Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2: I'm the pastor of Elevation Church, and this is our podcast.
Speaker 1: I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope
Speaker 1: this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.
Speaker 2: Hope it gives your perspective to see God is moving
Speaker 2: in your life.
Speaker 1: Enjoy the message. Now.
Speaker 2: I want to share the Word of God with you,
Speaker 2: and I want to ask you something. Would you be terribly,
Speaker 2: terribly inconvenienced if I spent just one more week talking
Speaker 2: about functional faith? I promise you this will be the
Speaker 2: last week. After this, I will never bother you with
Speaker 2: the subject of functional faith again. But I want to
Speaker 2: use one verse today that I think is appropriate for
Speaker 2: what we've been singing about and what we're experiencing right now.
Speaker 2: And it is in the Book of Revelation, chapter four,
Speaker 2: Verse one. Give me just a moment while I set
Speaker 2: up my office. Maybe you want to open your Bible
Speaker 2: and get ready to receive the word of God. How
Speaker 2: many of you are blessed just to be in church today?
Speaker 1: How many of you.
Speaker 2: Are blessed to have your sins forgiven? I said, how
Speaker 2: many are blessed to have your sins forgiven?
Speaker 1: Me too?
Speaker 2: I'm always blessed by Mike and Brian to see you guys.
Speaker 1: Love those guys. They stand out head and shoulders above
Speaker 1: the rest.
Speaker 2: And look at this verse real quick, just one verse,
Speaker 2: just one verse, but very powerful, very powerful, John says,
Speaker 2: after this, I looked, and there before me was a
Speaker 2: door standing open in heaven, and the voice I had
Speaker 2: first heard, speaking to me like a trumpet, said, come
Speaker 2: up here, and I will show you what must take
Speaker 2: place after this. Now that's the only verse I want
Speaker 2: to read you today. I'm gonna double down on it,
Speaker 2: read it again, just to make sure we've got it.
Speaker 2: Because this thing, this thing has really been blessing to me.
Speaker 2: I have really been praying about what God wanted me
Speaker 2: to give you today, and he said to tell you
Speaker 2: after this. I looked in there before me was a
Speaker 2: door standing open in heaven, and the voice I had
Speaker 2: first heard, speaking to me like a trumpet, said, come
Speaker 2: up here, and I will.
Speaker 1: Show you what must take place after this.
Speaker 2: So, in this final installment of Functional Fate, praying about it,
Speaker 2: God said that he wanted to give you an overview
Speaker 2: of your future.
Speaker 1: Are you ready?
Speaker 2: God said that he wanted to speak to you today
Speaker 2: very specifically and give you an overview of your future.
Speaker 1: Now, I need you to.
Speaker 2: Nudge your neighbor and tell him I'm getting ready for something.
Speaker 2: I'm getting ready for something. God is preparing me for something.
Speaker 2: And today God wants to give you an overview of
Speaker 2: your future. I need you to hear me in Rockhill
Speaker 2: because Jeremiah said that he knows the plans he has
Speaker 2: for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you,
Speaker 2: plans to give you a hope and a future. Paul said,
Speaker 2: in all these things, we are more than conquerors through
Speaker 2: Him who loved us. And neither life nor death, nor
Speaker 2: angels nor demons, neither the past, the present, nor any
Speaker 2: other shall be able to separate us from the love
Speaker 2: of God that is.
Speaker 1: In Christ Jesus.
Speaker 2: Jesus Christ themselves said, in.
Speaker 1: The world you will have trouble.
Speaker 2: But take heart, I have over come the world. So
Speaker 2: God wants to give you an overview of your future.
Speaker 2: Would you hug seven people and tell them it gets
Speaker 2: better from here, It gets better from here.
Speaker 1: It gets better from here. You may be seated. Thank you.
Speaker 2: I feel like the atmosphere of our hearts is ready
Speaker 2: and the word can be depositive.
Speaker 1: Let's go.
Speaker 2: To the Book of Revelation four verse one. Now some
Speaker 2: of you are expecting me to bring out my charts
Speaker 2: of the end times, because the Book of Revelation is,
Speaker 2: of course an apocalyptic book. This is the genre to
Speaker 2: which the Book of Revelation, written by John the Beloved, belongs.
Speaker 2: It is an apocryphal there's an apocalyptic book, not an
Speaker 2: apocryphal book. You know what, I'm not much of I'm
Speaker 2: not I'm not really an apocalyptic guy.
Speaker 1: I'm i tend to be more on the practical side.
Speaker 2: So I guess you could call this not an apocalyptic
Speaker 2: but in apocalyptic message.
Speaker 1: Ay man.
Speaker 2: My wife can't stand to hear people preach about the
Speaker 2: Book of Revelation and act like they know, you know, when.
Speaker 1: Which president represents which beast?
Speaker 2: And and I'm I'm kind of with her. My my
Speaker 2: oldest son, he's he's pretty sharp in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: When where he gets it from. I was just kidding.
Speaker 2: He's a he's at a Christian school. So he asked
Speaker 2: me the other day, do you understand the Book of Revelation, Daddy?
Speaker 2: I said, uh no, I said, nobody does. Elijah, I
Speaker 2: said this, you know it's really it's a.
Speaker 1: Symbolic book in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2: A lot of what they write, what what's written there
Speaker 2: is poetic and.
