 4: to be the finish line of your faith. And so
Speaker 4: then if you just imagine this, you're building a house,
Speaker 4: they pour the foundation, You set up tents and pay
Speaker 4: them full price, and you have no indoor plumbing, and
Speaker 4: you certainly have no marble countertops, and you paid for
Speaker 4: him and you got no run in water and you
Speaker 4: paid for it is paid for, but you're.
Speaker 1: Not living in it. It's paid for, but you said no,
Speaker 1: I'm a live in this tent.
Speaker 4: See a lot of Christians and they don't realize what's
Speaker 4: already been paid for. So now I'm living down in
Speaker 4: something that Jesus' glood already purchased more than. But I
Speaker 4: can't see past what I've been through. So I figure
Speaker 4: this Red Sea was meant to be the result. The
Speaker 4: Red Sea was just the road to get where I
Speaker 4: was going. It wasn't the place I was meant to stay.
Speaker 4: So I'm gonna fight every single one of you that says,
Speaker 4: men the good old days of Elevation Church, back when
Speaker 4: we used to be at Providence High School.
Speaker 1: Providence High School.
Speaker 4: If you think the good old days of Elevation Church,
Speaker 4: you were not setting up at Providence High School or
Speaker 4: tearing down. All that shows me is you were in
Speaker 4: a volunteer. That's why you thought it was the.
Speaker 1: Good old days.
Speaker 4: It is a perspective of praise that you get when
Speaker 4: you see, Oh God brought me through that, but he
Speaker 4: did not lead me to that as my destination. I
Speaker 4: declare over your life today, that everything you have seen
Speaker 4: God do was a foundation. He is not done building
Speaker 4: in your life. He is not done building in your
Speaker 4: blood life. He is not done building on your experience.
Speaker 4: He is not done building through your pain.
Speaker 1: Forget how far you've come. What I thought I was
Speaker 1: supposed to remember how far I've come.
Speaker 4: And last week I did a good little message because
Speaker 4: I preached on look forward, not far, and I was
Speaker 4: illustrating that when we tend to get too far out
Speaker 4: ahead of ourselves. Man, I prayed before our twentieth year
Speaker 4: of ministry started, I said, Lord, let me give him
Speaker 4: the plan for the next twenty years of the church.
Speaker 4: I started praying that in January. I was praying it
Speaker 4: up till.
Speaker 1: Nine twenty nine.
Speaker 4: Church started at nine thirty. And the lawyer said, Nope,
Speaker 4: not twenty years. How about twenty minutes. How about twenty minutes.
Speaker 4: Get up and preach the word. This is what the
Speaker 4: Lord says for your current situation. You know why we
Speaker 4: want God's plans to be so far in the future,
Speaker 4: because we're not committed to His presence in our daily life.
Speaker 4: This is what the Lord says. This is what the
Speaker 4: Lord says. Now, the Lord's going to speak to you
Speaker 4: in many ways through your life. I didn't give them
Speaker 4: Hebrews one one, but it came up in my spirits.
Speaker 4: So I'm gonna find it in my own big fat
Speaker 4: bible and read it to you right now, my small
Speaker 4: print bible, my bible that I could read nineteen years
Speaker 4: ago when we started this church, back when I could
Speaker 4: find the Book of Hebrews chapter one. It begins our
Speaker 4: twentieth year ministream. In the past, God spoke to our ancestors.
Speaker 4: I'm not being this is the scripture for really. In
Speaker 4: the past, God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets
Speaker 4: at many times, in various ways. That's what I want
Speaker 4: you to get at many times, in various ways in
Speaker 4: the past verse two. But in these last days he
Speaker 4: has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed
Speaker 4: heir of all things, and through whom he also made
Speaker 4: the universe. Now what that makes me think is God's
Speaker 4: been doing this a long time. He's consistent. Say that
Speaker 4: out loud. God is consistent. Put it in the chat.
Speaker 4: God is consistent. The worlds were framed by the word
Speaker 4: of God. So when Isaiah says, this is what the
Speaker 4: Lord says, God didn't just start speaking, you just started listening.
Speaker 4: He's just waiting for us to tune in when we
Speaker 4: start our worship service at church bridges joining of what
Speaker 4: Heaven is doing around the clock. Because he's consistent. He's
Speaker 4: consistently holy. That's why the angels call him Holy, Holy, Holy.
