I was in Genesis 1 and as I was looking in Genesis 1 I couldn't help but notice that the creation story in Genesis 1 is a story told in a pattern about patterns The Oxford Dictionary defines the pattern as a repeated decorative design or an example for others to follow. So when we look at Genesis 1, there is a literary structure somewhere between poetry and prose that tells us a story but uses a rhythmic pattern. Not only is the story told in this rhythmic pattern, but the creation itself is a pattern being created. And this pattern that is being created is an example for every other day to follow. So when God makes the seas, he's creating a pattern, and that pattern is how...
how the sea is going to function, not just on creation day, but for every day after it. It is a pattern inside of a pattern. It's really interesting because when we start off Genesis 1 and it says, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, it really is just a simplified explanation of an elaborate pattern that God put together.
Thank God for astronomy. We have a little bit more insight into what God created when he created the earth. He created the heavens and the earth.
What we know now is that when God created the earth, he put the earth on an axis. And when the earth is on the axis, it's spinning. And then not only is it spinning on that axis, but it is rotating three planets from the sun in orbit.
So when we talk about God creating the heavens and the earth, what we're saying is that God really created a pattern for the earth. And that pattern is that the earth will be... be on this axis. It'll orbit around the sun. It'll be inside of a galaxy that is 100,000 light years in diameter and over 10,000 light years thick.
And that pattern has not changed. Because when God creates a pattern, he doesn't change his mind. That pattern that he created when he created the heavens and the earth is still the pattern that we are standing in right now.
All throughout Genesis 1, we see this pattern over and over again. The pattern in the text, but also... the pattern and what God creates. When I was studying, I recognized that the pattern goes a little something like this.
God speaks it. What he speaks to obeys or responds. God sees it or evaluates it, then God confirms that it's good. Let's look at Genesis 1. When we look at Genesis 1, chapter 3 through 4, then God said, God said it.
Let there be light, and there was light. It responds. And God saw the light, that it was good. God saw the light. He sees it.
He evaluates it, and then he determines that it was good. That's that pattern. God speaks it. It responds.
God evaluates it. God says it's good. The same thing happens again in Genesis 1. I think it's verse 9. We see God says it.
It responds. Once it responds, God evaluates it, and God then says it's good. Genesis 1, 9, it says, Then God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear, and it was so. God said it. It was so.
God called the dry land earth and the gatherings together of the water he called seas and God saw it and it was good. That dry land is still called earth today. And the gathering of the water is still called the seas today. Because that pattern hasn't changed.
When God creates a pattern, he doesn't change his mind. Genesis 1 verse 11. God said, let the earth bring forth grass, the earth that yields seeds. the fruit trees that yields fruit according to its kind and whose seed is in itself and on the earth and it was so God said it it was so the earth brought forth it responded it responded to what God said then God sees it and says that it's good grass is still growing Trees are still producing fruit because when God sets a pattern in motion, he doesn't change his mind. When God speaks a word, Isaiah 55 lets us know that the word will not return into him void, but it will accomplish that for which it was sent to do. It says it's going to.
prosper because when I speak a word that thing must be executed and it's not that it just must be executed I've got to call it good God doesn't just speak a thing and then move on God says I got to make sure that what I spoke is what I see and what I see has got to be good that's a word for somebody because I want you to understand that God's pattern is to make sure that everything lands on good that's why people say if it's not good it ain't over Because when God gets finished, it's got to be good. He's going to cause all things to work together for the good. He said it in the Old Testament. He says it again in the New Testament.
Because his people need to understand that part of my pattern is to make sure it turns out good. I got a pattern. Great is thy faithfulness. I got a pattern.
Sometimes you just sing the song, but then there comes a moment when you know the song to be true. Because every time I thought that what I was looking at was going to be bad, some kind of way it ended up on good. There's no reason why some of us should even be in this room. But for some reason, God kept making sure that it landed on good. I didn't do everything the right way.
I don't know all of the right people. There's no reason you should even be jealous of me, honey, because the same God that did it for me, I know he can do it for you. There ain't nothing special about me.
