1
00:00:01,960 --> 00:00:05,760
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Elevation Church podcast. Today, we want to

2
00:00:05,800 --> 00:00:09,319
Speaker 1: share a conversation that Pastor Stephen had with Bishop T. D.

3
00:00:09,560 --> 00:00:13,720
Speaker 1: Jakes about moving past the painful, crushing seasons of life

4
00:00:13,800 --> 00:00:17,560
Speaker 1: and into God's purpose for your future. We hope you

5
00:00:17,640 --> 00:00:23,480
Speaker 1: enjoy this special presentation. Come on, give it up for

6
00:00:23,560 --> 00:00:36,479
Speaker 1: this red jacket color in living color. I love you, bye,

7
00:00:36,920 --> 00:00:39,040
Speaker 1: Excited to hear you talk for the next seven hours.

8
00:00:43,440 --> 00:00:45,440
Speaker 1: It's good to see you. It is good to be

9
00:00:45,520 --> 00:00:53,840
Speaker 1: seen and not viewed. I get it. How many old

10
00:00:53,840 --> 00:00:55,920
Speaker 1: preacher jokes do you have? Like that, like give me

11
00:00:55,960 --> 00:00:59,320
Speaker 1: another one, Oh, don't do that, don't do that. You

12
00:00:59,360 --> 00:01:03,720
Speaker 1: have to listen. They come organically. The first time you

13
00:01:03,800 --> 00:01:06,040
Speaker 1: hung out with me, you scared me, saved so like

14
00:01:06,160 --> 00:01:07,840
Speaker 1: he was nice enough to spend a day with me

15
00:01:07,959 --> 00:01:11,120
Speaker 1: talking about preaching. And in the middle of telling me

16
00:01:11,120 --> 00:01:15,319
Speaker 1: about preaching, he starts preaching about blind Bartimaeus, and he

17
00:01:15,360 --> 00:01:18,679
Speaker 1: starts acting out every character in the story of Blind Bartimaeus,

18
00:01:18,840 --> 00:01:22,039
Speaker 1: and blind Bartimaeus hollers in the story and it's just

19
00:01:22,080 --> 00:01:24,440
Speaker 1: me and him in the room, and he hollers, full

20
00:01:24,480 --> 00:01:27,920
Speaker 1: throat bishop voice across the desk at man, I still

21
00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:32,160
Speaker 1: my don't but I've told people about that. I told

22
00:01:32,200 --> 00:01:35,120
Speaker 1: him you can preach on anything. Well, it's not really that.

23
00:01:35,319 --> 00:01:38,800
Speaker 1: What we were talking about is it's spinning the texts. Yep.

24
00:01:39,240 --> 00:01:41,480
Speaker 1: Because on one hand I'm a preacher and on the

25
00:01:41,520 --> 00:01:43,880
Speaker 1: other hand, I'm a film producer. And one of the

26
00:01:43,920 --> 00:01:46,080
Speaker 1: things you have to decide whenever you do a film,

27
00:01:46,440 --> 00:01:48,600
Speaker 1: you have a story, somebody brings you a story, and

28
00:01:48,600 --> 00:01:50,640
Speaker 1: you decide to write a script for it. You have

29
00:01:50,760 --> 00:01:53,560
Speaker 1: to decide which character is going to be the narrative,

30
00:01:53,800 --> 00:01:56,960
Speaker 1: who's going to be talking. And so if you take

31
00:01:57,000 --> 00:01:59,560
Speaker 1: that principle and you apply it to the Bible, is

32
00:01:59,560 --> 00:02:01,320
Speaker 1: it going to be told through the eyes of blind

33
00:02:01,320 --> 00:02:03,120
Speaker 1: Bartimaeus or is it going to be told through the

34
00:02:03,120 --> 00:02:04,920
Speaker 1: eyes of Jesus or is it going to be told

35
00:02:04,920 --> 00:02:08,960
Speaker 1: through the other of the disciples? Because every POV point

36
00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:12,280
Speaker 1: of view leads you into a different realm of truth.

37
00:02:13,720 --> 00:02:16,560
Speaker 1: You see, it depends on whose perspective. It's like a

38
00:02:16,600 --> 00:02:19,000
Speaker 1: husband and a wife live in the same house, have

39
00:02:19,120 --> 00:02:21,200
Speaker 1: same i address, eat the same food, but they're having

40
00:02:21,200 --> 00:02:25,120
Speaker 1: two different experiences. And so the point of view determines

41
00:02:26,200 --> 00:02:29,239
Speaker 1: the relativity of the truth, the power of the truth,

42
00:02:29,639 --> 00:02:32,639
Speaker 1: the significance of the truth is all brought about by

43
00:02:32,680 --> 00:02:35,519
Speaker 1: who's talking. You take the prodigal son. It's one thing

44
00:02:35,560 --> 00:02:38,320
Speaker 1: to talk about it from the son's perspective. It's another

45
00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:40,639
Speaker 1: thing to talk about it from the older brother's perspective.

46
00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:43,160
Speaker 1: It's yet a third thing to talk about it from

47
00:02:43,160 --> 00:02:47,799
Speaker 1: the father's perspective. Okay. Each perspective opens up a new

48
00:02:47,919 --> 00:02:52,400
Speaker 1: ventricle of truth and feeling and perspective. And when you

49
00:02:52,400 --> 00:02:54,880
Speaker 1: look at it in his totality, then you see the

50
00:02:55,800 --> 00:02:58,359
Speaker 1: substratum of truth itself. All right, we've been going five minutes.

51
00:02:58,400 --> 00:03:01,720
Speaker 1: You've already said ventricle and substrate, so slow it down.

52
00:03:03,240 --> 00:03:06,600
Speaker 1: There's a reason I played my shot from Hamilton when

53
00:03:06,600 --> 00:03:10,280
Speaker 1: you came out, and you know why? You tell him?

54
00:03:10,520 --> 00:03:13,079
Speaker 1: Can I tell him? Yeah? Bishop Jakeson and I got

55
00:03:13,080 --> 00:03:16,000
Speaker 1: to watch Hamilton together a while back. So what I

56
00:03:16,000 --> 00:03:18,760
Speaker 1: thought would be fun, just a game and then we're

57
00:03:18,760 --> 00:03:20,160
Speaker 1: going to talk about the book. It's going to be

58
00:03:20,200 --> 00:03:24,480
Speaker 1: very spiritual. He woreed me to brace myself for something

59
00:03:24,520 --> 00:03:28,400
Speaker 1: he was going to surprise me with. So it's it's better.

60
00:03:28,440 --> 00:03:30,239
Speaker 1: It is better than a dance off. But what I

61
00:03:30,280 --> 00:03:32,280
Speaker 1: would like to do is play a game where I

62
00:03:32,360 --> 00:03:35,560
Speaker 1: give you a song title from Hamilton the musical Oh Wow,

63
00:03:35,600 --> 00:03:38,160
Speaker 1: and you preach us a one minute sermon on that

64
00:03:38,240 --> 00:03:41,960
Speaker 1: song title with a text, and how many of you

65
00:03:42,000 --> 00:03:45,360
Speaker 1: would love to experience this? I thought you would. I

66
00:03:45,360 --> 00:03:50,600
Speaker 1: thought you would. How y'all doing over there? This is

67
00:03:50,600 --> 00:03:53,920
Speaker 1: going to be the best night of your life. It

68
00:03:54,040 --> 00:03:58,200
Speaker 1: starts right now, starts with this. Okay, So the song

69
00:03:58,240 --> 00:04:00,640
Speaker 1: that we came out to, that you came out to,

70
00:04:01,320 --> 00:04:04,960
Speaker 1: my shot, what's the text and what's the sermon? My shot?

71
00:04:08,760 --> 00:04:14,600
Speaker 1: My shot is the young prophet who Elijah commissions to

72
00:04:15,560 --> 00:04:19,919
Speaker 1: shoot the arrow, and depending upon how far he shoots it,

73
00:04:20,000 --> 00:04:23,800
Speaker 1: it determines what he could have had and said, if

74
00:04:23,880 --> 00:04:26,280
Speaker 1: you would have struck the ground more times, you could

75
00:04:26,279 --> 00:04:31,200
Speaker 1: have gone further. The power of the text exists in

76
00:04:31,240 --> 00:04:34,720
Speaker 1: the reality that God does not make the shot for us,

77
00:04:35,760 --> 00:04:38,200
Speaker 1: but he gives us all of the ingredients that are

78
00:04:38,240 --> 00:04:41,719
Speaker 1: necessary to be successful. And so what is my time

79
00:04:41,880 --> 00:04:47,080
Speaker 1: to make my shot? You see, I can't wait on

80
00:04:47,320 --> 00:04:49,560
Speaker 1: God to make the shot. But I have to have

81
00:04:49,960 --> 00:04:52,960
Speaker 1: the will and the tenacity and the vision and the

82
00:04:53,120 --> 00:04:58,400
Speaker 1: drive to pull all the way back far enough to

83
00:04:58,520 --> 00:05:02,400
Speaker 1: take my shot. Such a nator say it's my shot

84
00:05:04,320 --> 00:05:06,440
Speaker 1: if I shouted for you when you had your shot,

85
00:05:06,520 --> 00:05:08,840
Speaker 1: Shot for me when I have my shot, if I

86
00:05:08,920 --> 00:05:19,720
Speaker 1: was glad for you when you had your next one.

87
00:05:22,800 --> 00:05:29,760
Speaker 1: The room where it happens, Oh gosh, Thomas coming into

88
00:05:29,760 --> 00:05:32,320
Speaker 1: the upper room after Christ has risen from the dead,

89
00:05:32,839 --> 00:05:35,560
Speaker 1: and he comes into the room having missed the initial

90
00:05:36,640 --> 00:05:40,240
Speaker 1: inaugural moment that Christ reappears to his disciples. Now he

91
00:05:40,400 --> 00:05:44,560
Speaker 1: comes to the room. The power of being in the

92
00:05:44,640 --> 00:05:48,679
Speaker 1: room will determine the destiny of his ministry and his life.

93
00:05:49,200 --> 00:05:52,599
Speaker 1: He comes to a room that he enters into the door,

94
00:05:53,200 --> 00:05:57,120
Speaker 1: but Christ comes through the door, spirit enough to come

95
00:05:57,160 --> 00:06:00,640
Speaker 1: through the door, and man enough to eat fish inside

96
00:06:00,680 --> 00:06:04,240
Speaker 1: the door. He boggles the mind of the disciples. But

97
00:06:04,360 --> 00:06:08,119
Speaker 1: that was not what convinced Thomas to believe. What caused

98
00:06:08,120 --> 00:06:10,440
Speaker 1: Thomas to believe, because otherwise Thomas would have thought he

99
00:06:10,560 --> 00:06:14,160
Speaker 1: was a ghost. He says, reach hither your hand, and

100
00:06:14,200 --> 00:06:17,600
Speaker 1: feel the nailprints in my hands, and touch my side,

101
00:06:17,640 --> 00:06:20,960
Speaker 1: and be not faithless, but believe. And all of a sudden,

102
00:06:21,320 --> 00:06:25,120
Speaker 1: the doubting Thomas is converted only because he is in

103
00:06:25,240 --> 00:06:35,240
Speaker 1: the room. Now touch your neighbors, say I'm in the room,

104
00:06:35,279 --> 00:06:43,720
Speaker 1: even if I'm in overflow in the room one more more.

105
00:06:43,760 --> 00:06:45,560
Speaker 1: You want to say more about that one? No, I can,

106
00:06:45,920 --> 00:06:48,679
Speaker 1: because I was like, I was on a basic track.

107
00:06:48,720 --> 00:06:51,240
Speaker 1: I was thinking, like, my shot is David ngeliaf but okay,

108
00:06:51,279 --> 00:06:56,880
Speaker 1: yours is better. No, no, Or we could go in

109
00:06:56,920 --> 00:07:00,719
Speaker 1: the room where they are mourning over the the corpse

110
00:07:00,839 --> 00:07:04,240
Speaker 1: of a twelve year old dead girl, and all of

111
00:07:04,240 --> 00:07:07,159
Speaker 1: a sudden, Jesus puts him all out of the room

112
00:07:07,839 --> 00:07:11,040
Speaker 1: until nobody's in the room but her and Jesus, and

113
00:07:11,120 --> 00:07:14,960
Speaker 1: there alone he raises her up from the dead because

114
00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:17,680
Speaker 1: he is gone into the room with her, you know.

115
00:07:18,400 --> 00:07:20,480
Speaker 1: And can you imagine what it would be like to

116
00:07:20,520 --> 00:07:23,960
Speaker 1: be outside the door and certainly hear the sound of

117
00:07:24,040 --> 00:07:27,440
Speaker 1: ruffling feet and thinking to yourself, who is that movie?

118
00:07:27,480 --> 00:07:30,400
Speaker 1: I hear the scampering of little feet, and I know

119
00:07:30,560 --> 00:07:32,960
Speaker 1: it could not be this girl, because I know she's dead.

120
00:07:33,000 --> 00:07:35,480
Speaker 1: I touched her and she was cold. I touched her

121
00:07:35,560 --> 00:07:38,200
Speaker 1: and she was stiff. I touched her and I knew

122
00:07:38,240 --> 00:07:40,560
Speaker 1: for sure that she was absolutely dead. But I hear

123
00:07:40,640 --> 00:07:43,679
Speaker 1: the sound of the scampering of a twelve year old's

124
00:07:43,720 --> 00:07:46,880
Speaker 1: feet because she was in the room with the right person.

125
00:07:47,320 --> 00:07:55,320
Speaker 1: She got back up again. So my conclusion is if

126
00:07:55,360 --> 00:07:59,320
Speaker 1: everybody forsakes me, and everybody leaves my room, as long

127
00:07:59,360 --> 00:08:02,360
Speaker 1: as Jesus Us is in the room, I can still

128
00:08:02,440 --> 00:08:08,400
Speaker 1: get back up a jip. So to all of you,

129
00:08:09,600 --> 00:08:12,000
Speaker 1: to all of you out there who are weeping over

130
00:08:12,080 --> 00:08:15,520
Speaker 1: who walked out the room, who left you, who forsook you,

131
00:08:15,840 --> 00:08:18,640
Speaker 1: who did not stand up with you, As long as

132
00:08:18,680 --> 00:08:22,120
Speaker 1: you've got Jesus in the room, you can still get

133
00:08:22,200 --> 00:08:33,400
Speaker 1: backed up again. Go to be in the room. Ah,

134
00:08:35,559 --> 00:08:45,680
Speaker 1: don't think of nothing else. I'm running out, Yes, dude,

135
00:08:47,679 --> 00:08:51,720
Speaker 1: Who lives, who dies? Who tells your story? Who lives?

136
00:08:53,320 --> 00:08:58,400
Speaker 1: Who dies? Who tells your story? Early in the morning,

137
00:08:58,440 --> 00:09:01,760
Speaker 1: the breaking of day, the women wrapped themselves up to

138
00:09:01,800 --> 00:09:08,319
Speaker 1: go down to the tomb. Loyal to Jesus, who has

139
00:09:08,360 --> 00:09:15,840
Speaker 1: become extremely controversial, has been executed, not crucified, executed on

140
00:09:15,920 --> 00:09:19,400
Speaker 1: the cross, and yet they are still going down even

141
00:09:19,440 --> 00:09:21,920
Speaker 1: though he did not do what they thought he was

142
00:09:22,000 --> 00:09:24,480
Speaker 1: going to do. These women rise up early and go

143
00:09:24,559 --> 00:09:29,200
Speaker 1: down to the tomb. Only when they arrived at the tomb,

144
00:09:29,840 --> 00:09:32,280
Speaker 1: with the dew on the ground and the mist in

145
00:09:32,320 --> 00:09:36,400
Speaker 1: the air, and the fragrance of death still lurking in

146
00:09:36,440 --> 00:09:42,360
Speaker 1: the inner chamber, the stone has been rolled away, and

147
00:09:42,440 --> 00:09:44,760
Speaker 1: sitting on top of the stone. On each side is

148
00:09:44,800 --> 00:09:48,480
Speaker 1: an angel saying he is not here. He has risen

149
00:09:48,600 --> 00:09:54,720
Speaker 1: from the dead. And the question then becomes, since he

150
00:09:54,840 --> 00:10:01,439
Speaker 1: is not here, who tells the story? This woman comes

151
00:10:01,520 --> 00:10:05,440
Speaker 1: running back. It is totally inappropriate in a misogenic age

152
00:10:05,600 --> 00:10:08,319
Speaker 1: that a woman would be the first one to carry

153
00:10:08,320 --> 00:10:12,880
Speaker 1: the message. But there are some times and some seasons

154
00:10:12,920 --> 00:10:15,360
Speaker 1: that you have to break the protocol of the day.

155
00:10:16,280 --> 00:10:20,400
Speaker 1: Because Jesus was looking for somebody who was bold enough

156
00:10:20,440 --> 00:10:23,480
Speaker 1: to walk into a room full of men and tell them.

157
00:10:23,559 --> 00:10:27,280
Speaker 1: I know for myself he is rhythm from the dead,

158
00:10:27,840 --> 00:10:40,960
Speaker 1: why alive to tell his story? Good night everybody. I

159
00:10:41,000 --> 00:10:43,559
Speaker 1: thought that would be amazing. It was one hundred times

160
00:10:43,600 --> 00:10:48,160
Speaker 1: better than I said. You always amazing. It was scary

161
00:10:48,280 --> 00:10:51,200
Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, so I want to ask you that

162
00:10:51,280 --> 00:10:52,880
Speaker 1: I want to get into the I want to get

163
00:10:52,880 --> 00:10:57,320
Speaker 1: into the content of the book. Crushing God turns pressure

164
00:10:57,320 --> 00:11:00,800
Speaker 1: into power. And I was thinking, how last time you

165
00:11:00,800 --> 00:11:05,560
Speaker 1: were here, you're a sore ar like eagles on the

166
00:11:05,559 --> 00:11:09,280
Speaker 1: cover and yeah, and now we're crushing. Yeah, so what happened?

167
00:11:12,720 --> 00:11:17,920
Speaker 1: One one is not diabolically opposed to the other. For

168
00:11:17,960 --> 00:11:21,760
Speaker 1: the eagle sore is about flying, But for the eglet,

169
00:11:22,040 --> 00:11:27,280
Speaker 1: sore is about falling. If the eagle stirs her nests

170
00:11:27,360 --> 00:11:29,480
Speaker 1: and the eaglets are pushed out of the comfort of

171
00:11:29,559 --> 00:11:33,319
Speaker 1: their nests, is that not crushing? If their food supply

172
00:11:33,600 --> 00:11:37,079
Speaker 1: is now cut off and they are pushed out by

173
00:11:37,120 --> 00:11:41,480
Speaker 1: their own mother to fall off the side of a cliff,

174
00:11:42,440 --> 00:11:46,240
Speaker 1: is that not crushing? Why would mama do that to me?

175
00:11:47,280 --> 00:11:50,720
Speaker 1: Why would mama not feed me? And in the process

176
00:11:50,880 --> 00:11:56,720
Speaker 1: of the eglet falling flapping its wings in hysteria, it

177
00:11:56,880 --> 00:12:01,200
Speaker 1: is the thing that crushed the eglet that causes it

178
00:12:01,240 --> 00:12:10,320
Speaker 1: to sow. And what the substratum up you told me

179
00:12:10,320 --> 00:12:20,800
Speaker 1: not to esus, what epitomizes. The whole value of crushing

180
00:12:21,720 --> 00:12:26,160
Speaker 1: is to explain to people not to be confused when

181
00:12:26,200 --> 00:12:31,720
Speaker 1: the crushing proceeds a soaring, because a lot of times,

182
00:12:31,840 --> 00:12:34,040
Speaker 1: if we only tell you about sowing and we don't

183
00:12:34,080 --> 00:12:37,920
Speaker 1: tell you about crushing, when something crushing happens in your life,

184
00:12:38,040 --> 00:12:42,040
Speaker 1: it looks like what we preach is not true. Right,

185
00:12:42,600 --> 00:12:47,600
Speaker 1: Whereas crushing is the process and soaring is the promise.

