Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God has moving in your life. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 1: Mark chapter two. I kind of want to continue on
Speaker 1: something that I said on Easter, and I'll explain that
Speaker 1: in a second. Let me read the scripture. A few
Speaker 1: days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard
Speaker 1: that he had come home. They gathered in such large
Speaker 1: numbers that there was no room left, not even outside
Speaker 1: the door, and he preached the word to them. Some
Speaker 1: men came bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by
Speaker 1: four of them, and since they could not get him
Speaker 1: to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening
Speaker 1: in the roof above Jesus. That's a strange phrase. You're
Speaker 1: not going to see it many times in the Bible.
Speaker 1: Above Jesus. You won't see that very much in the Bible.
Speaker 1: You won't see it. About sickness, you won't see you
Speaker 1: won't see it about shame. You won't see it about anxiety.
Speaker 1: You won't see it about panic attacks. You won't see
Speaker 1: it about political parties. So just circle that one because
Speaker 1: you won't see that above Jesus again, you won't. You
Speaker 1: will only see this one time. So physically speaking, they
Speaker 1: positioned themselves on the roof and watch this. A lot
Speaker 1: of y'all know this Bible story, but this is this
Speaker 1: is crazy if you stop and think about it. They
Speaker 1: dug through the roof and lowered the mat that the
Speaker 1: man was lying on, And when Jesus saw their faith,
Speaker 1: he said to the paralyzed man, son, your sins are forgiven. Now,
Speaker 1: some teachers of the law, we're sitting there thinking to themselves,
Speaker 1: why does this fellow talk like that. He's blaspheming it's heresy.
Speaker 1: Who can forgive sins but God alone. Immediately Jesus knew
Speaker 1: in his spirit that this is what they were thinking
Speaker 1: in their hearts. I can't wait to come back to you,
Speaker 1: vers eke. And he said to them, why are you
Speaker 1: thinking these things? Which is easier to say to this
Speaker 1: paralyzed man, your sins are forgiven, or to say get up,
Speaker 1: take your mat and walk, But I want you to
Speaker 1: know that the son of Man has shout the word
Speaker 1: authority on earth to forgive sins. So he said to
Speaker 1: the man, I tell you, get up, take your map,
Speaker 1: go home, get out of here, and tell you you
Speaker 1: don't need a ride home. So he got up, took
Speaker 1: his matt and walked out in full view of them. All.
Speaker 1: This amazed everyone, and they praise God. Say, ready, we
Speaker 1: have never seen anything like this. Put that in the chat.
Speaker 1: We have never seen anything like this. I want to
Speaker 1: speak to you today about unlearning your limitations. I dabbled
Speaker 1: in it on Easter, and I want to dive deeper today.
Speaker 1: So that's my title, Unlearning your Limitations. That's the straightforward title.
Speaker 1: That's the topical title. Here's the saucy title. You need
Speaker 1: a new roof. Now sit down and let's talk about it.
Speaker 1: You need a new roof because really, limitations are learned, right,
Speaker 1: And maybe you haven't had kids. They don't know. Tongues
Speaker 1: don't go in a line, electrical sockets, they don't know.
Speaker 1: They don't know anything about anything until they It's kind
Speaker 1: of like Graham was telling us one time he could
Speaker 1: beat up Mike Tyson. And just the confidence of Graham
Speaker 1: is something I need you all to pray about because
Speaker 1: I kind of think it's like a great gift, and
Speaker 1: then I kind of think it's like a liability, and
Speaker 1: I can't figure out which one yet. I mean, the
Speaker 1: boy walked into church today with a mullet, with his
Speaker 1: head held high and just the confidence the swag of
Speaker 1: Graham to not care what you think about his mullet.
Speaker 1: Now I'm gonna get off, I promise, I promise. But
Speaker 1: limitations are learned. And interesting thing about this text is
Speaker 1: it seems like the experience of the people who are
Speaker 1: experts in the Word of God works again them, and
Speaker 1: the stupidity of the people who get a miracle seems
Speaker 1: to have a strategic advantage. And I guess that's why
Speaker 1: I've always liked the passage, because in fifteen years of
Speaker 1: building the church, there have been so many times where
Speaker 1: I've had to try unorthodox things in order to do
Speaker 1: something for which I had no frame of reference. Now
Speaker 1: you may not know this. My dad wasn't a pastor.
Speaker 1: My dad was a barber. My grandfather was a pastor,
Speaker 1: but he pastored small churches. When I say small, probably
Speaker 1: like what one hundred people would have been on the
Speaker 1: bigger side, he did seventy churches of seventy fifty. I
Speaker 1: think in Monk's Corner it was the biggest one. That
Speaker 1: was about two hundred on Easter? Wasn't that big? Am
Speaker 1: I wrong? Am I off? Okay? So that to me,
Speaker 1: in my mind was the biggest church that I had seen.
Speaker 1: In fact, where I was a youth pastor, there were
Speaker 1: about about the same about one hundred twenty Santi Circle
Speaker 1: Community Church where Pastor Mickey let me learn to preach.
Speaker 1: When when I went to preach one time with Holly,
Speaker 1: I was I was sharing it a church I can't
Speaker 1: remember where. It was Calpins, South Carolina, Calpin's anybody from
Speaker 1: Calpins on EPAM And there were about there were about
Speaker 1: fifty people in the in the church, and the woman
Speaker 1: turned to Holly when I walked up to the pulpit
Speaker 1: to preach. I was only eighteen and we were in
Speaker 1: college and we had traveled out here for me to preach.
Speaker 1: And the woman turned to Holly and said, is this
Speaker 1: Stephen's first time preaching in a big church like ours?
