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Dufresne Ministries Podcast
My Experience In Faith, Part Three | Morgan Dufresne | Tuesday's Online Service | 5.19.20
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Hi, I'm Nancy Dufresne. Welcome to our podcast channel. We know you'll be blessed by today's message. I won't recap all that we have been discussing in previous services, but you know that the direction that we started out in, what the Spirit of God had said to me to title this series is My Personal Experience with Faith. And that is that I can't base my faith on a personal experience, and neither can you. We will have experiences, experiences in faith. We will have growth in our faith walk where we will see manifestations. We will have times in our walk with God that we are experiencing his goodness, the fullness of manifestations, the reward of faith. But that's not what we base our faith on. We base our faith solely on God's Word, not by what we see, not by what we feel. You know, when you begin to get light in God's Word and you're in the presence of, of God, you will feel and you will sense his presence. But faith says, I don't have to feel something to believe, good or bad. So when we make the statement, faith is not moved by what we see, what we hear, and what we feel that needs to be. We're not moved by what we feel, good or bad. Because there's going to be days that you'll wake up and you'll sense the anointing of God, or you will sense the presence of God in a service or at times in your devotion or as you're in prayer or worship. But faith is not based on what you feel in your times with God. Faith is based on His Word. Faith comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God. Now God ministers to us, the Spirit moves on us and blesses us. And we feel, oftentimes we feel and sense the presence of God. And that's wonderful. That is to develop our relationship with God. Because as we develop our relationship with God, well, we could say this. It becomes easier that when we hear His Word, we trust it. Faith is also based on God's Word and our relationship with God, knowing Him through His Word. But we can enhance that relationship and enhance that knowledge of the Word by our relationship with Him. So let's make sure our thinking is correct and straight on that that faith only comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God. Faith also comes by maybe hearing what God ministers to you in those times with. But our life of faith that's based on God's Word is enhanced in the presence of God, in fellowship, close fellowship with God. So I want us this evening we ended up last week talking about, not Judas, Thomas, go to John chapter 20, because I want us to start there again tonight. And then we're going to take and kind of move on to our next portion of this message. And here we see Thomas. We talked about last week. He wasn't in the right place at the time. He should have been in the right place. Why did Thomas leave? If we could put it, put ourselves in his shoes and be understanding with him, we. We don't want. He was still one of the 12. We don't want to take Thomas and throw the baby out with the bathwater. Thomas was still a man that was with Christ that saw miracles, that had enough faith to leave what he was doing before he met Jesus and go with Jesus and stay with Jesus. So there was faith there on his behalf. But there's going to be times in our lives that someone else's faith or the faith that we had is not going to be enough to carry us into the next season. And what we see with Thomas was there was a lack of faith to carry him into the next season. We don't want to get caught that when times change, seasons change. God's looking for you to move into the next thing. It could be a business, a home, progressing in your career, progressing in his presence, plan for your life, greater avenues that he has for you. We cannot get caught when that season change comes. That we are in the wrong place, and that we are not only in the wrong place, but we're amongst wrong fellowship. And that we haven't taken time to prepare ourselves and prepare our faith to be ready to make that next step. That we're making that step, next step without enough under foundation underneath our feet. And that's what we see with Thomas. He had faith for that season with Jesus, but when it came time for them to go out and preach the gospel, lay hands on the sick minister under the anointing and the power of God, he did not have faith to stay with those that he was divinely connected with. And this is such a huge key when it comes to faith. Oftentimes we think we can be so man. As my husband says, when it comes to faith, we want to go out and make our something of ourselves and we will trust God, but we don't realize he's put people in our lives to enhance our life of faith, to strengthen, solidify, ignite things in our heart when it comes to the word of God. With the interns about this last week, how important divine connections are that could be divine connections that are next to you, that could be divine connections that God