Speaker 1: How many have evidence in your life that God is
Speaker 1: with you despite everything that the devil tells you. To
Speaker 1: the contrary, God is with me. Elbow your neighbors say,
Speaker 1: God is with me in this moment. Tell him move
Speaker 1: over a little. You need to make room for Jesus.
Speaker 1: Jesus is with me. Come on, let's make room for
Speaker 1: the King of Kings, hand the Lord of lors. It's
Speaker 1: freaking time. Let's give our attention now to the scriptures
Speaker 1: in Genesis chapter fifty, beginning in verse fourteen. The verse
Speaker 1: that I've heard the most from Genesis is verse twenty,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to read that one, but I want
Speaker 1: to give you fresh context around it to help ushered
Speaker 1: the principle in this text into the problem that you're
Speaker 1: facing in your life. And I believe it's going to
Speaker 1: be very, very personal for you today. Wow. Wow. My
Speaker 1: friend Rick Biatto does a YouTube channel and he has
Speaker 1: a thing. He's a guitar player, musician, producer, and he
Speaker 1: calls it what makes this song great? He takes songs
Speaker 1: that you've heard a thousand times by worship leaders like
Speaker 1: Pink Floyd led Zeppelin Boston, and he takes those hymns
Speaker 1: of the faith, and he breaks it down and shows
Speaker 1: you things that you heard but you didn't know you
Speaker 1: were hearing them, and it's what makes the song great.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take a page out of his playbook today.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna show you what makes this verse great in
Speaker 1: verse twenty, where it says that God takes what others
Speaker 1: mean for evil and uses it for good. But let
Speaker 1: me show you what makes that verse great, all right?
Speaker 1: And to do that, I want to get a I
Speaker 1: want to get a start and ramp up from verse
Speaker 1: fourteen Genesis fifty fourteen, the Bible says, after burying his father,
Speaker 1: Joseph returned to Egypt together with his brothers and all
Speaker 1: the others who had gone with him to bury his father.
Speaker 1: And that's a big contingency because the chariots of Egypt
Speaker 1: and all the officials went with Joseph, so it's a
Speaker 1: huge traveling party, and seventy plus descendants of Jacob, so
Speaker 1: it's a big group. But then it comes to a
Speaker 1: personal decision verse fifteen. When Joseph's brothers saw that their
Speaker 1: father was dead, they said, what if Joseph holds a
Speaker 1: grudge against us and pays us back for all the
Speaker 1: wrongs we did to him. Well, now's a fine time
Speaker 1: to think about the consequences of your action. Right. I'm
Speaker 1: not sorry you did it. You're just sorry you got caught.
Speaker 1: Just scared of the consequences. So listen what they did
Speaker 1: verse sixteen. They sent word to Joseph saying, your father
Speaker 1: left these instructions before he died. Yeah, I'm sure he did.
Speaker 1: When other people tell you what God said to you
Speaker 1: as a form of manipulation. The Lord told me that
Speaker 1: you're supposed to date me. The Lord has my direct number.
Speaker 1: He could tell me. The Lord doesn't play the telephone game,
Speaker 1: all right, so he'll tell me. The Lord said we
Speaker 1: should go in business together. That's funny because he told
Speaker 1: me you were a crook because I checked your online review.
Speaker 1: All right, So read the scripture. Man, This is what
Speaker 1: you are to say to Joseph. I ask you to
Speaker 1: forgive your brothers the sins and wrongs they committed in
Speaker 1: treating you so badly. Now, please forgive the sins of
Speaker 1: the servants of the God of your father. That's what
Speaker 1: his brothers said that their dead dad said, which we
Speaker 1: know isn't true because he didn't really like them. Joseph
Speaker 1: was his favorite, so he would have told Joseph directly,
Speaker 1: you understand, and that's why the Bible says when their
Speaker 1: message came to him, Joseph wept not because his dad
Speaker 1: was dead. His dad has been dead for three months
Speaker 1: at this point, forty days of embalming, thirty days of mourning,
Speaker 1: and then a journey that's eleven days on each side,
Speaker 1: so he's had time to mourn his father, Jacob. But
Speaker 1: he is weeping because they still haven't changed, even after
Speaker 1: all the grace that he's given them. That's what he's
Speaker 1: crying about. This is the fifth time that he cries
Speaker 1: between Genesis thirty seven and fifty. So in verse eighteen,
Speaker 1: let's pick it up right here. His brothers then came
Speaker 1: threw themselves down before him. We are your slaves, they said.
Speaker 1: But Joseph said to them, don't be afraid. Am I
Speaker 1: in the place of God Verse twenty You intended to
Speaker 1: harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish
Speaker 1: what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
Speaker 1: So then verse twenty one, don't be afraid. I'm not
Speaker 1: going to kill you. I could, but I'm not going
Speaker 1: to not because of your little fabricated speech from Dad.
Speaker 1: But because I see God's purpose in this moment and
Speaker 1: in this season, so I will provide for you and
Speaker 1: your children. And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.
Speaker 1: Well back up to verse eighteen one more time. His
Speaker 1: brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. They
Speaker 1: bowed before the one they had betrayed. They bowed before
Speaker 1: the one they had betrayed, and said, we're your slaves.
Speaker 1: But Joseph said to them, don't be afraid. Am I
Speaker 1: in the place of God. I got up here this
Speaker 1: morning to tell you bent knees, break chains. That's the
Speaker 1: title of this message. Say it out loud, bent knees,
Speaker 1: break chains. And the truth that I want to communicate
Speaker 1: to you is all in those four words that bent knees,
Speaker 1: break chains. And Father, I thank you that the chain
Speaker 1: breaking power of your spirit is standing up inside of
Speaker 1: me right now to preach deliverance to every captive. Do
Speaker 1: it God in Jesus' name, I give you thanks. Samen,
Speaker 1: you may be seated, and I want you to start
Speaker 1: by considering this premise that the position that we're in
Speaker 1: influences the decisions that we make. I probably should have
Speaker 1: put it on the screen so you could write it
Speaker 1: down as a point. Let me just repeat it a
Speaker 1: couple times while you fish for your pen or you
Speaker 1: fire up your notes. App get this wisdom. Make sure
Speaker 1: it doesn't just run off into the streets, but you
Speaker 1: can capture it. Okay, that the position that you're in
Speaker 1: really influences the decisions that you make. It sounds obvious,
Speaker 1: but it's illustrated all throughout the Book of Genesis. God said,
Speaker 1: let there be light. He was in a position to
Speaker 1: make a decision to do something about the darkness. But
Speaker 1: you could run around shouting let there be light all
Speaker 1: you wanted to, And unless you have a flip to
Speaker 1: switch and are current on the power bill, no lights
Speaker 1: are coming on. The position that you're in determines the
Speaker 1: decisions you make. And the sub point that this is
Speaker 1: you are not God. You are not God. Your neighbor
Speaker 1: doesn't look convinced, so you tell them for me, say
Speaker 1: you're not God. No, I really want you to tell
Speaker 1: them you're not God. So sometimes if you get confused,
Speaker 1: just to remember the position. Put this on the comment
Speaker 1: feed right now. The position I'm in influences the decisions
Speaker 1: that I make. The easiest way to explain it is parenting.