Speaker 1: And we always thought that was so funny, a big
Speaker 1: church like ours, you know, with fifty and it was
Speaker 1: it was for her frame of reference, right, limitations are
Speaker 1: learned by that. I mean, you don't really come into
Speaker 1: the world knowing what you are not supposed to do
Speaker 1: because you're white, or because you're black, or because you're male,
Speaker 1: or because you're female, or because you're Baptist or because
Speaker 1: you're Pentecostal. I'd like to offend everybody before I finished
Speaker 1: this little list. Those things are learned, They are learned.
Speaker 1: Those are those are those are learned limitations. And here's
Speaker 1: what I mean. We wrote this song called Rattle last
Speaker 1: year and I was showing it to my friend and
Speaker 1: they said, well, you can't play that at your church.
Speaker 1: Black people won't like it. I didn't say it. Why
Speaker 1: are y'all looking at me like that? That's what they said.
Speaker 1: They said, black people don't really like rock and roll.
Speaker 1: And just in my head, I'm like, have you ever
Speaker 1: heard of Jimmy Hendrix? Chuck Berry? Like, how did you
Speaker 1: categorize a people group who pioneered a style of music
Speaker 1: and now you think they don't like like it? That's
Speaker 1: your ima. It's not the limitation of a person that
Speaker 1: you can just categorize anyway. You'll look up tight. Let
Speaker 1: me get back to the Bible verses in the Scriptures.
Speaker 1: In the Scriptures, there's a group of people called the
Speaker 1: scribes or the teachers of the law. It says here
Speaker 1: in Mark chapter two. And I have to be honest
Speaker 1: with you, I've been unfear to this group of people
Speaker 1: through the years because in verse six where you see
Speaker 1: them show up the teachers of the law or the scribes,
Speaker 1: And I'm going to tell you what that means in
Speaker 1: a minute. But they were sitting there and they were
Speaker 1: judging Jesus. So I always hated them in the passage.
Speaker 1: It made me hate them that they would criticize Jesus,
Speaker 1: who's the son of God. And at different times in
Speaker 1: my ministry, I've used this passage to preach to different needs.
Speaker 1: Like in some cases, I've used this passage to say
Speaker 1: that we as the church should be like the four
Speaker 1: men and bring our friends to Jesus. And then I'd
Speaker 1: give everybody a life Will Invite card for the next week,
Speaker 1: and I'd say, now, bring your friends back to church,
Speaker 1: and I'd tell him break the roof and send them
Speaker 1: out to go get their friends to Jesus. Bribe them,
Speaker 1: do whatever you have to do, and that's that's not
Speaker 1: a bad message. I've also used this passage at times
Speaker 1: before to talk to talk about what it would feel
Speaker 1: like to be the man on the mat who is
Speaker 1: getting dropped. Read it again, real quick. Show me where
Speaker 1: he agreed to this idea. Show me where he asked
Speaker 1: them to take him up on the roof and lower him.
Speaker 1: Show me where he signed his consent, his legal release
Speaker 1: that y'all can drop me in the middle of the number,
Speaker 1: you won't find it. And I've related to that man before,
Speaker 1: because sometimes you feel like you're put in situations that
Speaker 1: you didn't exactly sign up for. In the passage that
Speaker 1: I read to you just now, though, I felt some
Speaker 1: sympathy for the scribes this week that I've never felt before,
Speaker 1: because physically the doorway was blocked by the crowd. But
Speaker 1: that's not all that was blocked in the passage. These
Speaker 1: teachers of the law verse six were not the ancient
Speaker 1: equivalent of Internet trolls. These were not unemployed people with
Speaker 1: nothing better to do than to sit in judgment, and
Speaker 1: they showed up for a specific purpose in the house
Speaker 1: that day in Capernaum Kfarnahum, Village of Comfort, where Jesus
Speaker 1: did twenty two of his miracles only fifteen hundred people
Speaker 1: in the town, but he did twenty two of the
Speaker 1: biblical miracles happened in Capernaum. The sad part is at
Speaker 1: the end of his ministry, when he went to pronounce
Speaker 1: his woes and judgments. Copernaum, where he did a majority
Speaker 1: of his miracles, was on the list of cities that
Speaker 1: would not repent in spite of all that they had seen.
Speaker 1: The scribes in Mark chapter two were not sitting there
Speaker 1: just as critics that day. They were sitting as a
Speaker 1: how could I put this a correctness committee to make
Speaker 1: sure that this popular rabbi wasn't teaching something that contradicted
Speaker 1: the laws that they had given their life to defend
Speaker 1: and preserve. And I think we need to have a
Speaker 1: little more understanding when we read the Scripture sometimes of
Speaker 1: not just what we've thought about the people that the
Speaker 1: Bible talks about. You know this, this teacher of the
Speaker 1: law group that sitting there has traveled four days to
Speaker 1: be in Capernaum from Jerusalem at their own expense to
Speaker 1: make sure that the people aren't being taught anything that's wrong.
Speaker 1: They wanted to make sure that this guy wasn't running
Speaker 1: a cult. And I can get with that even back
Speaker 1: in the early days of the church. I would meet
Speaker 1: people who were in their forties, because I was in
Speaker 1: my twenties when I started, and I would ask the
Speaker 1: people in the forties, why were in their forties, which
Speaker 1: I am, now, why did you first come to our church?
Speaker 1: And they would say, my kids came over and I
Speaker 1: had to follow them to make sure you weren't crazy.
Speaker 1: And then I would say, well, was I And they say, yeah,
Speaker 1: but the good guy, you're the kind of crazy. I like,
Speaker 1: I like, you're kind of crazy. And then they say,
Speaker 1: but they came over and I thought they were judging me. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: they were protecting something precious to them. My father in
Speaker 1: law put me through so much to Mary Holly, and
Speaker 1: oh I didn't like him very much for a little while.
