Transcription
I went home from my wife to my wife from that trip, freshly born again. Drug addiction gone, just like that. Never touched it again. Pornography addiction gone, just like that. Never touched it again. Alcoholism gone, just like that. Still shrank a few beers.
Went home to my wife, said, "Let's go to church." First time she was slain in the spirit, and she couldn't believe. "Well, where do you want to go to church?" I said, "Well, take me to the church you grew up in." "You don't want to go to that church." And I said, "No, I want to go. You, you said you grew up a Christian. Take me where you grew up in." She's, she's kind of panicking. He said, "No, no." I said, "No, you take me where you grew up." She says, "Are you going to leave your gun in the car?" Because I always carried a .357 underneath my belt. I said, "Yeah, I'll leave the gun in the car." "Will you take the the dirty bumper sticker stickers off the bumper of the truck?" I said, "No." "Well, you got to back the truck in against the hedges then. That's it."
All right. So I walk into that little church, and it's an old holiness church that's camped out on what God was saying a hundred years ago. There's 30 little old ladies with gray hair, no men, two teenagers that were forced to come because they lived with their grandmothers. And I walked in that church with this little girl that grew up in that church, and then she met me, and I destroyed her life. And they turned around and gave me, "You've been to that church." One guy says, "I pastored that church." We left that, and I wanted, "What was that all about?" She said, "It's your, it's your hair, and it's your beard, and it's your clothes." "Oh, I know this game. I know this game." So I cut all my hair off. I shaved my beard off. I got me a nice set of clothes.
And I, I fished 20 to 25 days a month, and I'd be gone seven to ten days. So, so it was a few weeks later before I could get back to church on a Sunday morning. And so we pulled in the parking lot this time, and the pastor came running out of this red pickup truck. You see, my wife had said on the way to church, "Can we tithe?" She'd been after me to tithe for a year since she'd go back to church. And I'd give her ten dollars, and that's all you can put in. Well, I'd made pretty good money on that sixteen hundred pounds of fish. So I put a five hundred dollar check in the offer. I found out it was double the normal Sunday morning offering. And so when the pastor saw that red pickup truck come in, he, he knew that red pickup truck is tied to that $500 check. So he came running out, got my wife on one side, got me on the other side, walked into the church, and gave those little old ladies the book. "Hands off, am I hitting the ball right now? Am I hitting the ball right?"
And then they found out I'm a commercial fishing boat captain. "Would you bring us some fish?" I said, "Yeah, I'll bring you some fish." So next Sunday, I, I'm not at sea. I come in, and I got a giant cooler full of of grouper and snapper filets, completely de-boned, bagged up in two or three pounds, and nothing but meat. And I'm handing them out to all these ladies. And now the next Sunday, I came. Ah, everybody loves me now. The pastor loves me, all these people love me. My hair's cut, I'm fitting in. I looked right, I'm acting right, I'm talking right, I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. Am I hitting the ball right now? Am I hitting the ball right?
See, there's not many people as born again as I was born again. You know, there's a little born again, there's a lot born again. I mean, from the first day, drug addiction gone, alcoholism gone, pornography addiction gone, and start tithing the first Sunday at church. That's really born again. All right. So I immediately fall in the pattern. I'm a new creation in Jesus Christ, but strongholds reside within the soul. My spirit man was new in Christ, but in the soul, the mind, will, and emotions, you, you, you end up relating to God, relate to people, and even how you feel about yourself through the filter of all of life's past experiences. And so I started learning to hit the religious ball right. And within seven or eight months, they made my wife and I youth pastor of the church. Two teenagers, not much risk. All right.
I didn't know much about Christianity. I rarely got to church because my life's at sea on Sundays. But I'd have, when I'd come in for two or three days, I'd have all the kids over at my house, or the two teenagers. And I said, "Bring all your friends. Everything's free. I'm saving all this money. I don't do drugs anymore." So I'm starting to pour it into these kids. And I told them, "Hey, you come to church six Sundays in a row, don't miss. Come six Sundays in a row, you get a brand new leather bible with your name in gold print on it." Any of your kids, any of your friends. And so they started bringing the kids out of the projects because these kids lived with their grandmas in the projects. Every color you could think of. And these teenagers start coming. And within six months, we've got 50 teenagers sitting in those 30 little old lady seats on Sunday morning. It was really comical watching how upset they got about it.