Speaker 1: And so some of it is not meant to be
Speaker 1: taken literally. And I mean, it's a very it's a
Speaker 1: very serious book.
Speaker 2: And he said, well, one of my friends in the
Speaker 2: class said that his dad understands the Book of Revelation,
Speaker 2: and and he's not even a preacher. So I said,
Speaker 2: all right, well, okay, well, if it's like that, let
Speaker 2: me give you an overview of the Book of Revelation.
Speaker 1: We win.
Speaker 2: Come on, somebody, I need you to look at the
Speaker 2: person next to you and some marise the outcome of
Speaker 2: their current battle.
Speaker 1: Look them in the eye, like you know what you're
Speaker 1: talking about.
Speaker 2: Look like you're Marty McFly coming with a sports almanac
Speaker 2: from another year. Look at him and say, I don't
Speaker 2: know what you're going through, but you win.
Speaker 1: In the end.
Speaker 2: I did take a seminary course on the Book of Revelation.
Speaker 1: The professor said, after.
Speaker 2: Studying the Book of Revelation for over forty years, I
Speaker 2: have come to this overview. Evil is real, God is greater,
Speaker 2: I said man, because he told us this at the
Speaker 2: end of the whole class. And I said, we sat
Speaker 2: here for three and a half months. I paid tuition
Speaker 2: for that. You could have tweeted that and have twitter
Speaker 2: back then. Now, what I want to do today is
Speaker 2: a little bit different than kind of telling you everything
Speaker 2: that it means. I would like to use this model
Speaker 2: whereby John saw a vision of God and use it
Speaker 2: to help us approach God in our own lives in
Speaker 2: a way that He might become real and relevant to us.
Speaker 2: And within the Book of Revelation there are there are several.
Speaker 1: Lessons for us to learn.
Speaker 2: But I just want to go not necessarily to what
Speaker 2: John saw, and now I want to I want to
Speaker 2: talk first about how he saw it, and I'd like
Speaker 2: you to write down a few key thoughts today.
Speaker 1: And the first one is attention.
Speaker 2: Attention, because John says in Revelation chapter four, watch this.
Speaker 2: After this I looked, and you know, it's interesting because
Speaker 2: everything that happens after that wouldn't have happened without that.
Speaker 2: Everything that John saw after this would not have been
Speaker 2: revealed if he didn't pay attention.
Speaker 1: So I bring it up because sometimes we're asking.
Speaker 2: God to reveal his presence in our lives, his provision
Speaker 2: in our lives, his purpose in our lives, and sometimes
Speaker 2: we even pray about it, and we pray like we're
Speaker 2: trying to get God's attention. But I've come to believe
Speaker 2: that prayer rightly done is less about me getting God's
Speaker 2: attention and more about Him getting mine. See, I live
Speaker 2: my life from the foundational belief that I already have
Speaker 2: Heaven's attention. I mean, if I didn't have Heaven's attention,
Speaker 2: the Son of God certainly wouldn't have stepped down the
Speaker 2: spiral staircase of time and been wrapped in flesh made
Speaker 2: in the appearance of a sinful man to be a
Speaker 2: sin offering, so that I could approach God boldly and
Speaker 2: come before his throne with confidence because of a drop
Speaker 2: of blood on the mercy seat to make a way
Speaker 2: of access into the presence of God. So when I
Speaker 2: come before God, when I worship God, when I need God,
Speaker 2: when I call on God, I'm not trying to get
Speaker 2: his attention. I'm not trying to get him to notice me. Maybe,
Speaker 2: as I go through my life, a better question isn't
Speaker 2: is God paying attention to me? The question might be
Speaker 2: am I paying attention to him? Help me out today?
Speaker 2: Shake your neighbor awake and say pay attention. Maybe the
Speaker 2: same reason we don't experience God sometimes in our lives
Speaker 2: is the same reason that we flunk the math test
Speaker 2: in seventh grade, the same reason for that fender bender
Speaker 2: on Taivola. Maybe it's the same reason that we burned
Speaker 2: the dinner. Maybe the reason we don't experience God's presence,
Speaker 2: maybe it's the same reason that we didn't see our
Speaker 2: kids were hanging out with bad influences till it was
Speaker 2: a little too late, because we weren't paying.
Speaker 1: Attention.
Speaker 2: John says, after this, I looked, and there before me
Speaker 2: was a door.
Speaker 1: It was open in heaven.
Speaker 2: I want you to know today that you have a
Speaker 2: standing invitation to experience God's presence, but you have.
Speaker 1: To pay attention.
Speaker 2: You have to pay attention because attention creates access. Let
Speaker 2: me teach you a little bit. Attention creates access. So
Speaker 2: if emotions have access into your heart, it's because you
Speaker 2: gave those emotions your attention. If memories of pain and
Speaker 2: hurt dominate your thought life, it's because those memories.
Speaker 1: Have your attention. How can a memory hurt you It
Speaker 1: already happened.
Speaker 2: It can only hurt you if it has your ap
Speaker 2: preaching good. And there are some things that you've been
Speaker 2: giving your attention to that if you would turn your
Speaker 2: attention from them, you would take the power of them.
Speaker 2: God wants to know today, what has your attention? John
Speaker 2: said after this, I looked in There before.
