Speaker 1: Tell me what these cities have in common. Puck quiz, Austin, Texas,
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. It's in Oklahoma, Abbey. We were going
Speaker 1: through the cities the other night. She said, Now, where's
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City? I said, Oklahoma, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Kansas City, Missouri, Denver, Colorado,
Speaker 1: Saint Louis, Missouri. Are you seeing a pattern here? Fort Wayne, Indiana, Toronto, Ontario.
Speaker 1: Elevation Nights Tour April eighteenth through twenty seventh, twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: All of those cities were coming. Go right now and
Speaker 1: check it out, and we will be there soon here
Speaker 1: at Elevation today. I hope we didn't overwhelm you with
Speaker 1: new songs. We didn't do a single song that's on
Speaker 1: Spotify today all new songs because it goes along with
Speaker 1: my theme for this year. Don't just do you people
Speaker 1: are around? Do you do the new you? Do the
Speaker 1: you that God created, Do the you that God is changing.
Speaker 1: Do the you that is going to walk into the
Speaker 1: opportunity that is before you, full of faith, acknowledging your weaknesses,
Speaker 1: but confident in your strength in Christ. Do the new you?
Speaker 1: Are you getting this word as I'm preaching it? Come
Speaker 1: on if you're online, say I'm good this thing. This
Speaker 1: thing is sinking in for me. We're going right back
Speaker 1: to Ephesians four, so you might as well sit down
Speaker 1: and settle in. Right back to our key verse. I'm
Speaker 1: done arguing with the Lord when he tells me to
Speaker 1: preach something. I'm just gonna stop fighting it so he
Speaker 1: doesn't have to put my hip out of socket. Like
Speaker 1: Jacob over there in the Old Testament, who I mentioned
Speaker 1: last week. I'm gonna just go with it in along
Speaker 1: with our groups doing immeasurably more. I'm preaching from the
Speaker 1: Book of Ephesians. But the fourth chapter snuck up on
Speaker 1: me because I always liked Ephesians three twenty Now unto
Speaker 1: him who is able to do a measure more. Well,
Speaker 1: then when I got into four, I found out what
Speaker 1: more looks like, and then that helped me. Is helping
Speaker 1: me so much. Man, God is working on me. I'm
Speaker 1: glad too. I need him to. I'm not there yet.
Speaker 1: I have not achieved Ephesians four twenty four yet. Tell me,
Speaker 1: if you have to put on the new self, put
Speaker 1: it up on the screen, created to be like God.
Speaker 1: So I'm not there yet. I've reached some goals in
Speaker 1: my life. I think I've grown, But if that's the
Speaker 1: goal to be like God, oh man, I'm gonna need Jesus.
Speaker 1: I thought I just needed Jesus to get me to
Speaker 1: heaven when I died, but then I found out I
Speaker 1: need Him in my habits for everyday life now. A
Speaker 1: lot of times when we preach about Jesus, we talk
Speaker 1: about your new home in heaven. You're not going to hell.
Speaker 1: You're going to Heaven and be with Grandma and Gabriel
Speaker 1: and God. And then we forget to mention that, Okay, hey,
Speaker 1: just like we need a new home in heaven, we
Speaker 1: need new habits in our life. Oh. By the way,
Speaker 1: I don't need a single amen today. The Lord told
Speaker 1: me this sermon was good, So I'm gonna just break
Speaker 1: it out on you and do whatever you need to do.
Speaker 1: So let me read this scripture and then I'm going
Speaker 1: to talk about do you, which I know is kind
Speaker 1: of so oh man. When you hear people say that,
Speaker 1: it feels good right, like, hey man, you know, probably
Speaker 1: a fifty seven year old shouldn't have that haircut, but
Speaker 1: do you? I mean it's a little tight, probably fits
Speaker 1: you better. In a previous season, but I mean, if
Speaker 1: you feel if you can rock and rocket, do you?
Speaker 1: And I'm all for that, that uniqueness, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: all for that. If it's a mohawk that you want,
Speaker 1: get them all, if your parents say you can get
Speaker 1: them all. I like your blue hair? Do you? You You
Speaker 1: know what I mean? But I can't just take that
Speaker 1: whole philosophy. Do you if you want blue hair? And
Speaker 1: then tell you, well, if it's a bottle of pills
Speaker 1: that helps you escape and the doctor didn't prescribe it
Speaker 1: and you know you're addicted to it, just do you
Speaker 1: whatever gets you through the night. So what we're challenging
Speaker 1: ourselves in is this idea that the true you is
Speaker 1: the new you. And a lot of times, even if
Speaker 1: something is nicer when it's new, at first, I don't
Speaker 1: like it. And growing into our relationship with God looks
Speaker 1: like this. Let's go back to verse fourteen and let
Speaker 1: me break it down. And this sermon today is called
Speaker 1: permission to quit. Permission to quit. Oh, I know where
Speaker 1: this is going. You're going to tell me keep trying
Speaker 1: and march around the walls. And I know how this
Speaker 1: is man. You just go, oh God, it's gonna be
Speaker 1: one of those sermons. You're just gonna tell me, you're
Speaker 1: gonna make fun of me because I joined the gym,
Speaker 1: and I only went twice, and it's only January, and
Speaker 1: tell me I got to get back in there. But
Speaker 1: stay with me, because I think you might be surprised
Speaker 1: where the Lord is leading us this week. Ephesians, chapter four,
Speaker 1: Verse fourteen. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed
Speaker 1: back and forth by the waves, and blown here and
Speaker 1: there by every wind of cable news and teaching, with
Speaker 1: the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming,
Speaker 1: trying every diet, trying every religion, dabbling in this, dabbling
Speaker 1: in that, doing it six weeks for remembering what you
Speaker 1: know it used to be like in your old life.
Speaker 1: He said, that's not gonna happen anymore. Instead, verse fifteen,
Speaker 1: speaking the truth and love, we will, my favorite phrase
Speaker 1: in this whole passage, grow to become. That's so annointed.
Speaker 1: Say I will say it with conviction and gumption. I
Speaker 1: will grow to become. I'm gonna grow to become a
Speaker 1: better man. I'm gonna grow to become a better dad.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be a great dad. I'm gonna be a
Speaker 1: great If I was a great dad last year, wait
Speaker 1: till you see me this year. I'm gonna be a
Speaker 1: greater dad this year. I'm gonna be a better preacher.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be a better teacher. I'm gonna be more honest.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be more vulnerable, no less powerful. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: get up in here and say what God gave me
Speaker 1: to say without the interference of the fear of man.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna stop pulling back when God gives me something.