Speaker 1: When you start doing stuff as a parent that you
Speaker 1: hated as a kid, and you turn around and every
Speaker 1: parent in this room has had this thought. I sound
Speaker 1: just like my mom, I sound just like my dad.
Speaker 1: And you know it's because you now are in a
Speaker 1: position that not only you have to provide, but protect
Speaker 1: these lives that you treasure so much. So you're doing
Speaker 1: things that the kids don't understand. You can't go there,
Speaker 1: don't talk to them, and they think you don't want
Speaker 1: me to have any friends. I do want you to
Speaker 1: have friends, like I want to hang out with you
Speaker 1: all the time. I'd love for you to have somebody
Speaker 1: else to hang out with. I just don't know about
Speaker 1: these kids, and the position that I'm in is affecting
Speaker 1: the decisions that I made. But see, empathy is tricky
Speaker 1: for the kid to have for the parent, because although
Speaker 1: the parent has been a kid, the kid has never
Speaker 1: been a parent. So that's why teaching your kids to
Speaker 1: drive is like the scourging whip that they laid on
Speaker 1: our Savior's back when they hung them on the cross.
Speaker 1: It's because it is the punishment of their inability to
Speaker 1: feel empathy because the position that you are in determines
Speaker 1: the decisions that you make. That's true in parenting, that's
Speaker 1: true with money. Yeah, and a lot of times sweet
Speaker 1: say little cliches like money isn't everything. It is if
Speaker 1: you don't have any it is if you don't have any.
Speaker 1: How many of you have ever not had any money
Speaker 1: and had to do things, And that's I'm not talking
Speaker 1: about rob anybody. I'm not talking about anything crazy. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying when you didn't have it, you didn't walk
Speaker 1: around saying stuff like money isn't everything. You went around
Speaker 1: saying stuff like can I cut your grass? Can I
Speaker 1: wax your bald head? Can I do it? Can I
Speaker 1: clip your fingernails? Because money isn't everything once you have money, Right,
Speaker 1: So we get in a position where maybe we've come
Speaker 1: to a place where we're in our life and then
Speaker 1: we're like, well, money isn't everything. I don't do it
Speaker 1: for the money. That's because you have some. But if
Speaker 1: you don't have any, you gotta do what you gotta
Speaker 1: do to catch the crumbs that fall from somebody's table.
Speaker 1: And sometimes stop judging people for things they are doing
Speaker 1: in desperation for situations that you haven't been in or
Speaker 1: that you haven't been in lately. Amen. Amen, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: get my church back today. I'm gonna find my church today.
Speaker 1: Personal confession. I was a staff member at a church
Speaker 1: before I started this church, and I would always keep
Speaker 1: this mental list of dumb stuff that the pastor was
Speaker 1: doing that I would never do. And one day, when
Speaker 1: I get a spare minute, I'm gonna write him a
Speaker 1: whole card. It's gonna be a seventeen page card of
Speaker 1: all the things I judged him for in his position
Speaker 1: as a pastor, from my position as a staff member
Speaker 1: that I now just want to say I'm sorry, especially
Speaker 1: because I met him when he was into his tenth
Speaker 1: year of pastoring that church, and I didn't know how
Speaker 1: tired ten years can make you. You see all it
Speaker 1: is Gray y'all put on me in these last sixteen years.
Speaker 1: So now I feel different because the position that you're in.
Speaker 1: I want to nail this down. And if I lay
Speaker 1: this foundation right, then we can really really celebrate the
Speaker 1: truth in the text that Mennis break chains. But first
Speaker 1: of all, acknowledge that the position that you're in influences
Speaker 1: the decisions you make. Now, let's flip that because the
Speaker 1: decisions that you make influences the position that you're in,
Speaker 1: you are very timid celebrating that truth. I have never
Speaker 1: seen such a half hearted clap. I think he's probably right,
Speaker 1: but I don't like it because I want to say
Speaker 1: the devil did it. I don't really want to clap
Speaker 1: for that. That it could be possible that not everything
Speaker 1: that happened to me was caused by decisions I make,
Speaker 1: but some of it, a little of it, ten percent
Speaker 1: of it. When's the last time somebody lost their job
Speaker 1: and told you, you know what, I just really sucked
Speaker 1: at it. I was lazy, I talked bad about everybody,
Speaker 1: I chewed gum with my feet up, played words seven hours,
Speaker 1: and worked one Nobody says that. And then in church,
Speaker 1: now this is dangerous. In church, will slap a spiritual
Speaker 1: justification and a summary on something that happened through a
Speaker 1: series of decisions that you actually made, thereby enabling your dysfunction,
Speaker 1: by over spiritualizing your decisions. Goodbye, everybody. I've said enough
Speaker 1: so I don't mean to be Yoda on you, but
Speaker 1: those two things really go hand in hand. That the
Speaker 1: position I'm in determine the decisions I make. Sometimes I
Speaker 1: did something because I'm depressed, and the depression may not
Speaker 1: be my fault. I believe there's a genetic element to depression.
Speaker 1: But in the process of me complying with the habits
Speaker 1: that brought me to that place, I may prolong my
Speaker 1: stay in depression by my decisions. And when we talk
Speaker 1: about the devil attack me, the devil attack me? The
Speaker 1: devil attacked me, Well, the Lord gave me a word
Speaker 1: on that a few weeks ago. He said, it is
Speaker 1: not the attack that matters the most, it is what
Speaker 1: you do after the attack. Because watch this New Testament verse.
Speaker 1: I hope I get back to Genesis fifty, but I'm
Speaker 1: annointed for this right now. The Bible says the devil
Speaker 1: is like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.
Speaker 1: It does not say he can devour whoever he wants,
Speaker 1: but he can attack whoever he wants. And the difference
Speaker 1: between him attacking you and devouring you will be the
Speaker 1: decisions that you make in the attack. So, when you
Speaker 1: feel anxious, what do you do with that anxiety? When
Speaker 1: you feel sad, who do you speak to about your sadness?
Speaker 1: When you feel overlooked, do you retaliate or do you
Speaker 1: bring it to God and allow him to help you
Speaker 1: process it. We could describe Joseph's life in terms of
Speaker 1: a chain of events. Write that phrase down a chain
Speaker 1: of events. In reviewing all of those scriptures this week,
Speaker 1: I feel myself wishing that we had three days to
Speaker 1: do this, because everything in Joseph's life, oh, is so
Speaker 1: rich with detail, and just to boil it down to
Speaker 1: what the enemy means for evil, God means for good.
