Latest / Rick Manis Ministries Podcast / God is a Nurturer

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God is a Nurturer · Rick Manis Ministries Podcast

0:15
SPEAKER_00: The first time I ever uh spoke publicly uh uh in front of a church.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: Uh Judy found out it was actually uh on a June 21st, uh, 1981.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: Uh was the first time I ever uh spoke on a Sunday morning in church.
0:33
SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of an anniversary for me, but it's special to me because of my uh Heavenly Father.
0:39
SPEAKER_00: This is something very personal, something dear to me.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: I'm honored and excited to be able to share from my heart about our Father in the way that we're talking about this this morning.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: God is a nurturer.
0:55
SPEAKER_00: Um He cares.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: And of course, there's a there's a verse of Scripture that's real dear to me.
1:00
SPEAKER_00: It's in Psalms chapter 27, verse 10.
1:04
SPEAKER_00: And it says that when my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take care of me.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: And uh it's dear to me because of my story.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: And it's a story, of course, of the love of God.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: It's a story of something that was only made possible uh with me and and and my earthly father because of that love of God, and because of his caring and his nurturing and and the way that he brings us up.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: You know, he's so sweet, he's so good, he's so so personal, he really is gentle and kind, and I know we throw those words around, but but he is.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I can remember there were times early on and earlier on in my ministry when I'd I'd hear a lot of talk that and I'd kind of kind of jump in with other people, or they'd talk about, oh, God just took me to the woodshed this week, you know.
1:51
SPEAKER_00: And so I would repeat things like that.
1:53
SPEAKER_00: But sometime later I'd look back and I'd say, you know what?
1:56
SPEAKER_00: I've never been taken to the woodshed, you know.
1:59
SPEAKER_00: Or people say, Boy, God just yelled at me this week and just told me, and I'd I'd say things like that too.
2:04
SPEAKER_00: And I'd but then later on, I'd like, God has never yelled at me.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: Not one time.
2:11
SPEAKER_00: And we want to look at the reality of this.
2:14
SPEAKER_00: When father and mother forsake me, the Lord will take me in.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: This this actually happened to me.
2:19
SPEAKER_00: Um, I grew up uh over in Titusville, Florida.
2:24
SPEAKER_00: And uh uh back in the 60s, my dad, you know, worked on the Apollo program over there, and I was very proud of that.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: And to me, my dad was the smartest man in the world.
2:33
SPEAKER_00: He was uh the the most, he was he was he was the man.
2:37
SPEAKER_00: He was that one that, you know, I'm gonna be like you, dad.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: He was just, I just, I just felt lucky to have him as a dad.
2:46
SPEAKER_00: And uh he was always my favorite.
2:48
SPEAKER_00: Honestly, I I honestly growing up, I never felt like I was his favorite.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: I felt like my sister or my brother might have been.
2:56
SPEAKER_00: And and I don't know if that was really the case, but I felt like that.
2:58
SPEAKER_00: I I never once remember feeling like, oh, dad loves me best.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: But it didn't matter, I loved him the best.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, and I'd try to hang out with him.
3:07
SPEAKER_00: My dad was very mechanically inclined, and I wasn't, and you know, and he would like, you know, he'd say, you know, hand me the hand me a socket, and so I'd give him a hammer so he could sock it, and I didn't know, you know, and but but uh always like trying to hang out with them.
3:23
SPEAKER_00: And and my dad was, you know, he was he was like a lot of the old-fashioned dads.
3:27
SPEAKER_00: He showed his love by putting bread on the table, you know, and didn't didn't verbalize, wasn't um, you know, wasn't didn't do like I see a lot of dads doing now.
3:37
SPEAKER_00: Um but that was normal for the time.
3:40
SPEAKER_00: And uh a time came when I was about 12 years old when mom and daddy were gonna split up.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: They were gonna they were getting ready to divorce, and they sat they sat us kids down at the table, and uh they asked us who we wanted to go with.
3:54
SPEAKER_00: They gave us that choice.
3:56
SPEAKER_00: I said daddy.
3:57
SPEAKER_00: I mean he was my hero.
3:58
SPEAKER_00: He was my favorite, I could not imagine be without him.
4:01
SPEAKER_00: And uh and of course, a story like that has a lot of ugly things that you could bring up, but but the thing was I really I just wanted to be with dad.
4:11
SPEAKER_00: He was my hero.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: And uh and after about a year after that divorce, he had met another lady and they were getting married, and she had a couple of boys, and we really liked them, and we really liked her.
