Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 1: We are starting a brand news segment here today.
Speaker 2: I'm so excited.
Speaker 1: You are the only person on earth that knows the
Speaker 1: name of this word.
Speaker 2: I know and I remember it.
Speaker 1: You remember it, yes.
Speaker 3: Because you had to tell it to me so many times.
Speaker 3: I felt that I kept asking him and so, but
Speaker 3: I actually remember it.
Speaker 1: So let's set it up and then we'll do the reveal. Okay,
Speaker 1: I've always thought after I finished preaching, ah, I didn't
Speaker 1: get to say this that I didn't you know, I
Speaker 1: didn't get to go deep enough. Ah, I left this out.
Speaker 1: You know, I have all these notes that I didn't
Speaker 1: get to and it would feel frustrating. Well, one day,
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit says to me, after I was, you know,
Speaker 1: done coddling myself on the couch for three hours of
Speaker 1: how I didn't say everything.
Speaker 3: We're coddling yourself after I was cursing yourself Yeah, after.
Speaker 1: I was really beating myself up. I feel like I failed.
Speaker 1: I didn't get the job done. And you said, maybe
Speaker 1: you didn't fail, maybe you just didn't finish.
Speaker 2: Did I actually say it like that? Like that yoda?
Speaker 1: So that's the final draft of what you said, and
Speaker 1: I've alliterated it and co written it. But the concept
Speaker 1: just became real in my heart that we have all
Speaker 1: of these amazing ways to minister to you now, and
Speaker 1: so why not from time to time, not every week?
Speaker 1: Just come on kind of like what you guys do
Speaker 1: on coffee FIM. Just get in there and look at
Speaker 1: the sermon, talk about the sermon, and apply it. I
Speaker 1: love it. And so you, being the master of practical
Speaker 1: application that you are, Holly, I want you to reveal
Speaker 1: the title of this segment to the people.
Speaker 3: So the title of this segment is run it back,
Speaker 3: walk it out.
Speaker 1: A running back, walk it out. That's what we're going
Speaker 1: to make. Run it back. Everybody say, run it back,
Speaker 1: run and walk it out and walk it out. All right.
Speaker 1: So the Word of God is like a seed, right,
Speaker 1: seeds need soil. What else put it in the comments? Lighter, matriance, water,
Speaker 1: sometimes fertilizer, It doesn't smell the best helps.
Speaker 4: It out, but necessary helpful in the process.
Speaker 1: I actually think that when we just listen to a
Speaker 1: sermon or read a Bible verse so fast, it's like
Speaker 1: us throwing a seed on concrete and wondering why it
Speaker 1: didn't produce anything. Yep, you know, like the parable of
Speaker 1: the sower in Matthew thirteen, where Jesus said that the
Speaker 1: birds will come and snatch it up, the thorns will
Speaker 1: choke it out, the sunlight will just bake the seed.
Speaker 1: And so this is an effort for us to take
Speaker 1: my sermon, my first sermon of twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: Which was so good, thank you.
Speaker 1: Very much much. And she's not biased. The theme of
Speaker 1: the sermon was this is that day, and I'll explain
Speaker 1: what that meant in just a moment. If you want
Speaker 1: to stop this and watch that on Elevation Church YouTube,
Speaker 1: please feel free to do so. I will not be
Speaker 1: offended if you walk away and come back. I'll be
Speaker 1: right here waiting for you whenever you're ready. But this
Speaker 1: will work best if you heard that sermon. You can
Speaker 1: still watch it. If you didn't hear that sermon, because
Speaker 1: we're going to run it back, not necessarily show it
Speaker 1: back or show clips here. But just Holly's got good notes.
Speaker 1: She's a great note taker. She was a great student
Speaker 1: in college. I used to copy off her notes. That
Speaker 1: was one of the benefits of via her boyfriend and
Speaker 1: we would study together. And still her notes are better
Speaker 1: than mine. Like, look at her notes. Look at my notes.
Speaker 1: What a disaster I am.
Speaker 2: But I don't do that drawing thing.
Speaker 4: Well.
Speaker 1: When I finish my sermon and I look at your notes,
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, that's what I said. Good, that's good.
Speaker 1: That's good. I said that. Yeah, yeah, I said that.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if you're cleaning them up. But
Speaker 1: I want you to start us off, Holly, because I
Speaker 1: love the front row flashbacks that you post and each
Speaker 1: week you send to our staff. And I promised the congregation,
Speaker 1: I said, I'm putting part two on YouTube this week.
Speaker 1: So the part two isn't going to be me just
Speaker 1: teaching another sermon. I'll do that again next Sunday. I
Speaker 1: already have a sequel in mind. This is more of
Speaker 1: an opportunity for Holly and the great Chris Brown and
Speaker 1: Brittany at Gonzola to say this is what I heard,
Speaker 1: and this is how I've been walking it out, and
Speaker 1: we'll talk about that together. The Bible says he who
Speaker 1: walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of
Speaker 1: fools suffers harm. No fools on this couch today. We're
Speaker 1: just going to do this for as long as until
Speaker 1: we get tired of talking about it. So thank you
Speaker 1: for joining us, Holly. Why don't you kick it off
Speaker 1: with a little run it back and then we'll walk
Speaker 1: it out and I'll jump in and preach a little
Speaker 1: more and you can ask me whatever you want.