Speaker 1: And Rick Biatto, my YouTube guy friend, my friend Rick
Speaker 1: byatdo he would break it down and show you the
Speaker 1: isolated tracks. He'd be like, this is what makes the
Speaker 1: song great. And I want to show you how the
Speaker 1: events in Joseph's life that God did not prevent that
Speaker 1: were painful, positioned him for the purpose of Joseph's life
Speaker 1: that he could have never imagined. So let me do
Speaker 1: a typical sermon about Joseph in two minutes. You got
Speaker 1: to walk through everything that happened to him. Right, he
Speaker 1: had a dream, he told his brothers. That's an event.
Speaker 1: His brothers got mad about it and didn't like his
Speaker 1: Gucci coat that his father, Jacob gave him. Now understand
Speaker 1: when they threw him into a pit. They saw him
Speaker 1: as a snitch because he came out to check on
Speaker 1: them and see if they were doing their job. So
Speaker 1: you can understand then that from their vantage point, the
Speaker 1: position that they were in influenced the decisions that they made.
Speaker 1: And it's easy in this passage to feel like you're Joseph,
Speaker 1: But have you ever been his brothers? To have you
Speaker 1: ever been jealous? Because you do things when you're in
Speaker 1: a position comparing yourself to others. That's why the Bible says,
Speaker 1: when you compare yourself to somebody else, you're not wise.
Speaker 1: That's what is that. It doesn't say it's evil, it
Speaker 1: says it's not wise because you were gonna do dumb
Speaker 1: stuff trying to be like somebody who does not have
Speaker 1: your same bone structure background or the same blessing on
Speaker 1: their life. Rubin saved his life because he said, well,
Speaker 1: let's don't kill him, let's sell him, probably get twenty
Speaker 1: shekels for him, and they sold him to the Midianite Cara.
Speaker 1: Event these are the events of Joseph. So if I'm
Speaker 1: walking you through it, I'm saying, by the time you
Speaker 1: get to Genesis fifty, verse twenty he's fifty six years old.
Speaker 1: You didn't know that, did you. You thought he was
Speaker 1: standing there saying what the enemy means for evil, God
Speaker 1: means for good while he's going through his testing. But
Speaker 1: he went through forty years to get to the point
Speaker 1: that he understood that the events of his life, all
Speaker 1: of them, the dream that he had, the coat that
Speaker 1: he wore, the good things, the pit that they pushed
Speaker 1: him into. Y'all. He even ended up in prison because
Speaker 1: he did such a good job serving this man named Potiphar.
Speaker 1: And Potiphar's wife, Hottipher I named her, said, hey, big boy,
Speaker 1: come to bed with me. I like your coat, I
Speaker 1: like your character. I like the way you clean windows.
Speaker 1: Because remember he has a menial job, but he has
Speaker 1: a great sense of responsibility. So everything he did in
Speaker 1: Potiphar's house drew attention because God's favor was still on him.
Speaker 1: God's favor is still on you. God's favor is still
Speaker 1: on you. God's favor is still on you. God's favor
Speaker 1: is still on you. Pushing a mop, God's favor is
Speaker 1: on you, washing dishes. God's favor is on you. Quarter
Speaker 1: of a tank of gas and don't know how to
Speaker 1: fell it. God's favor is on you. Oh, by the way,
Speaker 1: when you get a promotion that puts you in a
Speaker 1: tax bracket, you never imagine that's God's favor too. It
Speaker 1: was your father that put the favor on you to
Speaker 1: bring you into the position. And when you understand that
Speaker 1: that God raised me up, it makes you two things.
Speaker 1: It makes you humble in high circumstances and hopeful in
Speaker 1: low circumstances. When I see that my father favored me,
Speaker 1: and Joseph knew that early in his life, and he
Speaker 1: saw this vision that his brothers were one day going
Speaker 1: to bow down to him, but he didn't see everything
Speaker 1: that would come before that. And this chain of events.
Speaker 1: Let me say that again, this chain of events, things
Speaker 1: that happened to Joseph that he largely could not control.
Speaker 1: Some people say that he shouldn't have told his brothers
Speaker 1: his dream and they wouldn't have pushed him in the pit.
Speaker 1: I say, if he didn't go in the pit, how
Speaker 1: could he have gotten to Egypt? So there was food
Speaker 1: waiting for them when they came through the famine. Makes
Speaker 1: me think that even my mistakes can become miraculous if
Speaker 1: I give them to God and be humble about them,
Speaker 1: but a lot more happened to Joseph, and although we
Speaker 1: won't explore all of it today, I just want you to.
Speaker 1: I just want you to hear some of the other
Speaker 1: things that come before this, so you can put yourself
Speaker 1: in this story in a way to try to figure
Speaker 1: out in this season of my life, what decision is
Speaker 1: God leading me to make, and the events that led
Speaker 1: you to this point in your life, however painful they were.
Speaker 1: I forgot to tell you this part. When he got
Speaker 1: to prison, he started interpreting dreams for the other prisoners.
Speaker 1: Now I wouldn't have done that because I would have
Speaker 1: been pouting that I don't belong here, because Potiphar's wife
Speaker 1: accused me of raping her and I was actually running
Speaker 1: from her and she accused me of rape, and I
Speaker 1: probably wouldn't have been able to get past my own
Speaker 1: pity party. Pitt he was in a pity party. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I'm just checking to see if I still have
Speaker 1: your attention. There's a lot of background, so there's a
Speaker 1: lot of things that happen. And eventually, when he interpreted
Speaker 1: the cupbearer had this dream, He's like, yo, I saw
Speaker 1: these three vines coming off of one branch grapes on it,
Speaker 1: and I squeezed grapes. It was in a dream, and
Speaker 1: then the cups were filled in. Joseph's like, oh, in
Speaker 1: three days, you're going to get your position back. It's
Speaker 1: going to be great. On Pharaoh's birthday, He's going to
Speaker 1: put you back in the position. And the baker was like, oh, yeah, me,
Speaker 1: to me, to me, to me too. I had a
Speaker 1: dream too. There was baskets on my head and bread
Speaker 1: and the baskets and the birds came and ate it.
Speaker 1: And he's like, oh, yeah, that's because your head's going
Speaker 1: to be cut off in three days. That's why it's
Speaker 1: three baskets. And the birds will eat your flesh, all right.
Speaker 1: So all of that happens just as Joseph's folking and
Speaker 1: cut Parat gets out of prison completely forgets to mention Pharaoh. Oops.
Speaker 1: For two years, he stays chained in a dungeon, not
Speaker 1: because of his decision, but because of an event. But
Speaker 1: here's what I want to show you. Within every event
Speaker 1: is a decision. You got it. I'm not even asking
Speaker 1: you to understand it yet, Just did you hear it?
