Speaker 1: So why don't you just take twenty three seconds since
Speaker 1: this year twenty twenty three and praise God for the
Speaker 1: opportunity to be in this cressus today. You can do
Speaker 1: it online. Hey. By the way, we're probably coming to
Speaker 1: a city near you this spring. Elevation Nights twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: April eighteenth through April twenty seventh Austin, Texas, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Minneapolis, Minnesota,
Speaker 1: Kansas City, Missouri, Denver, Colorado, Saint Louis, Missouri, Fort Wayne, Indiana,
Speaker 1: and Toronto, Toronto, Toronto, Toronto Elevation Nights dot com. Get
Speaker 1: your tickets right now, or you're gonna be sad because
Speaker 1: they're gonna sell. You'll be standing out there in the
Speaker 1: parking lot talking about a breakthrough. But God gave you
Speaker 1: one and you didn't take it when he gave it.
Speaker 1: Gets your ticket, Get your tickets, Get your tickets. Get
Speaker 1: your tickets at Elevation Nights dot com dot com dot com.
Speaker 1: Oh God, are y'all gonna put up with me like
Speaker 1: this all day? Oh? Man? I think it's the bandana?
Speaker 1: Did it tell me I need a bandana? Good to
Speaker 1: have you, Joel, Hey, I'm excited about the Elevation Rhythm album.
Speaker 1: When are we putting that out? Oh? That thing is
Speaker 1: it's called this is the Gospel, and I think you
Speaker 1: are going to find it to be very very good.
Speaker 1: So that'll be coming soon from Elevation Rhythm. God is
Speaker 1: doing a new thing, new songs, new season, new strength,
Speaker 1: new series. I start in two weeks ago. Now I
Speaker 1: kind of head faked you. I said I'm starting a series.
Speaker 1: Then I was gone. But now I'm back and I'm
Speaker 1: ready to bring it Joshua. Chapter one, Chapter one, new chapter.
Speaker 1: Somebody say that out loud, new chapter. We're preaching from
Speaker 1: this thought, there's so much more to the story and
Speaker 1: believing that for every family, every business, every person who
Speaker 1: maybe is recovering from a heartbreak or you're hoping for
Speaker 1: freedom from an addiction in your life. And we took
Speaker 1: that specific line from a song we've been singing around
Speaker 1: here called More than Apel, and it says, there's so
Speaker 1: much more to the story. You're not done with me yet?
Speaker 1: How many are glad that God didn't throw you away?
Speaker 1: Oh so the people that aren't clapping didn't make mistakes, y'all.
Speaker 1: They are in pristine condition. But some of us did
Speaker 1: so much stuff. God could have junked us and just
Speaker 1: written us off, but he didn't. And there's a reason
Speaker 1: for that. If you're breathing, there's a reason for that.
Speaker 1: If you're here, there's a reason for that. There's a
Speaker 1: reason for it. I believe there's a reason God sent
Speaker 1: you to this message today. You got on this YouTube
Speaker 1: channel and you were looking for a cooking video. Well,
Speaker 1: I've been cooking all right, the bread of life. The
Speaker 1: Lord wants you to receive this word. Now, let's go
Speaker 1: to Joshua Chapter one, verses seven through eleven, and I'll
Speaker 1: pick up one other verse as well. It's one of
Speaker 1: those scriptures got to breathe before you read it, because
Speaker 1: it's good. God is coaching up Joshua to do with it.
Speaker 1: He has to do that Moses couldn't do, but Joshua's
Speaker 1: called to do it. Break limitations and break barriers and
Speaker 1: lead the people into something great to glorify his name.
Speaker 1: So let me get ready for this verse seven. Be
Speaker 1: strong in my imagination, when I said that, y'all are
Speaker 1: like shouting and stuff. So we're gonna talk about your
Speaker 1: attitude when we appreciate this message. Be strong and very courageous,
Speaker 1: be careful to obey all the law. You're like, well,
Speaker 1: that's mine, the careful part. I'm the careful one. You
Speaker 1: don't normally see those two together, courageous and careful. Usually
Speaker 1: it's like, don't climb up there on that thing, You're
Speaker 1: gonna break your neck. That's the first thing our parents
Speaker 1: start telling us is all this stuff we're gonna break
Speaker 1: our neck doing and get killed doing so. I thought
Speaker 1: it was fascinating that they're right there together. Be courageous,
Speaker 1: not just courageous, but very courageous, and be careful. Isn't
Speaker 1: that interesting? I love these little tensions in the text.
Speaker 1: That's what helps me to really see the truth in it.
Speaker 1: Be very courageous and be careful to obey all the law.
Speaker 1: My servant Moses gave you, do not turn from it
Speaker 1: to the right or to the left. That you may
Speaker 1: be successful. Well, brother Steve, the Lord doesn't care if
Speaker 1: we succeed, does he not? Did he say that you
Speaker 1: may be successful? I mean, I want this sermon to
Speaker 1: succeed today. I hope you do too. I don't want
Speaker 1: to just talk and you get put down three notes
Speaker 1: and lose the note sheet before you even get to Tuesday.
Speaker 1: I want this sermon to get in your heart, and
Speaker 1: I want you to succeed. I want this sermon to
Speaker 1: work when you have to go to court next month.
Speaker 1: I want this sermon to work when you have to negotiate.
Speaker 1: I want this sermon to work when you have to
Speaker 1: say no to the thing you've been saying yes to
Speaker 1: for the last seventeen years. I want this to work
Speaker 1: for you in your life. He wants you to be
Speaker 1: successful wherever you go, and look at this. Keep this
Speaker 1: book of the Law always on your lips. Meditate on
Speaker 1: it day and night, so that you may be careful
Speaker 1: to do everything written in it. Then you will be
Speaker 1: prosperous and successful. Have I not commanded you be strong
Speaker 1: and courageous. Do not be afraid, do not be discouraged,
Speaker 1: For the Lord your God will be with you wherever. Oh,
Speaker 1: that sounds like a blank check to me. Wherever you go,
Speaker 1: who We're going to test the limits of that in
Speaker 1: a moment. You'll see verse ten. So, Joshua, last time
Speaker 1: I preached, I preached now, Joshua, right, God is bringing
Speaker 1: something into your life now, and God is always bringing
Speaker 1: something new into your life. So Joshua ordered the officers
Speaker 1: of the people. Go through the camp and tell the people.
Speaker 1: Get your possessions ready. Three days from now you will
Speaker 1: cross the Jordan here to go in and take possession
Speaker 1: of the land. The Lord your God is giving you
Speaker 1: for your own. Drop down to chapter two, verse one,
Speaker 1: last verse. Then Joshua, son of None secretly sh sent
Speaker 1: two spies. Secretly, secretly sent two spies from shie Em.
Speaker 1: It's a long eye, very important, shteem, y'all are so
Speaker 1: bad kind of church is this? Secretly sent two spies
Speaker 1: from Shiam. Go look over the land, he said, especially Jericho.
Speaker 1: So they went and entered the house of a prostitute
Speaker 1: named Rahab and stayed there. Very interesting. The title of
Speaker 1: this message is focus your faith, and that's what I
Speaker 1: want to teach you about today, how to focus your faith.
Speaker 1: And then the little subheading is do the thing that
Speaker 1: you would do, Do the thing that you would do.
