Latest / Pst T.D Jakes -The POTTER'S HOUSE / YOUR PROBLEM IS PREPARING YOU FOR GOD’S PROMOTION Bishop T.D. Jakes

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YOUR PROBLEM IS PREPARING YOU FOR GOD’S PROMOTION Bishop T.D. Jakes · Pst T.D Jakes -The POTTER'S HOUSE

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Get your Bibles and go to Genesis chapter 21 verse
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: 2 through 12. Tonight we're going to talk about spiritual maturity.
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  Speaker 1: Managing my faith and my fallacies. Spiritual maturity. Help me
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: to have equilibrium. Help me to be able to balance myself.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Bring me into spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity. The Bible said,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: make your moderation made known unto all men. The Lord
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: is at hand. Spiritual maturity is as much about balance
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: as it is about anything else and how you manage
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: your faith and your fallacies. And hopefully before the night
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  Speaker 1: is over, I will prove that we have them both.
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  Speaker 1: We like to think that there are people who make
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  Speaker 1: mistakes and there are people who don't make mistakes. But
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  Speaker 1: even the most successful person makes mistakes. Even the most
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  Speaker 1: spiritual person makes mistakes. Missteps, bad judgment, listening to the
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: wrong advice, partnering with the wrong person, hiring the wrong contractor,
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  Speaker 1: moving into the wrong position, dating the wrong person. I'm
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  Speaker 1: not going to look at nobody. Dating the wrong person. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  Speaker 1: You thought it was God. And then you realize you
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  Speaker 1: ate too much pizza and had a dream. And you
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  Speaker 1: followed the wrong. Come on, somebody.
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  Speaker 2: Come on.
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  Speaker 1: Genesis 21, 2 through 12, when you have it, say amen.
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  Speaker 1: Now listen at the word of God and listen real closely.
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  Speaker 1: There's so much going on in this text, I don't
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  Speaker 1: even know where to start.
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  Speaker 2: So we're going to pick up right in the middle.
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  Speaker 1: For Sarah conceived and bare Abraham a son in his
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  Speaker 1: old age.
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  Speaker 2: But watch this.
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  Speaker 1: At the set time of which God had spoken to him,
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  Speaker 1: he didn't mean for him to have it any sooner.
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  Speaker 1: And Abraham called the name of his son that was
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  Speaker 1: born unto him whom Sarah bared to him, Isaac. And
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  Speaker 1: Abraham circumcised his son Isaac being eight days old as
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  Speaker 1: God had commanded him. And Abraham was a hundred years
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  Speaker 1: old when his son Isaac was born unto him.
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  Speaker 2: My God.
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  Speaker 1: I don't know if I want no baby at a hundred, Jesus.
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  Speaker 1: I'm just saying. Let me praise the Lord. Anyway, and
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  Speaker 1: Sarah said, God have made me to laugh so that
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  Speaker 1: all that hear will laugh with me. And she said,
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  Speaker 1: who would have said under Abraham that Sarah should have
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  Speaker 1: given children suck for I have born him a son
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  Speaker 1: in his old age.
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  Speaker 2: And the child grew and.
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  Speaker 1: Was weaned and Abraham made a great feast in the
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  Speaker 1: same day that Isaac was weaned. And Sarah saw the
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  Speaker 1: son of Hagar, the Egyptian, which she had borne unto Abraham, mocking.
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  Speaker 1: Wherefore she said unto Abraham, cast out this, but wait,
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  Speaker 1: how did this story go bad so quick? We were
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  Speaker 1: at a party one minute and now she's putting a
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  Speaker 1: woman out and her baby in the next verse.
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  Speaker 2: Ain't life crazy?
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  Speaker 1: One minute you're dancing for joy and the next minute
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  Speaker 1: you're opening the door to tell her to get.
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  Speaker 2: Out and take her child with her.
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  Speaker 1: Wherefore she said unto Abraham, cast out this bondwoman and
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  Speaker 1: her son for the son of this bondwoman shall not
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  Speaker 1: be heir with my son even with Isaac. And the
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  Speaker 1: thing was.
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  Speaker 3: Very grievous in Abraham's sight because of his son. And
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  Speaker 3: God said unto Abraham, let it not be grievous in
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  Speaker 3: thy sight because of the land and because of thy bondwoman.
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  Speaker 3: In all that Sarah has said unto thee, hearken unto
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  Speaker 3: her voice. For in Isaac shall thy seed be called.
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  Speaker 3: Can you say amen? Let's pray. Spirit of the living God,
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  Speaker 3: bring this word.
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  Speaker 1: To life tonight as we teach and as we touch
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  Speaker 1: and as we begin to understand what you have in
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  Speaker 1: store for us in.
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  Speaker 2: Jesus' name.
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  Speaker 1: Amen. You may be seated. So before I get into
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  Speaker 1: the text, I want to talk about faith and fallacies.
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  Speaker 1: When I talk about faith, you can't talk about faith
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  Speaker 1: and not talk about Abraham because Abraham is called the
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  Speaker 1: father of faith. Abraham is called the father of faith.
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  Speaker 1: Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him as righteousness.
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  Speaker 1: Abraham believed God in such a way that he became
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  Speaker 1: the friend of God. The friend of God. He was
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  Speaker 1: so close to believing God. See, when we don't believe God,
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  Speaker 1: we insult God's character. To suggest that God has promised
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  Speaker 1: something and can't do it or won't do it is
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  Speaker 1: to suggest that God is a liar. And Abraham believed
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  Speaker 1: God in such a vivacious.
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  Speaker 2: And powerful and profound.
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  Speaker 1: And prolific way that he became the friend of God.
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  Speaker 2: Now, the Bible.
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  Speaker 1: Defines faith as the substance of things hoped for. The
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  Speaker 1: evidence of things not seen. And then it goes on
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  Speaker 1: to talk about through faith we understand that the worlds
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  Speaker 1: were framed by the word of God. So that things
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  Speaker 1: that do appear were not made from things that do appear.
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  Speaker 1: Saying to us that the visible starts in the invisible.
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  Speaker 1: That the tangible starts in the intangible. That everything that
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  Speaker 1: you see and everything that you receive started out in
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  Speaker 1: the spirit world before it manifests in the physical world.
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  Speaker 1: And we know that is true because every stitch of
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  Speaker 1: clothes you got on started out as an idea. Every
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  Speaker 1: vehicle you drove started out as an idea. Before it
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  Speaker 1: became a drawing on paper, before it entered the manufacturing stage,
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  Speaker 1: it started out with a thought. All of these pews
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  Speaker 1: started with a thought. This carpet started with a thought.
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  Speaker 1: So we need to give a lot more attention to
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  Speaker 1: our spiritual self because we must understand that everything starts
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  Speaker 1: on the inside and flows out. Healing starts on the
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  Speaker 1: inside and flows out. You receive it in your spirit
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  Speaker 1: before you receive it in your body. The baptism of
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  Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit starts on the inside before it comes out.
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  Speaker 1: You can't overflow a vessel that's not filled. Come on, somebody.
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  Speaker 1: And when God starts filling you, it's happening on the inside.
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  Speaker 1: And after a while, it overflows on the outside. And
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  Speaker 1: you get outer evidence of an inner filling and the
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  Speaker 1: indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And it starts on the inside.
