The Thyatira Contradiction: A Vision for Authenticity Undermined by Prosperity Prophecy

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:00:00] Even as you stand at the door and knock, O God, those who still will reject you, O God, those still will say, there is no God, those will still say, I'd rather do without him, O God.
[00:00:10] Lord, confuse the minds of the wicked, O God, even as you did the enemies of Israel. Confuse their minds, O God, confuse their minds, scatter them, O God, in the name of Jesus, O God.
[00:00:21] Lord, protect your people, O God, overseas in Nigeria, O God, who are being persecuted, O God.
[00:00:26] Lord, protect them, oh God, in the Middle East who are being persecuted, oh God.
[00:00:31] The underground churches in China, oh God, confuse the enemy.
[00:00:35] Let the word, Father God, continually be preached, oh God.
[00:00:38] Let the word continually go forth.
[00:00:39] Let the word of God, Father God, touch the four corners of this earth, oh God.
[00:00:44] Lord, execute righteous judgment, oh God, in the name of Jesus Christ.
[00:00:48] We know that you are just, God.
[00:00:50] We know that you are kind, God.
[00:00:52] And so we bless you right now.

[00:00:53] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_10]
[00:00:53] In Jesus name we give you all honor and glory and praise. We thank you. Amen. Amen. Amen morning church

[00:24:02] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_07]
[00:24:02] How's everybody doing? All right. Did you guys enjoy our little community get together last week with some chicken and some?
[00:24:09] Waffles. Yeah, that was awesome. I disappeared in a two-blade snow So as we celebrate coming together as a community, we'd like for you guys to sing this with us Okay, and it's about our God. That's all it is
[00:24:25] it's two lines our god reigns forever our god reigns and we want you to join in with us and let's let god know that we're here even though we're in a small number right now that's all right
[00:24:36] we only need two so let's do it all right we want we want you to tell everybody you know come to god's house and hear the word and you're done we're not out here to have to preach to
[00:29:44] everybody we just have to put the word out that jesus christ died on the cross for our sins

[00:29:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_10]
[00:29:49] and he reigns right now y'all good for me to transition i'm gonna have xavier play uh that's

[00:36:16] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:36:16] the way god made it that's the way god planned i want to i want to hear my little jam for a second how you doing praise team so my vibe is give me that slow stuff give me some i'll sing it out

[00:36:32] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_10]
[00:36:32] give me some give me some jump this one hit it x one more time last time here's what i want you to

[00:37:52] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:37:52] do i want you to take five minutes you're gonna talk to somebody you're gonna pray for them i mean this is a community thing right y'all want me to do it all y'all go talk to some people ask
[00:38:06] them how their day is going see if they need prayer maybe there's somebody you don't even

[00:38:11] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_10]
[00:38:11] know yet we're a church family we're supposed to be right let's hit it again x or today hit the 20

[00:41:11] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[00:41:11] put the faucets on a church it's a priority this morning because it matters i wanted to pray this morning there is a specific specific topic that's heavy on my heart and brad i love this song we
[00:41:29] keep it going. The specific topic on my heart for prayer that is heavy is for the church in Iran.
[00:41:36] I have been grieved for the church in Iran all week. I've been praying for the persecuted church and I don't want us to go any further without taking a moment to pray for the persecuted church.
[00:41:46] I think in America, we get spoiled. We get spoiled. I mean, it's kind of like, you know, you're always used to something until you get out of the nation and go live in a place that
[00:41:58] doesn't have what you're used to. And so today I want to give you all good news. We were there in the kids church this morning early and we had all the kids praying. Asher, Nick, we were praying in
[00:42:10] the spirit. Mimi was praying. We were back there prophesying. They were praying in tongues. We had the worship going. We got there early. The Lord has put on my heart to start doing this with the
[00:42:19] kids. When we get here in the morning, they were all praying and open up their mouth. And then, you know, we were doing certain things and they were praying over our nation.
[00:42:26] and it's just a powerful thing to know that the future generation is back there opening up their mouth and declaring over this nation that it will serve God I mean Brad you should have heard some
[00:42:39] of the prayers that they were praying it was precious they were like God help the next generation Nick prayed a unique prayer he said God help little kids that have bad homes where there's a lot of brokenness and a lot of pain I mean just out of the mouth of babes right and so
[00:42:55] it encourages me it encourages me and in our faith walking on this journey because if we don't open up our mouth then who will if we don't raise up our children to open up their mouth and speak life
[00:43:08] and live righteous and live holy and do what God would then who's going to train them up because there's a whole generation out there that's that is looking to have an encounter with the presence
[00:43:19] of God and I believe that's why we're here together today so father right now we just thank you for your, your goodness. We thank you that we woke up this morning. Lord, we thank you that you
[00:43:30] are faithful, that we have breath in our body. Lord, we don't take it for granted. We don't take it for just any, any old way that we get to come and gather. No, no. This is a new thing you're
[00:43:40] doing. It's a new thing, God. We get to come into your presence. We get to open up our mouth. We get to exalt you. And Lord, we realize that so many people across the nation, they're being killed
[00:43:52] right now for Christianity. There's horrible things happening to families all over, and Lord, particularly that the church in Iran is on my heart this morning. So Lord, we just pray over the church in Iran. We pray over the nations of the world. We thank you, God, that you are helping
[00:44:06] the women and the children and the leaders and the godly men in Iran that are born again to rise up in strength, that you would let them be bold in the face of death, bold in the face of fear, bold
[00:44:18] and persecution, that you would touch them and encourage them to keep going on, on the path, God.
[00:44:24] Contrary, God. Narrow is the road. Wide is it for destruction. Narrow. Narrow is the road that leads to life. And we thank you, God, that you're going to encourage the Christians in Iran this morning
[00:44:36] because we, the church, we open up our mouth and we pray. We open up our mouth and we speak alive.
[00:44:42] proverbs 18 21 power of life and death in the tongue and we open our mouth and we speak life over iran we speak life over the christians we speak life over the persecuted church we speak
[00:44:54] life over all the churches in america god we pray for pastors all over america right now that may be struggling with addiction suicide depression maybe want to shut the doors to their church god whatever it is god let the church rise up and be strong let the church rise up and be
[00:45:11] strong. God, let us rise up. We thank you, Lord, for such a time as this, that Lord, there's Asher and Nick and all the children in the back today that are opening up their mouth and they're
[00:45:22] prophesying and they're speaking life. God, for such a time as this, you allowed us to be alive and may none of us in here take one minute and one moment, but may we not waste it with idle time.
[00:45:33] May we not waste it in our own ability, in our own flesh, but may we be spirit-led all week long.
[00:45:40] may we be spirit led to intercede spirit led to pray and spirit led to walk the way that you want us to walk may we be in tune and in step with you we thank you god that you remember the persecuted
[00:45:52] church this morning and you remember the church at large and that god you will have your way in the nations of the world in america we declare it america belongs to you god america belongs to you
[00:46:05] No matter what's going on against the church today, we thank you that Christians will arise and that we will see revival on the land like never before.
[00:46:14] In Jesus' name, amen.