186
00:12:49,559 --> 00:12:53,960
Speaker 1: You cannot have promise without process. And we live in

187
00:12:54,000 --> 00:12:59,040
Speaker 1: a time where people preach more about the promises and

188
00:12:59,160 --> 00:13:03,000
Speaker 1: less about the prom So what happens is when you

189
00:13:03,040 --> 00:13:04,920
Speaker 1: come to church and you hear about the promise, and

190
00:13:04,960 --> 00:13:07,480
Speaker 1: you go home and you find yourself in the process

191
00:13:07,840 --> 00:13:12,280
Speaker 1: your life is a contradiction to your faith. But you

192
00:13:12,360 --> 00:13:16,520
Speaker 1: are so loyal to Jesus that you would never admit

193
00:13:17,400 --> 00:13:20,079
Speaker 1: that you are not seeing the manifestation of what your

194
00:13:20,120 --> 00:13:23,760
Speaker 1: pastor is talking about in your life. And it looks

195
00:13:23,880 --> 00:13:26,719
Speaker 1: like that you must be doing something wrong, because they

196
00:13:26,720 --> 00:13:29,920
Speaker 1: are talking about the blessings and the healing and the

197
00:13:29,960 --> 00:13:33,319
Speaker 1: soaring and the power of God and the strength of God,

198
00:13:33,360 --> 00:13:36,400
Speaker 1: and how all things are yours and all promises are

199
00:13:36,480 --> 00:13:39,240
Speaker 1: yea and amen, and you're the head and not the tale,

200
00:13:39,240 --> 00:13:41,880
Speaker 1: and above and not beneath. And then all of a sudden,

201
00:13:41,880 --> 00:13:43,760
Speaker 1: in the midst of them saying all of those things,

202
00:13:43,800 --> 00:13:48,240
Speaker 1: you are going home and dealing with marital issues, children

203
00:13:48,280 --> 00:13:51,760
Speaker 1: who won't obey or comply, a sister who doesn't like you,

204
00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:55,360
Speaker 1: a father who always preferred the other sister or daughter,

205
00:13:55,600 --> 00:13:59,359
Speaker 1: and you're saying, how is my life in such shambles?

206
00:14:00,520 --> 00:14:04,280
Speaker 1: Never realizing that those that God is going to anoint

207
00:14:04,320 --> 00:14:14,559
Speaker 1: the most, he always crushes the most severe. When we

208
00:14:14,559 --> 00:14:17,080
Speaker 1: were talking about the arrows. A moment ago and we

209
00:14:17,080 --> 00:14:19,240
Speaker 1: were talking about striking the ground, and we were talking

210
00:14:19,280 --> 00:14:24,080
Speaker 1: about the bow an arrow. You must realize the further

211
00:14:24,200 --> 00:14:27,720
Speaker 1: the arrow is going to be shocked, the more it

212
00:14:27,800 --> 00:14:32,800
Speaker 1: must be pulled back. And I wrote crushing in part

213
00:14:32,840 --> 00:14:37,560
Speaker 1: because I have never met anybody who did exceptional things

214
00:14:37,600 --> 00:14:40,960
Speaker 1: in their life who had not at some point endured

215
00:14:41,200 --> 00:14:45,080
Speaker 1: exceptional crushing. It is the force to which you have

216
00:14:45,160 --> 00:14:49,000
Speaker 1: been pulled back that determines the height that you will fly,

217
00:14:51,320 --> 00:14:55,120
Speaker 1: you see ye, And I wonder about that because I've

218
00:14:55,160 --> 00:14:58,520
Speaker 1: seen you at the height of success, and yet you've

219
00:14:58,560 --> 00:15:01,720
Speaker 1: shared with me your own crushing, and some of that

220
00:15:01,920 --> 00:15:06,040
Speaker 1: was external, some of it was internal. Some of the

221
00:15:06,040 --> 00:15:10,040
Speaker 1: things that you've shared with me privately gave me hope

222
00:15:10,040 --> 00:15:13,120
Speaker 1: to know that God is using a lot of the

223
00:15:13,160 --> 00:15:16,560
Speaker 1: things that I think this qualify me and that will

224
00:15:16,560 --> 00:15:20,760
Speaker 1: be the actual place of power. But what I wanted

225
00:15:20,760 --> 00:15:23,920
Speaker 1: to ask you on a deeper level is do you

226
00:15:24,000 --> 00:15:27,080
Speaker 1: think that there is a certain process by which we

227
00:15:27,240 --> 00:15:31,880
Speaker 1: accept that crushing that either turns it into something powerful

228
00:15:32,000 --> 00:15:37,600
Speaker 1: or something destructive in our life. Is the pressure of

229
00:15:37,360 --> 00:15:42,320
Speaker 1: the things that we go through in itself a growth mechanism,

230
00:15:42,600 --> 00:15:44,960
Speaker 1: or is there a response that's required from us to

231
00:15:45,600 --> 00:15:48,480
Speaker 1: make it turn into something. You know, that's a great question,

232
00:15:48,640 --> 00:15:51,440
Speaker 1: and you know, a couple of things come to my mind.

233
00:15:51,480 --> 00:15:54,360
Speaker 1: When I married my wife, I was pastoring. I've been

234
00:15:54,400 --> 00:15:57,080
Speaker 1: pastoring for two years. I pastored a very small church

235
00:15:58,160 --> 00:16:01,600
Speaker 1: in a rural area of West Virginia called Montgomery, West Virginia.

236
00:16:01,640 --> 00:16:04,640
Speaker 1: Though I lived in Charleston. I was pastoring and working

237
00:16:04,680 --> 00:16:08,560
Speaker 1: a full time job. I had a brand new car.

238
00:16:08,880 --> 00:16:11,640
Speaker 1: I had my own place. I mean, I wasn't wealthy

239
00:16:11,720 --> 00:16:13,560
Speaker 1: or anything like that, but I had the car, in

240
00:16:13,640 --> 00:16:15,960
Speaker 1: a good job, and I had my own place, and

241
00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:19,440
Speaker 1: I was good enough to say I do. And not

242
00:16:19,680 --> 00:16:23,920
Speaker 1: long after I said I do, the whole country shifted

243
00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:27,440
Speaker 1: and the Union car bade shut down the part that

244
00:16:27,520 --> 00:16:31,200
Speaker 1: I worked for, and many other industries began to leave

245
00:16:31,680 --> 00:16:35,840
Speaker 1: the Roustvelt States, and I was unemployed and ran out

246
00:16:35,880 --> 00:16:42,920
Speaker 1: of unemployment, and eventually they repossessed my car, and eventually

247
00:16:42,960 --> 00:16:47,440
Speaker 1: I could not feed my children. And eventually it got

248
00:16:47,440 --> 00:16:50,560
Speaker 1: so low that the deacon sloan me a car. But

249
00:16:50,640 --> 00:16:52,640
Speaker 1: the car was so raggedy that they hid it in

250
00:16:52,680 --> 00:16:56,120
Speaker 1: the back of the church. No, I'm serious. It was

251
00:16:56,120 --> 00:16:59,520
Speaker 1: a nineteen sixty seven volume with the floorboard rusted out

252
00:16:59,520 --> 00:17:01,400
Speaker 1: of the bottom of it, and I had to put

253
00:17:01,480 --> 00:17:03,840
Speaker 1: carpet over the bottom of the floor so my kids

254
00:17:03,920 --> 00:17:07,000
Speaker 1: feet didn't go through. And they didn't want anybody to

255
00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:10,679
Speaker 1: know that the pastor had that kind of car, so

256
00:17:10,800 --> 00:17:13,320
Speaker 1: when we had guests, they would hide my car in

257
00:17:13,400 --> 00:17:16,840
Speaker 1: the back because that was the stage of life I

258
00:17:16,920 --> 00:17:19,760
Speaker 1: was in. It got so bad that the car broke

259
00:17:19,840 --> 00:17:21,400
Speaker 1: down on the side of the road and I had

260
00:17:21,400 --> 00:17:25,679
Speaker 1: to thumb to get to church and climb across the

261
00:17:25,760 --> 00:17:28,560
Speaker 1: coal cars on the railroad tracks to go into the

262
00:17:28,680 --> 00:17:35,640
Speaker 1: church to preach faith. I never stopped preaching. I never

263
00:17:35,760 --> 00:17:38,919
Speaker 1: let up on preaching the power of God and the

264
00:17:38,960 --> 00:17:46,200
Speaker 1: strength of God, even though it became so bad that

265
00:17:46,320 --> 00:17:49,160
Speaker 1: we want at one point had to go gather apples

266
00:17:49,200 --> 00:17:52,960
Speaker 1: to feed the kids because we had nothing at all

267
00:17:53,160 --> 00:17:58,560
Speaker 1: to eat. God knew that later in my life he

268
00:17:58,760 --> 00:18:03,960
Speaker 1: was going to bless me extraordinarily and some people would

269
00:18:04,040 --> 00:18:09,800
Speaker 1: later question, are you serving God for stuff? So he

270
00:18:09,920 --> 00:18:14,080
Speaker 1: allowed me to be crushed early so that no matter

271
00:18:14,119 --> 00:18:20,480
Speaker 1: what they said, I would know, you understand what I'm saying,

272
00:18:21,640 --> 00:18:25,840
Speaker 1: Because they were going to come in at the end

273
00:18:25,960 --> 00:18:30,040
Speaker 1: of the movie and make assumptions. But I lived through

274
00:18:30,080 --> 00:18:33,479
Speaker 1: the first of the movie to validate the fact that

275
00:18:33,600 --> 00:18:36,119
Speaker 1: it was not for the things he gave me that

276
00:18:36,200 --> 00:18:39,040
Speaker 1: I do what I do. It was because of the

277
00:18:39,119 --> 00:18:42,640
Speaker 1: love and the passion and the annoying thing. And so yes,

278
00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:47,440
Speaker 1: it makes you, and sometimes it also creates a narrative

279
00:18:47,560 --> 00:18:51,240
Speaker 1: for you that completes your ability to reach both high

280
00:18:51,440 --> 00:18:55,040
Speaker 1: and low. I can reach the guy in the homely shelter,

281
00:18:55,640 --> 00:18:57,600
Speaker 1: and I can reach the guy in the penthouse sweep

282
00:18:58,480 --> 00:19:02,359
Speaker 1: because I have learned how to at a bound. I

283
00:19:02,920 --> 00:19:06,520
Speaker 1: suffered lax and I've had peny, and I have learned

284
00:19:06,560 --> 00:19:12,320
Speaker 1: whatever state I'm in, therewith to be contented. Some things

285
00:19:12,440 --> 00:19:14,960
Speaker 1: God takes you through or not for you, but it's

286
00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:24,280
Speaker 1: so you can reach somebody else. Sometimes sometimes he crushes

287
00:19:24,359 --> 00:19:27,000
Speaker 1: you because he's going to bless you so much. He

288
00:19:27,080 --> 00:19:30,680
Speaker 1: does not want you to get arrogant like your predecessors,

289
00:19:31,200 --> 00:19:34,480
Speaker 1: and so he humbles you. Anytime he's going to exalt you,

290
00:19:34,600 --> 00:19:37,639
Speaker 1: he humbles you. You take the two fish in the

291
00:19:37,640 --> 00:19:39,440
Speaker 1: five blows of Bread when they brought it to Jesus.

292
00:19:39,520 --> 00:19:41,800
Speaker 1: They brought it to Jesus to multiply it. And the

293
00:19:41,840 --> 00:19:45,040
Speaker 1: first thing he did was crushing. He took it, and

294
00:19:45,080 --> 00:19:47,159
Speaker 1: he blessed it, and he broke it. As he broke it,

295
00:19:47,240 --> 00:19:49,600
Speaker 1: he started crushing the fish and the bread, And the

296
00:19:49,600 --> 00:19:52,320
Speaker 1: more he crushed it, the more it multiplied. The more

297
00:19:52,359 --> 00:19:54,639
Speaker 1: he crushed it, the more it multiplied, the more he

298
00:19:54,680 --> 00:19:57,639
Speaker 1: crushed it, the more it multiplied. And all of a

299
00:19:57,640 --> 00:20:01,120
Speaker 1: sudden you find yourself in a state of complication, and

300
00:20:01,160 --> 00:20:04,480
Speaker 1: somebody comes in and says, look at all of that fish.

301
00:20:04,560 --> 00:20:07,119
Speaker 1: But you know that when you first came into his

302
00:20:07,240 --> 00:20:11,639
Speaker 1: hands you were not enough. It was his crushing that

303
00:20:11,800 --> 00:20:17,640
Speaker 1: made you more than enough. So sometimes it's intrinsic, and

304
00:20:17,720 --> 00:20:20,680
Speaker 1: sometimes it is so that you are relevant for other people.

305
00:20:20,760 --> 00:20:22,880
Speaker 1: I want to give you one more quick example. Look

306
00:20:22,920 --> 00:20:26,440
Speaker 1: at Air. You can give me one more not quick example. Okay,

307
00:20:27,720 --> 00:20:31,360
Speaker 1: look at Moses goes up on the mountaintop to get

308
00:20:31,400 --> 00:20:34,800
Speaker 1: the tin commandments from God. Simultaneously, he also has the

309
00:20:34,880 --> 00:20:38,760
Speaker 1: experience of getting the plans for the tabernacle, and there

310
00:20:38,840 --> 00:20:43,719
Speaker 1: he is. God designs the garments. Now, you know, sometimes

311
00:20:43,760 --> 00:20:46,280
Speaker 1: we'll have a name brand somewhe but to be designed

312
00:20:46,280 --> 00:20:50,560
Speaker 1: by God. Erin's robes were designed by the almighty God.

313
00:20:52,040 --> 00:20:56,000
Speaker 1: And God says, of all the people that have escaped

314
00:20:56,080 --> 00:21:00,399
Speaker 1: the trauma of Egypt. There is one guy that I

315
00:21:00,440 --> 00:21:03,760
Speaker 1: will allow to come into the holies of holies and

316
00:21:03,880 --> 00:21:08,359
Speaker 1: not die, and that guy is going to be able

317
00:21:08,400 --> 00:21:12,359
Speaker 1: to access My presence and represent the children of Israel.

318
00:21:13,000 --> 00:21:15,800
Speaker 1: The guy he is talking about has been left in

319
00:21:15,920 --> 00:21:18,760
Speaker 1: charge at the bottom of the mountain, and so while

320
00:21:18,800 --> 00:21:21,240
Speaker 1: God is designing what will be blue and what will

321
00:21:21,280 --> 00:21:24,840
Speaker 1: be purple, and what will be crimson, this guy has

322
00:21:24,880 --> 00:21:29,679
Speaker 1: got the whole camp strip neked, dancing, neked around a

323
00:21:29,720 --> 00:21:34,760
Speaker 1: golden calf in the process. When Moses comes down off

324
00:21:34,800 --> 00:21:39,000
Speaker 1: the mountain, he is so shocked he drops the Ten

325
00:21:39,119 --> 00:21:45,160
Speaker 1: Commandments because the one that God has promoted has fallen

326
00:21:45,359 --> 00:21:48,600
Speaker 1: into an abyss so low that it seems like there's

327
00:21:48,640 --> 00:21:52,040
Speaker 1: a disconnect between what happened up here and what happened

328
00:21:52,080 --> 00:21:55,200
Speaker 1: down there. But it is really the wisdom of God.

329
00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:58,880
Speaker 1: Because had God allowed anybody else to be the high

330
00:21:58,920 --> 00:22:02,560
Speaker 1: priest when people got ready to come and share their sins,

331
00:22:02,640 --> 00:22:07,880
Speaker 1: he might be arrogant. But because God had so crushed him,

332
00:22:08,400 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 1: he was humble enough that no matter what your sin was,

333
00:22:12,280 --> 00:22:16,119
Speaker 1: he would remember his own, and that humility would make

334
00:22:16,200 --> 00:22:19,399
Speaker 1: him able to be able to connect with you and

335
00:22:19,520 --> 00:22:23,320
Speaker 1: bekin both to the problem and kin to the answer.

336
00:22:24,040 --> 00:22:27,600
Speaker 1: This is a shadow of Christ who became sin for

337
00:22:27,760 --> 00:22:31,960
Speaker 1: us that we might be the righteousness of God. He

338
00:22:32,080 --> 00:22:35,000
Speaker 1: is in all points without sin, but tempted like as

339
00:22:35,080 --> 00:22:37,520
Speaker 1: we are, so that we can come to him, and

340
00:22:37,600 --> 00:22:40,280
Speaker 1: he can be touched by the feeling of our infirmity.

341
00:22:40,720 --> 00:22:45,040
Speaker 1: He became it so he could deliver us from it. Erin,

342
00:22:45,119 --> 00:22:55,119
Speaker 1: it's the shadow CHRISTI is the reality. I always figure

343
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:57,280
Speaker 1: that's what makes you stop and take time and care

344
00:22:57,320 --> 00:23:01,200
Speaker 1: about people. Is the years that you were preaching barbecue

345
00:23:01,200 --> 00:23:03,280
Speaker 1: sauce on your tie because you were making the chicken

346
00:23:03,320 --> 00:23:06,200
Speaker 1: for the fundraiser in the back of the church before

347
00:23:06,240 --> 00:23:08,320
Speaker 1: you preach. See, they don't know what you're talking about.

348
00:23:08,440 --> 00:23:10,800
Speaker 1: Let me tell you what I did. I think I

349
00:23:10,840 --> 00:23:12,880
Speaker 1: explained it pretty well. No no no, no, no no, no, you didn't.

350
00:23:13,080 --> 00:23:16,680
Speaker 1: You didn't do good at all. Just sit back. Let'

351
00:23:16,720 --> 00:23:21,440
Speaker 1: don't make sure you I do. My spiritual father's coming,

352
00:23:21,440 --> 00:23:23,399
Speaker 1: and he's coming with five bus loads of people to

353
00:23:24,119 --> 00:23:27,680
Speaker 1: celebrate my second or third or fourth anniversary. And I've

354
00:23:27,720 --> 00:23:31,960
Speaker 1: got maybe thirty members at best, counting pregnant people in debtfos,

355
00:23:32,720 --> 00:23:36,000
Speaker 1: and so we have to have all of this food

356
00:23:36,040 --> 00:23:39,240
Speaker 1: for all these bus loads of people he brought. So

357
00:23:39,600 --> 00:23:42,040
Speaker 1: my wife and I had to cook it. But we

358
00:23:42,080 --> 00:23:45,000
Speaker 1: didn't want to look like we cooked it. We wanted

359
00:23:45,040 --> 00:23:47,239
Speaker 1: to look like we had enough members to cook it.

360
00:23:48,000 --> 00:23:50,639
Speaker 1: So I had my bowtie one because it's my anniversary,

361
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:53,040
Speaker 1: and I had my pseuito on, and they said, you know, now,

362
00:23:53,119 --> 00:23:56,000
Speaker 1: let's receive the pastor and his wife. And I marched

363
00:23:56,040 --> 00:23:58,760
Speaker 1: down the aisle, you know, like I had all of

364
00:23:58,800 --> 00:24:02,040
Speaker 1: these members, which most of them were really his, and

365
00:24:02,200 --> 00:24:05,320
Speaker 1: he leaned over and whispitt of me and said, you

366
00:24:05,440 --> 00:24:11,920
Speaker 1: left a little barbecue sauce on your fingernails. I love that,

367
00:24:12,520 --> 00:24:14,800
Speaker 1: you know what. I love it too, because you know what,

368
00:24:15,560 --> 00:24:20,560
Speaker 1: I have always been tenacious. I have always been relentless.

369
00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:28,200
Speaker 1: I never allowed my circumstances to destroy my intensity and

370
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:30,639
Speaker 1: my drive and my feeling that God was going to

371
00:24:30,680 --> 00:24:36,120
Speaker 1: do something in my life. Yeah. So, having come from

372
00:24:36,160 --> 00:24:38,880
Speaker 1: a season of obscurity, and this is not six months

373
00:24:38,920 --> 00:24:43,199
Speaker 1: of obscurity, this is how many years, oh years, I

374
00:24:43,240 --> 00:24:47,280
Speaker 1: mean years I was in a churchhip. I preached twice

375
00:24:47,440 --> 00:24:50,320
Speaker 1: in seven years. My job was to clean out the

376
00:24:50,359 --> 00:24:54,880
Speaker 1: baptism pool and to shampoo the rugs three times a year,

377
00:24:54,920 --> 00:24:58,160
Speaker 1: and on a Saturday, I would do that. I drove

378
00:24:58,240 --> 00:25:02,920
Speaker 1: my pastor around, I cleaned up the church, I worked

379
00:25:02,920 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: in the ministry, and I hardly ever missed a service,

380
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:10,440
Speaker 1: though I was hardly ever called on to speak. Obscurity

381
00:25:10,520 --> 00:25:18,720
Speaker 1: though pastor is a great gift. It's a great gift.

382
00:25:18,880 --> 00:25:25,119
Speaker 1: There's a reason that God develops an embryo in obscurity.

383
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:28,160
Speaker 1: There's a reason that Moses was hidden in the tent

384
00:25:28,359 --> 00:25:32,800
Speaker 1: three months. There's a reason that christ dwelt in obscurity

385
00:25:32,920 --> 00:25:37,840
Speaker 1: till he was thirty. Obscurity gives you a chance to

386
00:25:37,880 --> 00:25:45,280
Speaker 1: have development, to fight your own devils, to overcome your obstacles,

387
00:25:45,880 --> 00:25:49,320
Speaker 1: to get your priorities in alignment. The problem we have

388
00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:52,640
Speaker 1: today is that people want a success for which they

389
00:25:52,680 --> 00:26:00,639
Speaker 1: have not been groomed for. Success that you have not

390
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:05,600
Speaker 1: been roomed for is like having birthing a baby prematurely.