4:23
SPEAKER_00: And uh they were telling us they were gonna get married.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: And uh me and my sister and brother were very excited about it.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: We thought the Brady Bunch was was was fresh on TV back then.
4:32
SPEAKER_00: We thought we were gonna be exactly like that, and we were gonna be nice to each other all the time, and if there was any disagreement, we would just be perfect, we would you know perfectly handle it.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: And and uh, you know, my dad was better than the Brady Bunch dad anyway.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: I thought he'd handle things even better than that.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, the Brady Bunch thing didn't happen.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: Once we got in the house together, there were jealousies, there was fighting, there was all kinds of stuff going on.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: And uh it was it was a real mess, and my dad made a hard decision and uh decided to that me and my brother and sister, we would go off and we would live with my mom.
5:05
SPEAKER_00: And uh, and and and in all these things, you know, it really uh it really uh hurt me when I looked back on it.
5:11
SPEAKER_00: And uh I really felt that a sense of rejection.
5:14
SPEAKER_00: I felt like daddy doesn't want me.
5:16
SPEAKER_00: And uh my mama, she was just she was she was a mess herself.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: She had she had addictions, she was it was it was hard.
5:24
SPEAKER_00: She she was I don't believe she was really in real good shape to be uh to be raising us alone, uh, didn't have skills, you know, so we were poor, and and it was it, I hated it.
5:33
SPEAKER_00: I just hated living with mama in those conditions, and began to despise dad for making us do that.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: And of course the rejection uh started setting in.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: And at a very young age, 13, 14, 15, and there, I just kind of kind of went off on my own.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: I just quit coming home for long periods of time, uh, got you know heavily into just doing what I did.
5:58
SPEAKER_00: I didn't feel like anybody else cared about me.
6:00
SPEAKER_00: I didn't feel like anybody else would or could take care of me, so I tried to take care of myself as a kid.
6:05
SPEAKER_00: And I made all the wrong choices anybody could make and and did what almost anybody in that position would do.
6:10
SPEAKER_00: I get into the the drugs and become addicted to things and alcoholism and and do and become a petty criminal, and and I'm in and out of jail a whole lot, and I'm a you know, I'm a teenager, and um, living on the streets, and many times I'm sleeping under bridges, you know, uh street overpasses, and uh, and uh uh sometimes just finding parked cars that were unlocked and sleeping there.
6:33
SPEAKER_00: And here I was, and and you know, at the age when you're to have the whole world ahead of you, and I'm done.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: I've got nothing.
6:39
SPEAKER_00: Life is horrible, the world's a dirty place to be, and I sure don't like me.
6:42
SPEAKER_00: And I'm engaging in all this self-destructive behavior.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: And uh, and uh and then a wonderful thing happened in April of 1979.
6:51
SPEAKER_00: I met Jesus.
6:53
SPEAKER_00: And uh for the first time in my life, I'll tell you this this is this is what I what on that day it was in a little church out in the country, and they had those altars in the front, and we you came and you knelt down uh to those to the altars and you prayed whatever prayer, and it worked.
7:09
SPEAKER_00: And I remember turning around and feeling I honestly felt the love of God.
7:13
SPEAKER_00: I felt like I was loved for the first time in my life.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: And I turned around and looked at people and I felt like I loved everybody.
7:19
SPEAKER_00: And it was it was it was amazing.
7:21
SPEAKER_00: And there was one person who was an enemy of mine who had recently gotten saved about two months before, and I hated that person even more because now they're righteous, and or you know, and and and and I turned around, and when I turned around, he was looking at me with tears in his eyes, and I we just hugged each other.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was like, what's going on here?
7:40
SPEAKER_00: This whole thing is wonderful.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, later on I've got a testimony, I mean, you know, later on in my life, there's a testimony of how I I got into more of a, you know, I was taught a mixed gospel, so that that kind of got me into some really bad ideas about God.
7:55
SPEAKER_00: But when I about 20 years ago, when I my eyes were opened to the goodness and the fullness and the love and the grace of God, it actually brought me back to that first day, my first love was Him loving me.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: And but there I was, and I still had all these issues in my life, but God began to nurture me.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: And I can remember, now this is when for me He became not only my heavenly father, but like He was like an earthly father that I never really had in those formative years.
8:30
SPEAKER_00: And and this might sound funny to you, and but it just doesn't go away, it just sticks in my mind, but I can remember the first time I felt the care of God or the personal nurturing of God really caring something about me.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: And I was on a basketball court, and I'm just and and me and some guys, we're just we're just shooting some hoops, and I'm trying to hit a bunch of, I'm trying to hit nothing but three-pointers, and and I'm just clanging everything, and you know, and the way I was, I was very easily frustrated about everything all the time.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: And uh, and I was just getting more frustrated, and and out of the blue, this the that that voice came from somewhere that I that was different than anything.