Speaker 1: Me was a door. It was there all along, but
Speaker 1: I saw it when I looked. And John could have
Speaker 1: been looking at a lot of things.
Speaker 2: I mean. The guy was an exile on a little
Speaker 2: tiny island called Petmus. He had been sent there because
Speaker 2: of his testimony of the Word of God. He calls
Speaker 2: himself a fellow sufferer and a patient endurer in the
Speaker 2: Kingdom of God. It's interesting to me that God gave
Speaker 2: the greatest revelation of himself to a man who was
Speaker 2: in exile.
Speaker 1: I want to stop for a moment and announce.
Speaker 2: That God is a god of access in exile. He
Speaker 2: is a God of access in exile. It means that
Speaker 2: even if you feel like you're on a little island today,
Speaker 2: all by yourself, you still have access to the presence
Speaker 2: of God. There is nowhere that life can take you
Speaker 2: that God's presence cannot reach you. There is nothing that
Speaker 2: people can do to you to keep God from getting
Speaker 2: to you. So we see a pattern in scripture that
Speaker 2: God is a god of access in exile. Ask Moses,
Speaker 2: he was a Midian in exile running from his act
Speaker 2: of murder. But when he turned aside and saw the bush.
Speaker 2: When he turned aside and gave the bush his attention,
Speaker 2: he heard an announcement, and God said, I've come down
Speaker 2: to deliver my people.
Speaker 1: I know you've been in this desert a long time.
Speaker 2: I know you've been on this island by yourself. I
Speaker 2: know you feel like nobody hears you. But I am
Speaker 2: the God of access in exile. You're not alone. You're
Speaker 2: never alone. And the God who was, and is and
Speaker 2: is to comis with you.
Speaker 1: In this moment. Asked Daniel.
Speaker 2: He was a Babylonian exile, and he saw a revelation
Speaker 2: of Jesus Christ before Jesus Christ was born. Daniel saw him,
Speaker 2: and he saw him in exile. And I thought that
Speaker 2: might encourage somebody to know that you have access even
Speaker 2: in exile. But you got to pay attention. You gotta
Speaker 2: pay attention, he said. After this, I looked, and there
Speaker 2: was a door. After this, I looked in there was
Speaker 2: a door. The door represents the revelation that God gave him.
Speaker 2: After this, I look, and there was a door. I
Speaker 2: think it's important what the door means. But I also
Speaker 2: think it's important where the door was. Come on, y'all,
Speaker 2: because he did not say, put the verse up.
Speaker 1: After this, I looked, and there behind me was a door.
Speaker 2: See, the open door is never behind you.
Speaker 1: Who who's this for?
Speaker 2: You've been stuck in regret. You've been stuck in what happened?
Speaker 2: You've been stuck in what was John said? After this,
Speaker 2: I looked, and there before me was a door. The
Speaker 2: open door is always before you.
Speaker 1: It's before you look.
Speaker 2: Unto Jesus, the Author and perfector of our faith, who
Speaker 2: for the joy set before him endoored the cross, despising
Speaker 2: his shame, the open door is before you. The open
Speaker 2: door is not in ten years ago, the opportunity that
Speaker 2: was missed.
Speaker 3: I know there's some stuff behind you that you can't
Speaker 3: get back. I know there's some things that happened to
Speaker 3: you that.
Speaker 2: Weren't fair, But you're not gonna get access by giving
Speaker 2: your attention to what happened back there. The open door
Speaker 2: is before you, it's in front of you. Your best
Speaker 2: days are not behind you. What God has for you
Speaker 2: is in front of you. Look ahead, help me preach.
Speaker 2: Find three people say look ahead, it's right in front
Speaker 2: of you.
Speaker 1: It's right in front of you.
Speaker 2: Maybe we've been at a baseball field too much, Coach Dave,
Speaker 2: because I keep telling I keep telling Graham.
Speaker 1: What I hear you tell him.
Speaker 2: You's always telling him keep it in front of you.
Speaker 2: This is what Coach Dave tells Graham because he coaches
Speaker 2: some eight year olds, and eight year olds don't have
Speaker 2: the best attention span, and so they'll be standing out.
Speaker 1: There in the field in the fifth inning.
Speaker 2: Acting like the ball's not gonna come to him. And
Speaker 2: so then when the ball does come, the gotta come
Speaker 2: back like this. But Coach Dave said, I want you
Speaker 2: on your toes so when they hit the ball, you
Speaker 2: be it. And I've seen not every pastor can do
Speaker 2: a lateral movement with that velocity.
Speaker 1: You ought to feel blessed to come to church here.
Speaker 1: Can I do it again?
Speaker 2: He said, I want you to be ready because he
Speaker 2: got a better chance to stop the ball.
Speaker 1: If you keep it in front of you.
Speaker 2: You know you got a better chance to have joy
Speaker 2: and a better chance to have success, and a better
Speaker 2: chance to have hope if you keep it in front
Speaker 2: of you.
Speaker 1: That's what Coach Dave's.
Speaker 2: And I heard the Lord say, where one door shuts,
Speaker 2: another door opens. They might have you on an island
Speaker 2: called Pantmost.
Speaker 1: But you're not stuck.
Speaker 2: Here because if you can't find a way out, God,
Speaker 2: I'll give you a way up. Come on, tell somebody say,
Speaker 2: we're going higher. We're going higher. We're going higher. We're
Speaker 2: going higher. We're going higher, We're going higher.