Speaker 1: But sometimes I look at a be yeah, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: I bet I will build an emotional mote for any
Speaker 1: squire that would dare to ask her hand. I gotta
Speaker 1: understand it was precious. Reading the scripture this week, I
Speaker 1: understood that there are two roofs. In Mark chapter two.
Speaker 1: The function of a roof, remember, is said that they
Speaker 1: dug through the roof of the house to get the
Speaker 1: man to Jesus, let's take a quick audience vote. Is
Speaker 1: a roof on your house a good thing to have
Speaker 1: in case of inclement weather? Y'all are so used to
Speaker 1: me flipping stuff in my sermons, hesitant about saying is
Speaker 1: a good thing right, because it keeps something out that
Speaker 1: can damage what's on the inside. So when I studied
Speaker 1: about the scribes this week, I was amazed to find
Speaker 1: that the function they served it was originally to preserve
Speaker 1: something that was very important to the people of God.
Speaker 1: Now you've got to know this or you won't understand
Speaker 1: why this is what Jesus said, Why are you thinking
Speaker 1: these things in your heart? Well? Why were they thinking
Speaker 1: these things in their heart? Why were they threatened by
Speaker 1: a prophet who would say, I forgive your sin an
Speaker 1: exclusive right of God alone? Why were they thinking these
Speaker 1: things in their heart? You have to understand what they
Speaker 1: were protecting. And in order to stand understand what they
Speaker 1: were protecting, you have to understand where they had been
Speaker 1: in Babylon, where God's people had been taken as captives.
Speaker 1: And see the scribes were specially trained to record the
Speaker 1: pronouncements and the legal decrees and the events and make
Speaker 1: sure to keep a record, But in Babylon. The customs
Speaker 1: of Babylon were different than God's chosen people had ever
Speaker 1: experienced before. And in Babylon is where the ribs begin
Speaker 1: to develop the oral traditions surrounding the Laws of Moses,
Speaker 1: so that God's people would not forget who they were.
Speaker 1: They were specially suited to do it because they were
Speaker 1: trained in recording the tradition. The only reason God's people
Speaker 1: even knew who they were when they came out of
Speaker 1: Babylon was because of the scribes. Now, Jesus, who is
Speaker 1: the Bible, calls the express image of God to show
Speaker 1: us what God is really like, shows up to fulfill
Speaker 1: the Messianic prophecies about him to save his people from
Speaker 1: their sin. And the scribes verse six. The teachers of
Speaker 1: the law were sitting there thinking to themselves, why does
Speaker 1: this fellow talk like that. He's not supposed to do this.
Speaker 1: You can't do that. That's not how this works. At
Speaker 1: the same time that they're thinking this, the debris is
Speaker 1: still falling through the ceiling from wear four rednecks. I'm
Speaker 1: using my imagination about what kind of guys would have
Speaker 1: done this? Have just moved through every excuse now This
Speaker 1: is a truth, This is a true statement. See if
Speaker 1: God's spirit verifies what I'm about to say to you.
Speaker 1: If this man would have been dependent on a lot
Speaker 1: of us, the moment we would have seen the crowd,
Speaker 1: he would have gone back home the exact same way
Speaker 1: he came. I promise you most of us. I don't
Speaker 1: want to say most of us. I don't want to
Speaker 1: talk about you. For me, I'm really quick to give
Speaker 1: up and assume something isn't God's will when I can't
Speaker 1: immediately see a way in. And so now we're in
Speaker 1: a passage where the scribes, these teachers of the law,
Speaker 1: who have preserved the identity of God's people. They weren't villains, really,
Speaker 1: they were heroes. But what happened over time was the
Speaker 1: oral tradition became more important than the truth. Did you
Speaker 1: ever play the telephone game? Do you know what I'm
Speaker 1: talking about? Where I tell you something and you tell
Speaker 1: them something and by the time it gets all the
Speaker 1: way around, everybody has rabies and everybody's gonna die. And
Speaker 1: it's a crazy thing when it gets passed down. And
Speaker 1: the thing about Jesus that maybe doesn't always get mentioned
Speaker 1: when we preach about him, is that he reveals to
Speaker 1: us that our God is a confrontational God. God is confrontational,
Speaker 1: and first thought about that might be no. God is
Speaker 1: a comforter. He's a good good father. Who he is, Stephen,
Speaker 1: who he is? Who he is and any is one.
Speaker 1: Scripture says that he comforts us with the comfort so
Speaker 1: we can comfort others with the same comfort by which
Speaker 1: we've been comforted. The Bible also says that God comforts
Speaker 1: the downcast, as something that Paul said when he was
Speaker 1: going through a lot of conflicts. He does comfort the downcast.
Speaker 1: He speak words of reassurance to you when everybody else
Speaker 1: is speaking words of condemnation to you. Be sure of it.
Speaker 1: But the same God that comforts the downcast also confronts
Speaker 1: the dysfunctional. And he loves you too much to leave
Speaker 1: you in something that is limiting you. He's a confrontational God.
Speaker 1: I know that thinking of God is confrontational may violate
Speaker 1: our perception of Him as it was handed down to us.
Speaker 1: But God is very confrontational. Right, God will get up
Speaker 1: in the face of anything that will keep you from
Speaker 1: being all that He created you to be. Now, before
Speaker 1: you take this as permission to just like go off
Speaker 1: on somebody and say you're being like Jesus. That's not
Speaker 1: the point of this lesson. The point of the lesson
Speaker 1: is for you to realize that God will break through
Speaker 1: any of the beliefs that you've developed about you, about
Speaker 1: him or about others. He's not scared to do that.