Speaker 3: Okay, So I'm of all, when we were going home
Speaker 3: from church, I well, okay, let me back it up.
Speaker 3: First of all, I cried in this message, and I
Speaker 3: walked back and I gave you a hug, and I said,
Speaker 3: that was exactly what I needed to hear, and so
Speaker 3: I want to thank you for that. And then I
Speaker 3: think I said to you at some point, I just
Speaker 3: feel like that sermon was classic Steven Ferdick.
Speaker 2: And what I mean by.
Speaker 3: That is you are the master of wordplay, and so
Speaker 3: you start off and of course you're like so organic
Speaker 3: and you write down one day when and you're talking
Speaker 3: to us all about one day when, which is perfect
Speaker 3: for the start of a new year, because we all
Speaker 3: have our one day wins for the year, for our life,
Speaker 3: for our future, whatever.
Speaker 2: And I'm just going.
Speaker 5: Right along with you, not even planning for you to
Speaker 5: do anything. And you switch it up, give me the
Speaker 5: next one, and you tell us becomes a one day win.
Speaker 5: And I'm telling you, like I think this will, this
Speaker 5: will forever be in my head a one day win.
Speaker 1: And you've heard me preach seven thousand times since we
Speaker 1: were boys, you know, out into yeah woods. And you
Speaker 1: texted me, what did you say?
Speaker 6: Well, I said, the message is goat status because of
Speaker 6: the same thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like, come on, wow, but it's so sticky. Well,
Speaker 1: the stickiness of it for me really ministered. And here's why,
Speaker 1: because I could easily be this vision board guy. You
Speaker 1: know this one day when I reached this certain status
Speaker 1: in my anything, my preaching ability, my creative achievements, my
Speaker 1: parenting patience, my net worth, anything you want to mention.
Speaker 1: That's a surface level accomplishment. One day when I feel
Speaker 1: good about myself. Yeah, one day, when then I will
Speaker 1: have arrived. One day when then I'll put the time
Speaker 1: into this or develop this new thing, or I'll get
Speaker 1: a hobby, but just thinking like even getting to that
Speaker 1: one day when that God plants in us the dream
Speaker 1: and the vision that he gives us starts with a
Speaker 1: one day wi in when. So for me, it wasn't
Speaker 1: just trying to be clever that's how I have to
Speaker 1: live my life.
Speaker 3: No, And that's what I that is what I love
Speaker 3: about your preaching. And I told you this, I said,
Speaker 3: you are so good at taking something that God gives
Speaker 3: you and living it out. And to me, this is like,
Speaker 3: this is your sweet spot is having a vision, Like
Speaker 3: you don't actually have a vision board, but I think
Speaker 3: you have a vision board in your head and you
Speaker 3: have this one day when with an E and you're
Speaker 3: able to break it down into daily winds.
Speaker 2: And I have seen you do this like.
Speaker 3: You're just you're the best at it at just going Okay,
Speaker 3: what's a win for today, or what's a win for
Speaker 3: this week? Or what's a habit or a routine that
Speaker 3: I'm going to put into place?
Speaker 1: So like, can you tell.
Speaker 2: Us a little bit more about going from when to win?
Speaker 1: It was because I was thinking about the people I
Speaker 1: was preaching to and I was studying this passage that
Speaker 1: God spoke to me three years ago in Isaiah twenty seven.
Speaker 3: I mean, you've had this verse written on your nightstand,
Speaker 3: for it's.
Speaker 1: Sitting on a note card on my nightstand as we
Speaker 1: speak up under some other books that I'm supposed to
Speaker 1: be reading. But it's not a very practical scripture. It's
Speaker 1: a prophetic scripture about the nation of Israel, and they
Speaker 1: were in captivity, and they were oppressed, and God was
Speaker 1: making them a promise. And I read it so many
Speaker 1: times over the last few years, and I shared a
Speaker 1: little bit about this scripture with our students at Youtheks
Speaker 1: this summer. But something so granular stood out to me
Speaker 1: this time, and I'm gonna share with you now. You
Speaker 1: can follow along Isaiah twenty seven. Verse one, in that day,
Speaker 1: the Lord will punish with his sword, his fierce, great
Speaker 1: and powerful sword, Leviathan, the gliding serpent, Leviathan the coiling serpent.
Speaker 1: He will slay the monster of the sea. I have
Speaker 1: a whole sermon on that I hope to share one
Speaker 1: day soon too. But then verse two, it picks up
Speaker 1: the motif in that day, so it says it twice.