See, I didn't pray with any of these kids to to accept Jesus. I didn't know anything about that. All I knew is is I want to somehow save these kids from going through the pain that I went through, and the perversion, and the immorality, and the abuse. I just want to love these kids. I told them, "Hey, if you're, you're out on town and you're drunk Friday night, Saturday night, you call me. I'll come get you and get you home. I'll make it right with grandma." Because most of these kids' mom or dad was in prison, mom off somewhere, and and they lived with their grandmas. And then I'd get them on church on Sunday. The pastor would preach, "Turn or burn." They'd run to the altars and get the hell scared out of them, give their heart to Jesus. And then I'd comfort them in the rest of the week at my house. And within a year, the church is up to 200 people. It only had 125 seats because these kids started bringing their their grandmas and their aunts and uncles. Some of their moms started coming. And then a few of their dads started coming. And all these people are being born again. No church transfers through these kids. I never prayed with anybody to receive Jesus. I didn't even understand how to do that. I hardly knew anything about religion. All I knew is I am free, and how can I love the hell out of these teenagers?
So they said, "You need to go to bible school." And I said, "Okay." I never wanted to leave the sea for anything else. But when one of the teenagers drove drunk one night while I was out at sea and was killed, I said, "I can't be at sea. That kid calls me when I know." I said, "I can't do this anymore." And the thing that I had loved and lived my life for, the sea, became became an abomination to me. I can't go back. I've got to give my heart to these broken and to the wounded and to the shattered. My wife and I went to bible school. Me, very non-religious. And I need a young, a young guy, a strong guy to come help me out. Young, strong guy, come help me. Hurry, hurry. Jump up here, or somebody push them out of their seat. All right, come on now. Come on now. What's your name? Todd.
So I mean, when I got to bible school, I am so, so non-religious. I mean, I'm, I, I've still got siemens language. I mean, I, I don't even really know how to be a good Christian. But I'm trying to learn to hit the ball right and be a good Christian. My dad drilled it in me, anything worth doing is worth doing right. And if you're going to do anything, do it right the first time. And so I get to bible school, and I'd never had a prayer life. I'd never had a, a word life. I mean, when you're at sea, you fish 20, 22 hours a day. You fish till you drop. If you get two or three hours sleep, you're lucky to get that for six, seven days. Because a storm's coming, you're not going to be able to fish for a day or two. Then I'd sit and read my bible. But I never really, you can't pray when you've got four crazies living on a boat together and a little tiny thing for a week at sea. But you could fellowship. And so my whole idea of prayer. Come on over here, Todd. Todd's me in bible school. Was I'd go up on top of the boat when the other guys got in the bunks, and I'd lay up on the on top of the overhead, and I'd just sit under the stars and just weep. Just God, I can't believe what you've done. It's just awesome. I mean, I didn't know how to, I didn't have a relationship with God. But we get to bible school, and the first thing they teach us is, you've got to be a man of prayer. If you're going to be a pastor, you've got to be a man of prayer. And they give us a truth that yes, we should fellowship with God, we should spend time with God. But anything that is not rooted and grounded in love, any religious duty, discipline, service, not rooted and grounded in the unconditional love of God that loves you the way you are, gradually gravitates to law and legalism. And I didn't, I didn't know how to pray. I just know how to, how to just be in God's presence and just thank him for what he'd done for my life.
So, so one of the things they give us is a, a prayer seminar. "Can you not tarry one hour?" And they give us the card of how to tarry one hour with with God, okay? And they said, "Man, if you pray an hour, you're going to be a man of power, and the anointing of God is going to be upon you." And they give us the truth. But the filter system in my life was, well, if an hour is going to make me something and bring pleasure and Father God's going to smile at me because I'm hitting the ball right, praying an hour a day, what? Two hours a day, dude? And I'm used to just a few hours sleep a night anyway. I was 30 years old when I went to bible school, and and I was used to getting up four or five every morning anyway. So I started getting up at four in the morning, spending the first two hours a day praying. And they gave me this wonderful discipline of prayer. But then they, they taught us, they taught us, you've got to be a man of the word. And they gave us our little, our little thing that says, if, if you check off these three chapters a day, you can read the word in a year. And any good Christian is going to be in the word of God, and they're going to read the word through every year. And they give us the truth. Yes, we ought to know the word. But what's the motive behind us spending time in the word? For me, there was a stronghold. I have a structure of thinking that says, I've got to hit the, I've got to hit the ball right. So if three chapters a day makes you feel good, now how many have gotten to July or June and they're totally caught up with their three chapters a day? Doesn't it give you warm fuzzies? Have you noticed how an hour of prayer and three chapters a day in the word, how you kind of, you kind of walk away with warm fuzzies? And then what if you miss three or four days and you get behind on your list? How do you feel? What happens if you get behind? You feel like you're behind, don't you? And so I got the word down. I started getting up and spending an hour a day in the word, ten chapters a day. Do you know how strong in God I began to feel? And I started feeling like super Christian.