[00:46:18] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:46:18] I understand the irony of the song while she's praying for the persecuted church that I ran.
[00:46:24] But you know what?
[00:46:26] Nothing's outside of God's control.
[00:46:30] Y'all love Rachel?
[00:46:33] She's all right.
[00:46:37] Good morning, guys.
[00:46:39] Yeah, I know.
[00:46:39] Y'all love her.
[00:46:40] Everybody loves her.
[00:46:41] all the preachers all the pastors like her too like all the preachers when i go have to meet preachers when i have to meet preachers i don't like preachers so when i have to meet them they
[00:46:51] i'll tell you why too do i a couple a couple she says i like some no there's some good guys um i got it baby good lord i want us to be interactive but my lord i know um they all
[00:47:06] love rachel though they're like how's that fiery wife of yours you sure you don't want her to take over you know they're like you know she's uh she's got that charismatic you know that that life i
[00:47:19] mean i'll never forget dating her i used to call her shotgun tongues and she would just go up to anybody and she'd be like how's your day and they'd say well you know i'm having a interesting
[00:47:28] day and before they could even finish she'd be like let me pray right now the spirit of the lord like dang girl that boldness uh semi rubbed off on me and my daughter's got it she don't play
[00:47:38] around either. Boy, Asher's got it. She will go up to you and just start. And I love it because you can hear her mama and she goes, we bind any accidents or incidents. You go silly. We override
[00:47:51] them in the name of Jesus. My girl is anyway. How y'all doing? Good. Nice cold morning, right? I like it. Apparently it snowed in Tallahassee, right? That's crazy. I love it. Anyway, I just got back
[00:48:06] from DRC. Yes. And Ghana. Yeah. So today I'm going to be pastoral in the sense of like I'm going to talk about story life, kind of the future of story life, put it in a scriptural
[00:48:20] context, explain some of my decision making, where I think we're going. And I'm going to try to get it done quick. But are y'all good with that? I want to take my time and kind
[00:48:34] of like explain kind of where I'm at, what's going on in my life, where we're going as a church, kind of some of the things that we're thinking about, um, because we're kind of going a unique direction.
[00:48:47] So let me just explain, first of all, that I will be going back to Africa quite a bit, probably like every other month, you know, for quite a bit of time.
[00:48:54] And the reason that that is, is because God opened up a really unique opportunity, uh, both in business there, but also in the Great Lakes region as a whole to do some things that I think are going to be really beneficial for people
[00:49:10] and actually for the body of Christ.
[00:49:14] I don't know if you guys know this.
[00:49:15] I'm sure you've heard about some of the conflict in the eastern DRC.
[00:49:18] But do you realize that at a minimum, 5.4 million people have died?
[00:49:24] At a minimum, 5.4.
[00:49:26] Those numbers could top over 11 million.
[00:49:29] 96% of whom are Christian.
[00:49:33] It's the largest death toll of Christians in human history caused by man.
[00:49:40] And nobody talks about it.
[00:49:42] Children are being raped, kidnapped.
[00:49:46] And the thing that's, the reason you say, well, if this is happening, why don't we hear about it?
[00:49:49] Well, the unfortunate reality of the world is that unless you have power and money, your story doesn't really get told.
[00:49:56] If you are poor and don't have power and you're African, your story really won't get told.
[00:50:03] And that's just kind of the nature of reality, unfortunately, when it comes to the West.
[00:50:08] And I don't mean that.
[00:50:08] I'm not, like, taking shots.
[00:50:10] It's just that's just how it works.
[00:50:13] That's just a fact.
[00:50:13] And so you have a bunch of people who have faced something that historically should mobilize not just Americans but the world to take action.
[00:50:25] and unfortunately it hasn't and that says a lot about power says a lot about how it works in the world but i've been placed in a position where maybe we can do some things and so i can't uh
[00:50:37] in good conscience avoid my responsibilities to fellow believers who are suffering and i actually think that your pastor and this church can have a role in changing the course of history so i wish I could go into more detail. I will as things unfold, but needless to say, God has put me in
[00:51:01] a position to where I think I have a unique opportunity and responsibility to the region and to the people. Africa has always been a significant part of my life. I lived in Ghana.
[00:51:15] The covering of this church is my mother and Gideon, right? Those two people. And those, Yeah, those are the two influences.
[00:51:21] Gideon's a pastor in Ghana.
[00:51:23] He's also my best friend in terms of like relationship.
[00:51:26] Him and Hank have been the closest people in my life.
[00:51:28] I only have a handful of close people.
[00:51:30] Hank, Brandon McDaniel, Gideon Donzo.
[00:51:33] I mean, you can count them on my hand, how the proximity of people to me.
[00:51:38] And Gideon is one of those people who have bonded to me very closely as a brother.
[00:51:42] And so the influence on Africa has been pronounced and it's God has now put me in a position to where I can kind of go back to the continent, not just Ghana, but the continent of Africa
[00:51:54] with relationships and begin to kind of shape the future in a way that I think will impact the body of Christ for generations to come.
[00:52:03] Is that, y'all with me?
[00:52:05] It's quiet.
[00:52:07] Feeling good about that?
[00:52:08] We good about that, Demetrius?
[00:52:10] So I say that to say like, it's a lot of work.
[00:52:14] I have to do a lot.
[00:52:16] You know, there's a lot of responsibility and a lot of work.
[00:52:19] And so it kind of coincides with kind of changes that have happened in me personally, changes that have happened in church and how I approach the church.
[00:52:29] And I've been doing ministry for 15 years, just about as long as I've been married, right?
[00:52:35] Is that right, babe?
[00:52:36] You'll help me keep me on track.
[00:52:37] I don't want to exaggerate, do the pastor thing.
[00:52:41] I've been doing ministry for 55 years.
[00:52:45] I was running churches at 10,000 when y'all were kissing in high school.
[00:52:49] um oh lighten up folk come on but um but i've been doing ministry for 15 years now i've been in ministry but i've only been pastoring a few years okay so so i'm i've just now kind of hit
[00:53:03] a stride where i kind of know who i am as a person who i am as a pastor kind of what god wants me to do and for many years there was a lot of conflict in how i uh carried the mission right are y'all
[00:53:17] with me thank you shay i'm gonna just look in shay's direction because i feel like y'all thought I was just going to preach something easy. But we're doing this together. Like I have to explain,
[00:53:26] right? Don't you have to explain yourself? Okay. Okay. So thank you. Thank you. All right. You're locked in. So I, for many years, so I've got to realize I've only been pastoring a few years and
[00:53:35] I can tell you, I'm going to kind of take you through the process. The first year of pastoring, I thought you build a church through preaching. So that, that's not, that's not, you have to
[00:53:46] understand something too, even though my mother is who she is, right? Nobody trained me in this.
[00:53:52] right? Like, nobody sat me down and said, like, this is what you do. I have overseers, I have good people, but, like, they were just like, hey, God called you to do it, and I'm like,
[00:54:01] you know, and y'all are the ones that have to go through that experience with me, right? And so I just got thrown into it, and you have to understand there's been a lot of changes. If you pay close attention to both how I preach over the past year and kind of, like, what
[00:54:16] I've done, you'll notice something's shifted, something's changed. I think some people like it, I think some people are leaving.
[00:54:22] I think some, you know, like it's a mixed bag.
[00:54:25] You either like it, but that's because fundamentally I've changed.
[00:54:28] My relationship to God has deepened to me in such a profound way that I feel like I've entered a place of maturity.
[00:54:36] My understanding of ministry has changed and I've kind of just settled.
[00:54:40] I've settled and I've narrowed focus and kind of things are coming into clarity that are definitely impactful for the church, but I didn't have formal training as a pastor.
[00:54:53] There's pros and cons to that.
[00:54:56] The pros to it are I do believe in independence.
[00:54:59] I don't like, I don't believe going to seminary qualifies you the way that people think it does.
[00:55:05] I don't think that having like bodies of oversight are necessarily, it's helpful to prevent scandal, supposed to, you know.
[00:55:17] I don't know, ask the Southern Baptist.
[00:55:18] this, but it's supposed to stop candle, and there's some positives, but the negatives to that are kind of like you can't really talk in terms of calling. You have to be qualified more on paper, and you kind of have to tie yourself to things that aren't necessarily what God is
[00:55:38] trying to do. You can't really be part of a lot of heavy denominational oversight or certain structures and then do something new, right? Or do something. The danger is if you do something too new, you end up Jim Jones, you know what I mean? You end up too far outside the purview.
[00:55:57] So the sweet spot is having the independence to do what God wants you to do while also having the accountability that you need to function. And I think that we are kind of, I've hit that
[00:56:09] kind of sweet spot because I have accountability with overseers legitimately because I'm so fiercely honest. I also have accountability amongst you guys because there's not a lot that I really hide in my life. And then some people are like, oh, you bleed too much on stage, but I don't care. I'd
[00:56:28] rather just tell you where I'm at at any given point. And just so you know, what kind of determines my thinking and drive is I'll always be a charismatic. And so there'll always be elements
[00:56:40] of prophecy dreams those things influence me they can never be fundamentally detached from this they'll never never never will i detach my course from god's word and the bible and so um like i had
[00:56:54] a dream uh on my trip this time that was so influential and significant and in order to test it um i go and i i i'm reading the book of acts and i'm searching how the church because
[00:57:06] you know, it shapes the direction. And so when those two things come together, when what I feel God is telling me internally is aligning up with his word, then I feel good about the direction that I'm going. And I feel like those two things are more in line than
[00:57:20] they've ever been. I actually feel like a lot of the things that I've done up until this point were kind of out of alignment in a fundamental way with the core tenets of how the church was
[00:57:29] meant to operate. And so, and I don't mean that just with me personally, I mean that with the institution of the church. And so I've always been uncomfortable with it. There's always been a tension, but when you receive an inheritance, right, of a certain type, right, I didn't just
[00:57:44] come out of nowhere. I'm Paula White's son, right? I grew up in the third largest church in America that had its own journey. I've seen a 12,000 people fill a room at one time, right, in church.
[00:57:58] And then I've also seen the pastor of that church end up heroin addict, homeless man, right?
[00:58:04] You know, I've seen the peaks, the highs and the lows.
[00:58:07] And so I have this really complicated relationship to churches, charismatic churches, even big churches.
[00:58:15] And so, of course, it took me time to kind of figure out my relationship to all of that.
[00:58:21] And where I've kind of ended up is in a place where it laid a foundation of things that were important to me.
[00:58:28] But now I can kind of stand and go, okay, I see what God's doing next for us.
[00:58:33] You know what I mean?
[00:58:33] I see what is happening next.
[00:58:36] And so I would venture to say that the first year pastoring, I leaned too much into, oh, I'm called.
[00:58:44] And so if I preach, things will just fall into place, right?
[00:58:48] I'm just being honest with you.
[00:58:50] And after the first year, I was like, well, that doesn't seem to be how this works.
[00:58:56] and so i dug deeper and i started praying and one of the things that happened to me if you'll notice like again i'm charismatic believe in prophecy but i i narrowed that part of my life a lot
[00:59:07] i quieted that a lot because i begin to watch as even within my own life and within other people's lives that too much of a good thing can still end up a bad thing and you can remove agency from
[00:59:25] people. And then even with myself, because of words and because of what I knew God, you know, had said, you can end up just waiting and sitting in a position of passivity. And before you know
[00:59:39] it, you're not out actively doing what God wants you to do. You're waiting for something to fall into place. And when God says you're going to go to a promised land, you still have to get up and
[00:59:49] walk, right? Are y'all with me? And so, and so one of the things that I've noticed is like, if you'll notice one of the changes is i'm i want us to all be i'm very careful now like i i i
[01:00:03] observed as i'm observing church and everything um we have a lot of prophetic people in here me and rachel in particular have operated in the gifts for quite a while but even rachel i'm like