Speaker 1: If you're following along, you'll see it in that day
Speaker 1: sing about a fruitful vineyard. So verse one is in
Speaker 1: that day, the Lord will punish Leviathan. I think this
Speaker 1: has to do with God dealing with the things in
Speaker 1: our life that drag us down. For many of you,
Speaker 1: right now, you're fighting against a spirit of depression. You're
Speaker 1: fighting against mental patterns of anxiety and everything you see
Speaker 1: online that tells you take an ice bath and meditate
Speaker 1: and break seven eggs over your head every morning at
Speaker 1: seven am and say mantras that you got posted notes
Speaker 1: up all around saying I am complete, and God's got
Speaker 1: this and it doesn't break through. And the promise of
Speaker 1: verse one is that God is fighting against everything that
Speaker 1: brings his people down. And verse two gives us a
Speaker 1: strategy that as God fights the battles that we can't
Speaker 1: fight in our own strength, we are to watch this
Speaker 1: verse two sing about a fruitful vineyard. And what first
Speaker 1: opened my mind to the revelation of a day, Because
Speaker 1: that's what I want you to get right now, is
Speaker 1: the revelation of a day in that day. It's a
Speaker 1: prophetic scripture. It's a term that's used to talk about
Speaker 1: everything going from the second coming of Christ to the
Speaker 1: judgment of God's people in certain context to the judgment
Speaker 1: of God's enemies. But I started seeing a little differently.
Speaker 1: I said, wait a minute. It says in that day
Speaker 1: God's going to fight against Leviathan the things that us down,
Speaker 1: and in that day we're supposed to be singing. So
Speaker 1: when I saw that there's a song and a sword
Speaker 1: in the same day, it sets my expectation. So I
Speaker 1: called the message this is that day. All right, this
Speaker 1: is going to be one of those days. You just
Speaker 1: better wake up knowing it. There's going to be blessings.
Speaker 1: I didn't expect today. A little smile I catch, or
Speaker 1: I'm able to give here there a little word of encouragement,
Speaker 1: a little word of discouragement. So we accept it, all right. Well,
Speaker 1: then I start having fun with it. I started reading
Speaker 1: verse six, where it said in days to come, Jacob
Speaker 1: will take root, Israel will butt and blossom and fill
Speaker 1: all the world with fruit. So now I'm thinking, okay,
Speaker 1: we got two actions happening in verse six. One is
Speaker 1: going downward taking root, one is going upward bearing fruit. Yes,
Speaker 1: and it showed me that each day we'll have its
Speaker 1: ups and downs, and both are a part of our destiny.
Speaker 1: Both are a part of God's purpose. So my first
Speaker 1: step was getting you to see that not only do
Speaker 1: you have a new year in front of you, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four, but that every day God's mercies are new,
Speaker 1: you get a new twenty four. Now that's a basketball term.
Speaker 1: I'm not a basketball fan, but I was watching a
Speaker 1: basketball game a few years ago and the guy missed
Speaker 1: a shot and he got an offensive rebound. And I
Speaker 1: know that the rules have changed in the NBA because
Speaker 1: I researched it before. I appreciate it. But back then,
Speaker 1: when you would get an offensive rebound off the glass
Speaker 1: in the NBA, the shot clock would go back to
Speaker 1: a full twenty four seconds. So you get a whole
Speaker 1: new twenty four every day, no matter what shot you
Speaker 1: missed last year, no matter what shot you missed today,
Speaker 1: no matter what YouTube video you were watching before this
Speaker 1: one mine that you feel guilty about. Well, you're here now.
Speaker 1: The revelation of the day for me was so powerful
Speaker 1: because I can get paralyzed by five years from now,
Speaker 1: and I need everybody to be honest for a minute.
Speaker 1: Are you like me where you have so many one
Speaker 1: day wins? Give me my card back with it.
Speaker 2: I was gonna I was going to keep them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can have them when I'm done. But I
Speaker 1: just need to be clear because its kind of tricky.
Speaker 1: One day when all the all the things you're going
Speaker 1: to accomplish for God, when you have more time to
Speaker 1: do it, all the all the nice things you're going
Speaker 1: to say to people, when the perfect opportunity comes up.
Speaker 1: I told somebody the other day, one day, when I
Speaker 1: get a chance, I'm going to tell you how much
Speaker 1: you meant to me at this stage of my life.
Speaker 1: And the Lord spoke to me.
Speaker 2: Tell now, do it now?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, get a one day win, like get
Speaker 1: get get the things said the best you can today
Speaker 1: and revise it tomorrow. So it's very practical for me,
Speaker 1: but it also has a heaviness. That's why I didn't
Speaker 1: want it to just be okay when when I get it,
Speaker 1: you change the letters like I'm van a white on
Speaker 1: wheel of fortune, change in letters or something. No, it
Speaker 1: was more powerful to me. It was getting to realize
Speaker 1: that the way that you're going to get to the
Speaker 1: one day when you are a patient person, the one
Speaker 1: day when you have financial security, the one day when
Speaker 1: you're able to let the peace of Christ rest rule
Speaker 1: and abide in your heart. The way you're going to
Speaker 1: get to the one day when is through the power
Speaker 1: of a one day when. So where does God want
Speaker 1: me to win today? And just to take it one
Speaker 1: silly step further and so you can see how demented
Speaker 1: my brain is with wordplay. I even use wi in
Speaker 1: as an acronym. What's important now?