Speaker 1: Tell your neighbor, do the thing that you would do,
Speaker 1: Do the thing that you would do. Father, I thank
Speaker 1: you for what you spoke. Help me just to step
Speaker 1: aside now and let you deliver your word. But you
Speaker 1: can use me. God. I'm available to you in Jesus' name, aymn,
Speaker 1: tell somebody focus on your way down to your seat,
Speaker 1: Focus your faith, Focus your faith. I don't know if
Speaker 1: you got to hear my last sermon, but I was saying,
Speaker 1: how I've been reading through the Bible real slow. With
Speaker 1: my oldest boy. We had this conversation where he asked me,
Speaker 1: shouldn't every Christian be required to read through the whole
Speaker 1: Bible at least once before they die. He said, it's
Speaker 1: so much better when you take the whole thing in
Speaker 1: and kind of you get invested in it. And he said,
Speaker 1: I realized that now I just used to pick little
Speaker 1: scriptures and this would definitely be one to pick. Right,
Speaker 1: be strong and courageous. The Lord will be with you
Speaker 1: wherever you go. It's like, all right, going to the club,
Speaker 1: I'm going out here. And isn't it crazy that right
Speaker 1: after God said that I'll be with you wherever you go,
Speaker 1: they went to a prostitute's house. I guess they were
Speaker 1: checking this out like like really like everywhere we go.
Speaker 1: And of course they weren't in the prostitute's house for
Speaker 1: any other reason than the fact that Rahab's resume included
Speaker 1: a history of hiding men. This is what I mean
Speaker 1: by the Bible is so cool when you read it,
Speaker 1: why Rayhab's house? And then on one hand you think
Speaker 1: maybe they're sinning, but they're not. They're going to a
Speaker 1: place that seems unlikely, in a territory that is full
Speaker 1: of enemies, and so they go to Rahab's house the Prostitute. Now,
Speaker 1: I don't want to speak much about Rehab the Prostitute
Speaker 1: this week, but maybe should show up next week. This
Speaker 1: might be a two week or or something like that.
Speaker 1: I really want to get on this motivational thing where
Speaker 1: he said, be strong and very courageous, be careful to obey,
Speaker 1: do not turn from the right to the left, that
Speaker 1: you may be successful. And then did you notice how
Speaker 1: he said in verse nine, do not be afraid, do
Speaker 1: not be discouraged. I love that sermon I did a
Speaker 1: few weeks ago where I had Graham come up here
Speaker 1: and put his forearm on my neck, and I was
Speaker 1: saying how at a wrestling match I heard a woman's
Speaker 1: screaming stand up, and like, how hard it is to
Speaker 1: do these things that we read about in the scripture.
Speaker 1: And I have not had so much feedback on a
Speaker 1: sermon in years as I got just going around people
Speaker 1: saying I loved when Graham was on top of you
Speaker 1: for like seven minutes, just grinding you into the ground.
Speaker 1: That was awesome. That was your best sermon ever. I'm like,
Speaker 1: do you remember the scripture? No? But that was really
Speaker 1: cool how Graham was like, because because I feel like that,
Speaker 1: because I feel like that in my life, and I
Speaker 1: can't say I ever could really name it, but when
Speaker 1: you acted it out, I was like, yes, exactly. You're like,
Speaker 1: don't be afraid. It's like, dude, you talk to people
Speaker 1: about God for a living. If you went to work
Speaker 1: where I went to work, you would understand my fear.
Speaker 1: So I think we found a point of connection there
Speaker 1: that is kind of crazy sometimes in your life. And
Speaker 1: so when when he says, don't be afraid, and then
Speaker 1: he says God says, not me. God says to Joshua,
Speaker 1: don't be discouraged. I'm really thankful that he said that
Speaker 1: to Joshua, who had to lead millions of people into
Speaker 1: a brand new land to fight a great, big enemy.
Speaker 1: Because you might be able to tell me I don't
Speaker 1: have a right to say it, and you might be right,
Speaker 1: but how many of you have this level of stress
Speaker 1: in your life? You are leading millions of people into
Speaker 1: a land that you have no real map for, and
Speaker 1: you're fighting enemies that are twice your size and experience.
Speaker 1: So then this applies to you. Do not be afraid.
Speaker 1: I was talking to a friend the other day who
Speaker 1: studies sociology, and he said, the thing that has been
Speaker 1: different the last few years in the people that he's
Speaker 1: worked with, whether they're millionaire CEOs are people that he's
Speaker 1: working with within the prison system, is that fear comes
Speaker 1: first when something changes in your life, and then comes discouragement.
Speaker 1: He's telling me this on the phone. Remember you came
Speaker 1: over the other day and I was like, I got
Speaker 1: this phone call and y'all were talking. I was like,
Speaker 1: I gotta go. I got a phone call. So I
Speaker 1: get on the phone with this guy. We had an appointment.
Speaker 1: He said, I've been noticing as we help people that
Speaker 1: we need to deal with the discouragement because fear is,
Speaker 1: oh no, it's changing. I don't know what to do.
Speaker 1: I better adapt. But after you've spent a season trying
Speaker 1: to adapt and it doesn't work, fear turns into discouragement.
Speaker 1: I said, say that again. He said, fear turns into discouragement.
Speaker 1: Fear comes first. And then when you've tried to stabilize
Speaker 1: through a turn or a transition, or some change, whether
Speaker 1: it's big picture change or little picture change in your life,
Speaker 1: or just trying to make a change in your life
Speaker 1: from the inside. At first you're afraid. But then after
Speaker 1: the fear has run his course and you've done all
Speaker 1: that you know to do to make this work and
Speaker 1: it didn't, then the fear turns to discouragement. And I
Speaker 1: interrupted him. I said, that's Joshua one nine. He said,
Speaker 1: is what now? Because he's a Christian, but I preach
Speaker 1: the Bible, and he's more fluent in the human mind.
Speaker 1: I said, that's Joshua one nine. That's what I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be preaching in a few weeks to my church. They're
Speaker 1: in the same verse. Y'all aren't gonna believe this, because
Speaker 1: anytime that the Bible says what we're just now finding
Speaker 1: out makes me think God's pretty smart, makes me think
Speaker 1: God knows stuff, makes me think I can trust him.
Speaker 1: How many know you can trust him? In the transition?
Speaker 1: Have I not commanded you verse nine? Be strong and courageous,
Speaker 1: Do not be afraid, Do not be afraid, Do not
Speaker 1: be discouraged. When you go into this land, you're gonna
Speaker 1: be afraid. But when you get in, because God knows
Speaker 1: what's ahead in this story. He knows that after they
Speaker 1: all get circumcised, they're gonna be hobbling over trying to
Speaker 1: walk around the walls of Jericho, trying to fight the
Speaker 1: Battle of Jericho after that surgery. You didn't know they
Speaker 1: did that after surgery. See, there's more to the story.
Speaker 1: Come back, I'll teach you. I'll teach you all the
Speaker 1: cool stuff in the Bible that they didn't put in
Speaker 1: your Sunday school. They always taught you to blow the
Speaker 1: trumpet around the wall of Jericho. They didn't tell you
Speaker 1: you've just been circumcised before you start walking. There's so
Speaker 1: much more to the story. This is not a boring story,
Speaker 1: and yours isn't either, which means it's gonna have twist
Speaker 1: and turns, which means that God is bringing you into
Speaker 1: a place. But the plot, okay, learned, I've learned this.
Speaker 1: He said, you're gonna be afraid, and then you're gonna
Speaker 1: fight some battles that you're gonna win. The first one
Speaker 1: was Jericho, first one. The second one was called I
Speaker 1: it's spelled A I I, and they did it wrong
Speaker 1: and they got beat. So now I'm thinking that what
Speaker 1: God knew when he's talking to Joshua is the first one,
Speaker 1: you're gonna be afraid, but it's gonna work. The second
Speaker 1: one you're gonna go in a little overconfident. It's not
Speaker 1: gonna work, and you're gonna be on your face. So
Speaker 1: don't be afraid, don't be discouraged. And so y'all have
Speaker 1: a good week. Don't be discouraged, and we just all
Speaker 1: go out and we don't be discouraged. Just don't be
Speaker 1: just don't be don't be discouraged. Does that mean I
Speaker 1: should never feel like like I'm taking for granted. No,
Speaker 1: you're gonna feel like you're taking for granted sometimes. And
Speaker 1: Moses led to people forty years and all they did
Speaker 1: was holler at him when they got thirsty. And then
Speaker 1: when Joshua took over they were like, hey, just like well, Moses,
Speaker 1: we're gonna obey you. I'd be like, no, thanks, you
Speaker 1: show some gratitude. You're gonna be taking for granted. Every
Speaker 1: mom say amen, this is my early Mother's Day message.