It's just the way that God works. He has a way of making sure that everything lands on good. If it ain't good, it ain't over. I want you to prophesy to somebody. Just nudge them and say, if it ain't good, it ain't over.
If it ain't good, it ain't over. I know you may be in the midst of a struggle, but I want you to know that if it ain't good, it ain't over. I want you to understand that if God is in it and it's still bad, then God is not finished because he doesn't know how to stop on bad. He doesn't know how to stop on I spoke it. He makes sure that what I spoke becomes what I see and that what I see becomes good.
Oh, I feel my help coming. I have a God who checks his results. I have a God who doesn't just speak it and move on. He spoke it 10 years ago.
If it hasn't happened yet, don't give up because he doesn't leave you with what he spoke to you. He makes sure that what I spoke becomes what you saw. That's a good word.
I like that because sometimes I start struggling when things start looking bad. And then I start thinking that God's left me and I started thinking that God's moved on to somebody else because I see somebody else's situation turning out for good and I see somebody else's relationships working out for good and I think to myself, God, I think you forgot about me, but God has a pattern. God, see, if I was just working with a random God, I'd be a little concerned, but because I know how my God works, I understand that if it is not good, then God is going to evaluate it.
Cain, why are you upset? If you do not go back, will I then not find a sacrifice and call it worthy? Don't give up just because what I evaluated doesn't look like what I wanted.
I'm going to give you another chance. I don't know who this is for, but I want you to understand that if God didn't say it was good, it doesn't mean that God doesn't still want to work with you to get it to good. You may have messed up in your past, But if you're still here, I need you to understand that your being here is a sign that it can still get to good. God says, I'll teach you.
God says, I'll show you how to do it. God says, don't worry about what anyone else did. I know how to evaluate your results and get your results to good. Oh, I thank you.
Yeah, God's Word, it has a pattern. He announces it, executes it, evaluates it. It's good.
You're gonna get a word today. Maybe you already been walking around with a word. Your job is to make sure that you execute. on the word God has given you and then it's not enough to execute then you got to submit yourself a living sacrifice you got to say God I did the best that I could but I'm also offering myself up for evaluation because if there's anything in me that is keeping good from coming out of me.
I want you to fix it. I want you to convict me. I want you to change me. I want you to transform me because I know you got to get to good and I want to get to where you going.
So if there's something in me that's not good enough, I thank God for the Holy Spirit that you will change me and transform me until I can get to good with you. We are. The only creation in Genesis 1 that doesn't look like what God started in the creation story. Genesis 1 says that we're going to be made in the image of God.
Oh, I wish I had my time. I'm going to turn to it anyway. Amen.
Genesis 1, 26. I got a real Bible because I'm saved saves. Y'all got digital Bibles. That's the starter kit. I brought my real Bible.
Can I tell y'all about this Bible and then I'll get back to my message? I won this Bible at Vacation Bible School in 1996. Here at the Potter's house. And then I lost it because I didn't care about it.
Then one day I was divorced and in my parents'house, single mom, two kids. And I was cleaning out one of their closets and I said, look at this Bible from 96. I think I'm gonna read it. Here I am with my 96 Bible like I'm super saved like I had it the whole time. Oh because sometimes when God do something in your life it'll look like you had it the whole time. Oh yeah we're gonna have fun today.
I feel it in my spirit. Genesis chapter 1 verse 26 it says, so God created man in his own image and in the image of God he created him male and female he created them. Then God blessed them and God said to them be fruitful multiply fill the earth and subdue it have dominion over the fish of the sea over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves on the earth and God said see I have given you everything that I created I gave it to you.
He creates man he looks at everything he created. He evaluates it and he says that it's good. But we don't look like that pattern that God created in Genesis 1. Some of us should have dominion over things that have dominion over us.
Some of us are letting things rule over us that we should be ruling over. Why is it that we don't look like that pattern that God created in Genesis 1? Because in Genesis 3, the serpent comes in and Satan understands that it is to his benefit for him to rule over us as opposed to us ruling over him. And so the serpent recognizes that if I want to change this outcome, I have to change the pattern. God help me.