Speaker 1: Within the event, there's always a decision illustrate this illustration
Speaker 1: of this. Today we are having a worship service. It's
Speaker 1: an event. The service is an event. We sang about
Speaker 1: four songs that was part of the event. Hopefully somebody
Speaker 1: offered you a breath mint and a pen when you
Speaker 1: came in the door, if you came in the door,
Speaker 1: or you logged online. And here I am now standing
Speaker 1: behind my pulpit with my Bible open, ready to preach
Speaker 1: to you. Been praying about it all week. This is
Speaker 1: the event. This is the service. But worship is a
Speaker 1: decision that you have to make in the event. The
Speaker 1: service is the event. Worship is the decision. Worship isn't offering.
Speaker 1: Some of y'all didn't sing a note. You watched this
Speaker 1: like it was some what's the show? Do they still
Speaker 1: have American idol? You were watching this like it like
Speaker 1: you're gonna vote whether they stay on the stage or not.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know that you are not what was
Speaker 1: the guy's name, Simon Cowell? You are not Simon. Why
Speaker 1: weren't you singing? God is the star of this, God
Speaker 1: is the audience of this. Why didn't you sing? Well, well, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: Pastor Steve Pester, Steve pastor, Steve Paster, Steve Pachter, Steve Pastor, Steve,
Speaker 1: you know I didn't sing because I can't sing that good.
Speaker 1: That doesn't stop you in the shower. That doesn't stop
Speaker 1: you on the shower. And then and another thing is
Speaker 1: if the person next to you doesn't like you're singing,
Speaker 1: you just told them ten minutes ago they're not God.
Speaker 1: So they don't like how it sounds, is good news
Speaker 1: because they're not the audience that you were singing to anyway.
Speaker 1: So get this, get this, when we were singing at
Speaker 1: the campus I'm at, I'm gonna see a victory. If
Speaker 1: that song went by and you didn't sing it, I mean,
Speaker 1: sing it out of tune, sing it loud, sing it bad,
Speaker 1: sing it good, singing falsetto, sing it bass, sing it
Speaker 1: ten or sing it out there. If you didn't sing it,
Speaker 1: and if you didn't believe it and put your heart
Speaker 1: in faith and say, you know, I don't feel that
Speaker 1: right now, but I believe it in Jesus's name. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna see it with my kids. I'm gonna see it
Speaker 1: on my job. I'm gonna see it in my body,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna see it in my mind. There is a
Speaker 1: breakthrough with my name on it, and I don't know when,
Speaker 1: but I have faith for it. I'm gonna see a victory.
Speaker 1: If you didn't sing it, how can you expect to
Speaker 1: see it? Because the song was the event, but your
Speaker 1: worship was a decision, and I forgive you. Hearing the
Speaker 1: sermon is an event. Sharing it with somebody who needs
Speaker 1: it is a decision. What if they're about to give
Speaker 1: up and you could send them a link. I'm talking
Speaker 1: to you. I'm talking to you logging on watching a sermon.
Speaker 1: This is an event. Wow, you can watch a lot
Speaker 1: of things on YouTube. But what if God prompts you
Speaker 1: to send it to somebody else? Hey man, thought about
Speaker 1: you today. Preachers up there talking about decisions and stuff,
Speaker 1: and I'm just thinking, how you got to make this
Speaker 1: decision right now? And so here it is. I love you,
Speaker 1: I see you Tuesday. You know whatever. That's a decision.
Speaker 1: The more we separate the event from the decision, the
Speaker 1: more room it gives God to move in our situation.
Speaker 1: I'll go a little deeper. Can I go a little deeper?
Speaker 1: I don't know why I'm asking your permission. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: do what I want to do anyway. What God leads
Speaker 1: me to do is here's one, here's one. I thought
Speaker 1: of a bunch of them, but I won't give them
Speaker 1: all to you today. Y'all won't like this. Traffic is
Speaker 1: an event. What time you leave the house? Got him?
Speaker 1: Got him like traffic was the Red Sea, like you
Speaker 1: didn't know was there, Like get in there every morning.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry the traffic was bad. The traffic's always bad.
Speaker 1: It is for eighty five. They're gonna be building it
Speaker 1: for the next four hundred and eighty five years. And
Speaker 1: you knew that when you pushed it to the last
Speaker 1: minute and hit snooze for the third time. And leaving
Speaker 1: early is a decision, and the decision to lead a
Speaker 1: little early might affect your decision to road rage. See,
Speaker 1: we got to stop blaming so much stuff in our life.
Speaker 1: Joseph is a model. We got to stop blaming the
Speaker 1: events and start making the decisions that God is calling
Speaker 1: us to make within the events that can empower us
Speaker 1: to move forward, or else you will always be a
Speaker 1: slave to what happened. Joseph has a decision to make now,
Speaker 1: and I think is such an emotional moment for him
Speaker 1: because his father loved him a little too much because
Speaker 1: he was born of Rachel, who was the wife that
Speaker 1: Jacob really wanted, not Leah, And because he was the
Speaker 1: firstborn son of Rachel, Jacob's favorite wife, Holly, you're my
Speaker 1: favorite wife, by the way, and that gave him a
Speaker 1: little extra status. Right. But he's going through this shift.
Speaker 1: A lot of people will tell you Joseph's life is
Speaker 1: about going from the pit to the palace. I don't
Speaker 1: see it that way at all. Although that geographically describes
Speaker 1: his position, because he ended up being promoted when he
Speaker 1: interpreted Pharaoh's dream about the famine to a position of
Speaker 1: responsibility where he could prepare the people for the famine,
Speaker 1: even his own family. Although that's true, it's really not
Speaker 1: the heart. He's really going from status to service, and
Speaker 1: God brings him from a place of great status to
Speaker 1: a place of great service. Or you could say see
Speaker 1: it this way too. He's going from a place where
Speaker 1: he's got to get from pain to purpose. And the
Speaker 1: position that you're in determines a lot of the decisions
Speaker 1: that you make, and a lot of the decisions that
Speaker 1: you make will determine the position you're in, because if
Speaker 1: at any point in Joseph's life, he would have decided,
Speaker 1: this isn't fair, forget it God. If he hadn't served
Speaker 1: with excellence in small positions, he could not have been
Speaker 1: trusted in a bigger one. All along the way, there
Speaker 1: were little decisions that he was making, that you're making
Speaker 1: to do it with your whole heart or to only
Speaker 1: do it when someone else is looking. Little decisions that
Speaker 1: you make, corners that you cut or you don't, words
Speaker 1: that you speak, and times you bite your tongue because
Speaker 1: it's not going to help anything anyway, little decisions. Where
Speaker 1: would you be financially if you had made little decisions
Speaker 1: along the way differently? Where would you be? Well, now,
Speaker 1: I don't have any money and I'm doing like what
Speaker 1: Pastor said, I'm in a bad position, so I'm taking
Speaker 1: desperate measures. But would you have to take desperate measures
Speaker 1: if you made some different decisions? And could it change
Speaker 1: from this point forward that your future is not chained
Speaker 1: to your past. We talked a lot about the chain
Speaker 1: of events that led to Joseph's moment of decision, But
Speaker 1: how about the chain of decisions that put him in
Speaker 1: this place? The chain of decisions? Think about that. It's
Speaker 1: a lot more interesting than giving me a list of
Speaker 1: everything that life did to you. I told somebody went done.
