Breaking the Generational Shrapnel in Your Life

Hey, listen. Thanks for being here tonight., if you're here, you're a guest or you consider yourself a guest or it's your first time., I'm glad you're here. We're going to have a lot of fun here at this Church. And look, it's not about this Church or another Church. I'm just letting who we're going to be., it's going to be a relaxed environment. There's going to be a lot of reverence for God's Word, but it's going to have a lot of relevance to your life. We're real people. We deal with real adversity, but we have real promises. Yes. And so there's a relevancy to what we're going to talk about in everyday life. But if you're here, some nights you just feel like picking a fight and you feel like getting scrappy and that's what that was. And so if that's weird for you, you'll adjust. It's okay., but I am glad you're here. Make yourself at home. Restrooms in the back. Get yourself another beverage if you need it.

And, be friendly to people because that's what matters, too., I've been doing a fun little thing. I think it's fun in month of May. I'm just calling it a May money moment just to give you another moment, another thought about money. I've never really talked about it in three years because so many people have opinions about Church and money. And I understand where it comes from and I get it. nobody has a problem with the humanitarian efforts of things. But the moment you put Jesus on it, it starts people start to have an opinion. They start to can throw some stones. And we've built trust. We've built relationship. It was by design to not really talk about it. And now I just want to begin to drip out little things about money regarding God's promise. And it does not just the reason I'm making it a significance about money is because people are sensitive about it. And I get it. But it's the same principle if we were talking about healing, if we were talking about peace, if we were talking about joy, if we were talking about any other promise of God or any other practical application of your life, your words, anything. Everything has to do with the condition of your heart. Everything that you do, everything that you say, everywhere that you go has to do, every every action, every reaction has to do with the health of your heart, the surrender of your heart to the Truth. And so I just want to bring up one verse, one thought for you to think about tonight that just again reiterates this part of it. It's in Matthew chapter 6 verse 24.

And I think it was interesting. And it's also in Luke, but I thought it was interesting because Matthew was a tax collector., and so Matthew was in the group of people that people didn't like because he was he was serving the Romans and he was and he was basically stealing from his own people and betrayed his own people. And so for him to make reference of this is kind of interesting to me. But it says this in Matthew chapter 6. He says, "No one can serve two masters. " This is common sense before I go any further. Nobody can turn left and right at the same time. You can't you can't go up and down at the same time. You can't serve two masters, for you will hate one and you will love the other. You will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money. The New King James says or serve mammon, which is the fear of not having enough. And so here's how this works or how it breaks down. What Jesus is saying is serving both cannot be done. You cannot have divided loyalties. Okay? You cannot you cannot make decisions that are only about your finances and make decisions with what God's asking you to do in pertaining your money or your heart. All right? And so it's very important to understand that what when we talk about money or the idea of money, man, it just has to do with your heart and the condition of your heart.

And that's it. You can't serve both. It's a heart condition. And so we can't serve God and money. But watch, we can serve God with money. Money is not evil. Money is neutral. I can give you $1,000 and you can go and feed homeless people with it or you can go buy a bunch of drugs. It's just money. And what you do with your money has to do with the condition of your heart. And how your heart is. If God is if Jesus is the Lord of your life, then how I spend my money or how I use my money or what I prioritize with my money has to do with where I've put God in that position of my heart. Because here's the deal. If I serve God and money, the moment that I feel an impression by the Holy Spirit for God by God to, buy somebody lunch, I'm like, well, I don't know. I mean, if you look at my budget, I don't know if I got money to buy somebody lunch this week. And so, I can't serve God and the fear of not having enough. I can't do both. And so, what God is saying is, look, he wants your heart. He wants your heart for everything. He wants your heart for your marriage.

