Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2: I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 2: I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope
Speaker 2: this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope it
Speaker 2: gives your perspective to see God is moving in your life.
Speaker 1: Enjoy the message. If we haven't met before, my name
Speaker 1: is said, I'm the pastor at our university city campus.
Speaker 1: We'll go and uh, my dad is in the room,
Speaker 1: and uh, let's say in front of everybody, Happy Father's
Speaker 1: Day to my dad, to my father, I'll say this
Speaker 1: theve the greatest gift. The greatest gift you gave me
Speaker 1: wasn't a pair of shoes. The greatest gift you gave
Speaker 1: me was me seeing you give your life to Jesus.
Speaker 1: You see, I had the great opportunity to be able
Speaker 1: to see my dad before Jesus and after. I'm not
Speaker 1: saying he's perfect. I'm just saying it's better. It's much better.
Speaker 1: It's much better. It's much better. And I'll tell you this,
Speaker 1: if you're a god in the room, the greatest gift
Speaker 1: you could give your kids is for them to see
Speaker 1: you following Jesus. It's for them to see you serving Jesus.
Speaker 1: It's for them to see you running after His purpose
Speaker 1: is for your life. And I have to take a
Speaker 1: moment in honor the father of this house. Can we
Speaker 1: thank God for our pastor, Pastor Steven, And while we're
Speaker 1: at it, let's praise God for Holly too. God. The
Speaker 1: thing that I gotta say about Pastor is is that
Speaker 1: I just thank God that he is a pastor that
Speaker 1: sees me, not only sees what I can do for him,
Speaker 1: but sees what God is trying to do in me.
Speaker 1: I thank God for my pastor seeing me. I did
Speaker 1: not see myself standing on a stage being a pastor
Speaker 1: at Elevation Church. This has all blown my mind. But
Speaker 1: it's beautiful to be able to have a pastor that
Speaker 1: sees you, that sees you coming. If you walk in
Speaker 1: every Sunday and you're like my pastor been following me
Speaker 1: around he bugged my phones. Thank God, Thank God for
Speaker 1: a pastor that sees, that sees that season. Can I
Speaker 1: sing to my wife, Whitney, I love you, Whitney, I
Speaker 1: love you. Y'all Ready for me to get to my
Speaker 1: scripture for today? All right, all right, all right, we're
Speaker 1: gonna be in Mark chapter six, Mark chapter six, Mark
Speaker 1: chapter six. You're gonna see the scriptures on the screen.
Speaker 1: If you're taking notes, write down mark chapter six, verses
Speaker 1: forty five through fifty one. We're gonna jump in right
Speaker 1: here and praying and believing that God's gonna do it
Speaker 1: only he can do today. God touch my mind, touch
Speaker 1: my lips, God flow through me today. Open up the
Speaker 1: eyes of your sons and daughters. We love you, We
Speaker 1: thank you, And it's in the mighty name of Jesus,
Speaker 1: I pray amen, verse forty five. You'll sit on the screen.
Speaker 1: It says, immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the boat.
Speaker 1: Can I just preach while I'm reading a scripture? I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but that just jumped out to me that a lot
Speaker 1: of times in my life, the miracles that I experience
Speaker 1: are on the other side of Jesus making me do something.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's a push from God, not my plans, that
Speaker 1: leads me to see so much that God is doing.
Speaker 1: He made his disciples get into the boat and go
Speaker 1: ahead of him. To best say it a while, he
Speaker 1: dismissed the crowd. After leaving them, he went up on
Speaker 1: a mountainside to pray. Later that night, the boat was
Speaker 1: in the middle of the lake and he was alone
Speaker 1: on land. He saw the Disciples straining at the oars
Speaker 1: because the wind was against them. Shortly before don he
Speaker 1: went out to them walking on the lake. What a sight.
Speaker 1: Imagine what that would have looked like. My favorite movie
Speaker 1: right now is The Equalizer. I imagine he walked out
Speaker 1: there like Denzel just I don't know about you, but
Speaker 1: my Jesus walks like Denzel, walks like Denzel. He came
Speaker 1: to them walking on the lake. He was about to
Speaker 1: pass them by, but when they saw him walking on
Speaker 1: the lake, they thought he was a ghost. They crowd out,
Speaker 1: They cried out because they all saw oh him and
Speaker 1: were terrified. Immediately he spoke to them and said, take courage,
Speaker 1: it is I don't be afraid. Then he climbed into
Speaker 1: the boat with them, and the wind died down, and
Speaker 1: they were completely amazed. The title of my message today
Speaker 1: is called Straining to see. Straining to see on your
Speaker 1: way to your seat, asked your neighbor. I asked him,
Speaker 1: say when was the last time you got your eyes checked?
Speaker 1: You can be seated. You can be seated. The reason
Speaker 1: I asked, is because many of you were straining to
Speaker 1: see the scriptures on the screen, and those of you
Speaker 1: that wear glasses, how is looking over them? Lynz help you?
Speaker 1: How does that help you see? Well? He me and
Speaker 1: my wife we have identical twin boys, Carson and Carter.
Speaker 1: They will be thirteen next month. I'm gonna have teenagers.