Speaker 1: So if it means going to Pharaoh and saying, let
Speaker 1: my people go, and he has to send frogs and
Speaker 1: turn the nile into blood, and if God has to
Speaker 1: send flies and locusts and plagues, even if God has
Speaker 1: to kill off the firstborn of Egipt, he will see
Speaker 1: to it that his people are really free, because He's
Speaker 1: a confrontational God. If it means he has to put
Speaker 1: you in a lion's den and shut the mouth of
Speaker 1: the lion to Soho never conness her that he is
Speaker 1: the great God and there is none above him, he'll
Speaker 1: do that. He's not a conflict avoiding God, and a
Speaker 1: lot of us never experience the growth because we will
Speaker 1: never face the conflict. One thing I love about Holly
Speaker 1: is when that switch flips and she turns from sweet
Speaker 1: Holly missus better half Holly, smiling Holly that y'all know
Speaker 1: and love and subscribe to her book club. But Holly,
Speaker 1: let me tell you someth about Holly. Let me know
Speaker 1: sorry about Holley. The other day she was on This
Speaker 1: is right at Christmas time that she was on with
Speaker 1: customer service. She is the most polite person. She's not nasty,
Speaker 1: she's not mean, she's balanced, she's even. She can diffuse,
Speaker 1: but at a certain point, I know you'll have y'all
Speaker 1: have a perspective of Holly. Right, She's just so and
Speaker 1: she is usually on this phone call. The lady, the
Speaker 1: customer service rep, wouldn't put her through to a supervisor, right,
Speaker 1: and and so I don't know what Holly said, but
Speaker 1: at some point the lady said, ma'am, I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: ahead and transfer you to escalations. And Holly said, that's
Speaker 1: exactly where you need to put me. It is escalations.
Speaker 1: That's the place for me, is escalations, escalate me. Holly
Speaker 1: said that. Holly, I'm like, who are you? I know you,
Speaker 1: but I don't know you. Because when something got in
Speaker 1: her way, now she's gonna try it a nice way
Speaker 1: and everything like that, but there comes the time to listen.
Speaker 1: It's okay sometimes for you to have that nice, gentle
Speaker 1: kind of faith about things in your life. Right, it's coming.
Speaker 1: It's a time just to be like nice and Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna wait and see how this turns out.
Speaker 1: But when something really matters to God's heart, in your heart,
Speaker 1: this one, I'm trying to say, there comes a time
Speaker 1: to escalate. There comes a time when people can't do
Speaker 1: it for you. So you have got to go above
Speaker 1: the people and go to the one who has all authority,
Speaker 1: all power. Aren't you glad that God's power doesn't need
Speaker 1: people's permission to operate. That if God decides to use
Speaker 1: you in a certain way, you can speak to the supervisor.
Speaker 1: If people aren't treating you good, you can go to
Speaker 1: your father. I say, you see how they're treating me,
Speaker 1: You see how their situation is. You see how I'm trying.
Speaker 1: Would you please get involved before I lose my mind
Speaker 1: and do something I'm gonna regret. God will step in.
Speaker 1: God will confront it. God will tell Pharaoh. God has
Speaker 1: a mighty hand, God has an outstretched gard. God set
Speaker 1: us sat in the misery my people in Aseel, and
Speaker 1: I'm coming down there. Not everybody likes this kind of preaching.
Speaker 1: It's not comfortable, but when you when when when you
Speaker 1: have an addiction that's robbing you of the daylight of
Speaker 1: your life. Yeah, So as the conflict is escalating, this
Speaker 1: is one of five stories in Mark's Gospel that's showing
Speaker 1: us the confrontational nature of God. And it's an interesting
Speaker 1: one because I'll point out a few things to you.
Speaker 1: When Jesus is arguing with the scribes about the Sabbath,
Speaker 1: they ask him, why are you breaking the Sabbath? Right,
Speaker 1: And he's trying to teach them the Sabbath is made
Speaker 1: for man. Man's not made for the Sabbath. You've got
Speaker 1: this completely out of order, right. In other words, you
Speaker 1: have turned a gift into a limitation. When he healed
Speaker 1: this man on a sabbath, all they could say is
Speaker 1: that's the wrong day to do it. Now, the Sabbath
Speaker 1: was given to people as a gift, but they turned
Speaker 1: it into a limit. This is a side note. Don't
Speaker 1: let your gift become your limitation. The more like, don't
Speaker 1: let something that God gave you in one season of
Speaker 1: your life to protect you become something in the next
Speaker 1: season of your life that prevents you. One example, you sure,
Speaker 1: all right, I got a hundred of these or like
Speaker 1: the way that we deal with people. Sometimes we learn
Speaker 1: to deal with people in a certain season of our
Speaker 1: life as a certain way to survive, because we have to,
Speaker 1: all right, And a lot of times I've been like swinging,
Speaker 1: like fighting, and I didn't even look up and realize
Speaker 1: my enemy was gone, and I'm still swinging at the air.