Speaker 1: You're ready, the sign that you're good is that they
Speaker 1: take you for granted. How many of y'all think the
Speaker 1: person who turned on the lights in the church today. Nope,
Speaker 1: they just do it, so you don't never say thank you.
Speaker 1: They're that good. Sometimes you're taking for granted because you're
Speaker 1: that good at it. Sometimes we take God for granted
Speaker 1: because he's that good. If God made you do fifty
Speaker 1: push ups before every breath he gave you, you'd start
Speaker 1: thanking him for the breast to see if you get
Speaker 1: down to forty, you start bargaining with God. But he's
Speaker 1: come on, y'all, he's that good. He's that good all
Speaker 1: the way from the back to the front. Say he's
Speaker 1: that good. Yeah, he's that good at his job. So
Speaker 1: he doesn't want us to take his presence for granted.
Speaker 1: And he enunciates said clearly, so there can be no
Speaker 1: mistake about who's doing the work. I the Lord, your
Speaker 1: God will be with you wherever you go. And truthfully,
Speaker 1: that's why you're here because He was with you. That's
Speaker 1: why you survived everything you survived because He was with you.
Speaker 1: It really is the only reason that we made it
Speaker 1: through because He was with us. Let's give God praise
Speaker 1: that he's with us. When he says do not be afraid,
Speaker 1: then he must not be talking about a feeling. Why
Speaker 1: would he tell me to do something that I can't
Speaker 1: help be like put me out in the rain and
Speaker 1: telling me, don't get wet. Where's my umbrella. I'm not
Speaker 1: giving you one. Don't get wet. Well, I got to
Speaker 1: go inside. Don't go inside, but don't get wet. So
Speaker 1: go into the promised land. Fight the enemies. Don't be afraid,
Speaker 1: don't be discouraged. Keep showing up doing the thing that
Speaker 1: you know you're supposed to do, but feel like it's
Speaker 1: not going anywhere, and you just keep let your big
Speaker 1: balance go down instead of up, going the wrong way
Speaker 1: instead of the right way. But keep showing up and
Speaker 1: don't be discouraged. Keep on loving people who are unlikable,
Speaker 1: but don't be discouraged. Let me do this for myself.
Speaker 1: Keep on preaching, and keep on preaching and preaching and
Speaker 1: preaching and preaching and preaching and preaching. And know that
Speaker 1: some of the people that you preach to are never
Speaker 1: going to listen to it, but don't be discouraged. Some will,
Speaker 1: some won't. Don't be discouraged. Keep sowing words of encouragement.
Speaker 1: Don't be discouraged. Keep on trying to do the Okay,
Speaker 1: I got to bring it up, the eating right thing,
Speaker 1: step on the scale. Don't be discouraged, keep doing it.
Speaker 1: And so I realized that God is not talking about
Speaker 1: a feeling here at all. He's talking about a folk.
Speaker 1: That was the breakthrough for me. As I thought about
Speaker 1: what to teach you about when you feel discouraged, I
Speaker 1: realize that God is not commanding Joshua or Jimmy saying
Speaker 1: don't feel discouraged. He said, don't be discouraged. That means
Speaker 1: there must be a big difference to God between what
Speaker 1: I feel and who I am. Between what I feel
Speaker 1: and who I am. I'm depressed right now. I've got
Speaker 1: joy inside. I just have to learn how to bring
Speaker 1: the joy from the inside out forward into my life.
Speaker 1: This condition is not my identity. I'm glad about that,
Speaker 1: because I feel some funny feelings. Sometimes I feel some
Speaker 1: freaky stuff. Sometimes I feel sometimes some stuff makes me
Speaker 1: so frustrated and discouraged. And God says, that's fine, you
Speaker 1: feel it, but don't be it. That's fine that you
Speaker 1: feel it, but you don't have to behave like it.
Speaker 1: You don't have to believe everything fear tells you. You
Speaker 1: don't have to believe everything that you think. Just because
Speaker 1: you think it doesn't mean you have to believe it.
Speaker 1: You can check that out. You know, they have like
Speaker 1: airport security, and certain stuff doesn't get through. Certain stuff
Speaker 1: you can say to your mind, Ah, that's not coming
Speaker 1: through today, not today, Come again tomorrow. Maybe there'd be
Speaker 1: a different TSA agent at the gate. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Maybe you can get it through tomorrow, but not today.
Speaker 1: Because I'm in a season that God is doing something
Speaker 1: and especial in my life, and I can feel it.
Speaker 1: It's coming from my spirit. And I don't have everything
Speaker 1: in the spirit worked out yet in my situation, but
Speaker 1: I'm not limited by my situation. And even the very
Speaker 1: language that I use has to be very peculiar in
Speaker 1: this season, because what I say in this season is
Speaker 1: going to determine what I step into. Do not be discouraged,
Speaker 1: Do not be afraid. You have seen glimpses of yourself
Speaker 1: that reveal your God's potential. You've seen them in certain
Speaker 1: moments where you were kind, You've seen them in certain
Speaker 1: moments where you were hospitable. You've seen it in certain
Speaker 1: moments where you said, no, that's fine, you right in
Speaker 1: the front seat, I'll sit in the bag. Not only
Speaker 1: did that once in nineteen eighty eight, but you did
Speaker 1: it once. You have seen seasons when you were disciplined.
Speaker 1: How many of you have gotten a glimpse of yourself
Speaker 1: that went like, oh, that must be the me that
Speaker 1: God sees when he says you are fearfully and wonderfully made.
Speaker 1: Now I'm not saying that you don't five minutes later
Speaker 1: below the whole thing. But you've seen it right, You've
Speaker 1: glimpsed it. Come on, don't leave me up here. You've
Speaker 1: seen it right. I've met myself strong. Have you met
Speaker 1: yourself strong? I have? I like that guy. Let me
Speaker 1: tell you about strong Stephen gets about strong Stephen, he
Speaker 1: doesn't have to prove his point and win every argument
Speaker 1: because he's coming from a place of strength, not neediness.
Speaker 1: So he can listen to somebody and go like, Okay, wow,
Speaker 1: that's crazy. Let me think about that week. Stephen sounds
Speaker 1: strong because he argues, and a lot of times he
Speaker 1: wins because he's good with these words, mama. But even
Speaker 1: though I win, it's really weakness because when I'm coming
Speaker 1: from a place of strength. I don't need to teach
Speaker 1: you a lesson because it's in God's hands. But weak
Speaker 1: me week Stephen. He's a different He's a whole different situation.
Speaker 1: He is a whole different case study. And that's why
Speaker 1: I was encouraged by verse seven and nine, because I thought, like, Oh,
Speaker 1: Joshua isn't just strong, because God wouldn't tell him not
Speaker 1: to be afraid, and he's not just encouraged or God
Speaker 1: wouldn't tell him don't be discouraged. And it gave me
Speaker 1: hope for what I've been preaching to you all year
Speaker 1: about do the new you. This passage to me communicates
Speaker 1: the belief of a coach that God had in the
Speaker 1: ones that He's chosen, and it also features some correction
Speaker 1: that's going to help us today. How many of you
Speaker 1: want this help that God has for you today. It's
Speaker 1: going to help us today to understand how to track
Speaker 1: back your discouragement and get back on track with what
Speaker 1: God's called you to do. Some of you are completely
Speaker 1: off track right now in your life. You know it.