Speaker 1: I'm growing to become. Man. I'm gonna be a good wife.
Speaker 1: Are you married? Not yet, but I'm growing to become it.
Speaker 1: And when I become it, God is going to be
Speaker 1: sure that I have the experiences that I need to
Speaker 1: fulfill the calling that He's given me. I'm growing into this.
Speaker 1: Don't memorize me right now. If you meet me again
Speaker 1: in a month, I'm going to be more like my
Speaker 1: maker because That's where I'm headed in this life. Don't
Speaker 1: take a snapshot of me and then criticize me. You've changed,
Speaker 1: I hope, so if I ever stopped change and cremate me.
Speaker 1: I got to do this. I've got to become what
Speaker 1: God said I was. But now, don't curse me out
Speaker 1: because I'm an acorn. I thought you said you were
Speaker 1: an oak tree. I am. Let me get in the
Speaker 1: right environment, Let me get the right water, let me
Speaker 1: get the right time. Come on, I'm growing to become.
Speaker 1: This helped me because I have a hard time striking
Speaker 1: a balance between contentment, which I know the Bible says
Speaker 1: is good, and ambition, which the Bible also instructs me
Speaker 1: to have grow to become like God. That's a pretty
Speaker 1: lofty go. And so when I realize, oh, God is
Speaker 1: calling me to grow to become, not to be all
Speaker 1: at once, but to grow to become. Now, this process
Speaker 1: works its itself out in the following way. Look at
Speaker 1: verse sixteen. Excuse me, I didn't read all of verse fifteen,
Speaker 1: did I. We will grow to become in every respect,
Speaker 1: the mature body of Him who is the head that
Speaker 1: is Christ from him, the whole body, joined and held
Speaker 1: together e groups by every supporting ligament. You are out
Speaker 1: of joint. You are out of socket when you're not
Speaker 1: connected with the right people, and He says together, if
Speaker 1: you're going to do the new, you don't make an
Speaker 1: idol out of your individuality. One of the ways you're
Speaker 1: going to grow to become is by getting around others
Speaker 1: who challenge you, who encourage you. And so then as
Speaker 1: the body builds itself up in love, each part is
Speaker 1: doing its work Verse seventeen. So I tell you this
Speaker 1: and insist on it in the Lord that you must
Speaker 1: no longer live. You must no longer live as the
Speaker 1: gentiles do in the futility or vanity of their thinking.
Speaker 1: They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the
Speaker 1: life of God because of the ignorance that is in
Speaker 1: them due to the hardening of their hearts. This phrase
Speaker 1: hardening of their hearts calls into mind linguistically when a
Speaker 1: bone is broken and resets, But the callous that grows
Speaker 1: is hard. Isn't that what happens to us in our life?
Speaker 1: We get broken in relationships, broken through experience, broken through trials,
Speaker 1: broken through temptations that we can't overcome, And then there
Speaker 1: is a hardness if it is not reset correctly, that
Speaker 1: keeps us from receiving from God what he wants to
Speaker 1: give us, to grow us into who He made us
Speaker 1: to be. But God's not going to leave you broken.
Speaker 1: God is not going to leave you with the bone
Speaker 1: broken and reset so that your heart is harder. He
Speaker 1: is going to bring you through this brokenness better than
Speaker 1: when you went into the brokenness. He is going to
Speaker 1: bring you through this brokenness. Who receives this word like
Speaker 1: if it's for you, He's going to bring you through
Speaker 1: this brokenness. I'm going to be better after I was broken.
Speaker 1: I'm going to be better after they fired me. I'm
Speaker 1: going to learn things from this failed relationship. And when
Speaker 1: God resets me, the God of resurrection is going to
Speaker 1: call me forth into a glorious future for the praise
Speaker 1: of his name, because I'm growing to become so, he says,
Speaker 1: don't live like these gentiles who, having verse nineteen, lost
Speaker 1: all sensitivity. They have given themselves over to sensuality, as
Speaker 1: to indulge in every kind of impurity you'll ever look
Speaker 1: around and think, just when you think that they can't
Speaker 1: invent any new sins, they make a new one. I
Speaker 1: feel like we are living in you know, they had
Speaker 1: the industrial Revolution. I feel like we are living right
Speaker 1: now in this time, in the impurity revolution. We are
Speaker 1: making new ways to be screwed up. It's all the
Speaker 1: lust of the flesh, lust of pride, pride lust of flesh,
Speaker 1: lest eyes, pride of life. But the flavors of it, y'all,
Speaker 1: we got some creative flavors of sin. I better back
Speaker 1: to the Bible. Y'all are looking at me strange. Maybe
Speaker 1: not in your zip code? Is fine, It's fine. It's
Speaker 1: just something I've been noticing. He says, they give themselves
Speaker 1: over to it. Now follow me. When he says they
Speaker 1: give themselves over to it, that is very different than
Speaker 1: saying that they get caught up in it. There's a
Speaker 1: big difference between giving yourself over and getting caught up.
Speaker 1: Everybody can get caught up. If you haven't seen the
Speaker 1: person sitting next to you get caught up in sin,
Speaker 1: you just haven't followed them to the right places yet.
Speaker 1: You haven't seen them in the right moments yet. They
Speaker 1: just hadn't shown you yet. We can all get caught
Speaker 1: up in different ways, different varieties, different prescriptions. But there's
Speaker 1: a big difference between getting caught up. Oh God, when
Speaker 1: I say that, because you're human, there is grace for
Speaker 1: your humanity. There is grace for the moments. Why did
Speaker 1: I explode on my wife five minutes after church? You're human,
Speaker 1: but do not let your humanness I might have made
Speaker 1: that word up. Do not let your humanness and the
Speaker 1: grace that God gives for your humanness become an excuse
Speaker 1: for your hypocrisy shouting in Houston. Just because I struggle
Speaker 1: with it doesn't mean I have to surrender to it.
Speaker 1: There's a big difference. I mean, there's some big guys
Speaker 1: in this room right now, and I'm sure that many
Speaker 1: of them if they took me and dragged me off
Speaker 1: the stage, they can get me off the stage. But
Speaker 1: that's a big difference than me again on their back, piggyback,
Speaker 1: isn't it? Is there a big guy? We should illustrate this.
Speaker 1: I need somebody bigger than me. I'm about one seventy,
Speaker 1: so you got to at least have me buy thirty pounds.