9:09
SPEAKER_00: And and I know it's just basketball, right?
9:12
SPEAKER_00: But I heard this voice say, Slow down, son.
9:17
SPEAKER_00: Step into it, follow through, and watch it go in.
9:19
SPEAKER_00: Something like that, and it just, I know it's basketball.
9:22
SPEAKER_00: Who cares about basketball?
9:24
SPEAKER_00: Certainly not God, right?
9:25
SPEAKER_00: But I felt this nerve, this intimate thing, and it just it just hit me.
9:30
SPEAKER_00: I just thought, I didn't know.
9:32
SPEAKER_00: I was very young Christian, and I just I thought, oh, I don't know what that was, but I thought, well, where did that come from?
9:38
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't me talking to myself.
9:39
SPEAKER_00: I know what that sounded like.
9:41
SPEAKER_00: But anyways, things like that started happening.
9:44
SPEAKER_00: I remember working on my car and working on the brakes, and I was getting frustrated again, and I was throwing tools, and and you know, and I and I and I couldn't get the caliper to open, and and then there was that, son, try this.
10:01
SPEAKER_00: And and it was just that that that voice treating me good like that.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: And so I did exactly what it said, and and it just clicked and worked, and and there would be those those those situations like that.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: And then later on, as I'm growing, actually operating in ministry, I can remember times and I'm like, God, God, help me with this.
10:22
SPEAKER_00: I still got these tendencies that I don't like, and and and why don't you just get them out?
10:26
SPEAKER_00: I've been praying that you would change me and take these things out of me.
10:28
SPEAKER_00: And and and then I heard this voice while I was praying one time.
10:34
SPEAKER_00: And it went something like this.
10:35
SPEAKER_00: He said, He said, Son, I could I could just fix that and take that away right now.
10:40
SPEAKER_00: He says, But I'm weaving my ways in you.
10:42
SPEAKER_00: And as you walk with me, you're gonna grow.
10:46
SPEAKER_00: And and as I look back over time, I can't tell you the day when it happened, but I can look back now and say, somewhere between now and then, that it happened.
10:56
SPEAKER_00: I can remember one time uh, you know, I was I was I was here I was hearing somebody speak, and as I was sitting there, I was just judging this person.
11:04
SPEAKER_00: I felt like I could just, I it felt like I was discerning like like like selfish motivations and all kinds of different things, and I hated thinking like that, and I hated feeling like that.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: And I went I went to my my hotel room and I just cried and I said, God, I don't like feeling this way about people.
11:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't like, I remember she had her book table out there, and I couldn't even talk to look at her.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: I just thought, I just felt, just felt so separated.
11:25
SPEAKER_00: And I and I said, God, I don't like that.
11:28
SPEAKER_00: And he and and I I heard something like, son, you're gonna grow.
11:33
SPEAKER_00: Where the things that other people do won't affect your soul negatively.
11:36
SPEAKER_00: Now, in all these things, when I look back, I I've I've noticed now as I think of these things that God was never as urgent about it as I was.
11:46
SPEAKER_00: Because he's a nurturer.
11:49
SPEAKER_00: He's not not just a fixer.
11:51
SPEAKER_00: It kind of reminds me of like when I when I first sent my kids off to school, you know, and they're going to school, now they're going to be away from you for hours.
11:58
SPEAKER_00: And I know what's there waiting.
11:59
SPEAKER_00: I know what school has.
12:01
SPEAKER_00: There are bullies in school.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: There's going to be times when they cut her out of the circle.
12:05
SPEAKER_00: There's going to be times when, you know, somebody's going to say, we don't want to play with you.
12:10
SPEAKER_00: There's going to be all that stuff.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: And you're just like, you feel like you just want to say on day one, you want to go in the class and say, This is my daughter.
12:17
SPEAKER_00: Don't anybody ever hurt her.
12:19
SPEAKER_00: Don't anybody ever do it.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: You know, you want to protect like that.
12:23
SPEAKER_00: But you can't do that, and that really is not the best way to handle it.
12:27
SPEAKER_00: So what you can do is you can give her some words, you can talk to her, you can nurture her, you know, you can nurture them so they can deal with the things of life.
12:35
SPEAKER_00: And that's what God does with us.
12:37
SPEAKER_00: A lot of times we, you know, people think, well, God can do anything.
12:39
SPEAKER_00: How come he doesn't just fix this?
12:41
SPEAKER_00: And how come he doesn't do that?