If I want to change the outcome of them having dominion and them subduing, then I have to change the pattern. You want to break generational curses and all you look at is the outcome. But if you want to change the generational curse, you have to be willing to look at the pattern that creates the curse in the first place.
The serpent understands that my best shot is changing the pattern and so Satan introduces his own pattern. Oh, if you're taking notes, I want you to write this down because this is the same pattern that he uses today. It starts with a question.
Did God really say? Look at the juxtaposition. In God's pattern, it starts off with a declaration. It starts off with an announcement.
In the enemy's pattern, he questions the announcement. Did God... Really say, oh, I feel my help coming. Did God really say that you couldn't eat from this fruit?
Did God really say that you were going to be the one? Did God really say that it was possible for you to do the thing that God said you could do? And now where you should have had a word, where you moved into execution, you've moved into confusion.
And God... pattern we go from announcement to execution. In the enemy's pattern we go from question to confusion.
Now I'm confused about what God's saying. Now I'm confused. And so I can't execute immediately because now I got to figure out maybe the timing was wrong. Maybe it wasn't for me.
Maybe he was talking to someone else. Maybe it's not my time. Maybe I heard him, but maybe I misheard him.
Maybe it was for someone else. And now I have confusion when I should have had execution. He questions.
Then you're confused. And now you're executing from a place of confusion. Eve, the woman, says she looks at the fruit and she sees that it's one desires to make one wise. And now she's executing from a place of confusion. Sometimes that's executing from a place of confusion is not necessarily what we do.
Sometimes that's executing from a place of confusion is that we do nothing at all. And when we should have been responding, when we should have been obeying, now we're executing procrastination. Now we're operating in disobedience.
Now we are in sin, which that Greek word means hermitia, it means to miss the mark, which means when I should have been executing, I'm doing nothing at all and I have missed the mark. I have sinned against God because I didn't execute the thing that he told me to do. I allowed my confusion to stand in the way of my execution and now I'm isolated.
I'm separated because the moment she eats from this fruit she's separated from God because when we miss the mark when we sin when we're disobedient we always separate ourselves from God and so now this is the pattern that humanity is stuck in between I'm stuck in between God's pattern of announcing, executing, evaluating, and saying it's good, and the enemy's pattern of question, confusion, execution, and isolation. I'm stuck between two patterns. Oh. Has anybody ever been stuck in between two patterns?
I know y'all, y'all real super saved. So you're probably watching online because everyone in here is really on God's pattern. But me and you and the people...
People watching online, we know what it's like to be stuck between two patterns where I want to be faithful, but I never had an example. I'm stuck between two patterns where I want to stop drinking, but I can't stop drinking because I keep needing this. I'm stuck between two patterns. I want my marriage to have a different outcome, but my marriage is stuck between two patterns. You yell, I shut down and now we can't have no healing.
I'm stuck between two patterns. I want to save the money, but I'm stuck between two patterns. I want to fix my heart, but I'm stuck between two patterns. I want to have a handle over lust, but I'm stuck between two patterns.
I want to think right and have my mind clear, but I'm stuck between two patterns. I'm stuck between two patterns. God, why? is it that I can't do the thing that I want to do is what Paul said because I'm stuck between two patterns there's a law on the inside of my body and that law is sin and I'm stuck between two patterns that that I want to do I don't do I'm stuck between two patterns Firehouse, I want you to know that you're not the only people stuck between two patterns.
That is grown folks in this room, stuck between two patterns. I want you to understand that you're not the only one that knows that I should do right and I shouldn't. talk like that and I shouldn't think like that but it's hard for me to break that pattern because I'm stuck between two patterns older generation we have a responsibility to the upcoming generation to let them know you're not the only one to be stuck between two patterns but thanks be unto God who always causes us to triumph yeah I'm stuck. Between two patterns, Paul says, so I find this law at work, although I want to do good.
I want to do good. I want to be in the pattern that on good. I want that.
I want my heart to be pure. I want my mind to be pure. I want to be focused.
I want to land on good, but every time I want to do that, evil is right there with me. It won't even give me a running chance. Evil is right there with me.