Speaker 4: When you say it three times, it underscores not only
Speaker 4: the significance of it, but the consistency of it. God
Speaker 4: doesn't take an off day from doing the right thing.
Speaker 4: Jesus was without sin, and yet he was made to
Speaker 4: become sin so that we who had sinned could become
Speaker 4: the righteousness of God through him. That's what he means
Speaker 4: by his son, who created the universe. Jesus did not
Speaker 4: become God when he was born. He was always God.
Speaker 4: He will always be God. He is Alpha and Omega.
Speaker 4: He's consistent. He was there from the foundation of the world.
Speaker 4: The world was framed by the very word of God
Speaker 4: that is coming into your heart today.
Speaker 1: He's consistent. Say it again. He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He didn't just start feeding his people when he gave
Speaker 4: them manna in the wilderness.
Speaker 1: He's consistent. He'd been feeding them all of their life.
Speaker 4: He's consistent. God can find so many ways to feed
Speaker 4: his children. If it's not manna in the wilderness, it
Speaker 4: will be the fruit of Canaan. But I'll tell you
Speaker 4: one thing. He's consistent, and he'll feed you. Whether it's
Speaker 4: ravens bringing you food which were considered unclean, bring into
Speaker 4: a Hebrew prophet a bird that was considered unclean by
Speaker 4: the Jewish religion. God can feed you anywhere you are,
Speaker 4: and he can find you anywhere you are, and he
Speaker 4: can fill you anywhere you are because he formed you. Now,
Speaker 4: whoever forms you knows what to fill you with. Whoever
Speaker 4: forms you knows what to fill you with.
Speaker 1: And the one who.
Speaker 4: Knows your future formed you before your future begin. Because
Speaker 4: the prophet Isaiah said, and excuse me, the prophet Jeremiah,
Speaker 4: his buddy, said, in Jeremiah chapter one, verse five, before
Speaker 4: you were born, I formed you in my mother's womb.
Speaker 4: I was knit together because he was formed. And so
Speaker 4: all of my days he has been faithful all my life.
Speaker 4: He has been so so good. That's the consistency of God.
Speaker 4: He is a consistent friend. He doesn't duck out when
Speaker 4: it's a liability to know your name or your number.
Speaker 4: He's a consistent stint friend. He's a friend that sticks
Speaker 4: closer than a brother. He knows how to celebrate your
Speaker 4: wins with you because he's consistent. He's not intimidated like
Speaker 4: some of your friends when you're doing good, and they
Speaker 4: only want to come around when you're doing bad, because
Speaker 4: misery loves company.
Speaker 1: He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He'll step into your good moment and he can be
Speaker 4: proud of you pass the point where other people can
Speaker 4: because he has no insecurities. He's consistent, he has no insufficiencies.
Speaker 1: He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He doesn't run out of energy. He doesn't get tired
Speaker 4: of carrying you. He doesn't say, because you pray to me,
Speaker 4: tomorrow is kind of late right now, and I'm not
Speaker 4: really a night person.
Speaker 1: He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He's not waiting for you to get the eyeboogers out
Speaker 4: of your eyes. He's a morning person too. He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He doesn't sleep, he doesn't slumber. He's consistent. He doesn't
Speaker 4: come off his throne when one party wins an election
Speaker 4: or another one wins the next one. He's consistent. He's
Speaker 4: Israel's king and your creator. He's consistent. He is consistent,
Speaker 4: so consistent that he'll walk with you, not only through
Speaker 4: the joys and the outain tops of your life, but
Speaker 4: in the sorrows of your life. He's not ashamed to
Speaker 4: be associated with you. He's consistent. If you hadn't caught
Speaker 4: any fish, he'll tell you where to throw the net
Speaker 4: out again.
Speaker 1: Because he's consistent.
Speaker 4: He's so consistent he's worthy of praise when your feelings
Speaker 4: are telling you that you're not worthy of his love.
Speaker 1: He's consistent. He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He relates to you on the basis of what he
Speaker 4: did for you, not what you do for him. So
Speaker 4: even if you hadn't done it right lately, he's consistent.