But see, in that particular bible school, it was very important. They take the word of God, and Paul's saying to Matthew, "We're to study to show ourselves approved by God." And so in order to help motivate us to study more, they took the top 30 grade point averages and they posted them on the bulletin board in the hallway for everybody to see. And whoever had the highest grade point average is at the top, all the way down to the lowest of the 30 at the bottom. And if your name wasn't in there, you're in the gutter. You don't have any value. And so man, I've got to start working harder to study to show myself approved of God and get my name as far up that list as possible. I didn't get it up to the top, but I got it in the top, the top ten percent. And I mean, I'm up at three, three thirty every morning studying to show myself approved by God. And so I'm, I'm praying two hours a day, I'm in the word an hour a day, I'm making straight A's in school. Do you know the warm fuzzies that comes when you know you're doing more than everybody else? And of course, you let your little card about how, how far ahead your you are on your bible reading fall out and during class so others see it and you know they're behind. I mean, you really know they're behind.
But see, in that particular bible school, one o'clock every Friday, we're put out on the streets in downtown Atlanta. And for five hours, we're to buttonhole people and give out tracks. And we're to write down how many people we get to take a track, how many we can get to pray with us. And whoever had the most people pray with them for salvation on Monday is marched up onto the platform during devotions, is lauded and praised by everybody. And so now I've got to get my witness down, and I've got to start witnessing to support myself approved of God. If you drop any of that, you're going to hell now. All right. And so I got my witness down, I got my prayer life down, I got my study. Tell me, how do you measure how close you are to God? By how much you pray? How consistent you are? Your bible reading? Your obedience? You're witnessing? Whatever you do to try to earn your way to God takes, takes energy, doesn't it? And see, because I was so good at this, they sent me right out a senior pastor in a little tiny church just outside of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. And after the first month, you have to turn every Sunday, you write down all your static statistics of how many were in church on Sunday. You mail it in. And there was 52 churches in our district. And I never saw one of these forums in bible school. But when it came back, it was how many churches, how many people you had in your church on Sunday. Whoever had the most, name was at the top, and whoever had the least, name at the bottom. And guess where my name was at? With 25 people in my church. I looked at that list, I immediately felt exhausted, and I knew I'm going to have to work harder now. So I had to go into the projects and start knocking on doors and bussing. And the first year as a pastor, I won the most coveted award, the fastest growing church award in North and South Carolina. Do you know how much that award weighs? Because once you win the award, now you've got to do it again. 14-hour days, seven days a week, trying to learn to hit the ball right. Because I still see God through the lens of my earthly father, and whatever I had to do to feel valued or loved and acceptance as a child, I'm trying to do as an adult to feel loved, valued, and accepted. And God. Now, how many want to be a Christian just like him? How many have been a Christian just like him? Somebody come and help set him free. I think he's ready. Thank you. Thank you. All right, give me a hand. All right, thank you.