In my inner being, I delight in God's law, but I can see that there's another law at work in me. It's waging war. Oh, I want to talk to somebody who's got a war waging on the inside of them. There's a war waging on the inside of me, inside of my mind, and it's making me a prisoner. I want to talk to some- who is a prisoner of a pattern I want to talk to somebody who feels stuck in the same cycle over and over again I can't get my head right I can't get my money right I can't get my family right I'm stuck in the pattern and I want to take you to verse 25 oh god I feel my help coming Paul says, thanks be to God who delivers me.
No, no, no, let me take it to 24. 24 says, what a wretched man I am. Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Where am I going to get my help from?
Who's going to help me? Who's going to deliver me? How do I get out of this pattern? And verse 25 says, thanks be to God. Who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord.
So then I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law. but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin but thanks be to God who delivers me. Why does Paul say thanks be to God who delivers me? I'm stuck between two patterns but for some reason Jesus delivers us from this back and forth this pattern of being stuck between two different ways of being because Paul understands covenant. God help me.
Because Paul understands covenant, Paul understands that I can be stuck between two patterns by myself. But because I am in covenant with Jesus, that which I cannot do on my own, I got back up in Jesus to get the job done. Oh, yeah, I feel like preaching in this help. I need you to turn me up in the monitors because I don't want to lose my voice halfway through this message.
Paul says, because I am in covenant with Jesus. It won't be by my might. It won't be by my power, but by the spirit says God that I'm going to be able to be delivered from these two patterns. I need you to understand the power of covenant. The power of covenant means that that what you cannot do in your own strength because you are in covenant with God.
If you turn to God and say, God, I don't want to be stuck in this pattern anymore. And I tried it in my. my own strength, but God, I need some help. The Jesus says, that's what I came for.
I came that you would be delivered from sin. I came that you would be delivered from destruction. I came that depression would have to back up off of you.
I came so that anxiety would have to leave you alone. I am in covenant with God. You think having Jesus in your heart is about being a good judgmental Christian? No, baby.
When I got Jesus, I got backup in the spirit. When I got Jesus, I got this prayed prayers that I couldn't pray on my own. I couldn't even come to the throne of grace. But because of Jesus, I can do things that I shouldn't be able to do because I am in covenant with God.
I'm in covenant with God. When you're in covenant with God, no weapon formed against you will prosper. When you are in covenant with God, though he slay me, yet shall I trust in him.
When you are in covenant with God, he'll make your enemies... your footstool. When you are in covenant with God, he'll cover you even when you made a mistake. When you are in covenant with God, demons start trembling.
When you are in covenant with God, generational patterns are broken. It ain't nothing but a covenant, baby. It ain't nothing but a covenant, baby. I am in covenant with God.
How do I know the child is going to be saved? Because I've never seen the righteous forsaken, nor their seed begging for bread. I am in covenant with God.
Covenant. He's a covenant keeping God. I'm in covenant.
And covenant gives me access to power. And covenant helps me to tell sin you got to leave me alone. Covenant is going to break the addiction. Covenant is going to save the family.
Covenant is going to change your name. Covenant is going to prepare you for the flood. Covenant is going to do you like Abraham and move you into new territory.
You're going to get out of your father's house and into a land that he will show you. Because I'm in covenant with God. When you're in covenant with God, you're going to be in covenant with God. in covenant with God, you start doing things that don't make sense to other people. But my covenant ain't none of your business.
I'm in covenant with God. I move where he tells me to move. I speak what he tells me to speak.
Covenant will have you looking for Goliath. Covenant will have you talking to a burning bush. Covenant will have you partying a red sea.
Covenant will have you move to Dallas, Texas. Covenant will have you up in the middle of the night in South America. Africa watching online because I'm in covenant with God I had to get up this morning I'm in covenant with God I had to break up with you I'm in covenant with God I had to go to therapy I'm in covenant with God I'm in covenant. I'm in covenant. I paid my tithes on the 1st and the 15th because baby, I ain't got time to be playing.
Everything in my house is in covenant with God. You better watch your mouth when you talk to me. My mouth is in covenant with God.