has put over you. These divine connections are the voices that will in times of need, times of distress, and especially sure, not just the word of God. It's a divine voice that will oftentimes bring light when the pressure is on, bring light, mind us of the faithfulness and the goodness of God and bring us back to the word of God when we don't know what to do, when we don't know how to get out of our situation, what to. How to look at what we properly, what we're facing. Those divine connections, those voices in our lives, and you have to know who those are. You need to have divine connections. You need to have right fellowship and right associations. You can have business associations, you can have people you work with that you're connected to help you as you build your, maybe your business. God's going to connect you to people that aren't necessarily in your local church or in your fellowship of the word. But know this, the voices that are around the fellowship of the word are the greatest voices in your life because they are going to bring to you answers from God's word, excuse me, that no one else can. So I want us to recognize that Thomas maybe wouldn't have struggled so much had over these three days he would have stayed with his divine connections. Where would his faith have been? Because they could have encouraged one another. I put myself in his shoes. Can somebody bring me a bit of water? I put myself in his shoes and I have to ask myself, maybe he would have been down because here he's invested the last three years, thank you, of his life following Jesus, being faithful to follow the Master, the great teacher. And now what? Have you ever been in that position? Now what? God, I did what you said, now what? I obeyed you for the season, now what? And I can only imagine for Thomas, he's at home going, now what? We've been abandoned. I don't understand. You know this. They had limited revelation, they had limited understanding of what was really going on in their world at that moment. And so I can't fault Thomas. I can't look down on Thomas. Don't look down on those around you who are struggling to believe what you find easy to believe. Because one day you may be in that position. And Jesus was so gracious. And to Thomas, he. He gently and kindly rebuked him. We never want to be told what Thomas was told. But nonetheless, in Thomas Doubt, Jesus still let him see his hands and see his side. God is so good, he's so merciful. His highest and his best is that we believe without seeing. But God is asking us to open the eyes of our heart, not just our natural eyes. His highest and best was that Thomas be included with these 11 that were there and to see him and come to the realization that the Savior is risen. He's alive. All that's been prophesied has come to pass and. But instead Jesus, if we look here in verse 24, but Thomas, one of the 12 called the Twin, this is John 20, verse 24, was not with him when Jesus came. So the other disciples kept telling him. Notice they had to tell him over and over. He still struggled even at the hearing of it. We have seen the Lord. But he said to them, unless I see in his hands the marks made by the nails and put my fingers and into the nail prints and put my hand into his side, I will never believe it. Eight days later, his disciples were again in the house and Thomas was with him. Jesus came though they were behind closed doors and stood among them and said, peace to you. Then he said to Thomas, reach out your finger here and see my hands and put out your hand and place it in my side. Do not be faithless and incredulous. But. But stop your unbelief and believe. And this is something I want us to focus on tonight. Stop your unbelief and believe. Thomas answered him, my Lord and my God. Jesus said to him, because you have seen me, Thomas, do you now believe, trust and have faith? Blessed and happy and to be envied are those who have never seen me and yet have believed and adhered to and trusted and relied on me. There are also many other signs and miracles with Jesus performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book. And Thomas saw those. Thomas was a witness to those. But Jesus was so good and so gracious to Thomas to show him to let Thomas have what he spoke. Notice Thomas spoke what his level of faith was. And Thomas spoke that if he could see it, he would believe it. Whether you realize it or not, what you say today is what you believe, even if it's doubt. He's called doubting Thomas. But he still was speaking what he believed. No matter whether you speak the word you speak, the circumstances, you still are speaking what you believe. You are still acting on a measure of faith. Now, God's Word, we know this. Our faith must only be based on God's Word. You can't know God by the natural. This is what Thomas wanted. He wanted to know Jesus by The natural. Listen up, folks. If you are wanting to know God by the natural, you'll end up foregoing the most precious relationship, which is a relationship of the supernatural. God is a supernatural divine being, and so are you. If you are to reduce God to