
Loading summary
Commercial Announcer
In a world where January is supposed to be boring, one staple of the holidays refuses to end the great deals at Verizon. The joy just keeps on coming. Right now you can save on four new phones and four lines. Critics agree it's the deal that keeps on giving. Come into Verizon and save on four new phones and four lines on unlimited. Welcome additional terms. Apply@seeverizon.com for details.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching your insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy. Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
BetterHelp Advertiser
This is an ad by BetterHelp.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
Did I talk too much? Can't I just let it go? I was thinking so much.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Take a breath, you're not alone. Let's talk about what's going on.
BetterHelp Advertiser
Counseling helps you sort through the noise with qualified professionals, and online therapy makes it convenient. See if it's for you. Visit betterhelp.com randompodcast for 10% off your first month of online therapy and let life feel better.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
This is the Potter's House Podcast.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
We're here to keep you filled with.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
The Spirit and guided by the Scriptures.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'm in Exodus 31. I'm going to try and come at this from a different angle because there's so much beauty in this text and sometimes I struggle. You'll notice. Sometimes when I'm speaking, I'm like, lord, help me to say it the way I feel it in my spirit. And I just feel a burden in my spirit about what takes place at this moment in the text. And so those of you who prayed for pastors earlier, that really blessed me because I feel like it's going to help me to release what God has placed in my spirit as it relates to this text. Text I AM in Exodus 31, verse 1. And for those of you who may not have heard the message last week, or maybe you're tuning in for the first time, just going to add a little bit of context. Moses has led the Hebrew children out of captivity in Egypt and they have entered into the wilderness. And as they have journeyed through the wilderness, Moses is beginning to understand that this is not going to be the easiest journey, that there's some things about the people and some things about God. And there's a little bit of a disconnect. And so he's standing in the middle as a prophet, as an intercessor, as a priest, almost like a priest. But Aaron's the priest, but he's standing as one who is representing God to the people and the people to God in this role. And when we find him in Exodus 31, he has received. Received instructions for a tabernacle. Now, I take the time to explain what a tabernacle is, because some people don't know everything that those of us who've grown up in church may know. And this tabernacle is a. A moving manifestation of the presence of God. And he says to Moses, I'm not just asking you to lead my people from Egypt into the promised land, but I'm asking you to also give them the instructions or on how to build this tabernacle, which will be a representation of my present dwelling with them. And it starts out thinking about Exodus 24, 25. The Lord begins to tell Moses the instructions for building this tabernacle. And it is detailed. Literally. Those chapters are just chapters after chapters about how big things should be and what materials to use. It's very detailed. And Exodus 31 is when he's laid out the instructions and he's giving him in insight into how he's going to accomplish the building of the tabernacle. It says, then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, see, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God. This is important. This is the first time we see anyone filled with the Spirit of God in Scripture. I have filled him with the Spirit of God in wisdom and understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, to design artistic works, to work in gold, in silver and bronze, and cutting jewels for setting and carving wood, and to work in all manner of workmanship. And I, indeed I. I'm the one who did this. I've also appointed with him Aholiab the son of Ahisamach of the tribe of Dan. And I have put wisdom in the hearts of all the gifted artisans that they may make all that I have commanded you the tabernacle of meeting, the Ark of testimony, Everything that the Lord has commanded, he has given them the ability to build this subject for those of you who like to take notes, I'm going to call it Glory in the changing. Glory in the changing. And Lord, I need you. I really, really Do I need your wisdom, your spirit, your prophecy, your creativity to help take this burden that you place placed in my spirit and to lay it out before your people? I believe now more than ever in this ever changing world that we need reminders that glory can exist in the changing. You've given me this word, you've given me this gift and ability and God, I just lay it at your feet and I say, build your church. Open their hearts to receive this Word. Allow this Word to be confrontational with the areas that are resistant to change. Allow this Word to lure them closer into the presence of God to the extent that they would be changed for sure, but also that they would believe that they are called to bring change to the world. I thank you God, for studying me, for giving me peace, clarity and vision. I receive it in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Okay, let's go to work again. Chad, we go to work again. I want to try and unpack this revelation that God has given me. But I'm going to try and use an analogy about how our minds work. And in the process of giving you this analogy of how our mind works, I believe that it's going to help us to understand more accurately what the Hebrew children were experiencing when they were in the wilderness. I'm going to lay this out by first showing you this image. There is an image on the screen. What do you see when you look at this image? Just yell it out, huh? Somebody said duck. Somebody say rabbit. Somebody said bird. That is, that is the perplexity of this picture is that some people are looking at it and they see a bird. Other people are looking at it and they see a rabbit. Each of us looking at the same picture, but seeing things differently. Each of us taking in the same experiences but looking at them differently. Now it's going to take about 20 minutes for somebody to see the duck and for somebody else to see the bunny. I can tell you because I'm trying.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
To move on and all I see.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Is people trying to show the person they sit next to. I'm gonna need y' all to be.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
A little bit more focused than that.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Take a picture of it and fight.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
About it later because that's taken away from my point.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I wish I could tell you that if you see a duck, it means one thing, and if you see a rabbit, it means one thing. Because when we see this stuff on social media, they try to make it seem like depending on what you see.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That is a sign of how much trauma you have experienced, your emotional health.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And your Personality type.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And I hate to break it to you, but whether you saw a duck.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Or a bird or a bunny, you're still crazy.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You know what I mean?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Like, no one's better than the other person. Depending on what you saw. It's not a sign of your personality. It's not a sign of your spiritual depth or wisdom. What's really important, really, is not what you see in the picture. What's really most important is how quickly your mind is able to see the other image. God help me. It's not necessarily what you see initially. It's whether or not your mind demonstrates the cognitive flexibility to be able to see something differently than the way you saw it the first time. Cognitive flexibility is the mental ability to switch your thinking and adapt your behavior in response to changing rules, demands, or unexpected situations. This is cognitive flexibility. When I assess what's happening in a room, in a relationship, in an opportunity, in a meeting, and I recognize that in order for me to adapt and to be effective for this room, this opportunity, in this space, I need to have cognitive flexibility for the way that.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This world is changing.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
We could sit back and we could long and lament for the way things were, or we can ask God to give us the cognitive flexibility to show up in the way things are. Because I am called to be effective in every season in which I am alive.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
So I am not doing the kingdom.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Of heaven any service by wishing things were the way they used to be.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
If I serve a God who is the same yesterday, today, and forevermore, it.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Doesn'T matter how this season changed.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
My God hasn't changed. So God is going to give me tools, wisdom, and strategy for how to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Show up in this season. So I need flexibility in my mind. Because God may do things differently than the way that I anticipated, the landscape may look differently than the way that I anticipated. I got to be flexible. I am beginning to think that healing and this process of healing and anyone who's, like, done the work and gone to therapy and all this stuff, and I've done a lot of this work, I'm beginning to think that healing is less about me no longer thinking the way that I once thought and more to do with me being alert and sensitive enough to understand that that type.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Of thinking did not serve me. So I got to change the way.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I look at something. God help me to say that real good.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Some of us get frustrated because we're like, when am I going to get over this?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
When am I going to stop thinking this way? When am I going to stop Acting this way.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And I am telling you that you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Have a default processing system. That means your initial response to a.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Stimuli, to a situation, to an opportunity.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
May put you in this default way of processing. Lord, help me say it real good.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I'll tell you mine.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'll tell you my business. I don't.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I don't usually let people mind my.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Business, but I'm gonna let you mind a little bit of my business. I have a default processing system.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
So I automatically assume that if someone.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Says that I did something wrong, that they're saying I am wrong. And I've been praying that God would deliver me from that. Sometimes deliverance is awareness that it exists so that you can attack it with the truth of what God says. I've got a default processing system that I automatically assume certain things about the world and certain things about people. That isn't always healthy.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But when you recognize that your default.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Processing system is flawed, then we have an opportunity to insert God's truth.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
We have an opportunity to insert God's process into our process. Because we no longer trust.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Trust that our process can produce health and righteousness and connection, the things that we need in order to grow. Yeah. This is why I believe in scripture. It says in Second Corinthians, chapter 10, verses 4 through 5, it says, for.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
The weapons of our warfare are not.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Carnal, but they are mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments, and every high thing that exalts itself.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Against the knowledge of God.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Listen, Bringing every thought into captivity. Oh, I want to focus. And everyone knows that this text is so layered, but I want to focus on a minute about what it means to bring every thought into captivity. Oh, God. See, some of us get so down on ourselves that we think the way that we do. But this scripture suggests to me that there's not necessarily anything wrong with you thinking what you thought.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