My mind is in covenant with God. Don't forget the covenant. Don't forget the covenant that you're not in it on your own. That all of the heavens resources back up covenant. A thousand may fall on my right side, ten thousand may fall on the other, but I'm gonna be okay because I'm in, I'm in covenant with God.
Kristen Cain, she's one of my favorite women preachers. And Kristen Cain talks about having a cancer scare. And I love her so much.
And she told me, she told a room full of people, so I'm not telling her business. She said that by the time she got finished talking to God, that she was wanting to be healed in her body. But she also realized that because she's in covenant with God, even if the doctor's report doesn't change, she's going to be okay.
Because she's in covenant with God. I want to talk to you. somebody who refuses to believe the report of the doctor because I've been covenant with God either I live or I have everlasting life but death is not an option because I'm in covenant with God the bank can tell me no but they can't kill my purpose because my purpose is in covenant with God I may have to restructure I may have to move but I'm in covenant with God and he will perform His word, he doesn't know how to do it.
How to abandon his word. He doesn't know how to give up on his covenant. We give up.
He doesn't know how to do that. So I don't lean into my own understanding. Because I'm in covenant with God. I'm going to cry tonight. But joy is coming in the morning because I'm in covenant with God.
It don't mean life doesn't hurt. It just means that I serve a God that's gonna get me the good because I'm in covenant with God. Oh God, I wish I could say this real good.
Being in covenant with God. Doesn't mean that I'm always going to feel prosperous. I can downsize and still be in covenant with God. Because being in covenant with God is about where my spirit is, not where my resources are.
When you have the source, it doesn't matter what your resources are, because I'm in covenant with God. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. In the context of my whole life can change, my whole world can change, it could be turned upside down. But I'm gonna be good. Cause I'm in covenant.
I don't know who you are, but I hear God saying you need to get back to covenant. Poor little serpent. In Genesis 3. Thinking that he has usurped authority over God's pattern.
Not recognizing that covenant breaks the curse. Not recognizing that there in Genesis 3, when he thinks he has exercised his pattern and thwarted humanity, is a promise that the seed of the woman is going to crush his head. There's a covenant buried in the curse.
Covenant is the pattern that God uses after what happens in the garden. With Abraham, with Moses, with Jacob, with David, he uses covenant. That's the new pattern, is covenant.
So when we enter the New Testament, we see that he's working out a new covenant, this blood covenant. Oh God, help me. Jesus says... I am the covenant. I am the blood covenant, the new covenant.
I know you heard about God making covenant with other men, but now the new covenant is that whosoever believes in me shall not perish but have everlasting life. I am the new covenant. So we have Jesus, the new covenant.
Who is creating a pattern for all of us to follow. Oh, God, help me. Jesus is the pattern that we're to follow. But he's also making patterns through the disciples.
Oh, God. I'm going to take my time because I don't want to mess it up. Jesus.
Our new covenant calls 12 disciples together. I'm going to give you insight, he says to the disciples, on what God is doing in the earth. Because when you're in covenant with God, you get information first that other people can't even understand.
I can tell you was off. God just dropped it in my spirit. I'm in covenant with God. You ain't lived until God dropped something in your spirit.
That's how you know. He says to the disciples, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Okay, that's a new pattern. That's a new pattern. This new covenant lays out a new pattern that everyone is to follow from this day forward.
If you believe in me, this is your pattern. Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Step one in the pattern, follow me.
Follow me. Just follow me. Just be in the atmosphere where I am.
Inconvenience yourself. To be where I am. Be willing to leave your familiar to be where I am.
Be willing to break out of your cycle to be where I am. I'm telling you, follow me, follow me, follow me, follow me. And some people, they did, they followed him.
But then there's this next step of the pattern where he says, and I will make you. Uh-oh. Can I tell you a secret?
Some people come to church and they follow them. But people who are in relationship don't just follow, they let Jesus make them. If you could have seen the person you sit next to before you were sitting next to him, you would know that he's a miracle working God.
I didn't just get to where I am, he made me into this. Baby, there was a time I would have cussed you and slapped you, but he made me into this. There was a time when I would have lost my mind, but he made me into this.
I didn't just follow him so that I could say I'm a cute little Christian. I allowed him to make me. I don't think the same way.