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  Speaker 1: Believe it or not, somebody's being filled right now. Somebody's
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  Speaker 1: being filled right now. And it may not manifest on
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  Speaker 1: the outside immediately. But once your cup overflows, you can't
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  Speaker 1: hide on the outside what overflows on the inside. Can
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  Speaker 1: I get a witness in here, somebody? And so we
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  Speaker 1: understand about faith. We understand that faith, that we are
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  Speaker 1: called to walk by faith and not by sight. And
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  Speaker 1: so we are not looking at the things that are
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  Speaker 1: seen for the things that are seen are temporal and
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  Speaker 1: the things that are not seen are internal, are eternal.
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  Speaker 1: When it comes to fallacies, it's a different thing because
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  Speaker 1: it's not so much a Bible word. And I want
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  Speaker 1: to take a moment and define fallacies. Fallacies is a noun,
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  Speaker 1: a plural noun, fallacies. A mistaken belief, especially one based
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  Speaker 1: on unsound argument. For example, the notion that the camera
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  Speaker 1: never lies is a fallacy. Or it could be a
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  Speaker 1: failure in reasoning, which renders an argument invalid. For example,
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  Speaker 1: Kraft exposes three fallacies in this approach. In other words,
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  Speaker 1: when you start talking about fallacies, fallacies deals with faulty reasonings,
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  Speaker 1: misleading or unsound arguments. The potential for fallacy, which lies
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: behind the notion of self-esteem is an example. So a
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  Speaker 1: fallacy is something that you have a conviction about that
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  Speaker 1: is not based on a sound decision, okay? It may
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  Speaker 1: or may not be a sin But it can be
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  Speaker 1: a fallacy. It can be bad judgment. It can be
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  Speaker 1: a faulty concept, a faulty notion, a faulty idea. And
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  Speaker 1: so fallacies stand on one side and faith stands on
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  Speaker 1: the other. And I can see both of them happening
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  Speaker 1: in this house. I would have hated to live in
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  Speaker 1: Abram's house. Abram lived in a house with two women.
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  Speaker 1: That's the first problem. One of them is his wife
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  Speaker 1: and the other one is his situation. And it's not
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  Speaker 1: a side chick because he is not a righteous man.
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  Speaker 1: It is a side chick that is brought in the
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  Speaker 1: house at Sarai's request as a surrogate more than a
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  Speaker 1: side chick. And they didn't have artificial insemination in those days.
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  Speaker 1: So they had had relationship and intimacy. And it was
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  Speaker 1: his wife's idea. Where are the women like that today?
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  Speaker 2: I don't know none of them. I don't know none
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  Speaker 2: of them. Maybe one of them's here.
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  Speaker 1: And not many women that'll bring a woman in and say,
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  Speaker 1: I tell you what, you borrow her for the weekend. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that wouldn't go down real well. In fact, it's so
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  Speaker 1: bad now that they say, what's she looking at you
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  Speaker 1: like that for? That girl don't want no prayer, you know.
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  Speaker 1: Oh God, can you imagine living in that house? That
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  Speaker 1: girl don't want no prayer. She don't want Jesus.
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  Speaker 2: I saw her.
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  Speaker 1: You already got, can you imagine the tension in the
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  Speaker 1: house with these two women sharing this one man and
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  Speaker 1: Hagar gives Abram something. that Sarai could not. She gave
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  Speaker 1: him a child. And that's what she was supposed to do.
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  Speaker 1: That was her job. That's what she was asked to
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  Speaker 1: do by his wife. And there is a reason for that.
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  Speaker 1: It is hard in this Western culture to understand this
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  Speaker 1: Eastern tradition, but it so happens that she births him
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  Speaker 1: a child called Ishmael. We often say Ishmael, but the
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  Speaker 1: correct pronunciation is actually Ishmael. And she has this child
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  Speaker 1: to him called Ishmael and she has Ishmael and Ishmael grows.
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  Speaker 2: Up and it's cool and it's fine.
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  Speaker 1: And it's wonderful and everything is going just according to
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  Speaker 1: how Sarah planned it because since she could not have
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  Speaker 1: a child, And since they were getting old, she wanted
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  Speaker 1: to be able to make sure that he had a
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  Speaker 1: child and everything is going good. She never understood when
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  Speaker 1: she made the choice that the time was going to
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  Speaker 1: come that God was going to bless her to conceive.
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  Speaker 1: Sometimes our impatience leads us to fallacies because the Lord
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  Speaker 1: doesn't move when we expect him to move. In the
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  Speaker 1: way that we expect him to move. In the time
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  Speaker 1: period that we have allotted him to move. I hate
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  Speaker 1: to tell you this, but God does not work on
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  Speaker 1: your time clock. He works on his own time clock.
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  Speaker 1: In his own good time. God does not work according
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  Speaker 1: to the trends of the time or the cultural expectations
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  Speaker 1: in which you are surrounded. God moves when he gets
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  Speaker 1: ready to move. And God wanted to get the glory
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  Speaker 1: out of this. And in order to get the glory,
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  Speaker 1: God had to wait until everybody was shut down. Her
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  Speaker 1: factory was shut down. Y'all know what I'm talking about.
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  Speaker 1: His factory had cobwebs. The Bible said his body was
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  Speaker 1: good as dead. And it ceased to be with her
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  Speaker 1: after the manner of women. My grandmama would say she'd
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  Speaker 1: gone through the change. When it was totally impossible, she'd
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  Speaker 1: get night sweats and waking up to bed is wet
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  Speaker 1: with sweat and all that kind of stuff, mood changes.
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  Speaker 1: And she's gone through all of that. And it is
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  Speaker 1: now totally impossible for her to be able to conceive.
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  Speaker 1: God says, oh, goody, goody, goody, goody, goody. Now is
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  Speaker 1: the time to do it. I waited till you couldn't.
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  Speaker 1: I waited till you couldn't. So you couldn't praise yourself
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  Speaker 1: for this. I waited till it was impossible for you.
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  Speaker 1: I waited till it was ridiculous. I waited till all
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  Speaker 1: human efforts and biological equations had completely been shut down
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  Speaker 1: so that it would have my signature on this miracle.
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  Speaker 1: As long as you are able to do it on
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  Speaker 1: your own, don't ask God to do anything you can
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  Speaker 1: do for yourself. When it is impossible with men, it
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  Speaker 1: is just right for God. And when it's just right
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  Speaker 1: for God, God moves into that position of calling those
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: things that are not as though they were. Somebody write down,
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  Speaker 1: it's never too late for God to move. I don't
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  Speaker 1: care if you're in the fourth stage of cancer. I
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  Speaker 1: don't care if you're in the eighth stage of cancer.
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  Speaker 1: If God gets ready to raise you up, he will
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  Speaker 1: raise you up. I have seen life leave the body
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  Speaker 1: and the paramedics pronounce people dead and God wake them
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  Speaker 1: back up again. Y'all don't hear what I'm saying. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: back when we used to have church the old time way,
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  Speaker 1: God would wake them up again and shock the medical professionals.
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  Speaker 1: and shock science and do the impossible and wake them
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  Speaker 1: up in their right mind because nobody is God but
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  Speaker 1: God and nobody can do the God types of things
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  Speaker 1: that God does except God. But Sarai, in her need
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  Speaker 1: to fulfill a promise that she was unable to fulfill,
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  Speaker 1: has now gotten Hagar, who is an Egyptian slave, to
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  Speaker 1: be a surrogate mother. And this is the first biblical
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  Speaker 1: reference to a surrogate in the scriptures. It may not
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  Speaker 1: be the first in history, but it's the first one
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  Speaker 1: in scriptures today. And it came with a blessing and
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  Speaker 1: it came with a problem. It came with years of tranquility.