knowing him through natural avenues and natural thoughts and carnal ways of conducting life, you will miss out on the greatest relationship that God ever intended for you to have. And that was a divine relationship. You are divine being a spirit being put in a body and given a soul. Don't reduce God down to knowing him through your mind and through your body. I need to know God through my spirit. As we talked about two weeks ago, the eyes of your spirit, as Ephesians says, being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of it? I need my spirit to know him. I need my spirit enlightened. I need my spirit spirit stirred up to what the Word of God says. I don't need my mind to understand any of it. Because when the eyes of my spirit see it, it doesn't matter what the eyes of the natural see. When the eyes of your spirit see your answer, nothing in the natural can take away from you what your spirit sees. You can give up what your spirit sees, but nothing can take away. When your spirit sees your answer, nothing and no one can take it away. That's why Jesus told Thomas, stop your unbelief. Stop it. You can stop acting according to the natural man. You can stop today, Thomas, needing for your hands to think, your eyes to see something. You can stop, make the correction and go forth in in faith. So it must. Your faith must only be based on God's Word. You cannot know by no God by the natural, and you can't know God by what has happened and what hasn't happened. You cannot know him based off what you have received and based off what you haven't received. You know him by his word and by your fellowship with him through your spirit. Now I want to go to mark 11, the one of the greatest faith scriptures that we have received. Revelation of Mark 11, the inexhaustible passage of faith that we know. This raised up dad Hagin off of his deathbed and out of that experience came the wonderful message of faith. Is man receiving by trusting God and not being moved by any other circumstance and that your future is determined by you. You can either be raised up or you can lay down. You can either go forward or you can stop where you're at. You can either say, I'm healed and whole and I believe it or you can can succumb to symptoms and disease. You can either say, no, he has paid the price for my prosperity and by the blood of Jesus I am rich, or you can stop and live by the labors of your own works in your own hands. Faith is the deciding factor. Not God, but your faith. And we see here in Mark 11, verse 22 it says, and Jesus answering saith unto them, have faith in God. For verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he say shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith not what God says. God has already spoken all that he needs to say about you. I'm so glad to know that. I'm so glad to know I am not waiting around to hear more from God to build up myself and my self esteem and my self worth and who I am in Christ. God has already authored all the words he needs to tell me regarding who I am in Him. It's my job now to take those words and have them become part of me. Don't wait around and wait for a word. This is why it's so wonderful that we are learning and developing as we are not able to be together. We can grow and develop in our own faith and recognize that as the Word is preached from the pulpit, you can in your own home take that word and decide, this is me. Not gonna be me. Not someday in the sweet by and by today this word I'm gonna stand up and say this word is for me. And I don't need any prophecy. I don't need anybody to lay hands thank God for those things. Those are to confirm, those are to bring impartations to help us to grow and develop in what we hear and see in the Word through our spirit. We need those things and when we get back together they will be waiting for us. But right now you don't need those because God is showing us in His Word we are people of faith and no matter what circumstance we're facing, we can stand up and say exactly what the Word of God says about us, regardless of circumstance. And so in Mark 11:23 for verily I say unto you that whosoever the Spirit of God said to me one time, he said, when I said to myself about this passage, well, I want to be a whosoever in the body and not a who. You have to decide to be a whosoever. Whosoever says to this mountain. But oftentimes we're just okay. Thomas. Thomas was okay with just being a who. Who was Thomas? Well, he was one of the disciples. You want to be a whosoever? You decide to be a whosoever. What is a whosoever? A whosoever is the one who stands up and does not let circumstances change him, but he changes his circumstances. That's what this passage is saying. Whosoever stands up and says to the circumstances, be thou according to the word of God. He shall have whatsoever he saith. And so God said to me, faith, words from a full heart, set you apart. Faith, words from a full heart set you apart. That's what makes you a whosoever. A whosoever. Their faith, words from their heart, set them apart from the who's. I don't want to just be a who in the