I don't speak the same way because I allowed him to make me, Jesus says. I'm gonna make you into something. If you follow me and you don't change, you didn't follow me.
Because if you follow me, you should have no choice but to be made into something else. If you follow me, I'm gonna make you. I know I called you an author and you have no idea what an author is. But if you follow me, I will make you into what I called you to do.
If you follow me, I will make you into the rooms I'm calling you to go into. If you follow me, I will make you into the husband you never thought you could be. If you follow me, I will make you into a person of integrity. If you follow me, I will make you walk with boldness. If you follow me, I will show you how to humble yourself.
If you follow me, I will give you the language you need. If you follow me, that trauma won't rule you. If you follow me, I will make you. I'll do surgery on the inside.
You go first. from being a woman with the issue of blood to a woman I call daughter. How could it be in the same text that I started off with issues and ended in adoption?
He must have a pattern where he announces that I am whole. And all of a sudden I'm whole again. I think I messed around and I let him make me. I wasn't a preacher when I was growing up here, but I started following God and he made me into what he called me for. I want to.
to talk to somebody who is being made into something new right now. I want you to know that if you get on the potter's wheel and don't mess around and get in the potter's house, I'll make sure that you are transformed. I'll make sure that you turn into a vessel that doesn't look like what they went through.
If you follow me, I will. I'll make you. Oh God. Woo!
Okay. I just... Y'all know, y'all know what I love about them?
Is that the following and the making is not a one-time thing. Because sometimes... I follow him and he makes me on the level that I am.
But then he calls me somewhere else and I got to follow him. Somewhere I've never been before and he says follow me and I'll make you again follow me and we'll go from glory to glory to glory just keep following Keep making. If you keep following, I'ma keep making.
If you keep following, even in your latter years, I'll still be making you. Even in your former years, I'll still be making you. Gotta, gotta.
God, at my big age, you would cause me to do something new. God, I don't know if I can survive in that new arena. I don't know if I can survive in that new industry.
God, you would call me, follow me, and I'll make you. I'll show you. I'll show you how to quit. I'll show you how to build.
I'll show you how to let go. I'll make you the person who doesn't even need that anymore. Follow me and I will make you. I'll make you into it. Holy and acceptable, I'll make you into it.
Follow me. I don't just call the shots. I get in the ring with you.
I'll make you into that man. I'll make you into that woman. I'll make you into that bitch. I'll make you into it. That word.
Thank you, Jesus. That word make. In the Greek, it means product.
Follow me, and you will be my product. You'll be my product. You'll be my brand. You'll be the collective essence of my expression.
I will make you. My product. And I know that he does this because in Acts 4, when the disciples are speaking in the synagogues, they perceive that they were uneducated and untrained men.
And they marvel because they realized they had been with Jesus. untrained, uneducated, but the product of Jesus. It was so evident that they had been with Jesus because they looked like a product of his. I want to be a product of Jesus. Lord, I've been a product of my environment.
I've been a product of my trauma. I've been a product of my success. I've been a product of my hustle. I've been a product of the culture. I've been a product of everything else.
I want to be a product of Jesus. I want people to marvel when they look at me because they see you shining through me. I want them to say she was untrained, she was uneducated, she didn't know what she was talking about, but I'm still marveling at her because for some kind of way, it looks like he speaks through her. To be a product of Jesus is not just to speak or preach or worship. You are the difference on your workspace.
You are the difference in your family. You are the difference in all of the storytellers that are creating films and television shows you. When you are a product of Jesus, it shows up in what God has gifted you to do.
This is my product. But what is yours? How are you different than the culture, the environment, the paradigms of your family, your community? Are you a product of Jesus?
Have you been made new? When I enter this text... In Matthew 10, verse 16, I really wrestled with this because I saw the pattern, follow me and I will make you.
But there was this hidden next step. And this is what I think I wrestled with in trying to study. And I think this is where many of us get stuck. Some of us do the following. And some of us do the making.
But in Matthew 10, we see the third part of this pattern. It's follow me. I will make you.
And then I will send you. God help me. Follow me.