391
00:26:06,520 --> 00:26:10,560
Speaker 1: The chances of survival go down the earlier the baby

392
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:14,679
Speaker 1: is exposed. And to be exposed too soon it's not

393
00:26:14,720 --> 00:26:20,119
Speaker 1: a blessing, it's curse. You don't want anything before it's time,

394
00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:24,720
Speaker 1: nothing before it's time. There's a time and a season

395
00:26:24,960 --> 00:26:29,359
Speaker 1: for every purpose under heaven, and so you don't want

396
00:26:29,400 --> 00:26:32,160
Speaker 1: to get married too soon. You don't want to buy

397
00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:36,400
Speaker 1: a house too soon, You don't want to be exposed

398
00:26:36,440 --> 00:26:40,280
Speaker 1: to crowds too soon. And so, because he loves you,

399
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:45,360
Speaker 1: it's not punishment, it's preparation. Because he loves you, he

400
00:26:45,440 --> 00:26:51,040
Speaker 1: hides you in obscurity. Anything that's valuable you protect. When

401
00:26:51,080 --> 00:26:53,679
Speaker 1: I say in a hotel, there's just safe for you

402
00:26:53,720 --> 00:26:58,959
Speaker 1: to put your valuables in obscurity, not because they're invaluable.

403
00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:01,480
Speaker 1: And there's somebody listening in us right now who feels

404
00:27:01,480 --> 00:27:03,800
Speaker 1: like they've been overlooked because they're not good enough. That's

405
00:27:03,840 --> 00:27:07,600
Speaker 1: not right. You have been hidden because you are valuable.

406
00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:13,280
Speaker 1: When the time is right, When the time is right,

407
00:27:13,920 --> 00:27:16,960
Speaker 1: when you are strong enough to withstand the elements to

408
00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:20,560
Speaker 1: which you will be exposed to, you will be revealed.

409
00:27:21,359 --> 00:27:23,600
Speaker 1: You understand. Yeah, And I wanted to ask you about

410
00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:27,720
Speaker 1: the contrast, because the pressure of success is the type

411
00:27:27,720 --> 00:27:31,760
Speaker 1: of crushing as well. Oh. Absolutely. And usually it's looked

412
00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:34,920
Speaker 1: at in a linear way. You know, if you'll tend sheep,

413
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,720
Speaker 1: then you'll kill Goliath, and then what and then you'll

414
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:40,520
Speaker 1: have greater responsibility, and then you'll have more battles and

415
00:27:40,560 --> 00:27:43,560
Speaker 1: bigger battles. So I want to ask you this personal

416
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:45,320
Speaker 1: hold on, hold on. I want to drive that home.

417
00:27:46,480 --> 00:27:52,359
Speaker 1: The reward you get for overcoming your last challenge is

418
00:27:52,400 --> 00:27:59,840
Speaker 1: your next challenge. That's basically what I was saying. Now,

419
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:02,520
Speaker 1: let me ask you this. I really want to ask

420
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:07,400
Speaker 1: you this. In your life, what has been a greater pressure,

421
00:28:07,960 --> 00:28:11,520
Speaker 1: the frustration of obscurity or the pressure of success. I

422
00:28:11,520 --> 00:28:14,600
Speaker 1: didn't have the frustration of obscurity because I never got

423
00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:20,040
Speaker 1: into this to be exposed. I never wanted to be famous.

424
00:28:20,160 --> 00:28:25,680
Speaker 1: I wanted to be effective. See, I think our motives

425
00:28:25,720 --> 00:28:29,119
Speaker 1: have to be right. So when I talk about some

426
00:28:29,200 --> 00:28:30,840
Speaker 1: of the worst parts of my life, they say I'm

427
00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: real bad and everything. But at the time it didn't

428
00:28:34,080 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 1: feel bad because I had nothing to compare it to,

429
00:28:37,760 --> 00:28:42,960
Speaker 1: and my job was to glorify God in the situation

430
00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:46,560
Speaker 1: I was in and to continue to lead the flock

431
00:28:46,640 --> 00:28:50,000
Speaker 1: I was in. You cannot be so driven by ambition

432
00:28:51,120 --> 00:28:56,600
Speaker 1: that you see obscurity as punishment. So I think for me,

433
00:28:56,800 --> 00:29:02,680
Speaker 1: the hardest part was managing what we call sess because

434
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:10,560
Speaker 1: that creates expectations, and the expectations are as different as

435
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:14,040
Speaker 1: there are people. When you have thirty people, you only

436
00:29:14,040 --> 00:29:18,640
Speaker 1: have thirty people's expectations to manage. The more you are

437
00:29:18,680 --> 00:29:22,160
Speaker 1: known around the church, your church grows, and then the state,

438
00:29:22,280 --> 00:29:24,760
Speaker 1: and then the country and then the world. There are

439
00:29:24,840 --> 00:29:29,720
Speaker 1: eight almost eight billion people on the planet. Somebody's not

440
00:29:29,880 --> 00:29:36,800
Speaker 1: gonna like you, and before they wouldn't know you. Right,

441
00:29:36,920 --> 00:29:40,680
Speaker 1: Like somebody is on YouTube right now commenting on our

442
00:29:40,840 --> 00:29:45,560
Speaker 1: clothes right our oh everything everything everything. He shouldn't have

443
00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:47,800
Speaker 1: that on. You know. I was at my son in

444
00:29:47,840 --> 00:29:50,160
Speaker 1: laws church. I had on some jeans. You know, they

445
00:29:50,200 --> 00:29:53,040
Speaker 1: were the ragged kind of rip jeans, because that's because

446
00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:54,760
Speaker 1: that's how they dress out. They're and I was trying

447
00:29:54,760 --> 00:29:58,760
Speaker 1: to be cool, like coming here, I stress out coming here,

448
00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 1: you know, rest for you, Thank you. I put great

449
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:11,440
Speaker 1: thought into this outfit. I am geared for suits and ties.

450
00:30:11,520 --> 00:30:14,000
Speaker 1: I have all kinds of suits and ties. And then

451
00:30:14,040 --> 00:30:15,600
Speaker 1: I come to you and I panic and I think,

452
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:20,640
Speaker 1: oh god, I have to be casual. What am I

453
00:30:20,720 --> 00:30:22,680
Speaker 1: going to wear? And I started to like a girl

454
00:30:22,680 --> 00:30:24,320
Speaker 1: and send and pictures to people. Do you think I

455
00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:32,080
Speaker 1: said wear this is what? And the other thing about

456
00:30:32,120 --> 00:30:35,640
Speaker 1: being big is this I'm preach in so many different worlds.

457
00:30:36,280 --> 00:30:39,160
Speaker 1: I'm preaching worlds where they would church you for wearing this,

458
00:30:40,240 --> 00:30:42,040
Speaker 1: and then I'll go and preach in a place where

459
00:30:42,080 --> 00:30:43,800
Speaker 1: if I wore a suit and a collar, you would

460
00:30:43,800 --> 00:30:47,680
Speaker 1: think it was strange. Being global causes you to be

461
00:30:47,920 --> 00:30:51,760
Speaker 1: relevant in so many rooms where the rules are different,

462
00:30:52,480 --> 00:30:55,560
Speaker 1: and you have to be flexible enough to be able

463
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:59,120
Speaker 1: to function in various types of situations and still be

464
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 1: true to who you are are you see Yah, The

465
00:31:05,200 --> 00:31:08,200
Speaker 1: Bible say it this way. To him who much is given,

466
00:31:09,960 --> 00:31:12,880
Speaker 1: much is required. So the more that's given to you,

467
00:31:12,920 --> 00:31:14,960
Speaker 1: the more that's required of you. That's why you ought

468
00:31:15,040 --> 00:31:19,600
Speaker 1: not to despise the preparation, because what got you applauded

469
00:31:19,880 --> 00:31:24,400
Speaker 1: over here will get you killed over here. And you

470
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,600
Speaker 1: won't even know that you have stepped into a different arena,

471
00:31:28,720 --> 00:31:32,240
Speaker 1: and you don't understand that this is not that. There's

472
00:31:32,400 --> 00:31:34,960
Speaker 1: nothing worse than sing A preacher who walks in the

473
00:31:35,040 --> 00:31:38,120
Speaker 1: room and he thinks that this is that, so he

474
00:31:38,240 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 1: goes into whatever the thing is that he does, and

475
00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:55,800
Speaker 1: he's God's done whatever he does about God, and somebody's

476
00:31:55,800 --> 00:32:01,280
Speaker 1: getting happy, but somebody saying, why is he singing? Why

477
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:07,760
Speaker 1: is he singing? So you're normal as somebody else is weird.

478
00:32:08,480 --> 00:32:13,240
Speaker 1: And the more God promotes you. The more ampidexterous you

479
00:32:13,360 --> 00:32:16,760
Speaker 1: have to be to be able to serve the body

480
00:32:16,800 --> 00:32:21,640
Speaker 1: of Christ, because the body is vast, and God forbid

481
00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:24,040
Speaker 1: that you get an opportunity. Because I don't just want

482
00:32:24,080 --> 00:32:27,680
Speaker 1: to serve the body of Christ, I also want to

483
00:32:27,720 --> 00:32:31,560
Speaker 1: be relevant in affecting the culture, because I don't just

484
00:32:31,600 --> 00:32:35,240
Speaker 1: want to preach where the amen's run free. I want

485
00:32:35,240 --> 00:32:38,000
Speaker 1: to go into the wild, into the jungle and capture

486
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:42,000
Speaker 1: and ride and ride a lion's back and pull him

487
00:32:42,040 --> 00:32:44,400
Speaker 1: by the main and pull him and say, set down,

488
00:32:47,480 --> 00:32:49,400
Speaker 1: you know, snatch him by his hand and say what's

489
00:32:49,400 --> 00:32:54,440
Speaker 1: my name? You know? You know, you know, Yeah, I

490
00:32:54,480 --> 00:32:57,320
Speaker 1: don't want to I don't want to go. Yeah, I

491
00:32:57,360 --> 00:33:00,200
Speaker 1: know your shock. You'll be okay. We're gonna bring Yeah,

492
00:33:00,240 --> 00:33:02,200
Speaker 1: you brought me. We're gonna have fun. We're gonna have fun.

493
00:33:04,800 --> 00:33:11,400
Speaker 1: Most of the preachers today only preach to Christians. At

494
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:13,480
Speaker 1: the time I came up, we would pitch a tent

495
00:33:14,960 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 1: in the roughest part of town. I mean I preached

496
00:33:18,960 --> 00:33:21,720
Speaker 1: it in a tent in the bronx where people were

497
00:33:21,760 --> 00:33:24,800
Speaker 1: throwing needles down on the altar. They were coming in

498
00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:28,400
Speaker 1: and throwing crack cocaine down on the altar. There were thugs.

499
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: There were people in there with guns and knives, and

500
00:33:31,240 --> 00:33:35,200
Speaker 1: I was happy. I was happy because I was young

501
00:33:35,280 --> 00:33:37,720
Speaker 1: and I was wild, and I was preaching get away

502
00:33:37,720 --> 00:33:40,240
Speaker 1: from that gate about the lame man at the gate

503
00:33:40,320 --> 00:33:43,080
Speaker 1: called beautiful, and I was preaching get away from that

504
00:33:43,160 --> 00:33:46,000
Speaker 1: gate where there wasn't a big amen section like this.

505
00:33:46,280 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: Today people always want to go into an environment that

506
00:33:50,040 --> 00:33:53,560
Speaker 1: is friendly fire. But the Bible said, go into all

507
00:33:53,840 --> 00:34:01,920
Speaker 1: the world and preach the Gospel to every reader, living creature,

508
00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:08,680
Speaker 1: black creatures, white creatures, brown creatures, intellectual creatures, illiterate creatures.

509
00:34:09,440 --> 00:34:12,120
Speaker 1: When I first got to Dallas, I knew. I knew

510
00:34:12,200 --> 00:34:16,160
Speaker 1: that my ideology had to change. When I first got

511
00:34:16,200 --> 00:34:18,200
Speaker 1: to Dallas, I threw a party for the homeless people

512
00:34:18,440 --> 00:34:20,279
Speaker 1: rented out in the civic Center and brought all of

513
00:34:20,320 --> 00:34:23,480
Speaker 1: these clothes and food and stuff. That was how I

514
00:34:23,520 --> 00:34:26,080
Speaker 1: opened up my church. And so we had all of

515
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:28,720
Speaker 1: these homeless people in there. And when I was leaving,

516
00:34:29,360 --> 00:34:32,040
Speaker 1: this man looked at me with tears in his eyes.

517
00:34:33,320 --> 00:34:36,319
Speaker 1: It's hurt for me to tell it, and he said,

518
00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:43,680
Speaker 1: I love you, mister bishop. And I drove away in

519
00:34:43,719 --> 00:34:46,239
Speaker 1: the car, and I thought he doesn't even know what

520
00:34:46,360 --> 00:34:52,360
Speaker 1: a bishop he is. And immediately I knew either you're

521
00:34:52,440 --> 00:34:56,120
Speaker 1: going to reach the world or you're going to honor

522
00:34:56,200 --> 00:35:04,400
Speaker 1: your traditions. Wo you have to go beyond your traditions

523
00:35:05,400 --> 00:35:09,359
Speaker 1: in order to be effective. And if you're going to

524
00:35:09,440 --> 00:35:16,239
Speaker 1: do that, that pliability what psychologists would call AQ, your

525
00:35:16,320 --> 00:35:22,240
Speaker 1: optability adaptability quote, your ability to adapt to environment comes

526
00:35:22,320 --> 00:35:27,120
Speaker 1: from being crushed. It comes from the I was gonna

527
00:35:27,160 --> 00:35:28,759
Speaker 1: say the women would relate to that, but the women

528
00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:31,800
Speaker 1: today don't do this. So the older women might remember

529
00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: when we needed bread dough. The younger women don't know

530
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:39,120
Speaker 1: what I'm talking about because they get the bread already

531
00:35:39,120 --> 00:35:43,239
Speaker 1: made at the grocery store. But when you go home

532
00:35:43,239 --> 00:35:45,800
Speaker 1: and ask your grandmother if I'm right about this, that

533
00:35:46,160 --> 00:35:48,120
Speaker 1: if you're going to make biscus from scratch, you have

534
00:35:48,160 --> 00:35:52,000
Speaker 1: to need the dough. And the more you crush it,

535
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:56,839
Speaker 1: the more pliable it becomes, and ultimately the bread will

536
00:35:57,000 --> 00:36:01,400
Speaker 1: rise because you pressed it. And if you're going to

537
00:36:01,480 --> 00:36:06,480
Speaker 1: be adaptable enough to fit into the future God has

538
00:36:06,640 --> 00:36:11,680
Speaker 1: designed for you, then it is it is the crushings

539
00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:15,120
Speaker 1: that prepares you not to be more loyal to your

540
00:36:15,200 --> 00:36:19,640
Speaker 1: traditions than you are your calling, not to look down

541
00:36:19,719 --> 00:36:23,440
Speaker 1: your nose at somebody who is into what you just left.

542
00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:39,520
Speaker 1: Because church people get amnesia. Okay, church people get amnesia quick.

543
00:36:41,560 --> 00:36:43,680
Speaker 1: They turn up there and I, oh, my god, the

544
00:36:43,800 --> 00:36:47,960
Speaker 1: smell of smoke, Come, my god, it and it was

545
00:36:48,040 --> 00:36:52,680
Speaker 1: just three years ago. You were sucking on one like

546
00:36:52,719 --> 00:36:56,359
Speaker 1: it was a straw, you know, you know, and now oh,

547
00:36:56,400 --> 00:36:59,600
Speaker 1: I just oh they used they said, a profane where

548
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: to come on, Henry, Let's leave, No, don't leave, let's stay,

549
00:37:04,680 --> 00:37:10,640
Speaker 1: Let's stay. Jesus. What made Jesus so radical? The religious

550
00:37:10,680 --> 00:37:14,120
Speaker 1: people hated Jesus. What made him so radical is that

551
00:37:14,239 --> 00:37:16,640
Speaker 1: Jesus went to the wine bibbers, and he went in

552
00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:19,640
Speaker 1: the street and he touched people who were hurting, and

553
00:37:19,800 --> 00:37:24,680
Speaker 1: they loved him. They loved him Jesus. That was so

554
00:37:24,800 --> 00:37:29,120
Speaker 1: relevant that he looked no different than the people around him.

555
00:37:29,480 --> 00:37:32,800
Speaker 1: He looked so ordinary to his environment that the Roman

556
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:37,160
Speaker 1: soldiers had to hire somebody to point him out. So

557
00:37:37,360 --> 00:37:43,120
Speaker 1: Jesus wasn't into standing out. He was interfitting in, Okay,

558
00:37:43,520 --> 00:37:46,560
Speaker 1: because in order for him to redeem us, according to

559
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:50,640
Speaker 1: the law, you had to be a kinsman redeemer. Okay,

560
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:54,440
Speaker 1: So in order to be a kinsman redeemer. He has

561
00:37:54,560 --> 00:37:57,680
Speaker 1: to be kin to the thing he wants to redeem.

562
00:37:58,120 --> 00:38:01,440
Speaker 1: And what makes a minister effect of a not condescending

563
00:38:02,120 --> 00:38:06,000
Speaker 1: is when you're reaching for that soul. This is the truth,

564
00:38:06,440 --> 00:38:09,960
Speaker 1: when you're reaching for that soul. The most effective ministers

565
00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:13,360
Speaker 1: are the ones who see a little bit of themselves

566
00:38:13,400 --> 00:38:18,399
Speaker 1: in the people coming down the aisle. Yeah, because you don't.

567
00:38:18,560 --> 00:38:21,120
Speaker 1: If you're not kin to them, you won't care about them,

568
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:23,359
Speaker 1: and you won't labor with them, and you won't work

569
00:38:23,400 --> 00:38:25,960
Speaker 1: with them, and you just walk out of wave and

570
00:38:26,040 --> 00:38:28,320
Speaker 1: go about your business. But when you akin to them,

571
00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:32,279
Speaker 1: you are moved with compassion because you know that could

572
00:38:32,280 --> 00:38:36,200
Speaker 1: have been you, that used to be you, and sometimes

573
00:38:36,239 --> 00:38:44,040
Speaker 1: it's still you because you don't live in victory every day. See.

574
00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:48,800
Speaker 1: But the pressure, the pressure of fitting into a religious

575
00:38:48,920 --> 00:38:55,279
Speaker 1: environment can tempt you to hypocrisy because we become more

576
00:38:55,320 --> 00:38:58,560
Speaker 1: concerned about being accepted by the people we worship with

577
00:38:58,960 --> 00:39:04,560
Speaker 1: than we are about used by God. So going into

578
00:39:04,840 --> 00:39:09,399
Speaker 1: environments that intimidate you excites you. Oh yeah, you like it?

579
00:39:10,960 --> 00:39:20,720
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you're a glutton form. Yeah, yes, what intimidates you? Oh?

580
00:39:19,400 --> 00:39:25,920
Speaker 1: Any anything that's foreign. A lot of times I'm speaking

581
00:39:25,920 --> 00:39:30,800
Speaker 1: in environments that are not faith based at all. Sometimes

582
00:39:31,560 --> 00:39:35,200
Speaker 1: I have to be able to deliver truth in a veil.

583
00:39:37,200 --> 00:39:39,239
Speaker 1: Sometimes I have to put it in a in a

584
00:39:39,360 --> 00:39:46,560
Speaker 1: film subtly to make it palatable enough that they don't turn,

585
00:39:47,440 --> 00:39:52,680
Speaker 1: but potent enough that it captures something on the inside,

586
00:39:52,800 --> 00:39:56,920
Speaker 1: and so that can be intimidating. I like to be

587
00:39:57,040 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 1: in a room full of smart people. I like to

588
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:04,160
Speaker 1: to hear people preach who make me feel stupid. It's

589
00:40:04,200 --> 00:40:09,279
Speaker 1: such a turno like it, like, yeah, yeah, it really is,

590
00:40:09,320 --> 00:40:12,080
Speaker 1: it is it is. I love it the best for

591
00:40:12,239 --> 00:40:14,000
Speaker 1: the guy preacher is so good that I feel like

592
00:40:14,120 --> 00:40:18,120
Speaker 1: just throwing my bottom up there that I claim because

593
00:40:18,280 --> 00:40:23,200
Speaker 1: you just described me every Monday listening to you get

594
00:40:23,200 --> 00:40:25,080
Speaker 1: out of here and I want to ask you about

595
00:40:25,520 --> 00:40:27,560
Speaker 1: this is going to sound so silly how I say it,

596
00:40:27,800 --> 00:40:35,120
Speaker 1: But I wrote down pms and it's early to be

597
00:40:35,200 --> 00:40:38,920
Speaker 1: going there. But I put it from the perspective of

598
00:40:39,480 --> 00:40:42,480
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of times on Saturday, I'm texting

599
00:40:42,520 --> 00:40:48,040
Speaker 1: you frantically like, hey, I've got people showing up and

600
00:40:48,239 --> 00:40:49,880
Speaker 1: they need to hear from God, and I don't know

601
00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:53,040
Speaker 1: if I have yet. You know, I hope so. And

602
00:40:53,080 --> 00:40:55,520
Speaker 1: you're kind to me, and then there's coming down after

603
00:40:55,680 --> 00:40:58,200
Speaker 1: preaching a message. But it's so much more than preachers

604
00:40:58,200 --> 00:41:00,600
Speaker 1: in here. I thought it would be helpful to talk

605
00:41:00,600 --> 00:41:04,160
Speaker 1: about not just pre message syndrome post message syndrome from

606
00:41:04,160 --> 00:41:08,600
Speaker 1: a preaching standpoint, But I want you to describe yeah, yeah,

607
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:14,319
Speaker 1: your pressure management system, because all right, I love the book.