Speaker 1: And yeah, pray for me anytime, anytime we have a
Speaker 1: major shift like this, I get real nostalgic. I love
Speaker 1: going back and looking at pictures. And here's a picture
Speaker 1: from their preschool graduation right here on the screen. Their
Speaker 1: preschool graduation right here. Yeah, so sweet. Now, I'll be honest,
Speaker 1: no matter how hard I strain, I can't tell you
Speaker 1: who's who on this picture. I have no idea which
Speaker 1: ones Carter, which ones Carson. I turned my head sideways.
Speaker 1: I really don't know. I really don't know. And if
Speaker 1: Whitney tells you she knows, she's live, she don't know
Speaker 1: who it is. She doesn't know who it is. But
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago, my boys just finished sixth
Speaker 1: grade and we were at their awards ceremony, and so
Speaker 1: here's the picture for when they had all ab on
Speaker 1: a row for the whole year. So proud of my boys.
Speaker 1: Where did my babies go? Where did my babies go? Now,
Speaker 1: if you pay attention to Carter, who's standing next to
Speaker 1: my wife, Whitney, you see Carter actually has on glasses
Speaker 1: in this picture. Okay, so just remember that. You'll freak
Speaker 1: them out if you see him. You come up and say, hey, Carter.
Speaker 1: You know it's Carter because he's the one with glasses.
Speaker 1: You can pull you can pull the picture down. A
Speaker 1: couple of years ago, we went to the doctor and
Speaker 1: we found out that that one of Carter's eyes didn't
Speaker 1: develop all the way and so he had to wear
Speaker 1: patch for a little bit to strengthen the other eye.
Speaker 1: And so we went to the doctor. They tested his
Speaker 1: eyes and they were like, oh gosh, he's straining. He's
Speaker 1: straining to see. You see my son Carter could see,
Speaker 1: but he couldn't see well. My son could see what
Speaker 1: he couldn't see well. And I remember when he got
Speaker 1: his glasses for the first time. He did it three
Speaker 1: sixty and he was like, did it always look like this?
Speaker 1: Did it always? Did it always look so clear? So Chris,
Speaker 1: but what happened? What happened? And God really spoke to
Speaker 1: me because I don't know about you, but I want
Speaker 1: to see all God has for me. I don't want
Speaker 1: to miss anything, and I'm gonna preach about that for
Speaker 1: a second. So get ready to praise God, because I'm
Speaker 1: telling you God has some good things in store for you.
Speaker 1: But this week, God gave me a real time illustration,
Speaker 1: and I prayed and fasted on whether or I was
Speaker 1: gonna show you this because I'm not gonna lie. It's
Speaker 1: kind of embarrassing. And just to give some context, anybody
Speaker 1: watched the show Ridiculousness. Okay, so this is one of
Speaker 1: those videos that you could see on Ridiculousness. Somebody put
Speaker 1: a pole in the office in front of Elevation Worship
Speaker 1: Studios that I didn't know was there. I didn't know
Speaker 1: it was there. I'm gonna show this video one time,
Speaker 1: one time, one time. If you want to see it again,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to go back and watch it on YouTube.
Speaker 1: But go ahead and show them this video. Hey, I
Speaker 1: could preach about the fact that I didn't stop after
Speaker 1: I could hit. I could preach about it, but here's
Speaker 1: the thing. I ran into that wall. Why because I
Speaker 1: didn't see it. I got a question, what things are
Speaker 1: you running into because you you couldn't see it? Are
Speaker 1: you into bad relationships because you couldn't see it? Are
Speaker 1: you running into horrible financial decisions because you didn't see it?
Speaker 1: Are you making bad business moves running into things because
Speaker 1: you couldn't see it clearly? Or it works the other way,
Speaker 1: because some of you are missing miracles because you just
Speaker 1: don't see it. Some of you your vision is blurred,
Speaker 1: and so you're missing the blessings that God has in
Speaker 1: front of you. And so I'm telling you, I don't
Speaker 1: know about you. I want to see my family blessed.
Speaker 1: I want to see my marriage blessed. I want to
Speaker 1: see my ministry blessed. I want to see my church blessed.
Speaker 1: I want to see my health blessed. I don't know
Speaker 1: about you, but I want to see a full picture
Speaker 1: of everything God has for my life. Here's the thing
Speaker 1: about when you have resion, you don't see reality well right.
Speaker 1: And when you don't see reality well, it gets delusional
Speaker 1: and it gets real dangerous. And for some of you
Speaker 1: been running into some things and missing some things for
Speaker 1: far too long. And God sent me here today to
Speaker 1: deal with your sight, tap your neighbors say, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: see it today. I'm gonna see it today. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: see it today. And so when we go back to
Speaker 1: our text for it today, we see that the disciples
Speaker 1: are in this boat, straining, straining to see what Jesus said.
Speaker 1: You see, Jesus said, I need you to get into
Speaker 1: the boat, and I need you to go to best
Speaker 1: say to where is Jesus sending you? Where's Jesus sending you?
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna tell you to that. I don't know
Speaker 1: about you. I'm gonna strain until I see what Jesus said.
Speaker 1: You see a lot of us, a lot of us
Speaker 1: our times we read the Bible, we make fun of
Speaker 1: the disciples. They're dude, usually doing something stupid, something foolish.