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  Speaker 1: But then after a while, things that are built fallaciously
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  Speaker 1: and things that are built erroneously and things that are
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  Speaker 1: built on bad wisdom and bad advice eventually come back
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  Speaker 1: to bite you. Oh, I'm preaching. I'm preaching good right now.
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  Speaker 1: How many of you have ever made decisions that worked
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  Speaker 1: out good for a while and later on it came
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  Speaker 1: back to bite you? And it's much easier and much
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  Speaker 1: more fun to get into trouble than it is to
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  Speaker 1: get out. We pick up the text at a time
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  Speaker 1: when that which Sarah never expected to happen, that which
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  Speaker 1: she had laughed at, that which she had said was impossible,
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  Speaker 1: suddenly happened. And she was with child. Can you imagine
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  Speaker 1: how happy she was to be 99 years old and pregnant?
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  Speaker 1: Walking around at Big Bear and Kroger's in the grocery
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  Speaker 1: store with her stomach all stuck out. Say, yeah. Or
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  Speaker 1: how proud he was coming up behind him talking about, yeah.
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  Speaker 1: That's right. That's right. On his cane. That's right. Don't
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  Speaker 1: let the cane fool you, baby. Don't let the cane
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  Speaker 1: fool you. Don't let the cane fool you. God has
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  Speaker 1: been good to me. Glory to God. Hallelujah. Can you imagine?
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  Speaker 1: Can you imagine testimony service? When I think of the goodness.
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  Speaker 1: Come on, brothers. Y'all know what I'm talking about. When
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  Speaker 1: I think of the goodness and all he done for me,
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  Speaker 1: my soul cries out, hallelujah. When people say that, you
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  Speaker 1: don't know what they're hallelujahing about. Abraham was hallelujah because
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  Speaker 1: God had done it again. He had resurrected. That's all
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to say about that. He had resurrected. He
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  Speaker 1: had so resurrected Abraham's body that Abraham's body stays resurrected
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  Speaker 1: throughout the life of Sarah. And he marries again and
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  Speaker 1: continues to sire children way into his old age. God, hallelujah.
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  Speaker 1: Before there was Cialis, before there was Viagra, before there
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  Speaker 1: was anything like that, there was a Holy Ghost power
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  Speaker 1: that quickens that which was dead. Now, he had to
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  Speaker 1: resurrect Abraham's body. And when Abraham's dead body produced the
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  Speaker 1: seed and hit Sarah's dead womb, it quickened it and
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  Speaker 1: brought it back to life again. And there's some significance
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  Speaker 1: in that because when Jesus was to come later, he
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  Speaker 1: would say, I am the seed of Abraham. So he
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  Speaker 1: literally shot Jesus into the womb of Mary and it
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  Speaker 1: quickened it and brought it back to life. And the
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  Speaker 1: old woman's belly started swelling. She started getting a mask
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  Speaker 1: on her face and started vomiting because when Jesus comes
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  Speaker 1: into a situation, he will bring it to life again.
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  Speaker 1: Jesus never said, I can resurrect. He said, I am resurrected.
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  Speaker 1: the resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me,
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  Speaker 1: though he were dead.
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  Speaker 2: Yet shall he live.
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  Speaker 1: Now we got a problem because that which she had
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  Speaker 1: given up on just happened. That which she thought she
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: had timed out of just occurred.
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  Speaker 2: And see, anytime.
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  Speaker 1: Somebody chooses you based on a need, they will only
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: want you as long as the need arises. When the
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  Speaker 1: need arises, the feeling changes. You need to watch people
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: who fall in love with you while you're afflicted because
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  Speaker 1: they're drawn to your pain. And that's good as long
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  Speaker 1: as you're hurting. But when you recover, all of a
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  Speaker 1: sudden the pain was the only thing you had in common.
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  Speaker 1: And when you recover, all of a sudden they are
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  Speaker 1: jobless because they only wanted you as long as you
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  Speaker 1: were afflicted. Come on, y'all don't hear what I'm saying.
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  Speaker 1: And Sarah only wanted Hagar as long as she couldn't.
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  Speaker 1: But the problem is now she can. Somebody shout, now
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  Speaker 1: I can. That's a game changer. Once I find out
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  Speaker 1: that I can do what I thought I couldn't do,
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  Speaker 1: that changes who I want around me. That changes what
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  Speaker 1: I need in my life. That changes how I interact
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  Speaker 1: with people. That changes my expectations. That changes everything around
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  Speaker 1: me because now I can. Type on the line, now
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  Speaker 1: I can. The thing that they said I'd never be
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  Speaker 1: able to do, the thing they said I would never
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  Speaker 1: be able to have, the places they thought I'd never
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  Speaker 1: be able to go, the degree they said I'd never
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  Speaker 1: be able to have, somebody say, now I can. That's
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  Speaker 1: the power of this text. The power of this text
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  Speaker 1: is that God has reversed it. He has turned it around.
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  Speaker 1: The tail has become the head. That means God has
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  Speaker 1: reversed the entire situation. And what was impossible with men
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  Speaker 1: is now possible with God. Are you following what I'm saying?
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  Speaker 1: And you begin to wonder where this idea originated with Sarai.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: to take advantage of this Egyptian slave as a surrogate.
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  Speaker 1: And I began to study the Code of Hammurabi. When
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: you study the Code of Hammurabi, this is not a scripture,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: this is not a Bible, this is a historical understanding.
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  Speaker 2: About language.
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  Speaker 1: When you study the Code of Hammurabi, you begin to
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  Speaker 1: understand that the Code of Hammurabi was developed in Mesopotamia.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: And it was some of the early writings that concerned
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: things like marriage. It concerned the marriage of a Natatu,
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  Speaker 1: which is a priestess attached to a temple who is
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  Speaker 1: not allowed to bear children. In this code, these are
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: some of the first laws that were ever written in
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: the code of Hammurabi. And when you read about it,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: it says her husband has the right to take a
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: second wife. But if she wishes to forestall this, she
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: can give her husband a slave. In the world of
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: ancient Near East, a slave woman could be seen as
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: an incubator, a kind of womb with legs. Now, it
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: is no mistake that the Code of Hammurabi was developed
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: in Mesopotamia And Abraham and Sarah came from Mesopotamia. The
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: Bible calls it Ur, but the Old Testament Ur is
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: the new reality of Mesopotamia. Out of their old culture,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: there is this lingering idea that this is not a
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: Hebraistic law. This is part of the Code of Hammurabi.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Now let's go deeper into this. In the Code of Hammurabi,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: they use cuneiform. Cuneiform is a logo syllabic script that
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: was used to write several languages of the ancient Near East.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: The script was in active use from the early Bronze
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: Age until the beginning of the Common Era. It kind
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: of looks like hieroglyphics. It's the kind of content that
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: you would see in Egypt. It is named for the
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: characteristic wedge-shaped impressions. Latin cunis, which form its signs that
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: you had to draw in order to be able to write.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: Writing did not exist. Cuneiform was originally developed to write
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: the Sumerian language of southern Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq. Along
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: with Egyptian hieroglyphics, it is one of the earliest writing systems.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: So we've got Writing is growing and being developed at
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: this time. The ability to write, the ability to translate
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: verbal language into writing is something we shouldn't take for granted.
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: We must understand that there was a time that there
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: was no language that could be written. So history, if
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: you go back far enough, becomes oral more than written.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: In the ancient antiquities of time, we see etches and
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: drawings on caves that begin the first dimensions to develop
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: a written example.