Speaker 4: When people walk out of your life, they walk out
Speaker 4: of your life for different reasons. He stays in your
Speaker 4: life for one reason, because you're his. He's consistent. He's
Speaker 4: a good father. He's consistent. If your father wasn't a
Speaker 4: good father, he'll pick up where your father and your
Speaker 4: mother forsake you, then the Lord will take you up
Speaker 4: because he's consistent. I'm celebrating today that he's consistent that
Speaker 4: I've never seen the righteous forsaken, nor is seed begging bread.
Speaker 4: He's consistent, So there's never been a time that I
Speaker 4: called to him, and he was busy with another one
Speaker 4: of his kids that he liked more. Even when I
Speaker 4: was trying to run away to Tarsus, she got me
Speaker 4: to nineveh in the belly of a whale, because he
Speaker 4: has many vehicles to get his voice to where he
Speaker 4: wants it to go.
Speaker 1: He's consistent.
Speaker 4: If there is one thing I love about God is
Speaker 4: that he's consistent. How many have found him to be consistent,
Speaker 4: and you can testify and come into agreement that he's consistent.
Speaker 1: But he's also creative.
Speaker 4: And I don't know if you know any creative people,
Speaker 4: but sometimes creativity and consistency don't get along so well.
Speaker 4: If you've ever lived with an artist, sometimes they don't
Speaker 4: know how to.
Speaker 1: Make their bed up.
Speaker 4: If you've ever lived with somebody who was creatively gifted,
Speaker 4: sometimes they're a little sporadically wired. God is consistent, but
Speaker 4: he's also creative. And I was praying, Lord, give me
Speaker 4: something special to show them today. This is our anniversary,
Speaker 4: it's the beginning of our twentieth year of ministry.
Speaker 1: I want us to have a twenty twenty vision. Come on, Lord,
Speaker 1: And what he spoke to me was something beautiful.
Speaker 4: He began to speak to me as I was falling
Speaker 4: asleep and waking up, and he took me to a
Speaker 4: text because I think at my heart I'm a storyteller.
Speaker 4: If you ever do the math on my sermons, a
Speaker 4: lot of them are based around stories. And so the
Speaker 4: prophetic declaration of Isaiah and the story of the people
Speaker 4: coming through the Red Sea, and the mention of the
Speaker 4: author of Hebrews about the supremacy, the superiority, the efficiency
Speaker 4: of Jesus Christ, our Savior, it all kind of finds
Speaker 4: a unity point in my mind in two of the
Speaker 4: miracles that Jesus did, and I won't belabor them, but
Speaker 4: I do want to show them to you in their entirety.
Speaker 4: In Mark chapter eight, Jesus heals a blind man. Now
Speaker 4: what drew me to this passage initially was the Lord
Speaker 4: told Isaiah.
Speaker 1: See, I am doing a new thing.
Speaker 4: And so I started realizing a lot of us don't
Speaker 4: have a supply problem, we have a site problem. It's
Speaker 4: not that God hasn't spoken, we just can't see. And
Speaker 4: realizing that one of the most frequent miracles that Jesus
Speaker 4: performed in the scripture was the healing of blind eyes.
Speaker 4: I went and studied different people that he healed of blindness,
Speaker 4: because I believe we all have spiritual blindness, blind spots,
Speaker 4: things that we say, Well, if I could go back,
Speaker 4: i'd do it different. But I didn't know that five
Speaker 4: years ago. I didn't know that I was hurting my child.
Speaker 4: I was trying to discipline them. But now I see
Speaker 4: that I was too harsh.
Speaker 1: I didn't mean to. I was trying to.
Speaker 4: I was trying to provide for my family, but I
Speaker 4: ended up kind of abandoning them emotionally and in an
Speaker 4: attempt to give them what I didn't have, which was
Speaker 4: money growing up, I didn't give them what I did have,
Speaker 4: which is love. And I'm looking back, and I was
Speaker 4: blinded by that. And so the healing of the Savior
Speaker 4: and the new thing that God is doing often brings
Speaker 4: restoration of spiritual sight what Paul called the eyes of
Speaker 4: your heart being enlightened. And in Mark chapter eight, there
Speaker 4: is a mention of a man I don't believe we
Speaker 4: get his name in the scripture, but Jesus did something
Speaker 4: amazing for it.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 4: I don't know when you're watching this, but if you're
Speaker 4: about to go to lunch, this might ruin your appetite.
Speaker 1: It's kind of gross Mark Chapter eight please.