Speaker 1: But in this text, in this text, I started to
Speaker 1: applaud because when Jesus said get into the boat and
Speaker 1: go to the other side, he left some details out.
Speaker 1: He didn't tell them that the wind was going to
Speaker 1: be blowing in the wrong direction. He didn't tell them
Speaker 1: that they were going to be going against the grain.
Speaker 1: And so I don't know about you. I would have
Speaker 1: been a little bit frustrated at the fact that I'm
Speaker 1: doing what Jesus told me to do, and it's starting
Speaker 1: to get hard. So just for a second, I want
Speaker 1: to deal with your perseverance. Am I in a room
Speaker 1: for the people that are fighters, that won't give up
Speaker 1: at the first sign of trouble, at the first sign
Speaker 1: of adversity. You see me and my wife, we just
Speaker 1: celebrated sixteen years. Sixteen years in January. We got married
Speaker 1: at twenty one. We got married at twenty one. We
Speaker 1: had to strain through being dumb. We had to strain
Speaker 1: through some insecurity, we had to strain through some financial struggles.
Speaker 1: We had to strain through some health scares, to strain
Speaker 1: through some loss of loved ones. I want to take
Speaker 1: a moment in front of everybody, whole church and just
Speaker 1: tell my wife, thank you, thank you for straining with me,
Speaker 1: because I knew when I stood at that isle. I
Speaker 1: cried when she came down and she was laughing, she
Speaker 1: was laughing, she was laughing, But I knew God told
Speaker 1: me that my marriage would be blessed. I don't know
Speaker 1: what you're dealing with or what you're going through today,
Speaker 1: but God told me to tell you to strain to
Speaker 1: see what Jesus said, strain to see it. Don't give up,
Speaker 1: don't throw in the towel. Some of you decided to
Speaker 1: say at the first time of an obstacle that came,
Speaker 1: some of you decided to stop at the moment that
Speaker 1: it got difficult. Strain to see what Jesus said, Strained
Speaker 1: to see what he said. Some of you are like
Speaker 1: it said. I hear you, but I've been straining for
Speaker 1: a long time, and if I could be honest, some
Speaker 1: I'm getting tired of straining. If I could be honest,
Speaker 1: I feel like I've heard this before. As I was
Speaker 1: reading and I was studying, I found out that it
Speaker 1: would have taken them anywhere from six to eight hours
Speaker 1: to make it from one side of this lake to
Speaker 1: the other side of the lake. Now the wind was
Speaker 1: blowing against them, so that probably would have added more
Speaker 1: time to their journey. Now in the Texas says that
Speaker 1: Jesus saw them in the middle of the lake. They
Speaker 1: have been straining at least five hours. I can imagine
Speaker 1: they were tired. I can imagine they were exhausted. I
Speaker 1: can imagine that Peter was like, hey, listen, let's go back.
Speaker 1: This is dumb, this is stupid. Just let's stop. Let's stop.
Speaker 1: And there's one thing, one thing that jumped out in
Speaker 1: this text for me that I want to preach for
Speaker 1: a second. Put up verse forty eight for me. Put
Speaker 1: up verse forty eight for me. It says he saw
Speaker 1: the disciples straining. Watch. It says at the oars, straining,
Speaker 1: at the oars, he saw them. So here's the thing
Speaker 1: that I want you to know right now. You probably
Speaker 1: should write this down, is that don't strain alone. Don't
Speaker 1: don't strain, don't strain alone. Don't strain alone. Don't strain
Speaker 1: by yourself. And I'm trying. It was it was dim
Speaker 1: it was day that were in this boat straining. Some
Speaker 1: of you. You're not going far because you haven't invited
Speaker 1: friends into your situation to I tell you the truth.
Speaker 1: There's been some time in the sixteen years. I thank god,
Speaker 1: I have some friends autumn come to the house. See
Speaker 1: the Oh mah, we're gonna show up today. I've had
Speaker 1: some friends that in the middle of some straining. Here
Speaker 1: here here, I'll make it. I'll make it clear. You
Speaker 1: need to have some friends that can take an oar.
Speaker 1: You need you need to have some friends that will
Speaker 1: take an oar. Because because some of you, some of you,
Speaker 1: you've been straining for a long time, but you're straining
Speaker 1: in circles because you're on one side of the boat,
Speaker 1: straining by yourself. You've been circling some things for a
Speaker 1: long time. Hey, can I can I go as far
Speaker 1: to say this one's gonna hurt. You've been straining for
Speaker 1: a long time and it's your fault. I'm going in
Speaker 1: circles because I ain't let a friend take an oar. Hey,
Speaker 1: can I make it plain? Let me tell you about
Speaker 1: an or oh oh, oh, oh oh, you feel overwhelmed.
Speaker 1: I need a friend that can take me when I'm overwhelmed. Hey,
Speaker 1: I got some anxiety. My hand's all over the place.
Speaker 1: I need some friends that can handle me when my
Speaker 1: mind's all over the place. In oh, I need some
Speaker 1: people that when I'm ready to give up, when I'm
Speaker 1: ready to throw in the towel, they can take an oor. Hey,
Speaker 1: can you take a moment and thank God for your
Speaker 1: friends that have jumped in and helped you in the
Speaker 1: moments that you couldn't give up, that helped you move forward.