Speaker 2: Wow, I got to write that down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's important now? So good? And I want you
Speaker 1: to start thinking that way this year because God has
Speaker 1: given you this year, but he's given you this day.
Speaker 1: So it was in my heart to help people, you know,
Speaker 1: because I don't want to be up there talking about
Speaker 1: a fruitful vineyard and Jacob taking rude and Israel and
Speaker 1: you're going, that's great for the Bible. But and I'm
Speaker 1: just trying today to like have one family meal with
Speaker 1: my family this week, or I'm just trying this week
Speaker 1: to have one day where I wake up and exercise right.
Speaker 1: And there's real power in the one day win and
Speaker 1: it's changed my life and I just want to share
Speaker 1: it with our entire church family and all those we
Speaker 1: minister to.
Speaker 2: Do you feel like your winds change from day to day?
Speaker 3: I do you have some that are like I have
Speaker 3: to do this every day, and then there are some
Speaker 3: where you're like, you know, today this is my win.
Speaker 1: That's a great question because it reminds me of a
Speaker 1: conversation I had with a really wise man. I said,
Speaker 1: I feel like if I'm winning in one area, I'm
Speaker 1: losing in another area. I feel like with my life,
Speaker 1: I can really be winning with what I'm producing creatively
Speaker 1: or for the ministry, and then in an area at
Speaker 1: home it needs my attention. And he said something so
Speaker 1: powerful back to me. He said, You're not gonna win
Speaker 1: everywhere every day. Just don't lose in the same area every.
Speaker 2: Day, right right, Okay?
Speaker 1: And it is it is a balance. Well, that's where
Speaker 1: you get with the Holy Spirit, and that's where you
Speaker 1: pay attention to what he's speaking to you. I mean,
Speaker 1: what do you think about it? Because you listen to
Speaker 1: the message, and this is called run it back, walk
Speaker 1: it out. So for somebody who's not so much of
Speaker 1: a win lost person, I don't know if this is
Speaker 1: a male female thing or just a competitive thing. I
Speaker 1: know that the term win isn't really your turn. I mean,
Speaker 1: you don't wake up in the morning late. I need
Speaker 1: to be a winner. I need to crush it. I
Speaker 1: need to smash it. You know that's not your vibe. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but how did you hear it about winning everyone?
Speaker 3: I think that it sets me free to say a
Speaker 3: one day win, because sometimes I get overwhelmed when I
Speaker 3: think about people like you who have who are very
Speaker 3: disciplined and so you have certain things that you do
Speaker 3: every day. But for me, it really set me free
Speaker 3: to realize, like, okay, wait, so for instance, today we're
Speaker 3: here and we're having this conversation. We're also working on
Speaker 3: shooting some videos for your new book release.
Speaker 5: There's a plug do the new you pre order it.
Speaker 2: It's amazing.
Speaker 3: And so this is not a winning mom day for me.
Speaker 3: This is a winning work day for me. And so
Speaker 3: when I lay my head on my pillow at night
Speaker 3: and somebody is frustrated because they couldn't find their their
Speaker 3: you know, their wrestling single isn't clean, or there's no
Speaker 3: Chewy bars in the house, I'm not going to bed
Speaker 3: feeling defeated because that wasn't the win for today for me?
Speaker 2: Does that?
Speaker 1: But I want to expand your definition of what a
Speaker 1: win is.
Speaker 4: Help.
Speaker 1: Did you not set an example for your kids today
Speaker 1: of what it means to come in and work hard
Speaker 1: at meaningful ministry? Do they not need to see that
Speaker 1: mom got up today and the biggest thing wasn't me
Speaker 1: cleaning that wrestling single that maybe the biggest thing was
Speaker 1: them learning how to do their own laundry. Because the
Speaker 1: world is bigger than just us. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of times you don't give yourself credit for the win
Speaker 1: because of how you defined it. So what's your definition
Speaker 1: of a win?
Speaker 2: Wow?
Speaker 1: Do you think that a win is being able to
Speaker 1: enable everybody else's laziness? Because sometimes it is through setting
Speaker 1: an example of balancing a complicated life that you actually
Speaker 1: give that kid a template that they can follow one
Speaker 1: day if they find themselves as a mom or as
Speaker 1: a dad. So I would challenge each of you to
Speaker 1: expand your definition of what you call a win. I
Speaker 1: like that movie Moneyball, and you can go back and
Speaker 1: watch just the very last part of it. And this
Speaker 1: guy hits a home run and it goes way over
Speaker 1: I think, over centerfield wall, and he trips when he
Speaker 1: gets to first base, and he's so discouraged because he
Speaker 1: tripped on first base. But when they tap him and
Speaker 1: they show him, wait a minute, that ball is over
Speaker 1: the centerfield wall doesn't matter. You hit a home run
Speaker 1: and you didn't even know it. Yeah, it's a great
Speaker 1: picture of how the enemy discourages us because we trip
Speaker 1: over this. Oh, I sounded so stupid when I said
Speaker 1: that they weren't listening to you. They weren't even paying attention.