Speaker 1: Come on, I need a big guy. Ah, mate's here?
Speaker 1: Where's mate? Where's mate? Get made up here? Get made
Speaker 1: up here. That's a great idea, made the great. Everybody say,
Speaker 1: mate the great? Now, it's not my fally bench presses
Speaker 1: five hundred and five pounds. You got that twenty four
Speaker 1: year old anointy? Are you too injured to do this? Illustration?
Speaker 1: I want to hurt you. He just went through an injury.
Speaker 1: We can't hurt him. But imagine this. I'm not even
Speaker 1: gonna do the full illustration. I care more about you
Speaker 1: than my illustration. I'm selfless. But imagine if he wanted
Speaker 1: to drag me off the stage, he could do it.
Speaker 1: It would just be a ma or a time. But
Speaker 1: that's real different than I jump up in his arms.
Speaker 1: So I just want you to see that. Go back,
Speaker 1: sit back down. It would have been cool if I
Speaker 1: could have done it, but I don't want to do it.
Speaker 1: I don't want to hurt him. When when you look
Speaker 1: at what God is doing, and I really haven't read
Speaker 1: the scripture I want to preach from yet, but that
Speaker 1: whole thing right there that helps me make a critical
Speaker 1: distinction in my life as to whether I am still
Speaker 1: struggling with sin. You know, the writer of Hebrews said
Speaker 1: you have not yet struggled with sin to the point
Speaker 1: of shedding your blood. And I guess he's saying, like,
Speaker 1: when you say I've done all I can do, I
Speaker 1: can't change it. Did you do all you could do? Rarely? Rarely?
Speaker 1: And then grace? When grace comes in, Some people take
Speaker 1: that grace and they don't really receive it as power.
Speaker 1: They receive it as permission to keep living in stuff
Speaker 1: that makes them miserable. So why would you want permission
Speaker 1: to be miserable? You can who's going to stop you?
Speaker 1: But this is what the Bible says in verse twenty.
Speaker 1: Now we're getting into it real deep here, that, however,
Speaker 1: the impurity, the greed, the sensuality, the indulgence, that, however,
Speaker 1: just talking nasty because you felt mad, You talk nasty
Speaker 1: just because everybody else is so mean to each other.
Speaker 1: Now you're just mean to Now you're hardened because the
Speaker 1: bone that was broken didn't reset in the hands of
Speaker 1: the healer. And Paul says, that is not the way
Speaker 1: of life you learned when you heard about Christ. I
Speaker 1: don't care if everybody else does it. That is not
Speaker 1: me now. Used to be yeah, but not now, somebody
Speaker 1: shout not now. God's done too much for me. Not now.
Speaker 1: I dropped out of church like for eighteen years, but
Speaker 1: not now. I used to think that it was more
Speaker 1: important to wash my car on Sunday than be in
Speaker 1: the house of God, but not now, because I need
Speaker 1: God to wash my soul every Sunday so I can
Speaker 1: go forward into my future uncontaminated. Whoa. There is power
Speaker 1: in the word of God, and there is permission in
Speaker 1: the Word of God to do it different. That is
Speaker 1: not me. That is what I used to do. That
Speaker 1: is what all my friends have been doing. That is
Speaker 1: what I saw growing up. That is what was done
Speaker 1: to me. But why would I take what was done
Speaker 1: to me and carry it into the future that God
Speaker 1: has for me that stays there because this is my
Speaker 1: Then let me make a sandwich real quick. Verse fourteen says,
Speaker 1: then everybody shout. Then Verse twenty says that everybody say that.
Speaker 1: So Verse fourteen speaks to a point of maturity where
Speaker 1: you say, I'm no longer just gonna be driven by circumstances.
Speaker 1: I'm no longer just gonna wake up and see how
Speaker 1: I feel and act like I feel. I'm no longer
Speaker 1: just gonna wake up and see what I think and
Speaker 1: follow my thoughts till they lead me right off the
Speaker 1: edge of the cliff. I'm no longer just gonna trust
Speaker 1: everybody who makes me feel good so I can get
Speaker 1: what I want in the moment. No more beans for birthright,
Speaker 1: So God says, when will your then finally come? When
Speaker 1: will it be enough of you getting the same result
Speaker 1: from repeating the same behavior. When will your then come
Speaker 1: the DEI to grow up, the decision to come into
Speaker 1: communion with God, the decision to say, Lord, I want
Speaker 1: to put this brokenness in your hands, and then something
Speaker 1: pretty awesome happens. He said, that is not you. The
Speaker 1: moment you make a decision, then I'm growing up. Then
Speaker 1: that no longer has control over you. That that it
Speaker 1: would get real uncomfortable if I started listing specific that's
Speaker 1: in the room, because the categories don't really don't really
Speaker 1: make you cringe. Impurity, creed lost, Oh yeah, I watched
Speaker 1: that Bernie Madoff documentary Creed. How about me always wanting
Speaker 1: more and never giving much? How about me always thinking
Speaker 1: somebody needs to encourage me? But who am I encouraging?
Speaker 1: See how this works? That is not me. And I'm
Speaker 1: going to do a list next week that I'll give
Speaker 1: you where I'm gonna teach you the new me is not.
Speaker 1: And we're gonna list some of the things that you
Speaker 1: are not anymore if you name the name of Christ,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna wage war against those things because we've
Speaker 1: been accepting them too long as normal. Just because it's
Speaker 1: natural doesn't mean it's normal. Watch this, that is not
Speaker 1: the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ.
Speaker 1: When you heard about Christ. And so faith comes by hearing, right,
Speaker 1: how many know that scripture. Faith comes by hearing, hearing
Speaker 1: the Word of God. Faith comes by hearing, but freedom
Speaker 1: comes by habit. That's why it is possible for you
Speaker 1: to know more about God than you are bringing into
Speaker 1: your current experience. That's why it's possible for you to
Speaker 1: drag around deficiencies and dysfunctions that Christ died to help
Speaker 1: you deal with, and then start justifying things that Jesus
Speaker 1: wants to set you free from. Yeah, we're going to
Speaker 1: get free in some areas of our life this year.