608
00:41:14,360 --> 00:41:18,480
Speaker 1: It's it's it's about how fruitfulness is not the end

609
00:41:19,600 --> 00:41:22,400
Speaker 1: that the gardener, the vine dresser crushes the grapes to

610
00:41:22,440 --> 00:41:27,800
Speaker 1: make wine. That process of pressure, if it's not managed correctly,

611
00:41:28,239 --> 00:41:31,560
Speaker 1: it can paralyze you. It can actually make you. It

612
00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:35,719
Speaker 1: can shut you down. And you've transcended so many limitations

613
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:38,640
Speaker 1: and broken barriers and stood up with your handshaking and

614
00:41:38,719 --> 00:41:41,319
Speaker 1: done things. Oh yes, And I want to know how

615
00:41:41,360 --> 00:41:44,960
Speaker 1: you do it because like I need to know, parents

616
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:49,480
Speaker 1: need to know, business owners need to know, how do

617
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:54,200
Speaker 1: you manage the pressure without the pressure beginning to overwhelm

618
00:41:54,239 --> 00:41:59,719
Speaker 1: you and consume you. If the pressure overwhelmed me and

619
00:41:59,800 --> 00:42:06,280
Speaker 1: to assume me, then the pressure would have aborted my destiny.

620
00:42:07,160 --> 00:42:12,200
Speaker 1: And I refuse to allow how I feel to abort

621
00:42:12,680 --> 00:42:19,360
Speaker 1: what I'm called to. You touched on so many things

622
00:42:19,360 --> 00:42:21,279
Speaker 1: that are so important. First of all. I don't want

623
00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:24,640
Speaker 1: to leave them with the feeling of you being uncertain

624
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:30,239
Speaker 1: of your message. He's never uncertain of his message. He's

625
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:34,640
Speaker 1: uncertain of himself. And the reason he's uncertain of himself

626
00:42:34,840 --> 00:42:38,799
Speaker 1: is because everybody in this room can see everybody in

627
00:42:38,840 --> 00:42:43,600
Speaker 1: this room, but they can never see themselves. And so

628
00:42:44,960 --> 00:42:49,280
Speaker 1: your pastor can see everything, but he can't see himself.

629
00:42:50,200 --> 00:42:52,600
Speaker 1: So when you can't, that's why you have a mirror,

630
00:42:52,640 --> 00:42:56,360
Speaker 1: because you can't see yourself. I can see everybody. I

631
00:42:56,440 --> 00:43:00,960
Speaker 1: see all of you, all the way up in the back, hie. Yeah,

632
00:43:01,040 --> 00:43:06,680
Speaker 1: how you doing? How you doing? I see you got

633
00:43:06,719 --> 00:43:08,920
Speaker 1: that yellow shirt on your arms. Sold I see you

634
00:43:09,000 --> 00:43:15,040
Speaker 1: up here. But yeah, yeah, I'm talking about you. Yeah yeah,

635
00:43:15,040 --> 00:43:18,239
Speaker 1: I saw yeah. Yeah, chocolate man and yellow shirt. I

636
00:43:18,280 --> 00:43:26,920
Speaker 1: got you. The problem in life, when you are truly gifted,

637
00:43:29,040 --> 00:43:35,480
Speaker 1: you can't see it. When you are truly gifted, When

638
00:43:35,480 --> 00:43:41,399
Speaker 1: you are truly gifted, it is your normal. Yeah. And

639
00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:44,760
Speaker 1: so the frustration is you're trying to manifest your gift,

640
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:47,279
Speaker 1: and you are manifesting your gift, but you don't know

641
00:43:47,640 --> 00:43:50,760
Speaker 1: that that is your gift because your gift is your normal.

642
00:43:52,360 --> 00:43:56,080
Speaker 1: People who can sing aren't trying to sing they just can.

643
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:01,160
Speaker 1: People who can write aren't trying to right, they just can't.

644
00:44:01,239 --> 00:44:03,160
Speaker 1: And so when they write things, they say, oh my god,

645
00:44:03,200 --> 00:44:05,120
Speaker 1: that's not good. Oh my god, it's not good. Oh

646
00:44:05,160 --> 00:44:07,600
Speaker 1: my god, it's not good because you can't see yourself.

647
00:44:07,719 --> 00:44:10,360
Speaker 1: So sometimes the more gifted you are, the more vulnerable

648
00:44:10,400 --> 00:44:13,520
Speaker 1: you are, and the more affirmation you need from your

649
00:44:13,600 --> 00:44:19,520
Speaker 1: inner circle. Because I could walk off a straight stage

650
00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:24,560
Speaker 1: and feel like strangling myself with a belt because that

651
00:44:24,680 --> 00:44:29,960
Speaker 1: was very graphic, good good, that's part of That's My

652
00:44:30,040 --> 00:44:35,640
Speaker 1: ministry is to give you pictures. So the reason I

653
00:44:35,680 --> 00:44:39,200
Speaker 1: think about strangling myself with the belt is because you should.

654
00:44:39,440 --> 00:44:46,360
Speaker 1: You should hear the guy that's preaching in me, and

655
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:51,279
Speaker 1: there I am trying to give you what he's giving me.

656
00:44:52,360 --> 00:44:55,440
Speaker 1: I'm never preaching against the guy who preached before me

657
00:44:55,560 --> 00:44:57,920
Speaker 1: or the guy who preached after me. I'm preaching against

658
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:01,719
Speaker 1: the guy who preaches inside of me. Okay, So the

659
00:45:01,760 --> 00:45:04,880
Speaker 1: bar is so high that a lot of times I

660
00:45:04,960 --> 00:45:08,680
Speaker 1: walk home to the the state and I think, you know,

661
00:45:09,120 --> 00:45:11,320
Speaker 1: why don't you get somebody else? I blew it. I

662
00:45:11,680 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 1: didn't get it across. I'm not sure that they got

663
00:45:14,320 --> 00:45:16,399
Speaker 1: it the way you got it to me. You got

664
00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:18,319
Speaker 1: it to me so bad I couldn't sleep that night,

665
00:45:19,560 --> 00:45:21,680
Speaker 1: and I'm not sure I can get it out. So

666
00:45:21,880 --> 00:45:25,560
Speaker 1: really gifted people are sensitive and they're vulnerable, and you

667
00:45:25,640 --> 00:45:30,280
Speaker 1: have to learn how to function within that sensitive, vulnerable space.

668
00:45:30,600 --> 00:45:32,040
Speaker 1: And I'm going to give you a couple of things

669
00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:35,440
Speaker 1: that will help you to do it. Insulate yourself with

670
00:45:35,520 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: a few inner circle people who love you enough that

671
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 1: you can be vulnerable in front of and yet are

672
00:45:42,440 --> 00:45:46,600
Speaker 1: honest enough. My daughter, let me tell my story. My

673
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:55,959
Speaker 1: daughter Sarah wrote this paper. Yeah, I know, she wrote

674
00:45:56,000 --> 00:45:58,120
Speaker 1: this paper one time and she sent it to me,

675
00:45:58,480 --> 00:46:02,279
Speaker 1: and I was a day where what just happened was

676
00:46:02,840 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 1: something so far away to you talk about it? Oh,

677
00:46:05,239 --> 00:46:06,719
Speaker 1: I talk about it in the book. I mean she

678
00:46:06,880 --> 00:46:15,560
Speaker 1: was the least likely child Lord have mercy if you

679
00:46:15,600 --> 00:46:18,399
Speaker 1: would have asked me, you know which one I would

680
00:46:18,560 --> 00:46:23,120
Speaker 1: have met. Anyway, I talked about it in the book.

681
00:46:23,120 --> 00:46:26,440
Speaker 1: You gotta read the book. She wrote a paper and

682
00:46:26,520 --> 00:46:28,600
Speaker 1: she sent it to me. And the thing about me is,

683
00:46:29,400 --> 00:46:32,759
Speaker 1: my wife says, I'm brutally honest. I say, I'm just

684
00:46:32,920 --> 00:46:37,280
Speaker 1: honest shed verse two. Then she said, a brutally honest

685
00:46:37,520 --> 00:46:40,720
Speaker 1: I will tell you the truth. She wrote this paper.

686
00:46:40,800 --> 00:46:42,600
Speaker 1: My daughter wrote this paper. She sent it to me

687
00:46:42,719 --> 00:46:44,560
Speaker 1: and I read it. And I remember I was in

688
00:46:44,680 --> 00:46:46,600
Speaker 1: LA at the time that I read, and I was busy.

689
00:46:46,640 --> 00:46:48,520
Speaker 1: I probably would have been more tactful at and I've

690
00:46:48,520 --> 00:46:50,719
Speaker 1: been so busy, but I was busy. And I read

691
00:46:50,719 --> 00:46:55,000
Speaker 1: through it and I said, Sarah, I said, I don't

692
00:46:55,080 --> 00:46:59,480
Speaker 1: even know what you're talking about it. I said, I

693
00:46:59,640 --> 00:47:01,759
Speaker 1: know you. You can write better than this. She need

694
00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:04,640
Speaker 1: to go back and write this over again. And she

695
00:47:04,719 --> 00:47:06,879
Speaker 1: said okay. She said that I'll give it another spit.

696
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:09,840
Speaker 1: I realized now in retrospect that I probably should have

697
00:47:09,920 --> 00:47:13,800
Speaker 1: softened it. A bit. Later on, she wrote her first book,

698
00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:16,200
Speaker 1: and I sat down to read the book, and I'll

699
00:47:16,200 --> 00:47:17,919
Speaker 1: be honest, I sat down to read the book because

700
00:47:17,960 --> 00:47:19,880
Speaker 1: she's my daughter, and she wrote it, and I was

701
00:47:20,040 --> 00:47:23,080
Speaker 1: going to read it. And it's the way they used

702
00:47:23,080 --> 00:47:25,960
Speaker 1: to cook, and some stuff they cooked their mother would need.

703
00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:29,560
Speaker 1: I would eat anything they cook, just so they have

704
00:47:29,719 --> 00:47:31,439
Speaker 1: confidence in itself. So I said, I'm going to read

705
00:47:31,440 --> 00:47:35,399
Speaker 1: this book. And I started reading it and I called

706
00:47:35,440 --> 00:47:37,680
Speaker 1: her and I said, Sarah, I sat down to read

707
00:47:37,680 --> 00:47:39,920
Speaker 1: the book because she wrote it, and I couldn't put

708
00:47:39,960 --> 00:47:43,600
Speaker 1: it down. I said, I read from the first page

709
00:47:43,600 --> 00:47:47,440
Speaker 1: to the last page, and I didn't stop because the

710
00:47:47,520 --> 00:47:53,520
Speaker 1: rhythm of your writing, the eloquence of your speech, the

711
00:47:53,600 --> 00:47:59,000
Speaker 1: visual images that are created through the opulence of your

712
00:47:59,080 --> 00:48:04,520
Speaker 1: vocabulary was so overwhelming that I was mesmerized. And I

713
00:48:04,600 --> 00:48:09,920
Speaker 1: left her that message and she called me back. She said, Daddy,

714
00:48:10,120 --> 00:48:12,960
Speaker 1: She said, Naddy. She said, I want to keep this

715
00:48:13,160 --> 00:48:17,400
Speaker 1: voice message forever. She said, I want to keep it

716
00:48:17,480 --> 00:48:20,479
Speaker 1: the rest of my life. And I said, Sarah, I said,

717
00:48:20,440 --> 00:48:22,440
Speaker 1: it was just what I thought. She said, I know.

718
00:48:24,719 --> 00:48:28,799
Speaker 1: She said, that's what made it real. She said, I

719
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:40,640
Speaker 1: could trust your compliments because of your criticism. You need

720
00:48:40,680 --> 00:48:43,319
Speaker 1: somebody who's not just going to say it because they

721
00:48:43,520 --> 00:48:46,040
Speaker 1: liked you, or said because they love you. You want

722
00:48:46,040 --> 00:48:49,560
Speaker 1: to get the absolute truth from them and inner circle

723
00:48:49,600 --> 00:48:52,160
Speaker 1: of people who will tell you like it TI is

724
00:48:52,680 --> 00:48:55,919
Speaker 1: so that you can trust them that when they say

725
00:48:55,960 --> 00:48:58,640
Speaker 1: it's good. Because the reason you have to trust them,

726
00:48:58,880 --> 00:49:01,080
Speaker 1: it's like a blind man for seeing our dog. You

727
00:49:01,080 --> 00:49:04,080
Speaker 1: gotta trust the dog because the dog can see you

728
00:49:04,160 --> 00:49:08,319
Speaker 1: can't see yourself, and you have to be okay with

729
00:49:08,400 --> 00:49:11,040
Speaker 1: that or you're never gonna get anything done. For God,

730
00:49:11,400 --> 00:49:14,879
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go just a little bit deeper. Jesus takes

731
00:49:14,880 --> 00:49:18,960
Speaker 1: a blind man and takes a blind man out of

732
00:49:19,040 --> 00:49:22,960
Speaker 1: best say it, and he lays hands on him, and

733
00:49:23,120 --> 00:49:25,360
Speaker 1: then asks a blind man, what do you say? The

734
00:49:25,600 --> 00:49:31,240
Speaker 1: healing is all predicated on honesty, the courage to tell

735
00:49:31,360 --> 00:49:36,560
Speaker 1: Jesus you touch me in it didn't work in front

736
00:49:36,560 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 1: of your disciples. He says, I see I'm better, but

737
00:49:42,760 --> 00:49:47,600
Speaker 1: I see men walking the streets, and Jesus touches him again,

738
00:49:47,719 --> 00:49:50,120
Speaker 1: or I believe fits in his eye and tells him

739
00:49:50,160 --> 00:49:52,520
Speaker 1: to go wash in the pool, and the man has

740
00:49:52,600 --> 00:49:58,920
Speaker 1: to take the first steps in the dark. The first

741
00:49:59,160 --> 00:50:01,960
Speaker 1: time I went the mic to preach, my hands were

742
00:50:02,000 --> 00:50:09,359
Speaker 1: shaking so bad that when I held the mic, I

743
00:50:09,440 --> 00:50:11,200
Speaker 1: was nervous when I picked it up. But when I

744
00:50:11,280 --> 00:50:13,360
Speaker 1: knew that they could see that I was nervous, that

745
00:50:13,440 --> 00:50:17,239
Speaker 1: made it worse. So it started. It starts ship. It

746
00:50:17,280 --> 00:50:19,879
Speaker 1: was like a It was kind of like a tambourine

747
00:50:20,000 --> 00:50:23,680
Speaker 1: or something, you know. So the next time I had

748
00:50:23,719 --> 00:50:26,480
Speaker 1: them adjust the height of the mic. I didn't quit preaching.

749
00:50:26,719 --> 00:50:29,120
Speaker 1: I had them adjust the height of the mic and

750
00:50:29,160 --> 00:50:32,160
Speaker 1: put my hands behind my back so they couldn't see

751
00:50:32,200 --> 00:50:34,480
Speaker 1: my hands, and I preached the first five or ten

752
00:50:34,560 --> 00:50:38,240
Speaker 1: minutes with my hands behind my back until enough annoying came,

753
00:50:38,680 --> 00:50:41,759
Speaker 1: because when the annoying comes, the fear goes. And then

754
00:50:41,800 --> 00:50:45,919
Speaker 1: I took the mic and started preaching. You cannot let

755
00:50:46,000 --> 00:50:53,239
Speaker 1: your fear hold you back from your destiny. You have

756
00:50:53,520 --> 00:50:57,600
Speaker 1: to feel the fear and do it anyway. Do it broke,

757
00:50:57,760 --> 00:51:01,480
Speaker 1: do it scared, do it nervous, it trembling. Do it

758
00:51:01,520 --> 00:51:04,240
Speaker 1: on your knees, do it with help, do it on crutches,

759
00:51:04,400 --> 00:51:07,640
Speaker 1: do it in a wheelchair. Because you don't want to

760
00:51:07,719 --> 00:51:09,759
Speaker 1: end up in a nursing home sitting on a bed pan,

761
00:51:09,880 --> 00:51:13,600
Speaker 1: wondering what would have happened if you'd only had more currents.

762
00:51:14,520 --> 00:51:17,160
Speaker 1: You don't want to end up in an old folks home.

763
00:51:17,520 --> 00:51:22,360
Speaker 1: And your dying thought is I wish I had a

764
00:51:22,640 --> 00:51:25,920
Speaker 1: because the one thing that you will never get is

765
00:51:26,040 --> 00:51:30,279
Speaker 1: more time, So you don't have time to allow your

766
00:51:30,320 --> 00:51:35,880
Speaker 1: fear to incarcerate you. When you have the key, reach

767
00:51:35,960 --> 00:51:39,600
Speaker 1: around there, unlock the door, and step into your destiny.

768
00:51:41,960 --> 00:51:44,000
Speaker 1: Don't you feel like a lot of stuff gets thrown

769
00:51:44,040 --> 00:51:47,120
Speaker 1: around at a cliche level like this, Like I was

770
00:51:47,160 --> 00:51:49,520
Speaker 1: thinking about this reading the book. You have this great

771
00:51:49,560 --> 00:51:54,759
Speaker 1: section on pruning and feel free to preach on John

772
00:51:54,800 --> 00:51:57,040
Speaker 1: fifteen at any point during this question if you want.

773
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:05,440
Speaker 1: But I was thinking how sometimes Christians use language to

774
00:52:05,520 --> 00:52:09,440
Speaker 1: cover up lifestyles. So you know, I really wanted to

775
00:52:09,480 --> 00:52:14,279
Speaker 1: ask you this tonight. Do we sometimes use pruning as

776
00:52:14,320 --> 00:52:20,279
Speaker 1: an excuse for our bad decisions? In other words, you know,

777
00:52:20,400 --> 00:52:22,640
Speaker 1: everybody walked away from me, God is pruning me. They

778
00:52:22,680 --> 00:52:26,399
Speaker 1: walked away from you and your self centered and your

779
00:52:26,400 --> 00:52:30,480
Speaker 1: breath smells bad, you know, or whatever, But that is

780
00:52:30,560 --> 00:52:37,359
Speaker 1: pruning too. Some people only learn through those kinds of

781
00:52:37,600 --> 00:52:43,720
Speaker 1: chastenings because anytime you won't hear God's warning, he will

782
00:52:43,800 --> 00:52:49,680
Speaker 1: chasten you, and whom the Lord loveth he chastens. And

783
00:52:50,400 --> 00:52:54,080
Speaker 1: you're right, they're not leaving because God is pruning you,

784
00:52:54,760 --> 00:52:58,400
Speaker 1: But they're leaving because of your behavior. But your behavior

785
00:52:58,480 --> 00:53:02,600
Speaker 1: is making them leave with just still a pruning because

786
00:53:02,640 --> 00:53:05,040
Speaker 1: it comes down to how many will you have to

787
00:53:05,160 --> 00:53:09,080
Speaker 1: lose for you to change? Okay, I want to go

788
00:53:09,120 --> 00:53:12,319
Speaker 1: into that bishop. So is there a difference between being

789
00:53:12,360 --> 00:53:16,120
Speaker 1: crushed by the hand of God versus suffering the consequences

790
00:53:16,160 --> 00:53:19,720
Speaker 1: of your own decisions? I think there. Sometimes God uses

791
00:53:19,760 --> 00:53:26,560
Speaker 1: his hand and sometimes he uses yours. Yeah, yeah, sometimes

792
00:53:26,600 --> 00:53:30,040
Speaker 1: he uses yours. But see, you cannot get God's people

793
00:53:30,080 --> 00:53:33,600
Speaker 1: out of God's hand. Whether they are dysfunctional, whether they're

794
00:53:33,640 --> 00:53:37,600
Speaker 1: emotionally dwarfed, they are still God's people. Whether they make

795
00:53:37,719 --> 00:53:41,920
Speaker 1: bad decisions or stupid decisions, or terrible mistakes, you cannot

796
00:53:42,000 --> 00:53:44,920
Speaker 1: get them out of God's hand. The souls that are

797
00:53:44,960 --> 00:53:47,200
Speaker 1: in the Father's hands, no man can pluck them out.