Speaker 1: And if you're here today, you were like I love
Speaker 1: to have a friend that can take it off. I
Speaker 1: love to have somebody jump into this situation with me.
Speaker 1: Every Sunday, JJ stands on this stage at Valentine on
Speaker 1: my campus, Bachelor stands on stage at their campuses. You
Speaker 1: have chat zolo online and every single week you wanna
Speaker 1: hear something about, Hey, we got an e group for you.
Speaker 1: Hey join and eat team, start serving today. It's not
Speaker 1: something that we want from you. With something we want
Speaker 1: for you, you need to have some friends that will
Speaker 1: take in or but also also also just like my
Speaker 1: son couldn't see, well, maybe you need some glasses. Maybe
Speaker 1: maybe maybe maybe you need some glasses. And there's two parts,
Speaker 1: two parts, two parts the glasses. The first part, first part,
Speaker 1: I want to explain. I had to take we had
Speaker 1: to take my son Carter to the store to be
Speaker 1: able to get his first set of glasses. I remember,
Speaker 1: couldn't see and finally he was able to get his prescription.
Speaker 1: And so I couldn't go with Whitney and the boys
Speaker 1: to the store. I couldn't go with them. So Whitney
Speaker 1: took them and you know when she she facetimed me
Speaker 1: at the store and it was one of those face
Speaker 1: times where she was like, hey, husband, I got an
Speaker 1: for you, like she was done, Like she was done.
Speaker 1: The boys was getting on her last nerves, on her
Speaker 1: last nerves, on he last nerd, and I was like, hey,
Speaker 1: what's going on, what's going on? What's going on? And
Speaker 1: so she explained to me what was going on. Those
Speaker 1: of you that wear glasses or contacts, you you will
Speaker 1: understand this. There's two sections, two sections in the store
Speaker 1: where you get glasses. There's this section that the insurance
Speaker 1: pays for. Sometimes this is square, but this is the
Speaker 1: place that the insurance play pays for. My son, my
Speaker 1: loving son with so much swagger. Where do you think
Speaker 1: he's at the designer frames? My son is trying on
Speaker 1: Gucci frames and brittle frames like he has a job.
Speaker 1: I told my wife, I said, hey, babe, if you
Speaker 1: don't tell that boy to get over that to the
Speaker 1: other side, that I'm leave and come over there and
Speaker 1: get you. The reason why I bring it up, the
Speaker 1: reason why I bring it up is because God spoke
Speaker 1: to me. As I reflected on it is because my
Speaker 1: son was trying to let me know I can't do
Speaker 1: cheap frames. It went right over their head. It went
Speaker 1: right over their head. Some of you are looking through
Speaker 1: cheap frames. And here's the thing I know about chief frames.
Speaker 1: They're easily broken. Some of you, some of you, you
Speaker 1: need a new frame today. You need something else to
Speaker 1: frame what you're looking at, where you're going. And here's
Speaker 1: the thing about frames. Put this up there. Frames give strength.
Speaker 1: Frames give strength. Now, remember why are they on this lake.
Speaker 1: It's not it why Jesus told them to go. You
Speaker 1: want to know what's going to give you strength? A
Speaker 1: word from God, A word from a word from God.
Speaker 1: When he got tired, When they got tired and they
Speaker 1: were ready to give up, somebody had a frame. They said, hey, hey,
Speaker 1: we can't give up because Jesus said, we can't give
Speaker 1: up because I got a word from the Lord. I
Speaker 1: can't stop because he said go to best say them.
Speaker 1: I can't throw in the towel because I'm heading in
Speaker 1: the direction that he's sending me to go to. That's
Speaker 1: why it's so important to show up to church. It's
Speaker 1: because you're getting tired, you're getting a weak and you
Speaker 1: need a word from God. But that's why you have
Speaker 1: a Bible, or you have a Bible at your house
Speaker 1: that you can open up when you get tired and
Speaker 1: you get weak, because you need a word from the Lord.
Speaker 1: How far you go may be determined by how strong
Speaker 1: your frame is. Now, who can stand up and maybe
Speaker 1: praise God for a second, because I've seen God's word
Speaker 1: never failed. I've seen God's word never go. I've seen
Speaker 1: him speak life and there was life. I've seen him
Speaker 1: seak healing and there was healing. I've seen couples ready
Speaker 1: to walk the other way and God spoke about a word.
Speaker 1: I've seen God's word works. Tell your neighbors say, hey,
Speaker 1: I got a frame. I got a frame. I got
Speaker 1: a frame. I got a frame. I got a frame.
Speaker 1: When I look back over my life and I think
Speaker 1: things over, I can truly say that I've been blessed.
Speaker 1: I got a testimony. And guess where it started. When
Speaker 1: Jesus said, when Jesus said, when Jesus said, you could
Speaker 1: be seid, he could be sity, you could be seated.
Speaker 1: You need a frame. You need a frame. You need
Speaker 1: a frame to give you strength. You need a frame
Speaker 1: to give you strength. But not only that. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you remember, back back in the early two thousand,
Speaker 1: we used to think we were cool. We were wearing
Speaker 1: frames with no lenses, don't leaven by myself. Who else
Speaker 1: did it? Who else did it? Who has did it? Was?