Speaker 1: And if you don't want to get free this year,
Speaker 1: don't come here Furdic preach, because Furdic is trying to
Speaker 1: get free this year of some childlike behaviors that are
Speaker 1: coming around in a grown man's body. And I want
Speaker 1: to be less petty, less prideful. I want to be
Speaker 1: stable because I don't know what wind and waves has
Speaker 1: come in my way. So I want to be more
Speaker 1: a tuned to worship. I want to be more tuned
Speaker 1: into the voice of God. I want to be like
Speaker 1: him say it. I want to be like him. Okay,
Speaker 1: you were taught in Him in accordance with the truth
Speaker 1: that is in Jesus. You were taught with regard to
Speaker 1: your former way of life, to put off your old self,
Speaker 1: which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires. Y'all remember
Speaker 1: tricks or for kids from last week? I know you do.
Speaker 1: I know if you missed last week, you caught the
Speaker 1: podcast first opportunity, because no way you would miss a
Speaker 1: sermon from the Word of God. You wouldn't do that
Speaker 1: and watch Netflix or Hulu, not you, Verse twenty three.
Speaker 1: This is the goal to be made new in the
Speaker 1: attitude of your minds, to put on the new self
Speaker 1: created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
Speaker 1: So now I'm looking at my humanity and I'm looking
Speaker 1: at God's holiness wholeness, changing me who I really am.
Speaker 1: And I'm making decisions daily about which one to choose.
Speaker 1: You know, in this church, I think it can be
Speaker 1: said that you can bring somebody who is hurting, somebody
Speaker 1: who is addicted, somebody who is living in a lifestyle
Speaker 1: that is way far from what the Bible describes, and
Speaker 1: they will hear and feel that God loves them and
Speaker 1: that they are welcome, and that they can come back
Speaker 1: as many times as they want to come back, even
Speaker 1: if their life never changes. I hope you know that.
Speaker 1: I hope you know that. Doesn't matter how loud I yell.
Speaker 1: I'm not mad at you. I'm not yelling because I'm angry.
Speaker 1: The thing that I'm angry at more than anything is
Speaker 1: the devastation that I see in the lives of people
Speaker 1: that I love because they are loyal to lifestyles that
Speaker 1: lead them to death. One time, a guy was kind
Speaker 1: of fussing at me very early in the church, where
Speaker 1: he said, we don't preach about sin enough. And he
Speaker 1: might be right, because, honestly, like, if we really preached
Speaker 1: about all the sin that's represented in this room, y'all
Speaker 1: wouldn't make it to work Monday morning, and I could
Speaker 1: just do my own life and we could get at
Speaker 1: least a Tuesday. But what he said, now, this is interesting.
Speaker 1: Listen to this. He goes, I feel like when you
Speaker 1: preach about acceptance and grace and the love of God,
Speaker 1: when you do that, it gives people a license to sin.
Speaker 1: Now I had heard that before, so I had to
Speaker 1: come back ready for it. I said, a license to sin.
Speaker 1: Most of the people that I preach to are doing
Speaker 1: just fine sinning without a license. I mean, what is
Speaker 1: sin an eighteen wheeler like you need a license to
Speaker 1: do it? What is sin? A single engine plane like
Speaker 1: you need a license? All of a sudden, what is sin?
Speaker 1: A like sin is hunting like you need a license
Speaker 1: to do it. You're doing just fine sinning without a license.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, you know what your sin
Speaker 1: license was? Your birth certificate. You got here knowing how
Speaker 1: to be selfish. Everybody who doesn't agree that's your birth
Speaker 1: certificate is your sin license? Has it had children? Has
Speaker 1: it even looked at yourself? So what I wanted to
Speaker 1: say to the man is I appreciate where you're coming from.
Speaker 1: Understand that God has a standard. But I need people
Speaker 1: to know that the same God who gives the standard
Speaker 1: will also give the strength. As long as I only
Speaker 1: tell you this is how you're sinning, As long as
Speaker 1: I only tell you this is how you're missing the mark,
Speaker 1: As long as I only tell you this is the
Speaker 1: fifteen ways that you could have been better yesterday. As
Speaker 1: long as all of our focus is on that, what
Speaker 1: do we do We continue in what we reinforce a
Speaker 1: license to sin. I never met a single person yet.
Speaker 1: I've pastored all kinds of people, Southern people, northern people,
Speaker 1: black people, white people, men, women, old people, young people.
Speaker 1: I never met one that needed a license to be stingy.
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, like, over half the church doesn't tithe.
Speaker 1: Where's you're not tithed? Sense? Where do they give those out?
Speaker 1: And even if we get past the big behaviors, like
Speaker 1: you get all these external things and all that, if
Speaker 1: we get down into the things that people don't see,
Speaker 1: like how sometimes you use your kids as a backdrop
Speaker 1: for the image that you want to present rather than
Speaker 1: raising them according to who they are. That's a sin
Speaker 1: and you don't need a license for it. In my experience,
Speaker 1: more often than not, people don't need a license to sin.
Speaker 1: They need permission and power to quit. Now you never thought,
Speaker 1: and I never thought that a message would come from
Speaker 1: this pulpit called permission to quit. Because there's one thing
Speaker 1: I believe is you got to keep going. And I
Speaker 1: was so happy when it was pouring down rain when
Speaker 1: I came to church today because I was like, this
Speaker 1: is great the room I'm going to be preaching in
Speaker 1: the weather will be nice in other parts of the
Speaker 1: world of efemine that. But the people I'm preaching to
Speaker 1: are the people who came anyway. I was so glad.
Speaker 1: I was like, this is the perfect message for these
Speaker 1: people because they know you don't just get to like
Speaker 1: not come to church because you might get wet going
Speaker 1: out to the car. Oh, that's a shower of blessing.
Speaker 1: God is bringing. The rain of the word of God
Speaker 1: is about to hit the seat of my potential. I'm
Speaker 1: getting there'll be a seat today. I'm going might clear
Speaker 1: out all those complacent Christians, so only come once a month,
Speaker 1: you know, the type, get the get the real ones
Speaker 1: in here. But I really did I thought that because
Speaker 1: you hear, because you didn't quit. There was a period
Speaker 1: in our in our world where you couldn't come physically
Speaker 1: gather in church and you didn't quit. You watched online.
Speaker 1: Everybody was screaming in the background. You know, it wasn't
Speaker 1: a really good experience immersively for you to do it
Speaker 1: that way. I mean, if you got to do it,
Speaker 1: do it. But now here you are sitting here and
Speaker 1: you don't get to quit because the Bible says, let
Speaker 1: us not give up the habit of meeting together as
Speaker 1: some are in the habit of doing so. I don't
Speaker 1: get to quit, not and live in victory. I don't
Speaker 1: get to quit. If you have the faith to say it,
Speaker 1: say I don't get to quit, and now put it
Speaker 1: right there in the comments. I don't get to quit
Speaker 1: on what God called me to do. I don't get
Speaker 1: to Moses didn't. He didn't get to quit leading to people.