[01:00:14] make sure you're very very mature very specific and very tight on what you say i don't want us always to be like, the Lord says this, and God says this, and God, because even if you're right
[01:00:27] 95% of the time, the 5% of the time you're wrong will do so much damage, and people say, how can you be wrong 5% of the time if God's like, but the thing is, it's, that whole realm is just something
[01:00:39] that you go, you know what, let's build off of character, and people, and relationships, and the word of God, and then be very, very meticulously careful and pointed with how we use the giftings or how they use us. And we don't want to build a church off of giftings. What I don't want to do
[01:00:58] is remove agency from people. I don't want to build a bunch of people who are passive, who are sitting waiting for God to happen. I want to build people who feel like they are moving towards what
[01:01:09] God has for them. And I don't want to build authority dependence. And that's another thing that when you always operate in that, I noticed there's an authority dependence that develops.
[01:01:19] And I am very antithetical to that. That's the exact opposite direction. I'm trying to break personality ministry down for this church. I don't care what other people do. It's not my business.
[01:01:29] But for me in my house, right, what we're going to do is we're going to be a people, a body together. I don't want it to be just driven by, by, uh, you know, Oh, what does Brad say this
[01:01:40] week? Or what does Paula say? Or what does Rachel say? Or I want it to be, what does the Lord say to me and what can I contribute to the body of Christ? Okay. So are y'all, is this, is this okay?
[01:01:55] So I'm just telling you where I'm at and how I'm processing. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, so um so i think that i can place kind of some of where we're going into a good biblical context
[01:02:10] um i've been very much paying attention to like the trends of the church and kind of where we fit in it and i feel like we're at the precipice of our moment uh story life i feel like the i've
[01:02:23] been such an outsider to how church has been traditionally done like when so when i say like when I joke about seeing, meeting preachers and pastors and stuff, and that's because the whole modality of my thinking is different than theirs a lot of time. So when I go to meet,
[01:02:40] like, and sit down with lunch, and I was just talking to Pastor Paul Doherty about this. We were both in Africa laughing about how much we don't like pastor conferences, because when you go sit with, like, a pastor, almost universally, the first thing out of their mouth is, how many
[01:02:53] are you running now? What you bringing in? Like, and you're like, it's not like, hey, what's God doing in your life? Or how are your people? And like this industry has become like a weird kind
[01:03:03] of, yeah, like a, like a narcissistic, like celebrity driven corporation. Right. And it's very strange to me. It's strange and it's very off putting. And so it's, it's one of those things that i i've kind of felt outside because i didn't really want to give into that um here's the thing
[01:03:29] if i if all right minister greg and tawana you guys were great we loved you guys it was a good run it was a good run you could have had a meeting with me first so the um the thing about that is
[01:03:49] you know even when it comes to preaching okay i can preach um if i really put effort into it even the form of preaching is good. I've heard some of my preaching back when I've really like preached
[01:04:01] and I'm like, man, that's good preaching, right? But I'm also hesitant. I'm also like, I'm careful.
[01:04:09] I want to be careful. Even if you watch me observing praise and worship, I'm observing it and I want to be careful. And here's why. I've been around this thing long enough to know how a lot of these things that we attribute to God operate, and a lot of them are kind of
[01:04:29] manipulations of the nervous system, all right? A lot of them are about getting people, a lot of people in a room, getting them in sync through music, through rhythm, through emotion, and then making it appear as though something has happened because bodies moved down to the floor.
[01:04:50] If you notice me, I'm very reticent.
[01:04:52] I don't do a lot of altar calls.
[01:04:55] I'm very, this is all conscious.
[01:04:58] Are y'all with me?
[01:04:58] I'm just trying to explain.
[01:04:59] Victor, it's good to see you, man.
[01:05:02] Okay, okay.
[01:05:03] So I'm just trying to explain myself.
[01:05:05] I feel like I owe it to the church.
[01:05:06] And if you're a newcomer, I'm so sorry.
[01:05:07] God bless you for coming.
[01:05:09] Churches aren't, Sundays aren't usually like this.
[01:05:11] But I'm very careful.
[01:05:14] I'm very reticent and just cautious to not create emotional fervor.
[01:05:19] I don't want to do that. I don't want to operate through syncing. I wrote down some notes about unfortunate, like how a lot of times, even if you look at how studies work with how church works
[01:05:30] collectively, there's this tendency towards synchrony, towards bonding that creates compliance, but it doesn't create transformation. Well, if you look at how our nervous systems work, we actually end up a lot of times confusing emotional contagion for moves of god
[01:05:50] okay and that's more of like psychological so so you know we dim the lights we pack the seating we raise our voices we have crying and we raise our hands and that's all okay that's fine however
[01:06:04] that becomes an environment at which people become collectively manipulated like that it's really easy and and guys i can't do it i can't do it and my insides even if it like looks good on camera and it looks good on paper i will never be the guy that says that was a great
[01:06:26] service because we had 5500 people at the altar crying right are y'all with me all right so what am I aiming for if I'm not aiming for that again I'm always going to be skeptical of
[01:06:41] arousal misattribution like just because there's high arousal in an environment doesn't mean that there's transformation in an environment and and I'm really really really really super cautious about suggestibility and authority cues like I I don't want to put myself in a place if you'll
[01:07:00] notice right now there's a purge happening especially in the charismatic movement there's a lot of scandal. There's a lot of, but a lot of it is because authority gets so anchored and there's suggestibility cues. And then there's this kind of narcissistic feedback loop that happens that
[01:07:15] does a disservice to the people and also the disservice to the leaders. And humanity's robbed.
[01:07:22] God is kind of removed from the picture, but it looks like the Lord is doing something because you have a bunch of people all saying the same thing. That does not mean that transformation's happening, and transformation and community is what I'm going for, that that's what I'm going
[01:07:37] for, and I think we have biblical precedent we're going to get for that. I'm not trying to get you to go, whoa, that was a good service. I'm trying to get you to have three generations of life
[01:07:47] anchored in the will of God for your family. I'm trying to build something permanent and real, okay and um and so i'm always going to favor transformation over emotional highs and and what looks big and so that's a harder path for us because on paper it's it's it's more difficult
[01:08:14] to accomplish but i think it's the the path of true church growth and a real legacy sense i think it's a path of healthy people, healthy families. You want your church to grow out of true relationship
[01:08:30] with one another, rooted in Christ, and material needs being met, right? Very practical, okay? So one of the things that I've noticed in observing things is there's the kind of this, I was skeptical of the so-called revivals that were happening. I was watching cautiously because
[01:08:52] I wanted to see kind of where story life fits into the schema of where church is going.
[01:09:00] And the data actually positions us to be kind of the people of the future. I'm going to get to that because the reality is, even though there looks to be some pockets of emerging revival or whatever,
[01:09:14] most of it is driven by music. Most of it's driven by like a high degree of emotionalism, people coming together music preaching is increasingly receding right and and there's a lot of music driven things that aren't really measurable outside of
[01:09:29] when they're occurring and so something happens then it fades off or you have like culturally reactive moments like after Charlie Kirk's death everybody goes to church for me and even though that sounds great and everything but
[01:09:43] you're like that has more to do with political culture and it does necessarily, and there's this kind of weird face of Christianity, this imperial Christianity right now, that make it look like something is happening that's not necessarily really happening. Because
[01:10:02] the reality is, if you look at the number, as of 2023, church attendance is down to 30% from 42% a decade before. Formal membership was down to 47%, and this is of 2020, that was down from 70%
[01:10:16] in 1999 uh christian identification is the one thing that's holding steady at 62 but it's been uh years of decline and uh the reality is if you dig into the research from 2022 to 2024 the research indicates that claims of revival are mostly anecdotal and there's not
[01:10:34] been a surge of like religious recommitting um there is something fascinating called the lie gap in which 22% of people self-report going to church weekly but if you look at the geolocation data of phones which they did that number drops to 5% so people
[01:10:54] say yeah I go to church weekly but the reality is about 5% of people now if you look at Gen Z right only 17% of them go to church 17% of Gen Z go to church now
[01:11:07] you look at that you go oh that's a shame and everything I look at that and I go, aha, I see, I see why God made me the way I am. I see why I'm doing things differently. I see
[01:11:19] why I want to take the message of Christ to college campuses. I see why I want to go to rehabs. I see, hey, Bubba, I see why we're built to be different because we're going to do something that outlast
[01:11:32] any fad, any moment. We're going to build a people and building a people is paramount at a time when everything's digital everything's audio-visual attention spans are shorter than ever and then people are going to start looking for embodied community so
[01:11:49] what's really gonna be something that builds churches and connects people having meals we had two people under the age of 30 just walk up think about that two people under the age of 30 just walk up and be like y'all are having a meal
[01:12:04] together because everything is so heavily digitized everything's so atomized and split that people are looking for embodied community something that we take for granted in our generations is now absent among young people and even what they do see if they
[01:12:18] they're saturated with all these voices online what is not being clarified is the importance and the clarity of the message of who jesus was as god so even that is being lost in the noise
[01:12:29] and church has become kind of a cultural and identity fad more like which tribe do you identify with than it has kind of the apostolic message of Jesus and the community that's built around that.
[01:12:42] And so I think we're in this prime position to change those numbers and be different. But if we try to be like everybody else, we're going to end up with the same result as everybody else.
[01:12:52] Are y'all with me? I know this isn't exactly, now let me get to the text and to the preaching.
[01:12:57] And I'm going to position us kind of as Jesus in the age of the Pharisees. Okay, I'm going to position is, and I'm going to just kind of explain to you how we're thinking. And so you'll notice
[01:13:10] I'm driving us towards embodied community, showing up, being together, presence. I'll continue to break this down. I'll continue to just, this will get smaller and smaller in terms of its importance and face-to-face relationship will get increasingly important. Okay. Homes and those things that we're
[01:13:31] really going to look like the book of Acts, okay? And you'll also notice with my messages, they'll get narrower and narrower. One thing you're going to notice with me, as I think the greatest message I ever preached in terms of form and content was on Genesis 18. I'll never forget
[01:13:44] that message. I preached it, and I walked away, and I was like, boy, that was bad. I was so proud of that message. My messages are going to get increasingly narrow and focused around Jesus.
[01:13:55] That's it. Nothing about, but in our national theology. Of course, buddy. You have water forms today um are increasingly focused on incarnational theology i'm just going to be driving towards who is jesus and what does it mean who is jesus and what does it mean there's
[01:14:11] a temptation when preaching and especially when it's centered around a preacher to have to be revelatory to have to invent new revelation to have to do this i'm not going to live according to that pressure i'm going to talk about jesus and i'm going to talk about community i'm going
[01:14:22] to talk about jesus and i'm going to talk about community until y'all are reciting it in your sleep. That's all we're going to do. Jesus and community, Jesus and community, Jesus and community. Okay. And I think that what does not fit, you discard and you go forward. And here's
[01:14:44] the basis of that. Now let me get into scripture. Mark 2, 23. It's a remarkable verse. I thought of you, Johnny, when I was putting this together, because I know how much you like history.