Speaker 1: I said, when I first got married, I got fat,
Speaker 1: and I did. I was turning into a big old boy.
Speaker 1: And the way I explained it was like how Adam
Speaker 1: explained why he ate the apple in the garden. This
Speaker 1: woman you gave me, Lord, she's a wonderful cook. I
Speaker 1: was actually like perverting the gift that God had given
Speaker 1: her as a cook. To explain the situation of my cellulite.
Speaker 1: You'll know, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Cellulites. Well,
Speaker 1: they were all coming against me. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they
Speaker 1: were all coming against me. And somewhere in that I
Speaker 1: had to own the fact that I ate what she
Speaker 1: put on the plate and then went and filled the
Speaker 1: plate three more times to get this way. So it's
Speaker 1: not exactly true to say I got fat, like it's
Speaker 1: something that just crashed into the earth, like it was
Speaker 1: a meteor shower, like it was a snow day. I
Speaker 1: ate food, I didn't exercise. I got fat. That's the event.
Speaker 1: The number on the scale screamed at me. I rebuked it.
Speaker 1: It didn't change. I prayed about it. It didn't change.
Speaker 1: I quoted Genesis fifty twenty. What you mean for evil
Speaker 1: God means for God, I reverse the curse. It didn't change,
Speaker 1: all right? And then I decided. I decided. I didn't
Speaker 1: get to decide once. I got to decide daily. I
Speaker 1: got to decide daily. Now, now, is this good to you?
Speaker 1: Joseph has a decision to make in this moment because
Speaker 1: now his dad is dead, and the only thing that
Speaker 1: can keep him being kind to his brothers is how
Speaker 1: he views his relationship with God, because his relationship with
Speaker 1: them is obviously never going to change. They lied about
Speaker 1: him when he was seventeen, and they are lying about
Speaker 1: him as he's fifty six. He's been playing with it.
Speaker 1: He's been playing with whether or not he wants to
Speaker 1: pay them back. He's been doing it for decades. You know.
Speaker 1: When they first came to him, he was thirty nine.
Speaker 1: The famine had only been going on two years. And
Speaker 1: when they came to him, he pretended like he didn't
Speaker 1: know who they were, because I think he was trying
Speaker 1: to decide, how am I going to move forward? He
Speaker 1: was already in a position of power, He was already
Speaker 1: in a position of authority. He was already in a
Speaker 1: position of influence, and the position that you're in influences
Speaker 1: the decisions that you may So he didn't tell him
Speaker 1: for a little while. He'd go cry in private, and
Speaker 1: then he'd come back out and be strong in public. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he even stuffed their bags with silver and then send
Speaker 1: his own men to arrest them and throw Simeon in prison.
Speaker 1: That's how bad it felt to him. So I want
Speaker 1: you to think about when something bad happens to you,
Speaker 1: the event. I wish I could draw this. I am
Speaker 1: not a good artist. Let's just you can draw it
Speaker 1: and post it online later. Okay, something bad happens. When
Speaker 1: Joseph says God meant it for good, he does not
Speaker 1: call their abuse, neglect, and betrayal good. He's moving past that.
Speaker 1: But so something bad happens, Right, many bad things happen
Speaker 1: to Joseph, And that's almost that's almost a disservice to
Speaker 1: what he's been through to call it something bad happened.
Speaker 1: But let's just call it that this thing happens and
Speaker 1: is bad and is bad. But now the decision that
Speaker 1: Joseph has to make, because from remember, the event, is
Speaker 1: not the decision. So now he says that was bad.
Speaker 1: What you did to me, that was bad. How you
Speaker 1: sold me that was bad, what I went through. I'm
Speaker 1: not sugarcoating anything or spiritualizing your decisions. It was bad.
Speaker 1: It was bad. Sometimes the first step to getting to
Speaker 1: God is good is to say it was bad. It
Speaker 1: was bad. It was bad, and it hurt and it harmed,
Speaker 1: and it set me back, and I wish it hadn't happened.
Speaker 1: And if I got to write the script, I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have put that in it. It was bad, you know,
Speaker 1: we do. God is good all the time, all the time.
Speaker 1: God is good, but it is bad a lot of
Speaker 1: the times, and a lot of the times it is bad.
Speaker 1: But God is good all the time and all the time.
Speaker 1: God is good, but it is bad. A lot of
Speaker 1: the that's bad. Read the news. That's bad, that's horrible,
Speaker 1: that's unthinkable. That's you and a lot of us, a
Speaker 1: lot of us in this room. We know somebody like Joseph.
Speaker 1: Everybody in this room knows that Joseph. You watched what
Speaker 1: happened to them, and you could not believe how they
Speaker 1: responded to it. My Joseph, that I think about all
Speaker 1: the time is my buddy Levi Lusco. He's a pastor
Speaker 1: in Montana, foreign country. He's an international missionary to the
Speaker 1: state of Montana. And I love him for many reasons.
Speaker 1: But y'all, I put my hand on his chest to
Speaker 1: pray for him the other night because he turned forty
Speaker 1: and I was praying and God annoying me, and I
Speaker 1: was speaking stuff over his life that I couldn't even
Speaker 1: understand where it was coming from. But when Graham was
Speaker 1: five and his daughter was five, and his daughter died
Speaker 1: of an asthma attack while he was out of the house,
Speaker 1: and he stood over her and prayed that God would
Speaker 1: make the sun stand still and save his daughter's life
Speaker 1: and she died, that would have broken me. And I
Speaker 1: had a context for it because I had a boy
Speaker 1: who was five, and I thought if I was in
Speaker 1: that position, I think I would be tempted to stand
Speaker 1: up and tell y'all, I quit, because how can I
Speaker 1: speak this faith over you? How can I trust a
Speaker 1: God who would let me go through that. So now
Speaker 1: standing on ten years later and watching him turn forty
Speaker 1: and seeing I hope he watches this message, Text him
Speaker 1: and tell him to watch it. He can watch it
Speaker 1: right now. He's on a different time zone out there
Speaker 1: in Montana. I think it's like eighteen forty three in Montana.
Speaker 1: It's like a different year zone in Montana. But I
Speaker 1: prayed over him, and he's a powerful man. He wrote
Speaker 1: a book. He wrote a book. It was bad. He
Speaker 1: wrote a book to let the devil know that my
Speaker 1: daughter Lenya will live on even if there's no breath
Speaker 1: in her lungs. You follow me, This is my Joseph.