Speaker 1: Even though he wouldn't get to go in the Promised
Speaker 1: Land and eat grapes for them, he still had to
Speaker 1: appoint Joshua as the successor to the bitter end. You
Speaker 1: don't get to quit. Even if you don't get to
Speaker 1: do the thing that you thought you were going to
Speaker 1: get to do. You don't get to quit. You got
Speaker 1: to help somebody else do it. You don't get to quit.
Speaker 1: You still got to have Isaac. Even though your body
Speaker 1: is as good as dead. The Bible said about Abraham,
Speaker 1: you still gotta try again, even though it's not what
Speaker 1: do they say, not as good as I once was,
Speaker 1: But I'm as good once as I ever was. You
Speaker 1: gotta go in and try try. You and Sarah got
Speaker 1: to try this again because God still gave you the seed.
Speaker 1: You don't get to quit, let me stay in this
Speaker 1: for a moment because it might be pivotal. You don't
Speaker 1: get to say, this is as much like Christ as
Speaker 1: I'm ever gonna be, This is as free as I'm
Speaker 1: ever gonna be. You don't get to develop little systems
Speaker 1: and workarounds for all of the things that you know
Speaker 1: that God wants to work on in your life. You
Speaker 1: don't get to quit. What are you gonna do about it?
Speaker 1: Pastor I don't know, slash your tires, do something. I'm
Speaker 1: not just gonna stand up here and let you quit.
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not gonna let you just quit on
Speaker 1: joy or I'm just melancholy. I took a personality toast in.
Speaker 1: It took three personality tests. So if this your personality
Speaker 1: versus God's purpose, and God says you're something and you
Speaker 1: say no, I'm not, God is not wrong. Can we
Speaker 1: all agree that in the beginning was God, and God said,
Speaker 1: and it was so? If the God who before you
Speaker 1: got here said that it is, and that you were,
Speaker 1: and that you can and that you must. Did you
Speaker 1: notice Paul's language that got me excited? He said, you
Speaker 1: must no longer live this way we never get to
Speaker 1: the new self because we kept saying, I might, I might.
Speaker 1: You're gonna join one of those groups. I might, You're
Speaker 1: gonna do that thing. I might You're gonna get I might,
Speaker 1: I might, I might, I might. How many mites are
Speaker 1: you gonna drown in before you get a must in
Speaker 1: your spirit that says, if none go with me, I
Speaker 1: still will follow. I must Why because God called me
Speaker 1: to it. And if I don't do it, I'll be miserable,
Speaker 1: and then I'll self sabotage and I'll fall apart, and
Speaker 1: I'll take it out on people, and I'll spend stupid
Speaker 1: amounts of money trying to cover the fact that I
Speaker 1: quit on what God called me to do, and I'll
Speaker 1: dress up my failures in flesh and I'll call it success.
Speaker 1: But deep down inside, I'm just struggling with the same
Speaker 1: stuff with more money. I'm just struggling with the same
Speaker 1: stuff in a little bit older body. I'm just struggling
Speaker 1: with the same stuff with the same friends who struggle
Speaker 1: with the same stuff. So we all get together and
Speaker 1: we pass it around and we smoke on it and
Speaker 1: we suck on it and we talk about it and
Speaker 1: we comfort each other. But it is not grace, because
Speaker 1: grace will give you, not only watch this the command
Speaker 1: to change. Grace will get up inside of you and
Speaker 1: give you the power to change, so that you can
Speaker 1: know that what you didn't do before, you could do
Speaker 1: it now. Feeling in my spirit, right now you can quit. Wait,
Speaker 1: I thought you said I couldn't quit. Yeah, I'm saying,
Speaker 1: if God called you, you don't get to quit. But
Speaker 1: if it is keeping you from being what God called
Speaker 1: you as of this moment, somebody shout. Now, I'm not
Speaker 1: talking about last week. I'm not talking about in three
Speaker 1: years when it gets easier. I'm not talking about when
Speaker 1: we see about this recession. I'm not talking about anything
Speaker 1: that's going to happen, anything that did happen. But right now,
Speaker 1: anything that is keeping you from being what God has
Speaker 1: called you to be, you have permission to quit. Like
Speaker 1: the neighbor who told joe y'all can't fish in this pond.
Speaker 1: Don't you see the thing? No fishing allow? But then
Speaker 1: the other neighbor, he also is on the pond. He said,
Speaker 1: tell us boys, they can fish anytime in my pond.
Speaker 1: It's my pond too. They can fish there. So you
Speaker 1: can fish there because somebody gave you permission who owned property. Now,
Speaker 1: if the man the first man said you can't fish here,
Speaker 1: he was right because it's not your property. But when
Speaker 1: somebody who does own property adjacent to the pond gives
Speaker 1: you permission, This is why all of our attempts to
Speaker 1: change in our human strength are short lived, because we
Speaker 1: keep trying to do it in a place where we
Speaker 1: don't own property. See until I come to Christ and
Speaker 1: really receive His power in my life and his spirit
Speaker 1: in my mortal body, I can't do it because I
Speaker 1: don't own that spot. So I keep trying to step
Speaker 1: up to it, and I fall short from it, and
Speaker 1: then I'm stuck in it. But God says, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: I have a piece of property. You're ready for this.
Speaker 1: When I went up a hill called cavalry, and when
Speaker 1: I establish the real estate of salvation in your heart,
Speaker 1: when I said this is my throne inside of you.
Speaker 1: You need to understand that not only did I come
Speaker 1: to give you my presence, I came to give you permission.
Speaker 1: And what you couldn't do in the law, what you
Speaker 1: couldn't do in yourself, what you couldn't do in your past,
Speaker 1: what you couldn't do under the guard. Are you in
Speaker 1: the tutelage of the Law of Moses, God said, I'll
Speaker 1: do it for you. You You can lift your hands in
Speaker 1: here because I give you permission to praise me. I
Speaker 1: give you permission to come boldly before the throne. You
Speaker 1: feel that God says, you can fish here, you can
Speaker 1: worship here, you can try again here, you can forgive here,
Speaker 1: you can move forward with your life. Here. Because I
Speaker 1: own this spot, you have permission to quit. And yet,
Speaker 1: the sad reality of the message that I'm preaching today
Speaker 1: is that most of us are more loyal to our
Speaker 1: old self than we are excited about our true self.