[01:14:55] Where's Gracie? She kind of abandoned me. She worked on that school project. I sent her stuff and she's like, this guy doesn't know what he's talking about. And I haven't seen her since.
[01:15:06] So we're, we're going to hit on some history today. Okay. Can I get, can I nerd out for a minute? All right. I think this is good for you guys to understand. What I want you to do
[01:15:14] is I want you to kind of understand kind of who the Pharisees were, kind of what Jesus was in that midst and kind of whose story life is in the context of that. Like if you map it onto today's
[01:15:25] world angelique is this okay are you with me all right are we good is this weird it's a different okay okay so it's not typical preaching so it's more just really really like who are we and where
[01:15:38] are we going okay so i'm gonna lay some of this out so that it makes a lot of sense and if you're not in the dates in history you're gonna be bored for the next 15 minutes okay mark 2 23 and it came
[01:15:52] to pass that he, he being Jesus, went through the cornfields on the Sabbath day, and his disciples began as they went to pluck the ears of corn. So he's going through a cornfield, he sees corn,
[01:16:04] he plucks it, okay, to eat. And the Pharisees said unto him, behold, why do they on the Sabbath day that which is not lawful? And he said unto them, have you never read what David did when he had
[01:16:19] need and was and hungered he and they that were with him how he went into the house of god and the days of abiathar the high priest and did eat the showbread which is not lawful to eat but for
[01:16:32] the priest and gave also to them which were with him and he said unto them the sabbath was made for man this is our key verse verse 27 and he said unto them the sabbath was made for man and not man
[01:16:45] for the sabbath verse 28 adds to this and says therefore therefore that's important the son of man is lord also of the sabbath now that is a radical verse those two verses together are astonishing and you could actually use them to summarize the ethos of story life you could kind
[01:17:10] have used them to summarize who we are. Number one, the Sabbath here, the Sabbath was made for man. We're not made for the Sabbath. What is that in story life terms? All of this is useful as long
[01:17:25] as it serves you. The time we come, the building, what we do, how we do it, it's useful as long as it serves you. You were not meant to serve this. You were not meant to, and what we've done is
[01:17:37] we've twisted it because preachers come and be like, welcome to the house of God. Yeah, that's beneficial to them, right? It makes sense that we welcome here. You're not meant to serve a platform, a preacher. We're meant to serve you. And the moment that we stop being useful to you,
[01:17:56] we're irrelevant. Seriously, we're irrelevant. And so whatever it is, whatever it is, if it doesn't fit, if it doesn't serve the people, if it doesn't serve the generation that needs to hear God's voice, if it doesn't serve the community, then it doesn't have a place. Okay. All right. So it
[01:18:19] doesn't have a place because we're not meant to be slaves to religious institutions. We're not meant to be slaves to church. Churches are meant for us, for our life, and for what our relationship with God looks like. And here is the key thing. Therefore, Jesus doesn't just stop there by saying
[01:18:40] the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. And I really hope that you take that home and meditate on that because the implications on grace versus law in that verse alone, the
[01:18:52] implications of saying that this 10th, this 10 commandment that God made, you weren't made to serve it. It was made to serve you should radicalize how you view both God's mandate for you and also
[01:19:09] his view of you. Everything that God does is like, hey, this is about your best interest. This isn't about you serving what I want because I wanted and demanded and you're not. This is about what I want
[01:19:21] serving your best interest. It serves your best interest. I make something for you and you embrace it because it serves and helps you. You were the apple of God's eye. You always were. God cares
[01:19:35] about relationship. He cares about people. He cares about that far more than he cares about titles, buildings, and institutions. Those things are meant to serve you, not the other way around.
[01:19:47] And therefore, the son of man is the Lord also of the Sabbath. Here, Jesus asserts himself and says, I can say that because I am the Lord of the Sabbath. In other words, everything ends up
[01:19:57] being about Jesus. And if it isn't contextualized in the God-man, then it isn't relevant. It isn't relevant. If it's not orienting and that river doesn't go back to the person of Jesus, I love principles, I love ideas, but if those tributaries aren't feeding into Jesus, they're not relevant.
[01:20:20] There's one thing that we're here to talk about, the God-man, Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ. This is all about Jesus. If it starts in Revelation, it better end with Jesus. If it starts in Genesis, it better end with Jesus. Everything points back to Jesus. What does it mean that this
[01:20:35] man is God? What does it mean that he resurrected? What does it mean for you? What does it mean for me? What does it mean for history? What does it mean for the world? Everything comes back to that.
[01:20:46] Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath. And so here you have this situation where Jesus is talking in this context where Pharisees are making the rules. And most of us are familiar with Pharisees, but I think it's helpful to know kind of where they came from in a historical context, because
[01:21:03] what you have is you have the Pharisees ruling in the time of Jesus, and what is kind of a Roman rule period, right? It's the time of Herod. It happens in 63 BC, and that Herodian dynasty
[01:21:20] last until AD 6. So Jesus is living under kind of Roman rule. But one generation before Jesus, you have what's called the Hasmonean period, okay? And we're going to get into this. This is important. So let's rewind a little bit because what you have when it comes to the place that we
[01:21:40] now call Israel is you have it under Persian rule from 539 to 332, and then what we call Hellenistic rule from 332 BC, okay? Hellenistic just means Greek, which means Greek, okay? So the Hellas is the word Greece in Greek, so they call it Hellenistic rule, okay? And so you have
[01:22:00] Alexander the Great's influence and Greek influence dominating this region all the way until what we would call the Maccabean revolts, where there was a revolt in the year 167 BC all the way seven years to 160 BC. Like if you ever read the book of the Maccabees, this is kind of what that's
[01:22:20] talking about and what we would call the Apocrypha, right? It's a history of that. Well, then what happens in the year 140 BC is the start of what we call the Hasmonean period, all right? This is
[01:22:31] important because after years of foreign oversight and rule, you have Judea ruled by a king and high priest merged. And so the people have their own ruler. And this lasts from the year 140 BC all
[01:22:48] the way to 37 BC. Y'all with me? This is relevant. You got this in your head? So imagine being ruled by foreigners, ruled by foreigners, and then all of a sudden you have a king high priest merging
[01:23:01] who then rules Judea. You understanding? Rules the region. So the Jews have their own ruler who considers the law and it's the king. Kings were also high priests, which was controversial, but this is important because they merged the imperial with the priestly. Those two things
[01:23:22] come together in that era. And it's in that era that the Pharisees begin to emerge as a lay movement. The Pharisees start as a people's movement, essentially similar to the evangelicals of america okay they start as a a movement on the ground that says you know what holiness doesn't
[01:23:42] just happen in the temples it happens everywhere and so they begin to advocate for daily life being interpreted through mosaic law okay one of the rulers john her kindness right he sides with the pharisees in the year 134 to 104 bc which lifts up their stature he lifts up their stature
[01:24:01] okay and so that what is it starts as a common movement becomes more ingrained institutionally with the hasmonean dynasty are y'all following this the kingly dynasty and what happens is then this ruler then switches to the sadducees now the sadducees were the temple aristocracy they were
[01:24:20] the ones that were embedded in the temple to to to as the aristotic class aristocratic class it would be like like the senate versus the the uh house of representatives so think of the pharisees
[01:24:30] as the house of representatives representing the people emerging from the people and the Sadducees representing the elite embedded within the temple. The Pharisees were very popular.
[01:24:40] They were teaching popular legal teachings. What's interesting is this leader sides with the Pharisees, then betrays them, right? Switches to the Sadducees. And what this does is this increases the Pharisee street credibility. Okay. Y'all following this? It increases their
[01:24:54] street credibility. So then you have after this, Alexander Janus from 103 to 76 BCE begins to kill the Pharisees, right? This leader and this sectarian violence, and they become even more popular. The Pharisees become more and more popular. And this kind of solidifies from 76 BC
[01:25:14] to 67 when Queen Salome of Alexandria restores Pharisees to power and appoints them to the Sanhedrin. So they became an unstoppable force among the people. They weren't always the elite.
[01:25:26] They emerged from the people and their ideas started as sincere. We want to do this the right way. We want to be more holy. We want to extend temple ideas to everyday life. We don't want to
[01:25:39] just be righteous when we go into the temple and the priest class. We want everybody to be righteous all the time. Sounds good, right? And it starts as a movement among the people, but then becomes embedded with power itself
[01:25:52] through persecution, through being killed.
[01:25:59] You have Rome then comes in and basically takes over from the year 63 BC to the year 86.
[01:26:08] That means that you have the end of the Hasmonean period.
[01:26:11] I want you to think about this when you're reading the Bible because the Hasmonean period only takes place within a generation of Christ being born.
[01:26:17] so within a generation of christ being born jews had rulers that were both kings and high priests that ruled them and then that's gone and they were taken over by herod they were taken over as a roman
[01:26:30] province this is why messianic fervor was at a peak when jesus is coming and he says the kingdom is now they're thinking oh he's going to restore the hasmonean dynasty but greater right they're thinking in terms of, hey, we've been one generation removed from self-rule. Now we have
[01:26:48] the chance to rule again. And so what you see is the exact opposite, that Jesus is talking about something fundamentally different. And the more that he talks about this kingdom, the more agitated those who are expecting a restoration, right, of what of their expectations get. I want you to map
[01:27:07] this. Because what's interesting when we read something like Mark is that Jesus is not a Roman.
[01:27:14] He's not agreeing with the world. He's not coming into agreement with the institutions of the world.
[01:27:19] He's not betraying his people, but he's not accepted by the power that ended up emerging even from amongst the people. He's a man without a tribe. He's a man without a people. He's lost in between worlds. And what you see is that increasingly he agitates both systems. He
[01:27:43] agitates the ones that started out pure and saw themselves as the representative of God and then became the institution. And they had the credibility. The people are with us. We think of the Pharisees as an elite people now, but they were able to say, no, no, no, no, no. We started out
[01:27:58] as a people's movement we started out about holiness we started out without power we were killed our blood led to this point they had credibility and jesus called them whitewashed tombs jesus calls them sons of satan jesus says their efforts make everything worse
[01:28:20] not better? Does that ring any bells in this church today? Do you see any parallels? What happens with Jesus is that he's displaced from the Roman institution that rules the world and he's displaced from his people. He's a man without a home. He's a man who refuses to kowtow and bow
[01:28:43] to any institution that doesn't serve both God's purpose and God's purpose being manifested as people. And so what happens is he's killed by both. He's killed by the Sanhedrin who convicts him and has to turn him over to Pontius Pilate, who then determines his death. And so similar to
[01:29:04] Jesus, I think when you look at his claims and you look at his focus, what you see is a church like Story Life in today's environment. We don't fit in the world, but we don't fit within the
[01:29:18] church as how it's laid out. We are a people really without a home. We refuse to do what everybody else has done, but that doesn't mean we're secular. That doesn't mean we're like the world. We're trying to form our own tribe in much the same way that Jesus had to form his own tribe
[01:29:36] and form his own people. We look at how the world does things, the Romans, and we say, that's not for us. Just because we criticize the church doesn't mean we're like you. We're not you.
[01:29:47] We're distinct from you. We obey and take these things of God very seriously. We want righteousness for our families. But then we turn around and we look at the church and we go, you're making things