He wants your heart for your friendships. He wants your heart to for your mouth. He wants your heart for your f. He wants your heart because he wants to be God through every avenue of your life. And so it's the same with this particular topic right here. I put in my notes here because I know that both of these men are here and I'm not going to acknowledge him. But one man has sold his truck because God put it on his heart to do it. Another man has a nice truck and is hauling tools around so he can help serve the Church and has been doing that for the last several weeks. It's not about the truck. It's just a truck. It's about the obedience to what God's asking you to do. Are you more Holy because you sold your truck? No. Are you more Holy because you're bringing tools in your truck? No. It's just a truck. It's the condition of your heart that both of them are surrendered to the obedience of what God's asked them to do. Are you tracking with me? So, what you do with it is only between you and the Lord. You can serve God with your money.

That does not mean you have to give money to this place. You don't have to. I want to say I don't care if you do, but I do care because I want blessing for your life. But I don't care if you do. But I want you to serve God with your money wherever you go. that you're obedient to be a blessing to people if it's at the coffee shop, if it's see somebody hurting or whatever it is that you're going to honor God. Might have to do with your children and and how you budget your money that you're going to serve God and how you structure your money at home. It doesn't have to be about giving here. That's not the motive of this little money made money moment. It's to help you recognize the condition of your heart in relationship to money. Are you tracking with me? And so understand that everything comes back to surrender, which is what we've been talking about for the last couple of weeks, man. God wants to do a supernatural work in your life. So let me review for just a moment the last couple of weeks before we begin to build on it. Man, we learned that we are surrendering just like Jesus did in the garden. He was surrendering his preference to accomplish God's mission. He said, "I I don't I would like this cup to pass from me. I really don't want to have to do it this way. " and he's sweating drops of blood, which none of us can relate to. I have never sweat blood.

Has anybody here ever sweat blood? I have never sweat blood. That is a level of a of stress and intensity that you and I can't really relate to. It is intense. He's sweating blood. He's praying. He's trying to get in alignment with the Father. He comes out, his homies are out there sleeping. When he asks him to stay up and pray and have his back, he's feeling alone. He's feeling isolated. He goes and prays for another hour. He's stressing to the intensity that he's trying to surrender his preference to accomplish God's mission or objective which is restoration for our souls. So when I tell you what is God's will is it God's will that Jesus died on the cross. It's God's will to restore you back to him. The requirement for that was Jesus to die on a cross. And so what Jesus had to do was surrender his preference. Had to surrender his will. Had to surrender his way of doing. He could have called down a legion of angels. He could have he could have eliminated us.

He could have flicked us and been done with us and moved on. But the Bible says that he laid down his life. He let people spit on him. Anybody in here do that? Anybody here just kind of let people spit on you? He let people punch him. And he let people spit on him and pull his beard. And he let them hit him with a cat and nine tails and that bone ripping into his flesh. He let them put a crown of thorns on his head and press it in. He let them mock him and make fun of him. He let them strung him up on a cross on a tree and nail him there. And he let he let himself suffocate and die so that he could accomplish the will of the Father which was to give you hope and and to reach and pull you and invite you to the life of God. And so when we receive that love from God, when you can hear the message and not just the story of the Gospel, but when you can hear the message of the Gospel, that God knows you, that God loves you, that God picked you, that God saw you in your mother's womb, that God knows the number of hairs on your head, that God has selected you, that you're the apple of his eye, and he has elected and chose to redeem you because he longs for you to have him. When you can hear the message of the Gospel that you're invited to the life of God, it changes everything. Now that I've heard the message, I receive the message, it changes my heart. And now what we're all doing is growing in the life and relationship with God, that we can begin to get to the place Jesus was that I could that I could stiff arm my own preference to accomplish what God's want to do in somebody else's life. Man, it's not convenient all the time to serve God, is it? It's not very It's not very comfortable all the time to serve God, is it? But because I've given him my life, because I've given him my heart, because I've surrendered to the lordship of Jesus, and I say, "Here am I, Lord. Use me.