798
00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:49,279
Speaker 1: Some of them are smart soul, some of them are

799
00:53:49,320 --> 00:53:51,719
Speaker 1: proud soul, some of them are arrogant soul, some of

800
00:53:51,760 --> 00:53:54,720
Speaker 1: them are prejudiced souls. But they are in God's hands.

801
00:53:54,800 --> 00:53:57,080
Speaker 1: And God will keep working with them, and working with them,

802
00:53:57,160 --> 00:53:59,879
Speaker 1: and reshaping them, and breaking them and making them again,

803
00:54:00,080 --> 00:54:03,480
Speaker 1: breaking up again, until they become what he had in mind.

804
00:54:05,080 --> 00:54:09,480
Speaker 1: Every branch of me that bears fruit, every branch of

805
00:54:09,520 --> 00:54:12,760
Speaker 1: me that's going kind of good, he says. The reward

806
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:17,760
Speaker 1: is I prune it that it might bring forth more fruit.

807
00:54:19,400 --> 00:54:23,480
Speaker 1: And ultimately herein is when our Father glorified verse eight,

808
00:54:23,560 --> 00:54:26,840
Speaker 1: that you bring forth much fruit. So shall you be

809
00:54:26,920 --> 00:54:30,640
Speaker 1: my disciples. In between fruit and more fruit is always

810
00:54:30,719 --> 00:54:37,120
Speaker 1: a knife. When God gets ready to take you up,

811
00:54:37,200 --> 00:54:42,880
Speaker 1: he always cuts you back. There will be some exodus,

812
00:54:42,920 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 1: There will be some loneliness. There will be some crushing place,

813
00:54:51,719 --> 00:54:59,520
Speaker 1: some weeping, wallowing stage of life because you are his

814
00:55:00,840 --> 00:55:04,879
Speaker 1: and he knows exactly where to cut you. In the book,

815
00:55:04,960 --> 00:55:07,000
Speaker 1: I talk about my mother had a rose bush and

816
00:55:07,040 --> 00:55:11,680
Speaker 1: I decided to help her out. And I was a

817
00:55:11,680 --> 00:55:13,360
Speaker 1: little kid, and I went out there to do like

818
00:55:13,440 --> 00:55:15,160
Speaker 1: I had seen her do. I was going to prune

819
00:55:15,200 --> 00:55:20,239
Speaker 1: the bush, and I almost killed it. The difference I

820
00:55:20,320 --> 00:55:22,400
Speaker 1: used the same knife, and it was the same bush

821
00:55:22,440 --> 00:55:24,960
Speaker 1: that I'd seen her prune the year before. I used

822
00:55:25,000 --> 00:55:28,760
Speaker 1: the same knife, but in my hand it was a weapon,

823
00:55:29,960 --> 00:55:34,120
Speaker 1: and in her hand it was a tool. God knows

824
00:55:34,200 --> 00:55:37,239
Speaker 1: exactly where to cut you to make you more productive.

825
00:55:38,520 --> 00:55:40,440
Speaker 1: I was doing the right thing, but I was cutting

826
00:55:40,480 --> 00:55:43,800
Speaker 1: in the wrong place. Mama knew exactly where to cut

827
00:55:43,840 --> 00:55:47,000
Speaker 1: that bush in order to make it go from fruit

828
00:55:47,840 --> 00:55:52,520
Speaker 1: to more fruit to much fruit. God knows exactly where

829
00:55:52,719 --> 00:55:56,200
Speaker 1: to crush you to bring you to the place that

830
00:55:56,280 --> 00:55:59,080
Speaker 1: you need to be. I want to throw this in

831
00:56:00,600 --> 00:56:02,799
Speaker 1: what started this journey? I was getting ready to preach

832
00:56:02,840 --> 00:56:07,920
Speaker 1: at Lakewood and uh, and I was sitting outside and

833
00:56:08,400 --> 00:56:10,160
Speaker 1: all of a sudden I got a download. And it's

834
00:56:10,160 --> 00:56:12,719
Speaker 1: hard for me to explain what a download is. I mean,

835
00:56:12,760 --> 00:56:14,560
Speaker 1: all the technical people know what it is as it

836
00:56:14,600 --> 00:56:18,080
Speaker 1: relates to technology. But that's kind of what we finally

837
00:56:18,120 --> 00:56:21,120
Speaker 1: got to in technology. The Holy Spirit was always there

838
00:56:21,880 --> 00:56:27,480
Speaker 1: because the Holy Spirit has always downloaded. Knowledge from the

839
00:56:27,560 --> 00:56:32,160
Speaker 1: Divine comes in waves. It doesn't come in reason. Right.

840
00:56:32,719 --> 00:56:37,560
Speaker 1: Behold is a download. They missed that that was so

841
00:56:37,680 --> 00:56:40,920
Speaker 1: good it was. They get it when they watch it back,

842
00:56:41,000 --> 00:56:46,719
Speaker 1: Preach it Sunday, It'll be all right. The word revelation

843
00:56:47,320 --> 00:56:51,399
Speaker 1: is the Greek word apocalypse. It means to unveil. Behold,

844
00:56:51,520 --> 00:56:53,799
Speaker 1: it is a download. All of a sudden, you know

845
00:56:53,920 --> 00:56:56,160
Speaker 1: something that you didn't know, and it comes in a

846
00:56:56,239 --> 00:56:58,600
Speaker 1: fullness and it comes and God started giving me this

847
00:56:58,680 --> 00:57:01,279
Speaker 1: downloaded Oh my god, it was. It was not a

848
00:57:01,360 --> 00:57:03,080
Speaker 1: normal one. It was a big one. It was too

849
00:57:03,120 --> 00:57:05,160
Speaker 1: big to be a sermon. I was writing all over

850
00:57:05,239 --> 00:57:07,160
Speaker 1: legal past, trying to keep up with it and trying

851
00:57:07,160 --> 00:57:09,360
Speaker 1: to trying to trying to get it all together, because

852
00:57:09,400 --> 00:57:13,160
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, I begin to realize that when

853
00:57:13,239 --> 00:57:17,000
Speaker 1: Jesus held up the cup in the Last Supper, that

854
00:57:17,120 --> 00:57:19,720
Speaker 1: there was and he says, the New Testament is in

855
00:57:19,800 --> 00:57:23,520
Speaker 1: my blood, that that what was in the cup had

856
00:57:23,680 --> 00:57:30,000
Speaker 1: synergy with the one who held it. The grape you see,

857
00:57:30,400 --> 00:57:34,680
Speaker 1: is one of the few fruits that that is raised

858
00:57:34,720 --> 00:57:40,560
Speaker 1: to be crushed. And Christ was born to die, and

859
00:57:40,600 --> 00:57:43,840
Speaker 1: as he held the cup, he was also the cup

860
00:57:43,960 --> 00:57:47,800
Speaker 1: was a reflection of him, except that the cup had

861
00:57:47,880 --> 00:57:54,200
Speaker 1: already been raised and crushed and resurrected in its eternal form.

862
00:57:55,080 --> 00:57:58,640
Speaker 1: And Christ was about to be And he says, take

863
00:57:59,440 --> 00:58:07,400
Speaker 1: and do this in remembrance of me. I was born

864
00:58:07,560 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 1: to die. You're about to see me be crushed, but

865
00:58:13,080 --> 00:58:17,960
Speaker 1: understand that as he crushes me like this cup, he

866
00:58:18,080 --> 00:58:24,920
Speaker 1: is transforming me from grapes to wine. And I wrote

867
00:58:24,920 --> 00:58:28,320
Speaker 1: this because there are so many people listening at us

868
00:58:28,440 --> 00:58:32,680
Speaker 1: right now who are being crushed, some in obvious ways,

869
00:58:33,720 --> 00:58:35,960
Speaker 1: some in childhood ways. There are people in here have

870
00:58:35,960 --> 00:58:38,000
Speaker 1: been raped. There's people in here have been molested. There's

871
00:58:38,000 --> 00:58:41,640
Speaker 1: people in here have been abused verbally, emotionally, mentally, raised

872
00:58:41,640 --> 00:58:44,560
Speaker 1: without parents, never been loved, never been treated right, and

873
00:58:44,960 --> 00:58:48,360
Speaker 1: they have been crushed. There are people who are being

874
00:58:48,440 --> 00:58:52,080
Speaker 1: crushed right now in situations that don't work, in circumstances

875
00:58:52,080 --> 00:58:56,440
Speaker 1: that are overwhelming. Sometimes the pressure is visible and you

876
00:58:56,520 --> 00:59:01,840
Speaker 1: can see the assailant, but other times it's invisible. It's

877
00:59:01,880 --> 00:59:05,000
Speaker 1: an emotional it's a mental, it's a turmoil. It's an

878
00:59:05,000 --> 00:59:10,400
Speaker 1: internal conflict that crushes you, and you suffer in invisible ways,

879
00:59:10,840 --> 00:59:13,240
Speaker 1: like a child that's been whipped and sent to school.

880
00:59:13,280 --> 00:59:16,600
Speaker 1: But they wore clothes to hide the scars. And there

881
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:19,000
Speaker 1: you are walking amongst people and nobody can see that

882
00:59:19,080 --> 00:59:22,600
Speaker 1: your scarred beneath it all. That's what crushing is. And

883
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:25,160
Speaker 1: there are people in this room right now who have

884
00:59:25,680 --> 00:59:30,000
Speaker 1: or will or are enduring crushing moments, and they are saying,

885
00:59:30,040 --> 00:59:32,920
Speaker 1: where is God? And he's under the clothes with you.

886
00:59:33,760 --> 00:59:36,240
Speaker 1: He's in the pain with you. He's in the situation

887
00:59:36,360 --> 00:59:42,280
Speaker 1: with you. He's in the turmoil with you. No nobody

888
00:59:42,400 --> 00:59:46,800
Speaker 1: else is as brutally, brutally give me this, brutally brutally

889
00:59:46,880 --> 00:59:52,919
Speaker 1: honest as God about crushing. It's right up front. The

890
00:59:53,000 --> 01:00:01,240
Speaker 1: whole emblem of Christianity is a cross. Duh, It's not

891
01:00:01,360 --> 01:00:06,920
Speaker 1: a crown. He comes right out front and tells you,

892
01:00:07,480 --> 01:00:10,040
Speaker 1: if any man will be my disciple, pick up his

893
01:00:10,160 --> 01:00:15,320
Speaker 1: cross and follow me. Come on, let's die when you win.

894
01:00:15,360 --> 01:00:16,840
Speaker 1: An I talk about this in the book. I talk

895
01:00:16,880 --> 01:00:18,920
Speaker 1: about the tabernacle, and the Tarbernacle stands out in the

896
01:00:18,960 --> 01:00:21,480
Speaker 1: middle of the wilderness, and the flapping of the goat

897
01:00:21,480 --> 01:00:23,640
Speaker 1: skins out of the the badger skins out in the

898
01:00:23,640 --> 01:00:26,240
Speaker 1: middle of the wilderness. The white flapping of the skins

899
01:00:26,320 --> 01:00:29,800
Speaker 1: is an indication that God wanted to meet with Man, Oil,

900
01:00:29,920 --> 01:00:33,320
Speaker 1: mo Ed and Hebrew the tent of meetings, and you

901
01:00:33,400 --> 01:00:35,520
Speaker 1: must come in at the door. And the door stands

902
01:00:35,520 --> 01:00:38,400
Speaker 1: out starkly different from the walls around it, with its blue,

903
01:00:38,720 --> 01:00:41,760
Speaker 1: and it's crimson and it's purple. It's blue for the

904
01:00:41,800 --> 01:00:45,280
Speaker 1: grace of God. It's crimson for the redemptive power of God.

905
01:00:45,320 --> 01:00:48,760
Speaker 1: It's purple for the majesty of God. The door stands

906
01:00:48,760 --> 01:00:51,040
Speaker 1: out because it's a picture of Jesus that says, I

907
01:00:51,080 --> 01:00:54,000
Speaker 1: am the door. The moment you walk through the door,

908
01:00:54,080 --> 01:00:58,800
Speaker 1: the very first thing you see is a brazen altar,

909
01:00:59,680 --> 01:01:05,120
Speaker 1: a dying place. No couches, no chairs, no furniture, no candles,

910
01:01:05,200 --> 01:01:09,400
Speaker 1: no sense and fragrances, no aromas, no aroma therapy. The

911
01:01:09,560 --> 01:01:14,160
Speaker 1: very thing you smell is the stench of burning flesh

912
01:01:14,200 --> 01:01:16,560
Speaker 1: and the dripping of blood into a pan beneath it.

913
01:01:16,640 --> 01:01:21,120
Speaker 1: Because God puts the pain upfront, he never hides or

914
01:01:21,240 --> 01:01:24,479
Speaker 1: disguises the fact that the moment you walk into the door.

915
01:01:24,560 --> 01:01:27,400
Speaker 1: You have to pay something for promotion. You have to

916
01:01:27,440 --> 01:01:29,880
Speaker 1: go through process to get a promise. You have to

917
01:01:29,880 --> 01:01:32,640
Speaker 1: go through pushes in order to have a crown. He

918
01:01:32,680 --> 01:01:34,880
Speaker 1: puts it right right up front. He doesn't give you

919
01:01:34,920 --> 01:01:36,880
Speaker 1: the labor. He doesn't you know how. They come along

920
01:01:36,920 --> 01:01:38,720
Speaker 1: and they give you the little towels on the plane

921
01:01:38,760 --> 01:01:41,560
Speaker 1: and all the little scented stuff. Before you do, he does,

922
01:01:41,600 --> 01:01:44,120
Speaker 1: no, no no, no, no. You will wash later, you will

923
01:01:44,160 --> 01:01:48,880
Speaker 1: burn first, you will rear and grown. And and let

924
01:01:48,920 --> 01:01:50,640
Speaker 1: me prove to you. Let me prove to you the

925
01:01:50,720 --> 01:01:54,280
Speaker 1: Apostle proves to us in the New Testament. I beseech

926
01:01:54,360 --> 01:01:56,280
Speaker 1: you there for a brother, and by the mercies of God,

927
01:01:56,600 --> 01:02:00,720
Speaker 1: that ye present your body a living sacrifice, holy and

928
01:02:00,800 --> 01:02:04,040
Speaker 1: acceptable under God. A living sacrifice is something that is

929
01:02:04,160 --> 01:02:08,480
Speaker 1: put on the altar, alive. Squirming, tied to something that

930
01:02:08,520 --> 01:02:11,760
Speaker 1: doesn't work, tied to something that doesn't move, tied to

931
01:02:11,840 --> 01:02:14,400
Speaker 1: a marriage that doesn't work, tied to a job that

932
01:02:14,440 --> 01:02:17,480
Speaker 1: doesn't work, tied to a city where you're not respected,

933
01:02:17,760 --> 01:02:21,240
Speaker 1: tied to a situation where you're squirming. And God uses

934
01:02:21,320 --> 01:02:25,880
Speaker 1: squirming situations to crucify the flesh. And it's all up front,

935
01:02:26,680 --> 01:02:29,000
Speaker 1: and if you can make it past the first piece

936
01:02:29,000 --> 01:02:32,120
Speaker 1: of furniture, then he'll wash away the stain of the

937
01:02:32,160 --> 01:02:35,479
Speaker 1: blood off of your hands and take you on into

938
01:02:35,600 --> 01:02:41,200
Speaker 1: an area that smells better. Because the first room, the

939
01:02:41,240 --> 01:02:46,880
Speaker 1: first outer court, smells like burning flesh. But if you

940
01:02:46,960 --> 01:02:51,240
Speaker 1: make it to the most holy place, what calms down

941
01:02:51,280 --> 01:02:55,680
Speaker 1: the stench of death. It's the smell of burning incense.

942
01:02:56,720 --> 01:03:00,200
Speaker 1: The prayers and praises of the saints drive back the

943
01:03:00,280 --> 01:03:02,880
Speaker 1: smell of death. And what it costs you to be

944
01:03:03,000 --> 01:03:06,120
Speaker 1: who you are, it costs you to make it now.

945
01:03:06,160 --> 01:03:09,280
Speaker 1: You didn't come through that door to smell death. You

946
01:03:09,440 --> 01:03:11,720
Speaker 1: came to that door to have an encounter with God.

947
01:03:12,120 --> 01:03:14,960
Speaker 1: But you have to walk through the whole process and

948
01:03:15,000 --> 01:03:18,520
Speaker 1: then get to the veil, and get past the veil

949
01:03:18,800 --> 01:03:23,880
Speaker 1: into the holies of holies. You have gone from daylight, daylight,

950
01:03:24,040 --> 01:03:28,800
Speaker 1: natural light, light that everybody sees, to candlelight, which is

951
01:03:28,920 --> 01:03:32,960
Speaker 1: revelatory light, the light of God's word, to their kind

952
01:03:32,960 --> 01:03:37,560
Speaker 1: of glory, which is divine light. Every step you go

953
01:03:37,640 --> 01:03:41,640
Speaker 1: from transition to transition, it smells different, it looks different,

954
01:03:41,760 --> 01:03:45,000
Speaker 1: it feels different. You pass the table of shoe bread,

955
01:03:45,920 --> 01:03:48,600
Speaker 1: where the Bible is specific to say that the table

956
01:03:48,600 --> 01:03:53,320
Speaker 1: of shoebread must be made out of fine flower. Now

957
01:03:53,400 --> 01:03:56,240
Speaker 1: today we don't get that because if you want fine flower,

958
01:03:56,320 --> 01:03:59,080
Speaker 1: you go buy it. But in the wilderness, if you

959
01:03:59,120 --> 01:04:03,960
Speaker 1: want fine flower, were you crush it? The finest flower

960
01:04:04,240 --> 01:04:06,840
Speaker 1: was the only thing that God's bread could be made

961
01:04:06,840 --> 01:04:09,560
Speaker 1: out of. In other words, it had to be crushed

962
01:04:09,680 --> 01:04:13,280
Speaker 1: and crushed and crushed and crushed and crushed until it

963
01:04:13,360 --> 01:04:17,840
Speaker 1: was fine enough to be bred. And in our lives,

964
01:04:17,960 --> 01:04:20,480
Speaker 1: when God gets ready to serve us to the world,

965
01:04:21,400 --> 01:04:24,880
Speaker 1: there are certain crushings that we go through. There are

966
01:04:24,880 --> 01:04:29,160
Speaker 1: certain crushings that you're going through right now in your life,

967
01:04:29,200 --> 01:04:31,800
Speaker 1: and sometimes people don't see it. They don't know that

968
01:04:31,840 --> 01:04:35,600
Speaker 1: you're being crushed because because sometimes you're being crushed in

969
01:04:35,640 --> 01:04:40,840
Speaker 1: your heart, in your emotions. I was doing research for

970
01:04:40,960 --> 01:04:43,360
Speaker 1: my book, and I found out that the same part

971
01:04:43,360 --> 01:04:48,480
Speaker 1: of the brain that processes physical pain processes emotional pain.

972
01:04:49,400 --> 01:04:52,280
Speaker 1: So my brain doesn't know whether my heart is broken

973
01:04:52,320 --> 01:04:56,200
Speaker 1: or whether you stab me in the leg. The same

974
01:04:56,480 --> 01:05:00,160
Speaker 1: part of the cerebellum that sends the message that you're

975
01:05:00,160 --> 01:05:03,640
Speaker 1: in pain is just as intense about a broken heart

976
01:05:03,840 --> 01:05:07,720
Speaker 1: as it is about a stabbed legs. You understand. So

977
01:05:07,880 --> 01:05:10,440
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, I'm in trauma, but there's no

978
01:05:10,600 --> 01:05:14,360
Speaker 1: paramedic because I'm not bleeding. I'm not being crushed on

979
01:05:14,400 --> 01:05:17,720
Speaker 1: the outside where you can put a tourniquet on it

980
01:05:17,760 --> 01:05:20,320
Speaker 1: and send me to the emergency room. I'm being crushed

981
01:05:20,360 --> 01:05:23,600
Speaker 1: in my heart. I'm being crushed by failed expectations. I'm

982
01:05:23,600 --> 01:05:26,040
Speaker 1: being crushed by the fact that I'm older now and

983
01:05:26,080 --> 01:05:28,080
Speaker 1: I thought I would be further than I am, and

984
01:05:28,120 --> 01:05:30,560
Speaker 1: I am not. God has a whole lot of ways

985
01:05:30,600 --> 01:05:33,320
Speaker 1: to crush you. I'm being crushed by bankruptcy. I'm being

986
01:05:33,360 --> 01:05:36,640
Speaker 1: crushed by disappointment. I'm being crushed because I love somebody

987
01:05:36,640 --> 01:05:39,280
Speaker 1: who won't love me back. I'm being crushed because I

988
01:05:39,320 --> 01:05:42,200
Speaker 1: have a child who disrespects me. There are all kinds

989
01:05:42,240 --> 01:05:44,560
Speaker 1: of ways for you to be crushed in places that

990
01:05:44,640 --> 01:05:47,400
Speaker 1: people don't see, and it affects you like you are

991
01:05:47,440 --> 01:05:54,240
Speaker 1: being stabbed. This trauma of the soul cannot be treated

992
01:05:54,280 --> 01:05:58,920
Speaker 1: in the hospital. This trauma of the soul, the secret

993
01:05:59,320 --> 01:06:03,840
Speaker 1: crushing that God allows us to go through sometimes in

994
01:06:03,880 --> 01:06:08,680
Speaker 1: our lives, are beyond expl explanation. And yet there's not

995
01:06:08,840 --> 01:06:12,000
Speaker 1: a person in this room, young or old, black or white, rich,

996
01:06:12,040 --> 01:06:16,200
Speaker 1: or poor, intellectual or illiterate who escapes it. You cannot

997
01:06:16,240 --> 01:06:19,120
Speaker 1: live in this world and not need what I'm talking about.