[01:29:58] worse than had you done nothing at all. You have forgotten what this was all about. This was about people. This wasn't about power. This wasn't about politics. This wasn't about imperialism.
[01:30:11] this wasn't about rules this was about people and more than anything it was about jesus and if it's not serving that and so we are both in an uncomfortable position because we are are outside of the norm but we're also in the same position that christ was in i really believe that
[01:30:33] about that and so i'm comfortable being in that position i really believe that's who we are and it's interesting because uh you continue to see now if it just for for reference sake um the
[01:30:47] pharisees ended up becoming the rabbinical judaism of today that happens after the destruction of the temple just in case you wanted to know there was a short period if you look at the book of acts from
[01:30:57] 80 41 to 44 where herod of agrippa kind of is the last judean dynasty he comes for like three years and he dies suddenly you can see it in the book of acts he dies suddenly and uh and he he starts
[01:31:09] killing Christians. And it was kind of like this tension that emerged between the early church and kind of the Pharisees and their Jewish roots that ended up kind of splitting permanently after the Bar-Kobar revolt. So just nerding out, if you want to know kind of where Christianity
[01:31:24] and Judaism split, you can kind of see the track line and how they responded to power and how they responded to fundamentally what was happening in the times around them. And it was after the
[01:31:36] destruction of the temple, which Jesus predicted, Jesus says, hey, this temple is going to be destroyed, right? And then he refers to his body as a temple. He says it's going to be raised back
[01:31:45] up. That collision and that difference became kind of final because now once the destruction of the temple takes place, there's no longer a temple. There's no longer sacrifices, which takes place in 70 AD. There's no longer Sadducees. There's only the Pharisees who were originated
[01:32:02] with the idea of making everyday life sacrificial and a temple oriented. And so now that's all that they're left with. That calcifies into what we call rabbinic Judaism. And that now has the Judaism of today versus the Christianity. That's how we kind of became two separate peoples. Y'all
[01:32:20] following? Makes sense? Is this boring? Okay. All right. So what does church look like and where do we want to go? And I'm almost done. I'm almost done. We're going to go to Acts 2, 42 to 7.
[01:32:33] I'm still under an hour.
[01:32:34] I know, son.
[01:32:35] Bye, buddy.
[01:32:35] I got it.
[01:32:37] It's important.
[01:32:39] Hey, next month, guess what, son?
[01:32:41] I'm talking about Batman and Superman in church.
[01:32:45] Yeah.
[01:32:45] March is superhero month.
[01:32:47] It's going to be a lot more fun.
[01:32:50] Yeah.
[01:32:52] All right.
[01:32:54] Acts 2, 42 through 47.
[01:32:56] And then we're going to wrap up.
[01:32:57] Done.
[01:32:58] So the reason that I bring that up and bring that history is because I wanted you to see, like, we think of the Pharisees in one term now.
[01:33:04] We go, oh, those are the bad guys, right?
[01:33:06] oh they're the ones that missed it but they're very much like the church and we hear that that that that used like oh the pharisees and it becomes kind of cliche and commonplace but the
[01:33:17] reality is the parallels are enormous between the evangelical church of america how they emerged as a people's movement then embedded themselves in power and then kind of determined who's in and who's out, right? And the Pharisees, and if you respond in the same way as Jesus did, and I don't
[01:33:37] even go that hard. I don't go that hard at all. But I'm saying I have a basis, Ms. Phyllis, a biblical basis with which if I wanted to, I could draw those comparisons and I could go that
[01:33:48] hard. If the church is not serving people, then it is failing. And let me tell you something, If it's declining, then it's not serving people.
[01:33:59] I don't care how big the mega churches of this country are.
[01:34:03] If the church was serving people, as we'll see in the book of Acts, it would not be declining.
[01:34:11] So I don't care how big some churches are.
[01:34:14] I don't care how, we're on a decline that can only be explained by the fact that we're failing people.
[01:34:20] And if you're failing people, then you're wearing Saul's armor, trying to do God's work.
[01:34:31] You understand me?
[01:34:31] you toss it you toss it man was not made to serve the sabbath the sabbath was made to serve man in other words these institutions were not made for men to serve but they were made to serve men
[01:34:47] if we are serving people we will see growth the way that god grants it if we are serving people then the trend lines will change things will be different and you know what maybe at a large scale
[01:35:02] it doesn't change. But for me and my house, right? For this church, we will be an arc in the middle of the storm. We will be different. We will have different patterns and different trends, and we
[01:35:13] will do things differently. Okay. And so what does that difference look like? It's pretty simple. Acts 2, 42 through 47. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship. Keep that in mind. And in the breaking of bread and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul, and many
[01:35:31] wonders and signs were done by the apostles and all that believed were together and had all things in common and sold their possessions and goods we'll get y'all y'all get there first i'll follow you and part of them to all men as every man had need and they continuing daily with one accord in
[01:35:52] the temple and breaking bread from house to house did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily
[01:36:04] such as should be saved. So when I say, hey, on the Sunday, Communion Sunday, we're going to have a meal together. It's not just Brad being weird. It's Brad saying, look at the book of Acts and
[01:36:16] let's start setting patterns that kind of restore this. Okay. So what are the things that define what we just saw in those five verses? The apostles teaching. They followed the apostles teaching. What is the apostles teaching? It's all about the resurrection. It's all about Jesus.
[01:36:33] All they did is went into public places and said, hey, let me tell you what happened. I was a direct witness of it. And if they weren't a direct witness of it, they knew a direct witness of it.
[01:36:43] And they said, here's what happened. Jesus resurrected. Now, what does that mean? And they reinterpreted Israel's story in terms of Jesus's resurrection. This is who he is.
[01:36:53] So when we say first and foremost, we're going to be like the early church, and we follow the apostles' doctrine, the apostles' teaching, what we're talking about is that Jesus focus. All our job is to say, I don't know about X, Y, and Z. I can't tell you everything about ethics. I can't
[01:37:09] tell you this, this, and this. I can tell you this. I want you to think about what it means if a man resurrected from the dead and claimed to be God. I want you to think about that. I want you to think
[01:37:19] about what it means if God and man are merged to one in the person of Jesus Christ. I want you to think about that. That's all our focus should be on is I don't know about everything, but I know
[01:37:31] about one thing. And that one thing is Jesus. And they had fellowship. And here's what's interesting about the fellowship that they had. The fellowship that they had, it says that they met within the temple area. And if you look, and if I had more time, I would show you photos and stuff. But in
[01:37:48] the temple area, it was kind of like a university courtyard. So they're like, the life is just taking place. What do they call them? The quads? Their life is just taking place. And, and when
[01:38:00] they go and they teach, they're going to just like, they're talking, it's not like this where it's like, okay, everybody sit down and I'm preaching. It's them engaging people where they're at in their everyday life. You hearing me? They're engaging people where they're at in
[01:38:13] everyday life. They're engaging people in the public square to tell them about Jesus. And then afterwards, they're having meals and homes. In other words, they saw their nine to five as an opportunity to go forth and represent Jesus. And then they lived their life together as a community
[01:38:36] in their homes. They broke bread and remembered who Jesus was. Breaking bread, prayer, prayer, was ritualized and routine they had togetherness on a daily basis they had miracle signs and wonders and here's what's key about that this was not miracle signs and wonders as in
[01:38:54] a crusade this wasn't this right and it has its place maybe i don't know man it ain't my bag i grew up with it i'll never forget i went to a crusade once can i just i have two minutes for
[01:39:19] funny story i went to a crusade once and uh the guy was like pulling everybody up and they were he was knocking them all down and he was calling up the pastor's kids and saying i was like 16
[01:39:30] years old he calls me up guys next to me knocks them all down i'm like just standing there knocks them all down nope knocks them all down finally comes up and he's just like he lays his body
[01:39:44] weight and he's like knocking my knees out and he pushes me down he's like here's the lord for you and I'm like, all right, all right, surrender, you win.
[01:39:51] You win, you ever had one of those where you don't go down and they're like tripping you and they do judo?
[01:39:56] They're gonna make sure the power of God hits you.
[01:39:59] That's not what was happening when we see miracle signs and wonders.
[01:40:02] They're going in the square and what's happening is they're talking about Jesus and all of a sudden miracles just emerged.
[01:40:08] I'll never forget when I was preaching one day in the middle of preaching about something, I turned to coach RJ and said, hey, within a year, after all this time, you're gonna have the baby, da, da, da, da.
[01:40:16] They just went back to preaching.
[01:40:17] a miracle hurt within a year it happened right miracles just occur when you're doing the work of god you don't have to get everybody hyped up and in sync in their nervous system and we don't
[01:40:31] have to like we don't have to be emotional when we do it notice how i pray for you now god i want you to like i'm not gonna hit that wow i'm gonna scream healing into you phyllis yeah can you hear
[01:40:52] yet. All right. Here's a big one, guys. They helped each other out financially. They helped each other materially. Derek and Shay have started a business directory here at the church. One of the things that I want to talk to them about is how do we take that and move from a business
[01:41:21] directory to a fund for every kid born into this church? How do we take it and put a thousand dollars into a savings account for every kid? How do we have funds that we can all invest in
[01:41:33] that are mentioned how can we aggregate and actually make money work for us as a community how can we build businesses together how can we take care of one another how can we address needs in an effective manner how can we make it so that our rising tide lifts all of our ships
[01:41:49] in here exactly the same way as the book of acts we shouldn't have it to where i'm doing so well and you're doing so poorly if that's the case if that's the case oh i still want to do well
[01:42:02] don't come ask me for money today. No, I don't care. You can ask me for money. I'll still say no if I need to. But if I'm doing well and you're not, you have a place to criticize me.
[01:42:19] It doesn't mean I'm responsible for you to everything I need. But if there's systemically something going on, we've got to get that right. And there's no reason that we don't have collective aggregate insurance together. There's no reason that we're not functioning with businesses
[01:42:37] together there's no reason that the church doesn't have a fund together there's no reason that every kid born in here doesn't have a guaranteed money for them that when they're 18 they have access to
[01:42:45] college there's no reason we don't have scholarship programs we should have these things and those defined the church and let me tell you something when you're doing that for people you're more relevant than just what i'm doing right now telling you information all right they had good
[01:43:02] Good social standing, that means that they weren't obnoxious and they had God-given growth.
[01:43:08] Acts 4, 32 to 35 talks about how they were with one heart and one soul, Jesus-centered, and that few had needs because they took care of them together.
[01:43:18] That's who we are and where we're going.
[01:43:21] And I wanted to share that with you guys.
[01:43:23] That's my heart.
[01:43:24] That is my hope.
[01:43:26] It'll take us a little bit of time to get there the way that we want it to, but I think we're gonna tell the story of Jesus.
[01:43:31] come, come help me close baby. Cause I'll just ramble. Oh, good. Always like testimonies. Uh, we, we are going to build a people, not just a church. And I wanted to share my heart with you
[01:43:48] guys, my hopes with you guys, my frailties with you guys. And I am figuring this out as the Lord leads me. I pray that you figure it out with me, that you help me, that you, this, this message
[01:43:59] would touch you to some extent, that if you identify with it, that you would help build with us here. And if you don't, I understand. I get that this place is not going to be for everybody.
[01:44:10] Everybody has their own journey, their own needs. But I really believe that we are called to set a standard and a model for the future of the church. I knew it would take about an hour. It took about