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: Of an oral expression.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: The code of Hammurabi is an example of that. And
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: up until recent years had never been discovered. But archaeologists
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: had dug down and found the code. And in the code,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: it kind of reinforces this idea, having come from the
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: same place that Abram came from and the same place
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: where Sarai came from. When God tells Abram to leave
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: thy country and thy kindred, he left his country and
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: his kindred, but no doubt his culture goes with it.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Oh, you didn't hear what I'm saying. It is possible to.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: Leave your country and your kindred and still hold on.
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: To your culture.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: And so even though he has left a polytheistic form
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: of religion, an idolatrous form of religion, and heard the
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: voice of God, Jehovah, call him out and call him
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: out from his people and out from his country, there's
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: still a residual culture that affects his thinking and her thinking.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: And backed in a corner and shoved to the wall,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: her old traditions start to manifest in her decisions. That
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: sounds a lot like us. No, that even sounds a
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: lot like the children of Israel who have been slaves
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: for 400 years and they left Egypt, but Egypt didn't
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: leave them. And when they got ready to build an
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: image of what they thought God looked like, they built
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: an Egyptian image because the influence of the Egyptian culture,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: they could not escape just because they crossed the Red Sea.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: They left the country, they left the people, but they
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: had trouble divesting themselves of the culture. How much of
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: your old culture is still lingering on you today? Shaping
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: your value systems, shaping your choices, shaping your apparel. I
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: never will forget being in Kenya and we had dug
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: wells out in Kenya. And there were two tribes that
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: had been fighting over water in Kenya. And when we
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: got ready to do a reconciliation service because we dug
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: a well, one of the tribes got up on stage
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: and they started singing and they started swinging from side
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: to side and started clapping.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: And they started singing.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: I remember thinking, so that's where we got this from. See,
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: when you go back far enough, some of your inclinations,
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: your proclivities didn't just start with you. They are innate
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: to where you came from and they travel down and
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: they become organic and natural to you without you even
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: being conscious of it. That's why culture is important to
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: understand your culture so that you can separate your culture
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: from your Christ culture. Oh, y'all don't hear what I'm
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: saying to you. And so it is understandable that all
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: of this is rooted in Mesopotamia. All of this comes
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: out of the same region. So her reasoning is a
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: result of where she came from. How much of your
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: reasoning is a result of where you came from? If
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: you came from poverty, how much of your reasoning is
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: affected from the impoverished surroundings that you came from? Now,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: you may not be in poverty any longer, but your
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: judgment may be being fed by the time that you were.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: Your values, how you handle money, how you handle resources.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: There's a certain mentality that comes with poverty that tends
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: to lean away from things like investment. Because you've been
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: without so long that when you finally start having, you
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: don't really know how to handle money. And when you
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: give people who don't have money some money, the first
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: thing they do is spend it. And the second thing
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: they do is spend it. And the third thing they
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: do is spend it. And the fourth thing they do
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: is spend it. And the fifth thing they do is
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: spend it because they didn't come up in a house
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: where they talked about investment. They didn't come up in
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: a house where they talked about life insurance. They didn't
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: come up in a house where they talked about annuities.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: They didn't come up in an environment that gave them
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: a strategy for the success they prayed for. So it
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: is possible to have a success that.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: You can't handle.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Oh, y'all don't hear what I'm saying. How much of
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: your behavior is a direct result of where you came from?
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: What you think about men, what you think about marriage,
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: what you think about relationships, what you think what is
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: normal to you may be affected by where you came from.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: If you were raised in a house where there was.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: A lot of violence... Violence.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: May be normal to you, and if people are too
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: nice to you, you may irritate them on purpose to
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: provoke a response that is familiar and then complain about
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: what you provoked because that is normal to you. Or
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: you might inflict punishment on somebody because that was the
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: model that you came from, and it affects how you
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: express rage, anger. frustration, aggravation. It affects everything about you
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: based on where you came from. Now, the Bible says
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: that any man being Christ, he is a new creature.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: He is a new creature, but you can still have
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: old ways and be a new creature. Oh, y'all don't
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: hear what I'm saying. I know you don't know anything
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: about having old ways. But you can have old ways
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: and be a new creature and not even understand it.
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: It can drive you towards success. It can make you
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: a workaholic. It can cause you to do things that
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: you wouldn't do because it's not what you're going to,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: it's what you're running from. What causes some people to
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: be more intense than other people? Because they're running away
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: from something that they never want to see again, which
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: causes you not to have balance in your life because
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: you're so busy trying to get away from what you
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: think is horrific that you overdo what you're going to
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: do because you were so affected by where you came
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: from because you never want to see that happen again
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: in your life. If you can understand what I'm talking about,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: hold your hand up. wave at me make some sort
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: of sign so you understand how Sarai reverts back to
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: this ancient Mesopotamian ideology and there seems to be some
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: reference to it in scripture because even when God promised
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: Abraham to bless him he said I'll bless whatever is
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: born in your house So the culture of the times
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: lends itself to creating the quagmire of this situation that
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: has erupted in Abraham's life in such a dimension that
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: now we find ourselves in a situation. It was fine
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: at first. Somebody say it was fine at first.
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: Say it again.
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Watch out for making decisions in the early stages of
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: any situation, because almost everything starts out fine at first.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: If marriages were as good as they were, as weddings,
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: everybody in the room would be married. It was fine
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: at first. Oh, when you first took the job, everybody's
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: so nice. Everybody treats me so good. They're so kind.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: They're so loving. Everything starts out fine at first. That's
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: why the Bible said, judge nothing before it's time, but
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: judge the righteous judgment. You gotta be patient before you judge.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: You can't say for sure somebody you just met who
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: they are and how they are, because you may not
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: have met them yet. You may have met their representative.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: But over time, they will drop their mask and show
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: you who they really are.
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: It takes time.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: I want you to understand that patience has to have
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: its perfect work in your life. It takes time to
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: know people. It takes time to know people. It takes
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: time to know organizations. It takes time to know yourself.
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go a step further. You are still
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: learning you. Oh no, Bishop, I'm 40 years old. You
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: are still learning you. Read my lips. You are still
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: learning you. I'm 50 years old. Yeah, you are still
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: learning you because life keeps changing and stages keep changing
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: and you knew yourself, your 20 year old self, but
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: you're not that anymore. And you got to see how
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: you react to 50 because who you are at 50
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: is not who you were at 20. That's why marriage
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: is a miracle. because you picked somebody now for then.
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: When I got married, I was 24 years old. I
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: didn't know who I would be by 64. I had
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: no idea who I would be at 64. And so
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: it has to be, it can't just be a roll
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: of the dice. It has to be a God divine
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: thing to pick somebody who can move with you and
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: flow with you throughout age. It's a difference between having
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: little kids and and having kids who want the car keys.