Speaker 1: Who else did it? Who else did it? Who has
Speaker 1: did it? So it's one thing to have a frame,
Speaker 1: but you gotta participate in this, and so you need
Speaker 1: a lens and so so so so we gotta we gotta,
Speaker 1: we gotta frame. That's what gives strength. And then you
Speaker 1: have a lens. That's what gives sight. You have a lens,
Speaker 1: and that's what gives sighting. Something interesting happens in the
Speaker 1: text that I want to use to break this down.
Speaker 1: Look at this in verse forty eight. It says he
Speaker 1: saw the disciples straining at the ords because the end
Speaker 1: was against them. Shortly before dawn. He went out to
Speaker 1: them walking on the lake. They didn't recognize and they
Speaker 1: was like, yo, that's Denzel. Yo, you saw equalized it.
Speaker 1: That was that was him out there. So I'm walking
Speaker 1: on the lake. They thought it was a ghost. They
Speaker 1: crowd out because they all saw him and were terrified.
Speaker 1: This is it says immediately he spoke to them and said,
Speaker 1: take courage. It is I don't be afraid this. This
Speaker 1: really really leaped out to me because Jesus was close
Speaker 1: enough for them to hear for them to hear his voice,
Speaker 1: but they still didn't recognize him. This this really jumped
Speaker 1: out to me. And as I was studying, I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what, no disciples, they need to get their
Speaker 1: eyes checked too. You know. So if I was an
Speaker 1: optometrist and I went to school for a lot of years,
Speaker 1: I would have learned about this eye chart, this eye
Speaker 1: chart that that they used to be able to test
Speaker 1: your So let me let me show you this eye chart.
Speaker 1: This is called the Snelling eye chart. It's called the
Speaker 1: Snelling eye chart. And doctor Snelling he used this eye
Speaker 1: chart to be able to test a lot of different things.
Speaker 1: Some of you just remembered when you find out you
Speaker 1: were blind. When you saw this, you just were triggered
Speaker 1: by this. You were triggered by this. And and I
Speaker 1: was studying, and there's there's a lot of different things
Speaker 1: that it tests. It tests ey sharpness, it tests eye movement.
Speaker 1: You see the green in the red line, It tests
Speaker 1: whether or not you're your color blind. So if you
Speaker 1: didn't see a green in a red line, there you go.
Speaker 1: And here's the thing that really stood out to me.
Speaker 1: Stood out to me, is you see see that there's
Speaker 1: there's ten e's, ten e's, ten e's on this I chart,
Speaker 1: there's ten letter E'SE. There are ten letter ease and uh,
Speaker 1: those of you that are trying to count them, if
Speaker 1: you did not see the big E up top, I
Speaker 1: want to make it home today. So please don't don't drive.
Speaker 1: Okay if you can't see the big E. But all
Speaker 1: the way from the top, all the way to the bottom,
Speaker 1: there are ten e's on this chart. And you know,
Speaker 1: as I'm studying, as I'm preparing and I'm praying, I
Speaker 1: kind of got frustrated. I was like, why am I
Speaker 1: going down this rabbit hole? Like why? Why? Why? You
Speaker 1: know people are gonna be looking at me like I'm
Speaker 1: crazy talking about the E and I'm not an optometrist,
Speaker 1: Like God, what are you doing? And something really really
Speaker 1: jumped out to me. I was really really blessed by
Speaker 1: what God spoke to me. And because you know, the
Speaker 1: E is, when you look this up, is actually the
Speaker 1: most common letter in the English alphabet, the ears used
Speaker 1: more than any other letter. And it has this vertical
Speaker 1: line in this three straight lines, which makes it harder
Speaker 1: sometimes to be able to see. And and so here
Speaker 1: here's Here's what God told me to tell you today.
Speaker 1: I want you to write this down. He told me
Speaker 1: to tell you to look for E. Tell me to
Speaker 1: tell you look, look look for E. Look for Tap.
Speaker 1: Your neighbors say, look for E. Look for em. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about E Edwards who plays the guitar.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about Erica or Eric. God really spoke
Speaker 1: to me. He said, Hey, I need you to go
Speaker 1: back a little bit to the Book of Matthew, and
Speaker 1: you're going to go to chapter one, verse twenty three,
Speaker 1: and you'll see who he is. Put it up on
Speaker 1: the screens for me. It says its behold, a virgin
Speaker 1: shall be with child and shall bring forth a son,
Speaker 1: and they shall call his name em Manuel, which being
Speaker 1: interpreted as God with us. Hey, some of you you
Speaker 1: know Jehovah, Jirah, you know Jehovah Nieci, But some of
Speaker 1: you today you needed to learn about E. You needed
Speaker 1: to know about Emmanuel, God with us. I don't care
Speaker 1: where you find yourself. You can look around and find Eve.
Speaker 1: I don't know what situation you're going through. Don't matter
Speaker 1: how high you are or how low you are, you
Speaker 1: better look for Ee. Some of y'all still didn't get it,
Speaker 1: So let me make it plain. Hey, put up wedding,
Speaker 1: Put up wedding, put up wedding. Anybody engaged in the room.