" And I and God puts in my heart to do something, let me be obedient to surrender my preference, even if it's weird or awkward, for the outcome that God wants to accomplish in somebody else's life. That's where we want to live. That's where we want to be. And so Jesus is doing that. We talked about how we pray for the for with silly stuff like we pray for more patience. And we always say, "Hey, be careful. Don't pray for more patience because what's going to happen, right? Everybody's heard all of that. " What you're really praying for is you're praying for less of you and more of God in your life because patience and gentleness and kindness and self-control is a fruit or evidence of him in your life. It's the evidence that he exists and dwells in your heart. And so the evidence of that when I get a new view of you, when I when the Truth is coming to my heart and I see things differently, the evidence of me seeing it differently, there will be more patience. There will be more love. I will be moved with compassion for people's ignorance because I'll see them that they don't know what they don't know yet because I've allowed God to heal my heart and I'll begin to see them differently. So the evidence of God healing my heart will be the fruit or the evidence of that and then what the result of that will be is healing in their life. What kind of fruit are people eating off of your tree? What kind of fruit are people seeing in your life? Man, they know you go to the covenant Church. They know that you're a Jesus person. And then what is the fruit that they experience out of your life beyond the surface? Listen, none of us are perfect.

I know it. But we all have the opportunity to get in alignment that we can walk in the Truth that we can we have been made perfect. We have been made right with God. And so now I have the opportunity to be transformed that I may live God's good, perfect, and pleasing will, which is what? the restoration and the healing and the breakthrough for people in their life. Man, there are people in here tonight that have invited and invited and invited and you say, "Why? " Because you just want to get opportunity for them to get what God has for them. Why do we got to take it outside these walls and be the same person in here with the same warrior mentality, the same fight mentality when we're at the coffee shop or in town or at the bank? Because God's elected to put you in front of somebody. And it's not his will that you're there. It's his will THAT God IS DRAWING THEM. And you can be the person that plants and waters. God's trying to harvest lives from people. He's That probably sounded weird. God is trying to harvest salvation in their life. First Corinthians 3, Paul's like, "Who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We're just servants of God. We're planters and waters and God is causing the increase in your life. Man, if somebody's here because you invited them, you're just a planter or waterer.

You don't get to take credit for that. I'm here because Carol Bedell was faithful. I'm here because Jerry Moore was faithful. I'm here because Bill Shear was faithful. I'm here because Todd Griffith was faithful. And you don't know any of them. And I'm in the same line now with those people in your life. I'm just another seed planter. I'm just another waterer. And what God is doing is taking the seed and he's taking the watering and he is extracting fruit out of your life. He is extracting your heart so that you can know him and walk with him and live with him and walk in that Truth and the evidence will be in your life. And what will it produce? It will produce growth in his kingdom. It will produce healing in people's lives. It will produce evidence for other people to begin to eat up that fruit and go, "Can I get some more of that? Where did Where did you get that? I would like some of that. How do you do that? I want to be a part of that. " Romans 12:2 on the screen says, "Don't be conformed to the patterns of the world.

" We don't think like the world. We don't talk like the world. Don't be conformed to the patterns of the world, but let God transform you. Man, we all know what Transformers are. We probably all seen the movie, man. It's a car and then it and it's a robot. It did not grow new parts. It did not. But the purpose of it changed. It transformed. Your life does not look any different the moment you gave it to Jesus or you surrendered your heart and say, "God, I'm open to your Truth. " But what happens as you stay surrendered to it is transformation happens in your life. If I will give the attention and the dedication to the Truth, to the Word, to opening my heart to surrender to it, it's going to heal my heart. And watch, if my heart is healing, then there's an elevation that's happening in my life. Not for my comfort, not for my glory, but my heart is healing. And so the evidence is healing in the circumstances around me. My life is growing. People are being impacted. My marriage gets better. My relationship with my children gets better.

My finances get better. My friendships get better. My there's things at work that get better. And things change in my life because my heart's being healed. If I'm allowing God to heal my heart, then elevation is happening in my life. It can't not. It's the fruit or the evidence of what God's doing in my life. Be transformed by changing the way that you think. I used to think one way, but I don't think that way anymore. I think now according to what God says about me. And then you will learn to know what God's will for you is. God's will is what God wants. What did God want through Jesus? He wanted restoration for his creation. Man, if you don't respond to it, the rocks are going to cry out. Jesus restored creation back to him. And if we don't accept the invitation to take it, man, the rocks are going to cry out. It's yours to lose. It's yours to not take. It's yours to give away.