The real issue is that you have allowed that thought to roam free in your mind. And because that thought has roamed free in your mind, it's now showing up in your actions. Because you have a default processing system, you're going to think some things that.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You shouldn't be thinking.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But when you recognize that the weapons of. Of our warfare are not carnal, but they're mighty through God, that means I don't just allow any thought to roam free in my mind. I bring it into captivity. I'm not mad at myself for thinking the way that I used to think. I just don't allow those thoughts to roam free in my mind anymore. You see, the Thoughts still pop up in my mind. But I have to remind my thoughts who I serve now. I have to remind my thoughts what God said. I have to remind my thoughts who's in charge now. You got to have a word for every thought.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That word, captivity, it means prisoner of word. It's a prisoner of war. It's a Greek word. And that Greek word literally means prisoner of war.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You have to understand that when you bring a thought into captivity that you are doing so because you recognize that you are in a war and this thought is waging war on who God has called me to be. So when I bring it into captivity, I say that that battle was already won on the cross. That means that I'm not going to allow you to make me believe that I don't have the victory. I got a whole warden down on the inside of me. I run a very strict program. I don't let my mind just say anything to me. I run a very strict program. I don't let my thoughts. Thoughts just take me into any old room. I run a very strict program, you see, because my thoughts had me doing some things that made me look back on myself and say, I don't know what you were thinking, but I know what I'm thinking now. I don't get mad at the thoughts. I bring them into captivity. I arrest them the moment they enter. You don't have what it takes. I bind you in the name of Jesus. I have everything that I need. My God shall provide everything. Everything that I need according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. I bring thoughts into captivity. When the devil tries to tell me that I can't raise that child, I remind the enemy that my God makes no mistakes. He knew who I was when he gave me that child. And he'll give me wisdom on how to I bring every. You better run a list of all of the thoughts the enemy has placed in your mind mind and start searching scripture cuz you got to go bar for bar with the enemy. And don't use your words cuz your words don't have no power in them. I dare you to get in scripture and start fighting the word of the enemy with the word of the Lord. I dare you to start telling the enemy he's not finished with me yet. I'm not just talking about something that feels good.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Good.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I'm talking about his word says for I know the plans I have for you. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope. You got to go Bar for bar with the enemy.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Oh, I'm. That's. I'm going be honest with you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I don't ever say this, but that's better than y' all clapping.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I need you to know that you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Can talk back to the enemy. I need you to understand the power of what Jesus gave you. He gave you access to power and authority. And the power of life and death is in your tongue. Let me tell you something. When the enemy wages war in your.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Mind, you can change the battlefield. Oh, this God's helping me. See, this is what some people do because they don't like to be loud and reckless. They like to internalize and keep things inside so they wage war with the enemy in them. So the enemy puts thoughts in their head, and then they think back to the enemy. You know what I mean? You know what I mean? Do you know, like, you just be talking to yourself in yourself? There's something that happens when you speak it out loud that changes the battlefield.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That says, you can't have my mind. I'm going to speak in the atmosphere what my mind needs to receive in his soul. I wish I could say that real good. I'm going to give you five seconds.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
In this room to go to war.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
With the enemy, but don't keep it inside of you. I dare you to decree and declare right now in the name of Jesus, out loud, I shall live and not die. No weapon. I dare you to say it out loud. No weapon formed against me will prosper. I dare you to say it out loud. God's going to provide everything. I dare you to say it out loud. Because he's been waging war in your mind. But we're going to change the battlefield for a minute. I want you to bring what the enemy's doing on the inside of you out in the open in an atmosphere of faith, in an atmosphere of anointing. I dare you to say it out loud. God's going to strengthen me in the areas of my weakness. God's going to heal me. God's near me. He's close to the brokenhearted. I dare you to change the atmosphere. You got to magnify the Lord. You got to know who you're talking to. You got to know what you're talking about. You have to believe that God's going to do what he said he was going to do. And the enemy will have you in your head when you need to be in your mouth. The enemy will have you in your head when you need to be interceding with your mouth. When you need to be prophesying and declaring, this ain't a mind game. This is a weapons game. And the weapons of our warfare are part of what God gave us. When he gave us a tongue to praise him, he gave us a mouth to sing his praises. Come on and exalt the Lord with me. I dare you to lift him up higher than your circumstances. Stands to lift him up higher than your situation. See?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Oh, Say it out loud. Say it out loud. Say it out loud. Say it out loud.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Speak that thing until you see that thing. Speak that thing until you walking in that thing, speak that thing. You got power.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Sin.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
The power of.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Life and death is in your tongue. And as long as the enemy can.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Make you overthink, you'll never release what's in your mouth. But when you step over your thinking and say, you know what? I'm just going to speak what God said, and my mind will catch up later. The Bible says I'll be transformed by the renewing of my mind. Anyway, that means sometimes I got to let the spirit speak and my mind catch up later. That battle in your mind ends today. That battle in your mind ends today. That battle in your mind ends today. God says, I'll end it when you open your mouth and say what I say. Speak what I speak.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Is Moses not a prime example of.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
One who had a battle in his.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Mind about who he was? God says, I don't care what you think about you. Can you speak what I'm telling you to speak? In order to do this effectively, you have to really know who your God is. It's not enough for you to know God through me. It's not enough for you to know God through your mother. She can bring them in the vicinity. And we thank God for people who made sure that God was in the vicinity.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Whoo.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Because if it had been up to me, oh, child, somebody kept him in the vicinity. But there comes a moment where it's not enough to just be in the vicinity. You have to know him for yourself. This is why you can't just open your mouth and speak. A borrowed person's revelation. This is why God. Thank you, Jesus. This is why sometimes I'm saying what everybody else said, but you don't know them the way he knows them. Oh, God, save it. Help me say it real good. Sometimes we try to skip the process of intimacy with God, and we try to take his promises and make them our own without full awareness of his ability to perform that which we are speaking. Hebrews tells us that in order for us to come to him, that we have to believe that he is. That seems like an incomplete sentence. Like, he is what? That's not an incomplete sentence.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That is the whole sentence. Without faith, it is impossible to please Him. For he who comes to God must believe that he is.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He is what? Anything you need him to be.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
If you're gonna have faith in God, you gotta believe that He's God. You gotta believe that he is who he says that he is. And if you don't yet believe that he is who he says he is, when you use his promises, they won't have the full power behind them because you don't really believe. But when you start to really believe that God is who he is, when you speak that word, enemies who start scattering, the demons start trembling. Because I believe that he is able to perform that which he said.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You've got to believe that he is. He is God and that he is a rewarder.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Oh, hallelujah.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I grew up in church. I've always believed in God. But believing in God and believing that.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
He is a rewarder of those who.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Diligently seek him are two different things. That's why there are two different statements here.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You can believe in God, but not.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Believe that he will reward your seeking.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But when you begin to believe, oh.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I wish if we got testimony service in here for a minute, there will be some people who told you, who.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Would tell you like I'm about to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Tell you, that everything in my life changed when I started seeking Him. And let me tell you, I didn't seek him in a fancy way. It was kind of those if, if, if, if you're real kind of way. What God can do with an if. That's a sermon unto itself.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Because what I found out about God is not only that did my life.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Change when I sought Him.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But my life did not just change. He showed up for me in a way that made himself real to me. When I talk about God being good, I'm not saying it because we've said it in church all the time. I'm saying it because I found out when I sought him for myself that he will reward those who seek Him. I found out for myself that he can be good in bad times, he can be good in good times. He can take the good times, hard times to make them better. He can be good in sickness, he can be good in health. He can be good in a courtroom. He can be good with a million dollars, by golly, he can be good with $12 an hour. My God's goodness Doesn't change about what level you're on.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
His goodness is good wherever you're able to seek him.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
If you waiting on God to be good. I'm telling you, if you start seeking, you'll see the goodness of God. Oh, if I could just have a moment here. When I look back over my life at the moments where I didn't know God. Where were you? I started seeking God if you promised you would never leave me nor forsake me. But I went through a season where I didn't think you were there. God, I'm asking you to take me back to that time in my life so that I can see the way that you were showing up, even though I missed you. And let me tell you, he was there in some of the darkest moments of my my life. I see in hindsight the way that he protected me. I see in hindsight the way that he covered me. Somebody needs to ask God to take me back to that moment where I felt uncovered. Take me back to that moment where I didn't know where you were and help me to start seeking you. You know why you need to do that? Because you need to know that the same God that was with you then can be with you now. I come up against the spirit of gaps where you think that God was with you here but not with you there. God's not playing hopscotch with your destiny. God says, I'm going to be with you every step of the way. If you make your bed in hell, I'll be there with you. I used to waitress at a strip club. I asked God to show me where you were when I was waitressing at the strip club. He said, girl, if I would have let the enemy have his wait way, you would have been found in an alley. Girl, if I would have let the enemy have his way, you would have been strung out on drugs. You think I wasn't there because you didn't see the way I was covering you? You didn't see the weapons that were formed against you. But I protected you. I dare you to ask God to take you back to that childhood where you felt like. How could you let me touch you, baby? I didn't allow them to touch you unless I knew I could rest, restore it. But I gave you a teacher who would see you, a grandmother who would protect you, a sister who would watch over you. He was there all along. He was there all along. Oh, God, may they have the epiphany that you were there all along. I didn't let harm come your way Unless I knew I could restore I only let you go, but so low because I knew I could pull you back up.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I was there all along. Okay, okay. See, and this is what happened to me last week. Because I'm. When I think about the goodness of.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Jesus years old, I get stuck in this little world where I start thinking about all the things he's done for me. And it's about five people in this room who get stuck in that world too. And they start thinking about all the ways when they look back over their lives. Oh, some people are praying for what God will do now. But when I look back over my life, I see the way he protect. You don't understand. Some of us shouldn't be in this room. Some of us have no business in church on a Sunday. Some of us have no business with these jobs. Some of us have no business with this roof over our head.