Speaker 1: Then you go back and apologize to somebody you'd ever
Speaker 1: done this. I'm so sorry when I did this, it
Speaker 1: sounded so stupid, And they go, what are you talking about?
Speaker 1: So you are penalizing yourself for losses that actually didn't
Speaker 1: even occur in reality. Yeah, and when we sync up
Speaker 1: with God, he shows us what's really important to him.
Speaker 2: So helpful.
Speaker 1: What do y'all think? And y'all are real quiet? I
Speaker 1: want I want to hear what Brent thinks. I want
Speaker 1: to hear what Chris thinks. I want to hear I
Speaker 1: want to hear from the whole group.
Speaker 6: Well, I was I was thinking, you've showed up a
Speaker 6: lot of times for songwriting session and you leave and
Speaker 6: maybe it wasn't the greatest song or the most productive day,
Speaker 6: and we might text about it later that night or
Speaker 6: the next day, and you're like, I showed up. I
Speaker 6: see it as a win, and you know, I don't
Speaker 6: know what'll come of that song, but I showed up,
Speaker 6: and I've got to see me showing up as the
Speaker 6: wind for yesterday. Yeah yeah, And so however that applies to,
Speaker 6: you know, any facet of life, Like I may have
Speaker 6: not felt like I had the deepest conversation with Joe
Speaker 6: and my son at bedtime tonight, but I was by
Speaker 6: his bed.
Speaker 2: You were there, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know.
Speaker 6: I spent five minutes with him saying you day good,
Speaker 6: talk about a movie that's nothing deep.
Speaker 1: But I was there, and he probably didn't want more
Speaker 1: than five minutes, ready to get back on anyway, exactly.
Speaker 1: And here's what I'm trying to say, Chris, like, I'm
Speaker 1: so glad you brought it up, because it actually came
Speaker 1: to my mind when I was studying. I even found
Speaker 1: a way to label those days where we go in
Speaker 1: to write music and it doesn't feel great. I call
Speaker 1: it a creative leg day. Anybody who lives weights knows
Speaker 1: like skipping leg day is the number one temptation, and
Speaker 1: at least it is for me. And yet it's the
Speaker 1: day that you go in and you don't expect it
Speaker 1: to feel the best. You don't expect it to be
Speaker 1: the most fun, but you do it. And there are
Speaker 1: days like that in parenting, there are days like that
Speaker 1: in friendship, there are days like that, certainly in ministry.
Speaker 1: And there are days like that for you where you
Speaker 1: don't judge the worth of that day. We're talking about days, right,
Speaker 1: You don't judge the value you of that day, the
Speaker 1: success of that day. You don't even label that day
Speaker 1: according to how good it felt in the moment. Back
Speaker 1: to the workout illustration. I remember talking to this guy
Speaker 1: who did CrossFit a few years ago, and he came
Speaker 1: to see me, but he was like, you look kind
Speaker 1: of rough. Honestly, he said, I'm sorry for the shape,
Speaker 1: my man. I just had a really great workout. He
Speaker 1: looked terrible. Yeah, he said, I threw up three times.
Speaker 1: Oh no, it was a great workout. So I realized
Speaker 1: that his definition of a great workout was based on
Speaker 1: the result that it produced, yeah, not the feeling that
Speaker 1: it provided.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: A lot of times we're sitting there thinking it was
Speaker 1: a horrible day. It might have been a tough day,
Speaker 1: that doesn't make it a horrible day. And I think
Speaker 1: we've got to stop labeling things because some of those
Speaker 1: days where we went away from songwriting and I came
Speaker 1: home and told Holly that was a wasted day. Became
Speaker 1: the seed of some of our biggest songs. Yeah, or
Speaker 1: they became the a sermon. So you never know what
Speaker 1: you're sowing for in that day. Many times you'll think
Speaker 1: you said something and it fell on deaf ears, or
Speaker 1: many times you think you do something and nobody even noticed.
Speaker 1: And golly, g willakers. Three years later they go back
Speaker 1: to that day and say, you remember when you and
Speaker 1: you go, I kind of remember when I did that. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: that changed everything for me. See, people aren't processing in
Speaker 1: real time either, and so we can't be so quick,
Speaker 1: I think, to judge the effects of the seed that
Speaker 1: we sow in any given day. And that's what's in
Speaker 1: the text that's really interesting, right, He says verse three,
Speaker 1: I'm back in Isaiah twenty seven. Now follow along, keep
Speaker 1: up this good stuff. Isaiah twenty seven, Verse three, I
Speaker 1: the Lord watch over it. I water it continually. I
Speaker 1: guard it day and night so that no one may
Speaker 1: harm it. So this is the Lord's promise to his people,
Speaker 1: he says, I water it continually. That means there are
Speaker 1: going to be days that you plant something and God's
Speaker 1: going to come along and water it, and then there
Speaker 1: will be harvests that you will receive later from something
Speaker 1: that you forgot you even did, or you thought it
Speaker 1: was so simple, so insignificant. But we have to live
Speaker 1: our lives in a frame of faith that says, Okay,
Speaker 1: God is watering what I do, not what I'm going
Speaker 1: to get around to one day when God is watering
Speaker 1: what I put in the ground today, the scripture I
Speaker 1: put in my heart today, God will water that. The
Speaker 1: relationship that I reach out, make an effort today. It
Speaker 1: may not heal today, but God will come along and
Speaker 1: water that. And that gives me a lot of confidence
Speaker 1: for the days where I feel like I'm a complete loser.