Speaker 1: You're discouraged, and you know it. You're down, and you
Speaker 1: know it. You're defeated, and you know it. But if
Speaker 1: you track it back, this is what came to me,
Speaker 1: and y'all are going to think, wow, that's not very deep.
Speaker 1: But if you track back your discouragement, it usually has
Speaker 1: to do with your discussions, not just with other people,
Speaker 1: but the conversations that happen inside of your own soul.
Speaker 1: You expect God to give Joshua all the military strategy
Speaker 1: in Joshua one, and yet he focuses way more. I mean,
Speaker 1: he gives him the whole picture. He says, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: give you from the desert to Lebanon, from the Euphrates
Speaker 1: to the Mediterranean. To me, that's like the opening scene
Speaker 1: of a movie where the drone is flying over the
Speaker 1: whole land, or they're showing us one specific place and
Speaker 1: they're giving us a setting. Ah. But then after the
Speaker 1: setting there has to be a good script. And so
Speaker 1: he's given him this script so that he can live
Speaker 1: the story that God wants him to live. And the
Speaker 1: Lord sent me to say some of you, the reason
Speaker 1: that your story feels such a dead end story is
Speaker 1: because your script sucks. Tell your neighbor, if you're not
Speaker 1: afraid they'll punch you, say your script sucks. Holly listen Holly.
Speaker 1: Y'all pray for Holly because she says inappropriate things to me.
Speaker 1: She says that I'm a bad actor. Anytime I try
Speaker 1: to like pull a little you lie to the kids
Speaker 1: and make them think something, she's like, you are such
Speaker 1: a bad actor. You're a horrible actor. Like we should
Speaker 1: be glad about that. It means I can't get away
Speaker 1: with anything. She's like, yeah, but you're such a bad actor.
Speaker 1: And so I always be like, well, test me. Give
Speaker 1: me a scene to do, and I'll come in the
Speaker 1: room and do it. So she'd give me something crazy,
Speaker 1: like somebody just died that I love or something, and
Speaker 1: I'll come in the room and she's like, and you
Speaker 1: just got the phone call and they died, And so
Speaker 1: I'll come in and the thing that I do every time,
Speaker 1: I start laughing. I cannot I cannot do it without laughing.
Speaker 1: And we play this game often and she's like, you're terrible,
Speaker 1: You're so horrible. Why do you keep making me do this?
Speaker 1: This is so bad, this is so dumb. You laugh
Speaker 1: every time. And one time I looked at her because
Speaker 1: she's like, you're a bad actor, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I need better lines. It's your fault. You didn't give
Speaker 1: me any lines. You didn't give me any you didn't
Speaker 1: give me anything to say. So you know, you gave
Speaker 1: me a setting, you gave me a kind of like
Speaker 1: a scene to work out, but you didn't give me
Speaker 1: a script. Give me a better script, and I'll be
Speaker 1: a better actor. At least that's my excuse, right. So
Speaker 1: God says, I'm going to give you the strategy for
Speaker 1: each city in your life. But first, before I give
Speaker 1: you the strategy for it, I want to give you
Speaker 1: the script so that when you get into it, what
Speaker 1: you say on the inside will empower you to face
Speaker 1: what's on the outside. Joshua, this is going to be
Speaker 1: an inside job. Yes, you're going to face giants. Yes,
Speaker 1: there is going to be dry terrain. Yes, there are
Speaker 1: going to be screaming, whining people that will remind you
Speaker 1: of toddlers that you will have to lead. But Joshua,
Speaker 1: be strong and very courageous. How do I be very courageous? God,
Speaker 1: be very careful, be very careful what you let in you,
Speaker 1: and you will be very courageous when you face what's
Speaker 1: in front of you. We keep trying to fix what's
Speaker 1: in front of us. Oh, if they would change. Oh,
Speaker 1: if I were single three years ago? You said if
Speaker 1: I were married? Which one is it? Because we keep
Speaker 1: talking about situations changing, but God is talking about conversations changing.
Speaker 1: The Lord said to Joshua, am I preaching? Or am
Speaker 1: I crazy? Because I think you might be discouraged not
Speaker 1: because of something that you're facing or feeling, but because
Speaker 1: of something that you are saying about what you were facing.
Speaker 1: So here's what you gotta do, Joshua. What do I do?
Speaker 1: Do I shoot them? Do I kill them? Do I
Speaker 1: stab them? Do A choke them? All? Right, before we
Speaker 1: get to all that, because we're gonna do all that.
Speaker 1: Verse eight, keep this Book of the Law. Now, Joshua
Speaker 1: is jealous of you because he had the Book of
Speaker 1: the Law Genesis exits number it's Leviticus Stuteronomy. You got
Speaker 1: the whole story. Hold on, let me see real quick,
Speaker 1: because you got something Joshua doesn't have. And I just
Speaker 1: want to make sure real quick. Oh yeah, you win.
Speaker 1: Spoiler alert. I didn't mean to mess it up for
Speaker 1: you because I know you were gonna read it this week.
Speaker 1: But you win. We win. The grace of God's people
Speaker 1: be with you. Amen, you win. Come Lord Jesus, we win.
Speaker 1: He's already here with us. You win. Wherever you step
Speaker 1: your foot, he's already there. You win. There's fifteen people
Speaker 1: who felt that. When I said it, it's like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I read this one. This is a good one. We
Speaker 1: gotta fight a lot, but we're going to have faith,
Speaker 1: and we're not going to feel it every time, and
Speaker 1: we're not going to see it every time, and we're
Speaker 1: not going to always know how. But He always makes
Speaker 1: a way. And we know this by faith because we
Speaker 1: have his word's exceeding great and precious promises. When author
Speaker 1: called down the living Word of God, which never returns void,
Speaker 1: is in your heart. We thank you for your word. Lord.
Speaker 1: I thank you for your word. Lord. I thank you
Speaker 1: for the promises that I have in spite of the
Speaker 1: problems that I face. I thank you Lord. Now with Joshua,
Speaker 1: the instruction is simple. Keep this Book of the Law
Speaker 1: always on your lips. Meditate on it. And it sounds
Speaker 1: Eastern meditation. Isn't that Buddhist or something? Is this a
Speaker 1: yoga class? We need to quit given our definitions of
Speaker 1: words to the world and let them take it from us.
Speaker 1: The Bible is Eastern, dude, I told somebody one day,
Speaker 1: I was like, I'm concentrating on breathing more these days.
Speaker 1: They're like, oh, that's new age. I thought God did
Speaker 1: that in the garden, like the very first page of
Speaker 1: the story. I thought, that's what the word for spirit
Speaker 1: meant when the spirit ruac. God started this. So we
Speaker 1: need to take some of this stuff back, just like
Speaker 1: success when I read that, or prosper, Oh God, let
Speaker 1: a preacher say prosper, Oh God, God said prosper. And
Speaker 1: if you think that refers only to cars and places
Speaker 1: that you can go on vacation, you just need a
Speaker 1: bigger definition of God, because it includes your peace, it
Speaker 1: includes your freedom, it includes the richness of your interior life.
Speaker 1: All that, all of that, all of it. Now, he said,
Speaker 1: let's fix this script you got going on, Joshua, before
Speaker 1: I take you into this place, before I give you
Speaker 1: this strategy, before I can get you this success that
Speaker 1: I want you to have, which is not necessarily the
Speaker 1: success that you imagine. It's going to be much deeper.