[01:44:21] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[01:44:21] an hour. Anything else? I think I'm done. Thank you, Pastor Brad. Wow. I always have to go back and relisten and digest it, even being married to him. Because sometimes he's like, baby, are you tracking with me? And I'm like, I'm trying. It's a lot, but it's so meaningful
[01:44:40] because it told him the history, the way that God has used Brad and continues to. I mean, we haven't seen anything yet, right? Like I'm grateful for his heart, for the church, his heart, you know, even his upbringing. I'm grateful for your upbringing. I think it's funny
[01:44:55] that someone tried to knock you down, you know, like, and, and when you talk about the nonsense of the church, I had a completely different experience. I didn't grow up as a pastor's kid.
[01:45:03] I came up in a lot of brokenness, just went to church here and there, and then really experienced the power of God. And thankfully the people that came into my life were the real deal through and
[01:45:13] through, and they're still in my life and they walk in integrity and they walk in the power of God and nobody tried to push me down. I maybe they didn't. I, God didn't let me experience that part
[01:45:22] the church because I probably would have bailed, but I experienced something completely different.

[01:45:26] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[01:45:26] So it's just funny how the Lord works it. Yeah. Just also in presentation today, I taught for an hour. My goal is to really narrow that down just because of attention spans and use mixed media a
[01:45:38] lot more, tell stories efficiently and effectively about Jesus. And so there's some changes there too.
[01:45:45] It's not just going to be me up here just talking. Okay. I don't think that that works for today's generation. I think those days are over. I can't even do it myself, just so you guys know. So just
[01:45:55] be open to new forms of delivering the same message, okay? All right, y'all good with that?