Speaker 4: They the disciples in Jesus came to Bethseta, and some
Speaker 4: people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged Jesus
Speaker 4: to touch him. Pay attention to every detail that you can.
Speaker 4: It will reward your attention if you'll pay attention to
Speaker 4: every detail in this little story. He took verse twenty
Speaker 4: three the blind man by the hand let him outside
Speaker 4: the village. When he'd spin on the man's eyes and
Speaker 4: put his hands on him, Jesus asked, do you see anything?
Speaker 1: I told you this is.
Speaker 4: Not a very appetizing miracle. I need to read that again,
Speaker 4: because you didn't even react to it. And it's so weird.
Speaker 4: When he had spit on the man's eyes, we just
Speaker 4: glossed over that, like that's just something people do, like
Speaker 4: he did a hail Mary over him or something. He
Speaker 4: spit on the man's eyes and then put his hands
Speaker 4: on him, and Jesus asked, do you see anything.
Speaker 1: He looked up and said, you did pretty good. I
Speaker 1: see people.
Speaker 4: They look like trees walking around. Now I'm gonna point
Speaker 4: out to you real quick. The fact that he knew
Speaker 4: what trees looked like means that he had been able
Speaker 4: to see it sometime in the past, so he's restoring
Speaker 4: his sight some things.
Speaker 1: God wants to bring.
Speaker 4: You back to you really do know what it means?
Speaker 4: And he said, I see it, but it's blurry. Have
Speaker 4: you got any blurry blessings in your life right now?
Speaker 1: I see it, but it's blurry. It's working, but it
Speaker 1: seems a little off. Can can you?
Speaker 4: I don't want you to spit on me again, but
Speaker 4: can I get a second touch?
Speaker 1: Can I get a second touch?
Speaker 4: The Bible says something very powerful once more, Jesus put
Speaker 4: his hands on the man's eyes, and then his eyes
Speaker 4: were open. His sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.
Speaker 4: Jesus sent him home, saying, don't even go into the village.
Speaker 1: What a great story.
Speaker 4: If that were the passage we were preaching from, we
Speaker 4: would say every miracle is messy, Every miracle is messy.
Speaker 1: Spit in your eyes is messy.
Speaker 4: We would also say that many miracles in your life
Speaker 4: happened over the period of time because there were two
Speaker 4: touches involved. But we're not viewing this miracle in isolation,
Speaker 4: because Jesus is consistent, but he's also creative. And here's
Speaker 4: what I mean. Go to Mark chapter ten. Another blind man,
Speaker 4: this one whose name we do know. Give me my
Speaker 4: Mark ten.
Speaker 1: Please.
Speaker 4: Then they came to Jericho. Is a different town, beth
Speaker 4: sta mark a Jericho Mark ten. As Jesus and his disciples,
Speaker 4: together with the large crowd, were leaving the city, a
Speaker 4: blind man, same condition. Bartimaeus which means son of Timaeus,
Speaker 4: was sitting by the roadside begging next verse when he
Speaker 4: heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth. He could hear,
Speaker 4: but he couldn't see. He began to shout because he
Speaker 4: could shout though he couldn't see. He's using everything that
Speaker 4: he has available.
Speaker 1: Jesus. He calls the name, son of David, have mercy
Speaker 1: on me.
Speaker 4: Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but
Speaker 4: he shouted all the more, Son of David.
Speaker 1: Have mercy on me.
Speaker 4: I'm using restraint because everything in me wants to preach.
Speaker 1: Don't you let them shut you up. Don't you let
Speaker 1: them shut you down. Don't you let them call you crazy.
Speaker 4: They tried to do it to me for almost twenty years,
Speaker 4: and if I had listened to everything they said about me,
Speaker 4: I wouldn't be here preaching to your beautiful self, I
Speaker 4: should dare miss what God has for you down the road. Man,
Speaker 4: y'all are easy to preach to today. Come back next week.
Speaker 4: Somebody in here is making a difference. What verse were
Speaker 4: we on? Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet,
Speaker 4: but he shouted all the more, son.
Speaker 1: Of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stopped and said,
Speaker 1: call him.
Speaker 4: So they the disciples, you're ready called the blind man
Speaker 4: called the blind man, share up on your feet.