BetterHelp Advertiser
Some the of.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Some of us have no business with this spouse, with this ministry. But God saw me through every step of the way.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
So. When I start going bar for bar with the enemy, I'm talking about a.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
God I know well. Oh, I'm talking about a God I know well When I say no weapon formed against me will prosper. I'm talking about a God I know well because I saw the weapons form and look at me still standing here. Went through hell but didn't come out smelling like smoke. When I go bar for bar for the enemy, I know for sure who I'm talking about when I say that God will supply all of my needs. I mean, it ain't no way my business should still be standing, but some kind of way he turned a dollar into $10,000. When I start going bar for bar for the enemy, I'm not talking about something I heard. I'm talking about something I know when I say he'll heal my body or he'll take me to heaven, so I'm not scared either way. I'm talking about a God who's shown up for me in the middle of my despair. When I say depression can't have the final say. I'm talking about a God that brought me restoration in the same place I felt depression. When I say he'll heal you, I'm talking about a God who will restore doing. It's some stuff you can't preach until you felt the reach. But when you start preaching in the place where you've been reached and make sure that the enemy cannot attack somebody.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Oh, that's not what I'm supposed to.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Be Saying, it's not what I'm supposed to be talking about, but God is doing something in my spirit this year, and it just won't get up off of me. God's trying to show me a deeper dimension of who he is.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Oh, so God, reveal yourself.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
To your people.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Reveal yourself to your people. Reveal yourself to your people. Give them fresh words. Fresh words. God, make their word come alive for them in a way they never make.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Your word come alive for them in.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
A way they didn't even know that they needed. Help them to see that reading time.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
As a time to get the weapons.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I open my Bible, I'm getting my weapons, I'm storing up ammunition because I'm in a fight and I can't win this fight on my own.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I need a power that's greater than what I can do on my own. So I get in my word.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Get in my word because I gotta stock up on ammunition. And I dare you. This is your homework. I dare you to not be afraid to admit that you're having thoughts that you would rather not have. Okay, this is the practical side of what I'm saying, because we like to over spiritualize things and pretend we're not thinking the way we thinking. You gotta admit you think the way you thinking. So you can issue an arrest warrant for that thought. I'm coming to get you every thought that was spoken over you because, oh, some of these thoughts we have are.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Really just the words that were spoken over us by someone else. And now those words have become our thoughts and we're trying to ignore them and spiritual bypass our way through them. I hear God saying, I need you to give them language so that I can give you the word weapon that can pull that argument down so that I can give you the weapon and.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
My word that can go bar for bar with that word. Okay, God's trying to change your mind. He's trying to change your default processing system. And in order for him to do.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That, you have to be willing to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Go to war with these thoughts.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You have to recognize that I'm going to have to change my processing, so.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'm gonna have to change my mind. This is why John preaches when he comes before Jesus, his cousin, the forerunner for Jesus, he starts preaching, repent, repent, repent, repent, repent, repent. For the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Repent, repent, repent. And if we aren't careful, we will interpret repenting as just being really, really sorry. That's not what it means. I repent because I'm really, really sorry. No, repentance is really something much deeper than that. Repentance, You'll. There's a root word there that lends itself to pensive, to thinking. Repenting is to change the way that you think about something. So when I begin repenting, you, you can't just repent because I'm supposed to be sorry. You repent from a very deep place of recognizing that the way that I have been thinking does not align with who God is. You understand?
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That's why you gotta be willing to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Take these thoughts and examine them, because.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You want to be able to say.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
What I have been thinking is so far off from who God is that I need to change my mind. I need to think differently. I need to repent. There are so many things that I've had to ask God to show me in my thoughts, to show me in my ways, so that he can bring me to a point of change.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This is why we are transformed by.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The renewing of our mind. I'm changing the way I think. This is not about changing your behavior. This is not about changing your wardrobe. This is about changing the way you think.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Because if you change the way you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Think, everything else will fall in line.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Your language will change when you change.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The way you think.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Your marriage will change when you change.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The way you think.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Your creativity will change when you change the way you think.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And so some of the things that.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I've had to change just on a.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Personal level, is this idea of things like I'm damaged goods, that God can't do anything with me, that I'm only.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
As good as my performance, that I.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Have to work to earn love.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Having to feel like you need to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Work to earn love, when God says freely.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Means that the enemy has made.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You believe that you are performing in order to receive connection.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And when you have a deep revelation.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Of just how God was unconcerned with your work.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Oh, I wish I could.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Say this real good.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This was never about you. It was always about Him. He knew who you were, your brokenness, your frailty. He knew your strength. He knew all of those things, and.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Yet he still stepped in and said.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I love them anyway, was never about you. And so for you to now think.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That I got to perform in order to be in connection with him. For you to believe that you're only.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
As valuable as your output is an attack against who God says he is. Sometimes I'm going through my life and.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'm doing things and I'm doing them without God. And I don't Realize until after the fact. And I repent because I thought I could do this without you. I repent because I thought my ways were better than your ways. I need you to understand that part of our relationship with God is him confronting the way that we think to.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Bring us into alignment with the way.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That he sees things. So his thoughts are not our thoughts. But through relationship with God, we're able to experience a transformation in our mind. We're able to experience a transformation in our thought life. And I need you to understand that it is not just God who's trying to change your mind, That the enemy is trying to change your mind, too. That's why it's a battle. That's why it's a prisoner of war. The enemy is trying to change your mind, too.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
So when you recognize the enemy's trying.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To change my mind and God's trying to change my mind, you recognize that I'm in the middle of a war right now.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And because I'm in the middle of a war, I have to be intentional about making sure that I'm changing in.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The direction of righteousness. Okay? This is how you will know when the enemy is trying to change your mind versus when God is trying to change your mind. Okay? I'm going to give you and put you on game. You have to consider what is the end result of this change?