Speaker 1: I think about him all the time when I go
Speaker 1: into a pity party, because I think about if he
Speaker 1: can decide that to keep preaching in the middle of
Speaker 1: what he if he can decide that. That's why I
Speaker 1: love lifting these Bible characters up to you on Sunday, right,
Speaker 1: because even if you don't know somebody like that personally,
Speaker 1: you get to be with Joseph for a little while,
Speaker 1: and you get to think about the fact that at
Speaker 1: the moment, I mean most of us would have been
Speaker 1: waiting for this moment to pay our brothers that, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm just waiting till Jacob dies. When Jacob dies, I'm
Speaker 1: about to let y'all have it. And to be over
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty do you know how long Jacob
Speaker 1: held on until he had put a blessing on all
Speaker 1: the kids, and then he dies, and they walk, they walk,
Speaker 1: they walk, they walk, They walk for eleven days to
Speaker 1: bury him. They walk eleven days back and then his
Speaker 1: brother sends some weak message talking about before he died,
Speaker 1: Dad said, trying to relay a message, showing him the
Speaker 1: evidence that there has been no change in their heart.
Speaker 1: And they bow before him, and he has to decide
Speaker 1: what he's going to do because he can't control what
Speaker 1: they do. You can't change them. Stop trying. They're on
Speaker 1: their knees before Joseph, but not for the right reasons.
Speaker 1: Forgive us, forgive us, forgive us. We are your slaves.
Speaker 1: We'll do whatever you say. We're sorry, You're not sorry.
Speaker 1: You're still lying. And he wept, and he came out
Speaker 1: and showed us something that right after he got done weeping,
Speaker 1: he still made the right decision, because your emotions don't
Speaker 1: determine your decisions, not when you've seen the goodness of God.
Speaker 1: These brothers, what they did was evil, But I'm not
Speaker 1: going to let what they did be the final word
Speaker 1: on what I do, because I still had life to live.
Speaker 1: So if I look at them and I say Reuben, Simeon,
Speaker 1: Judah and start calling them by name. And I say,
Speaker 1: this is the moment I've been waiting for. Y'all want
Speaker 1: to throw me in a pit, Let me show you.
Speaker 1: I'm in the palace now. If I use this moment
Speaker 1: of my power to put you in your place, than
Speaker 1: I am putting myself in God's place. That's what he said.
Speaker 1: He said, He said, no, no, no no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: They're on their knees. He says, wait, wait wait, wait, wait,
Speaker 1: wait wait, I'm not God. Am I in the place
Speaker 1: of God? Verse nineteen? You've got to go through verse
Speaker 1: nineteen to get to verse twenty. All things work together
Speaker 1: for the good. For the good, all things work together.
Speaker 1: God uses what the enemy meant for evil. You know,
Speaker 1: we kind of skip to that verse. No, no no, no,
Speaker 1: get to this verse first. Am I put verse nineteen?
Speaker 1: Am I in the place of God? Not only are
Speaker 1: they on their knees, but Joseph, after everything he's been through,
Speaker 1: in the moment of decision, you are at the moment
Speaker 1: of decision right now. Am I gonna stay chained to
Speaker 1: my past? Am I going to live in this resentment
Speaker 1: toward others and this regret? Toward myself. Some of you
Speaker 1: are angry at yourself. You think you're God. You think
Speaker 1: you can make a big enough mess that God can't
Speaker 1: clean you up. But it's not true. You're not God.
Speaker 1: If he died for you, and if he calls you,
Speaker 1: and if he comes for you, and if he raises you,
Speaker 1: even you yourself can't change his mind, because the gifts
Speaker 1: of God are without retentance. And Joseph has a decision
Speaker 1: to make, and he does it like this, I'm not God.
Speaker 1: And in the moment of decision, he takes a posture
Speaker 1: as the second most powerful man in the land. He
Speaker 1: takes his posture to say, God, and what it looked
Speaker 1: like for you to have this mentality, to say, God
Speaker 1: put me here for a purpose, and I'm submitting everything
Speaker 1: that's happened to me to God. I'm gonna do. I'm gonna,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna put myself in a position on
Speaker 1: my knees before God. I've never come to preach to you.
Speaker 1: If I can help it that I don't do this,
Speaker 1: even if it's for ten seconds before I round the corner,
Speaker 1: because a lot of times the way that I'll preach
Speaker 1: stuff will be just be coming to me to the
Speaker 1: last minute, and I'm literally like, but I try. I
Speaker 1: try every time to take one minute by myself. I
Speaker 1: say God, when I get out there today and there's
Speaker 1: there's people out there whose parents abandoned them. There's people
Speaker 1: out there who were molested. There's people out there who
Speaker 1: are going through the most scary medical situation in their
Speaker 1: life or their kids are There's people out there who
Speaker 1: have no idea how they're going to catch up on
Speaker 1: four months worth of mortgage. There are people out there
Speaker 1: today who need you, and I can only meet that
Speaker 1: need on my knees. And it reminds me that if
Speaker 1: I do this, I can do this because see, the
Speaker 1: power that you need is not in me. But if
Speaker 1: I go to the one who has all power and
Speaker 1: all authority, and I get down low and I say God,
Speaker 1: I lift my eyes to the hills, where does my
Speaker 1: help come from. My help comes from you. I know
Speaker 1: big knees can break things. I know one word from
Speaker 1: Almighty Dom, one breath from the spirit of Hot. Feel
Speaker 1: chase breaking right now, Hot, feel burden flifting right now,
Speaker 1: Hot feel shackle second, my prison floors, prison doors flying
Speaker 1: open right now. Because when you do this. God does
Speaker 1: that way. Pray. What you did to me was bad.
Speaker 1: What happened to me is bad. What I'm going through
Speaker 1: is bad. But if I blame you, then my blame
Speaker 1: will become bitterness, and my bitterness will become bondage. Not
Speaker 1: your bondage, it will be my bondage. So I either
Speaker 1: get to stay chained to the events or I get
Speaker 1: to make a decision. This is where God brought you to.
Speaker 1: This is why you logged on. This is why they
Speaker 1: sent you the link. This is why you came to church.
Speaker 1: You thought you decided to come to church. You're crazy.
Speaker 1: God sovereignly brought you to church. You had ten excuses
Speaker 1: not to come. What didn't fit and I have nothing
Speaker 1: to wear. But here you are. It's a size too small,
Speaker 1: but you can't why for this moment. God wanted you
Speaker 1: to know. You are in an important moment of your life.
Speaker 1: And if you do this, come on. Every athlete knows
Speaker 1: you can't hit a golf ball good if you don't
Speaker 1: bend your knees. That's where your power comes from. You
Speaker 1: can't shoot a basketball right if you don't bend your knees.