Speaker 1: I might be down here on this island in my body.
Speaker 1: I might be down here on this job. I don't
Speaker 1: like it in my body.
Speaker 2: I might be in a bad situation in my back account.
Speaker 2: But you can't change my mind to the crown. I'm
Speaker 2: coming up higher. So let's talk about altitude.
Speaker 1: Altitude. The invitation is to see the.
Speaker 2: Open door before you, before you and I heard the voice.
Speaker 2: Your life is moving in the direction of your vision
Speaker 2: and your voices. So it's always what you see and
Speaker 2: what you hear that determines how high you go. John's
Speaker 2: revelation is interesting because in apocryphal apocalyptic literature, when they
Speaker 2: saw a vision of God, they had to go through
Speaker 2: an arduous journey to get to him. If you read
Speaker 2: some of the Old Testament revelations of God, usually in
Speaker 2: the Apocryphal, which is not the Old Testament, but in
Speaker 2: some of the books that we have of the prophetic
Speaker 2: imagination of the past, they would have to make a
Speaker 2: difficult journey to get to God.
Speaker 1: John's vision is.
Speaker 2: A little different because he says, I didn't get there
Speaker 2: by effort.
Speaker 1: I got there by invitation. And the invitation goes like this.
Speaker 2: It was a voice like a trumpet making an announcement,
Speaker 2: and it said, come up here, and I will show
Speaker 2: you what must take place.
Speaker 1: After this act.
Speaker 2: Once I was in the spirit, you know how quickly
Speaker 2: God can lift you if you let him. I mean,
Speaker 2: he really can't. He really can't. John didn't say that
Speaker 2: he went into a trance for forty three minutes, because see,
Speaker 2: I'm doing some practical work on my life right now.
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to be a better person, not a
Speaker 2: better preacher. I mean, I want to be a better
Speaker 2: preacher too, but I think that a better person makes
Speaker 2: a better preacher. So I'm just like working on things
Speaker 2: because I'm I'm a little on the grumpy side by nature,
Speaker 2: especially before let's say like ninety five, am I do
Speaker 2: not feel saved, sanctified, and spirit filled until about nine
Speaker 2: forty five.
Speaker 1: Am Eastern Standard time.
Speaker 2: And another thing is that not only do I kind
Speaker 2: of start my day sometimes in that grumpy place, but
Speaker 2: I notice I end my day in an anxious place,
Speaker 2: and just observing my patterns, lately.
Speaker 1: I figured that that can't be the best.
Speaker 2: Way to wake up and go into my day and
Speaker 2: then in my day.
Speaker 1: So I'm working on that. I'd like you to work
Speaker 1: on it.
Speaker 2: Too, because your altitude is going to determine your access.
Speaker 2: So where you start your day is kind of important.
Speaker 2: Where you start your day really does matter. So you
Speaker 2: got to start your day with some caffeine. The Lord
Speaker 2: said that you could. I shouldn't tell you this, but
Speaker 2: I drink a cup of coffee every morning. That's not
Speaker 2: the part I shouldn't tell you. The part I shouldn't
Speaker 2: tell you is I chase it with a diet mountain
Speaker 2: dew because I like the contrast of the warmth and
Speaker 2: the cold carbonation.
Speaker 1: It blesses my soul.
Speaker 2: Don't judge me, go away, but it helps me. It
Speaker 2: helps me think about higher things. Anyway, then I've been
Speaker 2: practicing just the voices that I.
Speaker 1: Pay attention to early in the morning.
Speaker 2: Can we talk not apocalyptic, Let's talk a practalytic.
Speaker 1: Because it's real easy to get excited.
Speaker 2: About Jesus comes on a horse and wipes out the world.
Speaker 2: But what about till he gets here? What about till
Speaker 2: that happens? Because he left us here in the meantime,
Speaker 2: so we can't do his work if we're at the
Speaker 2: wrong level.
Speaker 1: So I gotta get up in the morning, even if
Speaker 1: I'm mumbling when I first start, even.
Speaker 2: If I got that stuff in the corner of my eye,
Speaker 2: gotta flick it out when I get out to bed,
Speaker 2: I gotta flick.
Speaker 1: That stuff on the devil's head and say, I'm awake.
Speaker 1: He should have killed me. I'm my asleep.
Speaker 4: I'm awake and I'm blessed. I'm awake and I'm a blessing.
Speaker 4: I'm awake and I'm a river. I'm awake and I'm
Speaker 4: a giver. I'm awake and I'm alive. I'm awake, I'm redeem,
Speaker 4: I'm awake.
Speaker 2: My eyes are open, I'm awake, my heart is open,
Speaker 2: I'm awake, my soul is ready. I've just been trying
Speaker 2: to dip myself up to a higher level because I
Speaker 2: need some runway, because I.
Speaker 1: Don't know what I'm a run into when the day
Speaker 1: gets started.
Speaker 2: I don't know what kind of crazy person is gonna
Speaker 2: be driving in traffic trying to cut me off. And
Speaker 2: if I'm at the wrong level, I might might not
Speaker 2: pray for him. So I gotta I gotta.
Speaker 1: Get a little runway. I gotta come on up higher.