Speaker 1: And so my style of doing things, Like the best
Speaker 1: example I can give to you of this from my
Speaker 1: own life is that the way I've seen myself in
Speaker 1: certain seasons doesn't apply in other seasons. And God can
Speaker 1: give you something as a gift in one season. What
Speaker 1: am I thinking of? We wrote this other song that
Speaker 1: we just put out called talking to Jesus? Have you
Speaker 1: heard it? Heard it now? So Chris can tell you
Speaker 1: the whole time we were writing that song. We wrote
Speaker 1: that with our friend Brandon, and the whole time we
Speaker 1: were in the song, it broke all the rules of
Speaker 1: a worship song, because worship songs are supposed to be
Speaker 1: like this. You're supposed to only say about thirty words
Speaker 1: and just scramble them all around. Right, And we're writing
Speaker 1: this song and I'm finding myself saying lyrics like Mama
Speaker 1: used to drag me to church Sunday mornings and Wednesday
Speaker 1: night kaki pants and a polo shirt. Boy, I put
Speaker 1: up a fight, and I'm thinking, can you say khaki
Speaker 1: pants in a worship song? Now, there's a reason that
Speaker 1: worship songs are supposed to have a certain focus. The
Speaker 1: reason is when we come in to sing with our church,
Speaker 1: we want everybody to be able to access it. And
Speaker 1: maybe you didn't wear kaki pants to church. So you're
Speaker 1: worshiping God, Lord, I love you. I'm talking to Jesus,
Speaker 1: what a friend I have in Jesus khaki pants? Huh?
Speaker 1: And pulls you out of it. It's just like, Oh,
Speaker 1: I thought that was my song, but I guess that's
Speaker 1: not for me. The crazy thing about it was that
Speaker 1: I found God trying to give us a song about
Speaker 1: generational faith, but my rules for how God moves in worship,
Speaker 1: we're trying to restrict the expression that God wanted us
Speaker 1: to bring. Those rules were there for a reason. The
Speaker 1: scribes were there for a reason, to preserve the identity
Speaker 1: of God's people. But sometimes what was said to preserve
Speaker 1: something begins to prevent something. And I wonder has that
Speaker 1: happened in your life? I wonder do you need new rules?
Speaker 1: And while we're at it, I wonder who built your
Speaker 1: roof to begin with, Like, who set the limit to say,
Speaker 1: this is what God can do through you, and no more.
Speaker 1: This is what you're gifted at, and no more. People
Speaker 1: from your background, your education, your age, this is what
Speaker 1: you can do, and no more. I was talking to
Speaker 1: my friend who's forty three the other day and he
Speaker 1: was talking like his career was over. And then I
Speaker 1: told him about the guy who was fifty nine who
Speaker 1: reinvented and became a millionaire. So who put that roof
Speaker 1: on you? Who put the roof on you that if
Speaker 1: you are married by twenty five, there's something wrong with you?
Speaker 1: Who put that roof on you? Who put the roof
Speaker 1: on what we think God can do in church? That
Speaker 1: we think that God has to be confined to a building.
Speaker 1: The irony of my ministry is that everything God has
Speaker 1: done through me was something that I told him he
Speaker 1: couldn't do. I'm stubborn. I need the Holy Spirit. I
Speaker 1: need God's help because I'm so stubborn because I have
Speaker 1: these rules. You know, like to online, church isn't real,
Speaker 1: said me. Now you see why I feel bad for
Speaker 1: these scribes, these guys I've been preaching about all these years,
Speaker 1: These scribes, these you know, these teachers of the law,
Speaker 1: these pharisees, these you know. It was like a Pharisee
Speaker 1: in me. It's what I'm trying to deal with. It's
Speaker 1: not the crowd blocking the door that I have to
Speaker 1: worry about. I told our team, I said, I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't think the church online can be real church,
Speaker 1: you know, because I've never seen it before. And if
Speaker 1: you never seen it before, you believe it can't be real.
Speaker 1: If you've never seen a healthy marriage, I'll be When
Speaker 1: we said verse twelve, this amazed everyone, and they praised
Speaker 1: God's saying we have never seen anything like this. The
Speaker 1: same thing that they said in praise is also the problem,
Speaker 1: because we've never seen anything like this before. So this
Speaker 1: can't be God. This is not the image I had
Speaker 1: of it. This is not the imagination I had of Though.
Speaker 1: He's not doing the rules we want him to do.
Speaker 1: It's not following the rules. And at the same time
Speaker 1: Jesus is breaking the rules. The men are breaking a roof,
Speaker 1: and I realized there were two roofs being removed in
Speaker 1: Mark chapter two. One was physical. It was Peter's house,
Speaker 1: by the way, No, it really was. It says when
Speaker 1: Jesus came to the house in Capernaium, that's the one
Speaker 1: where they based out of. It was Peter's house. If
Speaker 1: it would have been John, he'd kick those boys off
Speaker 1: off the roof, because John had good sense. But Peter
Speaker 1: was like, I like your style, Sa, That's something I
Speaker 1: would do. We'll get a new roof. Just break the roof.
Speaker 1: Let's get this time. Peter loved a mots fit Peter
Speaker 1: a crowd died. Peter doesn't care and give a crap
Speaker 1: and cut off in the here. Jesus can put it
Speaker 1: back and look. I told Elijah the other day, I said,
Speaker 1: I hope I set a good example for you. I
Speaker 1: hope I show you how to treat a woman. I
Speaker 1: hope I show you how to maneuver through difficult times.
Speaker 1: I hope I show you something about how to seek God.
Speaker 1: Be creative, make friends with your own creativity, don't let
Speaker 1: it turn inward, make sure you use it in service
Speaker 1: of others. I hope I show you a few things
Speaker 1: about Romanian dead lifts and Arnold presses, and some things
Speaker 1: you can take with you. The rest of your life.
Speaker 1: I hope I show you some good music like Nirvana,
Speaker 1: nevermind other classic gospel albums of the nineties. I said,
Speaker 1: y'all have limitations on genres. I'm telling you there's some
Speaker 1: good worship music you haven't heard yet. But I said,
Speaker 1: if you if you discover something, now listen to this.