He's already received you or restored you. And so God's will for you that he wants to do is good and it's perfect and it's pleasing. What God wants to do through your life is accomplish what he did through the cross of Calvary, through Jesus, which is to get you in alignment with him so that you could live with him and walk with him. And with adversity all around us, somehow just live in peace. Somehow when the world's going to hell, like we're just in joy. Somehow when everybody else is freaking out and in fear, we're not worried. Why? because my focus, my emphasis is on the victory that God's already won for me. So now I just get to live in God's will in spite of the circumstances around me. Watch. I get to live God's will through the circumstances I'm doing that I'm facing. That's what I'm going in. So here's something that I was chopping up with Jackson this week. We were talking have a little disciplehip time and I wanted to bring it forward to you guys. We don't use the Word sin except when we're talking about the Bible. We don't use the Word sin except when we're, talking about the Gospel. And that's understandable. But what is it? When we try to talk about it, what is it? And you guys have heard answers and, but it's obviously being apart from God.

Sin separates us from God. So just think of it in the simplest form like that. There's a disconnect. There's a breach. Sin is a breach between us and God. And so instead of getting to walk and talk and live in alignment with God, his presence, his Truth, his victory, and all the things, I'm separated from it. And here's the deal. I was born like this. So what do we say? We were born into sin. In other words, you were born into a life that was breached from the Truth of who you really are. Are you tracking with me? I was bre I was I was born in separation from God because the world's broken. because the world's cursed. And so then you hear verbiage like this about living in sin and it feels very condemning and it feels very belittling. But a lot of times we're just living apart from God and we don't even realize that's that. See, it's kind of like saying that you're an American. You were born an American, right? You were just born in this country. You're just an American.

It's all you've ever really known. You don't really know how other cultures operate. You don't really know how other things think. That's what you were born into sin. You were born separated from the reality of who you really are in the Truth. And so what God has done, watch the Gospel message is easy. He's rescued you so that you can walk with him again. He didn't have to. What you were born into wasn't your fault. Wasn't your choice. And you were born into practical circumstances that were probably some of you very heinous. the results of them being apart from God. You dealt with the shrapnel of your parents who apart from God. You dealt with the shrapnel of your grandparents who were apart from God who left one another. So your dad grew up without parents and he was offended and then he beat your mom and then that's what you grew up and d you dealt with them apart from the Truth and they weren't living the life of God and so you dealt with the shrapnel of it and so it's all you've really known. And so then you hear this message that God invites you to walk with him and wants to heal your heart. It's not going to change the past. It's not going to undo what you were born into or what's happened to you. It restores you back to him. Psalm chapter 23, David said this, "You restore my soul.

" My soul was separate. It was lost. What is my soul? It's my mind, which we just read. It's my will, which we just read, and it's my emotions, how I make decisions, what I want, and how I think. And what he does the moment I receive the message of the cross, his love for me, it begins to restore my soul. My thoughts begin to get in alignment with the Truth. My will becomes his will, what he wants to do. My emotions become stabilized, and they no longer dictate or direct my life anymore. If anything, they're just things that help me recognize what's going in my own heart so I can run to him with it. He can handle your emotions. Just so, he can handle your language. He can handle He can He just wants your honesty. Because if you're coming to him and you are full-blown angry and you're letting it fly and you're and you're thinking, "Man, you shouldn't talk to God that way and all that stuff. " Listen, he can handle you. Because when you're coming to him with both fingers blazing and a full mouth and all the stuff that you're frustrated about, you're humble because you're coming to him. Tricks on you, suckers. Right? Like you're coming to him thinking, "Man, I'm mad at God. " And he's going, "Finally.