Speaker 2: Isn't that what the announcement said, come on up here
Speaker 2: to a higher place.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: I know we don't have the same invitation John had
Speaker 2: to see the unfolding of end time events and the.
Speaker 1: History of the world before it happens.
Speaker 2: But we do have a standing invitation in Heaven that
Speaker 2: anytime we want to lift our eyes to the hills,
Speaker 2: we can look to our help. We can look to
Speaker 2: our God, we can look I'm gonna stop screaming in
Speaker 2: a minute. You gotta understand. I'm just excited about the
Speaker 2: invitation that God has given me to come up high.
Speaker 2: Does somebody say come on up? When I was a boy,
Speaker 2: they used to have a show called Price is Right.
Speaker 2: Now they still have a version of it, but it's
Speaker 2: not Bob Barker.
Speaker 1: So it's not the real show. Can I get a witness.
Speaker 2: Bob Barker had that skinny little mic, and when Bob
Speaker 2: Barker would throw it to Rod Roddy, y'all remember Rod
Speaker 2: Roddy and Rod Roddy. All these people are in the
Speaker 2: audience and the difference of prices right is at any moment,
Speaker 2: you might go from the crowd to the front and
Speaker 2: if they call your name, you might win a washing machine.
Speaker 2: You might win a vacation trip for two four nights,
Speaker 2: all expenses paid to can Coo. You might win a
Speaker 2: new car. So when Rod Roddy grabs the mic, people
Speaker 2: listen and they lean forward.
Speaker 1: And Rod Roddy had this thing he used to say.
Speaker 2: I don't know if they say it anymore, but Rod
Speaker 2: Roddy used to announce a name and he would say,
Speaker 2: Stephen Ferdick, come on down, you're the next contestant on
Speaker 2: the price is right now. Rob Roddy wasn't available for
Speaker 2: church today, but the spirit of God is here, and
Speaker 2: I hear him saying, if you want to listen in Providence,
Speaker 2: if you want to listen in Matthews, if you want
Speaker 2: to listen at Butler High School, if you want to
Speaker 2: listen at Blakeney, if you want to listen in Lake Norman.
Speaker 2: You might want to jump up on your feet for
Speaker 2: what's next. Because I hear the spirit saying.
Speaker 5: Child of God, come on up.
Speaker 2: Come on up.
Speaker 1: This is rob Roddy in reverse.
Speaker 2: Come on up, Come on up where the piece is.
Speaker 1: Come on up where the blessing is. Come on up.
Speaker 6: You see that sun.
Speaker 1: Rise, my mercies with every rising off the sun, and
Speaker 1: I wanna let you know.
Speaker 7: You get come on up.
Speaker 2: Somebody shot up coming up. Now you gotta shout at
Speaker 2: like a trumpet.
Speaker 1: I'm coming up. So I'm gonna start my day at
Speaker 1: the right altitude.
Speaker 2: And and everybody say and touch them, say but wait,
Speaker 2: there's more. Yeah. God said he wanted to talk to
Speaker 2: you today about your future.
Speaker 1: He said he wanted to give you an overview of
Speaker 1: your future.
Speaker 2: He said, come up here, and then I'll show you
Speaker 2: what happens next.
Speaker 1: I want to give you an overview of your future.
Speaker 2: I don't want you to look at your day through
Speaker 2: the lens of everything that might go wrong.
Speaker 1: I want you to get up high.
Speaker 2: See, sometimes when we travel, we take these little planes.
Speaker 1: We probably shouldn't take them, they're.
Speaker 2: Probably not safe, but sometimes we have to get somewhere
Speaker 2: real quick, and we take a little plane. And when
Speaker 2: we take that little plane, I always know that if
Speaker 2: the weather is too bad, they're going to cancel the
Speaker 2: flight because the plane isn't big enough to get me
Speaker 2: above the weather. But when I fly with Delta or
Speaker 2: US Air, I might have to go through security, and
Speaker 2: I might have to shove my bag in the overhead bend.
Speaker 2: But there's one good thing about a big plane. No
Speaker 2: matter what storm comes, no matter what turbulence we encounter,
Speaker 2: no matter how cloudy it is in the sky, I'm
Speaker 2: in something that can get above it. Now, I need
Speaker 2: to let you know that the size of the plane
Speaker 2: doesn't change the weather, but it gets me above it.
Speaker 1: No, I need you to know that the size of
Speaker 1: your faith might not change the weather, but it'll get
Speaker 1: you off.
Speaker 2: I was in the spirit on the lrdstack and A
Speaker 2: saw a visit of Him who.
Speaker 7: Is and was and is to come, And I see
Speaker 7: my future from Heaven's perspectium.
Speaker 1: That fifteen seconds of praising for your future.
Speaker 7: Come up, prison, Come on, you want to praise in Concord.
Speaker 1: You are a prison.
Speaker 7: You are to prise him up town, Come on, pras
Speaker 7: and blake me Let's get up higher. Let's lift them up,
Speaker 7: he said, if I they left it up, how tall
Speaker 7: man left him up?
Speaker 1: Let him up.
Speaker 2: I see the Lord seated on the throne, the train
Speaker 2: of his robe fills the temple. Let's get practical. I
Speaker 2: want to start my day at the right altitude.
Speaker 8: And I want to finish my day on a note
Speaker 8: of praise.