Speaker 1: That's where your accuracy comes from You can't do a
Speaker 1: takedown standing up straight. There's no Division one wrestling champions
Speaker 1: that stand up straight talking about why are you fighting
Speaker 1: your battles like this? When God gave you this? This
Speaker 1: is how I fight my devil. Watch me surrendered to
Speaker 1: God cause been knees breaks. You can't do it in
Speaker 1: your own strength. If you could, you would have by now.
Speaker 1: But God brought you to your knees. God, he's breaking.
Speaker 1: Subsiderational change up to the Holy Ghost. Come Lord, come Lord,
Speaker 1: break those changes. Break it, break it, break it, break it,
Speaker 1: break it, break it, break it. Breaking the past has
Speaker 1: no power over you. The blood of Jesus makes up better.
Speaker 1: I'm breaking in the name of Jesus, Ah, cause you
Speaker 1: still have so much life to live. Joseph lived to
Speaker 1: be one hundred and ten. He was fifty six. It's
Speaker 1: only halftime. It's a huck, It's it's it's high five.
Speaker 1: Somebody say this is your halftime speech. This is your
Speaker 1: halftime speech. Come on, let's turn this into a locker room.
Speaker 1: I'm down by twenty, but I got time on. Watch
Speaker 1: me ben my knees, watch me hit this song, watch me,
Speaker 1: watch me, watch me, watch me worship watch me trust God,
Speaker 1: cause I have a decision to make what to do
Speaker 1: with the time and the life I have left. And
Speaker 1: so ben these great chains. Long as you rehearse what happened,
Speaker 1: you can never reverse what happened. Uh huh. Will y'all
Speaker 1: drive nice? If I keep you a little long and
Speaker 1: you run into the other people that are coming in
Speaker 1: the surface, I won't do too much. What makes us
Speaker 1: verse great? Genesis fifty twenty, What makes us verse grade?
Speaker 1: If Rick the otto over here, he will tell you this,
Speaker 1: It's not what you think. Verse twenty of Genesis could
Speaker 1: be the worst verse in the Bible. It could be
Speaker 1: when it says you got it, you intended to harm me.
Speaker 1: It's what comes after the comma. God brought you here
Speaker 1: so you can make a decision. What comes after your comma.
Speaker 1: It's just halftime. This is just a comma, not a coma.
Speaker 1: A comma a comma. Put it back up. How could
Speaker 1: one comma make such a big difference? Because that's where
Speaker 1: Joseph went from the event to the decision. And I'm
Speaker 1: choosing to do this on my knees, because if I
Speaker 1: let this whole power over me, I stay a slave,
Speaker 1: and I won't be chained to what you did, and
Speaker 1: I won't be chained to what I did when I
Speaker 1: remember what God has done. He set this up in
Speaker 1: your life. You don't have to believe that, but you can.
Speaker 1: I can decide. I can decide. Is this the moment
Speaker 1: that you decide to own your story, the bad and
Speaker 1: the good, and put something after the calm? I hear
Speaker 1: the spirit of God saying, finish the sentence, finish the sentence,
Speaker 1: And in the spirit of Kanye West, I'm gonna let
Speaker 1: you finish. Come on, come on, come on, stay with me,
Speaker 1: Stay with me. You tried to hurt me. It hurt me.
Speaker 1: But my hope is what happens after the comma. But
Speaker 1: God give me the scripture. But God intended it for
Speaker 1: good to accomplish what is now being done to saving
Speaker 1: of many lives. Decision decision Verse twenty one. Decision, decision, decision, decision.
Speaker 1: So then don't be afraid. I will decision provide. He
Speaker 1: makes this decision. If I don't feed you, it will
Speaker 1: eat me. So I'm gonna use this as food. And
Speaker 1: he fed that family, the same family that failed him
Speaker 1: by a decision. You have a decision to make today
Speaker 1: Are you gonna stand up and try to be so
Speaker 1: strong in your own strength? Are you gonna bend your knees?
Speaker 1: I'm talking physically. This week. I want some of y'all
Speaker 1: to pray on your knees for at least a minute
Speaker 1: a day this week. It doesn't have to be long,
Speaker 1: but you drop on your knees just to remind yourself, Well,
Speaker 1: God doesn't need me to kneel. No, you need to
Speaker 1: kneel because the position that you're in determines the decision
Speaker 1: that you make. So when you get up, maybe you
Speaker 1: walk different, maybe you talk different. Maybe you remember, I'm
Speaker 1: favored by God and He has a purpose in a
Speaker 1: plan for my life that needs and when you submit
Speaker 1: it to God. How do I know when I've submitted
Speaker 1: it to God? Other than physically? Okay, a couple things.
Speaker 1: When you stop waiting for others to change for you
Speaker 1: to obey, you're on your knees. The way they treat
Speaker 1: me is not going to make me toxic. That's one sign.
Speaker 1: Another sign is you start becoming absorbed in the process
Speaker 1: of what God tells you to do and stop being
Speaker 1: attached to the outcome. That's when you know you're on
Speaker 1: your knees. This is how I fight my battles. I
Speaker 1: got to do what God gave me to do today.
Speaker 1: That's all I can do. You know how I know
Speaker 1: what I'm really annointed to preach. When I don't care
Speaker 1: how you look at me while I'm doing it, that's
Speaker 1: when I'm like, oh oh, that's when I got my
Speaker 1: power up, my invincibility, mushroom. You know, remember super Mario,
Speaker 1: all right, the star, The star was the invinciment. Look
Speaker 1: at me, you'll quit playing. This is so important when
Speaker 1: you have given up the illusion of control, but you
Speaker 1: have committed yourself to the process of obedience of what
Speaker 1: God spoke. Now you're on your knees and look. The
Speaker 1: Bible says in Philippians two, verse five that this is
Speaker 1: what Jesus did. He considered it not robbery to be
Speaker 1: equal with God. And he was God in beginning words
Speaker 1: with God, and the word was God. And he did this.
Speaker 1: He became sinful man and humble himself to the point
Speaker 1: of death on a cross. We're not talking about Joseph.
Speaker 1: We're talking about Jesus, and he lives in you. So
Speaker 1: he said, when Jesus humbled himself, God has given him
Speaker 1: God will lift you up. God will lift you up.
Speaker 1: You gotta trust God to lift you up. You gotta
Speaker 1: trust God to position you and bring you where he
Speaker 1: wants you. Because the scripture says in Philippians too, that
Speaker 1: one day every knee will bow, everybody will be brought
Speaker 1: to their knees. If life hasn't humbled you yet enough,
Speaker 1: if you're still in the dream state, that's okay. Life
Speaker 1: will eventually bring you to this point. So why not
Speaker 1: bow now? Why not bow now? Why not do it
Speaker 1: God's way now? If you do it his way now,
Speaker 1: you'll be ready for whatever he has next. Joseph didn't
Speaker 1: die in the pit. He didn't quit in the prison.