Speaker 1: He's calling you. Throwing his cloak aside. He jumped to
Speaker 1: his feet and came to Jesus. What do you want
Speaker 1: me to do for you? Jesus asked him, and.
Speaker 4: The blind man said, Rabbi, I want to see now.
Speaker 4: I can't prove it in the text because the text
Speaker 4: says that the blind man threw his cloak. I can't
Speaker 4: prove it in the text because the text says that
Speaker 4: he shouted loud. I can't prove it in the text.
Speaker 4: But I think when he said I want to see,
Speaker 4: Peter and the other disciples backed up a little bit
Speaker 4: because the last time Jesus did what he's asking him
Speaker 4: to do. And maybe they even said to the God,
Speaker 4: hey man, you might want to. You got a change
Speaker 4: of clothes, you know, just to prepare you. This can
Speaker 4: be kind of traumatic if you're not expecting it, just
Speaker 4: to let you know.
Speaker 1: But watch this. Jesus is a healer. He's consistent.
Speaker 4: He doesn't tell the man Now I don't feel like healing.
Speaker 1: Check back Thursday.
Speaker 4: Thursday is my healing day because he's consistent. But the
Speaker 4: same Savior who is consistent is also creative, which means
Speaker 4: he is not constrained, which means he doesn't have to
Speaker 4: do the same thing this time that he did last time,
Speaker 4: which means.
Speaker 1: That he's gonna heal the man. But this time, watch,
Speaker 1: it's a little different. Jesus just said, go verse fifty two,
Speaker 1: your faith has healed you. And immediately he received this
Speaker 1: side and followed Jesus along the road. And barthol of
Speaker 1: You and.
Speaker 4: Andrew and John and James and Peter are like, wait, Jesus,
Speaker 4: you forgot to spit.
Speaker 1: You gotta spit.
Speaker 4: Remember the chapter eight when Jesus did, I mean, when
Speaker 4: you got to spit on him like that, He's not
Speaker 4: gonna work if it doesn't spit.
Speaker 1: I mean, you spin on that guy and you still
Speaker 1: had to do it. Twice.
Speaker 4: If you're taking notes of as a disciple, here's what
Speaker 4: you're writing down, because you've never seen anything that's amazing before. Right,
Speaker 4: she's walking on healing blind eyes and stuff. So you're
Speaker 4: keeping notes. Okay, we're gonna have to do this without
Speaker 4: him one day.
Speaker 1: So what does he do? Okay?
Speaker 4: So he spits and then the first touch doesn't really work,
Speaker 4: so you got to do it twice, okay.
Speaker 1: And then Jesus walks right.
Speaker 4: Up on this man name Bartimas, and the man's screaming,
Speaker 4: and they're like, you're not supposed to scream, and Jesus like,
Speaker 4: I don't mind him screaming, don't bother me.
Speaker 1: And the man throws his cloak, and Jesus like, let
Speaker 1: him throw off anything he wants to.
Speaker 4: And Jesus looks straight at that man and heals him
Speaker 4: how he wants to, how he chooses to. He's healing you,
Speaker 4: but maybe not how you want him to, maybe not
Speaker 4: how you're used to. Isaiah said, remember when the sea split,
Speaker 4: it's not gonna split this time right instead, Verse nineteen.
Speaker 4: I'm doing a new thing. Even now. It springs up
Speaker 4: the song you're singing from seven hundred years ago. The
Speaker 4: sea split.
Speaker 1: This time the water.
Speaker 4: Isn't gonna split, It's gonna spring, but it's still water.
Speaker 4: And I wonder, is this not the wisdom of God?
Speaker 4: Because he knows we'll get addicted to miracles.
Speaker 1: And not be dependent on him.
Speaker 4: So he says, you wanted me to do it like that, Nah,
Speaker 4: I'm not splitting to see this time. This time is
Speaker 4: coming from a different place. Now you assume that God
Speaker 4: isn't speaking, I wonder, are you just not seeing?
Speaker 1: And he's speaking?
Speaker 4: Because the same Savior that spit in the man's eyes
Speaker 4: didn't spit this time. This time he just spoke because
Speaker 4: he's creative, so he doesn't have to spit. He can speak,
Speaker 4: he can spit. He can spit while he speaks. Like me,
Speaker 4: A lady told me one time, I sit on at
Speaker 4: least the fourth throw because watching you preaches like be
Speaker 4: in a sea world. I gotta get out of his
Speaker 4: flash zone. She said, you spit when you speak. And see,
Speaker 4: God doesn't always have to spit when he speaks. He's consistent,
Speaker 4: but he's creative. And sometimes the fact that he is
Speaker 4: so creative causes you to forget how consistent he is.