[01:46:01] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[01:46:01] All right, thank you. Awesome. Awesome. Come on up here, Joe and Nicolette. Come on up here.
[01:46:05] We have a quick testimony. We're going to go right into giving. I also want to give a shout out to our special guests all the way in, Rodney and Dawn from Illinois. Well, you woke up in, it's basically
[01:46:16] like Illinois this morning here in Florida. I saw someone post, we're in Floraska, Florida and Alaska, right? We woke up, it's freezing. So first time visitors, people that are in on vacation, come see us. We want to get to know you. We want to pray over you. It's our heart to do that. And
[01:46:33] so, but right before we get into giving, we have a testimony, okay? I love how God, sometimes you think you're down to the last wire, you're down to the minute, right? But God always comes through.
[01:46:45] and I'm going to let them share it. Go ahead. Thank you. Thank you. A quick testimony.

[01:46:52] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]
[01:46:52] I have received a word for the past three to four years. Whoever has been that long here knows that the Lord was bringing my husband, right? And we saw it come to pass to God be the
[01:47:05] glory. He's here serving, planting. So last year during the conference that's coming up, he received the word he used to go to his church i would come here my church for four three to four
[01:47:21] years he received the word last year here that he was going through a transition the lord was breaking him to build them up to ministry which prophet gideon had released that he was going to
[01:47:33] own multiple hotels to god be the glory he's been through a journey himself where the lord has rebuilt him his faith where he speaks to the lord by himself like he would go to church receive
[01:47:45] award and he receives from here he's been interceding god is working mightily in my husband's life and i love the journey that i've seen him grow throughout this year that's the big testimony from all the ones because someday we'll give you the long story yes last sunday we
[01:48:02] came to church. We are on our seventh extension of PSA to purchase a property, a hotel like the Lord had. And you got a word specifically, Prophet Gideon. Yeah, Prophet gave us the word for closing.
[01:48:16] So last Sunday we come, they told us you need pre-approved. They said you need one more investor, big requirements. A lot of the person needed to have a lot of funding, good credit. And we had
[01:48:29] asked several people and we prayed lord is a big ask we come and we asked pastor rachel for prayer she prayed she said within 48 hours there's gonna be an angelic uh visitation and your divine helper
[01:48:43] and we looked at each other like 48 hours to find a multi-millionaire to co-sign us and trust us it's going to be a big ask the word was released at 1 p.m on sunday by tuesday at 3 p.m my husband
[01:48:58] did a call we were defeated we had asked presented sold some equity of the business signed it off and was just like i remember we were in bed and we're just like just call this
[01:49:07] one last person he said hey we have the situation we need an investor he said send me the information