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: That changes everything. So don't write any books about parenting
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: when you got a five-year-old. I, for one, will not
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: be buying the book. I don't want to read it.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: If you have survived having a child at best 30,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: I might want to talk to you. But until you
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: have survived adolescence.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: Aggravation, frustration, humiliation, been fussed out, been cussed out, been
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: through trials and tribulation, ran down to school on your
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: lunch break, got back to work late, trying to understand
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: things that are going on, defending somebody that you know
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: is guilty. Oh, y'all not going to say nothing to me.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: It takes time. Don't write no book on parenting. Don't
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: write no book on marriage if you've been married three years.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: It takes time for you to figure out how to
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: stay together through different stages. It's a difference between a
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: parent whose biggest problem is to make sure you brought
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: the bottle and you got the blankets and you got
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: the car seat in place from somebody whose kid just
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: took the car. I ain't going to look at no
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: particular person in case you're in here right now. You
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: got to survive all of that to understand. It's a
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: difference between being married to somebody when they're young and
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: you're laying on the beach and you got sand all
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: over your body and your biggest job is to put
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: some tan protection lotion on them and somebody who's going
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: through menopause or somebody who's going through midlife crisis and
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: there he is with gray hair and a red sports
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: car with the top down. And the music turned on
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: and he's playing hip hop. You got to survive all
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: these different stages and ages and twists and turns. And
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: it's not what you're running to, it's what you're running from.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: Almost everybody I know who is inordinately successful is running
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: from something. They put in long hours. They work extra hard.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: They work when other people say, I'm going to take
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: it easy. You don't understand why you're driven. You are
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: driven by the thing behind you. Somebody got a getaway
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: spirit in here right now. I got to get away.
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: I got to get away. I don't want that to
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: ever happen to me again. I don't ever want to
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: be that vulnerable. I don't ever want to trust anybody
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: like that again. I don't want to ever be dependent
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: on anybody else again. So the thing that drives you,
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: isn't it funny how bad things can drive you to
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: good things? But if you're not careful, it'll drive you
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: so far that the good thing will go bad because
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: it'll drive you over a cliff that you should have
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: stopped at because you're still running from ghosts. Where my
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: real people at? I want to talk to some people
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: that want to keep it 100. You so busy trying
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: to pick somebody that's not like your old boyfriend that
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: you pick somebody he's not like your old boyfriend but
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: you swapped the devil for the witch. Your last one
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: was too aggressive and this one is so passive.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: He won't even go to work.
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: You fixed the old problem, but you created a new
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: problem because you are driven by where you came from.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: Do you hear what I'm saying to you? Sarai is
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: driven by where she came from, and it leads and
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: affects her decisions, and it causes her to have fallacies.
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: And ultimately, it seems to work out at first. And
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: Hagar births a child for her called Ishmael. And Ishmael
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: is called Ishmael, which means God will hear. God will hear.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: This Egyptian woman who comes from an idolatrous background names
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: the child, and it's an Egyptian woman who has now
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: named the child Ishmael in reference to Abram's God.
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: God hears. will hear.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: Later on, we will see where she is out in
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: the wilderness and she's about to die. And the Bible
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: said that God heard the cry of the baby. God
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: will hear. It's a prophetic name. Be careful what you
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: let people call you. Be careful what you adapt to.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: Be careful what you let people call you because it
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: has prophetic inferences to it. Little did she know when
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: she named him, God will hear that that cry of
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: that baby would lead to her deliverance because it wasn't
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: so much her cry that God heard. It was the
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: cry of the child. And God said, I heard the
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: cry of your child and God will hear. I came
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: to tell somebody tonight that God will hear you. I
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: don't care how far in the desert you are. I
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: tell you, if you make your bed in hell, God
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: is there. If you take the wings of the morning
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: and ascend to the uttermost parts of the earth, God
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: is still there. If you get behind the door and laugh,
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: God will hear. If you murmur in your own head,
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: God will hear. If you think in your own mind,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: God will hear. The Bible says that he is a
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: discerner of the thoughts. and the intentions of the heart.
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: There is nothing that you think that God can't hear.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: So don't sit there with your holy self and your
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: nose up in the air trying to be important and
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: impress me because I didn't hear what you thought, but
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: God heard what you thought. And if you aren't dirty
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: in your life, you've been dirty in your mind. God,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: talk to me somebody. God will hear. There's none good
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: but the Father. There's none righteous but the Father.
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: No, not one.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: Not the bishop, not the elder, not the butcher, not
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: the baker, not the candlestick maker. None of us, none
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: of us are that righteous. If you get in our head,
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: we'll all lose our position. How many people in here
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: are glad that your mind is not on a loudspeaker?
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: You can't even trust your mind to be on a
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: loudspeaker when you're in church because you have to reel
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: your thoughts in even in the house of God. You
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: have to cast down imaginations even in the service of God.
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: You have to capture your thoughts even in the spirit
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: of God. You can be worshiping one minute and think
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: something crazy the next and you don't even know where
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: it came from and look around and wonder did anybody
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: hear what you thought because if somebody next to you
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: heard what you thought they wouldn't even ride home in
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: the car with you. Ishmael, God will hear. There is
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: a prophetic power over this child. Even though he is
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: born through a fallacy and a failed attempt, a human
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: effort to bring to pass the promise of God, there
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: is still a prophetic utterance over his life. God will hear.
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: Just because you're not the one doesn't mean you're not
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: a one. Oh God, I'm talking good tonight. Just because
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: you're not the one doesn't mean that you're not a one.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: The problem with this generation that we're living in now,
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: everybody wants to be the one. Out of 8 billion
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: people on the planet, you want to be the one.
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: So you don't mind who you step on, who you
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: step over, who you step across, because you think there's
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: only room in God's plan for one person. But I
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: came to serve notice on you. God has a plan
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: for your life. You might not be the one, but
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: you are a one. You are the apple of his eye.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: You are chosen of the Lord. God has a destiny
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: for you to fulfill. And stop fighting over one chair
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: because God has other sheep that are also of this fold.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: Them also must he bring. And you don't have a
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: franchise on the favor and the hand of God.
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: I smell. God will hear. Ice, ice, ice, ice.
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: In the Old Testament, it talks about Isiah. I will
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: call thy name no more Balaam, but I shall call
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: it Isiah. That's a converting moment. When the prophet married
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: the prostitute, she changed the name from Baal to Isiah.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: She had found Isiah, Ishmael, Isaac. All of these are
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: references and utterances that have God in it. Later Sarah
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: will have Isaac, meaning Isaac, I, God has made me
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: to laugh. Ishmael, God will hear. I will call thy
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: name Ishi. God dwells amongst us. God is in it all.
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: I said God is in it all. Ishmael means God
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: will hear. Look at Genesis 21, 18 through 21 for
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: just a minute. Genesis chapter 21, verse 18 through 21.
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: Am I teaching good tonight? This is what God says
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: about Ishmael. Up, lift up the boy and hold him
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: fast with your hand for I will make him into
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: a great nation. Then God opened her eyes and she
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: saw a well of water and she went and filled
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: God is taking care of Abraham's mistake in the wilderness. Oh,
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: somebody ought to shout me down right now. Because you
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: made a mistake and you think God doesn't care about it.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: But God will take care of your mistakes as well
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: as your miracle. And God cared for Ishmael and wouldn't
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: let him die in the wilderness. And God was with
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: the boy and he grew up. He lived in the
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: wilderness and became an expert with the bull. He lived
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: in the wilderness of Paran and his mother took a
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: wife for him from the land of Egypt. History will
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: teach us that Ishmael will go on to have 12 sons.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: He will have 12 sons. Isaac is the promised seed.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: He will only have two, Jacob and Esau. But Abraham's grandson, Jacob,
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: will have 12 sons. And those 12 sons will become
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: the 12 tribes of Israel.
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: Look at Abraham's trees.
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: The branch on one side is coming up with Hagar's
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: ice mail. And on the other hand, something just sprouted
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: out of the dead womb of Sarah called Isaac and
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: another branch is growing. Later on, when Sarah is dead,
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: he will marry Keturah and another branch will come out.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: No wonder God said, you will be the father of many.