Speaker 1: He said, do this, keep this book of the Law
Speaker 1: always on your lips, meditating on it day and night,
Speaker 1: which does not mean hear me, please to quote scriptures
Speaker 1: obnoxiously at people when they're going through stuff. Just for
Speaker 1: a cautionary moment in this sermon, he said, be careful. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be careful. This does not mean you walk
Speaker 1: around the house and your kid is like I had
Speaker 1: a bad day. Well, all things work together for the
Speaker 1: good of them that love God and are called according
Speaker 1: to His purpose. For those he for knew, he also predestined,
Speaker 1: and those he predestined he also justified, and those he
Speaker 1: just shut up say I'm sorry you had a bad day.
Speaker 1: You want to talk about it. That's not what the
Speaker 1: word always on your lips means. Somebody said, man, I'm
Speaker 1: really struggling. Well, Judas went and hanged himself, So you
Speaker 1: see how can backfire if you hear me wrong. So
Speaker 1: what does he mean when he says meditate? I got
Speaker 1: a picture of him. I got the picture about seven
Speaker 1: years ago, but I didn't realize it was a picture
Speaker 1: of meditation at the time. I thought it was a
Speaker 1: NASCAR race. I went to a NASCAR race to see
Speaker 1: Joey Logano, the champ, the two time champ, and his
Speaker 1: number on his race car is twenty two. Like Taylor Swift.
Speaker 1: I don't know about you, but I'm feeling twenty two.
Speaker 1: I know we got a lot of drivers in the church,
Speaker 1: but Joeoe is my guy and I will always cheer
Speaker 1: for him. And he said, come out and see me race.
Speaker 1: I said, I want to. I said, I respect what
Speaker 1: you do, but that sounds really boring. He's like, bring
Speaker 1: the kids, they'll like it. I promise we'll take care
Speaker 1: of them. So, man, they treated us so good. As
Speaker 1: soon as we got there, they gave us these little
Speaker 1: uh like look like a walkie talkie and shout out Warren.
Speaker 1: He gave each of the kids one and we all
Speaker 1: had one and on it we could hear. But show
Speaker 1: them the picture of Abby because we have one of
Speaker 1: Abbey holding it, just to kind of bring it into
Speaker 1: the scene that. Yeah, they gave me a hat, a shirt.
Speaker 1: I think those are Joey Logano jeans or something Joey
Speaker 1: Logano underwear somewhere in there too, and then those yellow
Speaker 1: Joey Logano headphones and all of this that you know,
Speaker 1: because we're right by the track, and we're standing by
Speaker 1: the track and you see that little thing that Abby's holding,
Speaker 1: Do you see it? You see it? Talk to me, Okay,
Speaker 1: that thing is uh, hand it to me, just just yeah,
Speaker 1: just hand it to me. Yeah, yeah, thank you, baby.
Speaker 1: She called, next sermon illustration is me. When I had
Speaker 1: Grandma up here, she said, hey, next sermon illustration is
Speaker 1: me some kind of multitask and parenting and preaching right now?
Speaker 1: All right? So we had this, and I promise you
Speaker 1: this is not a made up sermon illustration because it's
Speaker 1: going to sound like, oh, that's just too perfect. You
Speaker 1: made that up. But I promise you. We had a
Speaker 1: video of it too, but I didn't want to show
Speaker 1: you the video. Abby's five years old and she's holding
Speaker 1: this thing and she's standing there because on this you
Speaker 1: can hear the crew chief of the driver and the
Speaker 1: spotter telling Joey what to do, and you can hear
Speaker 1: what they're saying to him. Is amazing. It's made it
Speaker 1: really fun for me. Give it helped me understand a
Speaker 1: little bit more of what was going on. But Abby,
Speaker 1: she thought that Joey could hear her too, So she's
Speaker 1: standing over there now really how there's cars going fast
Speaker 1: and what they do at NASCAR and she's going five
Speaker 1: years old. Joey Wigano, Joey Wigano, Joey Wigano. Can you
Speaker 1: hear me, Joey Wiggano, Joey Logana. And we let her
Speaker 1: do it for like an hour because it was so cute.
Speaker 1: I know we're going to hell because we let her
Speaker 1: sit there for at least forty five minutes going, Joey Wiganeo,
Speaker 1: joe Ogano? Is that you, Joey wigane Can you hear me?
Speaker 1: Joey Wigano. And finally, after I got the video in
Speaker 1: the picture and we left left and left and left,
Speaker 1: I say, he can't hear you, baby, This is a
Speaker 1: one way device. But what if he could just come
Speaker 1: with me real quick from Palestine to the Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Speaker 1: I'll take you on the journey right now. What if
Speaker 1: Joey did from Joshua to Joey what if he did?
Speaker 1: What if they met every fan at the gate and said,
Speaker 1: here you go, now put this on, and the driver
Speaker 1: has a headset too, and you could put this on.
Speaker 1: Don't want me to put it on. He's gonna mess
Speaker 1: my hair up? Right that way? I should have practiced
Speaker 1: this is it on wrong? It's upside down? What you mean? Oh?
Speaker 1: Strapping the bell? Thank you? Like that? Is it right?
Speaker 1: I can't really hear y'all, these are really really it's wrong. Okay.
Speaker 1: I tried so, but you saw it. Good grief, Okay,
Speaker 1: come back to the Bible. So he's like, Joshua, there
Speaker 1: are certain things that need to be in your heart
Speaker 1: that will enable you to fight the good fight when
Speaker 1: you are discouraged and afraid. Now watch this. What if Joshua,
Speaker 1: when God spoke to him, instead of Verse ten, says
Speaker 1: he went around and told all of the people, get ready,
Speaker 1: get ready. In three days, we're going in. Hey, hey,
Speaker 1: officers go around telling people get ready, get everything packed,
Speaker 1: get your shoes laced, get everything ready. We're going in
Speaker 1: in three days. We're going in in three days, three days.
Speaker 1: I don't know how we're getting across the Jordan. Joshua
Speaker 1: will tell us. I guess we're going in. How are
Speaker 1: we going to get over the walls of Jericho. I
Speaker 1: don't know. Just get ready, We're going in in three days.
Speaker 1: Imagine if he had gone around asking them what'd you think?
Speaker 1: And then I remember they tried that forty years earlier.
Speaker 1: They tried that. The whole nation started saying to Moses,
Speaker 1: we can't do that, we can't be that. We can't
Speaker 1: defeat that, we can't beat them now. And you're like,
Speaker 1: this does not sound like Canaanites and land I understand that.
Speaker 1: It sounds like change you need to break. It sounds
Speaker 1: like impact that you know you can make. It sounds
Speaker 1: like that thing that you have been avoiding that you
Speaker 1: know God is calling you to engage, and you know
Speaker 1: what it is. So imagine Joey meets everybody at the
Speaker 1: gate and says, here, just tell me when you think
Speaker 1: I should turn. Here's your device. Just tell me what
Speaker 1: to do. Because see when you're in the car and
Speaker 1: there've been in one bit. This is what he told me.
Speaker 1: He said, you can only look forward. You can't turn
Speaker 1: your head at all. So that's why the spotter has
Speaker 1: to tell him. Here's what's ahead of you, here's what's
Speaker 1: behind you, Here's what's going on around you. Oh, they're
Speaker 1: about to wreck up there. This is where we need
Speaker 1: to be. That's why the crew chief. Now the crui
Speaker 1: chief doesn't talk as much as the spot but he
Speaker 1: could talk to He could tell him stuff too. But
Speaker 1: imagine if every single NASCAR beer drinking NASCAR fan and
Speaker 1: five year old girl got a device, got a device,
Speaker 1: got a device, got a device to talk to the driver.