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Does this change bring me closer to righteousness? Does this change make me more like God?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Or does this change pull me away from him? So in the garden, when the woman and the man ate from the fruit, he was trying to change their mind about God. Did God really say, no, that's not what he said. That's not what he meant. He's trying to change their mind about God. And in the process of him trying to change their mind about God, sin enters the world, and sin separates. It pulls us away from God. Okay? This is why what Job does is so powerful. When we look at Job and we've heard this scripture, though he slay me, yet shall I trust in him? Job went through test after test after test. He went through trial after trial after trial. And no matter what he went through, the enemy could not get him to change his mind about who God is. Oh.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
See, because some of us, we go.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Through a few trials and we start.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Thinking, maybe God's not who I thought he was. And we start changing our mind about God. But Job refuses to let what he's.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Going through change his mind about God.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That's what I wish for you. I wish the type of Mental resilience that no matter what you go through, it doesn't change your mind about who God is. It may change my expression towards God. It may change my questions. Because Job had a lot of questions and sometimes he changed his questions. But it never allowed him, he never.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Allowed himself to change his perception of the character of God. He still believed that God was faithful.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
He still believed that God was able. He still believed that God was powerful. That's why he said, though he slay me, yet shall I trust in him? Not because life is going the way that I want it to, but because I refuse to change my mind mind about who God is, regardless of what I am going through. When you get that level of mental fortitude, you are not just someone who comes to church. You are somebody who is in relationship with God. You are not just someone in relationship with God. You are a friend of God. You see, you got to know too much about them to let something come into your life and change how you feel about them. May you know God so well that you don't change your mind about him. Even when life gets scary. I'm crazy enough and bold enough to be at a stage in my life where I recognize that God's going to show up for me. I may not know how, I may not know when. It may not be in the way that I want it. But one thing I know for sure is when I get finished with this, I'm going to come come out as pure gold. One thing I know for sure is who my God is. That's why I'm not scared about what's happening in the world. The world can keep on changing. Technology can get out of hand. I don't care what. I know that my God's going to protect me. I know that my God's going to see me through. I know that my God has a strategy and I cannot be convinced otherwise. I'm sorry, but I have been persuaded. Persuaded that nothing will keep me from the love of God. I have been persuaded that he will go ahead of me and make my crooked path straight. I used to cry when things didn't go my way. I used to be upset when people walked away from me. Now I understand that when you walked away that God was protecting me. Now I understand that if the deal didn't come through, it's because the deal wasn't meant for me. Now I know that what's for me is what's what is for me and what isn't is not. And God will remove it and order.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
My steps I know who my God is, Job. Job refuses to change his mind about who God has been. But most powerfully, he is also so convinced about his righteousness that he doesn't switch up his character in the midst of the trials. Because sometimes we can keep our faith in who God is, but when we start going through the trials, we start slipping away from righteousness. Can you stay righteous even when it hurts? Can you stay righteous even in the middle of the grief? Job models for us what it looks like to stand by his righteousness.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And when we understand that this change.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
This war, this battle for change is happening, that the enemy is trying to change us and God is trying to change us, it should bring us to a certain level of sensitivity where we begin to search for the glory in the changing, help us to find the glory. The changing. When we enter in this text in Exodus, the Lord is introducing change. He's trying to change the Hebrew children and their thoughts and the way they think about God and the way they think about themselves. They're in the process of a change. So far, what they know about God is this, is that he is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But they have spent 400 years in captivity, so they know that he's the God of those who came before them. At this point in the text, they even know that he is the God who will move for them because he's part of the Red Sea and he's put plagues in Egypt. But what they're about to learn in.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This moment is that he is also.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The God who wants to dwell with them. He's trying to help them change their mind about what it means to have him as their God. Oh, God, this is it. This is it. This is it. He's changing their mind about what it means for me to be your God. When the world is changing, when your identity is changing, I want you to.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Understand that I'm also changing what it.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Means for me to be your God in this season.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You see, in the past, you may have known me as the God who just helped you make it from.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To make the ends meet.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But now I'm going to be the.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
God of your overflow. Come on, somebody. Hold on.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I'm trying to change the way you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
See Trying to change the way you see me.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You're used to just coming to me and asking me for something. But now I'm going to show you that I know how to dwell with you. Oh, I came to talk to somebody in this room, and God is changing the way you engage with them. Oh, he's not just the God of my forefathers anymore. At this moment in the text, God said, I want to get to know you personally. I don't want you to just know me through history. I want you to know me through a present encounter. I'm trying to, to change the way that we engage.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And so he's reintroducing himself the layers and dimensions of who he is.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Oh, that's what you got to know.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
About God, is that there are layers and dimensions of who he is.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And if we are not careful, we will put him in a box and we will say he is the God who just does miracles. And we will only come to him when we need a miracle. But when we recognize that he can also be a comfort in the middle of a storm, you'll recognize that, wait a minute. He's not just a miracle working God. He's a peace giving God. And just when I wrap my mind around him being a God who will provide and give me peace, I learned that he is the God of war. And there is something about being in a battle. When I recognize that he is a God who will go ahead, ahead of.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Me in battle, he's changing their mind about what it means to be in relationship with Him. Why is this powerful? Because in order for us to fully walk out our relationship with God, we have to be sensitive to the ways.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That he wants to change the way.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He relates to us. I want to change the way I relate to you. Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus. You're used to hearing me in a certain way. You're used to experiencing me in a certain way, but I want to change the way you relate with me. Then he also says, and there's, I feel the Holy Spirit ministering to somebody in this moment because they've been trying to figure out where God is in the midst of it all. And God says, you're in a season in your life where I'm going to change the way we relate. That is going to be intimate.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
More.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Personal than you imagined. I want to dwell with you. I don't want to just see you to the promised land. I don't just want to be the God that gives you what you ask for. I just want to dwell with you. He builds a tabernacle. This tabernacle is a moving tent. It's ornate and it's detailed and it's got structure, but it's a moving tent. See, you have to understand the paradigm that the Hebrew children have. They are used to being in Egypt.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Where they built Huge monuments and structures.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
For their little gods.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And these huge, huge monuments and structures were things that you had to go.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To in order to experience their little gods. But God says, I, as the one true and living God, I don't want to build something where you have to come to me. I want to go to where you are. I want to dwell with you. Not on the mountaintop, not when you make it.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I need you to know me as the God who will dwell with you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
In the wilderness, in the place where.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
No one else would go, in the place where anyone else would be afraid. God says, that's where I'm going to dwell with you. I am the God who's going to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Show up myself to you in the wilderness. And what is powerful about this? It almost requires a split screen to really take in the beauty of this text. Because on one hand, we have Moses getting instructions for a tabernacle, which tells.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Us that God is trying to help his people understand that I am going.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To dwell with you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I'm going to build something. Now, this is just a conversation between him and Moses.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The people don't know it yet.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
God's planning a strategy for how he's going to dwell with them, but the people don't know it yet. So on the other side of the split screen, we've got a people who are wondering, is God?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Has God forgotten about us? Has he abandoned us?
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And while God is giving instructions for how to build a tabernacle, they have taken it upon themselves to build an idol made out of a golden calf.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Oh, so we got two things taking place.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
God's trying to change their mind about.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
What it means to dwell with them.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And they have reverted to a way.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Of thinking that reflects where they came from, but not where they are. God help me say it real good.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
So they start taking their gold jewelry.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And building something that looks like where they came from, even though they're in a new season.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And God is walking them into a new identity because they're so uncomfortable with the new. They start building something that looks familiar. It's some people in this room who know what it's like to start building something familiar because you're so uncomfortable with the new place that God has planted you. And everything you're trying to build doesn't really look the way it's supposed to look or have the power it's supposed to have, because you are building from the old paradigm when God's trying to bring you into a new way of thinking and a new way of engaging. God says, I want to build something new, something that you've never seen before. But in order to do that, you're going to have to trust me. In the moments where it looks like we're not building anything at all.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Okay, you're going to have to trust me.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
In the moments where it doesn't look.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Like we're building anything at all, you're going to have to trust that me.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Pausing is not punishment. You're going to have to trust that I'm working things out in a race realm. You cannot see, so can you. Stay faithful to where I placed you until I send the word for what you're going to do next. God says when I change you, sometimes I put you in a position where it doesn't feel like you're changing at all. Because I want to make sure that there's an environment that can facilitate the fullness of the change. Oh, God, help me to say it real good. What God wants to do by dwelling.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
With the Hebrew children is so elaborate.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And so intricate that it takes time.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To get this strategy together.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