12:42
SPEAKER_00: It's not, it's it's not that way.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: It never was that way with God.
12:45
SPEAKER_00: It's always been a personal thing.
12:47
SPEAKER_00: It's always been a loving thing, a caring thing, where it's it's it's nurturing, it's rearing.
12:52
SPEAKER_00: And his ways become our ways.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: We take on the likeness of our Father in our growth.
12:58
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we tell people don't ever don't ever be uh upset or frustrated with yourself because you're not where you want to be spiritually, or you still see tendencies that you're like, why can't I just stop doing this?
13:11
SPEAKER_00: What we tell people is celebrate the growth.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: Because you're being cared for, you're being nurtured.
13:17
SPEAKER_00: And God's not holding any of it against us.
13:19
SPEAKER_00: He's a father who loves and he cares and he nurtures.
13:23
SPEAKER_00: God is really a nurturer.
13:25
SPEAKER_00: And it was wonderful to me.
13:26
SPEAKER_00: It's very personal to me because I didn't have that.
13:30
SPEAKER_00: My daddy's story is not as wonderful as most stories I hear.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: On this day, when almost all my life in churches, all everybody talked about was how wonderful dads are, and my dad was the greatest, and this and that and the other, and I'm sitting there like, boy, am I the only one with a story like this?
13:48
SPEAKER_00: And I thought my dad was great, and he was a good man.
13:50
SPEAKER_00: He probably never took a penny that didn't belong to him.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: He was he was as honest as the day is long, good moral man, you know, worked you know, faithfully and faithful to mama, all that stuff.
14:02
SPEAKER_00: But I wasn't nurtured.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: And God nurtured this soul, he nurtured this broken heart.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: In Romans 8, 15, he says, You did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry, Abba Father, Daddy, oh daddy, father.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: There's a that spirit of inner that says, You're my dad.
14:29
SPEAKER_00: You care, you helped me shoot the three-pointer.
14:34
SPEAKER_00: You're nurturing me, you're you're you're gently helping me to grow.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: And that makes the growth okay.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: I don't have to know everything, I don't have to be perfect in any way.
14:42
SPEAKER_00: I I'm with daddy.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm in the best place I can be.
14:46
SPEAKER_00: Are y'all hearing me this morning?
14:48
SPEAKER_00: That spirit of adoption is a little bit funny to us because we think of the legal uh adoption, but that word is huathesia.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: Huios meaning son, and thesia talking about placement, it means he placed us into sonship.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: And I feel like that's exactly what happened to me.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: He placed me into sonship when I didn't feel like like like my daddy wanted me, like I wasn't worthy to be his son, apparently.
15:10
SPEAKER_00: Children think all these things, and and and you just and and I felt unlovable growing, you know, in those those years.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: If daddy can't love me, who can love me?
15:21
SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't even love me.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: And did some very, very almost every every choice I made seemed to be self-destructive.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: But he placed me into sonship.
15:34
SPEAKER_00: You know, in in the book of John, chapter 14, verse 18, he says, I will not leave you orphans.
15:42
SPEAKER_00: I will come to you.
15:45
SPEAKER_00: And and I like think when he's telling these people in John, he's telling his disciples here, no, think about this.
15:50
SPEAKER_00: Here they are, they have these guys that are following Jesus, people that believe in Jesus, even if sometimes if they would just say, Well, Jesus healed me, they excommunicate them.
16:00
SPEAKER_00: Well, they'll kick them out of the church.
16:01
SPEAKER_00: They don't want you saying anything about Jesus in most of the churches they were going to.
16:06
SPEAKER_00: And here's these people, their families are are are separated now, they're because they're because they're it's almost like they're leaving, in a sense, they're leaving the the the traditions of their fathers and Moses and Abraham to take a flying leap with this man from Galilee.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: And you can imagine, you know, I've I've even just changing churches, just leaving one church and going to another.
16:25
SPEAKER_00: There's all this stuff that's gone in my head, but it's like, am I doing the right thing?
16:28
SPEAKER_00: You know, what am I doing here?
16:31
SPEAKER_00: And you kind of feel that security of having that old thing, even though you know there's something better out there, and you really want this and you really want to go there, but but there's this sense of security, family, something there that it's hard to break from.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: And and here they have this and they've done this.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: And it's like Jesus is assuring them, it's like, listen.
16:50
SPEAKER_00: So they're saying that Abraham's our father, and now you guys are going with this other thing.
16:54
SPEAKER_00: They're saying we have Moses, all these traditions.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: He says, Listen, I'm not going to leave you orphans.