Speaker 2: I loved how you called it down days.
Speaker 3: Because at first, I mean, it really didn't.
Speaker 2: I wrote it down. I went back and looked at it.
Speaker 2: I was like, I don't like calling it a down day,
Speaker 2: but noe.
Speaker 3: But like it's reframing that a day that I thought
Speaker 3: maybe wasn't full of winds actually was my roots going
Speaker 3: down that day. It was it was training, It was
Speaker 3: it was progress, even though you didn't see it, or
Speaker 3: even though it wasn't perfect, and I.
Speaker 2: Really loved it.
Speaker 1: Might the down days or the dirty, dirty days. Dirty
Speaker 1: the dirty days the root days that give us the
Speaker 1: stability to appreciate the good days. Your roots determine your reach.
Speaker 1: So if God is going to do something amazing in.
Speaker 3: Your life, do you know that, like scientifically the tree
Speaker 3: when you look at how wide a tree's branches are,
Speaker 3: that their roots literally line up with their widest branch.
Speaker 1: This is why I'll bring you to run it back,
Speaker 1: walk it out session because I didn't know that at all.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that at all. So the indication of
Speaker 1: the things that God is going to do in your
Speaker 1: life through generations or even through let's say a business
Speaker 1: that God has put in your heart, or or something
Speaker 1: that God has called you to communicate to the world,
Speaker 1: you feel like, okay, well this day I didn't even
Speaker 1: I don't even have anybody in front of me. I'm
Speaker 1: very alone, I'm very isolated. Start seeing those days as
Speaker 1: root days and value them the same as the fruit days.
Speaker 1: You have some days where you'll go, oh, I'm seeing
Speaker 1: that payoff of that. Oh okay, it's getting through. Oh
Speaker 1: it's working. Okay, great. Let those encourage you for the
Speaker 1: next down day. I don't mean down in a negative sense. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean down in a sense that it feels negative,
Speaker 1: but it is absolutely imperative and essential and necessary. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not negative. It's necessary. Somebody put into comments it's necessary, beautiful,
Speaker 1: it's necessary. And when we define days in such a
Speaker 1: polar way, don't you think, britt when we say how
Speaker 1: is your day and we start evaluating good or bad? Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: that's too binary.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I love this so much because I'm even just
Speaker 4: going back through the catalog of my day to day
Speaker 4: thinking about how many wins have I forfeited ooh, because
Speaker 4: I'm categorizing them wrong or incorrectly. And I was thinking
Speaker 4: about everybody that might be joining us. And I love
Speaker 4: how you pointed out the two scriptures, like Scripture one
Speaker 4: where it's like the sword, right, there's a fight in it,
Speaker 4: and then verse two.
Speaker 1: I'm singing and we talked.
Speaker 4: You called it a strategy, and I was like, what
Speaker 4: happens when we're not good at both of those strategies?
Speaker 4: Like for me, I'm naturally a fighter, Like I don't
Speaker 4: know why passed. I got it in me and I
Speaker 4: know what sent me. I'm not always as quick to
Speaker 4: celebrate or to sing, or to recognize the good. So
Speaker 4: I know I got wins that I'm not recognizing. But
Speaker 4: the concept that you're talking about, I think works the opposite, right, Like,
Speaker 4: if I can get like a one day win, like,
Speaker 4: it's going to put me on a trajectory, and the
Speaker 4: same way, if I can't do that, it puts me
Speaker 4: on another trajectory. So I don't know, like what you
Speaker 4: would say to some of us that are forfeiting certain
Speaker 4: wins in our life because we can't grasp both of
Speaker 4: these concepts or both of these strategies. We don't know
Speaker 4: how to accept the good, you know, the person that
Speaker 4: can't receive the compliment or can't see the win and
Speaker 4: the fact that you're working hard today, Holly, like showing
Speaker 4: your kids a great example. But then also like there's
Speaker 4: some of us that aren't the fighter, and I don't
Speaker 4: know how to like stand strong in the midst of ncy.
Speaker 4: Oh no, I'm still winning, and this is how I
Speaker 4: identify my win today.