Speaker 1: This is this is something I would say to anybody,
Speaker 1: but I said it to my oldest son. I said,
Speaker 1: if you see something in me that limits who God
Speaker 1: has made you to be, don't be loyal to my limitations.
Speaker 1: And here's the example I gave him. I had a
Speaker 1: friend who he used to train other preachers how to preach,
Speaker 1: and they would try to copy him. But they would
Speaker 1: copy not only the good things that he did because
Speaker 1: he was an amazing evangelist. They would even copy his
Speaker 1: mannerisms that were just incidental or glitchy. One thing in particular,
Speaker 1: he said, they tried to walk like him when they preached.
Speaker 1: And he said they were trying to walk like him,
Speaker 1: not realizing he had a bad back. So they're limping
Speaker 1: across the stage to be like their mentor, right, And
Speaker 1: I thought, that's crazy, man, They're imitating your injury. They're
Speaker 1: seeing you do something and they are thinking that because
Speaker 1: you do it, it must be right. So I told Elijah,
Speaker 1: I said, don't imitate my injury. Imitate me as I
Speaker 1: imitate Christ. But I think this is what I told him.
Speaker 1: I think that my ceiling can be your floor. And
Speaker 1: I don't mean in a pulpit as a preacher. I'm
Speaker 1: not limiting my kids that they need to be in
Speaker 1: the ministry. They are going to be in the ministry.
Speaker 1: It just might not be my style of men. It
Speaker 1: might not be a pulpit or a preaching or an
Speaker 1: acoustic guitar. What if what of them leads worship with
Speaker 1: a trap bet? What if that's what the next wave
Speaker 1: is of God's anointed holy music in the earth. What
Speaker 1: if they don't work at a church at all? But
Speaker 1: what if God uses them a great way in the world.
Speaker 1: After all, most of the miracles that Jesus did, we're
Speaker 1: in the marketplace. What are we trying to confine God
Speaker 1: to the places that we're most comfortable in. Why do
Speaker 1: we think that the most important stuff God's going to
Speaker 1: do is going to be through a preacher. The only
Speaker 1: point of a pulpit is to empower you for your field,
Speaker 1: for your feel you need a new roof. You keep
Speaker 1: banging up on the things that and here's what happens
Speaker 1: through life. You learn lies and become loyal to them,
Speaker 1: and then those lives become limits. You can't put khaki pants,
Speaker 1: send a worship song, well I did. You can't come
Speaker 1: in through the roof, Well we did, yeah, yeah, And
Speaker 1: I thought about calling the sermon. It's better to ask
Speaker 1: forgiveness than permission in some cases, because a lot of
Speaker 1: times we're waiting on somebody else to give us permission.
Speaker 1: You've got to get certain permission from within. Now I
Speaker 1: don't mean, I don't mean be inappropriate, walk around without
Speaker 1: your mask. Coming about Mark two, I'm not talking about that.
Speaker 1: I just want to I want to put the thought
Speaker 1: in your mind about inner permission. It's the inner permission
Speaker 1: that matters. Go to Corinthians. Let me show you. This
Speaker 1: is this good first Corinthians two. Now, this might be
Speaker 1: too much, but I'm going to give it a shot.
Speaker 1: You know, Jesus argued with the scribes about the washing
Speaker 1: of hands. There's so many things he argued with In
Speaker 1: this particular instance, there's one difference. Let me illustrate it.
Speaker 1: From this First Corinthians to go all the way to
Speaker 1: verse six. It's about ten verses. I want to read
Speaker 1: you do y'all have six? Oh? I started later, so
Speaker 1: I'll read you six and they can put it in later. Okay.
Speaker 1: We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among them
Speaker 1: a toure, but not the wisdom of this age or
Speaker 1: the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No,
Speaker 1: we declare God's wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden
Speaker 1: and that God destined for our glory before time began.
Speaker 1: None of the rulers of this age understood it, for
Speaker 1: if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord
Speaker 1: of glory. However, as it is written, watch just what
Speaker 1: no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and
Speaker 1: what no human in mind has conceived. The things God
Speaker 1: has prepared for those who love him. Don't stop at
Speaker 1: that verse. Verse ten says something pretty cool. These are
Speaker 1: the things, what things, the things that no eye has
Speaker 1: seen and no ear has heard. These are the things
Speaker 1: God has revealed to us by his spirit. I'm so
Speaker 1: glad I have my own Bible, because I would always
Speaker 1: thought that. First Corinthians two stopped at verse nine. I
Speaker 1: heard this verse quoted for years, no eye has seen,
Speaker 1: no ear has heard, neither has it entered into the
Speaker 1: heart of man, what God has prepared for those who
Speaker 1: love him. And they'd stop. Verse ten says, these are
Speaker 1: the things, somebody say, these are the things God has
Speaker 1: revealed to us by his spirit. Put it in the chat.
Speaker 1: These are the things, These are the things, These are
Speaker 1: the things, These are the things. Go back to March
Speaker 1: chapter two. Now for a moment. Now, some teachers of
Speaker 1: the law were sitting there thinking to themselves, why does
Speaker 1: this fellow talk like that. He's blaming who can forgive
Speaker 1: sins but God alone. Immediately, here's my verse. Jesus knew
Speaker 1: in his spirit that this is what they were thinking
Speaker 1: in their hearts, and he said to them, why are
Speaker 1: you thinking these things? The power of the Lord is
Speaker 1: present to heal the sick, and all you want to
Speaker 1: think about is the limitations of your senses, what you
Speaker 1: can understand, what you can make sense out of. Why
Speaker 1: are you thinking these things? Well, I can tell you
Speaker 1: why they thought those things. They were taught those things.