998
01:06:20,520 --> 01:06:24,960
Speaker 1: You cannot live in this world. I need it. Something

999
01:06:26,000 --> 01:06:30,640
Speaker 1: in your life is going to be what God uses

1000
01:06:30,920 --> 01:06:36,600
Speaker 1: to crush you. But remember that crushing is not the end.

1001
01:06:38,560 --> 01:06:41,840
Speaker 1: Crushing is not. Then after the grapes have been smashed,

1002
01:06:42,000 --> 01:06:45,120
Speaker 1: I started into this download, and I saw the Bible

1003
01:06:45,160 --> 01:06:48,560
Speaker 1: said in Genesis that the heel that the seed of

1004
01:06:48,600 --> 01:06:51,240
Speaker 1: the woman would bruise ahead of the serpent, and serpent

1005
01:06:51,240 --> 01:06:53,760
Speaker 1: would bruise his heel. And I looked at the heels

1006
01:06:53,800 --> 01:06:57,600
Speaker 1: of Jesus. And I looked at the bruised heel of Jesus,

1007
01:06:57,760 --> 01:07:00,240
Speaker 1: and immediately I was taken in the spirit. And I

1008
01:07:00,240 --> 01:07:03,800
Speaker 1: saw women trembling on grapes. And when I saw the

1009
01:07:03,840 --> 01:07:06,960
Speaker 1: women trembling on grapes, I saw the stains of the

1010
01:07:07,000 --> 01:07:09,600
Speaker 1: grapes on the heels of their feet. And all of

1011
01:07:09,640 --> 01:07:12,320
Speaker 1: a sudden, the Holy ghosts begin to connect the blood

1012
01:07:12,600 --> 01:07:15,160
Speaker 1: and the redemptive power of Jesus Christ with the crushing

1013
01:07:15,200 --> 01:07:17,640
Speaker 1: of the grape. And when I looked at Jesus holding

1014
01:07:17,640 --> 01:07:19,760
Speaker 1: the cup, I knew that he was in the cup.

1015
01:07:19,760 --> 01:07:24,800
Speaker 1: And yet he was holding the cup, and immediately I

1016
01:07:24,960 --> 01:07:27,280
Speaker 1: sensed in my spirits, said, I want you to go

1017
01:07:27,480 --> 01:07:31,360
Speaker 1: tell my people that crushing is a stage. It's not

1018
01:07:31,480 --> 01:07:39,520
Speaker 1: a destination. It's not a destination. It's not a destination.

1019
01:07:40,160 --> 01:07:42,800
Speaker 1: Do not, do not. I gotta get this out because

1020
01:07:42,840 --> 01:07:47,520
Speaker 1: this is important. Some people take on a pathology of pain,

1021
01:07:48,640 --> 01:07:53,120
Speaker 1: and they make the crushing their address, and they live

1022
01:07:53,440 --> 01:07:57,000
Speaker 1: in what should have been a stage, and no matter

1023
01:07:57,040 --> 01:07:59,160
Speaker 1: what you do, you cannot pull them out of it,

1024
01:07:59,240 --> 01:08:03,680
Speaker 1: because pain becomes their normal. They will provoke you till

1025
01:08:03,720 --> 01:08:07,000
Speaker 1: you fight them. They will push you away to you

1026
01:08:07,240 --> 01:08:10,280
Speaker 1: reject them because it is the thing that they are

1027
01:08:10,400 --> 01:08:13,800
Speaker 1: most familiar with, and they don't understand that they self

1028
01:08:13,840 --> 01:08:17,360
Speaker 1: sabotage their success. You're not fighting a demon, You're not

1029
01:08:17,439 --> 01:08:20,280
Speaker 1: fighting the devil. You are fighting the fact that you

1030
01:08:20,439 --> 01:08:24,760
Speaker 1: have become so accustomed to pain that it is your

1031
01:08:24,880 --> 01:08:30,280
Speaker 1: place of residency. And I challenge you today to shatter

1032
01:08:30,479 --> 01:08:32,840
Speaker 1: your way out, to break your way out. If you

1033
01:08:32,920 --> 01:08:34,960
Speaker 1: can't get out of the door, come out of the window.

1034
01:08:35,360 --> 01:08:41,519
Speaker 1: I challenge you today. I challenge you to be happy,

1035
01:08:41,800 --> 01:08:45,640
Speaker 1: even if being happy feels funny. I challenge you to

1036
01:08:45,720 --> 01:08:48,280
Speaker 1: have joy if you feel even if it feels like

1037
01:08:48,360 --> 01:08:51,439
Speaker 1: it's phony, even if it's not you, if it's not

1038
01:08:51,479 --> 01:08:53,639
Speaker 1: your personality, it's not going to be you at first.

1039
01:08:53,720 --> 01:08:55,919
Speaker 1: What do you mean? How do you do that? Because

1040
01:08:56,120 --> 01:08:58,920
Speaker 1: because when you are used to being miserable, you will

1041
01:08:58,960 --> 01:09:01,800
Speaker 1: provoke everything around you until you are miserable. Your self

1042
01:09:01,880 --> 01:09:06,320
Speaker 1: sabotagey because you made what should have been a process,

1043
01:09:06,520 --> 01:09:10,040
Speaker 1: you have made it permanent, and now it's you doing it.

1044
01:09:10,040 --> 01:09:12,759
Speaker 1: It's not God doing it. It's you doing it to yourself.

1045
01:09:12,960 --> 01:09:16,000
Speaker 1: And God is steadily trying to rescue you out of

1046
01:09:16,040 --> 01:09:19,280
Speaker 1: the pit, Joseph, but you won't grab the rope because

1047
01:09:19,320 --> 01:09:22,040
Speaker 1: you have become so comfortable in the pit that even

1048
01:09:22,040 --> 01:09:24,360
Speaker 1: when God sends the minion knites to pull you out

1049
01:09:24,400 --> 01:09:26,320
Speaker 1: of the pit, you choose to stay in the pit

1050
01:09:26,400 --> 01:09:29,960
Speaker 1: because you like it down here. I like it down here.

1051
01:09:30,120 --> 01:09:32,439
Speaker 1: Ain't nobody bothered me down here. I just like to

1052
01:09:32,479 --> 01:09:34,960
Speaker 1: be by myself. I want to be alone. I'm just

1053
01:09:35,000 --> 01:09:37,960
Speaker 1: that kind of person I'm being No, you're not. It

1054
01:09:38,080 --> 01:09:40,799
Speaker 1: is not good for man to be alone. Your creator

1055
01:09:40,840 --> 01:09:43,720
Speaker 1: said you were not designed to be alone. You have

1056
01:09:43,880 --> 01:09:50,920
Speaker 1: allowed the process to become permanent. So when you break out, Stephen,

1057
01:09:51,280 --> 01:09:54,439
Speaker 1: you feel strange. You feel like an immigrant. You feel

1058
01:09:54,479 --> 01:09:57,080
Speaker 1: like a foreigner, you feel like you're in a strange situation,

1059
01:09:57,439 --> 01:10:00,280
Speaker 1: and you want to retreat back to the familiar, because

1060
01:10:00,320 --> 01:10:03,320
Speaker 1: even though it's toxic, it's become your normal. And so

1061
01:10:03,400 --> 01:10:06,040
Speaker 1: when you start getting into these other atmosphere you can't

1062
01:10:06,120 --> 01:10:09,920
Speaker 1: wait to get back to the familiarity of this self

1063
01:10:10,040 --> 01:10:13,760
Speaker 1: inflicted torture that you put on yourself. And anybody who

1064
01:10:13,760 --> 01:10:16,880
Speaker 1: says you preach nice so you look nice good, you

1065
01:10:16,880 --> 01:10:20,920
Speaker 1: don't believe them because believing them would free you. You

1066
01:10:21,160 --> 01:10:32,760
Speaker 1: you you don't believe them. If you believe them, that

1067
01:10:32,840 --> 01:10:35,559
Speaker 1: would free you. Jesus said, you shall know the truth,

1068
01:10:35,840 --> 01:10:39,200
Speaker 1: and the truth shall make you free. That means if

1069
01:10:39,240 --> 01:10:40,760
Speaker 1: I was the double, all I have to do to

1070
01:10:40,840 --> 01:10:43,840
Speaker 1: keep you balance, keep you from knowing it. You can

1071
01:10:43,880 --> 01:10:46,759
Speaker 1: be beautiful, just don't know it. You can be wonderful,

1072
01:10:46,840 --> 01:10:49,320
Speaker 1: just don't know it. You can be effective, just don't

1073
01:10:49,320 --> 01:10:51,479
Speaker 1: know it. You can be smart, just don't know it.

1074
01:10:51,520 --> 01:10:54,840
Speaker 1: And so the enemy keeps you blind to what you

1075
01:10:55,040 --> 01:11:00,840
Speaker 1: have because you're not used to light. The hardest thing

1076
01:11:00,880 --> 01:11:03,559
Speaker 1: in the world is to go from dark rooms into

1077
01:11:03,600 --> 01:11:06,639
Speaker 1: bright light. And so all of a sudden you say, oh,

1078
01:11:06,800 --> 01:11:09,640
Speaker 1: that's too much. And so when God does want to

1079
01:11:09,720 --> 01:11:13,160
Speaker 1: emancipate you, you have a tendency to go back into

1080
01:11:13,200 --> 01:11:17,120
Speaker 1: the crushing place because it is your familiar place. But

1081
01:11:17,240 --> 01:11:21,000
Speaker 1: in order for you to find your strength, you have

1082
01:11:21,160 --> 01:11:23,960
Speaker 1: to not only go into the crushing, you must come

1083
01:11:24,040 --> 01:11:29,880
Speaker 1: out of it. You cannot make wine underfeat. It has

1084
01:11:30,040 --> 01:11:33,120
Speaker 1: to come from the crushing stage to get to the

1085
01:11:33,160 --> 01:11:36,160
Speaker 1: wine stage. It has to survive and talk about the

1086
01:11:36,160 --> 01:11:37,960
Speaker 1: fermenting stage and all of that in the book, and

1087
01:11:37,960 --> 01:11:40,400
Speaker 1: it has to go through these different stages ultimately to

1088
01:11:40,439 --> 01:11:43,439
Speaker 1: become wine. And grapes are at their best when they

1089
01:11:43,479 --> 01:11:47,360
Speaker 1: are wine. Grapes are at their best when they are wine.

1090
01:11:47,400 --> 01:11:51,400
Speaker 1: They are strongest when they are wine. They are more

1091
01:11:51,439 --> 01:11:55,640
Speaker 1: effective when they are wine. They can affect the consumer

1092
01:11:55,840 --> 01:11:59,280
Speaker 1: when they are wine. They infiltrate the blood system when

1093
01:11:59,280 --> 01:12:02,120
Speaker 1: they are wine, like you got to go through digestion.

1094
01:12:04,479 --> 01:12:15,080
Speaker 1: You understand what I'm talking about. Please, please please, I

1095
01:12:15,160 --> 01:12:22,679
Speaker 1: feel in my spirit God breaking through some deeply personal

1096
01:12:22,720 --> 01:12:26,720
Speaker 1: things in this room. Some things that we don't get

1097
01:12:26,720 --> 01:12:28,840
Speaker 1: on Sunday morning and that we don't talk about, and

1098
01:12:28,880 --> 01:12:33,799
Speaker 1: that we don't expose people to. Some pathologies, some ways

1099
01:12:33,840 --> 01:12:40,280
Speaker 1: in which you process yourself that keeps you underfoot. And

1100
01:12:40,320 --> 01:12:43,479
Speaker 1: I wrote crushing to tell you, yes, you go through it,

1101
01:12:43,520 --> 01:12:45,080
Speaker 1: and I go through it, and we go through it,

1102
01:12:45,160 --> 01:12:47,080
Speaker 1: and we all go through it. And I've never met

1103
01:12:47,120 --> 01:12:50,719
Speaker 1: anybody extremely gifted who has not gone through extremely crushing.

1104
01:12:50,960 --> 01:12:57,519
Speaker 1: But none of them stayed there. And I believe that

1105
01:12:58,080 --> 01:13:01,840
Speaker 1: many of you your time has come to come out

1106
01:13:01,840 --> 01:13:06,840
Speaker 1: from underfoot, even if the foot is your own, and

1107
01:13:07,160 --> 01:13:13,759
Speaker 1: to finish the process of becoming what God had in mind.

1108
01:13:14,400 --> 01:13:18,559
Speaker 1: Jesus says, Father, Now glorify me with the glory that

1109
01:13:18,680 --> 01:13:21,599
Speaker 1: I had with you before the foundations of the world.

1110
01:13:21,800 --> 01:13:25,639
Speaker 1: Take me back to what you had in mind. Now.

1111
01:13:25,760 --> 01:13:32,519
Speaker 1: The cross is the transportation, It is not the destination. Wow.

1112
01:13:33,479 --> 01:13:35,760
Speaker 1: First thing my grandmother taught me I was walking through

1113
01:13:35,760 --> 01:13:38,160
Speaker 1: the house. I was a little boy. I'll never forget it.

1114
01:13:38,280 --> 01:13:40,720
Speaker 1: I had bought a crucifix somewhere and it's still you know,

1115
01:13:40,720 --> 01:13:43,280
Speaker 1: a crucifix has Christ on the cross. And she said, no, baby,

1116
01:13:43,320 --> 01:13:48,920
Speaker 1: she said, don't wearry that. He's not there anymore. He's

1117
01:13:48,960 --> 01:13:54,080
Speaker 1: not there anymore. It's important that the cross be empty

1118
01:13:54,200 --> 01:13:56,560
Speaker 1: to remind you that he did not get stuck in

1119
01:13:56,640 --> 01:14:01,400
Speaker 1: a stage. I mean, said, touch somebody and say I'm

1120
01:14:01,400 --> 01:14:05,599
Speaker 1: not there anymore. I'm not there anymore. Some people need

1121
01:14:05,640 --> 01:14:12,000
Speaker 1: you to be there because they have built a system

1122
01:14:12,080 --> 01:14:17,599
Speaker 1: around your pain, and they have they have created jobs

1123
01:14:17,640 --> 01:14:20,280
Speaker 1: around your dysfunction, and they don't want you to get

1124
01:14:20,280 --> 01:14:25,000
Speaker 1: well because if you got well, they're afraid that they

1125
01:14:25,080 --> 01:14:27,760
Speaker 1: might not be important to you. And sometimes it's not

1126
01:14:27,960 --> 01:14:31,800
Speaker 1: in their interest for you to recover. I'm going on

1127
01:14:31,880 --> 01:14:35,840
Speaker 1: and on. Let me turn up. I should write a book, aside,

1128
01:14:36,000 --> 01:14:46,320
Speaker 1: I should write a book. It's like therapy. I'm settled.

1129
01:14:47,640 --> 01:14:49,680
Speaker 1: I should I should write a book because what I'm

1130
01:14:49,720 --> 01:14:53,479
Speaker 1: talking about is so personal that you should be in

1131
01:14:53,520 --> 01:14:58,439
Speaker 1: your bed reading this where I told them, I told

1132
01:14:58,520 --> 01:15:00,880
Speaker 1: them now this is I'm old school, so look over me.

1133
01:15:01,040 --> 01:15:04,040
Speaker 1: This is even look over. I still like books. Now

1134
01:15:04,080 --> 01:15:06,280
Speaker 1: we have the books and stuff like that. That's nice.

1135
01:15:06,280 --> 01:15:08,479
Speaker 1: And to all of you that are different, get the

1136
01:15:08,479 --> 01:15:10,200
Speaker 1: e books and then we have audiobooks and we have

1137
01:15:10,240 --> 01:15:12,439
Speaker 1: it in Spanish and all that kind of stuff. I

1138
01:15:12,560 --> 01:15:16,360
Speaker 1: like books. I like books so that I can dog

1139
01:15:16,400 --> 01:15:21,600
Speaker 1: hear the pages and bend it back and abuse the

1140
01:15:21,680 --> 01:15:25,439
Speaker 1: book and write my stuff on top of the book.

1141
01:15:25,880 --> 01:15:32,360
Speaker 1: Because when you hear a writer, think that's what reading is.

1142
01:15:32,479 --> 01:15:37,160
Speaker 1: Is to hear your writer think. It impregnates you with

1143
01:15:37,280 --> 01:15:41,000
Speaker 1: thought until you start thinking things that are not even

1144
01:15:41,040 --> 01:15:44,240
Speaker 1: in the book. And so I like to write little things,

1145
01:15:44,400 --> 01:15:46,800
Speaker 1: little notes that came to me as a result of

1146
01:15:46,880 --> 01:15:49,120
Speaker 1: something I read in the book. And I like to

1147
01:15:49,160 --> 01:15:51,559
Speaker 1: get like a little bit of jelly on the book

1148
01:15:54,280 --> 01:15:57,000
Speaker 1: and spill my coffee on it, or just a little bit,

1149
01:15:57,320 --> 01:16:00,000
Speaker 1: just a little bit, so that I got high lighted

1150
01:16:00,160 --> 01:16:02,320
Speaker 1: parts of the book and notes in the book, and

1151
01:16:02,400 --> 01:16:04,160
Speaker 1: a little bit of jelly and a little coffee. But

1152
01:16:04,240 --> 01:16:06,679
Speaker 1: then somebody wants to bob, no, you can't have my book.

1153
01:16:08,240 --> 01:16:10,679
Speaker 1: That's a DNA in there, my favorites, and to beget

1154
01:16:10,680 --> 01:16:15,160
Speaker 1: a wife from me. That's my book. You cannot lead.

1155
01:16:15,240 --> 01:16:22,040
Speaker 1: If you do not read, you cannot lead. We have

1156
01:16:22,280 --> 01:16:28,840
Speaker 1: raised a world that has everything so automated that we're

1157
01:16:28,880 --> 01:16:34,439
Speaker 1: afraid of quiet. We want little sound bites information. So

1158
01:16:34,520 --> 01:16:36,439
Speaker 1: what happens? Let me tell you what this generation does.

1159
01:16:38,040 --> 01:16:41,240
Speaker 1: I can post an excerpt from the book on Instagram.

1160
01:16:42,120 --> 01:16:45,000
Speaker 1: It can blow your socks off and you will repost it,

1161
01:16:46,200 --> 01:16:51,760
Speaker 1: but not read the book. So you walk away with

1162
01:16:51,920 --> 01:17:05,559
Speaker 1: cliches but no wisdom. So when the enemy tries you

1163
01:17:06,920 --> 01:17:09,719
Speaker 1: and finds out that there's nothing beneath you but something

1164
01:17:09,760 --> 01:17:13,320
Speaker 1: that you reposted but you really don't understand, and you

1165
01:17:13,439 --> 01:17:16,680
Speaker 1: really have delved down into and he starts attacking you

1166
01:17:16,760 --> 01:17:20,000
Speaker 1: on the level that you spoke on. You're not able

1167
01:17:20,040 --> 01:17:22,640
Speaker 1: to stand up against it because you don't have the

1168
01:17:22,840 --> 01:17:32,160
Speaker 1: roots you understand. I'm sad. I sense that coming through

1169
01:17:32,200 --> 01:17:36,080
Speaker 1: in the book that you're frustrated with this microwave mentality. Yes,

1170
01:17:36,760 --> 01:17:40,800
Speaker 1: you're frustrated with this skim the surface spirituality. Yes, that

1171
01:17:40,920 --> 01:17:42,960
Speaker 1: you're seeing a failure of it in the church and

1172
01:17:43,080 --> 01:17:48,920
Speaker 1: in our lives. Yes, And I don't I don't want

1173
01:17:49,240 --> 01:17:57,400
Speaker 1: to leave this world without making sure that what our

1174
01:17:57,520 --> 01:18:06,320
Speaker 1: fathers passed to us, it's passed to you. Our father

1175
01:18:06,439 --> 01:18:08,960
Speaker 1: sat around the dinner tables and talked about the Lord,

1176
01:18:09,240 --> 01:18:11,479
Speaker 1: and we would wash dishes and do anything just to

1177
01:18:11,479 --> 01:18:13,640
Speaker 1: be in the kitchen or be around where the conversations

1178
01:18:13,680 --> 01:18:18,599
Speaker 1: were being held. And and and the level of our

1179
01:18:18,800 --> 01:18:21,519
Speaker 1: thought was cultivated because we got to be in the

1180
01:18:21,640 --> 01:18:25,400
Speaker 1: room where it happened, where it happened, where it happened.