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: You will be the father of many children. You will
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: be the father of many. Many nations came out of
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: the loins of one man. And he was significant to God.
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: And his life is just reaching the apex of significance
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: at a hundred years old. Give yourself some time. Calm down.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: quiet yourself. Both sons were circumcised. Look at Genesis 17,
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: 10 through 14. Both sons were circumcised. Circumcision was a
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: covenant that God made with Abraham and his seed as
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: a sign of the covenant. It is not the covenant.
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: It is the sign of the covenant. So Ishmael has
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: the sign of the covenant just like Isaac does. This
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: is my covenant which you shall keep between me and
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: you and your offspring after you. Every male among you
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: of your foreskins and it shall be a sign of
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: the covenant between me and you. He who is eight
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: your generation, whether born in your house or bought with
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring.
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: Both he who is born in your house and he
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: who is bought with your money shall surely be circumcised.
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant.
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people.
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: He has broken my covenant. Are you with me? It's
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: amazing to me. When we pick up the text, we're
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: dealing with a circumcised Isaac at eight days old and
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: an Ishmael who has been circumcised. And ultimately, Sarah is
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: going to ask him to put the bondwoman out and
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: her son, which is a circumcision. The removal of Ishmael
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: is as much a circumcision as the cutting of his flesh.
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: This whole text is circumcision. Are you hearing what I'm
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: saying to you? In every case we are seeing flesh
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: being cut away and cast off. Put out the bond
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: woman and her son. That's circumcision in the family. Every
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: male child shall be circumcised. There's circumcision in the body.
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: And God is into circumcision. What have you cut off lately?
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: Cutting off certain things, certain people, certain situations is not
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: the covenant, but it's the sign of the covenant. This
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: is an equal opportunity chance, male and female. We all
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: got some cutting to do. Write that down. We all
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: got some cutting to do. In order for us to
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: receive the promise of God, we've all got some cutting
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: to do and we've all got some bleeding to do
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: and we've all got some pain to bear. Because cutting
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: off that which you are connected to is painful. So
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: in our text, there is pain. There is a party
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: and then there is a pain. In our text, language
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: is growing, genealogies are growing, nations are growing, and God
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: is pruning. There is a continual ongoing pruning in your
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: life that does not stop. It is highly unlikely to
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: live a life void of poor judgment or fallacies. That's
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: what I want you to see. The second thing I
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: want you to see is that God's grace is broad
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: enough to offer a plan for your fallacy while his
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: greatest providence rests on your faithfulness. I'm telling you that
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: God can get the glory out of your humanity as
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: well as your holiness. God said, I'm going to make
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: a great nation out of Ishmael. He's not the one,
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: but he's still a one. And I'm going to make
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: a great nation out of Ishmael. And that nation today
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: is called Arabs. And the Arabs are descendants of Ishmael.
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: And they have become a great nation and a warring people.
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: And God bless them to survive to this day. And
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: yet they were not B1, but they were still A1.
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: You got to make peace with your fallacies so that
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: you can walk into your faith and your destiny. A
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: separation is often required when your fallacies mock your faithfulness.
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: There is a rumbling in this house. Because for a while,
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: your fallacies and your faithfulness can live together under the
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: same roof. But eventually, your fallacies will begin to mock
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: your faith. And this is what's happening in this text.
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: They were cool. They were having a party. Isaac has
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: been weaned. Abraham throws a party. They were all having
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: a good time until Sarah looked out the window and
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: she saw her mistake mocking her miracles. I wonder how
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: many people in this room have had your mistakes mock
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: your miracle. Oh, it's getting quiet in here. As long
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: as I'm looking at Isaac, everything is fine. But you
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: look out the window and you know that Ishmael is
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: making fun.
• 49:45
  Speaker 2: Of Isaac.
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: That Ishmael is making fun of Isaac and it's all
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: in your house. Anytime you have inconsistencies, eventually one will
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: mock the other. And at some point along life's journey,
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: you got to put one of them out. In order
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: to be whole, in order to have peace, in order
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: to have tranquility, in order to have unity, there comes
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: a point that something that is mucking, something that God
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: has promised you has got to go.
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: That's what's happening in this text.
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: But Jesus says of his father, he says, I am
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: the vine. He are the branches in John 8 chapter 1.
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: And my father is the husbandman or he is the
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: vine dresser or he is the gardener. And there is
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: nobody in that text that doesn't get cut. Every branch
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: in me that beareth not fruit, I cut it away.
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: Every branch in me that beareth fruit, I cut it
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: that it might bring forth more fruit. No branch escaped
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: the cut. There's not a person in this room that
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: can escape God's knife. There's not a person in this
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: room that won't have party one moment and pain the next. Oh,
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: do you hear what I'm saying? How could this switch
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: from one verse to the other? They're having a party.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: They're having a celebration. Isaac is weaned until Sarah looks
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: out the window and she begins to see the mockery
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: in her own life.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: This is the.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: Catalyst of change. When you confront what is mocking your destiny.
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: The real lesson here is the promotion of patience. It
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: is understanding that letting go of your fallacies is painful
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: and problematic, but it is also, the real lesson here
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: is the promotion of patience. If Sarah had only waited,
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: she wouldn't have had to deal with this fallacy.
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: Now Abraham is in a crisis.
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: He is in a crisis because now his wife has
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: asked him to put out his son. His son who
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: he knows, not the son he just had, the son
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: he's grown up with. He wants him to cast out,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: she wants him to cast out the bondwoman and her son.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: And Abraham ain't hearing it. He's not hearing it. He's
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: not hearing it. And an argument has broken out in
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: the house because Abraham told Sarah, you must be tripping.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: He wouldn't have been in the house if this is
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: what I said. This is Jake's version of the Bible.
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: He wouldn't have been up in this house in the
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: first place if your mouth hadn't made this decision to
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: bring him in the house.
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: Now you're going to.
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: Turn around and change your mind in the middle of
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: the story. It's a good argument. It's a true argument,
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: but it's not right. Oh God, can I go deeper?
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: It can be true and not be right. It is
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: true that Sarah is reversing her own idea. It is true,
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: but it's not right. How do you know it's not right?
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: Because God said, hearken unto the voice of thy wife, Sarah,
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: which I have given you. Sarah is right. But the
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: problem is they're asking Abraham who has waited till he
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: was a hundred to.
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: Have a child while all of.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: His brothers and all of his family and all of
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: his kin people are having children.
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: He has nothing to show for a hundred years.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: And you know how it is when you get something
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: after not having something for a long time and now
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: they want to take it from you. Now you're ready to....
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: You come up... You take it....
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: Because when you've waited a long time to get something
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: and now you got to give it up.
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: It is difficult. It is painful. It is hard. And
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: it takes faith.
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: It took faith for Abraham to submit to the voice
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: of God. To hearken unto the voice of a woman
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: who got him in the mess in the first place.
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: Now y'all know you will change your mind.
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: Can you feel the tension in this text? Can you
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: feel the marital discord in this text? Abraham is the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: father of faith and he's having trouble in his marriage
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: because he is.
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: Sick of Sarah. This is a part of the Bible
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: that we don't teach.
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: These are our spiritual parents. Our covenant parents, the patriarchs
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: of all that we embrace as faith are having marital problems.
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: They're having a fight. They went from a feast to
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: a fight. From a party to pain. But they still
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: stayed together. Can you stay with somebody that you have
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: a right to leave? Oh, y'all ain't gonna talk to me.
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: Let me go on back home. Y'all not ready to
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: talk to me. I can imagine what's going on online.