Speaker 4: Because while you're waiting for him to spit. He's just
Speaker 4: speaking one word. Go, one word from God. This is
Speaker 4: what the Lord says, Go. And I came into the
Speaker 4: first weekend of our twentieth year of ministry to declare
Speaker 4: to you that not only is this the praise Church,
Speaker 4: but this is the proclamation church. This is the proclamation Church,
Speaker 4: where the word of the Lord reaches beyond the barriers
Speaker 4: of a physical campus or location, beyond the demographic of
Speaker 4: a certain socioeconomic stratus or class, beyond the backgrounds that
Speaker 4: we've all experienced up to this point. God said, forget
Speaker 4: all of that. I am not defining your life by
Speaker 4: the former. This is the most beautiful thing he gave
Speaker 4: me in so long, because after he said forget the
Speaker 4: former thing Verse twenty, he said, even the wild jackals
Speaker 4: and the owls know how to honor me, because I
Speaker 4: provide water in the wilderness.
Speaker 1: The sea is not splitting this time.
Speaker 4: It doesn't need to the same people aren't going to
Speaker 4: call you this time.
Speaker 1: They don't need to. It's not going to feel the.
Speaker 4: Same way this time. It doesn't have to. He said,
Speaker 4: I provide water in the wilderness, and so the animals
Speaker 4: honor me, and waiting for the verse to come back
Speaker 4: up so I can finish it out and streams in
Speaker 4: the wasteland to give drink.
Speaker 1: To my people. Watch this, my chosen.
Speaker 4: That's who you are, my people, my chosen Verse twenty one,
Speaker 4: the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my.
Speaker 1: Praise.
Speaker 4: Leave the verse un let's splash around in this water
Speaker 4: for a minute. He said, I want you to forget
Speaker 4: the former because you are the people I formed for myself.
Speaker 1: And since he is God and is not limited by time,
Speaker 1: he formed you for a future that only he knows.
Speaker 4: So everything you feel insecure about let it go is
Speaker 4: not going to matter.
Speaker 1: Because he is your former. What do you mean former?
Speaker 4: The same Hebrew word that Isaiah uses for former is
Speaker 4: translated as potter and planner. So what's he saying? Let
Speaker 4: go of your plan so I can show you my purpose.
Speaker 4: Let go of every plan that you made without God.
Speaker 4: Let go of every plan that you made by consulting
Speaker 4: your past. Let go of every plan that.
Speaker 1: Was limited to the people you have around you.
Speaker 4: Right now, there's new rivers, new streams, new blessings, new wells,
Speaker 4: new beginnings.
Speaker 1: And what has stayed the same for.
Speaker 4: Twenty years now in this church is the name, the
Speaker 4: name of Jesus the Great. I am in flesh, incarnate
Speaker 4: in action the name of Jesus.
Speaker 1: The numbers have changed, The numbers have changed greatly. I
Speaker 1: used to preach to a room full of nineteen people.
Speaker 1: My passion wasn't lower. I didn't talk softer.
Speaker 4: I'll scream louder because I was desperate and youthful.
Speaker 1: Nothing changed about that when the numbers changed. But it's
Speaker 1: an amazing thing.
Speaker 4: How sometimes God is speaking to you but you.
Speaker 1: Don't recognize him because it doesn't come from where you
Speaker 1: expect it.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 4: I have one friend in my life who changes his
Speaker 4: phone number about every ten months. Every time he changes
Speaker 4: his number, and he knows exactly who he is. I
Speaker 4: don't even bother anymore to replace his old name with
Speaker 4: his new name. I just put a year out beside it,
Speaker 4: and let's say his name is is John. I have
Speaker 4: John twenty nineteen, John twenty twenty, John twenty twenty one,
Speaker 4: first quarter, John twenty twenty one, second quarter.
Speaker 1: In my phone.
Speaker 4: I got his name like fourteen times, but he hasn't changed.
Speaker 4: Just where he's calling me from.
Speaker 1: Same name, new number, same name, new number.