Speaker 2: I see. I figured that the way I start my
Speaker 2: day will determine how I experience my day, and the
Speaker 2: way I end my day.
Speaker 1: Will determine the way I start the next one. Sit down,
Speaker 1: I got to show you something. Everybody say, practice.
Speaker 2: This takes practice because we are used to living at
Speaker 2: a low altitude.
Speaker 1: We're not used to coming up. We're not used to
Speaker 1: the air up there.
Speaker 2: We're not used to interpreting people through the idea of grace.
Speaker 2: We're not used to coming up. We're used to having
Speaker 2: our stomachs all tied up in knots. We've learned to
Speaker 2: depend on it. Anxiety is like our needle. We need it.
Speaker 2: We need it. We're almost at the end of the day.
Speaker 2: We almost put the welcome matt out for the devil
Speaker 2: to just take over.
Speaker 1: The next one.
Speaker 2: Okay, going to bed, thinking about everything that went wrong.
Speaker 2: So I just had enough of it. And a little
Speaker 2: while back, I saw in the kitchen this this little
Speaker 2: notebook my mother in law gave me. She gave me
Speaker 2: like five of them, and they were just sitting around,
Speaker 2: and I picked up this orange one because it's the
Speaker 2: color of God. And it says that she got this
Speaker 2: notebook for seven dollars and forty nine cents. It was
Speaker 2: originally priced at nine ninety nine. But what I've been
Speaker 2: putting in here is priceless because I put on the
Speaker 2: front of it, I put g P gratitude practice, and
Speaker 2: I decided to start ending my day on a high.
Speaker 2: But it only takes me like five minutes, and it's
Speaker 2: not fancy, so you might not be very impressed, but
Speaker 2: it it's really been blessing me too. At the end
Speaker 2: of my day to fill up just one page.
Speaker 1: And I picked a.
Speaker 2: Small notebook so it wouldn't be very intimidating, just one
Speaker 2: page on this little notebook. How many of you are
Speaker 2: already planning your trip to Target.
Speaker 1: Or Walmart because you need one of these. You need
Speaker 1: one of these.
Speaker 2: I just at night. I've been doing this. It's been
Speaker 2: helping me a lot and that's why I thought i'd
Speaker 2: share it with you. Is just I write at the
Speaker 2: top of the page gratitude practice.
Speaker 1: Just to run mind myself that I don't have to
Speaker 1: feel grateful to be grateful.
Speaker 2: And sometimes the pen doesn't start writing real quick. Sometimes
Speaker 2: it takes me all of the first five minutes to
Speaker 2: even get the pin moving. But it's amazing. Once I
Speaker 2: get the pin moving, what I remember from that day,
Speaker 2: it's amazing. It's like giving me a different overview because
Speaker 2: I go to bed so focus.
Speaker 1: On what might happen tomorrow, what didn't get done today.
Speaker 1: But it's just been helping me.
Speaker 2: If you want to try it, you can and then
Speaker 2: put your picture on social media and I'll see your
Speaker 2: little journal and you can we talk about it and
Speaker 2: you can hashtag it.
Speaker 1: You can hashtag it.
Speaker 2: Come on up, you can hashtag it, you can hashtag it. Overview,
Speaker 2: because when I'm looking my day over I want to
Speaker 2: look at it from the perspective of all the things
Speaker 2: that I might have missed.
Speaker 1: And didn't pay attention to that day that God did
Speaker 1: for me.
Speaker 2: Because what that's going to do is when I start tomorrow,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to start down here.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna start it up higher. Now.
Speaker 2: If I start tomorrow here, maybe I can end here.
Speaker 2: And maybe if I end that day here, I can
Speaker 2: start the next one up there. He's taking me from
Speaker 2: strength to strength and glory to glory.
Speaker 1: So I just write down little dumb stuff.
Speaker 2: It's nothing fancy, it's nothing poetic, it's nothing they're going
Speaker 2: to publish if I die. It's nothing that anybody's gonna
Speaker 2: read at my funeral.
Speaker 1: Just little old dumb stuff. Just stuff that wouldn't mean
Speaker 1: much to you.
Speaker 2: Just stuff that I remember from the day open doors,
Speaker 2: ways that God.
Speaker 1: Made, moments that I had a.
Speaker 2: Car wreck that I didn't get in, you know, all
Speaker 2: the stuff that didn't happen. Sometimes is a good reason
Speaker 2: to praise God.
Speaker 1: Too, just little stuff.
Speaker 2: Christy brought me a coffee yesterday before I preached.
Speaker 1: I thank God for the coffee.
Speaker 2: I thank God for a new season of show that
Speaker 2: I wanted to watch.
Speaker 1: Well, why not thank him for it? Why not? I
Speaker 1: can praise him over flicks. You don't have to, but
Speaker 1: I can.
Speaker 2: Every good, imperfect gift comes from above. Maybe that's a
Speaker 2: stretch I put down. This sounds kind of cute. Some
Speaker 2: shells in the ocean that my kids brought. Amen, that's
Speaker 2: what I'm looking for. I'm looking for that all because
Speaker 2: I might have missed that.
Speaker 1: I might not be paying attention. Just to remember that.
Speaker 2: Your kids are healthy and they played on the beach today.
Speaker 2: And while I'm at it, why don't I thank God
Speaker 2: for the ocean. You know, the ocean was there before
Speaker 2: I got there. It's gonna be there when I'm gone.