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: Y'all are not ready to talk. Can you stay on
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: a job that you have a right to quit? Can
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: you stay because God put you there? Can you stay
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: because you're called there? Can you stay because your destiny
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: is there? Can you work it out because God is
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: about to do something amazing in your life? Is there
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: ever a time in your life that God gets bigger
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: than your feelings? Oh, y'all not going to talk to me.
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: Let me try this. Is there ever a time in
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: your life that God gets bigger than your fear? I
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: hear you dance. I hear you shout. I hear you
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: speak in tongue. But the moment something gets on your nerves, you.
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: Are out of there.
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: Abraham is staying with a woman whose advice has created
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: a problem and her cure has created pain. Abraham who
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: didn't flinch at cutting the foreskin off his penis. is
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: going crazy about putting away his son.
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: Men, back me up. I have never had a day
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: in my life that I thought, No, no, no, no.
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: You cut my fingernails or something like that. You cut
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: my toenail. You cut my hair. Don't you bring that
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: knife over there because I'm not hearing that because that's
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: going to hurt. Abraham didn't flinch at that. But at
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: putting away his son, now we got a problem. But
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: Abraham's problem was also Abraham's practice. Y'all ain't ready for
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: me tonight. Abraham's problem was also Abraham's practice. God allowed him.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: He said, hearken unto the voice of thy wife. I
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: want you to get used to giving up your son.
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: Stay with me. Because by the time we get to
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: Genesis 22, when God says, take now thy son, thy
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: only son, Isaac, to the mountain to offer it up,
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: it has become easier for Abraham to give up Isaac
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: than it was for him to give up Ishmael. He said,
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: I've been through this before. And if God took care
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: of Ishmael, God will take care of Isaac. So now
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: he takes Isaac to the mountain and he doesn't stagger
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: at the promises of God because the promise, the problem
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: led to the promise. Talk to me a minute in here.
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: Talk to me a minute in here. Abraham said, I'm
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: used to cutting off stuff. I cut off my flesh.
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: I cut off my Ishmael. And if you ask me
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: for Isaac, you can have him too. And he told
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: his servants, me and the lad are going yonder to
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: worship but some kind of way God is going to
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: get us out of this if he took care of
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: Ishmael he'll take care of Isaac I survived the cutting
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: of my flesh I survived the cutting of my first
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: son and I'll survive the cutting of my oh y'all
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: don't hear me Daddy, I see the knife. And daddy,
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: I see the wood. But where is the sacrifice? Don't
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: worry about it, boy. God himself shall provide the sacrifice.
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: Your faith comes out of your experience with God. And
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: little by little, Abraham is growing up. He's growing up
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: through the things he suffered. He is learning obedience through
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: the things he suffered. He's learning endurance through the things
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: that he suffered. And by the time we get to
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: the 22nd chapter, which is just another chapter away, Abraham
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: has gotten good. at saying yes to God even when
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: it hurts. Is there anybody in here that's gotten better
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: at saying yes to God even when it hurts? Or
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: is God just a God of your convenience and a
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: God of your good times and a God when things
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: are working out and a God when you agree with him,
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: you say yes.
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: But when it draws blood, you back away.
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: That's why the book of Hebrews said, you have not
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: yet resisted on the blood. You got to be God's child,
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: even when it causes you pain, even when it draws blood,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: even when it hurts your feelings. The promises of God
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: are sure. The promises of God are sure. He will say,
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: surely blessings I will bless thee and multiplying I will
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: multiply thee. The promises of God are sure. Say it
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: with me. The promises of God.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: Say it again. The promises of God. Say it again.
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: Say it again. Now that's praise. That's praise. When you
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: compliment God's character, when you brag on his integrity, when
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: you trust him in uncertainty, when you praise him in
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: the middle of pain, when you give him the sacrifice
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: of praise, when you believe him even when you're hurt.
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: When you believe him even when you're frustrated. When you
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: believe him even when it doesn't feel good. When you
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: believe him even when you're living in a situation that
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: is below what you want it to be. When you
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: believe God even when your flesh is saying, leave this
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: crazy woman and walk out the door. And I'm not
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: talking about Hagar. I'm talking about Sarah. I'm sick of
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: her and her bad advice because now she wants to
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: hurt me again. And yet God says, wait, wait, go
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: back and hearken to the voice of thy wife. The
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: woman is right. I want you to practice giving up
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: your son. Your problem is your practice. Can I go deeper?
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: They gave me my first church. It was in Montgomery,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: West Virginia. At that time, and I think even now,
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: Montgomery had one red light in the whole town. So
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: you know how big that was. You blink and you
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: was out of Montgomery. And I had to drive about
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: an hour or so to even get to the church
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: and I was working a full-time job. And it wasn't
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: a church, it was a building. And the building wasn't
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: a church, it was a hole in the wall. And
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: I was preaching my heart out and preaching Sunday mornings
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: and Sunday night and teaching Wednesday night Bible class and
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: had to be at work at seven in the morning
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: And the church was not growing. And the church was
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: not developing. And I was teaching everything I knew. I
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: was teaching on the tabernacle ever since I was a teenager.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: I was teaching Moses' tabernacle, the tabernacle of David, the
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: temple of Solomon. I was teaching eschatology. I was teaching Christology.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: I was teaching everything I knew how to teach to
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: about five old ladies and two little kids. And a
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: big service was 40 people And if we hit 100,
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: it would have blown our mind. We'd have to put
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: out chairs. And I thought, God, eventually, it took me
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: a while because at first I was grateful to just
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: be there at all. But eventually I got tired of
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: preaching to a handful of people and people were making
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: fun and they were laughing at me and they were
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: calling me the boy preacher. I didn't realize that my
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: problem was my practice. What you may be wrestling right now,
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: it may only be preparation for what God is about
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: to do in your life. And stop being so frustrated
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: because it's not working out. This is not the recital.
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: It's just the rehearsal. And you know, the choir don't
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: look like the choir when they come to rehearsal. They
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: don't have on the robes when they come to rehearsal.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: They don't have their hair done and their black dress
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: with the pearls around their neck when they come to rehearsal.
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: And so don't be so upset about what you're going through.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: Your problem is your practice. Let me prove it to
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: you in Scripture. The Bible said if you can be
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: over many. And so I was faithful for 10 years,
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: preaching to less than 100 people to prove to God
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: that I would preach even when the numbers were down.
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: I couldn't even imagine preaching in a building like this.
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: I couldn't even imagine preaching to the crowds that I
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: had preached to. Later, I would preach to a million
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: people in Uhuru Park in the middle of Kenya. But
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: at that time, I couldn't get 100. But I was practicing.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: And if you're faithful over a few things, God will
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: make you rule over many. I don't know who I'm
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: preaching to right now. Your business might be failing. You
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: might be struggling to keep the doors open. But don't
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: you doubt the promises of God. Weeping may endure for
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: a night, but joy is coming.
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 2: In the morning.
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: Your problem is practice. A few more quick points and
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: I'm done. God's promises transcend your circumstances. All we pray
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: about nowadays is our circumstances.
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: Give me out, Lord. I'm sick of this. I'm tired.
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 2: I don't feel good. They hurt my feelings. They don't
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 2: respect me.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: Give me out.
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 2: Give me out.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: And God has given you a promise. And all you
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: pray about is the circumstance. The second thing I want
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: you to get out of the class tonight is that
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: walking with God often includes contradictions. Faith on one hand,
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: fallacies on the other. Promises on this side, problems on
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: that side. The greater the promise, the greater the problems.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: New levels, new devils. If you cannot run with the footman,
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: how shall you contend with the horses? So God has
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: put you in a foot race and you're ready to faint.