Speaker 4: I commit to you afresh and anew on this the
Speaker 4: beginning of our twentieth year, and anybody who needs to leave,
Speaker 4: I'm gonna give you a second to do it before
Speaker 4: I close this message. Thank you so much. Now, y'all
Speaker 4: look at me.
Speaker 1: I don't care how many or how few God sends us.
Speaker 1: There is one name that is able.
Speaker 4: To save in this ministry. There is one name that
Speaker 4: is able to heal in this ministry. There is one
Speaker 4: name that is able to get your kids off drugs.
Speaker 1: In this ministry. There is one name that is able
Speaker 1: to put your arn't back together in this ministry.
Speaker 4: And as long as the name of Jesus is being proclaimed,
Speaker 4: this is what the Lord says. There will always be
Speaker 4: a current word over this house. There will always be
Speaker 4: a fresh word over your life. And Father, I just
Speaker 4: thank you today for your word in our wilderness. You
Speaker 4: showed me before I stood up to preach God that
Speaker 4: this is what you have to say to this people
Speaker 4: on this day, and you gave me a word for
Speaker 4: this occasion.
Speaker 1: But I don't believe it was just for our church anniversary.
Speaker 4: I believe in my heart because I know you to
Speaker 4: be good, that you are too consistent to ever change,
Speaker 4: and you are too creative to do the same thing
Speaker 4: the same way twice. So we thank you that although
Speaker 4: our world feels unstable, unsteady, and changing all around us,
Speaker 4: never been a more important time for us to look
Speaker 4: toward your faithfulness.
Speaker 1: With your head's bowed and.
Speaker 4: Your eyes closed, there's somebody here that God is calling
Speaker 4: to for salvation. I would like to give you the
Speaker 4: invitation today, whether online or in the room, to receive
Speaker 4: Jesus Christ as your savior and Lord. There is no
Speaker 4: more important decision than this. There is no more important decision,
Speaker 4: not where you're gonna live, not who you're gonna marry,
Speaker 4: who your heart belongs to, who you trust in for
Speaker 4: the salvation of your soul. This is the most important
Speaker 4: decision you will ever make. This has always been a
Speaker 4: church where people are welcome to come as they are,
Speaker 4: But it's also a church where God's not gonna let you.
Speaker 1: Stay that way.
Speaker 4: He wants to change you called you chosen, so right now,
Speaker 4: heads bowed, eyes closed. If this is your moment and
Speaker 4: you're ready to commit your life to Christ or recommit
Speaker 4: your life to Christ, I'm gonna.
Speaker 1: Lead you a prayer.
Speaker 4: This prayer is not magical, but the power of God
Speaker 4: when you pray this prayer is miraculous. And right now,
Speaker 4: in this moment, if you're ready to come to God
Speaker 4: and be forgiven of your sins, I want you to
Speaker 4: repeat after me, and the whole church is going to
Speaker 4: pray with you. Pray this Heavenly Father. Today is my
Speaker 4: day of salvation. I am a sinner in need of
Speaker 4: a savior. And I believe that Jesus Christ is the
Speaker 4: Son of God and the savior of the world. And
Speaker 4: today I make Jesus the Lord of my life. I
Speaker 4: believe he died that I would be forgiven and rose
Speaker 4: again to give me life.
Speaker 1: This is my new beginning. I am a child of God.
Speaker 4: If you pray that, sh at your hand up on
Speaker 4: the count of three, one, two, three, and we're praising God.
Speaker 1: With you, praising God with you.
Speaker 4: Awesome man, awesome on every location. We celebrate you on
Speaker 4: every come on. This is the praise Church.
Speaker 1: This is the praise Church.
Speaker 4: You know, we gotta do right.
Speaker 1: You know what we gotta do right. We gotta give God.
Speaker 4: The biggest praise we've given him in our twentieth year.
Speaker 1: Five four three, twenty seconds to break brow pass those
Speaker 1: bibles around.
Speaker 4: Yeah, take that Bible, man, get in it. Find out
Speaker 4: this is what the Lord says. Never wait till you
Speaker 4: get to church to hear what the Lord says. The
Speaker 4: devil follows you around all weeks, so don't wait till
Speaker 4: Sunday to suit up. What a privilege, What an honor.