I will make you and then I will send you. I am not making you to keep you. I'm making you to send you.
Oh, that's the kingdom. Some of us, we come to church. And we follow him and we've been made new. But we don't allow ourselves to be sent. And the kingdom of heaven, which is different than church, is about how we invade what happens outside of this room.
It is how we take the kingdoms of this world and make them the kingdom of our Lord. It's when the ideas and the creativity that God has placed on the inside of us doesn't stay with us. He tells these disciples, I'm sending you.
and you were stepping into what you were made for. I don't know who's in this room but I want you to understand that maybe you're like the disciples. And this is the part that I feel is so prophetic, and maybe it's just my own mail, and I'm letting you read my mail. Some of us are about to step into what we have been made for. Now I want you to take ten seconds and really worship God.
Because I want you to be a product of your worship, not a product of your fear. I want you to be a product of the environment that has been making you and shaping you. Because I want you to understand that the kingdom does suffer the violence and the violence taken by force, that there's somebody in this room and I hear God saying that it's kingdom season.
I hear God saying that it is time for you to go into territories. Bearing the mark of what you have been made for. The only thing that Jesus preaches is repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And when he creates these disciples, these patterns that we are to follow, he wants them to do the same thing he did. He wants them to go, not stay with yourself, but I want to send you out first to the lost sheep of Israel.
There is a people who are scattered. And you are the only one who can reach them. And you cannot reach them unless I send you.
You cannot change the industry unless I send you. You cannot touch them unless I send you. And I want you to go get the people who don't know that they're my people yet.
As I was reading this text, I wondered to myself in Matthew 10 verse 16, it says, Jesus tells them, behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. I don't know if you've ever had God call you somewhere where making the wrong move could get you eaten alive. I mean eaten alive.
The politics, the systems, the structures. The following and the making part is actually the easy part. It doesn't feel like it when you're in it, but the following and the making, that is the easy part.
The hard part is when he sends you. And now I have to speak to people. who are more educated than I am. I have to change a culture that has existed in my family for a long time. I have to be a new pattern amongst old patterns.
And I'll tell you, as I was reading this text, I wondered to myself, how in the world did they not give up? How in the world? Did they not tell Jesus, get somebody else to do that?
I don't want to be a sheep amongst wolves. I don't want to have to experience the danger and exposure of being the one who speaks out of the one who do something, does something differently. I don't want to have to live with this reality. And yet he says, still, I'm going to send you out. I want to deliver you up to councils.
Quite literally, there are people in this room, and your job is to go up against systems and structures that have existed in this world for a very long time. You are a sheep amongst wolves. To change what you want to change in your community?
To establish the kingdom of heaven in your family? You are a sheep amongst wolves. How? God, tell me how. How do I tell them they're going to be okay?
How did the disciples know that they were going to be okay to be the difference? And Jesus told me, Sarah. You are underestimating what happens in the making process.
When you are in the making process... Yes, you get my spirit. Oh God, help me.
When you were in the, when the disciples were in the making process, they received his desires. Oh God, help me. They got a passion for the kingdom that was worth the exposure of what they were going up against.
When scripture says let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus, what we're saying is I want to be so focused on what you have called me to do that it doesn't matter what danger I am up against, I want to be desperate for your kingdom to come. your will to be done. I got to be desperate for your kingdom to make the difference.
And when the disciples were in the making process, they seen the disease be healed. They've seen the sick be made cleansed. They've seen Jesus preach good news to those who needed it. They were desperate to see that invade the earth.
I told my husband I have a kingdom message for those of us who go to church. This kingdom message is that this cannot stay in here. It cannot stay in you.
What God is doing in your life. It is kingdom and you got to be desperate for someone else to experience this. I don't care what they say about church.
I don't care what they say about religion. I want to know what he did inside of you. because you got to be desperate to see that go into the world.
You got to be desperate to let people know there's another way to do it, another way to be it, another way to see it. You don't have to debauch yourself. You don't have to allow your name to be drugged through the mud.
There's a way that you can do this and do it with integrity. You got to be the difference. The collective expression, the collective expression of his essence is when we allow ourselves to be made and then sent.