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: And yet you told me you could outrun the herd.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: How you outrun the herd and you can't outrun the footman?
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: I'm telling you that God will test you before he
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: promotes you. I'm telling you that he put Moses in
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: the desert and let him practice his miracles with nobody watching.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: So that when Moses got before Pharaoh, he was good
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: at his tricks. He said, let me show you something.
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: You think your magicians are bad? Let me show you something.
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: Their magician threw.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: Down their rod.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: It turned into a snake. He threw down his rod.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: It turned into a snake and ran their snakes off.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: He picked up the snake. It turned into a rod again.
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: He stuck his hand into his bosom. It came out
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: with leprosy. He stuck it in again. It got healed.
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: He poured out water. It turned to blood. But Moses
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: had been practicing. Tonight we're talking about spiritual maturity creates
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: patience in you that you are willing to wait.
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 2: And wait through contradictions.
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: Removing the contradiction takes as much faith as receiving the promise.
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: It took faith for Abraham to do what he did
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: not want to do And put out his son. And
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: by the way, I believe that Abraham was bond to
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: the bond woman. Come on, talk to me somebody. That
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: this is not just a laboratory exchange of fluids done
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: in a test tube. Abraham has spent some time with Hagar.
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: And you know about pillow talk. And you're sitting over
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: there talking about what you want to be and what
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: you would do with your life and how you grew
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: up and where you came from.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: And now this is a ripping of history.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: Flesh and it is most painful because he is bond
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: to the bond woman which is part of the reason
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: Sarah wants her out of there because I was foolish
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: enough to believe that she could incubate my baby and
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: not my man.
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 2: That's stupid.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: And now they're in a situation where Abraham has to
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: have faith to cut away his flesh again. Life is
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: a series of losses. No shouting tonight. Life is a
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: series of losses. In order to gain, you got to lose.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: In order to walk, you had to fall. In order
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: to be healed, you have to be sick. In order
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: to prosper, you got to go through pain. For every yin,
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: there is a yang. For every north, there is a south.
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: For every east, there is a west. Nobody gets away
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: without bleeding. Everybody is going to have some tears before
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: this life is over. Stop being jealous of people who
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: look like they haven't been through anything. There is no
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: way for you to have everything and not go through anything.
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: The only way you can have anything is to go
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: through other things. You are not the only one in
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: here bleeding. You are not the only one in here lonely.
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: You are not the only one in here sore. You
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: are not the only one in here who has suffered loss.
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: If your Savior suffered loss, then spiritual maturity requires that
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: you face with the same grace the.
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 2: Loss as you do the win.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: One moment he's partying and the next moment he's in pain.
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: One moment he's happy and the next moment he's in
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: an argument. Ain't that just like life? One text can
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: take the smile off of your face. One phone call
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: and you would have to leave the room. One incident
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: could change everything in your life. God is the righteous judge.
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: God is merciful if we repent. God knows how to
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: fix our fallacies and yet build our faith. There are
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: people in here who have made some bad choices, but
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: God wants to fix them. Stress often comes when our
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: lives are too complicated. And in order to detox from
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: the complication, you got to let some things go. What
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: are you willing to send away to bring peace to
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: your life? This is deep. There's too much stuff going
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: on under the same roof which creates stress and depression.
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: Paul said I was pressed above measure and beyond strength
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: so much so that I despaired of life itself while
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: I was in Asia.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 2: He left. Some things are too much for you.
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: You have got to develop the ability to save when
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: things are enough.
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 2: Enough is enough.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: Something has got to go because my destiny is being
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: mocked by my history. As I close tonight, I'm talking
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: about spiritual maturity. And I'm telling you that while Abraham's
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: tree of nations was growing, Abraham and his faith was
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: growing at the same time. That Ishmael was growing, Isaac
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: was also growing, and we are also growing. And you
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: know you're growing as you deal with the inconsistencies of
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: faith and fallacies and maintain the integrity of staying faithful.
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 2: Through it all.
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: As I closed tonight, I was watching this man. He
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: was paralyzed. He had some sort of disease. And the
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: only thing he could move was his lips. And he
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: had to talk through a computer. And he was going
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: to die. And they said, when you start to get really,
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: really down toward the end, do you want us to
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: resuscitate you?
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: He said, yes.
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: Yes. And I thought to myself, why would you want
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: to be resuscitated? Nothing works. Nothing moves. Nothing is going
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: your way. You can't go to the beach. You can't
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: go to the party. You can't make love. You can't
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: have fun. Why would you want to stay? He said,
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: life is so precious that I want to experience the
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: whole thing. I will take no shortcuts. Every breath he
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: gives me, I'll take it. Because life is the most
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: precious thing.
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 2: I have ever known.
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: And he talks so much about the preciousness of life that.
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 2: I drop my head.
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: Because here I am standing on two good legs with
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: two good feet and a strong body and a reasonable
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: portion of health and strength clothed in my right mind.
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: And this man who can't move a muscle or turn
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: his head or chew his own food, this man who
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: is sucking his food through a straw still thinks life
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: is precious. And suddenly I realized he was more mature
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: than I was. He had learned to value what I
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: am taking for granted. Spiritual maturity will stop you from
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: leaving when things get tough. Abraham could have left Sarah,
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: ran off with Hagar, and changed the course of destiny
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: But God had a plan for him that required that
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: he endure pain sometimes and pleasure sometimes and disagreements sometimes.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 1: And inconsistency sometimes. I'm not saying to stay in a
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: situation where you're being abused and being raped and being
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: molested and all that kind of crazy stuff. But I'm
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: talking about leaving over burnt toast and leaving because he
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: lost his job and leaving because she can't cook and
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: leaving because they get on your nerves. You're not worshiping God,
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: you're worshiping you. Our ancestors made dinner out of yams.
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: They had no refrigerator. They covered the yams with leaves
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: and fed the neighborhood. My grandmother raised 23 children off
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: of yams and peas and greens. And you're sitting in
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: air conditioning saying I can't make it. And yet you
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: are filled with the Holy Ghost. And I love the
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: way we dance and I love the way we shout
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: and I love the way we praise God. But I'm
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: wondering when are we going to grow up? Growing up
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: means that you glory in tribulation because tribulation works with patience.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 2: Patience. Patience. Patience.
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: And patience experience and experience hope. But we are in
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: the generation of I want it now and I want
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: it fast and I want it quick or I quit.
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: You cannot become the father of many nations until you
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: learn how to stand until your branches grow to their
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: full capacity. Let's stand to our feet. Tonight there may
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: be somebody. Were you blessed tonight? I don't know why
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: God had me teach this. But somebody in here does.
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know who needs this. But somebody in here did.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: It may be somebody in our virtual community that has
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: experienced a touch of the Holy Spirit right now. And
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: you're tired and you're annoyed and you're frustrated and you
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: want to walk away. and maybe God sent this word
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: to you about spiritual maturity so you could manage your
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: faith and your fallacies and understand that this your problem
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: is your practice by the time I got to Dallas
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: I was ready to pastor Because being in West Virginia
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: raised me. I could stand tribulation. I could stand storms.
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 1: Things that would have made other people walk away from
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: this ministry in this city. I passed through it like
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: it wasn't nothing. Because he had trained me in the desert.
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: He had called me in the wilderness. He had taught
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: me how to preach through pain and preach through turmoil.