Speaker 2: And while I'm at it, why don't I thank God
Speaker 2: that he's.
Speaker 1: Bigger than me.
Speaker 2: And why don't I thank God that I have windows?
Speaker 2: I just thank God for whatever you can think of.
Speaker 2: If you sit there and try to make it too fancy,
Speaker 2: it won't work. I thank thee thou, Lord God, that
Speaker 2: thou didst create the heavens and the stars, and by
Speaker 2: thy mercy was the firmament.
Speaker 1: No, none of that.
Speaker 2: I thank God for My new book that I read
Speaker 2: is called Shoe Dog.
Speaker 1: About Phil Knight from Nike. I enjoyed it.
Speaker 2: Saw put it in the notebook because I wanted to
Speaker 2: remember something good that happened that day.
Speaker 1: Amen, I could just go through.
Speaker 2: This notebook and I'm not beating the devil with some
Speaker 2: big rocket grenade lunch or you know, I'm just gonna
Speaker 2: beat them with some paper cuts. I'm ana beat. I'm
Speaker 2: a beat depression with some paper cuts. I'm ana beat despair.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna make my way up a little bit at
Speaker 2: a time. I'm gonna increase my altitude, one thought at
Speaker 2: a time. I'm gonna do it, one night at a time,
Speaker 2: one day at a time. Touch somebody say, I'm coming up,
Speaker 2: I'm coming up. I'm coming up higher. I'm coming up higher.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna end my day as a victim. I'm
Speaker 2: gonna end it as a victor. I got an overview.
Speaker 2: I got a place in heaven around the throne of God.
Speaker 8: And I see my situation. I see my situation from above.
Speaker 8: And when I see it from a per I noticed something.
Speaker 8: I notice something about authority.
Speaker 1: After this I looked in There before me was the
Speaker 1: door you got nine minutes.
Speaker 2: That's all I need to tell you about authority standing
Speaker 2: open in heaven. And the voice I had first heard
Speaker 2: speaking to me was still speaking to me. And the
Speaker 2: door that was opened for John is still open for you.
Speaker 2: Jesus Christ opened to heavens. They haven't shut. Abby came
Speaker 2: to me the other day and said, Daddy, this door
Speaker 2: is broken. We were at a store and it had
Speaker 2: automatic doors, and she said, the door is broken. She's five,
Speaker 2: so I had to explain to her baby, the door
Speaker 2: isn't broken. You just didn't get close enough to open it.
Speaker 2: There's some censors up here, and you stopped five feet
Speaker 2: short of where you had to stand, and the doors
Speaker 2: would have opened.
Speaker 1: After this.
Speaker 2: I looked, and there before me was a door standing
Speaker 2: open in heaven. And the voice I first heard said,
Speaker 2: come on up, and I will show you what must
Speaker 2: take place after this. He saw a door because he
Speaker 2: looked ahead. He heard a voice because he got above.
Speaker 2: So preach my sermon to your neighbor. Tell him look
Speaker 2: ahead from above. As you look at your future, look
Speaker 2: at it from God's perspective. Even as you think about November,
Speaker 2: think about November from God's perspective. I'm preaching to all
Speaker 2: of you Fox News, Chunkies and MSNBC two.
Speaker 1: Because the next thing that John saw will.
Speaker 2: Set your heart free from anxiety.
Speaker 1: Can I give it to you.
Speaker 2: We're down to seven minutes, so we'll have to work quickly.
Speaker 2: But he said, I saw a door and I heard
Speaker 2: a voice, and at once I was in the spirit,
Speaker 2: and there before me, before me, was a throne in heaven.
Speaker 2: I wish I had time to tell you about this throne. Man,
Speaker 2: I do I have time to tell you, because there's
Speaker 2: a whole other group that's coming to church. I would
Speaker 2: tell you about everything that's around the throne. There is
Speaker 2: a rainbow around the throne of God that encircles the
Speaker 2: throne to represent his brilliance. I would tell you about
Speaker 2: the twenty four elders who sit on twenty four thrones
Speaker 2: around the throne little lowercase T throat around the capital
Speaker 2: T big throne, and how they have crowns of gold
Speaker 2: and gold represents dignity, and they wear robes of white,
Speaker 2: which represent purity because.
Speaker 1: The Lamb has washed us clean.
Speaker 2: And I would tell you, if I had time, about
Speaker 2: the four living creatures who are sitting around heaven one day,
Speaker 2: and one of them looks like an ox, and one
Speaker 2: of them looks like a lion, and one of them
Speaker 2: has a face like a man, and one of them
Speaker 2: has wings well, in fact, all of them have wings.
Speaker 2: They have six wings each, and they're covered with eyes
Speaker 2: because they can see God perfectly. And their job is
Speaker 2: to get around the throne. And they wrote a song
Speaker 2: for God one day and they said holy is the
Speaker 2: Lord God Almighty. And then one of them said, I
Speaker 2: don't think that's good enough. We should do holy Holy
Speaker 2: is the Lord God Almighty, because if we say it
Speaker 2: twice to get the point across, because as God we're
Speaker 2: speaking about. And they sang that for like a couple
Speaker 2: thousand years, and then eventually one of them said, I
Speaker 2: don't think we're doing it right because he's not just
Speaker 2: holy holy, He's holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty.