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that. I love that. I
Speaker 1: love that question. Now, I don't know if you're gonna
Speaker 1: love my answer, but I love the question because I'm
Speaker 1: a fighter too, and what convicted me. We'll look at
Speaker 1: it together. Go to Isaiah twenty seven to one. Okay,
Speaker 1: follow along with me in that day, I will punish
Speaker 1: with my sword. No, the Lord will punish with his sword.
Speaker 1: So who's doing the fighting? The lord? Okay? Keep going
Speaker 1: his fears great and powerful sword? Whose sword his sword?
Speaker 1: Leviathan the gliding servant. I know I asked about mythological
Speaker 1: creatures like Leviathan. You're like, can you describe Leviath? Then
Speaker 1: a little bit more to me, No, you can describe
Speaker 1: him just fine. For yourself. You live with Leviathan. You
Speaker 1: know your Leviath, then I know my Leviathan. For someone,
Speaker 1: it's going to be an addiction that you're hoping God
Speaker 1: will break in twenty twenty four. And the problem is,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to address this a little bit on Sunday, okay,
Speaker 1: is that you thought it might be twenty three, you
Speaker 1: thought it might be twenty two, you thought it might
Speaker 1: be twenty one. And with every year that it didn't
Speaker 1: with every year that he didn't deliver you, your hope
Speaker 1: diminished a little bit. Yeah, and I really want to
Speaker 1: make sure that this teaching comes across with a strong
Speaker 1: emphasis of who's doing the fighting. God is fighting for you.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 1: Put it in the comments right now. God is fighting
Speaker 1: for me. He will fight for me, and he's fighting Leviathan.
Speaker 1: And let's just finish verse one, brit because we're both
Speaker 1: fighters and we need it. We need this reminder who's
Speaker 1: doing the slaying. In verse one he will slay, Yes,
Speaker 1: he will slay. And then verse two says in that
Speaker 1: day you will sing, So you do the singing and
Speaker 1: he will do the slaying. What in the world does
Speaker 1: that mean? Pastor stevens sonfes to walk around my house singing, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'll sing about a proof of vineyard cucumber melon and
Speaker 1: come quts and like this isn't it? You know he's
Speaker 1: loving James. You get sing all day long, it won't
Speaker 1: pay your bills and it won't raise your children, and
Speaker 1: it won't get you to work on time. So we're
Speaker 1: not going back here on the idea that Look, we've
Speaker 1: got to devote ourselves to what God has put in
Speaker 1: our hand. That's one of my core teachings is that
Speaker 1: God will do for you what you cannot do for you.
Speaker 1: He will not do for you what you can do
Speaker 1: for you. Yeah. What I mean about it is that
Speaker 1: victory belongs to the Lord, okay, and we are instruments
Speaker 1: in his hand. And I'm trying to get you to
Speaker 1: come from a place of victory rather than trying to
Speaker 1: work to a place of victory, because I think that
Speaker 1: will give you that momentum that you want to say.
Speaker 1: If I feel like I'm losing everywhere, eventually, I don't
Speaker 1: want to play this game anymore. Especially if you make
Speaker 1: a man feel like the game is unwinnable.
Speaker 2: He's done.
Speaker 1: We will walk away. And so when we make walking
Speaker 1: with God an unwinnable game for people, you know, now
Speaker 1: I got a fast two hours. Now I gotta give
Speaker 1: up cigarettes. Now, well, you might need to fast from cigarettes.
Speaker 1: I remember a guy who told me one time he
Speaker 1: was fast and from a chocolate porn pre marital sex.
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, you probably should keep that
Speaker 1: fast going a little bit past lent. Those are things
Speaker 1: just good to eliminate, not to abstain from for a
Speaker 1: little while. But it was really really interesting to me
Speaker 1: how he almost saught like, I'm white knuckling this thing
Speaker 1: to live for God as long as I can, and
Speaker 1: that's why I'm breaking it. Down into a day because
Speaker 1: if you think, well, this year, I'm not gonna fight,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna nag, I'm not gonna get mad, I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna get upset. I'm not going to do any
Speaker 1: of those bad things. This year twenty four is my year. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: twenty four, one day at a time. Do you remember
Speaker 1: even when I broke it up and said that the
Speaker 1: average number of breadths a person takes his seven teen
Speaker 1: to thirty thousand. Yeah, yeah, this is just from Google.
Speaker 1: Do not fact check me. I don't know if it's true.
Speaker 1: That part was crazy though, but I averaged it out
Speaker 1: as I said, that's about on average seventeen to thirty
Speaker 1: that's about twenty four thousand breadths. So even if you
Speaker 1: just can take it to breathing in when I get
Speaker 1: when I get really spun up, breathing is advanced. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when I get really out of control. And so what
Speaker 1: I'm trying to get the fighter in me to seat
Speaker 1: and brit This is the strategy of it is that
Speaker 1: this outcome is in God's hands and the process of
Speaker 1: singing about a fruitful vineyard. I don't think it's about
Speaker 1: musical notes. I don't think it has anything to do
Speaker 1: with music. I think it has to do with mindset.