Finally. I've been waiting for you to humble yourself enough to come to me. I can handle your little potty mouth, bro. Are you with me? That's a humility that comes to him. And now, no matter how you come to him, he can begin to heal your heart because you're coming to him. And to come to him is to humble yourself. To come to him, no matter how you're wrestling with him. And so, here's what's amazing is the Bible says in Romans chapter 6, and we'll jump over there. It says that the power of sin is broken. The power of being apart from him has been broken. I no longer have to be apart from him. And this is the invitation. You get to leave here alive under God, sensitive to his Truth, with the opportunity to hear his voice, completely redeemed, completely washed away, completely redeemed and made restored and made back right with God. Your sin covered, your sin washed away. The breach has been repaired, and you get to walk with God the rest of your life if you would like to. pretty good opportunity. And so it says this in Romans chapter 6 verse 16. Don't you realize that you become the slaves of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to life apart from God.

You you can deal with the results that come with being separated from God. And look, on the surface, you may have a lot going on in your world. You may got a few dollars in your pocket, got you a nice vehicle, got you a good job, got you a decent house, man. Maybe you're still together, but there's this void or this emptiness that's just none of it really makes sense. It's kind of like ecclesiastic. All in the end, it's just kind of meaningless. I'm like, I don't I still understand what the point of it is, man. You got some happy times. You got a boat. You get out on the river. You're enjoying the sunshine. We live in America. There's plenty to be glad about, but yet somehow none of it even alltogether still is not enough to satisfy my soul for some reason. It's just not enough. And so you become a slave or endure or or trapped by the results of life apart from God. But you can be a slave to sin which leads to death. Where does it lead to? It leads to death. It leads to destruction. It leads to the end.

It leads to hopelessness. Or you can choose to obey God which leads to righteous living. Watch. Let me say it differently. You can be a slave to your sin. You can be a slave to your selfishness or you can be a slave to God. There's no in between. Your choosing is either what I want, when I want it, how I want it, or it's going to be as unto the Lord and what he wants and what he's asking of me. I've either given him my heart or given him my life or I haven't. And listen to me, this is not a condemning conversation or a condemning moment. It's the reality. It's actually the greatest news of the world. You're invited to no longer live apart from God. It's been paid for. when you go to the restaurant and somebody picks up your bill? It's a great feeling. You don't even know who it is and you're like, "Man, I wish I want to find out who it is so I can tell him thank you. " It was Jesus. You can tell him thank you anytime you want. That's who paid your bill.

You can tell him. So watch this. Listen to me. If we reject God, and that sounds so dramatic, but if we choose selfishness and reject surrendering to God, listen, by default, then we serve his Enemy. And if you say, "Well, I just don't really want to go there. I just don't have to deal with that. " Well, you don't have to. But it's a reality. It's the reality that if I don't choose the goodness of God and this great message, this unbelievably great Gospel about God saving me, then by default, I choose to do what I want to do. And in the end, it's going to have a result. It's going to pay. It's going to to produce. Look at verse 20 now in chapter 6. When you were slaves to sin, watch this. Watch this. Watch this amazing verbiage. When you were slaves to sin, when you were apart from God, you were free. Everybody say free. You were free from the obligation to do right. I can do whatever I want.

I can I can I can I can I can jump off that cliff. I can get high. I can I can I can say what I want to these people. I can quit my job. I can go where I want. I'm free to do whatever I want to do. I'm not accountable to anyone or anything. I'm not accountable to a higher power because I'm I choose to live apart from God. And so I'm free to do what I want. I'm not I'm free from the obligation to do what is right. I'm not obligated to do anything. You're free. And what was the result of that freedom? You are now ashamed of the things you used to do. Things that end in eternal doom. Things that end. It's like, man, I was free to do what I want to do. I did what I wanted to do and what was the outcome? Foolishness, embarrassment, jail, divorce, abuse, emptiness, hopelessness, fear. What was what was the end result of doing it the way you wanted to do it without God, without choosing God's way?