body of Christ. Well, who's that? You get to heaven. Well, who are you and what did you do? I want to be a whosoever. It's not about titles. It's not about names on billboards. It's not about recognition. It's about who lived by faith. And whosoever said to the mountain, that's what we want to be known by is a whosoever. I want to be a whosoever. From now until the day I go home to see Jesus. I want to be a whosoever even the day I go home. You can exit this life as a whosoever. You can say, I am done and I've been a faithful servant and I'm ready to go. Whosoevers, determine their future. Whosoevers. Don't let circumstances determine their future. Whosoevers. Allow the word of God to reveal, rule and reign in their thought life. Whosoevers. Allow their thoughts to agree with God's thoughts. Whosoevers. Don't let their bodies tell them how they're going to feel. Whosoevers. Don't let their finances tell them whether or not they're rich. Whosoevers speak to their finances and tell their finances that they're rich. And that's the difference between a who and a whosoever. I want to be the whosoever that tells my bank account who I am and not my bank account telling me who I am, I am and where I'm at. Amen. Be a whosoever. So I want to be a whosoever, not a who. I want faith, words from a full heart to set me apart. These things are mine. You've got to stop trying. We've got to stop trying to fix what we see to make it easier to believe. Sometimes this is really what Thomas wanted to do. He wanted to fix what he saw, saw to make it easier for him to believe. That's human nature. Human nature wants to fix certain things and get things in order. Before we decide we're going to step out in faith and believe. Unless the Holy Ghost directs you to make adjustments, you have the right to speak the word of God. And oftentimes more instruction doesn't come until we speak the word of God. Because when we speak the word of God, we're showing God that we agree with him and we're setting our heart in his direction. Why oftentimes, why would God want to give us further instruction when we haven't taken this instruction that's already been given and we're not doing it? We need to do the instruction that we see in front of us first instead of expecting more instruction outside of his word. Start here. Now. I want us to look at. I love something dad Hagin said he talked about in one of his faith books that you have to know what faith isn't to oftentimes know what it is. And I want us to address doubt and address that we know and identify. Am I really in faith? Or is there somehow some way, a measure of doubt determining certain actions that I take? Did I say, you know, you can say all day long that everything we do is by faith, but only your heart knows whether or not these actions of faith are by. These actions are by faith or by fear, whether they're by faith or by doubt, whether we really trust God or. Like I said, we're trying to rearrange our circumstances to make it easier for us to believe. Doubt is that you're still believing. You just believe what you see and the report that you hear and how you feel. So doubt is not a lack of believing. It's just believing in the wrong direction. And many people think that doubt is simply not believing God. You're believing something. You're always believing something. If you wake up and just every day, I'm going to locate today what I'm believing God will reveal to you. The Holy Ghost is your helper. He will show you where it is that your faith is in. Is my faith over here in the natural or is my faith in God's direction? I want God to show me, to reveal to me. You've got to oftentimes lay down your pride. God can promote a humble man and a humble woman. He will Reveal himself to those of humility. You have to humble yourself and maybe an action that you've been taking and you thought it was faith the whole time, and it was really something that you were trying to control in the natural. It wasn't by faith. It wasn't done by. You know, there, there's times I've counseled with people and I've talked to people and they truly and honestly believed that their budget was by faith. And I had to help them. See, honey, that budget is bondage. And you are living according to that budget. Trying to use words of faith. Now, budgets aren't wrong, but they show us where our faith needs to be. It's not faith in the budget. It's you taking your faith to go above and beyond that. And so oftentimes people want to take and control and call it faith. You can't control your circumstance and call it faith. You must recognize. What in your life are you controlling and saying, oh, I've been believing God and God brought this to pass, or did you just save up and budget for it? Don't put on God what He didn't do. I want God to take full credit for only what he can do. And if you're a person of faith, he will lead you to only what he can do. Don't try to keep yourself in a controlled environment where you want to step out in faith, but you've always got your backhand ready to take the reins. The greatest victories I've seen in mine and my husband's life