Speaker 1: I don't think it has to do with the fact
Speaker 1: that we're denying our problems. I think it's that we're
Speaker 1: focusing on our blessings. Because if I'm singing about a
Speaker 1: fruitful vineyard, Wow, what do I not have time to
Speaker 1: focus on?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 1: You're right, all the thorns and the weeds, and yes,
Speaker 1: we deal with those things, but we do it from
Speaker 1: a place of focusing on what God has given us.
Speaker 1: So maybe that's the challenge today. Maybe maybe when you
Speaker 1: hear one day that one. Maybe when you hear one
Speaker 1: day when what you need to hear is not hey,
Speaker 1: get up and get make sure you run your three
Speaker 1: miles today, get in your rower. Do you two thousand meters?
Speaker 1: Maybe you need to list one from yesterday, because I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tell you what you won somewhere yesterday? Yes, so good?
Speaker 1: You won somewhere yesterday, yes, and even getting that momentum
Speaker 1: in your mind. And if you're not a win lost
Speaker 1: kind of person, you're like, I'm not competitive. I like
Speaker 1: to bask. I'm more of a basker. Okay, just let's
Speaker 1: call it. Let's call it relishing. Let's call it savoring.
Speaker 1: Are you a foodie, Let's call it savoring. How about that?
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 1: How about a one day savor. See it doesn't have
Speaker 1: the same feel to it. That's why I say one day.
Speaker 1: But I don't want this to turn into a competition
Speaker 1: for you where you start saying, all right, well, I
Speaker 1: gotta wind to day, I gotta wind today. I got
Speaker 1: a wind today. It's just about getting you to see
Speaker 1: that the out there somewhere that you hope to experience,
Speaker 1: whatever that looks like, the internal state, the fruit of
Speaker 1: the spirit, the love, joy, piece of patience, kind is goodness,
Speaker 1: faith on this, gentlemen, and self control that we all
Speaker 1: want to produce in our lives is in this process
Speaker 1: of God watering his vineyard continually. And that's where I
Speaker 1: want to leave you on this inaugural episode of running
Speaker 1: back walk it out. I want to leave you thinking
Speaker 1: about whose garden you are. You are God's garden. He
Speaker 1: will take responsibility for weeding out and for watering. That
Speaker 1: means you don't have to figure this out by yourself.
Speaker 1: And that's where my teaching deviates a little bit just
Speaker 1: from pure motivational teaching. I like motivational teaching or inspirational
Speaker 1: personal development. I love that stuff. Where I'm called to
Speaker 1: focus a little bit differently, though, is to get you
Speaker 1: to realize is that this victory isn't in your hands.
Speaker 1: It's in His hands, and He's given you victory all
Speaker 1: around you, and I just want you to see a
Speaker 1: little bit of it so that you go into this year,
Speaker 1: whatever vision you have of one day, when whatever vision
Speaker 1: you have of one day, when I want you to
Speaker 1: recognize your victories of the one day, when this is
Speaker 1: the day the Lord has made and you got something
Speaker 1: to rejoice about today. So I want you just to
Speaker 1: light up my comments right now, Okay, I want you
Speaker 1: to put what is the victory that God gave you today?
Speaker 1: And if you got to go all the way down
Speaker 1: to I'm on breath twelve, six hundred and ninety three,
Speaker 1: ninety four, yeah, ninety five, I just want you to
Speaker 1: breathe that in and let it permeate your perspective today
Speaker 1: and let the Lord fight the battles that are too
Speaker 1: big for you. Let him deal with Leviathan. You just
Speaker 1: get that leverage of the daily win, and I believe
Speaker 1: this revelation will continue to unfold in your heart, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to be looking through the comments, and Holly's
Speaker 1: going to be looking, and Chris is going to be looking,
Speaker 1: and BRIT's going to be looking, and we're going to
Speaker 1: be praying. In fact, I'm going to pray right now
Speaker 1: that God will enable you to walk this out, to
Speaker 1: walk into your one day win, just step by step Father,
Speaker 1: in the name of Jesus, I come into agreement with
Speaker 1: your desires for each person who was led by you
Speaker 1: to join with this experience. It was divinely timed that
Speaker 1: they came across this video. It was orchestrated by you
Speaker 1: because they were discouraged, defeated, or spread thin. And now
Speaker 1: you've given us a focus and we even feel the
Speaker 1: fruitfulness of your word going forth. Now, Lord, would you
Speaker 1: water it. We've shared some thoughts today, some applications, some randomness,
Speaker 1: some usings, but I believe there's been some revelation too,
Speaker 1: And would you allow it to unfold as we each
Speaker 1: day have a new twenty four And may this year,
Speaker 1: as it unfolds, be made up of the days that
Speaker 1: are committed to you in your hands in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen,
Speaker 1: all right, you let me know if you liked our
Speaker 1: new program, We'll do another one, all right. We ran
Speaker 1: it back. Now walk it out and see you here soon.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
Speaker 1: you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
Speaker 1: you that this ministry is possible. You can click the
Speaker 1: link in the description to give now, or visit Elevation
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Speaker 1: bless you