Keep it simple. just to surrender to God's way of doing things when we chose to not. We were free to do whatever we want. We weren't obligated to God. We weren't the religious folks. We weren't the Holy rollers. We weren't the Church folks. So, you weren't obligated to do anything. But the end result for that leaves you empty. Leaves you without. Look at verse 22. But now you are free. Everybody say free. But now you are free from the power of sin. So the other one you were free from the obligation to have to do anything as right as under the Lord. You you're free. You can do whatever you want to do. But then you gave your life to Jesus and now watch. Now you're free from the power of sin. In other words, over here I'm apart from God and I'm free to do whatever I want to do for me.

But now that I've given my life to Jesus, I'm no longer apart from God, which is what sin is. And the power that holds me in this trap, that power has been broken. And so now I'm free from the power of it and have become slaves to God, which is only to your benefit. Pastor Bill would always say, "He's a benevolent dictator. " A dictator is somebody who dictates you for their gain and for their benefit. God's a benevolent dictator. He dictates and has standards, but it's for your benefit. See, when he says you're a slave of God, you're like, "I don't know if I like being a slave of God. " It's to your benefit. Trust me, it's to your benefit. Now, now you do those things that lead where do they lead? They lead to holiness and results and eternal life. Watch. Earlier, you were free to do what you want. You weren't obl you were free from the obligation and it led to things that ended in hopelessness and death. Now you're free from the power of sin. And what does it lead to? It leads to holiness and results in eternal life. Look at verse 23. Which many people know very, very well.

For the wages of life without God is death and hopelessness. But the free gift, the free gift, free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Man, God invites you to his goodness. That's why the Bible calls it the joy of his salvation. Your life is valued. Your life is purposed. You were born maybe apart from God. And nobody's ever told you. And if anything, probably people made you feel condemned because you didn't know. But here's the deal. You didn't know. And what you now can know is that emptiness and that void that's there. It's because there's a separation. And God and only God can fill it and wants to fill it. He wants to fill the void that you were born with that you didn't even know that's what that was. That you've tried every kind of drug and every kind of alcohol and every kind of porn and every kind of dumb decision to try to satisfy it and it just doesn't work. You've had money in your pocket. You've had success. You've had vehicles. You've had the popularity.

You've had all things. Or maybe you did it and you've gone off the cliff with offense, with bitterness, with rage, with anger, with all this stuff. AND NONE OF IT works because only the Truth of the message of the Gospel CAN HEAL THE HEART. AND ALL OF A SUDDEN, I'M IN LINE WITH God. BECAUSE WHY? BECAUSE HE ACCEPTS ME. I didn't earn it. I didn't work for it. He just invites me and he wants me and he accepts me and THAT MAKES ME FEEL VALUABLE AND THAT MAKES ME FEEL LOVED AND that changes everything AND REPURPOSES MY LIFE and now I get in alignment with who he is and I get to live THE LIFE OF God BECAUSE I'M ALREADY ACCEPTED. I'M ALREADY LOVED. I'M ALREADY VALUED. Changes everything. And it begins to heal my heart in that void. It's like, "Oh my gosh, now everything makes sense. Now everything is good. Now everything is healthy. " Even the adversity that I'm facing, I get to have peace that God's causing it to work together for good. God is wanting to heal your heart and elevate your life and do a great thing. Let me leave you with this verse, couple verses. Philippians 2:13, and I'm done.

Watch this. When I talk about what God's will, we've talked about God's will. God wants to bring healing to people. He wants to bring restoration to people. He wants to do all these things in your life. Look at Philippians 2:13. God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him, to do what his will is. He's working. Watch what God is working in you. God is working in you. That's why I keep telling you, you're sitting under the Word. The Truth is working your life. The Truth is healing your heart. What's he doing? He's working in you. God's working in you. You're not the same guy you were yesterday and tomorrow you'll be better than you are today. He's working in you. He's working in you to change the desires of your heart to be in alignment with him. Just like with Jesus, he's working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do.