where there were no reins to grab on, we had nothing in the natural to grab ahold of. All we had was faith in God to step out on. That's all we had. That's all we could walk by. That's all we could live by. There was times where I was in my living room and all hope seemed to be lost. And I cried out tears running down my face because my flesh wanted so badly for some kind of reassurance that everything was going to be all right. But the only one who could assure me, the only thing that could assure me that everything was going to be all right was God's word. That was because he had brought us to what only he could provide, only he could do. God is so good to bring us to places of faith and fulfill every promise. If you won't let go. To speaking to the mountain, to being a whosoever. You know, there was a time where, and I was sharing with the Bible school students this, that I had come to when, when believing God for some things with our home. And it looked like there was a huge mistake that had been made. And we had done all we could in the natural. You know, there are steps to take in the natural that you can take by faith. God had led us. We had done everything we could in the natural. And we had done what those that were had. Our paperwork had basically our fate in their hands. In a measure, we understood it was in God's hands, but we still needed man's approval. And it was in their hands. It was in man's hands. And what they told us was not good news. And what they told us was what that we had done something to effect. But it was at their instruction. And so we knew we had done all that they had told us. And then what they had told us was wrong. And so I remember feeling completely defeated at that moment. It was the. One of the lowest moments in the whole three, four year process. I remember having. And I remember calling Pastor Nancy on the phone and saying, I have done everything and I don't know what to do. This is what I was talking about, divine connections. And I said, I don't know what to do. I have done all. And they're saying that this mistake could be catastrophic. And I didn't know not to do this. I didn't know we. We did what they told us to do. And I love what she said to me. All she said was, this is why we need a savior. This is why you need need a savior. A savior is not just for the day of salvation. A savior is for every day of salvation. I live under my salvation every day. And right then and there, I knew exactly what she meant. And I was in my car, I had run an errand, I had come home and my husband said, what are you going to do? What have you decided? And I remember putting my fist down on the kitchen counter and saying, no matter what I decide to be a whosoever, I will be a person of faith no matter what, till the day I die. That is all that they will be able to write on my gravestone is she was a person of faith. If this takes every action ounce of faith I have, so be it. I will not quit. You can decide. That's why Jesus said to Thomas, stop it. Don't live. You can stop right now. Living according to the natural. So from that day forward, I decided, I will finish this course. I will finish this out. But by faith, no matter what was told me, no matter what I see, no matter what I hear, I can decide, I can choose which way this thing is going to go. You can choose which way your life is going to go. You have authority and you have a right according to the blood of Jesus that your Savior shed. That's what she was saying. And so at that moment, it was time to call on the blood of Jesus. It was time to call on my Savior. My Savior was not just for the day I received Christ into my heart. My Savior is forever interceding on my behalf at the right hand of the Father, making requests for me. And that day I made my request with my Savior. And he. He spoke to my Father. And the three of us were enough to get it done. Amen. You have got to recognize where has doubt come in? And this is why you need a Savior. You are still believing in some measure. What are you believing in? What are you trusting in? Where have you set your eyes and your attention on? Is it on God's Word? Doubt for the believer is like going hungry with a pantry full of food. Doubt in the life of a believer. And we're talking a believer who hears the Word. It's like going hungry when you got a pantry full of food. Don't let yourself and don't let your situation starve you out of the promises of God. The Word can fill you up with faith and you live full and satisfied having received according to the Word, but not according to what you you see in the natural. I don't want to live strictly satisfied by manifestation. Manifestations are satisfying. There is such a, of course, a. A sense of accomplishment that only God can do what was manifest. It's great to rejoice and rehearse past victories. We're not diminishing those. But you can live full and satisfied only based on the Word of God. You can be satisfied today whether or not you see a manifestation. You can be satisfied that what God has told you and promised you about your future, it shall come to pass. The word satisfied satisfies, not manifestations. That's why Thomas had had a choice. He could have chosen to have been satisfied at the word of the disciples, but he wasn't. He needed a manifestation to be satisfied. The person of Faith that Mark 11 that Jesus is talking about this whosoever, the whosoever is satisfied at the faith words in their mouth, not the manifestation of their eyes. Faith people are satisfied at a provision and a promise. They don't need to have anything else revealed to them other than God's Word. They are fully satisfied that when their spirit sees it, they believe it. And that means they have It. Amen. Your choice to live in doubt is like going home hungry from the Thanksgiving potluck. Potluck. Who wants to go home hungry and not having eaten from the Thanksgiving potluck? Don't go through life hungry. When we have the word of God. Living in doubt and you have God's word is like choosing to forego the Thanksgiving potluck, potluck line and go sit on the couch with cat. Even the cat probably is more satisfied than you don't choose the life of difficulty and of doubt and believing in circumstances and believing only in yourself. See, faith people, they don't believe in themselves. They believe in God. They believe in God's words in their mouth, but it's still God's words. It's still his authority and his power that's backing them up and backing up their authority. So your choice to live in doubt is like going home hungry from the Thanksgiving potluck. You choose faith. Faith doesn't choose you. You decide. That's why Jesus told Thomas, stop. You can choose the life of faith, Thomas. In faith, the faith life doesn't choose you. You choose faith. Amen. You know, I want to address one more thing, and then we'll close with this. And I have so much more, and we'll continue with this probably next week. You know, there's this issue of time that you may be facing. I've been there. We've been there. Time passes. Time is sometimes the loudest voice that you hear. It's not even what you see. It's not even what you touch. It's not even what anybody is saying. It's the tick, tick, tick of every day, another day crossed off. And that calendar will speak volumes. That calendar will put pressure. That calendar and that timeline will cause you to believe that it won't come to pass. Time will derail a life of faith faster than even a changing circumstance. Because time is something that none of us can control. Time is the one variable in every human being's life that they cannot do anything about. And so you could say, I've lived by this situation for so long. I have lived without for so long. I have lived with these things, symptoms for so long. I want you to know time is not your enemy. Time is not something that you need to be anxious about. But time is in God's hands. The moment you let it go and you let that calendar go, and you realize time is in his hands. He knows what time it is. He knows your age. He knows where you're at in life. He knows where you are in your walk with him. God knows you're going to have to stop putting more faith in the calendar and more expectation in the calendar and keep your expectation on God so we can see this happen with some of the greatest men of faith. It was time that made them men of faith. You understand that time turned them into giants of faith. Moses lived in the wilderness for 40 years. He knew he was the one to deliver the children of Israel. He made a huge mistake. And after 40 years of it looking like that was never going to be fulfilled. After 40 years, God calls him out into his destiny. We can see Abraham waited years for his son, and time was already time. When God promised him a son, time was already not his friend. There wasn't a small window for him to have a child. There was no window for him to have a child. What window do you think looks close to you? What? What do you think looks like? It will never come to pass. What looks like an impossibility. Do you know time will take your circumstance and make it look like an impossibility like nothing else can. Time will speak to you in the middle of the night. Time will talk to you while you're at work. Time will try to have the loudest word when you get in God's words. Time is going to try and be the ruler of your life. That's what happened with Abraham. And we know this because Abraham took matters according to the time passing by, took matters into his own hand and had a child. That was not the promise because too much time had passed. But we know this. Abraham got back into his life of faith, got back in line with God's word and what God had promised him in their covenant. And that was a son. Joshua waited 45 years and received the promised land. Time had passed, and him and Caleb refused to let go. Noah, how long did it take him? Years, 100 years to build this ark. And there had never been any rain. So we can look at these great giants of faith and there is more, but these are the ones that just immediately stood out to me. That they did not let time, as it passed by, determine what they believed, what they said, their relationship with God. Yes, they had their moments. But overall, these men spoke and believed what God had said to them. They decided to go God's way and not time's way. You can go God's direction. You can choose that. Time is not going to set your life in the direction that it wants for you. The devil will use time. The devil. We're in a natural world. The enemy can have his hand in many different things when it comes to finances, progress that you're trying to make. Maybe with your business, with where you work, with your family, the devil can make it look like and alter circumstances, but only for a time. You understand. God's power is greater than any hindrance the devil brings. You've got to believe that God's power and that's coming from your lips. Faith from your lips is power from your mouth. Faith from your lips is God's divine resurrection power flowing into your situation. You have to believe that it's greater than any hindrance, any opposition, and anything the devil can do to try to affect what you believe. So time it means. And this is the way he showed it to me. Time means as much to God as me putting on perfection. Perfume means to you tonight, me putting on perfume and walking out of that green room meant absolutely nothing to you. I could be standing here right now and have just run three miles and would it mean nothing to you? You cannot smell me. You are unaffected by whether or not I have on perfume, deodorant. You know it means nothing to you because you have simply watched to hear what I have to say. So is it with God? Time means nothing to him in your situation, all he's looking for is what you have to say. That's all he's waiting on. Time in your situation means absolutely nothing. It means as much to God as you caring about whether I speak smell good. Whether or not that's how I saw it, I realized, oh, my goodness, God. It doesn't matter if it's 10 years, 15 years. Time means nothing to you. You watch this service because it mattered to you what came out of my mouth according to the word of God. You tuned in to hear the word of God. You're watching to hear. You're watching to receive. God is simply watching your life. Time means nothing. He's watching to hear his words come from your lips. He's watching to see if we receive as long as we receive. Not a manifestation, but we receive by faith. That's all he cares about. Time means nothing. Don't let time mean something when it should be, when it should mean nothing. Amen. Relief is what we want. We time. We want relief from time. Let's just be honest. We want relief from the clock. We want relief from the pressure that the clock brings. We want relief from what other people have said about the time that has passed in our lives. You know, a mother wants relief while she's in labor, but she still wants her baby More. You know, you may want relief, but you've got to want what you're birthing through your faith more than you want relief. Don't give up relief. Don't give up to get relief on your flesh, on your mind, from other people. Want to see it through and see the manifestation more than you want relief. You know, a mother, she is in labor and it's painful. No matter. You know what, there's always a process to labor. There's always a beginning, a middle and an end. So is it with faith. There's a beginning, a long middle sometimes, but there's always an end. Faith, people look at the end. That mother is willing to go through anything and everything because she knows in the end the reward that she gets is eternal. That child is eternal, that baby, the joy that that baby brings and the new relationship. You know, every time you stand firm on God's word in that middle part and not be moved by time or anything else, God is so excited that you will receive because of your faith and eternal reception reward. God is pleased with your faith. He's pleased when you're not moved by what you see, what you feel, and by what other people say, by what even you say at one time, you maybe have said something against and contrary to God's word. That's okay. Jesus told Thomas, stop it. You can today stop it. Faith doesn't choose you. You choose faith. Amen. So tonight I've decided. I choose faith. No matter what it is, no matter what we face, no matter what we see, we can choose faith. And the end means more to me than what's going on in the middle. Time means nothing. I will not quit because time has passed. I will not let go. I will not let the clock rule and reign over my life and Lord, over my life. With pressure, with anxiety and with doubt. I will only let God's word determine where I go, what I think, what I believe, how I act. I choose to be a whosoever. Let's decide to be whosoevers. Not just who's in the body of Christ, but whosoever is. Amen. Thank God for his word. It's alive to us. It's the light to our path. And tonight we've been changed by it. Amen. We trust you've enjoyed this message. Visit us@DefrainMinistries.org to learn of our upcoming meetings, share your testimony, become a partner or visit our online store. This program has been made possible by the friends and partners of Dufresne Ministries.