What God wants to do in your life is so elaborate. This is a prophetic word. I don't know who you are, man. I think it's for you. I see you standing with that blue shirt on. What God wants to do in your life is so elaborate and so intricate that it feels like you are on pause. But in reality, God is just making sure that the blueprint is set out so fully that once it starts rolling, it cannot be stopped. God said, if I gave you half the plan right now, it would not be the fullness of what I could do. But when I start the ball rolling, I don't want anything to stand in its way. So I got to make sure that everything is in position. I got to make sure that every question is answered before it even comes up. God says it's going to be elaborate, it's going to be intricate, and it's going to take time. Do not be surprised when it feels like you are in a holding pattern. Sometimes they put planes in a holding pattern on the Runway because they recognize that I gotta hold you for a minute while the weather passes. I gotta hold you in a minute so. So I can clear the traffic. I gotta hold you for a minute because I don't want you to take off and then end up coming down. I gotta hold you for a minute so that when you take off, nothing stands in your way. So that when I tell you to go, you've got everything you need to build. So that when I tell you to go you know exactly how to do. Takes time to build what God's going.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To do in your life.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Do you understand? You have a destiny that is bigger than anything your family has ever seen. I'm not preaching to gas you up. And this may not be everybody's word. I want to talk to somebody who God has given you an insight, a spiritual hunger about what he wants to do in your life and it is like nothing you have ever seen before. I hear God saying you will not be an overnight success. It will look like it happened overnight, but you and I will know that we have been strategizing this for decades. I know you don't want to wait. I know you want it right now. I know it looks like other people are outpacing you, but. But I hear God saying that I slow cooked you because I wanted to make sure that everything I placed in.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You came out in due season.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching your insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy. Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
BetterHelp Advertiser
BetterHelp Online Therapy bought this 30 second ad to remind you right now, wherever you are, to unclench your jaw, relax your shoulders, take a deep breath in and out. Feels better, right? That's 15 seconds of self care. Imagine what you could do with more. Visit betterhelp.com randompodcast for 10% off your first month of therapy. No pressure, just help. But for now, just, just relax.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Trying to change the way you see it.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I don't know who you are, but God's trying to change the way you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
See this season of your life. When God gets ready to change the season for the Hebrew children, the first thing he says to Moses in verse 31 and this is very interesting to me and I'm going to wrap up, I promise. He says something so powerful. He says, so when you read 24, 25, when you read all the verses that came before it, God's just giving them thing, everything, everything, everything, everything. But then when we get to 31, he goes, see, see, wait a minute. It's almost like he's saying, I told you all of those things but now I want you to lean in because I'm going To show you how I'm going to do everything that I just said, what's going to happen. And in order for you to see.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
How I'm going to do everything I.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Just said I'm going to do, it's.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Going to require a deeper level of attention.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That's what it is. That's what it is.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That's what it is. That's what it is. That's what it is. He's so used to writing down the.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Instructions for the tabernacle that this next.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Part, God wants to make sure you don't miss. So, see, whenever we see, see, or like behold in scripture, behold, behold is like an alarm.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
It's like a siren. Pay attention as you're reading your study.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Whenever the Lord says, behold, he's trying to let you know, I'm about to deposit something.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'm about to say something that requires.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
All of your attention.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And he says to Moses, see, see, see, see, See, see? I have filled Bezalel with the spirit of God. See, this is how I'm going to do it. I'm not going to make you do it by yourself. He changes the way that he sits, sees the people who he is in charge of. Okay? He changes the way that he sees the people who he is engaged with.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
God says, I am going to build.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
This tabernacle, but I'm not going to.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Use any outside resources or people. I'm just going to change the way you see the resources and people that you have available to you right now. Oh, come on, somebody.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Let me tell you, I'm not gonna bring in anything new so you can.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Stop trying to network your way into destiny. You're not gonna connect your way into this. God says, everything I've called you to build, I've already embedded in the atmosphere where you currently exist. The only thing that I'm going to require you to do is to see.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Differently what's around you. Oh, that's good, right? That's good. See, you got a seeing problem. You got a seeing problem. You don't see it right, so you think you got to build it on your own. You don't see it right? So you waiting on somebody else to come and save you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You think your only path to happiness requires marriage or a child, so you. So you think I need something else? God says, everything I'm going to do, all is going to requires you to see.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He goes, see, I have called by name, but you got to remember, this is a split screen moment. So on one hand, the Lord is saying, see? They don't know, but I got people who I have filled to complete the assignments. Down. Down at the bottom of Mount Sinai is Bezalel somewhere walking around with no idea what's in them. Somewhere down on the bottom of Mount Sinai is Bezalel and Aholiab with no idea what God's going to do with everything he's placed inside of him. Oh, I feel this prophetically, that the.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Time is about to intersect, that what God has said in the mountains concerning you is about to intersect with the present position that you are in. And it's going to make a demand on everything that God has placed on.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The inside of you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I feel that prophetically, I don't know who you are. Bezalel doesn't even know it, but he's waiting on a word.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He doesn't even know it, but he's.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Waiting on a word that's going to break the seal of what God placed on the inside of him. Can you imagine what it felt like to be Bezalela and to know there's something inside of me, but it hasn't been able to get expression. There's something inside of me, but I haven't been able to use it properly. There's something inside of me, but the time hasn't come. Little does he know that the time is coming right when he was ready to give up on God. God says the time is coming for what I placed on the inside of you to come out in its fullness.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He doesn't know it. I have filled him with the spirit of God in wisdom and understanding, in knowledge and in all manner of workmanship. He's just waiting on a command. The command is going to change his position from being just one of the Hebrew children to the lead architect for what God wants to see happen in the earth. So not only does God change the way that Moses sees the people he's connected with, God changes the way that Moses sees the material he's working with. Okay, I'm saying this. I'm closing. I'm finished. This is what God told me to say. He says that he's filled him with the spirit of God. So you got to see things differently. You got to see these people differently, changing the way you see the people. But I also want you to understand that I'm changing the way you see the materials. When the Hebrew children left from Egypt, they took as much as they could in treasure and in fabric.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And they didn't know what they were going to.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Do with this material. This is the residue of their affliction. They took it from Egypt. So where some people see gold, we got to know that they saw affliction. Where some people saw treasure, we gotta know that they had to have seen the wounds and the scars that produced those treasures. And they have these, the residue from their affliction, but they don't know what to do with it. What do I do with what I have left over? What do I do with the residue of this affliction? I don't know what worth or value is going to have for where I'm headed, but I'm still carrying it anyway. I'm carrying with me the weight. Come on, somebody. Of where I came from. And they tried to create something for themselves with it, but it's not exactly what God would do with it. And so they have to deconstruct what they built. Oh, I wish I could tell my story in here of me taking the residue of my affliction and trying to build a life that I thought would give God the glory. But God says, that's not what I want to do with that. I wish I could tell the story of the way that I carried things and carried things and just didn't know what God was going to do with them. God has a strategy for the material that they've carried with them out of Egypt. And God has a strategy for the residue of your affliction. Not only does he have a strategy for the residue of the affliction, in order for us to even offer it up to him, we have to see it as material. Oh, God, help me. It's not just your scars. It's not just the leftovers. It's not just the shattered pieces of what happened to me. This is material. When you begin to see it as material and not shame.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
When you begin.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To see it as material and not evidence that you weren't thinking properly.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
When you begin to see it as material, God says, that's what I want.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To use to build with.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I don't want to build with the things that you think are material. I want to build with the residue of your affliction because I want to make sure that you understand that what the enemy meant for evil, I meant for good. I need you to take what the enemy left you with so that I can show you what I can do with with leftovers. If we had about 20 more hours, I would preach to you about the God of leftovers and how we serve a God who can take the scraps of what we have left over and build a monument for his glory. You see, it as shame. He sees it as material. You sees it as insecurity. He sees it as material, you see it as the weapon. He sees it as material. Material. You see it as what disqualifies you. He sees it as material. And when you begin to recognize that I am his workmanship, that means that everything I've gone through is an opportunity to be material for his glory. You start asking God crazy things like, what do you want to build with? What I have left over? Because anything you build is going to be greater than what I build. Anything you erect will be greater than what I erect. He changes the way they see the.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Material they're working with, the people they do it with. But listen, he doesn't just use gold.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
In Egypt, they made gods and symbolism.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Out of pure gold. That's why when they made the calf, they made it out of pure gold. He takes gold and wood. He takes a treasure and he takes what's common and he puts it together.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I'm just happy because I think my message makes sense.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
He takes the gold and he takes what's common.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And because he's trying to change their mentality about how they engage with him, they want them to understand that I'm not just a God who wants the gold. I'm also a God who will take what's common. That there is something about humanity and divinity coming together is where I fully get the glory. There is something about what is common and what is divine coming together that allows him to build the tabernacle. This is what you need to understand about God, is that God is not just going to use what you think is valuable. God is also going to use the things that you think are just common. He has this way of taking what's valuable and what's gold and what other people would long for and combining it with what's common. And so he takes the wood, the acacia wood, and he overlays the acacia wood with gold.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That wood. That wood is gold. But it's wood backing it. We going home.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
It's gold, it's valuable, it's got value. And it's been through some things. It's the residue of what I have left over. And on its own, the residue of what I have left over may not give God the glory because we've seen what gold alone can do with the golden calf. But this gold is backed by wood. Can I tell you a little bit about the cross?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Are we going home?