Speaker 4: I love being your pastor. Holly loves it too. Coming
Speaker 4: up with me, Bebe, I got you.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you one.
Speaker 4: More story I left out of my sermon, and then
Speaker 4: I'll let the campus pastors all close.
Speaker 1: You mind if I close here? Okay, take this for
Speaker 1: me real quick. I was going to tell you this,
Speaker 1: but I feel like maybe it was for this moment.
Speaker 4: When we were in Los Angeles a couple of years
Speaker 4: ago doing one of our elevation nights, I found myself
Speaker 4: on the brink of something like what I've heard a
Speaker 4: panic attack is before I went out to preach.
Speaker 1: Now, I begin to understand.
Speaker 4: That because of the adrenal fatigue of doing that so
Speaker 4: many nights in a row, I really have to manage
Speaker 4: my energy.
Speaker 1: But there was a moment before I went out to preach.
Speaker 4: To the people of God, and I thought, I'm not
Speaker 4: going to be able to do it tonight. Combined with
Speaker 4: fatigue was the fact that I was a little bit
Speaker 4: awe struck by how many people were coming to be
Speaker 4: a part of the ministry. And it blew my mind.
Speaker 4: And it didn't make me think I'm the man, look
Speaker 4: at me now. It made me think, God, what in
Speaker 4: the world am I doing here? And I began to
Speaker 4: remember my past almost so vividly that, although I'm thankful
Speaker 4: for it, it kind of became a limitation on what
Speaker 4: I thought the Lord could do through me, because what
Speaker 4: is a boy from a town of six thousand people
Speaker 4: doing preaching to fourteen thousand in LA And it kept
Speaker 4: getting worse because they kept telling me about different people
Speaker 4: that were coming that night, and some of them were
Speaker 4: very well known. And as I was just freaking out
Speaker 4: with God for a moment, hollywalked in.
Speaker 1: When she did, I.
Speaker 4: Had a sort of flashback of all of the ministry
Speaker 4: that we've done together since we were eighteen years old,
Speaker 4: and all of a sudden, I was no longer in
Speaker 4: Los Angeles, California, preaching to fourteen thousand. I was back
Speaker 4: in a little town called Loris, South Carolina, preaching to
Speaker 4: fourteen I was no longer in California at all. I
Speaker 4: was in Cowpins, South Carolina, preaching to six and I
Speaker 4: realized something in that moment that gave me confidence that
Speaker 4: I've held on through many situations in my life, and maybe.
Speaker 1: It'll bless you too.
Speaker 4: I realized that although the numbers are much bigger, the
Speaker 4: faithfulness of God has always been the same. And as
Speaker 4: I looked at Holly and I began to remember all
Speaker 4: of those times that we stood and saying, Lord, I
Speaker 4: lift your name on high, and every move I make
Speaker 4: in you, I make in you, make me move Jesus,
Speaker 4: and Lord, prepare me to be a sanctuary. And as
Speaker 4: the deer panted for the water, and I realized I
Speaker 4: got the same girl and the same God. So after
Speaker 4: I say this, I'm going to dismiss you, So campus pastors,
Speaker 4: you better take.
Speaker 1: It right now.
Speaker 4: I don't know what this new season of your life
Speaker 4: is intimidating you with, threatening you with. I don't know
Speaker 4: what's in your past that haunts you or what you
Speaker 4: wish you could go back to.
Speaker 1: But I declare Isaiah.
Speaker 4: Forty three nineteen over every man, woman, boy, girl and
Speaker 4: family in Elevation Church today. See I am doing a
Speaker 4: new thing.
Speaker 1: Now it springs up. Now it springs up. Do you
Speaker 1: not perceive it? And what's what God is doing? I
Speaker 1: am making a.
Speaker 4: Way in the wilderness and streams in the way slang.
Speaker 4: So everybody believes that the God who was with you
Speaker 4: then is with you now. Give him an eternal praise.
Speaker 1: I love you, God, bless thank you. Let's do this
Speaker 1: twentieth year right. God is with you.
Speaker 4: God is for you. Have a great day. Happy annivers
Speaker 4: for Church.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
Speaker 2: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
Speaker 2: You can click the link in the description to give
Speaker 2: now or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more
Speaker 2: information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
Speaker 1: You can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2: You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
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Speaker 2: Elevation Church.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening.
Speaker 3: God bless you.