Speaker 1: We really are were We still want to play Nintendo
Speaker 1: Sega Genesis and the Lawyer's got an Xbox twelve and
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, know how to word that controls me?
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna play this Nintendo Now. The question I
Speaker 1: really came up here to ask you. I want you
Speaker 1: to talk about it to somebody today before the day
Speaker 1: is over. Are you more committed to your limits than
Speaker 1: you are to your potential? Are you more loyal or
Speaker 1: committed to your limits than you are to your potential?
Speaker 1: Based on the way a lot of us speak and
Speaker 1: what shows up in our language, because our language will
Speaker 1: always be a great light detector to see things that
Speaker 1: we still say and how it affects the way that
Speaker 1: we think, and it leaks out in our language. So
Speaker 1: the moment that we begin to basically defend the way
Speaker 1: we've always been not acknowledge it, I think that's awesome. Hey,
Speaker 1: here's where I am, here's what it is, here's what
Speaker 1: I did, here's what I learned. And there's a lot
Speaker 1: of healing in that, because, as I mentioned, when the
Speaker 1: bone is broken, if it grows back callous, then that's
Speaker 1: going to be worse than the end. So I am
Speaker 1: not talking about the fact that you don't acknowledge it,
Speaker 1: but a lot of us go far beyond acknowledging. We
Speaker 1: actually become advocates of our own weaknesses. I don't mean
Speaker 1: facing the fact that at five point four and forty
Speaker 1: seven years old, you're probably not going to play in
Speaker 1: the NBA. I think that is a wonderful limitation for
Speaker 1: you to embrace in your life. I think your family
Speaker 1: will be happy and you will put food on the
Speaker 1: table by acknowledging certain limitations. That's why I didn't get
Speaker 1: on mates back when he came up here because I thought,
Speaker 1: oh no, I forgot he was hurt. Now, somebody over
Speaker 1: there was sending you up like a limb to the slaughter,
Speaker 1: trying to get you reinjured. But I'm your pastor. I
Speaker 1: care about you in that moment. Oh no, no, no,
Speaker 1: this is not this is not wise. That's good. That's good.
Speaker 1: Every time I preach about permission to quit, somebody goes
Speaker 1: and gets a divorce. And I'm telling you, if God
Speaker 1: told you to march around the walls and not say
Speaker 1: a word, you got to walk around the walls again.
Speaker 1: If God told you to go check again and there's
Speaker 1: a cloud up there and you can't see it, you
Speaker 1: got to keep looking for it. That is not the
Speaker 1: advocation of a lack of persistence. But what I think
Speaker 1: happens to us is when it sounds real good, get
Speaker 1: rid of the old self. It's much harder than it sounds,
Speaker 1: because the old self really helped me through a lot.
Speaker 1: My anger has been a good friend of me in
Speaker 1: certain situations. So to a bend in my anger and
Speaker 1: to choose in moments to be a peacemaker is so hot.
Speaker 1: To say good bye to yes today, let me see
Speaker 1: if I get a copyright strike. And to me, I
Speaker 1: know all the parts of that song. I know the feeling,
Speaker 1: I know the sentiment. I got stuff in my closet
Speaker 1: that I sing. That too is so hard, three holes
Speaker 1: in the sweatshirt to say goodbye, so comfortable. And I
Speaker 1: don't know why we shadow all so much as we
Speaker 1: do over say goodbye to the old self. You know
Speaker 1: how painful that is to make a break with a
Speaker 1: way of life. In many ways, it feels like a
Speaker 1: betrayal of yourself to change. And now you're surrounded by
Speaker 1: a bunch of dummies and bluehorns that say, do you?
Speaker 1: Your husband doesn't have to know, do you? Do you?
Speaker 1: Do you have any idea who you could become if
Speaker 1: you would make the decision in this moment to receive
Speaker 1: the permission of the holy ghost that lives inside of you,
Speaker 1: that was sent to help you and enable you to
Speaker 1: get up from what you've been staring at. And I
Speaker 1: read a quote that gripped me. The lady's name was Phipps.
Speaker 1: I don't know anything about this lady, but she said
Speaker 1: something so powerful. She said, if you argue for your limitations,
Speaker 1: you get to keep them who. I'm gonna send phips
Speaker 1: an offering once I find out who she is. She's right.
Speaker 1: If you argue with your limitations, I just have a temper.
Speaker 1: Then you get to continue to burn through perfectly good
Speaker 1: relationships and keep the people in your life from loving
Speaker 1: you like they could because you have a temper. Oh man,
Speaker 1: I mean I just can't. The money's tight, I can't
Speaker 1: be generous. Well, the world of the generous gets larger
Speaker 1: and larger, the world of the stingy gets smaller and smaller.
Speaker 1: So you are shrinking yourself with every limitation you defend.
Speaker 1: Should I do a few more examples? All right, let
Speaker 1: me see what I can think of. I didn't plan
Speaker 1: this part out. I'm oh, oh, you know I'm not.
Speaker 1: I'm not a vocal person, so you know I'm not
Speaker 1: going to speak up about this. You know I'm not
Speaker 1: going to say anything about this. So now you're just
Speaker 1: going to suffer in silence till you eventually just explode.
Speaker 1: And it's going to be way worse than if you
Speaker 1: learn how to say, hey, I need help. I love
Speaker 1: it when we get creative about defending our deficiencies. If
Speaker 1: you would reinvest the creativity that you put into the
Speaker 1: offending what you can't do, and if you would reinvest
Speaker 1: that you could be the next Walt Disney. As creative
Speaker 1: as you are, you invent limitations that aren't even there,
Speaker 1: limitations that might be, limitations that could possibly who might
Speaker 1: not possibly like you. Well, I would go, but you
Speaker 1: know there's probably gonna be already somebody there as even happy.
Speaker 1: Yet we used to tell my oldest son Elijah all
Speaker 1: the time something that everybody told me they'd go. You
Speaker 1: ought to be a lawyer one day. As much as
Speaker 1: you love to argue, And I have a lot of
Speaker 1: friends in the church now that are lawyers, and they
Speaker 1: don't stand in court and argue all day long. So
Speaker 1: I now know there was a flawed philosophy that if
Speaker 1: you like to argue, you should be a lawyer. But
Speaker 1: you know what, when it comes to the limitations in
Speaker 1: your life, some of you ought to be a lawyer,
Speaker 1: because not only will you argue with people when they
Speaker 1: try to tell you can do better, not only will
Speaker 1: you argue with the evidence in your life that you
Speaker 1: can overcome and keep on going back, you will argue
Speaker 1: with Almighty God about who you are. He will send
Speaker 1: signs and signals to you that there is more in you,
Speaker 1: and he will show you things that you can do.