Speaker 1: You didn't either give God praise that you didn't quit
Speaker 1: give God praise. It was his mercy that got you
Speaker 1: through it. Quit trying to look so strong. It was
Speaker 1: his mercy. I don't understand being a self made man,
Speaker 1: because if I'm self made, that means I can be
Speaker 1: enemy broken. I'm a God made man. Yeah, yeah, he
Speaker 1: did it for me. He was with me, and I'm
Speaker 1: bowb befo him to give him the glory. And that's
Speaker 1: not weakness. Bit knees aren't weak. That's where your strength
Speaker 1: comes from. So Joseph goes on to raise these two kids.
Speaker 1: You know their names. JJ. Come on, tell me you
Speaker 1: remember in Manassa and Manassa, they both got a Joseph
Speaker 1: got an extra ridge in the allotment of the promised land,
Speaker 1: and Manassa, the half tribe of Manassa, got property to
Speaker 1: his kids, got blessed because of what he did. Because
Speaker 1: of what he did. Wow, there's a lot on the
Speaker 1: line right now. Some of you are breaking generational chains
Speaker 1: and you don't even know it, but you need God's
Speaker 1: help to do it, not by power, but by his spirit.
Speaker 1: Bent knee say it, dent knees, break chains? Yeah? Not
Speaker 1: you proven you're right? Not you refusing to admit when
Speaker 1: you're wrong. And I love what the Bible says. Not
Speaker 1: leave you with this thought today for what God has next.
Speaker 1: If you will bend your knees now I don't mean
Speaker 1: physically in this room. I mean if you will submit
Speaker 1: and surrender these events, this situation to God and ask
Speaker 1: him for his wisdom and act on what he shows you.
Speaker 1: Ask him for his wisdom, act on what he shows you,
Speaker 1: make the decision to turn pain into purpose. Look what
Speaker 1: happened to Joseph. You won't believe it. Verse twenty two.
Speaker 1: Please that Joseph stayed in Egypt along with all his
Speaker 1: father's family. The death of Jacob was an event. Staying
Speaker 1: in Egypt was a decision. Yeah, and he lived one
Speaker 1: hundred and ten years. Now. I told you that already,
Speaker 1: but I didn't tell you this next verse and saw
Speaker 1: the third generation of Ephraim's children, y'all, that's great grandchildren,
Speaker 1: great grandchildren. God's not through with you yet. God is
Speaker 1: not through with you yet. God is not through. It
Speaker 1: is too early and too soon for you to plan.
Speaker 1: And also the children of mckure. It means in Hebrew
Speaker 1: sold that's what happened to him. That was the event.
Speaker 1: But the children of mckure, the son of Manassa, you
Speaker 1: got it. The children of his child were placed at
Speaker 1: birth where on Joseph's knees. When you bow your knees
Speaker 1: to God and surrender your situation to him, it makes
Speaker 1: room on your knees for the future that He has
Speaker 1: in store for you. So I close with this thought
Speaker 1: for everybody who has been brought to your knees by
Speaker 1: a situation in your life, expect God to bring to
Speaker 1: your knees a new beginning. God wants you free and
Speaker 1: clear from all of the junk, all of the bondage,
Speaker 1: all of the bitterness, all of the blame. And you
Speaker 1: gotta do what you gotta do to get on your
Speaker 1: knees so you can get your knees ready for what
Speaker 1: God wants to bring you next. And he is able.
Speaker 1: I preach this to every nation right now to do
Speaker 1: exceedingly abundantly above and beyond what you ask or imagine.
Speaker 1: And God wants to bring you what's next when you
Speaker 1: get on your knees. Joseph said, I've been in prison
Speaker 1: and before I didn't like it. I want to be
Speaker 1: free now. So God, I'm on my knees. Lord, today
Speaker 1: we lift our hands. Go ahead, lift them up right now,
Speaker 1: just as a sign of our prayer and our eager
Speaker 1: hope for the freedom that Jesus died to bring us
Speaker 1: to be made a reality in our lives. I thank
Speaker 1: you today, Lord, that this week is going to be different.
Speaker 1: It's going to be different because we're not going to
Speaker 1: spend it chained to bitterness. We're not going to spend
Speaker 1: it looking for something or someone to blame. But this
Speaker 1: week We're starting this week right here, right now, bowing
Speaker 1: before you, saying that Jesus Christ is Lord, and what
Speaker 1: God has planned for my life, no man can stop it.
Speaker 1: No curse can stop it, no betrayal can stop it,
Speaker 1: No sickness can stop it. No reason session can stop it.
Speaker 1: No virus can stuff it, no pandemic can stuff it.
Speaker 1: When God gets ready to bless me, when God gets
Speaker 1: ready to raise me, when God has a purpose, it
Speaker 1: will come to pass. Let's give him sixty seconds a praise.
Speaker 1: That bit needs break change. Come. Throw off those chains,
Speaker 1: throw off that attitude, throw off that shame, throw off
Speaker 1: that kill, throw it off this. Praise him, Praise him,
Speaker 1: praise him. That's not enough, that's not enough. Who the
Speaker 1: Son says free is free. Indeed, bow your head, Bow
Speaker 1: your head. The scripture says that if you confess with
Speaker 1: your mouth Jesus's Lord, and believe in your heart God
Speaker 1: raised him from the death, you will be saved. This
Speaker 1: is a salvation moment of decision for somebody, a salvation moment.
Speaker 1: You are making the decision right now to place your
Speaker 1: faith in Jesus Christ, to place your faith in his death,
Speaker 1: to place your faith in his resurrection. He died for
Speaker 1: your forgiveness. He rose again to give you life. He
Speaker 1: invites you to follow him. He has promised you his spirit.
Speaker 1: All you've got to do is receive it, and the
Speaker 1: moment you hit your knees, his forgiveness will hit your life.
Speaker 1: And I want to lead you in a prayer right now.
Speaker 1: We're going to pray this across all of our campuses
Speaker 1: and our epaum around the world for the benefit of
Speaker 1: those who are making the decision right now to place
Speaker 1: your faith in Christ, because He has already made the
Speaker 1: decision to save you. It's God who calls you, It's
Speaker 1: God who's drawing you. It's God that works in you,
Speaker 1: and He brought you to this moment. So for those
Speaker 1: of you who need to come to Him for the
Speaker 1: first time or come back to Him, I want you
Speaker 1: to repeat this prayer after me as you bow your
Speaker 1: heart before God, Heavenly Father. I am a sinner in
Speaker 1: need of a savior, and today I bow my heart
Speaker 1: to you. I give you my life, make me new.
Speaker 1: I believe you die that I could be forgiven and
Speaker 1: rose again that I could live. Jesus, I receive you
Speaker 1: as my Lord and Savior. I bow my life to you.
Speaker 1: I belong to you. This is my new beginning. Well,
Speaker 1: if you enjoy today's podcast, there are a couple 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 Elevation Church dot org, slash
Speaker 1: give and thanks again for joining us on the Elevation Podcast.