1181
01:18:25,640 --> 01:18:29,639
Speaker 1: And so I'm writing, and I'm teaching, and I'm speaking

1182
01:18:30,800 --> 01:18:34,360
Speaker 1: at this season in my life because I think I

1183
01:18:34,400 --> 01:18:40,360
Speaker 1: see a fading away, generals going home, generals going home,

1184
01:18:40,520 --> 01:18:43,920
Speaker 1: or Roberts gone home, Billy Graham gone home. Countless people

1185
01:18:44,000 --> 01:18:47,400
Speaker 1: gone home that that we loved and cherish of all

1186
01:18:47,560 --> 01:18:51,320
Speaker 1: racist colors and hymns all denominations. Some of our top

1187
01:18:51,439 --> 01:18:55,360
Speaker 1: thinkers are going home, and they're being replaced with our

1188
01:18:55,400 --> 01:19:06,200
Speaker 1: top tweeters. And so we're now breaking because it's trending.

1189
01:19:06,240 --> 01:19:09,160
Speaker 1: My god, it's trending. You know, it's trending. It's trending.

1190
01:19:09,640 --> 01:19:15,000
Speaker 1: And what I want is to get the word in

1191
01:19:15,040 --> 01:19:20,000
Speaker 1: a place that can't be hacked. Thy word have I

1192
01:19:20,120 --> 01:19:26,120
Speaker 1: hid in my heart so that what I'm talking about

1193
01:19:26,560 --> 01:19:29,080
Speaker 1: is so deep. It has to get in you to

1194
01:19:29,120 --> 01:19:32,280
Speaker 1: heal you. It can't just be something cute you put

1195
01:19:32,320 --> 01:19:35,960
Speaker 1: on so you get more followers. I don't want to

1196
01:19:36,000 --> 01:19:38,760
Speaker 1: do that with you. I didn't come up here so

1197
01:19:38,840 --> 01:19:41,800
Speaker 1: you get more followers. I want you to get this

1198
01:19:41,920 --> 01:19:43,800
Speaker 1: down in you so that when you had one of

1199
01:19:43,800 --> 01:19:46,479
Speaker 1: those bad nights like I've had, where you're curled up

1200
01:19:46,479 --> 01:19:49,600
Speaker 1: in a corner and you really secretly want to die,

1201
01:19:50,160 --> 01:19:52,360
Speaker 1: that you have enough inside and you to pull you

1202
01:19:52,479 --> 01:19:54,040
Speaker 1: up off of the floor and get you back up

1203
01:19:54,080 --> 01:20:03,280
Speaker 1: from your feet a going I want to put enough

1204
01:20:03,280 --> 01:20:05,840
Speaker 1: word in you so that when you are holding your

1205
01:20:05,880 --> 01:20:10,559
Speaker 1: mother like I held mine, and watch her gasp and die,

1206
01:20:12,600 --> 01:20:16,760
Speaker 1: and feel her body get cold in your arms and

1207
01:20:16,880 --> 01:20:21,280
Speaker 1: rock her to see stiff, that you'll have something inside

1208
01:20:21,280 --> 01:20:24,880
Speaker 1: of you that will not break, that will not fade away,

1209
01:20:25,760 --> 01:20:28,840
Speaker 1: that will not fall apart, that will make you able

1210
01:20:28,880 --> 01:20:31,160
Speaker 1: to stand even if the person you love walks out

1211
01:20:31,200 --> 01:20:46,200
Speaker 1: on you, that you cry, but you don't die. This

1212
01:20:46,200 --> 01:20:54,520
Speaker 1: this is not about selling books. It's about leaving footprints.

1213
01:20:57,880 --> 01:20:59,519
Speaker 1: I'm okay. If you don't get in the book, I'll

1214
01:20:59,520 --> 01:21:05,800
Speaker 1: be fine. I'm good. This is not about commercialization. I

1215
01:21:05,800 --> 01:21:08,760
Speaker 1: say I'm good because all my kids are grumba. I'm good.

1216
01:21:09,120 --> 01:21:11,240
Speaker 1: I'm good. We can downside and live in the trailer somewhere.

1217
01:21:11,240 --> 01:21:13,120
Speaker 1: We make it. We'll be all right. We will make

1218
01:21:13,160 --> 01:21:15,240
Speaker 1: it to old age. We are in old age now,

1219
01:21:15,280 --> 01:21:26,000
Speaker 1: but we're in denial. I want to leave footprints behind.

1220
01:21:28,000 --> 01:21:34,000
Speaker 1: My son is in this room right now. I want

1221
01:21:34,000 --> 01:21:37,639
Speaker 1: to say something that outlives me. I want to say

1222
01:21:37,640 --> 01:21:41,400
Speaker 1: something that catches in when I'm dead. I want to

1223
01:21:41,439 --> 01:21:45,559
Speaker 1: say something that becomes fuel for the next two hundred years,

1224
01:21:45,600 --> 01:21:49,760
Speaker 1: that lives on in your mouth and the mouths of

1225
01:21:49,840 --> 01:22:00,160
Speaker 1: your children. I'm way past needing to be known, have

1226
01:22:00,920 --> 01:22:13,240
Speaker 1: smell the fragrance of his presence as unworthy as I am,

1227
01:22:13,400 --> 01:22:18,040
Speaker 1: and I have this this need to tell you, and

1228
01:22:18,120 --> 01:22:25,600
Speaker 1: he's more than amazing, that he's greater than religion, and

1229
01:22:25,640 --> 01:22:28,439
Speaker 1: he's better than your dogma and your creed and your

1230
01:22:28,600 --> 01:22:33,880
Speaker 1: doctrines and your theology. That sometimes he saw the only

1231
01:22:33,960 --> 01:22:36,320
Speaker 1: thing in an unstable world that keeps you from falling

1232
01:22:36,360 --> 01:22:52,479
Speaker 1: absolutely apart. So I call it crushing, and I want

1233
01:22:52,479 --> 01:22:54,000
Speaker 1: to tell you so I'm going to be honest with you.

1234
01:22:54,040 --> 01:22:56,200
Speaker 1: The subtitle really is in mine, it's what the it's

1235
01:22:56,240 --> 01:22:59,400
Speaker 1: what the publishers. One of my title really was crushing

1236
01:22:59,760 --> 01:23:04,880
Speaker 1: is the end, because the substratum of the Bunk is

1237
01:23:04,960 --> 01:23:12,559
Speaker 1: really about not getting stuck in a stage and deteriorating

1238
01:23:13,520 --> 01:23:19,519
Speaker 1: and rotting and giving it up on yourself and your

1239
01:23:19,640 --> 01:23:23,640
Speaker 1: dreams and how to be productive at every stage of

1240
01:23:23,680 --> 01:23:27,760
Speaker 1: your life and not to think because you have a setback,

1241
01:23:27,960 --> 01:23:30,760
Speaker 1: that this is not God and that you can't win

1242
01:23:31,000 --> 01:23:33,200
Speaker 1: and that you can't be successful. Because I would not

1243
01:23:33,600 --> 01:23:37,360
Speaker 1: be here if I believe the first ten years of

1244
01:23:37,439 --> 01:23:41,559
Speaker 1: my pastor, and I wouldn't be here. Wow, I passed

1245
01:23:41,720 --> 01:23:44,000
Speaker 1: the first few years of my church, sitting on a

1246
01:23:44,040 --> 01:23:48,320
Speaker 1: piano bench. My foot was the drum I played for

1247
01:23:48,439 --> 01:23:52,040
Speaker 1: myself while I was preaching. I took all the money

1248
01:23:52,040 --> 01:23:55,160
Speaker 1: from my job and put it into my church. My

1249
01:23:55,240 --> 01:23:59,000
Speaker 1: mama was frying fish and chicken behind the wall because

1250
01:23:59,040 --> 01:24:03,280
Speaker 1: she believed in my d and had success been determined

1251
01:24:03,320 --> 01:24:07,880
Speaker 1: by numbers, I would have quit. But the Bible said,

1252
01:24:07,920 --> 01:24:12,800
Speaker 1: after you suffered a while, I'll establish shit and make

1253
01:24:12,880 --> 01:24:17,799
Speaker 1: you perfect. When I started preaching all over the country,

1254
01:24:17,880 --> 01:24:20,000
Speaker 1: like you're preaching all over the country, I was still

1255
01:24:20,040 --> 01:24:23,040
Speaker 1: pastoring the storefront and they were making fun of me

1256
01:24:23,080 --> 01:24:25,839
Speaker 1: because I was preaching in all the biggest churches around

1257
01:24:25,840 --> 01:24:28,400
Speaker 1: the country, and I came home to a storefront. It

1258
01:24:28,520 --> 01:24:31,080
Speaker 1: was so small that when people came to visit me,

1259
01:24:31,320 --> 01:24:32,920
Speaker 1: I was standing at the front door and watch them

1260
01:24:33,000 --> 01:24:37,360
Speaker 1: drive past. No, I'm not being fun. I'm telling the truth.

1261
01:24:37,479 --> 01:24:39,840
Speaker 1: They would be looking for my church. It was at

1262
01:24:39,880 --> 01:24:42,080
Speaker 1: that point. It was right across the street from Rose

1263
01:24:42,160 --> 01:24:45,120
Speaker 1: City Cafeteria in South Charles and Westernginia, and they would

1264
01:24:45,120 --> 01:24:46,840
Speaker 1: be driving past. They were looking for one of those

1265
01:24:46,840 --> 01:24:50,040
Speaker 1: big places. They went right past my church like it

1266
01:24:50,120 --> 01:24:54,760
Speaker 1: wasn't even there. When I got on national television. I

1267
01:24:54,840 --> 01:25:01,759
Speaker 1: had one person, one staff person in our entire ministry.

1268
01:25:01,800 --> 01:25:05,599
Speaker 1: We had eight thousand dollars in the bay and the

1269
01:25:05,640 --> 01:25:08,920
Speaker 1: first time one eight hundred Bishop Too rang in. I

1270
01:25:08,960 --> 01:25:12,559
Speaker 1: had all the church mothers answering the phones. I had

1271
01:25:12,600 --> 01:25:14,439
Speaker 1: a phone in the pulpit. I had a phone in

1272
01:25:14,520 --> 01:25:16,679
Speaker 1: the sound room. I had a phone in my office,

1273
01:25:16,840 --> 01:25:19,000
Speaker 1: and I had a phone in Beverly's office. And I

1274
01:25:19,040 --> 01:25:21,040
Speaker 1: had all these old ladies asking the fellow saying what

1275
01:25:21,120 --> 01:25:25,720
Speaker 1: ain't hand Bishop too? And they were writing stuff, and

1276
01:25:25,720 --> 01:25:28,720
Speaker 1: we couldn't even read what the people had said. We

1277
01:25:28,760 --> 01:25:31,759
Speaker 1: couldn't read the prayer request because our hands was shaken.

1278
01:25:34,280 --> 01:25:38,480
Speaker 1: And I only I didn't own a duplicator. I borrowed

1279
01:25:38,560 --> 01:25:41,559
Speaker 1: a duplicator from Brian Keith Williams and drove to Columbus,

1280
01:25:41,600 --> 01:25:44,960
Speaker 1: Ohio to get it. To just start duplicating pape. It

1281
01:25:45,000 --> 01:25:51,120
Speaker 1: does not matter where you start, do you hear me?

1282
01:25:51,720 --> 01:25:56,120
Speaker 1: It does not matter where you start, It matters where

1283
01:25:56,160 --> 01:26:00,120
Speaker 1: you finish. It does not matter how you suffer. It

1284
01:26:00,200 --> 01:26:02,800
Speaker 1: does not matter how they laugh at you and make

1285
01:26:02,920 --> 01:26:06,080
Speaker 1: fun of you. They told jokes about me. They said

1286
01:26:06,120 --> 01:26:09,559
Speaker 1: I never have anything. They said I couldn't preach. They

1287
01:26:09,560 --> 01:26:12,519
Speaker 1: said I couldn't pastor they said, they said, they said,

1288
01:26:12,600 --> 01:26:16,439
Speaker 1: they said, they said that none of it was true,

1289
01:26:16,760 --> 01:26:19,880
Speaker 1: None of it was true. Do you have to hold

1290
01:26:19,920 --> 01:26:24,880
Speaker 1: your truth inside of you? You have to know when

1291
01:26:24,920 --> 01:26:27,639
Speaker 1: all hell is breaking loose, and he that has begun

1292
01:26:28,080 --> 01:26:31,040
Speaker 1: a good work in you shall perform it until the

1293
01:26:31,080 --> 01:26:35,240
Speaker 1: day of Jesus Christ. I know I'm probably gone over it.

1294
01:26:35,400 --> 01:26:39,200
Speaker 1: I don't know what I'm suppore to do. How many

1295
01:26:39,200 --> 01:26:45,920
Speaker 1: people are being blessed tonight? How many people needed this

1296
01:26:46,040 --> 01:26:57,639
Speaker 1: word from God about trusting tone everybody in here who's

1297
01:26:57,680 --> 01:27:00,439
Speaker 1: been through something Prussian just touch somebody and tell them

1298
01:27:00,479 --> 01:27:10,280
Speaker 1: it crushed me and crust me. But I survived. Crowd

1299
01:27:11,120 --> 01:27:15,880
Speaker 1: but I survived, and trust me, but I survived. I

1300
01:27:15,920 --> 01:27:24,599
Speaker 1: went to a test that I survived because I figure

1301
01:27:24,640 --> 01:27:29,240
Speaker 1: if you would tell them that it crushed you. I

1302
01:27:29,280 --> 01:27:31,719
Speaker 1: think that if you would tell them and stop acting

1303
01:27:31,880 --> 01:27:36,720
Speaker 1: like you don't relate to this, then we would see

1304
01:27:36,760 --> 01:27:41,600
Speaker 1: survivors and other people would learn that that you that

1305
01:27:41,680 --> 01:27:47,240
Speaker 1: there's something beyond the crushing. That grapes do turn to wine,

1306
01:27:48,040 --> 01:27:53,120
Speaker 1: that crosses turned to crown, the pain turns to power,

1307
01:27:54,760 --> 01:28:00,120
Speaker 1: the scars turn the stars. Somebody needs to know that

1308
01:28:01,200 --> 01:28:05,720
Speaker 1: you and Honeyboo didn't live together happily for fifty years.

1309
01:28:09,160 --> 01:28:11,920
Speaker 1: Sometimes you just came home because that's where your shoes were.

1310
01:28:16,160 --> 01:28:18,679
Speaker 1: Sometimes she faced the east and you face the west,

1311
01:28:20,000 --> 01:28:22,240
Speaker 1: and your hip bones didn't even touch. You was so

1312
01:28:22,360 --> 01:28:26,040
Speaker 1: far apart. I can sleep on you know, that little

1313
01:28:26,200 --> 01:28:29,920
Speaker 1: rail on the side of the mattress. I can get

1314
01:28:30,000 --> 01:28:36,040
Speaker 1: my whole big body, the entirety of my two hundred

1315
01:28:36,080 --> 01:28:40,320
Speaker 1: and eighty plus bounds, can lay right on that edge

1316
01:28:40,439 --> 01:28:51,120
Speaker 1: all night long and knock fall off the edge. Yes

1317
01:28:51,160 --> 01:28:59,000
Speaker 1: it can, Yes it can. We got people that get

1318
01:28:59,080 --> 01:29:03,240
Speaker 1: married and if everything isn't wonderful, in nine months, they're out.

1319
01:29:06,240 --> 01:29:14,200
Speaker 1: They've been in twelve churches, they quit every job they

1320
01:29:14,240 --> 01:29:16,920
Speaker 1: had because they don't recognize your worth and who you are.

1321
01:29:17,080 --> 01:29:28,120
Speaker 1: Shut up, Shut up, grab a broom, sweet mop, do something.

1322
01:29:29,800 --> 01:29:33,320
Speaker 1: God puts you there to learn something. It's not always

1323
01:29:33,320 --> 01:29:38,280
Speaker 1: about the money. Sometimes it's about the moment. Sometimes it's

1324
01:29:38,320 --> 01:29:41,600
Speaker 1: about somebody you met. Sometimes it's somebody got sent you

1325
01:29:41,640 --> 01:29:56,760
Speaker 1: there to influence. Everything is not about you. We talk

1326
01:29:56,920 --> 01:30:03,000
Speaker 1: like this, you and I all the time. If all

1327
01:30:03,000 --> 01:30:05,639
Speaker 1: of y'all left, we would still be sitting there talking

1328
01:30:05,680 --> 01:30:09,040
Speaker 1: like this. We talk like this on the phone because

1329
01:30:09,080 --> 01:30:30,800
Speaker 1: you know what your pastor has greatness in him, and

1330
01:30:31,600 --> 01:30:36,120
Speaker 1: you know what greatness needs. Greatness always needs a friend.

1331
01:30:41,720 --> 01:30:48,960
Speaker 1: Greatness always needs somebody to say I'm scared. Greatness always

1332
01:30:48,960 --> 01:30:56,240
Speaker 1: needs somebody who will not judge you criticize. Greatness always

1333
01:30:56,280 --> 01:31:01,160
Speaker 1: needs a soft place to fall because sometimes being great

1334
01:31:01,840 --> 01:31:11,240
Speaker 1: ain't so great. Sometimes being great means being crushed and

1335
01:31:11,360 --> 01:31:17,160
Speaker 1: not being allowed to whimper. Sometimes being great means bearing

1336
01:31:17,240 --> 01:31:19,920
Speaker 1: the fact that you're in a crushing season and helping

1337
01:31:20,000 --> 01:31:29,719
Speaker 1: other people and going home empty yourself. Sometimes being great

1338
01:31:30,160 --> 01:31:34,840
Speaker 1: means giving all of your courage to people until they

1339
01:31:34,880 --> 01:31:40,320
Speaker 1: go home encourage and you get in your card discourage

1340
01:31:41,000 --> 01:31:42,720
Speaker 1: and sit up to two or three o'clock in the

1341
01:31:42,760 --> 01:31:52,479
Speaker 1: morning trying to get yourself to sleep. So before you

1342
01:31:52,520 --> 01:31:57,680
Speaker 1: become jealous of anybody you see on any stage, you

1343
01:31:57,760 --> 01:32:00,519
Speaker 1: don't have to be preaching the hip hop. I don't

1344
01:32:00,560 --> 01:32:05,320
Speaker 1: care what it is poetry, drama, art, science, math, technology,

1345
01:32:05,479 --> 01:32:11,240
Speaker 1: I don't care what platform it may be. They didn't

1346
01:32:11,240 --> 01:32:17,280
Speaker 1: get there because they were cute. They got there because

1347
01:32:17,280 --> 01:32:31,960
Speaker 1: they were crushed. And all I want to be is

1348
01:32:34,920 --> 01:32:41,080
Speaker 1: it's some soft place for you to say I'm tired

1349
01:32:42,320 --> 01:32:46,519
Speaker 1: or i'm mad, I'm aggravated, I got a revolution, I

1350
01:32:46,600 --> 01:32:51,840
Speaker 1: heard from God, or I feel empty. And the reason

1351
01:32:51,880 --> 01:32:54,360
Speaker 1: I want to give you that is because I know

1352
01:32:54,479 --> 01:32:59,400
Speaker 1: so well what it is to need that, and I

1353
01:32:59,439 --> 01:33:06,600
Speaker 1: know how valuable it is when you are crushing secret places.

1354
01:33:06,840 --> 01:33:13,840
Speaker 1: Nobody comforts you when you are Superman. Nobody knows your

1355
01:33:13,920 --> 01:33:26,120
Speaker 1: Clark kim Ya. And for every heroic mama, grandmama, big mama, daddy,

1356
01:33:27,160 --> 01:33:33,920
Speaker 1: big brother, uncle, single parent in this room, you know

1357
01:33:33,960 --> 01:33:38,000
Speaker 1: what I'm talking about. You know that Mama's not always

1358
01:33:38,000 --> 01:33:43,080
Speaker 1: as happy as the kids think she is. You know

1359
01:33:43,160 --> 01:33:45,760
Speaker 1: that it's not always as easy to be daddy as

1360
01:33:45,760 --> 01:33:49,400
Speaker 1: it looks like it is. You know what it is

1361
01:33:49,600 --> 01:33:52,919
Speaker 1: to have to be consistent while you are being crushed.

1362
01:33:56,600 --> 01:34:03,000
Speaker 1: It is to you that I write, It is to

1363
01:34:03,120 --> 01:34:09,200
Speaker 1: you that I breathe. It is you that gave me calling.