Speaker 1: And here we are trying to steer our lives in
Speaker 1: a season we've never been in before. And yet the
Speaker 1: first thing we do when we wake up in the morning,
Speaker 1: Oh what do they think? Oh where are they today?
Speaker 1: Oh where are they vacationing? Oh what is this political
Speaker 1: party up? To? Shut it down? And look up and
Speaker 1: see what God's doing? Lauren, Glory, Glory, Glory, Gord. In
Speaker 1: times of transition, you gotta keep it tight. You gotta
Speaker 1: keep it tight. Touch three. People say, keep it tight
Speaker 1: right now, keep it tight, right now, keep it tighter.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying don't make new friends. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: don't read books. I'm not saying don't take a class.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying don't have counsel on the multitude counselors
Speaker 1: their safety. I know the Bible versus two. But what
Speaker 1: I'm telling you is God is your spotter. Oh I
Speaker 1: got a better one, and Jesus is my CRUSI there's
Speaker 1: more than the story. Baby zas on. What's the only one?
Speaker 1: God sat? Cause three days later, Jesus saying, we're going
Speaker 1: across this sortid, We're crossing over this Cancel from dead
Speaker 1: to life, from dead, so alive, from the long to praise?
Speaker 1: He yes, Lord, But what do you think I should do?
Speaker 1: How do you think I should raise my kids? What
Speaker 1: do you think I should should do? Keto? Should do?
Speaker 1: Should do it? What do you should do? What should
Speaker 1: I feel? What should I feel? It is so crazy
Speaker 1: that we've got so many voices. Some of them aren't
Speaker 1: on our phone. Some of them are from our family,
Speaker 1: from people who are dead, who raised us, still talking.
Speaker 1: I can make the message real simple. Who's in your headset? Who?
Speaker 1: Who gets to you? I don't want to I don't
Speaker 1: want to be stuck up. Then you'd rather be stuck
Speaker 1: I'm not saying don't listen to other people's point of view.
Speaker 1: That is not this message. But the Lord said in
Speaker 1: Transition times you only need to listen to two. How
Speaker 1: many spies did Moses send into the Promised Land? No, Moses, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he sent twelve too many? Too many. Joshua knew that's
Speaker 1: ten too many. Joshua was one of the two. Y'all
Speaker 1: are never gonna forgive me up here in this headset
Speaker 1: with a wired dangling around, looking like I'm five years
Speaker 1: old and I can't even put it on correctly. You
Speaker 1: are never gonna forget this sermon. And that's just the
Speaker 1: way I want it. So the next time that you
Speaker 1: got ten telling you we can't do it. The next
Speaker 1: time you got Twitter telling you who to hate and
Speaker 1: who like, the next time you got Facebook all up
Speaker 1: in your face, sap in your faith making you a friend.
Speaker 1: You remember that preacher. You remember Fredick was up there
Speaker 1: telling me I just need two. I just need my
Speaker 1: spoder that's God. I need my cru sees, that's Jesus.
Speaker 1: And if I got the Holy Spirit, I got an
Speaker 1: engine that will never turn out. And so watch me
Speaker 1: make this turn, watch me turn this corner, watch me
Speaker 1: do this thing, watch me reinovent in this season, discern
Speaker 1: a greater purpose. Watch me be a mentor, watch me
Speaker 1: be a single mom. Watch me break out of these things,
Speaker 1: watch me grow this sort of sada the god. So
Speaker 1: sus us us all yeah, I've been discouraged to change
Speaker 1: the discussion. Get a different scrapped. I got one. I
Speaker 1: got one for you. I got one for you. Gosh,
Speaker 1: that make it per so for? I said, how personal? Lord?
Speaker 1: He said, real personal? I said, embarrassing? He said, as
Speaker 1: deep as you can go without getting fired. I said,
Speaker 1: all right, I share this Richard watch, watch Rotch, watch Roger.
Speaker 1: I've been driving up to this church to preach for
Speaker 1: over seventeen years now, never even really understood that the meditation,
Speaker 1: And I don't want you to use that word like um,
Speaker 1: think of those, think of those the headset that'll help
Speaker 1: you better to understand what I'm saying. Because I said,
Speaker 1: how faster are you going out there? He said two
Speaker 1: hundred miles an hour? I said, wow, Then you can't
Speaker 1: really afford to just have Uncle Billy weighing in on
Speaker 1: what Joey should do. Turn left, turn left, turn left,
Speaker 1: turn left. That's what Uncle Billy knows about racing. Come on.
Speaker 1: The fastest car Billy ever had was a Maxima. You're
Speaker 1: gonna let Billy tell you how to drive. You're gonna
Speaker 1: get Billy of device. Here you go, Here you go, Culture,
Speaker 1: here you go, CNN, here you go, Fox News, here
Speaker 1: you go, Elon, here you go, Kanye. I don't care
Speaker 1: who it is. If they're not the spotter, if they're
Speaker 1: not the crew teeth, I can listen, but I gotta
Speaker 1: keep it tight wide because we're in a season right
Speaker 1: now where we're all trying to turn the corner. Oh,
Speaker 1: are we getting set up for Jericho where you're gonna
Speaker 1: have to go around and around and around and around
Speaker 1: and around and around seven times? And it isn't working.
Speaker 1: And so I'm discouraged. So when you get discouraged and
Speaker 1: you wonder, what's this really? God? Am I really valuable?
Speaker 1: Will I ever heal? Is it gonna get better? Should
Speaker 1: I even live? Am I gonna make it? Is it
Speaker 1: gonna work? Can I recover? Is there still time? As
Speaker 1: you're making those turns? You need to learn how to
Speaker 1: talk with the one who is watching you and who
Speaker 1: knows every hair on your head because he's with you.
Speaker 1: I need two of you. I need a spotter and
Speaker 1: a crew chief. I need goodness and mercy. I need
Speaker 1: to I need to. Everybody get two fingers up. They
Speaker 1: say that's the peace sign. Well, for right now it
Speaker 1: is gonna be the peace sign. It's gonna remind you
Speaker 1: that when you are discouraged is often because you're distracted.
Speaker 1: Stuff it don't matter, stuff is passing. I know exactly
Speaker 1: who I'm saying this for. Right now, you've been telling
Speaker 1: your stuff, craziest stuff. You don't like your story, then
Speaker 1: Why are you sticking with the script that was given
Speaker 1: to you? Why are you letting a five year old
Speaker 1: tell you how to drive? Yeah, I'm talking Paris. I
Speaker 1: don't want to go to bed. Okay, stay up forever
Speaker 1: and die, Like what kind of parenting is that? You
Speaker 1: gotta hand that over? So I was driving up to
Speaker 1: preach every week. You know what, My meditation was not
Speaker 1: um and it was worse some weeks than others, but
Speaker 1: many seasons it ran through the background. I hope I'm
Speaker 1: not a disappointment. I never would have known how to
Speaker 1: name it as I was feeling. See, that's why you come,
Speaker 1: so we can put a name on some of the
Speaker 1: stuff that's going on in here. And you go, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, that's a five year old talking to me.
Speaker 1: That's an earlier version of me somewhere. I'm scared of
Speaker 1: letting these people down. That's not where God put me now,
Speaker 1: That's not who I am now, and recently, very recently,
Speaker 1: but long enough ago that I've been working on it
Speaker 1: so I can share with you you this didn't just
Speaker 1: happen this week. I'm preaching about stuff while was that fresh.
Speaker 1: I drove up to the church and the Lord said,
Speaker 1: change the whole thing that you're thinking, changed the whole
Speaker 1: meditation and say this. Okay, the first part came like
Speaker 1: this took me a minute. I just sat there. He
Speaker 1: gave it to me. Say this, God is not against me,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, well, that's weird. I'm not worried about
Speaker 1: you being against me, God, I'm worried about them being
Speaker 1: against me. The other one said, I'm scared of letting down.