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Can I tell you a little bit about the cross? Can I tell you a little bit about the cross? Can I tell you a little bit about the cross and what happens when God takes what you went through and backs it with the cross to build a tabernacle where he can dwell with. It's some people in this room who look like gold, but up underneath it, it ain't nothing but wood, baby. It's some people in this room who don't look like what they've been through. But if you can see what was backing them. I'm backed by the cross. I'm packed by the blood of the lamb. If you see what I'm shining, you should see what backs me up.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Okay, This is it.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This is what he's trying to teach them.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
This is what he's trying to teach them about how God works.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This is why he's trying to change them.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I need you to change your mind.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
About how you dwell with me and.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
How you relate with me.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Because I do things that don't make sense. I take gold and wood and put it together. I use competing materials. I use the kind of things that the world would never use because I know how to change them for my glory. That's why his strength and my weakness produce perfection. His strength is made perfect in my weakness. That's gold and wood coming together to build a dwelling place. Place for God. I want to talk to you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Because.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
God is trying to build you into a tabernacle.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That's why this is so important that they understand who God is and how God works and what he uses and.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
How he accomplishes his will. Because if they get this framework correct.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
It'Ll lay a foundation for everything he.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Does after this moment. So they won't be shocked when God uses competing materials to build something for his glory. They won't be shocked when a little boy with a slingshot says, show me a giant because he uses competing materials. They won't be shocked when Jesus takes clay and spit and puts it together and puts it on that eyes of a blind man because he uses competing material. They won't be shocked when he's get a virgin baby out of a teenage mother because he uses competing materials. They won't be shocked when a 14 year old teen mother becomes the co senior pastor of the potter's house. Yeah.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Yeah. Oh, Don't be shocked when the materials God gives you don't make sense because.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You serve a God who uses competing material.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The foolish things of this world. He uses competing material.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
We have this treasure in earthen vessels.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And there is glory in the changing. You have to be willing to allow.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Certain seasons to Change you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
For his glory.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Because the Lord is trying to build.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Something.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And the materials he use, it won't make sense to you. But I hear God saying there's glory.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
In the changing.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
If you can find.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
A way.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
To submit to the change. The Hebrew children struggled because they could.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Not find a way to submit to the change. But the change produces glory.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And you can't see the glory unless you're willing to change. The world is changing, but you saying the same, that's not good.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The New Testament talks about us being transformed from glory to glory, to glory, to glory. That's change.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And if we do not embrace the.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Times that we're living in and the change that it will demand of us, we will never be able to see the fullness of what God has placed inside of us. Bezalel and Holiab were filled with the spirit of God on the bottom of the mountain, waiting on the times to.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Change.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Waiting for Moses to speak the command that would awaken their change. Can I tell you this? The Lord told me, because whenever I'm speaking, I'm like, lord, are we. Are we Bezel. Are we, Moses? Like, who are we in this text? So that I can lead our people in the best way to respond. And God told me, there are people in this room, and you are. Are. Moses told me that who you are in your secret time with God.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That what you know, based on the evidence of who God has been to you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Has equipped you to call out what he's placed in someone else. Waiting. Bezalel. Oh, they're just waiting on him to speak the command. And then there are others, and they're like Bezalel, and they're waiting, waiting for the word and the opportunity that would allow them to pull from what they don't even know is fully in them. What I love about this text is the first time, and there's just so many layers to it. And I pray I did it justice. Because He's. The Lord is teaching them to build the physical tabernacle, but he's also given them a foreshadow in Bezalel of what it would mean to be a living tabernacle who dwells with God to be a temple themselves. So it's two things happening at once.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
The future and the present. God is showing them what they will ultimately become in Bezalel because I'm going.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To fill everyone with my spirit, and.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
They will be called temples. But it's a process.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
It takes time for his plan to unfold. But he offers them a foreshadowing so Bezalel has been filled with the spirit, but he's waiting on a word, on an opportunity that would allow him to pull from what God placed in him. This is what he has to do. When you read on, and I highly suggest reading on because I promise you, I didn't do it justice. When you read on. I didn't. Guys, I love you. I promise you. I want you to read what happens after this moment. That Moses receives the instructions and then the Lord tells him, you better get down to the bottom of that mountain because they're down there building a calf. And Moses like, oh, I take one break away, these guys. And what happens is that it ends up being where the Moses says, who's on the Lord's side? And the Levi's come and they say, I'm on the Lord's side. And they kill any and everybody who's not on the Lord's side. All of this happens in the atmosphere where Bezalel and Holyhab exist, that people got distracted, that they had to choose whose side they were on before they could even pull from what God had placed inside of them. There was a shaking. There were some times where some people fail, where some people who he probably thought were going to make it didn't make it.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
All while he's still waiting to figure.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Out what's in them.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
But God makes sure that he sets.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The stage properly so that when he finally pulls Bezalel into position, he knows exactly what kind of people he's working with. And their heart postures are. To see God get the glory, it takes some time for him to step.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Into what God has filled him for. If that is you and you're in.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
This room, I want you to understand.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
So many things about God is that you can be filled with the spirit of God and not really know it, not fully understand what it's for. You're not weird. You're not uncommon. That is a reality. I also want you to understand that.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
God will not release it prematurely. Don't be upset with God because you're asking for a premature delivery when he wants to allow your gift to come to full term. There's a certain atmosphere and a certain environment that allows you to release what God placed in your you. Stan, I want to pray with you. Oh, Jesus, I want to pray with you. There's glory in the changing. God's changing me. I feel it. I don't know what into.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I don't know who I'll be when.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
It'S all said and done. But God asked Some things from me. And what he asked from me required a killing of my flesh, a discipline. And I offered him that. And yet I still don't know what is for. Feel this in my heart. The Lord has been asking you to lay some things down. I don't know what it is. Some of you may have it literally with you right here in the room. It may be a substance. It may be a relationship. There are things in this room that the Lord has been trying to get you to lay down. Listen. Not because they are changing, you hear me? But because they are keeping change from coming to you. If that's you, one, if you have it here with you, I don't care if it's a substance. I don't care if you smoke it or shoot it up. If you have it in you, I want you to lay it at the altar. I promise you. I don't care if it's a flask. I don't care if it's already rolled up.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
If it is keeping you restricted and chained.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I want you to lay it at the altar. If you're in this room and you know that there's something that the Lord has been asking you to lay down, I want you to do as this woman just did. And I just want you to come and lay it at the altar. It may not be a physical thing, but I want you to lay it at the altar. I want you to touch the altar. Get as close as you can. It'll be crowded. Listen, and I'm going to say this. And I feel this strongly from the Lord. I don't care how far up you are in the balcony or how far back you are in the room. If there is something that you need to lay at this altar.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Do not let the enemy convince you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To stay where you are. It's a way of thinking. It's an addiction. It is something that is keeping God from getting the glory in your life.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You don't know who you'll be on.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The other side of it, but you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Know you cannot continue to be who.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You are right now. I'm laying it down. I'm laying it down. I'm laying it down. Say excuse me. If you gotta say excuse me. Get as close to the altar as possible. I'm laying it down. I'm changing. The glory is not in the staying the same. The glory is in the changing. At this time in the service, a few things happen. Some people come to the altar. Some people may have to go. They got work. They got flights. I am only asking for two Things.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I am asking for those who are.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Laying things down at the altar to get as close to the altar as possible. And if you are staying in this room, I am asking you to intercede. This is not a spectacle.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This is not entertainment.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
This is war with the enemy.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And I need you interceding for those who are laying things down at this.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Altar.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Because I believe that the Lord.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Is going to change them on the spot.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And I need people who have faith.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
For instant, not deliverance, instant transformation to begin interceding in this moment. I need you to pray the way.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That you needed someone praying over you when you were caught up in whatever you were caught up in.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And don't be fooled into believing that.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
This is just a moment for the.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Good Christians, because all of us end.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Up caught up.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
In ways of thinking that the Lord wants to change. God says, I want to change you. I want to change you. But I got to lay it down. You got to lay it down. You got to lay down that way of thinking. You got to lay down that addiction. You got to let. You got to get help. You got to get help. You got to get help.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You got to get help.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You need help in the spirit. I want to break that off of you. I want to break that pattern off of your life.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I want to show you how to change into a person of integrity. You lie before you can even think straight. I want to break that off of you. Come on, somebody. We in real church. We gonna have real church. I want to change your ways. I don't just want to change your bank account. I want to change your ways. I don't just want to change your career. I want to change your thinking. I want to change your being. I want to change the way you love. I want to change the way you communicate. I want to change your value. I want to change your worth. I want you to stop giving yourself away. I want you to stop thinking that there's only one way for you to be who I've called you to be. I need you to lay it down.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Lay it down. Repent. God, I change my mind about what I need. Oh, God, I change my mind about.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
How I need to show up. Lord, I'm laying down my pride.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I'm laying down my ego. I'm laying down my degrees, my accolades. I'm sorry, I don't know who you are, but you haven't moved yet and you feel a tug from the Holy Spirit to come down here. I'm asking you to do the most courageous thing you will ever do. And that is to say yes to God in a way that changes the way that you're used to showing up. I see you coming. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Come on. We'll wait for you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You know why?
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
We'll wait for you because you're worth it. We'll wait for you because we need you. We'll wait for you because the Lord waited on us. Oh, come on. Somebody. Oh, baby.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I see you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I see you. Surrender. I see you, baby.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Let God have his way in your life. Let God have his way in your life.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I see you.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I see you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
See.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You don't understand that when you come.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
You pull down strongholds.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
You don't understand that when you come, you break the chain of the enemy. You think it's just some unnecessary part of church. Don't let the enemy make you believe that this is some unnecessary part of church. This is a sign to the enemy that where you once had me bound, you cannot keep me any longer. This is a sign to the enemy that I have changed my mind about how I want to show up for God. This is a sign from the enemy that I am living, leaning into the change that I'm going to be everything that God has called me to be.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
BetterHelp Advertiser
This is an ad by BetterHelp.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
Did I talk too much? Can't I just let it go?