Speaker 1: Anybody engaged in the room. Hey, I'll see y'all see. Okay, Hey,
Speaker 1: on your wedding day, ask the pastor that's officiating to
Speaker 1: do the three strand coord braid, because on your wedding
Speaker 1: day you better look free. You see, one quarter represents
Speaker 1: the husband, one quarter represents the wife. But I will
Speaker 1: on my marriage to have e woven through it. But
Speaker 1: some of you enemy just start trying to speak to
Speaker 1: your ear. You're like, hey, but I just walk through
Speaker 1: a divorce. Here's the thing I know about divorce is
Speaker 1: when you get all the way, come on, put divorce
Speaker 1: up on the screen. Oh, somebody helped me preach today
Speaker 1: when I get all the way to the end of
Speaker 1: that divorce. I was sitting with my friend this week
Speaker 1: and he was telling me about walking through a divorce,
Speaker 1: and he said, at the end of it all that
Speaker 1: Jesus never left him, that Jesus never forgotten about him.
Speaker 1: He still saw his goodness, he still saw his grace.
Speaker 1: Some of you might be going through some sickness in
Speaker 1: your body. I'm telling you, if you find yourself going
Speaker 1: through sickness, at the end of sickness, there's an E.
Speaker 1: But some of you are like, hey, I will find
Speaker 1: God when I get healed. He's there too. He's there too.
Speaker 1: He's there too. It's always reflect on this. This is I
Speaker 1: was reflecting on this. I remember back in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: This is probably one of the hardest seasons of me
Speaker 1: and my family's life. Last time I preached, I shared
Speaker 1: a little bit about this, that my mother was in
Speaker 1: a horrible accident. Matter of fact, my mother is still
Speaker 1: in a coma to this day. And and and we
Speaker 1: flew out to Arizona to be able to see and
Speaker 1: it was all kinds of craziness going on. It was,
Speaker 1: I'm telling you it was. It was. It was hard experience,
Speaker 1: probably the most difficult experience of my whole life. And
Speaker 1: I remember, I remember when we got there, we went
Speaker 1: into these hospital rooms and going back and forth, and
Speaker 1: it was a lot. It was a lot. The moment
Speaker 1: I came back home, remember this is twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: Moment I came back home, I wasn't even home a week.
Speaker 1: I ended up catching COVID, and and when I got COVID,
Speaker 1: it didn't get better. It kept getting worse. My oxygen
Speaker 1: level had dropped all the way down to eighty nine.
Speaker 1: And my wife looked at me and she said, you
Speaker 1: go to the doctor. Men go to the doctor. Not
Speaker 1: gonna be more elegant and than that. Goo. Go to
Speaker 1: the doctor. Yes you're in God's hands, but yes it's
Speaker 1: the doctor's in God's hands too. So I'm hying if
Speaker 1: you haven't going to get a yearly check up in
Speaker 1: some years. I went to the doctor. I went to
Speaker 1: the doctor. Finally, I went to the doctor. Mary, She's
Speaker 1: gonna have to go. My oxygen level wouldn't go up.
Speaker 1: And the doctor looked at me and he said, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna have to keep you overnight. I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to keep you overnight. So I got oxygen and I'm
Speaker 1: telling you. He closed the door. I start speaking and something,
Speaker 1: I'm getting out of here. There, Hallelujah, thank you God,
Speaker 1: shout out like sheesus, I need you. I'm getting out
Speaker 1: of here. I started remember Pastor Stephens prayers. I was like,
Speaker 1: I've breathe you in Holy spirit, and your strength comes
Speaker 1: suddenly I'm doing them all. I'm doing all I mean.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm getting out of this hospital room. I'm
Speaker 1: getting out of this hospital room. It was scary. It
Speaker 1: was scary. It was scary. But God spoke to me.
Speaker 1: Because I had seen more hospital rooms and more than
Speaker 1: I had seen in my whole life. God spoke to me.
Speaker 1: He says, you know what, every time you walked into
Speaker 1: the hospital, there was a word on the door that
Speaker 1: said entrance. I said. Every time you walked out, that
Speaker 1: was a word that said exit. And here's the thing
Speaker 1: that God showed me. It doesn't matter what you're walking into,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what you're walking out of. At every entrance,
Speaker 1: in every exit, there is an eed. Hey listen, he listen.
Speaker 1: I feel faith rising. If you're missing it, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1: You better look free. That's the lens. That's the lens
Speaker 1: that you need to look through. There's no situation that
Speaker 1: you'll find yourself in that you won't be able to
Speaker 1: find your God. He'll never leave you, he'll never forsake you.
Speaker 1: You gotta look for him. You need a frame, You
Speaker 1: need a lens. The frame gives strength, the lens gives sight.
Speaker 1: But all of that school, God minister to me. I
Speaker 1: hope that minister to you. But that wasn't the biggest
Speaker 1: thing that God showed me in the text. Can I
Speaker 1: show you, can I show you, can I show you.
Speaker 1: The thing that really stood out to me was that
Speaker 1: verse forty five. Put verse forty five up on the screen.