Speaker 1: What if I say something stupid? That's not really a
Speaker 1: what if? Is it? That's kind of just a baseline
Speaker 1: requirement for me to grab this mic? But what if
Speaker 1: I try to let the Holy Spirit flow? If I
Speaker 1: miss it? See all that? You know what else Joey
Speaker 1: told me. He said, one thing about racing is if
Speaker 1: you don't want to hit the wall, don't think about
Speaker 1: hitting the wall, because you hit the wall. And I
Speaker 1: don't know what we're preaching about today, are we Are
Speaker 1: we preaching about a new creation in Christ or a NASCAR?
Speaker 1: You're preaching about all of this because this is you.
Speaker 1: Life is going fast, and not everybody else out there
Speaker 1: is for you. Some of them are against you, but
Speaker 1: God is not. See I'm talking about the secret things,
Speaker 1: not the things that the enemy shouts, the things he whispers,
Speaker 1: sh secret things you can't even you can't even name
Speaker 1: them with language because they're happening at the level of
Speaker 1: a feeling. So you don't even know how to process it.
Speaker 1: You don't even know how to process it. You just
Speaker 1: you're just turning here when you should turn there, and
Speaker 1: you're crashing, and you're losing opportunity, and you don't know
Speaker 1: why and the reason why. I was showing up a
Speaker 1: lot of times so anxious, I must have secretly thought
Speaker 1: that God didn't want to work with me that day
Speaker 1: to communicate his word to people because I study, I prayed.
Speaker 1: I'm not perfect, but I'm sincere. I am passionate. So
Speaker 1: if I gave it to him, and I gave him
Speaker 1: the time that week, and I'm not running around being
Speaker 1: an idiot and blaming it on the sovereignty of God
Speaker 1: that I didn't have a sermon Lord speak, He's like
Speaker 1: I was trying Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. You were distracted.
Speaker 1: If I've been with him, and even if I haven't,
Speaker 1: he wants to speak to you more than he wants
Speaker 1: me to study. So even at that moment when you
Speaker 1: screw up. You still got to believe He wants to
Speaker 1: work with you. How can you possibly get up and
Speaker 1: preach or parent, or run a small business, or graduate
Speaker 1: from school, or go back and get your degree, or
Speaker 1: fight diabetes or can and you to show up and
Speaker 1: see your mom three times a week at the nursing
Speaker 1: home and know that she doesn't even know who you are.
Speaker 1: How can you possibly push through that kind of discouragement
Speaker 1: if you don't believe that God is with you and
Speaker 1: for you? He said, sind two spies, not too many.
Speaker 1: You don't need a whole bunch of this right now.
Speaker 1: You need to focus on what God spoke to you.
Speaker 1: So here's the question I want going through your mind.
Speaker 1: What is something I know God spoke that I can
Speaker 1: obey today? Get it? What is something I know God
Speaker 1: spoke that I can obey today? Do you see how
Speaker 1: different that is than what we run around managing a
Speaker 1: lot of times we run around thinking like, oh, I
Speaker 1: got to get my life together. If you do it
Speaker 1: like that, you're gonna fall apart. That's too much. Now.
Speaker 1: The enemy's just listing stuff you need to fix in
Speaker 1: your life. You need to fix your attitude. You need
Speaker 1: to fix your relationships. You need to fix your money.
Speaker 1: You need to fix your kitchen, sink and a toilet
Speaker 1: too much. Watch what Joshua said in chapter two, verse one.
Speaker 1: He said, go to spies. It's an inside job. We're
Speaker 1: gonna We're not gonna make a big deal about this.
Speaker 1: We're just going to focus our faith right now. I
Speaker 1: not only feel that God called me to impart faith
Speaker 1: to you today in this series, but also to impart focus.
Speaker 1: What is the next thing you need to face? Just that?
Speaker 1: What is the one thing? Because Jericho was like the
Speaker 1: key city, it was the strategic command center. It's like
Speaker 1: your mind is to your body. If they got in Jericho,
Speaker 1: they could take the rest of the land. And I
Speaker 1: am telling you the enemy is trying to get you
Speaker 1: to focus on too much so that all you want
Speaker 1: to do is go take a nap and do it tomorrow.
Speaker 1: But no, who cannot call to What can I do today? Oh?
Speaker 1: Well I don't have money. Well what would you do
Speaker 1: if you did have money? Do a little bit of that.
Speaker 1: I don't have time to go work out? Well you know,
Speaker 1: I do it. I don't have time. You got ten minutes, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I got ten minutes. Do ten minutes. I would work
Speaker 1: out for an hour. Okay, do the thing that you
Speaker 1: would do for an hour for ten minutes. You don't
Speaker 1: get it. I heard a guy say the other day,
Speaker 1: if I was a billionaire, i'd build orphanages in Africa.
Speaker 1: I said, do you support the outreach ministry of your church?
Speaker 1: You can go over here. So what in offensive? He's like,
Speaker 1: not explicitly. I'm like, what does that mean? Not explicitly?
Speaker 1: All the stuff we say to avoid doing stuff, you
Speaker 1: wouldn't do it at a billionaire level. If you won't
Speaker 1: do it at this level, that's deception. And this goes deep,
Speaker 1: right because the things that you're really discouraged about are
Speaker 1: running deep. And so you're like, if I had I
Speaker 1: would do that. Okay, do the thing that you would
Speaker 1: do if you had that. What would you do if
Speaker 1: you did? Okay, I don't have Let me make up
Speaker 1: another one. I don't have kids right now, and I
Speaker 1: want kids, Okay, what would you do with your kids
Speaker 1: if you had them? I would love them? Then who
Speaker 1: can you love? I don't have prayer time in the
Speaker 1: morning because I have to leave it at five point
Speaker 1: thirty for my job. The car is the sanctuary. Do
Speaker 1: the thing that you would do sitting there at the
Speaker 1: table anyway, and do it on the road, and plug
Speaker 1: the iPhone in and put me in your device, and
Speaker 1: I'll be your spotter. I'll start talking to you. I
Speaker 1: will preach this same I'll make a deal with you.
Speaker 1: I will meet you tomorrow morning and preach you this
Speaker 1: same sermon word for word on your device. I'll be
Speaker 1: your spotter, and see can be your crutieth. And together
Speaker 1: we're going in to something amazing. So get ready for it,
Speaker 1: get strong for it, and be careful what you led
Speaker 1: in your heart. I've met week Stephen. I've met strong Stephen.
Speaker 1: And you know what the Lord is teaching me to do.
Speaker 1: When I'm weak, say I'm strong, and do the thing
Speaker 1: you would do if you were strong. When you get
Speaker 1: this going in your life, you're going to be able
Speaker 1: to do everything that the Lord commanded you to do,
Speaker 1: not everything he commanded somebody else to do, and not
Speaker 1: everything you're in laws think you should do, and not
Speaker 1: everything that your mom or your dad hoped that you
Speaker 1: would do that they didn't do, so they're taking it
Speaker 1: out on you. But the thing that God made you
Speaker 1: to do, core you. I speak to that you today,
Speaker 1: who's in your head? Say let's get the Holy Spirit
Speaker 1: in there for a minute, telling you, hey, I'll be
Speaker 1: with you. Come on, y'all. They went to Jericho and
Speaker 1: God was with them to knock down walls. You think
Speaker 1: he's not with you. They went to a prostitute's house,
Speaker 1: stayed there. God used even the enemies to confirm his purpose.