Speaker 1: They were taught those things. You were taught how to
Speaker 1: think about who you are in Christ. You were taught
Speaker 1: to think about how to You were taught to think
Speaker 1: about how you function in the world. You were taught
Speaker 1: to think about your definition of power. You were taught
Speaker 1: to think about what you can and can accomplish. And
Speaker 1: if you've never seen it before, it's hard to believe
Speaker 1: that it can be. But here in Mark chapter two,
Speaker 1: we have Jesus, who is number one, able to see
Speaker 1: something no one else can see. Did you notice it
Speaker 1: in the texts that in verse five, Jesus saw their faith?
Speaker 1: How can you see faith? I didn't know you could
Speaker 1: see faith. I never walked up to somebody and said,
Speaker 1: looks like you've been gaining faith. Wow, you've lost some faith?
Speaker 1: Can I pray for you? But he could see faith
Speaker 1: in the form of the roof that was at his
Speaker 1: feet because of their action. He saw. Watch this their faith,
Speaker 1: not the man on the mat. Their faith. How many
Speaker 1: praise God that the right people in your life can
Speaker 1: lead you to healing? Come on, I mean the right people,
Speaker 1: the right people who won't give up when they see
Speaker 1: the crowd, the right people that won't give up on
Speaker 1: you because you're a little heavy, the right people. And
Speaker 1: I have a question. I have a question. I have
Speaker 1: a question if the right people can get you healed,
Speaker 1: can the wrong people keep you paralyzed. Some of the
Speaker 1: greatest limitations we put on ourselves come in the forms
Speaker 1: of the relationships that have no more purpose to serve
Speaker 1: in this season of our life. You need a new roof,
Speaker 1: You need some new relationships. You really do. You need
Speaker 1: some new people. I found out that that just like
Speaker 1: the men carried their friend. In fact, I always said
Speaker 1: it was his friends that got him to Jesus. But
Speaker 1: the Bible never even calls them his friends. It just
Speaker 1: says they were some men. I don't know if they
Speaker 1: were friends or if he hired them for the job.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. They got it done. But I'll tell
Speaker 1: you something, when you circle up with people who are
Speaker 1: stuck in a limitation of what God used to do,
Speaker 1: it is very hard for you to believe that all
Speaker 1: things are possible. So I give you a challenge today,
Speaker 1: and you can choose to receive it, or you can
Speaker 1: choose to reject it. That's going to be up to you.
Speaker 1: But I believe I'm speaking to somebody who's been blocked lately.
Speaker 1: You've heard of writer's block. Probably I've experienced that. There's
Speaker 1: even preacher's block. I promise you it's a real thing.
Speaker 1: There's also peace block, joy block. The biggest block in
Speaker 1: the passage was not the crowd at the door. It
Speaker 1: was the limitations in the hearts of the scribes who
Speaker 1: were sitting there thinking to themselves. And so Jesus proved
Speaker 1: his power over sin. He's like, hmm, if you don't
Speaker 1: believe that I forgive sin, maybe you'll believe me. If
Speaker 1: this man gets up and walks, it's easier for me
Speaker 1: to make him walk than it is for me to
Speaker 1: forgive him, because I'll have to die for him to
Speaker 1: be forgiven. What are the limitations that God is calling
Speaker 1: me to unlearn? I mean, certain limits are good. All right,
Speaker 1: the NBA is over, you're thirty four. You're not going
Speaker 1: to do it now. It's not going to happen now.
Speaker 1: Dunk on your son, but it's not going to the
Speaker 1: professional level. You're not going to get paid for it.
Speaker 1: But certain things you said. I said this on Easter,
Speaker 1: and I talked about how we'll even blame it on
Speaker 1: a personality type. Personalities aren't permanent. Temperaments are given, but
Speaker 1: personalities aren't. There's no such thing as I'm just a
Speaker 1: negative person. There's just negative patterns. What are the limitations
Speaker 1: that you need to unlearn that you received because of
Speaker 1: lies that you believe your limitations were learned. You didn't
Speaker 1: always just think like that. You didn't just always think, well,
Speaker 1: you know, if I love anybody, I'm just gonna get hurt.
Speaker 1: So I'll just stay here to myself and I'll just isolate.
Speaker 1: And I never really let anybody in because can't trust me.
Speaker 1: You learned that. And in Luke chapter five I was reading.
Speaker 1: Because Luke puts it a little different, it's the same story,
Speaker 1: but he said that when Jesus saw the men lower him,
Speaker 1: he looked at the man and said, friend, you're sin
Speaker 1: are forgiven. All these years I've been preaching this text,
Speaker 1: and I said, his four friends are the reason he
Speaker 1: got here. Put Luke five twenty again, Jesus said to
Speaker 1: the man friend, when the man's friends had taken him
Speaker 1: as far as they could, he found a friend that
Speaker 1: had no limitations. And the real beauty of it is
Speaker 1: that friend lives in you. So whatever whatever external limitation
Speaker 1: it is, I believe God is going to use in
Speaker 1: your life to reveal to you an internal grace that
Speaker 1: is greater than the external limitation. I declare it over
Speaker 1: your life. I prophesy it over your life. I don't
Speaker 1: have to scream to prophesy. I'm saying it till you
Speaker 1: direct flat footage. Watch me stand here and say it.
Speaker 1: The limitation is a gift. The external thing serves a
Speaker 1: purpose in your life to show the greatness of God.
Speaker 1: Jesus knew that the man needed to be forgiven more
Speaker 1: than he needed to be healed. He gave him the
Speaker 1: gift of a limitation to give him the gift that
Speaker 1: he didn't know he needed. So we have a Jesus
Speaker 1: who can hear thoughts. Isn't that scary? They didn't even
Speaker 1: say anything, and he argued with them, a Jesus who
Speaker 1: can see faith and a God who can forgive sins.