Speaker 1: Put verse forty five up on the screen. Immediately, Jesus
Speaker 1: made his disciples get into the boat and go on
Speaker 1: ahead of him to best say that while he dismissed
Speaker 1: the crowd forty six forty six, forty six forty six
Speaker 1: after leaving, after leaving them, he went up on a
Speaker 1: mountain side to pray. I wonder what Jesus was praying
Speaker 1: on the side of that mountain as he climbed up
Speaker 1: that mountain. I wonder what Jesus was praying. I wonder
Speaker 1: what he was praying for. I think he was praying
Speaker 1: for the disciples. I think he was praying that God
Speaker 1: would give him strength. I think he was praying that
Speaker 1: they wouldn't give up. I think he was just praying
Speaker 1: for them. But he went way up, way up, way up,
Speaker 1: way up on top of this mountain. Says that he
Speaker 1: was on a mountain side praying your praying man right,
Speaker 1: Praise God, Praise God. God knew I needed to pick
Speaker 1: this side. Jesus was up on the mountain side praying
Speaker 1: forty six, forty seven, let me see it, let me
Speaker 1: see it. Later that night the boat was in the
Speaker 1: middle of the lake and he was alone on land
Speaker 1: forty eight he saw the disciples straining at the oars.
Speaker 1: That really blessed me because maybe this message isn't about
Speaker 1: my sight. Maybe it's about Jesus. Remember, they had been
Speaker 1: out there rowing for a long time, at least five hours,
Speaker 1: into the middle of the lake, and Jesus is on
Speaker 1: top of this mountain, the mountain side praying. This blessed
Speaker 1: me because it says he saw them. God wanted me
Speaker 1: to tell somebody it doesn't matter how far you think
Speaker 1: you are from God. He sees you. You you may have
Speaker 1: to strain to see Jesus. He's never taking his eyes
Speaker 1: off of you. And Proverbs, as this versus says, for
Speaker 1: the people perish for a lack of vision. I've always
Speaker 1: heard that and I was like, have a vision, have
Speaker 1: a vision for your life. But when God was ministering
Speaker 1: to me today, I realized that I love that my
Speaker 1: life isn't built on my vision. I wist sit down
Speaker 1: until they stand up and get the fact that it
Speaker 1: wasn't based on my vision. But it's his vision. That's
Speaker 1: the only way that you won't perish. That's the only
Speaker 1: way that you won't fall. Your sight may fail you.
Speaker 1: But I praise God today that he's not straining to
Speaker 1: see me. He's not straining to see you. Healed, He's
Speaker 1: not straining to see you all. He's not straining to
Speaker 1: see you. Pleased, hallelujah, Thank you Jesus, all your neighbor.
Speaker 1: Thank God for seeing me, thank God for seeing me.
Speaker 1: Stand up. I'm getting ready. I'm getting ready. I'm getting ready.
Speaker 1: I'm getting ready to close. It's Father's Day. And as
Speaker 1: I was, God just leaped to me and I saw,
Speaker 1: I saw this, and he said, hey, good, take them,
Speaker 1: Take them to Luke. Take them to Luke Chapter eighteen,
Speaker 1: because I want you to see the father's loving this.
Speaker 1: Some of you I may know this story, the story
Speaker 1: of the prodigal Son. They're actually two sons, and the
Speaker 1: younger son asked his father for his inheritance. She says,
Speaker 1: he give me my inheritance, and he ran off and
Speaker 1: it says that he squandered it all. Another way to
Speaker 1: say he lost it all. He fumbled it all and
Speaker 1: got so bad that he's sitting in a pig pin
Speaker 1: and he's so hungry that he wants to fill his
Speaker 1: belly with the pods that the pig eat. It's a
Speaker 1: low place. Some of you are like, I'm in a
Speaker 1: low place, and I don't think he can see me
Speaker 1: that low. Some of you think the only way that
Speaker 1: he can see you is when you're standing up. But
Speaker 1: I love that he sees me when I might be
Speaker 1: laying down and I don't know if I can get up.
Speaker 1: I thank God he sees me, and it's like nothing.
Speaker 1: Put the verse on the screen. Put the first on
Speaker 1: sc He says, I will set out and return to
Speaker 1: my brother and say the verse before this. I don't
Speaker 1: know if I gave it to him, but it said
Speaker 1: he came to a census. It's like he took the
Speaker 1: crowd out of the middle of his That's what God's
Speaker 1: doing for some of you today. He came to a census.
Speaker 1: Hold up, hold up, hold on. I can go back
Speaker 1: to my father's house. I can go back to my father.
Speaker 1: This is what blessed me. I'll said out, and I
Speaker 1: go back to my father's house and I'll say them, father,
Speaker 1: I have sinned against you when he came to a since, yep, okay,
Speaker 1: I got you. Y'all went back and got the verse
Speaker 1: for me. Y'all are amazing. Can we thank God for
Speaker 1: the production team? Go to verse nineteen. Go to verse nineteen.
Speaker 1: He says, I'm no longer worthy to be called your son.