1364
01:34:10,720 --> 01:34:17,799
Speaker 1: All of these years, I'm called to you. I always

1365
01:34:17,840 --> 01:34:22,880
Speaker 1: have been, I always have been, I probably always will be.

1366
01:34:33,680 --> 01:34:35,280
Speaker 1: Can I can I get up? I want to get up.

1367
01:34:35,280 --> 01:34:38,120
Speaker 1: I want to get up. I want I want to

1368
01:34:38,160 --> 01:34:44,840
Speaker 1: tell you that I'm I'm here for you. I ain't much,

1369
01:34:46,200 --> 01:34:50,640
Speaker 1: I ain't much, but he called me because of you.

1370
01:34:53,000 --> 01:34:55,519
Speaker 1: When I first started preaching earlier in my ministry. I

1371
01:34:55,600 --> 01:34:58,400
Speaker 1: wasn't used to big stages, of big crowds, and all

1372
01:34:58,400 --> 01:35:00,680
Speaker 1: of the heat, and all of the and all of

1373
01:35:00,720 --> 01:35:02,840
Speaker 1: the criticism and all of the envy and all of

1374
01:35:02,880 --> 01:35:05,960
Speaker 1: the strife and all the stuff. Let me fix my clothes, Lord,

1375
01:35:08,040 --> 01:35:10,080
Speaker 1: fix the old man up. If you're gonna be standing

1376
01:35:10,120 --> 01:35:14,679
Speaker 1: behind me, Lisia can at Lisia can do it. Fix

1377
01:35:14,760 --> 01:35:21,120
Speaker 1: me up. And when this old country boy first got

1378
01:35:21,120 --> 01:35:25,040
Speaker 1: exposed to what it costs to be up front, I

1379
01:35:25,080 --> 01:35:29,400
Speaker 1: didn't want it. And I'd gone to evangel Temple in

1380
01:35:29,720 --> 01:35:32,320
Speaker 1: d C. And preach, and I decided, I'm appreciate night,

1381
01:35:32,400 --> 01:35:36,600
Speaker 1: I'm gonna quit. The Washington Post had written a blistering

1382
01:35:36,640 --> 01:35:41,479
Speaker 1: what I thought was a blistering article about me, because

1383
01:35:41,640 --> 01:35:46,840
Speaker 1: that's what they do. They never write blistering articles about

1384
01:35:47,000 --> 01:35:52,639
Speaker 1: preachers that aren't big enough to be known, because then

1385
01:35:52,680 --> 01:35:56,760
Speaker 1: the controversy sales product. You have to be big enough

1386
01:35:56,760 --> 01:36:02,280
Speaker 1: to be attacked. I should have seen it as a compliment,

1387
01:36:02,320 --> 01:36:06,320
Speaker 1: but I wasn't mature enough to understand that levels bring

1388
01:36:06,439 --> 01:36:09,080
Speaker 1: new devils and that promotions bring new problems. And I

1389
01:36:09,920 --> 01:36:16,000
Speaker 1: didn't understand that to be in the paper at all,

1390
01:36:16,680 --> 01:36:19,040
Speaker 1: Even though I wasn't misunderstood, and the paper meant that

1391
01:36:19,080 --> 01:36:23,519
Speaker 1: I was significant enough to be evaluated. I hadn't gotten

1392
01:36:23,520 --> 01:36:27,879
Speaker 1: there yet, so I wanted to quit. And I decided

1393
01:36:27,880 --> 01:36:31,000
Speaker 1: this my last sermon. I preached my head off and

1394
01:36:31,080 --> 01:36:34,599
Speaker 1: I said that's it. And I was in act Ours Fellowship,

1395
01:36:34,600 --> 01:36:36,560
Speaker 1: and they kept worrying me about some woman downstairs that

1396
01:36:36,680 --> 01:36:40,360
Speaker 1: morning to see me. And I said, well, she's there

1397
01:36:40,400 --> 01:36:42,479
Speaker 1: when I come down. Because I was tired, I wasn't

1398
01:36:42,520 --> 01:36:46,320
Speaker 1: going down. That was my way. Again. I said, she's

1399
01:36:46,360 --> 01:36:49,280
Speaker 1: there when I come down, I'll talk to her. Well.

1400
01:36:49,320 --> 01:36:51,800
Speaker 1: I finally came downstairs. This woman was standing there. She

1401
01:36:51,920 --> 01:36:58,280
Speaker 1: was tiny and frail and shaken, and she said, I

1402
01:36:58,360 --> 01:37:03,240
Speaker 1: came all the way here to see you. She said,

1403
01:37:03,280 --> 01:37:07,200
Speaker 1: I just got out of the hospital. I checked myself out.

1404
01:37:09,040 --> 01:37:11,519
Speaker 1: She said I was carrying a dead baby in my

1405
01:37:11,960 --> 01:37:15,760
Speaker 1: boom and the baby was rotting inside of me. And

1406
01:37:15,800 --> 01:37:19,160
Speaker 1: I've never been so sick in all of my life.

1407
01:37:21,000 --> 01:37:23,080
Speaker 1: And she said the only thing that kept me alive

1408
01:37:23,280 --> 01:37:28,519
Speaker 1: was hearing you preach. Wow. And she said, if you

1409
01:37:28,600 --> 01:37:35,719
Speaker 1: didn't keep preaching, I would have died. And she said

1410
01:37:35,720 --> 01:37:37,320
Speaker 1: the Lord spoke to me and told me to get

1411
01:37:37,400 --> 01:37:41,160
Speaker 1: up out of the hospital and go find you and

1412
01:37:41,280 --> 01:37:46,880
Speaker 1: to tell you it's not for them that you preach.

1413
01:37:48,680 --> 01:38:04,439
Speaker 1: It's for us. She said, it's for us. It's not

1414
01:38:04,520 --> 01:38:10,120
Speaker 1: for them, it's for us. I staggered back like she

1415
01:38:10,280 --> 01:38:14,800
Speaker 1: shot me. I got in the car, man and I

1416
01:38:14,920 --> 01:38:18,920
Speaker 1: cried all the way all the way home. I couldn't

1417
01:38:18,960 --> 01:38:26,280
Speaker 1: stop crying because that woman I didn't even know reminded

1418
01:38:26,280 --> 01:38:31,640
Speaker 1: me why I am breathing. Now. That was early in

1419
01:38:31,680 --> 01:38:34,519
Speaker 1: my ministry and right at the point it was beginning

1420
01:38:34,520 --> 01:38:38,120
Speaker 1: to explode. Last year, two years ago, I was on

1421
01:38:38,160 --> 01:38:40,559
Speaker 1: a book tour and this woman walked up to me

1422
01:38:41,120 --> 01:38:43,280
Speaker 1: at the signing and she said, you remember that lady

1423
01:38:43,280 --> 01:38:46,040
Speaker 1: that came to see you at evangel Temple. And when

1424
01:38:46,080 --> 01:38:48,840
Speaker 1: she said I started crying. I lost it immediately. She said,

1425
01:38:49,120 --> 01:38:59,040
Speaker 1: I'm that woman, and I told her. I said, I

1426
01:38:59,200 --> 01:39:02,960
Speaker 1: prayed nor name or nothing. I prayed that I would

1427
01:39:02,960 --> 01:39:07,160
Speaker 1: see her again to tell her thank you, because when

1428
01:39:07,200 --> 01:39:12,400
Speaker 1: I was being crushed, she reminded me of why I breed.

1429
01:39:17,040 --> 01:39:22,040
Speaker 1: While God was toughening me up enough to stand the

1430
01:39:22,080 --> 01:39:24,559
Speaker 1: weight of something that he called me to do that

1431
01:39:24,680 --> 01:39:30,280
Speaker 1: I didn't even have, for he sent an angel right

1432
01:39:30,320 --> 01:39:34,880
Speaker 1: out of the hospital to tell me don't get stuck

1433
01:39:35,960 --> 01:39:41,200
Speaker 1: in the crushing, that when this is over, you shall

1434
01:39:41,200 --> 01:39:56,439
Speaker 1: come forth as kid. And I feel like I'm here

1435
01:39:56,520 --> 01:39:59,560
Speaker 1: for a reason. I don't care whether you get a

1436
01:39:59,560 --> 01:40:02,559
Speaker 1: book or not. But I'm here for a reason. I

1437
01:40:02,720 --> 01:40:05,639
Speaker 1: wrote the bookfore reason. I'm standing here for a reason

1438
01:40:09,120 --> 01:40:11,600
Speaker 1: because I think that I'm supposed to give to you

1439
01:40:12,160 --> 01:40:15,760
Speaker 1: what was given to me. That if you are in

1440
01:40:16,120 --> 01:40:19,840
Speaker 1: or have been in your question place, don't you die here.

1441
01:40:29,600 --> 01:40:32,240
Speaker 1: Don't you let somebody standing on the outside and you

1442
01:40:32,280 --> 01:40:34,880
Speaker 1: say something about you that makes you die. Don't you

1443
01:40:35,280 --> 01:40:39,479
Speaker 1: let somebody who left you or forsook you, or divorce you,

1444
01:40:39,760 --> 01:40:43,080
Speaker 1: or denied you or betrayed you make you hate your

1445
01:40:43,120 --> 01:40:46,600
Speaker 1: life enough that you stop breathing before you see the

1446
01:40:46,640 --> 01:40:53,680
Speaker 1: fulfillment of the promise of God in your life. And So,

1447
01:40:53,840 --> 01:40:56,360
Speaker 1: whether you're in this room, or whether you're in one

1448
01:40:56,400 --> 01:40:58,880
Speaker 1: of the campuses, or whether you're in an overflow room,

1449
01:40:58,960 --> 01:41:03,320
Speaker 1: or whether you're standing outside peeking in the door, whether

1450
01:41:03,360 --> 01:41:09,840
Speaker 1: you're streaming online, I wrote a book that ain't sexy

1451
01:41:09,920 --> 01:41:13,280
Speaker 1: and ain't for about the promises of God. In Three

1452
01:41:13,320 --> 01:41:16,040
Speaker 1: Ways to be Blessing, Five Ways to get a new car,

1453
01:41:16,080 --> 01:41:18,840
Speaker 1: and two Ways to get your house painted while you

1454
01:41:18,880 --> 01:41:24,439
Speaker 1: sit on your couch. I wrote to the people who

1455
01:41:24,479 --> 01:41:35,680
Speaker 1: have been crushed. I want, I want, I want to

1456
01:41:35,720 --> 01:41:39,280
Speaker 1: do something. I'm gonna keep going till he grabbed me.

1457
01:41:41,880 --> 01:41:43,920
Speaker 1: I want you to reach out and touch somebody next

1458
01:41:43,920 --> 01:41:50,760
Speaker 1: to you, and not just assume that they're okay, even

1459
01:41:50,800 --> 01:41:55,720
Speaker 1: if you're married to them. I'm serious, because you can

1460
01:41:55,800 --> 01:41:59,519
Speaker 1: be being crushed laying next to somebody who has no

1461
01:41:59,600 --> 01:42:05,960
Speaker 1: idea that you are being crushed, and some of us

1462
01:42:06,040 --> 01:42:09,320
Speaker 1: are so masterful at being crushed at it that it's

1463
01:42:09,360 --> 01:42:14,800
Speaker 1: become normal. You might be touching somebody right now who

1464
01:42:14,880 --> 01:42:17,160
Speaker 1: has got stuck in a state of crushing and they

1465
01:42:17,200 --> 01:42:22,240
Speaker 1: can't get out. You might be touching somebody who runs away,

1466
01:42:22,320 --> 01:42:25,120
Speaker 1: anybody who looks like they care about them because they're

1467
01:42:25,160 --> 01:42:28,000
Speaker 1: scared of rejection and the only way of coping is

1468
01:42:28,080 --> 01:42:29,880
Speaker 1: to not let you in, because if I don't let

1469
01:42:29,920 --> 01:42:31,400
Speaker 1: you in, then I don't have to see you go.

1470
01:42:35,439 --> 01:42:39,200
Speaker 1: You might be touching somebody who was abused as a child,

1471
01:42:42,320 --> 01:42:47,320
Speaker 1: great birelative, and they are all made up and gusted

1472
01:42:47,400 --> 01:42:48,920
Speaker 1: up and looking good, and they don't want you to

1473
01:42:49,000 --> 01:42:56,960
Speaker 1: know that they have nightmares and terrors and flashbikes. You

1474
01:42:57,040 --> 01:43:00,599
Speaker 1: might be touching somebody who's trying to be a father

1475
01:43:00,680 --> 01:43:05,720
Speaker 1: and didn't have one, trying to be a man and

1476
01:43:05,800 --> 01:43:12,599
Speaker 1: never saw one. You might be touching somebody who's trying

1477
01:43:12,640 --> 01:43:15,280
Speaker 1: to find love and live with the man, but they'd

1478
01:43:15,360 --> 01:43:17,760
Speaker 1: never lived with a man before, and they don't understand men,

1479
01:43:18,000 --> 01:43:19,600
Speaker 1: and they're married to a man, but they talk to

1480
01:43:19,680 --> 01:43:21,679
Speaker 1: him like he's a woman because they never had a father,

1481
01:43:22,000 --> 01:43:31,559
Speaker 1: and men are a mystery. You might be talking to

1482
01:43:31,600 --> 01:43:34,280
Speaker 1: somebody who's trying to raise a child and you gave

1483
01:43:34,360 --> 01:43:38,320
Speaker 1: him everything, and they're still angry and disrespectful, and you

1484
01:43:38,439 --> 01:43:41,080
Speaker 1: work like a dog, so they'd have the best of everything,

1485
01:43:41,400 --> 01:43:43,519
Speaker 1: And now when you need them the most, they don't

1486
01:43:43,600 --> 01:43:45,599
Speaker 1: understand you. And you don't feel appreciated, and you don't

1487
01:43:45,600 --> 01:43:48,320
Speaker 1: feel loved, and you come to church sometimes it's your

1488
01:43:48,360 --> 01:43:50,400
Speaker 1: only escapist to get in the house of God and

1489
01:43:50,479 --> 01:43:53,519
Speaker 1: worship yourself till you are drunk because you can't deal

1490
01:43:53,560 --> 01:43:56,240
Speaker 1: with what's going on in your life. Squeeze that person's

1491
01:43:56,240 --> 01:44:00,280
Speaker 1: hand right there, because that's who I came to talk

1492
01:44:00,400 --> 01:44:08,080
Speaker 1: to tonight. And we come in all colors, and we

1493
01:44:08,160 --> 01:44:10,960
Speaker 1: come in all racists, and we come in all genders

1494
01:44:10,960 --> 01:44:14,120
Speaker 1: and all ages. Because the one thing about pain, it

1495
01:44:14,160 --> 01:44:18,640
Speaker 1: ain't never prejudice. It to get everybody. It a get anybody,

1496
01:44:18,840 --> 01:44:22,479
Speaker 1: It to get any gender, any race, any orientation. Pain

1497
01:44:22,840 --> 01:44:25,519
Speaker 1: will come anywhere. So squeeze a hand to let them

1498
01:44:25,520 --> 01:44:34,519
Speaker 1: know that they are not alone. And so here I stand, Lord,

1499
01:44:34,600 --> 01:44:40,840
Speaker 1: with these your people. These are your grapes, clusters and

1500
01:44:40,920 --> 01:44:46,760
Speaker 1: clusters and clusters of grapes that at some point, at

1501
01:44:46,760 --> 01:44:51,840
Speaker 1: some time or another, they have gone through something, maybe

1502
01:44:51,880 --> 01:44:56,800
Speaker 1: going through something right now. But oh God, I know

1503
01:44:56,880 --> 01:45:04,720
Speaker 1: you're the wine maker. Whoa glory to God. I know

1504
01:45:05,520 --> 01:45:08,559
Speaker 1: you are the wine maker. I know you're not finished

1505
01:45:08,560 --> 01:45:11,400
Speaker 1: with them. I know you're not through with them. I

1506
01:45:11,479 --> 01:45:14,400
Speaker 1: know it ain't over yet. I know it's not over yet.

1507
01:45:14,520 --> 01:45:19,880
Speaker 1: And I pray God that you give them, give them

1508
01:45:19,880 --> 01:45:25,800
Speaker 1: a faith injection in this little bit of time I

1509
01:45:25,960 --> 01:45:30,160
Speaker 1: tried to impart just a fragment of what you gave me.

1510
01:45:31,560 --> 01:45:33,759
Speaker 1: I pray Lord, not only would they get the things

1511
01:45:33,760 --> 01:45:35,720
Speaker 1: that I wrote in the book, but I pray God

1512
01:45:35,760 --> 01:45:38,280
Speaker 1: that you would say stuff to them that I didn't

1513
01:45:38,280 --> 01:45:42,280
Speaker 1: know the right, that you would talk to them about

1514
01:45:42,320 --> 01:45:45,679
Speaker 1: the specific tool you used in their life to crush

1515
01:45:45,720 --> 01:45:49,800
Speaker 1: them and go beyond that and show them the triumphant

1516
01:45:49,880 --> 01:45:53,040
Speaker 1: plan that you have to raise them up above where

1517
01:45:53,040 --> 01:45:59,479
Speaker 1: they have ever been before. I pray God that revival

1518
01:45:59,520 --> 01:46:05,800
Speaker 1: would break not so much in the country, not so

1519
01:46:05,960 --> 01:46:09,280
Speaker 1: much even in the church. I'm not praying that revival

1520
01:46:09,320 --> 01:46:12,360
Speaker 1: would break out in elevation. I pray revival would break

1521
01:46:12,360 --> 01:46:18,040
Speaker 1: out in your chest. I pray that revival would break

1522
01:46:18,040 --> 01:46:21,400
Speaker 1: out in your spirit, and in your mind, and in

1523
01:46:21,520 --> 01:46:28,120
Speaker 1: your being and in your soul. I pray that worship

1524
01:46:28,160 --> 01:46:30,680
Speaker 1: service would break out in your car, that you go

1525
01:46:30,920 --> 01:46:34,360
Speaker 1: home worshiping God so strong that you'd have to sit

1526
01:46:34,400 --> 01:46:37,400
Speaker 1: in the parking lot for a while to get yourself together,

1527
01:46:37,800 --> 01:46:41,120
Speaker 1: because the glory of the Lord has set all over you,

1528
01:46:41,520 --> 01:46:50,120
Speaker 1: and the power of God has overshadowed you. Father. I

1529
01:46:50,160 --> 01:46:56,960
Speaker 1: pray for this young lion pauling behind me. I pray

1530
01:46:57,040 --> 01:46:59,799
Speaker 1: that his teeth be sharp and his back be straight.

1531
01:47:00,960 --> 01:47:03,920
Speaker 1: I pray that his head be held up high. And

1532
01:47:04,040 --> 01:47:06,639
Speaker 1: I pray Lord that you'd make his feet at Hind's

1533
01:47:06,720 --> 01:47:11,080
Speaker 1: feet strong enough to climb for years and years and

1534
01:47:11,360 --> 01:47:15,040
Speaker 1: years and years and years to come, and that he

1535
01:47:15,080 --> 01:47:19,160
Speaker 1: would do like David and serve his generation well. I

1536
01:47:19,320 --> 01:47:24,879
Speaker 1: pray that the power of God would overshadow every pastor

1537
01:47:25,479 --> 01:47:29,760
Speaker 1: in this room, in the overflow in other places, watching online,

1538
01:47:29,840 --> 01:47:35,479
Speaker 1: every leader, every feeder, every single mama, every daddy trying

1539
01:47:35,520 --> 01:47:38,439
Speaker 1: to be a dad, every man trying to pull his weight,

1540
01:47:38,800 --> 01:47:41,200
Speaker 1: every young boy trying to figure out who he is

1541
01:47:41,439 --> 01:47:44,320
Speaker 1: and get himself together, and wishes he was further than

1542
01:47:44,360 --> 01:47:47,200
Speaker 1: he was right now. I pray that the poem God

1543
01:47:47,520 --> 01:48:04,880
Speaker 1: would find him. Thank you for the opportunity to be

1544
01:48:05,040 --> 01:48:09,240
Speaker 1: used in this small way to speak to these your

1545
01:48:09,320 --> 01:48:28,840
Speaker 1: children in Jesus' name. Amen, thank you for joining us.

1546
01:48:29,120 --> 01:48:31,600
Speaker 1: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to

1547
01:48:31,640 --> 01:48:35,120
Speaker 1: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.

1548
01:48:35,600 --> 01:48:37,800
Speaker 1: You can click the link in the description to give

1549
01:48:37,880 --> 01:48:42,040
Speaker 1: now or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more

1550
01:48:42,040 --> 01:48:45,840
Speaker 1: information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.

1551
01:48:46,120 --> 01:48:48,200
Speaker 1: You can share it with your friends. You can click

1552
01:48:48,240 --> 01:48:50,439
Speaker 1: the share button, take a screenshot and share it on

1553
01:48:50,479 --> 01:48:53,360
Speaker 1: your social stories and tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks

1554
01:48:53,400 --> 01:48:59,800
Speaker 1: again for listening. God bless you