I don't have that kind of patience. I KNOW HE'S WORKING IN YOU TO HAVE the kind of patience. I don't I don't have that kind OF LOVE FOR PEOPLE. I KNOW HE'S WORKING IN YOU SO THAT YOU CAN LOVE PEOPLE WHO ARE UNLOVABLE. That's what HE'S DOING. AND YOU HAVE TO ALLOW HIM. You have to open your heart to him and let it in so that he can do it. He's working in you to for your heart to will and to do. How? By hearing the Truth. John 17:17, we've talked about that. He sanctifies you. He's making you Holy by his Truth. And how are you going to hear the Truth? Faith comes by what? Hearing. Look at Romans chapter 10:1 16. But not everyone welcomes THE GOOD NEWS. WHY NOT? WHY NOT?

WHY? LOOK AT this statement, Miss Holly. Look at THIS STATEMENT. NOT EVERYONE WELCOMES THE GOOD NEWS. I don't GET IT. BUT Isaiah KNEW IT IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. For Isaiah the prophet said, "The Lord," Am I bleeding? "Who has believed our message? " Who has believed it? You don't have to believe what I'm telling you. And I'm great with that. I would love to have coffee and hear what you do believe. I would love to, not to debate with you. I just want to hear because you don't have to welcome the good news. You don't have to welcome the invitation. You don't have to welcome the free gift. But then look at verse 17. So faith comes by hearing. That is hearing the good news about Christ. I want to thank you again for coming.

I want to thank you for hearing the good news. And I hope that it builds your faith tonight. I hope that everything that we've done and wrestled for is to help you HAVE STRONGER FAITH TO GO OUT AND CONQUER WHAT God has promised you in your life. That's what I want for you. And so 2 Corinthians chapter 5, last verse. Chapter 5:6. Enough with the babysitting, Gigi. We need you. Just kidding. One of these days, we're going to have a nursery. Are you guys ready for that? That's going to be great. My little man, he's ready to run all over the place. Okay, seriously. Last couple verse right here. So, we are always confident. Everybody read that first line. What does it say? We are always Say it again. We are always confident.

Say it again. SO, WE ARE ALWAYS CONFIDENT. I just don't I just don't feel today like hey we are always confident that even though we know that as long as we live in these bodies we're not at home with the Lord. So what he's saying is even though I know we're not there yet I'm always confident. Man, life's got some challenges to it. Man, this body needs a little work. I'm g be honest. NO COMMENTS. I'M JUST SAYING. EVEN THOUGH WE'RE NOT THERE YET, even though Jesus HASN'T COME BACK, EVEN THOUGH IT'S NOT WE HAVEN'T SEEN IT ALL, I'M GOING TO SEE IT. I'm still always confident every day of my life. That you can be confident every day of your life is amazing. Look at verse seven. For we live by believing and not by seeing. Faith comes by hearing. Hearing by the Word of God, hearing the Truth. I've given you this message. I've offered you a free gift. I believe this message. And now I live my life by believing this message.

Not by what I see the adversities that you're facing. I live my life by believing the promise of God. My hope is in his promise. Let me tell you what hope is. Let me give you a lazy picture. If if Nah says tonight at six o'clock she's, making chicken and green beans and that's my favorite meal or something, then watch. I don't have it yet. But here's what I know. At six o'clock, I'm gonna have it. That's what hope is. When I say I hope in God's promise, like it's coming, it will produce in your life. Well, I don't have the chicken and green beans right now, but wait till six o'clock. I'm going to get two double portions. I might throw some cheese up on it. what I'm saying? Like, I'm just I'm in it cuz it's coming. So, it's 2 o'clock in the afternoon and it's like, man, I'm hungry. Oh, I can't wait for six o'clock. That's hope. It's a confident expectation.

I'm not wishing for chicken and green beans. Well, I wish I had some chicken and green beans. I have hope in the promise that it's coming. And I get to live my life at 2:00 with the hope of six o'clock on the rise. I get to live my life today confident because of what's on the horizon for me. You're winning.