Speaker 1: Make me like one of your highest servants. Twenty. So
Speaker 1: he got up and he went to his father. But
Speaker 1: while he was still up alone way off, how far
Speaker 1: look this blessed me. He blessed me because I saw
Speaker 1: Jesus up on the mountains side. And then I saw
Speaker 1: his father sitting maybe on his porch. And while he
Speaker 1: was a long way, the son couldn't see his father yet,
Speaker 1: but the father sure saw his son. And I loved
Speaker 1: what happened. While he was a long way off, his
Speaker 1: father saw him. He was filled with compassion for him,
Speaker 1: and he ran. He ran, He ran to his son. Hey,
Speaker 1: some of you went to a Pentecostal church and they
Speaker 1: was running around the church praising God. But hey, some
Speaker 1: of you are like, I'm too tired to run. I'm
Speaker 1: too tired to run. When you're too tired to run,
Speaker 1: he ran to you. He ran to you. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Some of you saw God as he was just sitting
Speaker 1: there watching. Watching and seeing is two different things. I
Speaker 1: thank God that I don't have a God that just
Speaker 1: is watching over me, but that sees me, and he
Speaker 1: has compassion for me, and then he runs towards me
Speaker 1: when I need him the most. I thank God for
Speaker 1: seeing me. Then, just to typos, everybody's standing, everybody's standing,
Speaker 1: everybody's standing Hebrews twelve, Verses one and two. It's just
Speaker 1: put everything into perspective for me. Here's what it says. Therefore,
Speaker 1: since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses,
Speaker 1: let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin
Speaker 1: that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance
Speaker 1: the race marked out for us. What does it say,
Speaker 1: fixing our eyes on Jesus to your neighbor, you better
Speaker 1: look for E. You better look for E. You better
Speaker 1: look for Eve. They here and perfector of our faith
Speaker 1: the joy set before him. He endured the cross, scorning
Speaker 1: its shame, and sat down at the right at the
Speaker 1: throne of God at the right hand of the throne
Speaker 1: of God. What a picture of my sight in God's sight.
Speaker 1: It's blessing me Church, because maybe maybe he was straining
Speaker 1: to see me. Because it says where the joy set
Speaker 1: before him, he endured the cross, that that cross wasn't easy,
Speaker 1: and on that cross he had pain. On that cross.
Speaker 1: The pierced his side on that cross. They mocked him
Speaker 1: on that cross. They spitted him. On that cross. He
Speaker 1: was straining to take his loudice breath. But this gives
Speaker 1: this blessed to me, he says. But the joy sat
Speaker 1: before him while he was straining. He was seeing you
Speaker 1: saved while he was straining. He was seeing you delivered.
Speaker 1: While he was straining. He saw you with hope. While
Speaker 1: he was straining. He saw you with peace. While he
Speaker 1: was straining, he saw you. I'm gonna give an invitation,
Speaker 1: But maybe some of you are like, hey, why were
Speaker 1: they going to Best Saida in the first place? Why
Speaker 1: was he so bent on them making them go to
Speaker 1: best Sayda? They don't get to best Sada until chapter eight.
Speaker 1: And guess who was waiting on that waiting there for him?
Speaker 1: There was a bond man. There was a bond man.
Speaker 1: Maybe you're here today. And the reason why I strained studying,
Speaker 1: I couldn't sleep well last night is because you were bond.
Speaker 1: You couldn't see. And today God was just feeling back
Speaker 1: the scales over your eyes and he wanted you to
Speaker 1: see him. He wanted you to see his love. So
Speaker 1: every one of our campuses, everybody's standing, where you're at,
Speaker 1: if you're a home ony fam if you're everybody's standing,
Speaker 1: want you to bow your head, close your eyes, no
Speaker 1: one moving, no one moving. If you're here today and
Speaker 1: you don't have a relationship with Jesus, you've never given
Speaker 1: your life to him. For the first time you have
Speaker 1: experienced God not on the door of your heart, you
Speaker 1: realize he's not just watching you. He sees you, not
Speaker 1: only that he went to a cross to die for you.
Speaker 1: I want to give you an opportunity to give your
Speaker 1: life to Jesus today. Or maybe you're here today and
Speaker 1: you used to walk with God. You used to talk
Speaker 1: with God, but you walked away from the faith. I
Speaker 1: want to give you a moment to come back home.
Speaker 1: We're going to say this prayer together as a church
Speaker 1: family for the benefit of those coming to God. Everyone
Speaker 1: to repeat after me, say I believe that Jesus Christ
Speaker 1: is the son of God, that he died on a
Speaker 1: cross and a rose from the grave to forgive me
Speaker 1: and my sins. So I'll give you my sins, I
Speaker 1: give you my shame, and from this day forward I'll
Speaker 1: follow you. This is my new beginning. I am a
Speaker 1: child of God. Oh he's about all os closed. If
Speaker 1: you just said that prayer, you meant it making good
Speaker 1: decision to put your faith in Jesus or you're coming
Speaker 1: back to him. I'm gonna count to three, and when
Speaker 1: I get to three, I want you to shoot your
Speaker 1: hand up boldly so we can celebrate this moment with you.
Speaker 1: Here we go one, two, three, shoot your hand up.
Speaker 1: If you're making good decisions to where your faith in Jesus.
Speaker 1: Come on, Come on, Doug. God bless you, God blets you.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
Speaker 2: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
Speaker 2: You can click the link in the description to give now,
Speaker 2: or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more information.
Speaker 1: And if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You
Speaker 1: can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2: You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
Speaker 2: share it on your social stories and tag us at
Speaker 2: Elevation Church.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening. God bless you.