[01:49:12] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]
[01:49:12] i'll co-sign i kind of put it like uh you know you you you wait years and years to go on vacation to a theme park now you're waiting at the roller coaster and it was like even last week it was like
[01:49:33] you're going you're like you're almost there you're almost there and then you turn it's like here's the whole nother turnstiles right over there and now here we are getting ready to go

[01:49:43] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[01:49:43] on a roller coaster and it's 24 degrees but 30 years i've been in the business serving people

[01:49:57] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]
[01:49:57] and serving other hotel owners and making it happen and making it happen and this is what

[01:50:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[01:50:03] has come to. Give God the glory. You're the owner. Let's stretch our hands towards them. God, we thank you for the completion of the miracle. We thank you, God, as they got everything in line, that
[01:50:17] they are the owners, that they will do great things in the kingdom, that they are wealth investors into the kingdom, God. And as you did it for Nicolette and Joe, and Nicolette and Joe, you're
[01:50:28] going to do it for us, God. You're going to allow all of our businesses, all of our, everything we set our hand to do. It is for a greater purpose. It's for the kingdom, and we thank you that you
[01:50:38] did it for them. You did it in 48 hours. I don't know who needs a 48-hour miracle, God, but we release our faith, and we thank you for supernatural advancement and acceleration over finances. Now,
[01:50:51] we open our mouth, and we prophesy over storyline. We prophesy over investments. We prophesy over what you want to do here at this church, here at this property. We prophesy over our finances. God, we thank you. We're not going to be broke, busted, and disgusted. We're not going to struggle all the
[01:51:07] time. No, we're going to be able to be a giver. We're going to be able not to just give in all of these areas and not have any money to give, but we're going to be able to bless people even
[01:51:16] financially. God, it goes beyond money. It goes into wholeness. It goes into generations serving you, great relationships, people having the right perspective and the right heart and attitude towards the kingdom and the principles of God and we thank you for that today in Jesus name
[01:51:33] amen that was our giving today let's stand to our feet let's bring it down we get to give to be a blessing God loves a cheerful giver not a reluctant giver not a compulsive giver but a cheerful giver
[01:51:47] second Corinthians 9 7 and and I just want to remind you as you give today you online we thank you for your generosity. We do so many things from the faith office. Y'all pray for Pastor Paula,
[01:52:00] right? Y'all remember NFAB, National Faith Advisory Board, to Paula White Ministries, to what we're doing here locally with our food drops, the story life. Who's ready for Unleashed?
[01:52:10] Y'all ready for Unleashed? Get the word out. Please register. It's free to register. February 18th, it is starting. It is going down. We have people coming in all over the world. We do not want you
[01:52:22] to miss it. It is going to be absolutely incredible. So it's just something that, you know, if you can register, it helps us out. But just God is doing some awesome things, and we want to remind you
[01:52:34] that tomorrow, God, it is already, y'all, it's February 1st. So I don't know what happened in January, but welcome to February, okay? So February 2nd, which is tomorrow, we need help with our food pantry. Please arrive here at 10 a.m. We have lines wrapped around the building. It will be a colder
[01:52:52] day. So please come and be prepared. Also February 6th, this Friday, where my lady's at, we are kicking back off our Bible studies. We've been doing it. We, we, we did Christmas party. We took
[01:53:05] a little break for the new year for fasting and, and we've been doing intercessory prayers still, but this Friday I'm doing it. I, the Lord spoke to me. We're changing some things up. We're still
[01:53:14] going to have some events on the weekends, but I'm going to be moving it to Friday mornings at 10 a.m. And we're going to kick off the first one right here at the church. Bring your Bible. We'll
[01:53:24] have the coffee. We'll have some wonderful pastries and treats. And we're going to get together with the ladies. We're going to get in the Word and we're going to pray. So get the Word out. Invite
[01:53:33] somebody that can come hang out with us on Friday and it'll be awesome. What else? We want to thank everyone for making Communion Sunday just an incredible time. And we have free winter kits, y'all for seniors in need. If you know of someone who's a senior, we have partnered with a senior
[01:53:50] resource alliance. They have kids with hand warmers, blankets, jackets. Are you sure you have to be a senior? Because right now I'm in need. I cannot feel my hands. Hand warmers, blankets, gloves, hats, and more. If you're a senior, grab it from the table on the back and stay warm, okay?
[01:54:07] Last night, Asher and Nick and I, we prayed for all of our friends on OBT. You know, my children and saw them, they all get their sleeping bag and their blanket and they're lined up against the
[01:54:16] wall over there by the stadium. And we go out there, we, you know, we feed them chicken. We pray we're going to get ready to do another outreach to y'all. Don't worry. We're getting ready to hit the streets again. But they, they talk about that. That made such an impression in
[01:54:28] them. You know, that my son on the streets tracked down this guy and said, mom, we're not leaving until we find that guy. I mean, it was two hours. I'm like, I don't know if we're going to see that
[01:54:37] guy again. He remembered his name. His name was Joel. And then he came back around the corner and Nick prayed for him. And so, you know, when we go, when we think of the cold weather, they
[01:54:48] open up shelters. I just think of the people who need help, right? There's a lot of people, I mean, but by the grace of God, we could be in that same position, really, like literally by,
[01:54:57] by, by a thread, really like, so think of people, if you know someone who needs a place to stay warm let us know we have a lot of organizations a lot of people that we know and just like pastor
[01:55:08] brad's talking about community community we're here to uplift we're here to help in other ways

[01:55:13] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[01:55:13] make sure you got hand warmers and gloves amen um this yeah for all the singles here uh we're planning with the multiple churches a mixer singles mixer for for february so anybody y'all be better happy for the single people all right anyway and uh we're trying to we're
[01:55:32] gonna expand communion sunday too to include like more stuff i'm excited about it so um make it really a comprehensive day and i think we're also going to try to do a movie night and a board game
[01:55:44] night here at the church for february so we're trying to do let's just have some fun all right

[01:55:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[01:55:49] that's it that's awesome i love it i'm so excited about the singles if you are 18 there's an age right because kirsten well yeah no no we know there's an age because kirsten has a 17 year old
[01:56:02] and she was like well that's you know anyway no no no no hey that was the mama's discretion she'll be 18 in two months that's why I say that there is an age there's an age and so if you're 18 because my kids were confused too I said
[01:56:23] guys you go one day you're gonna know you're the person you're gonna marry but for 18 19 for young adults who have really been wanting to get married Yeah. No, that's what I'm saying. Like we have, we believe the church is a place to foster those
[01:56:38] relationships, to foster those relationships. And so we want to encourage that. That has been Brad and I's heart. We want to see, I know Lynette's going to get married. God show me her husband multiple times. We want to see what God, the next phase of your life. And I can't wait
[01:56:54] because it's coming soon, Lynette. We want to see these things come to fruition and we're your biggest cheerleaders, right? The world has all the perverted ways. They have all the crazy apps and all the stuff that people go missing and sex traffic and all this nuts and all the crap. No,
[01:57:07] no, it's absolutely bonkers out there. No, we are going to do it right and trust God for godliness and healthy whole relationships, right? Maybe some of y'all were married before and it was a disaster.
[01:57:18] God's got a new beginning. He's got a new marriage. He wants you to enjoy life, right? He doesn't want you to repeat the same cycles, okay? But I did want to say the age thing because my kids were
[01:57:29] like, we're coming. And I'm like, guys, y'all can come and pray. Asher, you can come and pray.
[01:57:34] So anyway, y'all ready to dismiss today? Let's stand to our feet. Let's stand to our feet and let's close out. We love y'all church family. Jeremiah 29, 11, for I know the story I have for
[01:57:48] you a life of a hope and a future do you need to say something okay hold on and then we are out

[01:57:54] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]
[01:57:54] love y'all love y'all everybody love you pastor rachel love you pastor brad hey y'all we had our first communion sunday last week and i want to say y'all there were a few people that showed up here
[01:58:05] at 6 a.m to start setting up 6 15 and it took us four hours and we still needed help amen but when we broke down it took 30 minutes to break everything down so i say this to ask if you were
[01:58:16] one of those people that helped break down and you want to be like, yo, I'm available. I can help next week, next month, two months from now, whenever. Meet me at that table back there with
[01:58:25] my beautiful, lovely wife. I'm going to get your information and we're going to make next communion Sunday very, very smooth. All right. Love y'all.