BetterHelp Advertiser
Take a breath. You're not alone.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Let's talk about what's going on.
BetterHelp Advertiser
Counseling helps you sort through the noise with qualified professionals. And online therapy makes it convenient. See if it's for you. Visit betterhelp.com randompodcast for 10% off your first month of online therapy and let life feel better.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Hallelujah. You will know that you have sufficiently laid it down when you feel a sense of vulnerability and nakedness, because what you've been hanging on to has been your security. It's been your comfort. This is not going to be one of those moments where you leave this altar feeling like you're going to take on the world. Oh, thank you, Jesus. It's going to be a moment where you feel like the only way I can do this is if I dwell with God. I'm trying to crack you open. I'm trying to crack you open to make room for you to be the tabernacle. Yeah. Hallelujah. There is a grief that comes with laying things down. It's okay to grieve it. It's okay to be nervous about who you'll be on the other side of this. It's okay. That's the human part of this. But we trust God anyway. You gonna need God. I want you to stay at this altar until you feel like I'm gonna need God when I walk out of here, God, I'm gonna need you. I'm gonna need you. I'm gonna need you. I'm gonna need you. I'm gonna say no, I'm gonna lay it down. But I need you to take up the space where that thing was keeping me distracted. Distracted. God, I'm going to need you to dwell with me. And in the dwelling I know you'll change me. Spirit of the living God, We feel your presence in this room. I thank you, God, for your wisdom, for your strategy. I thank you, God, for this encounter, for these, your sons and daughters. I thank you, God, that they've made the brave and courageous choice to lay down a habit, a way of thinking, a lifestyle that they know you can't get any glory out of.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Lord.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
And they're here at this altar. And some of them are nervous and afraid. And some of them are scared because.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
They don't know what waits on the other side. They don't know who they'll be on.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
The other side of this. But Lord, I thank you that your word is true and that one thing we know for sure is that you will dwell with them in the middle of the change.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
That your glory will be with them.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
In the midst of the change.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
And so, God, I am asking for a fresh outpouring of your spirit.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
That your spirit would begin to have.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
A personal encounter with each and every last one of them. That they would be filled to the overflow with your spirit in ways that they could have never imagined was possible. And I thank you that as you.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Fill them with your spirit, that you're going to give them wisdom, that you're going to give them understanding, that you're.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Going to give them knowledge. I thank you, God, that you're going.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To dwell with them.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I thank you, God, that you're going.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
To clean up house with them.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I thank you, God, that you're going to take them back to their past and show them the ways that you protected them in the past. I thank you, God, that you're going to give them insight about their future. I thank you where somebody wasn't excited to wake up in the morning, that they're going to wake up with joy because they recognize that they're not facing this thing on their own anymore. I thank you God, that you're going to comfort them. I thank you God, that you're going to walk with them. I thank you God, that you're going to whisper mysteries in their ears. I thank you God, that you're going to heal them. I thank you God, that you're going to restore them, that you're going to release the gift that you've placed on the inside of them and that they're going to function with power and authority. And so God, we surrender to you and we say, change our mind, change our ways, change our thinking, change our hearts, God, until they look like what you want to see. And God, when you get finished changing us on the inside, I thank you that you're going to strengthen us so that we can change what we see on the outside. Because you are a God of constant change. And he that began to work in them is going to come completed until the days of Jesus Christ. I thank you that change is not just for a moment, but changes for a lifetime and changes for a community. So God, I thank you in advance for the people connected to their change. I thank you in advance for the marriages connected to their change, for the breakthrough connected to their change. For the little boys and the little girls connected to their change. I thank you for communities healed. I thank you for communities developed. I thank you for the nations declaring your work. I decree and declare right now in the name of Jesus revival coming to their city, Revival coming to their house. I thank you for resurrecting power where they were dying on the inside. I thank you God, somebody is coming back to life. I thank you for dry bones living again. I thank you for tongues professing again. And I thank you God, that what you start with them is going to be contagious. Let it overflow into the neighbor. Let it overflow into the next generation. Let it overflow until all have seen and all have heard not just who our God is yes yesterday, but who our God is today and who he will be forevermore. And I thank you God for breakthrough multiplied breakthrough. May it hit their house. May it hit their heart.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
May it hit their gifts and their talents. May they do things they never thought was possible because they laid down what they once thought they couldn't do without. Repeat after me. Heavenly Father, thank you for your love. I Feel it. Thank you for your faith. I receive it. Thank you for Jesus. Thank you for making him who had no weakness, no limitations, no sin, all of mine, all of my weakness, all of my addictions, all of my sins, all of my negative thoughts, all of my negative behaviors you placed in this body, nailed it to the cross and put it to death. And when he was raised up free and victorious, I was raised up too. I'm free. I'm free to think better. I'm free to love. I'm free to dream. I'm free to create. I'm free to change without fear. Thank you, God, for this moment of encounter. Seal it, allow it to take root and allow it to produce fruit. In Jesus name. Amen. I see you in the red hoodie. I don't know what you're ashamed of, but I promise you. I promise you that God sees you. God loves you and God will redeem you. I know you had to be tough and you've had to be hard. And I see you're tired. I hear God saying he wants you to be free and you can be free. But I hear God saying you're gonna have to trust him. And trust. There you go.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Surrender.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
God says, I still, still got plans for you. And I'm gonna use every affliction you've ever gone through to build a monument for your glory. For his glory. Spirit of the living God. Somebody touch that man. I plead the blood of Jesus over you. We repel wickedness. We repel. Repel disease. We repel generational curses.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
By the blood of Jesus, we repel the enemy tormenting your mind. For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind. We speak a sound mind in your life. We speak the power of God working in your life. I don't care what you have allowed the enemy to do. We rebuke it right now in the name of Jesus. I hear God saying, I kept you alive because I want to redeem you. I kept you alive because I want to restore you. I hear God saying that you're going to be freer than you ever been. I hear God saying that I'm going to restore your innocence. Your innocence is coming back to you. Your purity is coming back to you. And there is a glory that is down on the inside of you that is going to radically shape your community and your family. I. I speak to principalities and powers right now in the name of Jesus. And I say flee. Loose here. In the name of Jesus. Loose here. Let that man go. Let his mind go. Let his spirit be free. Stir up the gift of God that's on the inside of him and let it overflow. I need somebody to celebrate with me and pray over him.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Somebody hug them.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I know you laid hands on them.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
But I need somebody to hug them. I need somebody to hug them. I need.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I heard God saying that as he.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Hugs that it's going to break the walls down.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Come on, men. Come on, men. Who's looking out for the fellas? You are your brother's keeper. Hug that man. We don't know who's fathered him. We don't know who touched him him. But if some men of God would get around him. I hear God saying this is a prophetic utterance of what will happen for the men in this generation when men come together. We've seen what women can do. When men come together. I hear God saying that it will raise up a generation of soldiers, a generation of armies. Men, where are you in this room? You better go out and get your brother. You better go out and get our community. My sons need you to to take your position. You better father this nation. Kings arise. We need you now more than ever. And may the kingdom of heaven suffer violence because every man took his position. I plead the blood of Jesus over every man. And I rebuke the plan of the enemy that would make you think that we don't need you any longer. We need you now more than ever. You may have to change your job. You may have have to change your definition. But I hear God saying I still got work for men to do. I got a work that only a man can do. Don't let a strong woman make you think that. I don't need strong men. It's going to take the both of us to take the devil out of our families. It's going to take the both of us to take the devil out of our community. Yes. Yes.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Yes.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Yes.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Yes.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Yes.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
Yes.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
I wish you could see these men gathered around this young man. Yes. That's how we gonna get it done. That's how you gonna stay strong. That's how you gonna stay in position. And some of you needed that hug. So while you hugging him, you feel the arms of the those men around you telling that you have what it takes. That you're needed for this generation. That you shall run and not grow faint. That you will be strengthened in the day of adversity.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I don't know. It's 12 o'.
BetterHelp Advertiser
Clock.