Speaker 1: And you get up in the face of God tell
Speaker 1: me about well I can and I didn't and they didn't.
Speaker 1: And you are a defense attorney for your limitations. And
Speaker 1: if you argue for those limitations, you get to live
Speaker 1: in them. See y'all next week or I'm almost done.
Speaker 1: You'll help me get this thing home. You'll help me
Speaker 1: get this thing home, or I'm gonna finish the quote.
Speaker 1: I don't know how what Phips said next, but I
Speaker 1: know what I want to say next. From the Bible.
Speaker 1: You're ready. First part was Phipps. Next part is Verdict
Speaker 1: Part one. If you argue for your limitations, you get
Speaker 1: to keep them, but if you agree with God about
Speaker 1: your potential, you get to outgrow them. Come on, it
Speaker 1: is supposed to be my rainy day crowd that knows
Speaker 1: how to shout over a good point. If you get
Speaker 1: with God and say, I see what the situation is
Speaker 1: trying to say about me. I see what my past
Speaker 1: has been so far, and I know that the patterns
Speaker 1: of my past suggest that I will never be more
Speaker 1: than this. And I know the last January, I was
Speaker 1: sitting in church feeling ambitious too. And I know that
Speaker 1: this has happened so many times in my life that
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm a slave to it. But now
Speaker 1: I am making a decision in this moment to take
Speaker 1: off everything that God did not put on me, to
Speaker 1: strip it away. Now. I'm not going to just get
Speaker 1: to do this once. I'm not just gonna get to
Speaker 1: do this one time. Okay, God old self is God. No,
Speaker 1: Paul says, every day, Hey, you wake up every time
Speaker 1: you feel it, come back, every time that limitation squeezes
Speaker 1: you. You You know the limitation I'm talking about. You know
Speaker 1: the thing you think I can't help it. I just
Speaker 1: always do it. I'm always gonna do it. I can't
Speaker 1: be that kind of person when that comes. Instead of
Speaker 1: arguing with God, who says, I've given you my grace,
Speaker 1: my power, it's more than enough, try just agreeing with them.
Speaker 1: All right. Maybe you think I do have what it
Speaker 1: takes and that's why you put me in this situation,
Speaker 1: or be like the spies and the Book of Numbers.
Speaker 1: We can't go in. We're too small. We're like grasshoppers.
Speaker 1: They're bigger than us and guess what they got. They
Speaker 1: had a grasshopper self image and they lived in a
Speaker 1: grasshopper situation for forty years. Because if you argue with
Speaker 1: your limitations, you challenge them, you get to see what
Speaker 1: God can do. But if you argue for your limitations,
Speaker 1: do you do this? Do you ever do this? Do
Speaker 1: you defend what you cannot become before a God who
Speaker 1: has said you already are that. It reminded me when
Speaker 1: they found a woman in john A, and I didn't
Speaker 1: know why the scripture came to my mind, but I
Speaker 1: thought about that man who said, you're giving them a
Speaker 1: license to sin, and I'm like, oh, lord, man, I
Speaker 1: don't need a license to sin. I need power to
Speaker 1: change you feel that way. And I really don't need
Speaker 1: anybody throwing rocks at me for something that I'm already
Speaker 1: beating the crap out of myself about while I'm at it.
Speaker 1: And Jesus was you can look this up later. He
Speaker 1: was teaching one day in john A and they dragged
Speaker 1: this woman to him and they're like, we caught her
Speaker 1: in the act of adultery. First of all, your creeps,
Speaker 1: how did you second? Last time I checked adultery. It's
Speaker 1: two people where is he? And now Jesus has to
Speaker 1: make a decision because the Law of Moses says stoner
Speaker 1: and they got their rocks ready. Now, maybe you don't
Speaker 1: feel like anybody is throwing rocks at you. Maybe you do.
Speaker 1: A lot of times we victimize ourselves of other people
Speaker 1: who are thinking this about us, and they're not thinking
Speaker 1: about us. They're thinking about lunch. The main thing that
Speaker 1: set me free in preaching was realizing, no matter how
Speaker 1: good or bad I do, all you're thinking about is
Speaker 1: Chipotle five minutes after I'm done. But see, it's not
Speaker 1: really those people you have to worry about, is it.
Speaker 1: It's the stones that you throw at yourself. And so
Speaker 1: now I'm confused because I think this preacher is telling
Speaker 1: me do better. I'm gonna God's gonna no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I didn't say any of that. The people Paul was
Speaker 1: talking to an Ephesians were already saved, but their situation
Speaker 1: didn't reflect their new self, so they wanted better for them.
Speaker 1: And this woman is standing there with her clothes torn,
Speaker 1: no doubt, and dusty from being dragged through the streets,
Speaker 1: and very well aware of what she did, with no
Speaker 1: defense to give. She was caught in the act of
Speaker 1: adultre So Jesus makes this move that I think reflects
Speaker 1: everything I've been trying to talk to you about. Where
Speaker 1: he starts riding in the dirt, and you know, I
Speaker 1: kind of think he's going back to where we came
Speaker 1: from to begin with, to remind us that he knows
Speaker 1: that we come from the dirt. And whatever he wrote
Speaker 1: in the dirt, it must have been really, really weird,
Speaker 1: because the Bible doesn't say, but he made a statement,
Speaker 1: let the one who is without sin throw the first
Speaker 1: rock at this woman, and then he starts writing. Now,
Speaker 1: it has been suggested, although it cannot be proven, that
Speaker 1: maybe he was writing their names and listing certain stuff
Speaker 1: that they did that maybe they don't want to get
Speaker 1: caught in. And maybe it wasn't the fact that they
Speaker 1: didn't sind Maybe they just didn't get caught. So now
Speaker 1: self righteousness has no place, because we got a God
Speaker 1: who's writing in the dirt with the only hands that
Speaker 1: never sinned, and he's showing us something about heaven touching
Speaker 1: humanity and whatever he wrote. The Bible says that they
Speaker 1: begin to leave one by one. You ready for this,
Speaker 1: The oldest one left first. They left in order of
Speaker 1: how long they had had to screw up their lives.
Speaker 1: Oh God, he's writing that about her. Got to get
Speaker 1: out of here right now. How would he even know that?
Speaker 1: It's like he's God. But whatever he wrote is not
Speaker 1: what I want to leave you with today. I want
Speaker 1: to leave you with what he did in verse ten,
Speaker 1: this is so beautiful play. Jesus straightened up and asked
Speaker 1: the woman, because they're all gone now, all the rocks
Speaker 1: are lying there in the presence of the only righteous one.
Speaker 1: And he asked her, woman, where are they? Has no
Speaker 1: one condemned you? And verse eleven touched me because she said,
Speaker 1: no one, sir, And he said, then, neither do I
Speaker 1: condemn you. But I do want to change you. That's
Speaker 1: the gospel. Man. I don't know how to give it
Speaker 1: to you any plainer than this. I don't condemn you.
Speaker 1: There's no rock in my hand, but there is healing there.
Speaker 1: You want to be different, you can watch this. I
Speaker 1: know how we read the Bible. We read it in
Speaker 1: the wrong tone. We read it like this angry God
Speaker 1: that we were taught about that isn't really who he is.
Speaker 1: We read it from the wrong mountain, like the mountain
Speaker 1: mount SINAI. We don't read it from Mount Calvary, where
Speaker 1: Jesus purchased her life with his blood and said, you
Speaker 1: can be forgiven, you can be healed, you can be classed,
Speaker 1: you can have a future. You can have a new beginning.
Speaker 1: He said, I don't condemn you. Go now and leave
Speaker 1: your life of sin. They wanted to give her punishment.
Speaker 1: He wanted to give her permission. Stand to your feet.
Speaker 1: God sent you this word to give you permission. Go
Speaker 1: now and leave your life of sin for the sinless one.
Speaker 1: His name is Jesus has given you a new identity
Speaker 1: and longs to give you a new beginning. You know what,
Speaker 1: you keep saying, But God is too late. Now Are
Speaker 1: you really going to argue with him when he says
Speaker 1: I've given you a hope in a future. You think
Speaker 1: he didn't know how much time it would take for
Speaker 1: you to get to this point. That God who made you?
Speaker 1: Are you really going to argue with the God who
Speaker 1: created you to be like him? Or would you agree
Speaker 1: with him for a moment that maybe I am who
Speaker 1: God says I am. Maybe I'm not what I did.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm more than the sum total of my behaviors
Speaker 1: and my personality traits and my genetics and what I
Speaker 1: saw model. Maybe I'm wrong and God's not. Maybe all
Speaker 1: I am is not an alcoholic. Maybe the third relapse
Speaker 1: wasn't the last time I need to try it. Maybe
Speaker 1: I'm not always going to suffer from this chronic anxiety.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm going to learn a more peaceful way to live.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm not going to die alone. Maybe I will
Speaker 1: love again. Maybe I will make a difference. Maybe I
Speaker 1: will set a better example and be there for my son.
Speaker 1: Whatever he's speaking, I bring you into agreement. Now agree
Speaker 1: with him. That's the first step, just to agree with God.
Speaker 1: That's even what the word amen means, y'all. It doesn't
Speaker 1: mean that's good preaching. It means I agree. So be it.
Speaker 1: If you see it, so be it. God. If you
Speaker 1: say it, oh be it. If you call me it,
Speaker 1: so be it. And if you don't, I'm making a
Speaker 1: break today, even if it takes me the rest of
Speaker 1: my life to live in this freedom. Every day of
Speaker 1: my life. Just like I put on new socks every
Speaker 1: day of my life, just like I put on a
Speaker 1: new shirt every day of my life, just like I
Speaker 1: put on my shoes, I am committed to follow you
Speaker 1: in the light of life, for you are the light
Speaker 1: of the world. Go now and sin no more. Go
Speaker 1: now and sin no more. It's gonna be different, it's
Speaker 1: gonna be difficult. But don't give yourself over to a
Speaker 1: way of life that is leading you to death when
Speaker 1: the author of life is calling you to live. Jesus,
Speaker 1: I bring your people before your feet today, where there
Speaker 1: is no rocks to throw, Oh, only righteousness to receive.
Speaker 1: Heads about, eyes close. The spirit of the Lord is
Speaker 1: working in someone's life in this moment. To give your
Speaker 1: life to Jesus. You have never really given him your life.
Speaker 1: You went to church when you were little, you heard
Speaker 1: the gospel, you know some songs about it. You may
Speaker 1: have even at one time been in a better place,
Speaker 1: but you've never really given him you. Well, this is
Speaker 1: your moment. This is your permission to stop living for
Speaker 1: yourself and live for him. Stop trusting in your own
Speaker 1: righteousness and trust in his. To stop trying to achieve it,
Speaker 1: and receive it by grace with heads bowed and eyes closed.
Speaker 1: At every location, if you hear that tender voice of love,
Speaker 1: that's the voice of Jesus saying where are your accusers?
Speaker 1: I don't condemn you, but I want to change you.
Speaker 1: In this moment, you and God is calling you. I
Speaker 1: want to lead you in a prayer. This prayer is
Speaker 1: not a magic trick. It's an expression of your heart
Speaker 1: to God. For the Bible says that if you confess
Speaker 1: with your mouth Jesus is the Lord, and believe in
Speaker 1: your heart God raised him from the dead, you will
Speaker 1: be saved. It is by grace. We are saved through faith.
Speaker 1: It's not of work, so that no one can boast.
Speaker 1: It is the gift of God. Right now, if you're
Speaker 1: ready to give your life to Jesus online at a
Speaker 1: campus right here at Valentine, I want you to repeat
Speaker 1: this after me, our church family, repeat this out loud
Speaker 1: for the benefit of those who are coming to God,
Speaker 1: Heavenly Father. I am a sinner in need of a savior,
Speaker 1: and today I make Jesus the Lord of my life.
Speaker 1: I believe he died that I would be forgiven and
Speaker 1: rose again to give me life. I receive this new life.
Speaker 1: This is my new beginning. If you just pray that
Speaker 1: on the count of three, shoots your hand up one, two, three,
Speaker 1: all over the room, all over the room, in the
Speaker 1: chat right now online our intam come on, lift it up.
Speaker 1: Don't be a shame, don't be a same. Well, if
Speaker 1: you enjoyed today's podcast, there are a couple of things
Speaker 1: I'd love for you to do. Make sure to subscribe, rate,
Speaker 1: and review this podcast. You can also help us reach
Speaker 1: others by investing today at Elevationchurch dot org, slash give
Speaker 1: and thanks again for joining us on the Elevation Podcast.