Speaker 1: Let's take a moment today in our lives and do
Speaker 1: what the men did. Let's put the issues of our
Speaker 1: life at the feet of Jesus. All he was proving
Speaker 1: is I have all authority. There is nothing you can
Speaker 1: bring into my presence. There is nothing you can say
Speaker 1: about yourself. There is nothing that you can bring into
Speaker 1: into this room, into the presence of God. There is
Speaker 1: no problem that you can name that is greater than
Speaker 1: the power of God. So right now, Lord, in the
Speaker 1: name of Jesus, in the name of your son Jesus,
Speaker 1: who walked the earth and lived the life that I
Speaker 1: could not live, the one who died to death on
Speaker 1: a sinner's cross, the one who, in the weakness of flesh,
Speaker 1: demonstrated the strength of God. In that name, in the
Speaker 1: name of Jesus, Christ of Nazareth, I speak to every
Speaker 1: human frailty. I speak to every sickness. I speak to
Speaker 1: every disease. I speak to every insecurity. I speak to shame.
Speaker 1: I speak to deep shame. I speak to secret shame.
Speaker 1: I speak to fear. I speak to night terrors. In
Speaker 1: the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, you
Speaker 1: will rise up above what was holding you, and you
Speaker 1: will demonstrate the authority of the Word of God in
Speaker 1: your life. This day, this week, this moment. You will
Speaker 1: break through every roof. You will break through every tradition.
Speaker 1: You will break through every barrier, you will break through
Speaker 1: every limitation, You will break through every name that has
Speaker 1: been placed on you. His name is greater, and I
Speaker 1: speak it over every life. God. We have proof, We
Speaker 1: have evidence that you forgive and heal. But we must
Speaker 1: believe it to be true for us because the greatest
Speaker 1: block in our life will not be something standing outside
Speaker 1: the door. It'll be something that grows up in our hearts.
Speaker 1: So Lord, right now we bring it all before you
Speaker 1: as we minister today. Lord, we said that there are
Speaker 1: some things that only your spirit can reveal. Eyes can't
Speaker 1: see it, ears can't hear it, but your spirit knows it.
Speaker 1: I pray for your sons and daughters this week that
Speaker 1: they would be visited by revelation of who you are
Speaker 1: and who they are in you, Oh God, If they
Speaker 1: find that out, they will never be blocked again. We're
Speaker 1: using this moment to escalate. We want to be transferred
Speaker 1: to another department. We've been down here dealing with some
Speaker 1: stuff and we don't need permission from scribes and people.
Speaker 1: We don't need a pretty interest God, we just need
Speaker 1: a way into your presence. God, you have given us
Speaker 1: a way in through the sacrifice of your son, and
Speaker 1: now we receive your touch in this moment. We thank
Speaker 1: you for your presence. Right now, I want to give
Speaker 1: an invitation for somebody to receive Jesus Christ as you're
Speaker 1: savedor and received the grace of God. The Bible says
Speaker 1: that it is by grace you are saved through faith.
Speaker 1: It's not of work, so that no one can boast.
Speaker 1: It's the gift of God. You just heard this message
Speaker 1: today in your PARI lies not physically. Maybe it's a
Speaker 1: spiritual paralysis that sin creates. It's the sense that you
Speaker 1: can never reach God. It's the sense that you can't
Speaker 1: keep the law. It's the sense that you need the
Speaker 1: grace of God, and that grace has been made available.
Speaker 1: There's not seven steps to this to getting right with God.
Speaker 1: There's not all this knowledge that you have to be
Speaker 1: able to quote. It's as simple as the faith of
Speaker 1: this man who was positioned at the feet of Jesus
Speaker 1: and forgiven of his sin. And if you would like
Speaker 1: to receive that forgiveness of your sin. I want to
Speaker 1: lead you in a prayer right now, and I want
Speaker 1: to just bring you to Jesus and I'm going to
Speaker 1: pray a prayer. I want you to repeat this prayer
Speaker 1: with me. It's going to be a life changing moment.
Speaker 1: And we're praying all together out loud as a church family.
Speaker 1: Pray with me, Heavenly Father. I believe believe that Jesus
Speaker 1: Christ is the Son of God and the savior of
Speaker 1: the world. Today, I make Jesus the lord of my life.
Speaker 1: I believe he died for me and rose again to
Speaker 1: give me life. I receive this new life. This is
Speaker 1: my new beginning. I am a child of God. On
Speaker 1: the count of three, if you pray that shoots your
Speaker 1: hand up one, two, three in the chat, say I
Speaker 1: receive Jesus. Just say it right there in the chap.
Speaker 1: We want to celebrate with you online. I received Jesus.
Speaker 1: Come on, I received Jesus. Not I achieved. I received Jesus.
Speaker 1: I received the grace of God. Well, I pray that
Speaker 1: you received exactly what you needed from God today, and
Speaker 1: I pray that this week you'll put your faith into action.
Speaker 1: Right He told the man, pick up your map and
Speaker 1: go home. And that's what we want to do. We
Speaker 1: want to take the message that God gave us and
Speaker 1: apply it in our lives. And I pray that God
Speaker 1: will give you the faith and the grace to do
Speaker 1: something this week that you've never done before, something that's
Speaker 1: been in you all along. Heley, and I love you.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us, Thank you for giving to
Speaker 1: the ministry. You're amazing. We're always grateful for your partnership
Speaker 1: in the gospel and for your prayers. It means a lot.
Speaker 1: We're praying for you to see you next time.