Lead Pastor or Main Speaker
I don't know. Listen, For those of you who feel called I want to challenge you to sow into the word on whatever level means something to you, to put seed in the ground. You may be in this. I didn't plan this, but I do feel like there's something that happens when we receive a word and we don't know what to do with it. We gotta act on it. And maybe that's what this linger is about. I'm going to tell you what I hear God saying to me, and you can respond in whatever way you see fit. Let me tell you one thing I don't want is anybody giving who doesn't mean it. I can tell you why I give and you can ask God, does this resonate with me? I give because in the old days when the Lord would have an encounter with them, they would build an altar, and on that altar they would put their goats or lambs, whatever kind of animal, and they would say, God, you spoke to me. And animals were their currency. It was part of what they used as currency. We're not in the old days, and I can't slaughter anything. But when the Lord has an encounter with me, it's my way of saying what happened in the spirit. I wanted to show up in the natural. So I take the currency of this world and I sow it in the atmosphere of what God did in the room. I hear God telling me five, the number of grace. Grace to change. If you feel in this room that the Lord has released a grace for you to change, I'm going to ask you to get whatever, whatever denomination of five resonates with you. I would apologize for being late again, but I'm not really sorry. I'll be honest. I'm going to. Baby, will you hand me my phone? I'm going to get a grace seed. Grace to change. Grace to change. Grace to change. If you're watching online and you feel a grace to change, $5.50. If you feel compelled, don't do it. If you don't feel compelled, if the Lord's still talking to you and you're like, I don't know. I'm just, don't do it, do it. If you feel the grace to change, we're going to offer this sacrifice to the Lord. Oh, Chad, I already gave my tithe and offering, so I know. I know that this is the Lord because I would not, in my own mind, choose to give again. But I don't want to miss this grace. Can I tell you this? And this is not to boast or brag, but I feel confident about my ability to Offer you this moment of sacrifice because I have experienced the grace to change. I promise you, anybody who's seen any part of my journey, and many people, people in this room have seen it. From the time that I was eight years old, I am not the same person I was. And even now, God is continuing to change me, that I'm going from glory to glory to glory. I promise you this is not to boast a brat. God's doing. God's just doing something in my life, and I don't. I don't know what it is, but I'm listening to him and I see him more clearly, and I'm just grateful for it. If you're sewing into your word, I just want you to hop up. I'm gonna pray. You're in this room and you want to sew, but you don't have it to sew. It's in your heart to sew. God sees that you lift your hand and you way, lord, this is our altar. It is not as elaborate of the days of old, but in our heart it is God. This is our way of saying we hurt you. That we believe that there is harvest connected to this room, harvest connected to this word. And we ask God, that you would cultivate our hearts for the harvest, soften our hearts for the area of change, remove our defenses and our excuses, challenge our default processing system, transform our minds. And I thank you, God, that your word is true. And you say that those who thirst and hunger for righteousness will be filled. We're thirsty. We're hungry to be changed from the inside out because we believe that there's glory in the changing. So we sow this seed of faith and expectation that change is on the way. And we recognize it, just like in Exodus, that change may get gory before it gets glorious. Give us strength to stay righteous even in the process of the glory. I thank you, God, for what you've already decided to do in the lives of these, your sons and daughters. Make it clear to them, and in Jesus name I pray. Amen.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
You've been listening to the Potter's House podcast. If this episode encouraged your faith, walk it out with authority. Until next time. Be blessed.
Commercial Announcer
In a world where January is supposed to be boring, one staple of the holidays refuses to end the great deals. At Verizon, the joy just keeps on coming. Right now, you can save on four new phones and four lines. Critics agree it's the deal that keeps on giving. Come into Verizon and save on four new phones and four lines on unlimited. Welcome. Additional terms apply@seeverizon.com for details.
Progressive Insurance Advertiser
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, Monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds because Progressive offers discounts for paying in full, owning a home and more. Plus you can count on their great customer service to help you when you need it. So your dollar goes a long way. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save on car insurance, Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.
Commercial Announcer
Paramount is the new home of UFC and we're coming out swinging with UFC 324.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Oh what a shot.
Commercial Announcer
And 325 on back to back weekends. The new era is here.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Time.
Commercial Announcer
Every fight.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Bam.
Commercial Announcer
One subscription.
Co-Pastor or Secondary Speaker
Oh my goodness.
Commercial Announcer
Peeperv. You just got knocked out. Let's go backto back blockbuster UFC events this month only on Paramount plus.
The Potter’s House Podcast
Speaker: Sarah Jakes Roberts
Date: January 18, 2026
In this powerful sermon, Sarah Jakes Roberts explores the concept of finding “glory in the changing”—the work of God in our lives during seasons of transformation, challenge, and uncertainty. Drawing on Exodus 31 and the story of Bezalel, Roberts encourages listeners to embrace change as an opportunity for God’s glory to be revealed, to renew their minds, and to offer God even the residue of past struggles as building material for something new. The message is deeply personal, practical, and prophetic, offering both spiritual insight and actionable steps for listeners undergoing transitions of any kind.
Illustration with the Duck/Rabbit Image ([04:50–10:00])
"It’s whether your mind demonstrates the cognitive flexibility to be able to see something differently than the way you saw it the first time." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (09:28)
Applying this Spiritually
Bringing Every Thought Into Captivity ([13:00–16:00])
Sarah unpacks 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 on spiritual warfare in the mind.
Healing isn’t about eliminating certain thoughts entirely, but learning to recognize and challenge them with truth.
Thoughts contrary to God’s promises should not “roam free” but must be confronted and replaced by scripture.
Quote:
"You have a default processing system. That means your initial response... may put you in this default way of processing. Lord, help me say it real good." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (12:13)
"That word 'captivity'... is a Greek word. And that Greek word literally means 'prisoner of war.'" (15:19)
Practical Steps
"When the enemy wages war in your mind, you can change the battlefield... I dare you to decree and declare right now in the name of Jesus, out loud, I shall live and not die. No weapon formed against me will prosper." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (18:02–19:15)
"Sometimes we try to skip the process of intimacy with God and we try to take His promises and make them our own without full awareness of His ability to perform that which we are speaking." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (23:13)
God Dwelling With His People ([46:06–53:53])
In Exodus 31, God isn’t just giving the Israelites instructions; He’s teaching them what it means to have His presence dwell with them in transition, not just blessing them from afar.
The tabernacle was mobile—a clear sign that God is not tied to one place or way of doing things.
Quote:
"I, as the one true and living God, I don't want to build something where you have to come to me. I want to go to where you are. I want to dwell with you... in the wilderness, in the place where anyone else would be afraid. God says, that's where I'm going to dwell with you." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (50:06–50:46)
Old Patterns vs. New Season ([51:34–53:18])
The Israelites, uncomfortable with newness, built a golden calf—a throwback to old, familiar patterns.
God calls us to trust Him through unfamiliar territory and not revert to past coping mechanisms out of fear or impatience.
Quote:
"Because they're so uncomfortable with the new, they start building something that looks familiar... because you are building from the old paradigm when God's trying to bring you into a new way of thinking and a new way of engaging." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (52:17)
"You see it as shame. He sees it as material... When you begin to recognize that I am His workmanship, that means everything I've gone through is an opportunity to be material for His glory." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (67:12–67:23)
The tabernacle’s construction required both gold and common acacia wood.
Our ordinary and extraordinary, weakness and strength, come together as God’s dwelling place.
Quote:
"There is something about what is common and what is divine coming together, that allows Him to build the tabernacle. God is not just going to use what you think is valuable... He has this way of taking what's valuable and what's gold and combining it with what's common." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (69:14)
True transformation requires submitting to the process, even when it feels like “nothing is happening.”
God uses “competing materials” and unexpected methods so He gets the glory, not us.
Quote:
"And there is glory in the changing. You have to be willing to allow certain seasons to change you for His glory. Because the Lord is trying to build something. And the materials He uses... won't make sense to you. But I hear God saying there's glory in the changing." —Sarah Jakes Roberts (74:35–75:11)
On the necessity of repentance:
"Repenting is to change the way that you think about something. You repent from a very deep place of recognizing that the way that I have been thinking does not align with who God is." (35:57)
Encouragement for those feeling “on pause”:
"What God wants to do in your life is so elaborate, it feels like you are on pause, but in reality, God is just making sure that the blueprint is set out so fully that once it starts rolling, it cannot be stopped." (54:03)
On laying down what hinders transformation:
"The glory is not in the staying the same. The glory is in the changing." (85:00)
Corporate altar call—standing in faith for personal & communal breakthrough:
"Do not let the enemy convince you to stay where you are. It's a way of thinking... it is something that is keeping God from getting the glory in your life." (84:34)
“Glory in the Changing” is an invitation to embrace God’s work in seasons of transition, challenge unhelpful thought patterns, and surrender the remnants of pain or shame so God can build something beautiful. Through personal anecdotes, scriptural insights, and prophetic encouragement, Sarah Jakes Roberts makes a compelling case that the greatest move of God in our lives often comes amid change—if we are willing to submit to the process.
Listeners are left with:
Notable Quote to Remember:
“The glory is not in the staying the same. The glory is in the changing.” (85:00, Sarah Jakes Roberts)
For further reflection: