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Come join us, Sam's Club. Wanna know you're on the best path to the right car. At CarMax, the price you see is the price you pay. No negotiating, no last minute surprises. Every car is CarMax certified and backed by a 10 day money back guarantee. So you can buy with confidence. Wanna shop from home? Go for it. You can come in when you're ready, take it for a spin and buy however works for you. No pressure, no haggling, just the right car your way. Visit CarMax.com Want to drive? CarMax? Hey, this is Steven Furtick. I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message. You ready? You sure? Ready for the word. Wow. Good catch. Y' all don't have confidence in me. They got nervous. Ready? You ready, Josh? I better stick with the front row. It's a very litigious society. Ready now, just like she did. We're about to do around the audience response. That's premium ministry, my brother. Look at somebody next to you and say, I caught a thought. I caught a thought. Chunks, are you ready? Let's see. Caught it. Sorry about that. Caught something. By the way, this guy who just threw me the bible is like my best friend in the world, but he's the worst. He's always Blaming people when he gets sick. He's always trying to track back to who had a runny nose four months ago. Blaming it on my kids. It was so and so. You came back from that mission trip. I think I caught it from them. It was food poisoning. You can't catch food poisoning. Why are you trying to blame the missionary? Because you have a stomach virus? He's Magnum P.I. trying to investigate. It's a pop culture reference for the young people. Very relevant and current. I caught it. Look at somebody and say, I caught a thought. Let me ask you something. Is it possible to catch an attitude? Do you have anybody? Just when you see their name on your phone. Y' all are responding a little too much to this. You might be giving yourself away. I caught a thought. Can you catch faith? Can you catch fear? Can you catch an idea? Can you catch a dream? Can you catch a vision? Can you catch a word from God that will cause you to worship from a deep place past the shallows of feelings and emotions? You're here today because you caught a thought. You thought you should come to church. You caught a ride and you came. But before you caught a ride, you caught a thought. I should go to church. Because you caught a thought. You're about to look at 12 people ready. That's how we ought to. I caught a thought. Now I'm demonstrating this physically, but I want to demonstrate it scripturally. Go in your Bible to numbers, chapter 13. I want to look at a passage of scripture that has been really helpful to me so many times through the years when I am caught between two thoughts. When one thought says you should and you can, and one thought says you can't. So don't try. This passage has often helped my perspective. It's a familiar story for anybody who knows about Father Abraham had many sons and many sons had Father Abraham. I am one of them and so are you. So let's just praise the Lord. That Bible school stuff, it works in grown up life too. The children of Abraham are of course coming into the land God promised them in the Book of Numbers. They have the opportunity to receive the gift, but they get more focused on the giants that oppose them than the gift God has given them. That happens to us all the time. So what we see in Numbers, chapter 13, verse 30. And I'm so excited to show you this, I'm having to contain my excitement. There will always be a thought that God will bring you to deliver you. There will always be a thought the enemy will bring to destroy you. They're both Right here in numbers, chapter 13. Let's study this together. The Bible says then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said we should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it. But the men who had gone up with him said, we can't attack those people. They are stronger than we are. And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, the land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. We saw the Nephilim there. The descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim. We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes. And we looked the same to them. Stop. There was no conversation between the giants and the spies I about who was bigger. That wasn't what they heard, that was what they thought. The nation never saw the Promised Land for themselves. They relied on the support or the report of the spies to give them a picture of the promise of God as well as give them a prediction about the outcome. It wasn't because they saw something. It was because it was because they heard something. And what they heard was a result of something the spies thought. So when it said in the scripture, they spread among the Israelites a bad report. That report kept the Israelites from going into the land God had given them. I realized it is possible to be stopped not because of your giants, but because of your thoughts. Not because of something that is actually bigger than you, but because of something you have made bigger than you on the movie screen of your mind. How many of you have an IMAX screen in your mind and you can blow things up all to all different proportions. The whole nation caught a thought and it made their faith weak. And God had given them the land and they could have had the land. In fact, the land was already theirs because the enemy can take away anything God has given to you. However, if he can attack your faith through weakening your immune system, that faith immune system that is supposed to filter out those microscopic germs, those seeds of discontent that will cause you to walk away from what God is calling you to walk into, although he can't take it away from you. If he can get to your faith, if he can get to that part of you that believes God and cause it to be disrupted by something your eyes see or your ears hear. Holy Spirit, help me say this the right way. He can't take it. So what he wants to do is to move you from a place of believing. He loves you, called you, qualified you, set you apart, put you There to do it. The issue with me is that I experience both thoughts, both voices simultaneously. Let me try to break this down. I have Caleb telling me this is one thought you should. You can. Then I have 10 other spies. Have you ever noticed how it seems to be more reasons why you shouldn't than you should? Have you ever felt outnumbered in your thought Life? I have 10 spies. Now the spies are going into the land. And the number one rule of being a spy is, is don't get caught. Y' all with me, it's the number one rule of being a spy. Whatever you do, sneak in. Joshua was one of the two spies who saw it the right way. He told them. Moses told Joshua and Caleb and the 10 other spies. He said, when you go in there, make sure they don't see you. But then they got caught. But they didn't get caught by their enemies. They got caught by their insecurities. I'm going to preach to you. They got caught by a thought. The thought was, we're not big enough. The thought was, we don't have enough. The thought is, we can't. They're bigger. So then now, all of a sudden, they are dominated not by their enemies, but by their thoughts. God said. I was preaching to somebody today who is caught between two thoughts. One is telling you that God gave you everything you need to raise that child. The other is telling you you're the one who screwed them up. I'm going to preach into your business today. One is telling you that it's all right. God can restore the years that the locusts have eaten. The other is telling you you've wasted too much time and now nothing good can happen in your life. So I'm caught between two thoughts. On one hand, I see the size of the grapes. I see the size of the promise, and I know the size of my God. On the other hand, I hear all of the reasons why a great big God could not use a little puny person like me from Moncks Corner, South Carolina. A little puny person like me who never did this on this level before. Even as I preach to you, I'm caught between two thoughts. She looks like she has never heard a better sermon in her life. Somebody up there looks like they hate me and are contemplating how they can slip out. And how did I get stuck in the middle of this row for this sermon? Why is he yelling like that? That shirt is too bright and it hurts my eyes, and I just want to get out of here. I'm going to preach to you. I'M going to preach to the love in the room. I'm going to preach to the faith. Are you feeling better, lj? He had to miss last Sunday. It's the first time he has missed playing behind me in three years. He's never missed, but he caught a stomach bug. I'm not going to lie to you. This may make me a bad pastor. When I saw him Tuesday, I waved at him. I didn't dap him up. I don't love him that much. I'm not going to spend the whole week throwing up just to tell you hello. We can do this virtually. Love you, man. Praying for you from a distance. I'm not getting close enough to catch it. Honestly, this is why I had to stop hanging out with some certain people. Because I started realizing you catch what you're close to. If you need to take out your phone at this point in my sermon and do some surgery with that, swipe left, delete, move. Some of y' all don't need to lift your hands to have more faith. You need to swipe your thumb because it is your contacts. I caught something. I catch something every time I'm around them. Every time I scroll. I noticed this the other day. I get in a certain mood and I can't figure out how was I so happy 3 minutes ago? Have you ever had it switched that quick? So I started studying and I realized before I caught a feeling, I caught a thought. Sometimes that thought is just me going through my feed and I will see something that won't register. Now here's what I noticed. You don't feel it while you're scrolling. When I ate a whole bag of Oreos one Thanksgiving after I'd already eaten three meals, I didn't feel sick while I was eating them. My taste buds didn't tell me to stop, so I'm scrolling and I don't feel sick until after I've stopped what I realized about myself. And maybe you're more spiritually mature than me and you can find a church where the pastor is whole, healthy and doesn't have these issues. But for all of us who understand that sometimes you are mad about something you saw 10 minutes ago on your phone because you were in everybody else's life but your own, trying to figure out, am I better than them? Are they better than me? What happened while I was scrolling? I saw them on vacation and I know they're in debt, so I caught a thought of judgment. Why should they be on vacation when I know they're in debt? Now I feel sick 10 minutes later because of the thought I caught while I scrolled through somebody else's situation. That has nothing to do with my responsibility. Are y' all going to help me with this or am I going to? So what happened to me was I caught a thought of offense and then I reaped an attitude of frustration. I got offended the other day because I saw God blessing somebody he wasn't supposed to bless. Did you ever watch God just do something awesome for the wrong person? He didn't consult you. So I found myself feeling insecure. The reason I felt insecure in myself is because I caught a thought of offense about somebody else. Now here's what happens. You become a victim of your own judgment. When you judge others that way, you judge you that way. So when you catch a thought of judging others, don't be surprised when the judgment comes upon you. The less y' all say Amen, the more I know I'm preaching. So I caught a thought and I realized that the thought I hold onto you can catch a wave. You could catch a football for the game winning touchdown like Graham Furtick did yesterday, just this very yesterday. But I never knew I could catch a thought. I knew you could catch a case. I had some relatives that did it. I knew you could catch a cold, but I found out you could catch a thought. Then I traced sometimes the weakness of my faith and I asked myself the question, where did that thought come from? It's important where it came from because where it comes from determines where it leads to. My issue is that when I say I hear from God, I don't hear him out loud. God bless you if you do. I've never heard the audible voice of God. I mean, he speaks through my wife all the time. But other than that exception, I've never heard the audible voice of God. If you have, I'm not mad at you unless you start trying to use it to manipulate people by making up stuff God told you. Because God has three way calling and he can tell us both. So don't tell me God spoke to you something I'm not in agreement with and try to get me to do something you want to do by saying God told you to. Especially if you say God told you to quit your job because you're just tired of dealing with frustrating people. I don't know if that's God or if you're just tired and need to get some sleep and have a better attitude when you show up. I've never heard from God out loud. One guy asked me One time he was like, when you say God spoke to you, how do you know? Great question. Because I don't hear God at an auditory level. So when I say God spoke, that can be misleading. When Peter said Jesus spoke to me, it was literal. Jesus was a person. He spoke to me. I was fishing one night. I hadn't caught anything. I was frustrated. Jesus said, let down your nets in the deep for a catch. Peter would say, at first I was frustrated because I thought, you're a carpenter. I'm a fisherman. You do your job, I'll do mine. You wanted my boat to preach from. I didn't know you were going to try to drive it. But because you say so, I will let down the nets. Now, when he let down the nets, he caught a great number of fish. But God was showing me that before he caught the fish, he caught a. Do you like this church? Before there was a seat, there was a thought. The issue with this is I don't hear God out loud like that. I connect with God. Not at an auditory or sensory level. I connect with God at the level of thought. Which would be fine if God spoke to me at the level of thought. And he was the only one who spoke that way. But I have this other joker. They call him the Devil. But when I say the devil tempts me or the devil discourages me, I'm not talking about a guy in a Halloween costume he got on clearance at Target, walking up with a pitchfork and a cape and some horns. I never saw the devil like that. I just put him off my shoulder. He's not on my shoulder when he comes to me. He comes to me through a thought. So now I have God speaking to me through my thoughts. I have the enemy trying to speak against what God spoke to me through my thoughts. I have two voices on the same device, and I'm caught between a thought. One is telling me, your greatest years are ahead of you. One is telling me you've already done all the good things you're going to do. You better ride it out because it won't be much longer. One is telling me, go ahead and speak it and say it and do it and step into it and believe for it. The other one is telling me, well, you'd better not go too far out there. You know, if you go too far out there, you'll be embarrassed. After all, if you climb high, they can pull you down. I'm caught. Between Caleb and the other spies. I'm caught. Caught. I got caught. I got caught by a thought. I Don't know how it happened, but y', all, I have this thought that goes through my mind all the time that says it doesn't matter. Just all the time. I could be doing anything and it would be like, You know that eye roll emoji? That would be the face of it. But the thought behind it is like, who cares? It doesn't matter. Have you ever had that thought? Catch you trying to do something? Raise your hand again if you've ever had that thought. Why did y' all raise yalls hands so much higher the second time I asked her? Oh, oh, oh, you're not enough. I don't know if you say it exactly like that, but it's crazy how many people I talk to. I used to think it was people who didn't have a lot of confidence, but then I realized professional athletes have this thought that I'm not enough. They are the ones who our society worships. Still, there's a thought. It's a thought that's going around. The reason it's going around so much more now than it used to go around is because now we don't judge ourselves or measure ourselves according to the calling God has given us. We compare ourselves to a fictionalized account of somebody else's life. That's where you always get in trouble. Now get this point. You always get in trouble when you start comparing your calling to somebody else's. Because when you compare callings, you catch insecurity. When you compare callings, you catch insufficiency. When I think I'm not enough, I'm not enough. Even the disciples, it's not enough food to go around Jesus, you need to send them away. How many times have I sent away something God put in my life because I caught a thought that I'm not enough? They wandered around and around and around in the wilderness for 40 years, not because of their enemy, but because of their thought. Then even sometimes when things are going good, I have this thought. I don't know where it comes from. I don't think it's God. I don't think it is. It's hard to tell sometimes because it's not like he talks like this. I don't even know what that was. I'm glad he doesn't talk like that. That was super weird. He doesn't like Morgan Freeman. It's just a thought. Come on. If God sounded like Morgan Freeman, you could do it. If he narrated your life like that, you could do it. You could make it. You would. You would go to sleep and wake up and just be ready for the day. But it comes like a thought. Even when it's going good, it won't last. They'll leave you, too. You can't count on them. Then you sabotage the gift because you're not secure in it. Because even while it's happening, you don't believe it's real. This is my thoughts. I don't know where I caught them. I had a good mom, good dad. They weren't perfect. Don't get me wrong. I wish I could trace it back to just one traumatic event. I think that would be easier. Not enough. Where'd that thought come from? I'm not sure where it comes from, but I know where it takes me when I look back on the seasons of my life that I was so deep in depression. Oh, yeah, I know the Bible verses. Yeah, I know them better than you. Let's have a quoting contest. Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again. Rejoice. See my hand motions? I know the verse. Rejoice in the Lord always. Then Paul says, I will say it again. Rejoice. Well, you can say it as many times as you want to, Paul. I'm sad right now, and I can't find my way out. So now I'm fighting on the level of my feelings. But watch this. Before it became a feeling, Even Paul, it wasn't just like Moses was a bad leader. Even Paul had to fight against opposing voices and thought systems that undermined the essence of the grace of God. In the Gospel, even in the churches he started, even in the church at Corinth. He would write to that church, and what would happen to them was they would be led astray. Or the word he likes to use in 2 Corinthians is deceived. He says, I fear that you're being deceived by the power of suggestion. He uses the example. He says, like Eve was deceived by the serpent. Do you remember that story when God said, you can eat any of this? Then she caught a thought from a snake. She allowed something that was beneath her to speak to her. She caught a thought. See, I never had a snake slither up to me and talk to me. I wish I did. I wish it was a snake that I could chop the head off of it. It's a thought. I have to live with this and I have to deal with it. The serpent said to Eve, did God really say, you see it? He introduces a doubt into the possibility and potential of faith, causing her to focus on what is not available. Rather Than what is? Paul says, I'm afraid that you will be deceived because there are these spies in the church at Corinth and they're leading the Christians astray. They're doing it by the power of thought. They are introducing the thought into the church that you need something other than Christ to justify you. He says, I fear that you have been led astray from your pure devotion to Christ. Pure is the right word. That's the important word. Pure. It's that uncontaminated place that you access occasionally where you know God has you and everything is going to be all right. Have you ever just felt that and you had no reason to, and you didn't even have the facts to back it up? Have you ever just felt that? Like, wow, I feel like I'm going to make it and God is going to do it? I can't even prove it on a flowchart or anything like that. But I just. What happens is the enemy deceives you. He can't take what God gave you. You know that, right? I need to make sure you know that. He can't take what God gave you. But if he can get you to catch a thought that opposes it, he can keep you so weak that you will not walk into. This is what he says to the church at Corinth. Because they have spies running around introducing lies to the church. They have thoughts that oppose the knowledge of God. In fact, that's how he phrases it in 2 Corinthians 10:4. He says, the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. What's a stronghold in military terms? It's a place you go to seek refuge. A stronghold where you set up to do a battle where the enemy can't get to you. Or it can become a place where the enemy traps you in. He says, what happens in a physical battle can happen mentally, spiritually, emotionally, to any one of us at any time. Because it is with the thought I can experience God. I can catch a thought of Jesus and His grace for me and his love for me and his mercy toward me. That thought can move me to worship him in the beauty of holiness, in the splendor of his magnificence. And in fact, I want to say this. One thought of Jesus can lift you above any wave of worry. One thought of Jesus. Have you been having trouble breathing this week? Get a thought on your mind of the goodness of God. You see that battle he brought you through? You see that Way he made for you and just one thought of Jesus how many know One thought can lift me out of the pit One thought, thought. But a stronghold can also ensnare you A thought I'm not enough. A thought. I wonder what they're thinking about me right now. They're not. But that thought. That thought this isn't going to end well. That thought. I'm not what they think I am. Here's one of my strongholds. If they really knew you, they wouldn't like you. If they really knew, because all of us are bluffing. All of us are faking it. All your little cool friends are faking it. They all have acne. They all have issues. They all feel lonely. And none of y' all are cool. Everybody is faking it. I don't care how expensive your shoes are, you aren't perfect. But Paul, they were coming into church like, oh, he's an imposter. He's not a real one. They were introducing a thought to rob them. You know the devil is a thief, right? He can't take your promise, so now he wants to steal your thoughts. I was reading something in Proverbs. Can I show you this real quick? I didn't get to show him last night. In Proverbs 6:30, it says, People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his hunger when he's starving. A thief is just a thief. You know the enemy is a thief. You can't blame him for trying to steal what he doesn't want you to have. But check the next verse. I love this. Yet if he is caught. Yet if he is caught, he must pay sevenfold. So today we came into this service to catch a thief and to let him know. Give me my joy back. Give me my peace back. Give me my wisdom back. Give me the joy of my salvation. Restore it sevenfold. I caught a thought. I realized he loves me. And if he loves me, it doesn't matter if you like me. I caught a thought. I'm bold about it. I formed for it. I'm made for it. I'm called to it. I believe I'll walk right forward into my future holding onto a thought of the favor of God. Some of y' all need to catch this. Come on. Catch this favor. Catch this word. Catch this joy. Catch this peace. You've been hanging around Facebook, but you came in here for some faith today, didn't you? Well, catch this. God is for you. He's more than the world against you. Kick those ten spies out of your head. And listen to Caleb. We can. We should. We will. He is. I have. I am. High five them and say, I caught a thought. I caught a thought. Just like I caught a cold last February. I caught a thought. I found out that he is able. I found out that he who began a good work in me will be faithful to complete it. I found out he is the bread of life. He is El Shaddai. He is more than enough. I caught a thought of God. A thought brought me into depression. And a thought is going to bring me out. When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of Glory died. My richest gain I count but loss and pour contempt on all my pride. What's he saying? I caught a thought of the goodness of God and it lifted me out of the pit of my despair. You can't keep the thought from coming. But watch what Paul said. He said we demolish strongholds. How do we destroy it? Verse 5 is important. He said, we demolish every spy that says we can't and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. How many know something about God that is deeper than a feeling? I mean, you've known it since you were a child. You've known it in your soul. You've known it in your spirit. Deep calls to deep. So when I have a thought that opposes what I know about God, what are you going to do about it? I can't keep it from coming. But he said, we take captive every thought to make it obey Christ. When they say you seem different this week, you don't look so stressed this week. Tell them. Oh, yeah, it's the craziest thing. I caught a thought. It was about this big. I found out God is about this. I caught a thought of his greatness. I magnified him in my mind. I began to rejoice in the rock of my salvation. This I recall to my mind. Therefore I have hope. I caught a thought and it led me to a hope. Now, the thought you hold onto, the one you allow to dominate, that will be the stronghold of your life. If the Lord is your stronghold, if he is the place where you hide, if you catch a thought, a glimpse of your calling, here it is. There was a woman who was bleeding on the inside. She heard Jesus coming through her part of town. She had done everything to fix it at the level of the symptom, but nothing worked. The condition she had was a deep one. It was causing her to hemorrhage and lose blood, just like many of us are hemorrhaging Emotionally and losing energy and losing hope. When she heard Jesus passing through her desperation for a change caused her to do something dramatic in her life. Because she had gotten a second opinion and a third opinion and a fourth opinion. None of that worked. But here comes healing and here comes hope. The Bible says she did what she had to do to get through all of the people who could have blocked her and to grab ahold to catch Jesus as he was passing by to heal somebody else. He's moving quickly and Peter is backing everybody away. Don't touch him. He's in a hurry. But she reaches out. The Bible says verse 37. She touched his cloak. She caught him. She caught his cloak. She caught what could heal her. She caught a flow. She caught a miracle. She caught a change. Because she thought. Before I caught the answer. I caught a thought before I caught forgiveness. I caught a thought. Before I caught bitterness. I caught a thought. If I can catch a thought, I can catch his cloak. If I can touch him, he can make me well. With everyone standing and your hands lifted to heaven like you need to catch what heaven has Today I declare over your life that faith and favor are flowing from the person of Jesus in the form of the Holy Spirit in this moment, across every location and our efam around the world. Catch this. You've been holding on to thoughts of low self worth and low self esteem all to lead you to this moment in the presence of Jesus. That if you can catch a thought. The woman was made well because she touched his cloak. She touched his cloak because she caught a thought. There are great opportunities for love and for joy and for peace and for provision. There is a great calling and assignment on your life, my sister. There is a tremendous promise in front of you. There's Caleb saying you should, you can. There are 10 other spies saying you can't. I don't care if you're outnumbered 10 to 2. If you will follow Caleb into Canaan, you can eat the fruit of the land. You can experience the joy of the Lord if you can catch this thought. This I recall to my mind. I caught a thought and it lifted me from my despair. I caught a thought and it lifted me from my addiction. I caught a thought of Jesus and it lifted me from my shame. And I began to rejoice and worship him with gladness. Because I caught a thought of victory. For the battle belongs to the Lord. He is my stronghold. He is the strength of my life. And I will not be put to shame. For the joy of the Lord is my strength. Come on, Catch this victory, Catch this wind Lift your sails and catch this victory Catch this wind Sing it over the people, Chris, till they catch it I'm going to see it in the land of the living I'm going to see the goodness of God I'm going to sing it. Come on, touch his garden. Come on, you can catch it's an impartation oh, I'm gonna see your victory. Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of you who give generously to this ministry. It's because of you that this ministry is possible. You can click the link in the description to Give now or visit elevationchurch.orgpodcast for more information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You can share it with your friends. You can click the Share button, take a screenshot and share it on your social stories and tag us levationchurch. Thanks again for listening. God bless you. I'm U.S. transportation Secretary Sean Duffy the Sound of a Seatbelt it's one of the most important sounds in our car. It means everyone is ready and everyone is safe. The more our kids see us put on our seatbelts, the more natural it is for them to put theirs on too. Make it a priority. Buckle up every time. Hear the sound. Make it a habit. Paid for by NHTSA I know a thing or two about longevity and doing things the right way. That's why I'm giving my stamp of approval to my favorite Kohler cast iron products for their durability, beauty and timelessness. Since 1883, Kohler cast iron sinks and baths have been handcrafted in Kohler, Wisconsin. I even visited the foundry myself, work boots, coveralls and all, to see the 2700 degree molten iron the artisans hand applying enamel and the stunning finished pieces ready for homes like yours. Bring the warmth, character and enduring style of Kohler Cast Iron into your kitchen or bath. See my curated favorites@kohler.com Long live Kohler cast Iron. Strong, elegant, timeless. This is Tony Ayo from the Real Report with Tony Ayo and Uncle Murder. 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Episode Title: I Caught A Thought
Date: July 24, 2026
Host: Pastor Steven Furtick
Podcast: Elevation with Steven Furtick
In this dynamic message, Pastor Steven Furtick delves into the profound power of thoughts—how they shape our faith, our outlook, and even our destinies. Drawing from the biblical story in Numbers 13, he explores how both faith and fear, hope and despair, often hinge on the thoughts we “catch” and hold onto. The episode challenges listeners to be vigilant about the thoughts influencing their lives, encouraging them to “catch” thoughts of faith and promise rather than those of defeat or doubt.
(Begins ~03:30)
(~07:40)
(~14:00)
The inner struggle between the encouraging voice (Caleb: “We can!”) versus the discouraging majority (“We can’t”).
Relates this to personal insecurities, feeling outnumbered by negative thoughts.
(~18:00)
Extends analogy to social influence—sometimes, catching the wrong mood or attitude from certain people or even from scrolling online.
Suggests that proximity matters: “You catch what you’re close to.”
Challenges listeners to consider “doing surgery” on their contacts list or social media feed if they're catching the wrong attitudes.
(~24:00)
Distinguishes between God’s voice (often as a subtle thought) and the enemy’s voice (also through thought).
Warns against using the claim "God told me" manipulatively or without discernment.
Addresses the subtlety of spiritual temptation: not a cartoonish devil, but an intrusive, discouraging thought.
(~31:00)
Explores how comparison fuels insecurity: judging callings, achievements, or blessings against others’ highlight reels leads to “catching thoughts” of not-enoughness.
Even the disciples thought their resources weren’t enough, paralleling our own feelings of insufficiency.
(~35:00)
Confesses personal struggles with negative self-talk (“it doesn’t matter,” “you’re not enough”), acknowledging this is universal—affecting people at every level.
Recognizes that even with knowledge (Bible verses), emotional struggles can root in deeply-held thoughts.
(~40:00)
(~46:30)
Encourages listeners to deliberately “catch” the thoughts of God’s love, favor, and sufficiency.
Uses Proverbs 6:30-31—a thief, once caught, must restore sevenfold—to empower listeners to reclaim peace, joy, identity from negative thought patterns.
(~51:00)
(~54:00)
Pastor Steven leads the congregation in lifting their hands—symbolically “catching” the faith, favor, and promise of God.
Urges listeners to let go of thoughts of defeat, shame, insecurity, and instead catch hope, purpose, and victory.
Ends with worship and a declaration for listeners to catch the victory God has for them.
| Segment | Description | Timestamp | |---------|-------------|-----------| | Opening & Interactive “Catching” Illustration | Steven uses audience participation to introduce the theme | 03:00–05:30 | | Numbers 13 — The Spies’ Thought Contagion | Key biblical passage and its meaning | 07:40–12:30 | | “Not Caught by Enemies, But By a Thought” | Parallel to personal insecurities | 15:40–17:20 | | Social Influence & Catching Bad Attitudes | Thoughts/emotions caught from people and social media | 18:00–23:30 | | God’s Voice vs. Enemy’s Voice | Wrestling with internal competing thoughts | 24:00–29:00 | | The Dangers of Comparison | How measuring against others poisons self-worth | 31:00–34:00 | | Persistent Negative Thoughts | Testimony on battling intrusive thoughts | 35:00–39:30 | | Paul, Strongholds, and Taking Thoughts Captive | Application from 2 Corinthians and spiritual warfare | 40:00–45:30 | | Proverbs 6 — Catching the Thief | Using a biblical metaphor for reclaiming what’s lost | 47:00–49:00 | | The Woman Who Caught Her Miracle | Hope anchored in a caught thought | 51:00–54:00 | | Declaration & Worship | Exhortation to “catch” faith, worship closing | 54:00–end |
Pastor Steven Furtick’s message, “I Caught A Thought,” is a passionate call to spiritual and emotional vigilance. He reminds listeners that what we dwell on can empower or sabotage us, and that taking control of our thought life is key to stepping into God's promises.
Central Takeaway:
We can’t always control the thoughts that come, but we can choose which ones we catch, nurture, and allow to shape our reality—and by catching thoughts of faith, hope, and victory, we align with God’s best for our lives.
For More:
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