Speaker 1: You think he's not with you. So I started showing
Speaker 1: up to the church and I started saying this. I
Speaker 1: say it out loud because there's nobody with me in
Speaker 1: the car. Well. Shoot, if there was somebody, i'd tell him, hey,
Speaker 1: watch this. I don't care anymore. I would rather look
Speaker 1: crazy than be crazy. But that's just the point in
Speaker 1: my life I'm at. I say, God is not against me.
Speaker 1: He is in it with me, working through me, fighting
Speaker 1: for me. God is not against me. Do the thing
Speaker 1: that you would do if you believed God was not
Speaker 1: against you. Do the thing that you the one God knows,
Speaker 1: the knew you the Jeremiah one to five. You do
Speaker 1: the thing that you the kind, you, the whole. You
Speaker 1: do the thing that you would do, one step at
Speaker 1: a time. Joshua told the spies, just Jericho, don't look
Speaker 1: around at the whole land. You're going to get discouraged.
Speaker 1: Just Jericho and do the thing that you would do
Speaker 1: if you knew what to do. Do the thing that
Speaker 1: you would do. Take a step in that direction toward God,
Speaker 1: because I see people in my spirit right now who
Speaker 1: need to take one step forward. And so let's change
Speaker 1: your not medication, but your meditation today. Let's do it
Speaker 1: real quick, say it out loud. God is not against me.
Speaker 1: I really need you to feel that, because if you're
Speaker 1: just like, okay, if we say it, he'll let us go,
Speaker 1: and I'm hungry, then nothing happened. But I want you
Speaker 1: to get this in your headset so I can get
Speaker 1: in your mindset, so it can get in your mouth,
Speaker 1: so it can get in your life, so it can
Speaker 1: get in your marriage, so it can get all up
Speaker 1: in your business. God is not against me. Jesus died
Speaker 1: for me. God sees me through eyes of love. He
Speaker 1: looks at me with the very same affection that he
Speaker 1: looks at his son, who gave his life for me.
Speaker 1: So I know he's not against me. If he was
Speaker 1: against me, he would already because I saw what he
Speaker 1: did to Pharaoh. He was against Pharaoh he not against me.
Speaker 1: God is not against me, but he's in it with me.
Speaker 1: He said, I'll be with you wherever you go. Now
Speaker 1: put that in your heart. God is in this with me.
Speaker 1: God is in this with me. You say that when
Speaker 1: you come to church. I need you to say it
Speaker 1: as you're walking out of here into it. God is
Speaker 1: in this with me. God is in it with me.
Speaker 1: God is in it with me. God is in it
Speaker 1: with me. Three thirty in the morning. Oh, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be in front of that board on Tuesday, and
Speaker 1: God is going to be in it with me. God
Speaker 1: will already have the coffee made when I get there
Speaker 1: because God is in it with me. He will be
Speaker 1: with me wherever I go. He's already preparing for me
Speaker 1: what He is preparing me for. God is in it
Speaker 1: with me. I want it to get in your head.
Speaker 1: I want it to get in your heart. God is
Speaker 1: in it with me. But I'm not selfish. He's working
Speaker 1: through me. God wants to flow through you. God wants
Speaker 1: to use you, and he's fighting for me. I want
Speaker 1: you to get this in your heart so deep this week.
Speaker 1: Put in in that chorus for make Away that you
Speaker 1: can almost make a song out of it where you
Speaker 1: could just walk around. I don't remember how the chorus
Speaker 1: went at the moment, but I was just hearing it,
Speaker 1: like God is not against me. God is not against me.
Speaker 1: That's the key, right, because if I just say it,
Speaker 1: they'll forget it. But if I sing it, we might
Speaker 1: remember it. God is not a guesst me. God is
Speaker 1: not guesst me. I'm gonna do the whole thing. Put
Speaker 1: it on the screen, y'all. Let's turn this real quick.
Speaker 1: I talked to doctor God on your behalf. He said,
Speaker 1: you've been discouraged and it's becoming a disease. So he
Speaker 1: said that you need to come. I'll be the pharmacist.
Speaker 1: He said, this is the pharmacy. He is the doctor,
Speaker 1: and he wants to change not your medication, but your meditation.
Speaker 1: Once you walking around all week saying stuff like this
Speaker 1: to yourself. God is not against me. Let's say it.
Speaker 1: But he's in it with me, working through me, fighting
Speaker 1: for me. Again. God is not against me, but he's
Speaker 1: in it with me, working through me, fighting for me again.
Speaker 1: God is not against me. I want to see it
Speaker 1: all in the chat. But he's in it with me,
Speaker 1: working through me, fighting for me. You feel that faith
Speaker 1: coming right now. Let's do it a couple more times.
Speaker 1: Let the Canaanite snow, let the Hittite snow, Let the
Speaker 1: Jebusite snow. Let the anxiety I know, let the depression
Speaker 1: I snow, Let the loneliness I know. Let him know.
Speaker 1: God is not against me, but he's in it with me.
Speaker 1: He's working through me, fighting for me. Again, God is
Speaker 1: He's not against me, He's in it with me, working
Speaker 1: through me, fighting for me. One more time. God is
Speaker 1: not against me, but he's in it with me. Do
Speaker 1: what you would do if you believe God was in
Speaker 1: it with you? How would you praise him right now?
Speaker 1: If you believe He was in it with you? How
Speaker 1: would you stand in the fire if you knew he
Speaker 1: was in it, if you knew that not only was
Speaker 1: He in it with you, but He was working through you,
Speaker 1: flowing through you, setting generation free through you. I feel
Speaker 1: God working through me right now to come through that
Speaker 1: camera and tell you God is not against me, but
Speaker 1: he's in it with me. He's working through me, and
Speaker 1: he's fighting for me. Do what you would do if
Speaker 1: you believed it shound like you would shout. If you
Speaker 1: believe it, shout like you wouldn't shout in your film,
Speaker 1: that's you do, not you doing? Come on doing what
Speaker 1: you would do if you know do what you would do,
Speaker 1: you would do it, if you will make all right,
Speaker 1: Let's get this medical Let's get this meditation, medication to
Speaker 1: go down. Say, I guess me, but he's in it
Speaker 1: with me, working through me. It's fighting for me. You
Speaker 1: know it's not against me, but he's in it with me,
Speaker 1: fighting for me. Only got two? How are we doing?
Speaker 1: God is not against me, but he's in it with me,
Speaker 1: working through me, fighting for me. Like that. Here we
Speaker 1: go turn this man's wake up. Let's get some meditation.
Speaker 1: Meta follow me. Let's get this discouragement out. God not
Speaker 1: again me, but he's in it with me. You're working
Speaker 1: through me, fighting on the screen, y'all? What it off there?
Speaker 1: God is not right down with me, working through me,
Speaker 1: fighting for me. Sa sa sa sa. Same. God is
Speaker 1: not again me. Why he's anyway with me, working through me,
Speaker 1: fighting for me? Why know God is not again, but
Speaker 1: he did it with me, working through me. Fight. Oh
Speaker 1: wait all week thinking out all way. God is not
Speaker 1: agay me, but he's doing with me, working through me.
Speaker 1: Fight ball of me God is not again for me,
Speaker 1: But he's in it with me working. Do me fight, Yes,
Speaker 1: he's in it with me working, doom me fighting, ball me.
Speaker 1: I know that he's in it with me working. Do
Speaker 1: me fighting? No knowing me working fight. Yes, he's being
Speaker 1: with me working, Do me fighting? Call me well. If
Speaker 1: you enjoyed today's podcast, there are a couple of things
Speaker 1: I'd love for you to do. Make sure to subscribe, rate,
Speaker 1: and review this podcast. You can also help us reach
Speaker 1: others by investing today at Elevation Church dot org. Slash
Speaker 1: GiB and thanks again for joining us on the Elevation
Speaker 1: Podcast