17:01
SPEAKER_00: You've got a you've you've you've you've got a heritage.
17:04
SPEAKER_00: I'm giving you the spirit, I'm giving you something that goes past Abraham, something before Moses, something before Adam, something before anything was created, because your father is God.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: I'm giving you a heritage of heaven, I'm giving you a heritage of eternity, I'm giving you a heritage of absolute complete love.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: You'll never be alone.
17:30
SPEAKER_00: This is what we got.
17:32
SPEAKER_00: Well, the story goes on.
17:35
SPEAKER_00: So I got saved at the age of 21.
17:41
SPEAKER_00: Very soon I went into the ministry.
17:47
SPEAKER_00: I before that happened, let me let me say this because I got the worst point of it when I was right when I was about 18.
17:54
SPEAKER_00: Now I had, I mean, my life was so messed up, dropped out of school, the whole thing.
17:59
SPEAKER_00: I got in contact with dad, and uh we talked a little bit, and he I was gonna move move back in with him, he's gonna help me and get my diploma and get me get me into college, help me go to college and all that stuff, and so this is a time in my life and things are gonna change.
18:13
SPEAKER_00: I'm coming back with dad.
18:14
SPEAKER_00: Always did love dad, even though I was hurt.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: Always wanted dad, always wanted my dad.
18:20
SPEAKER_00: But we get together now.
18:21
SPEAKER_00: I'm at the age, I've been on, I've been doing my own thing way too long.
18:25
SPEAKER_00: And he's still a very authoritarian person.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: And he would, you know, he had rules, and I hated those rules.
18:31
SPEAKER_00: I thought, where were you when I when I needed you, and now you want to tell me what to do?
18:35
SPEAKER_00: And we we we clashed and we had these these verbal fights all the time, and it got so bad that one time I mean we st we called each other outside and we were face to face, ready to go to blows.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: And I backed down and I went and packed and I hit the road hitchhiking.
18:53
SPEAKER_00: I left.
18:54
SPEAKER_00: And didn't see him for many years, but after I met Jesus and my heart was beginning to heal, I came into contact with him again.
19:05
SPEAKER_00: Actually, I'd moved back to Titusville to start a church there in 1989.
19:11
SPEAKER_00: And uh I wanted my kids to know their grandpa, so I would I would go and visit him, and when we first started, we were like a couple of businessmen.
19:18
SPEAKER_00: It was very cordial.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: How you doing, Dad?
19:20
SPEAKER_00: How you doing, Rick, you know.
19:22
SPEAKER_00: But we kept hanging out and I kept going to visit, and my heart had been healed, and none of the things, none of the things from the past were there in in my heart.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what was going on in his mind, but my heart was healed.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: And I didn't need anything from Daddy anymore.
19:42
SPEAKER_00: I really had a love, and I just wanted to love him.
19:46
SPEAKER_00: I didn't even want, I didn't, I never even brought up the past or anything.
19:49
SPEAKER_00: As far as I was concerned, Daddy doesn't owe me a thing anymore.
19:53
SPEAKER_00: I don't need anything.
19:54
SPEAKER_00: My heart has been healed by my heavenly father.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: He's been nurturing me.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: Daddy, I'm okay.
20:01
SPEAKER_00: God's been nurturing me, God's been good to me.
20:04
SPEAKER_00: I'm not bitter, I'm not angry, I'm not hurting anymore, I'm not dysfunctional anymore.
20:11
SPEAKER_00: I'm loved.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: And I love you.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: And it took a little while, but he began to believe it.
20:18
SPEAKER_00: He began to see it.
20:20
SPEAKER_00: He began to see that I didn't want anything from, he began to see that none of the things from our past had any kind of gap between us.
20:29
SPEAKER_00: And we became very comfortable around each other.
20:32
SPEAKER_00: We became, we became good, we became good, not only good friends, but we became daddy and son, and we went fishing all the time.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: And we he had a boat, we'd go out on the ocean, and those were our greatest times.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: And and we would, when he when he needed help, he'd call me.
20:45
SPEAKER_00: When I needed help, I'd call him.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: Me and Daddy got home together.
20:51
SPEAKER_00: And he became daddy again.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: And I became and and even though it was older, I didn't have that when I was younger.
20:56
SPEAKER_00: I was getting the best version of him, and he was getting the best version of me.
21:00
SPEAKER_00: And at later time in our life, we had a wonderful time.
21:04
SPEAKER_00: Not only that, but at one point near the uh about 1998, uh one thing, one thing about daddy was he he was very spiritual but hated Christianity.
21:18
SPEAKER_00: In fact, before I ever became, I remember as a kid, he said, don't ever get religious.
21:24
SPEAKER_00: And uh and and and and he just he hated Christianity and he just uh he he didn't have much respect for the Bible, but he was kind of a I don't know what he was a kind of a mixture of new age and reincarnation and and astral projection, and I mean he was into all this psychic phenomena, he was into all this anything spiritual except Christianity.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: Buddha, whatever, you know.
21:48
SPEAKER_00: And uh but in 1998, he'd you know he started coming to my church and we'd be, you know, hanging out, and maybe he saw the fruit, but anyway, in 1998, he Came forward in a church here in Orlando and my daddy got saved.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: My daddy got saved.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: And uh after that, he started coming to my church.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: Pretty soon I'd have him greeting at the door, you know, and he just wanted to help in every way.
22:19
SPEAKER_00: And uh he was retired, so he took a job driving a shuttle at the airport, and he became maybe my best evangelist.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: He would just tell everybody about our church and invite people to church.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: And think about that.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: Me and Daddy were working together in ministry now.
22:37
SPEAKER_00: And me and Daddy became very, very close.
22:41
SPEAKER_00: Probably about the last year of his life, he he bought a bought a motorhome and traveled around the country, and that was probably the happiest I'd ever seen that man.
22:50
SPEAKER_00: You know, I never brought up the past, and sometimes it would it would just come up, but he had different versions of it than I did.
22:58
SPEAKER_00: He had a version where he actually did the right things, and and I never in my case, I never tried correcting him.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: I just thought, let the let the man have peace at this time in his life.
23:10
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's he doesn't owe me anything.
23:14
SPEAKER_00: I was healed.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: Someone had nurtured me.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: I was healed.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: I was well.
23:21
SPEAKER_00: I was in a place that you just can't get to on your own.
23:24
SPEAKER_00: You I was in a place that without God you don't go.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: I was well, I was healed.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: Daddy died a few years ago.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: I was the last one that he called.
23:37
SPEAKER_00: Told me that he had very late stage cancer, there was nothing they could do, and he was about to get his affairs in order.
23:45
SPEAKER_00: I made plans to go to go and see him.
23:47
SPEAKER_00: I was living in another state at the time.
23:49
SPEAKER_00: I was making plans to come and to come down and see him, but he died just a few days later.
23:56
SPEAKER_00: And at his funeral, I was I was remember thinking, I was so glad for what God did, not only in me, of course, but with him.
24:04
SPEAKER_00: He truly turned the hearts of the Father to the Son in that situation.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking that this could not have happened without an unconditional love that was given to me.
24:18
SPEAKER_00: Because that unconditional love became something I could give to a man that had become my enemy at one time.
24:27
SPEAKER_00: Now, as I tell this, and before I I go to wrapping this up, as I tell this, I want, I want to I want to say this.
24:33
SPEAKER_00: Please don't feel like, if you've got a situation that that resembles this in any way, please don't feel like I'm telling you to do what I did.
24:42
SPEAKER_00: I know it's a personal thing, and it's with you and you and God, and and it's not, there's not a set rule.
24:48
SPEAKER_00: In some cases, it can't be done.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: It can't work out the way I the way it has with mine.
24:53
SPEAKER_00: So please don't feel like that.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: But the whole point of this is that God took us in.
25:02
SPEAKER_00: And he nurtured us and he cared for us.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: And I think a lot of people miss that where they they they they're looking, they're they're looking at the things that are going on in this world.
25:10
SPEAKER_00: There are there are good things that happen, but sometimes there are bad things, and people will kind of they'll take it personal sometimes.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: You know, if something doesn't work out, it's almost like God did that to me.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: You know, Jesus said, in this world there's tribulation, and he really didn't do much about that.
25:27
SPEAKER_00: They wanted him to.
25:29
SPEAKER_00: You know, when will you establish your kingdom in the earth?
25:31
SPEAKER_00: Take care of Rome, take care of Herod, take care of Israel.
25:35
SPEAKER_00: He said, in the world there's tribulation, but in me there's peace.
25:38
SPEAKER_00: And be of good cheer because I've overcome all of that.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: We're in a world right now, we're in a year of a whole lot of chaos, aren't we?
25:47
SPEAKER_00: But in him, isn't there such peace?
25:49
SPEAKER_00: Aren't we so glad to be in the best place we could be with God?
25:53
SPEAKER_00: Someone who does care.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: And you know, this thing is so personal, and this is what we want everybody to know that this whole thing is all about this personal thing.
26:02
SPEAKER_00: It's a relationship.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: It really gets rid of all the rules, it really gets rid of all the why this and why that and everything else.
26:08
SPEAKER_00: And you just know that you're with your heavenly daddy.
26:12
SPEAKER_00: And in my worst situations, when pressures of life come and I have trials like you do, and everybody, everybody has, sometimes the pressure comes comes down on you.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: What works for me is I'm just like it, I just remember I'm in the best place I can be.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: I'm with the one that I will be with throughout eternity.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: Daddy cares.
26:34
SPEAKER_00: In Luke chapter 4, verse 18.
26:40
SPEAKER_00: It's where Jesus famously said that the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor.
26:49
SPEAKER_00: He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted.
26:51
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to finish with this verse because this is where I see me.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: That word brokenhearted is amazing when you look it up.
26:59
SPEAKER_00: The words are very strong.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: It means crushed, utterly shattered, broken in pieces.
27:07
SPEAKER_00: Not just a cracked heart.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: And I feel like my heart had been utterly shattered.
27:14
SPEAKER_00: The things that I experienced at a young age, it burst that bubble of protection that I thought I had in my nuclear family.
27:23
SPEAKER_00: And I found myself naked to the world and all on my own as just a kid, or I felt like I was.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: And this broken boy, crushed in pieces, shattered, completely lost, had no clue.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: How does this happen?
28:07
SPEAKER_00: Somebody had to love me.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: Somebody had to love me.
28:15
SPEAKER_00: I don't mean to sound like a woe was me, but I honestly didn't think anybody would or could.
28:25
SPEAKER_00: But somebody loved me.
28:26
SPEAKER_00: I remember that love when I when I first came to the Lord in those days, everybody was just preaching, you need to get right with God because you're going to hell and you're, you know, and and and I and I and I believed enough of that gospel message that I just knew that I needed to get right with God.
28:42
SPEAKER_00: And I was scared of hell.
28:44
SPEAKER_00: And I felt like God, I mean, I was unlovable anyway, but tackling all the things that I was doing and the way my life was, there was no way God could like me.
28:55
SPEAKER_00: Thankfully, I believed enough to know that if I called on him, that he would take me as I was.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: And when he did, and I felt that love, I remember sitting around a table with people and saying, This is what nobody told me this.
29:10
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I would have done this sooner.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: What surprised me most about salvation was the love that I felt.
29:20
SPEAKER_00: And maybe it was because there was such a dearth of it before.
29:23
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I just didn't, I felt like I was in a desert before, but maybe I was like that sinful woman that came in and anointed, kissed Jesus' feet.
29:38
SPEAKER_00: Just felt like I had much sin and was forgiven of much.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: But I felt loved.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: Thanks be to God.
29:49
SPEAKER_00: I'm not that broken, dysfunctional kid anymore.
29:54
SPEAKER_00: And when I say kid, I mean even as a young adult.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: Thanks be to God.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: That love, this is my message everywhere.
30:04
SPEAKER_00: That love is the fullness that fills every heart that can receive it.
30:12
SPEAKER_00: When I saw the fullness of how much God loved me, and honestly, I the the the the true revelation of it didn't even happen until about 20 years after my salvation.
30:26
SPEAKER_00: But I had a God who was this big, and when I my eyes opened up to seeing that he loved me with absolutely no conditions, he was infinitely large.
30:36
SPEAKER_00: And I went from the Christian that was saying, I believe God loves me, but I just don't see how he can, because we say those things because we're looking at us.
30:45
SPEAKER_00: But when you look at him, you say, Of course he would love me.
30:50
SPEAKER_00: Look at him.
30:52
SPEAKER_00: Of course he would die for me.
30:53
SPEAKER_00: How could he not?
30:55
SPEAKER_00: That's who he is.
30:58
SPEAKER_00: Of course he forgives infinitely.
31:00
SPEAKER_00: Look at him.
31:02
SPEAKER_00: He could do no less than that.
31:05
SPEAKER_00: God is love.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: Does he really care?
31:09
SPEAKER_00: Can he care?
31:10
SPEAKER_00: Don't look at all this stuff that's going on here.
31:13
SPEAKER_00: Look at him.
31:14
SPEAKER_00: And you'll say, of course, he could do no less.
31:17
SPEAKER_00: How could he not?
31:19
SPEAKER_00: See, aren't we learning?
31:21
SPEAKER_00: Even as we hear these messages week after week, aren't we learning that it we're to take our eyes off of all of us and all this stuff, and we're looking at him and it's making us full.
31:33
SPEAKER_00: And a full heart doesn't need anything.
31:36
SPEAKER_00: A full heart doesn't need any payback.
31:38
SPEAKER_00: A full heart needs no revenge.
31:40
SPEAKER_00: A full heart doesn't need anything.
31:43
SPEAKER_00: It's got everything that it really wanted.
31:46
SPEAKER_00: I love how when Javen said uh a few weeks ago, so think of the one thing that you want more than anything in life, and then lay that down because what he offers and what he gives us is what we really want.
32:00
SPEAKER_00: I could have listed a lot of things that I wanted for my life.
32:05
SPEAKER_00: And what I got was not one of them on my list.
32:07
SPEAKER_00: I didn't even know it existed.
32:11
SPEAKER_00: But I got that.
32:16
SPEAKER_00: And I'm fool.
32:19
SPEAKER_00: And when I, the unlovable young man, had no love to give to anybody else, no mercy for anyone.
32:31
SPEAKER_00: It's like it's all we have now.
32:34
SPEAKER_00: Don't you love him?
32:36
SPEAKER_00: This is our father.
32:37
SPEAKER_00: He didn't leave us fatherless, he didn't leave us or orphans.
32:42
SPEAKER_00: He came to heal this that was crushed, shattered, broken in many pieces.
32:52
SPEAKER_00: Proclaimed liberty.
32:53
SPEAKER_00: He opened our eyes and set free the ones who were oppressed.
33:00
SPEAKER_00: The word there also is crushed.
33:03
SPEAKER_00: Would y'all stand up?
33:04
SPEAKER_00: I want to pray and praise real quickly.
33:14
SPEAKER_00: We're all in our different places in our walk with God.
33:17
SPEAKER_00: It's a wonderful thing.
33:20
SPEAKER_00: And wherever you're at with God, you're you're in a it's a good thing.
33:25
SPEAKER_00: If you feel like you're just in kindergarten in your walk with God, oh, please enjoy that.
33:30
SPEAKER_00: Because it's a good time.
33:34
SPEAKER_00: When we're kids, we all want to grow up.
33:36
SPEAKER_00: But enjoy the growth, because when you look back, these are good times.
33:42
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy the lessons, because daddy's teaching us things.
33:46
SPEAKER_00: And he's very patient, he's not hurrying us.
33:49
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't try to make grass grow by pulling on it.
33:53
SPEAKER_00: He's kind, isn't he?
33:55
SPEAKER_00: He loves us.
33:56
SPEAKER_00: If you've been crushed, if you've been broken, if you relate in any way to any of these things that I've said here, be blessed.
34:08
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy the love.
34:10
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy the love.
34:11
SPEAKER_00: It's everything.
34:13
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy your father God.
34:16
SPEAKER_00: You're not orphans, you're not alone.
34:18
SPEAKER_00: If you feel like, I feel like, man, I've been unlovable, you feel like sometimes there's days it's like nobody loves me except my dog.
34:24
SPEAKER_00: We've had lots of those.
34:28
SPEAKER_00: Our eyes are opening to the reality of God with us.
34:34
SPEAKER_00: That's that voice that pops in out of nowhere and says, here's the way, walk in it.
34:39
SPEAKER_00: That's okay, son.
34:41
SPEAKER_00: That's okay, daughter.
34:43
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna grow.
34:44
SPEAKER_00: I'll be with you.
34:45
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna help you.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: That's priceless.
34:50
SPEAKER_00: It's not spectacular, but it's priceless, isn't it?
34:54
SPEAKER_00: So I pray for crushed hearts.
34:56
SPEAKER_00: I pray for those who relate in any way, and I say thank you, Father, for the ministry of your love today and your spirit.
35:03
SPEAKER_00: Let it bring a song in every heart and a spring in every step, a smile on every face, and your joy upon our heads.
35:11
SPEAKER_00: We thank you, Father, for who you are and opening our eyes to you.
35:18
SPEAKER_00: I do have a little booklet called Daddy Doesn't Want Me.
35:22
SPEAKER_00: It's one of the books out there on that table.
35:24
SPEAKER_00: It's a very, very thin book.
35:29
SPEAKER_00: But that's out there.
35:30
SPEAKER_00: It's been it's proven to be useful.
35:32
SPEAKER_00: People have bought them that to, it's helped some of them, of course, they buy it for themselves, but many times they know people that could relate to my story.
35:40
SPEAKER_00: And they give them out, and it's we've got lots of good testimonies from it.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for giving me your time today.
35:48
SPEAKER_00: I love you.
35:48
SPEAKER_00: That's all I got to give you is love.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: Let's celebrate our Father.
35:53
SPEAKER_00: God bless you.