Speaker 2: He is and was and is to come see he
Speaker 2: is holy, he was holy, he will be holy.
Speaker 1: He's holy, Holy Holy. He is the God who stands in.
Speaker 2: Your future, redeeming your past from your present. He is Holy, Holy, Holy,
Speaker 2: the Lord God Almighty.
Speaker 1: I wish I had time to tell you about the throne.
Speaker 3: I would tell you about the seven lamp stands that
Speaker 3: are before the throne, that represent the seven spirits of
Speaker 3: God that have gone out into the earth.
Speaker 1: I tell you about.
Speaker 2: The sea of crystal that's before the throne, clear as crystal.
Speaker 2: Because God sees everything that happens on earth from his
Speaker 2: vantage point in Heaven. There's no tear, you cried, He
Speaker 2: hasn't seen there's no heartbreak you've suffered that he didn't witness.
Speaker 1: There's nothing you're going through he's not aware of. He
Speaker 1: sees it from the throne.
Speaker 2: I wish I had time to tell you about ten
Speaker 2: thousand times ten thousand angels. You'd be so excited if
Speaker 2: you could see those angels. They're not stressed out in heaven.
Speaker 2: They're looking at the future and they know that God
Speaker 2: is on the throne. I wish I could tell you
Speaker 2: about the throne. Is anybody grateful but there's still a problem.
Speaker 2: Come on, I need you to thank God.
Speaker 7: For the throne, where mercy rains, where love rooms.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you about the throne. I would tell you.
Speaker 2: About how from the throne of God, John heard the
Speaker 2: peals of an earthquake and the flashing of lightning and
Speaker 2: the rumble of thunder that came from the throne, because
Speaker 2: that lets me know that God is awesome. And when
Speaker 2: he stumps his foot and when he puts his foot down,
Speaker 2: the earth shakes. John said, I saw the future from
Speaker 2: the throne, and it changed the way I thought about it.
Speaker 2: And now I would like for you to stand because
Speaker 2: I'm closing my message.
Speaker 1: And I'm closing my series.
Speaker 2: But I want to tell you my favorite thing about
Speaker 2: the throne. And this is for all of you who
Speaker 2: have anxiety in your heart about your future. Okay, what's
Speaker 2: gonna happen to you? What's gonna happen. Faith is anticipation
Speaker 2: minus anxiety. Faith gives me the ability to say, whatever's next.
Speaker 1: I'm ready.
Speaker 2: If it's Hillary, if it's Bernie, if it's Donald, I'm ready.
Speaker 2: Because they might sit behind the desk, but they don't
Speaker 2: sit on the throne.
Speaker 1: Come on, charts. We don't watch the polls. We watch
Speaker 1: the throne. Gets their eyes up.
Speaker 7: Look ahead, get your eyes up, get a bow.
Speaker 2: And the last thing I wanted to tell you. I
Speaker 2: wanted to tell you look ahead, get a bath, and
Speaker 2: step aside, because John said.
Speaker 1: I saw a throne and watch this. This is my
Speaker 1: favorite part. This is my message. This my message, just
Speaker 1: my message. Ready.
Speaker 2: Verse two, I saw a throne.
Speaker 1: With someone sitting on it. And here's the good news.
Speaker 1: There is a throne, someone is on it and it's
Speaker 1: not you. Well, I thought you'd clap over that.
Speaker 2: You've been staying up late worrying about how it's gonna happen.
Speaker 1: But God just gave you an overview. He wanted to
Speaker 1: let you know about your future.
Speaker 5: I rule, I ray, I am, I rule, I am,
Speaker 5: I was, I am, and I will be forevermore.
Speaker 1: There is a throne, I'm not on it.
Speaker 2: And whatever is on the throne of heaven needs to
Speaker 2: be enthroned in my heart. So if Christ is enthroned
Speaker 2: in heaven and nothing that happens on earth happens without
Speaker 2: His permission and his purpose, then that means there are
Speaker 2: some things that are on the throne of my heart
Speaker 2: that have to go.
Speaker 1: So look at fear. How long has fear been on
Speaker 1: the throne in your life.
Speaker 2: You need to make an announcement to fear, and you
Speaker 2: need to do it today, and tell Fear get off
Speaker 2: the throne. This seat is taken. You got it, and
Speaker 2: don't ask nicely. This seat belongs to the King of
Speaker 2: kings and the Lord of lords.
Speaker 3: Come on, lift your hands. His presence is here, and
Speaker 3: thrown him in your praise. Some of you need to
Speaker 3: look at failure. You've been dominated too long by what's
Speaker 3: behind you. God brought you here to give you an
Speaker 3: overview of your future. I hope you're standing.
Speaker 1: The king is here. I hope you got your hands lifted.
Speaker 1: I hope you got your hotel. The King is here.
Speaker 1: We enthrone you on our praise feelings.
Speaker 2: Get up the throne, selfishness, get up the throne.
Speaker 6: He who is and was and is to come is
Speaker 6: sitting on the front, and we crowded gown.
Speaker 1: Come on, crowding gowd. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 9: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
Speaker 9: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
Speaker 9: You can click the link in the description to give
Speaker 9: now or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more
Speaker 9: information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
Speaker 1: You can share it with your friends.
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Speaker 9: Elevation Church.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening. God bless you.