Praying two hours a day, an hour a day in the word, fasting 30, 40, 50 days a year, a man of integrity, a man of purity, and set free from the addictions. Fastest growing church in my denomination, doing all the right Christian things. But when I walked into the front door of my house, my whole personality changed from pleasing men in the community to a state of agitated resistance against my wife and children because they were a potential threat to my independence and self-reliance. I didn't abuse my kids, they deserved it, but they just got the look all the time. And I could just never do anything right in my eyes. I've been filled with a spirit in bible school, led a revival where 70 other students of the 120, filled with the spirit at bible school, 25 teachers filled with the spirit. Revival went for six weeks, every night in my, in my living room, 500 people saved around the neighborhoods from us knocking on doors. I'd known the power of the cross, I'd known the power of the Holy Spirit. But the deepest need every one of us have has to be at rest in the Father's heart. And whatever I feel I have to do to feel valued or accepted by God, others are going to have to do to feel valued and accepted by me. My wife ended up in suicidal depression. My children were afraid for me to come in the house because when I came in the house, all joy would leave the house because everybody had to act right. And on church on Sunday, you better not do anything to not look like the perfect pastor's kid. And I ruled them with fear and intimidation through the look. And my wife just couldn't take it. She couldn't cut the mustard. And we had to leave the ministry after two years to save her life and get her straightened out. And see, I couldn't see it because there's nothing easier than self-deception when you're doing all the right Christian stuff. And so you think your husband's the problem, you think your wife's the problem, you think your pastor, your boss, the children of the problem. Hey, anybody here not battled a stronghold of fear? This is an issue I've learned every one of us must address in our life. None of us are obsolete.
After a couple of years counseling, prayer, counseling, peace restored the house. I went back captain in a wealthy man's marlin fishing boat, fishing the marlin fishing tournament up the North and South Carolina coast. But we had an opportunity to go back in ministry, associate pastor in the largest spirit-filled church in South Carolina. And went on staff there with 10 other staff pastors. And within three years, followed the same pattern again. I found myself addicted to the praise of men, addicted to ministry, addicted to prayer and the word, and doing all these things, making myself strong. And and the stronger I got, when we're strong, we can't find God's love. And we make walking with God about religious duty, discipline, and service. And then we come home at an angry etch. My wife burned out again. She couldn't keep up with me. And see, people would look at me and think, "Oh, he's just such a wonderful minister. Look at how well he communicates from the pulpit. Look at how he lays his life down. He's always there for us. He's always there." But that poor, that poor wife God gave him. So we left the ministry again. We got back under counseling, marriage and prayer counseling. We started Shiloh Place Ministries out of all the counseling we'd been through. We started working with burned-out pastors, marriages, and families. And for a few years, peace returned to us. But then God started up pouring out his spirit in the mid-1990s. I fell right in. But my wife didn't want anything to do with it. And as God began to pour out his glory in '94, and God started using me in a whole new and different dimension. And I mean, we'd be in church till two and three in the morning, and they'd carry people out. And and started getting invitations here and there, and running to the nations. And and this wife God gave me just didn't appreciate what a mighty man of God I was. My teenagers lived in the bedroom behind closed doors. When I came home, I didn't beat them. I wanted to, but I didn't beat them because I taught the marriage and family seminars. So I knew I couldn't beat them and teach the seminars. But they just didn't respect me. And and they're rebellious kids. Rules without relationship breed rebellion. Doing all the right Christian stuff, purity, integrity, but emotionally detached. Because when I came to my dad as a little child and risked opening my heart, and nothing came back at 12 years old, I'll not let him hurt me again. Something shut down. And I lost the ability to open my heart in the fear of trusting, the fear of rejection and abandonment, and the fear of opening my heart to relationship in intimacy. Intimacy and love became a stronghold. And even though I was born again, spirit-filled, could handle the power and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, Paul said in First Corinthians 13:1, 2, and 3, "If you've got faith to move mountains, prophesy with the best of them, if you know the mysteries of God, if you can speak and razzle and dazzle them, if you're willing to give up everything for the poor, but you don't have love, what do you got?" But see, I justified, "Oh, you see the love, but the ministry I have out there, the way God's using me. And boy, I could pray, man, man, I could pray over your wives and get your wives free." But I couldn't pray over my own life. So was my ministry rooted and grounded in love in Ephesians 3:17, or was it rooted and grounded in fear and trying to feel better about myself through what I did in ministry, in prayer, in the word of God? Do you realize 19 out of 20 ministers don't pray with their spouse? How can we effectively minister to God's bride if we aren't able to minister to our own?
So I'm out relishing in the glory of the ministry. My wife came to me in 1995 and said, "I've been through it twice, and I can't go this route again." Because I was raised in a holiness church, divorce is not an option, but murder is becoming one. And she said, "Jack, you spend your life giving to others that which rightly belongs to me and the children. And I can't believe that this ministry you're in, it's of God. I don't care how many are getting saved. I don't care how much power of the spirit's flowing. Until it brings your heart home, I can't believe this is rooted and grounded in God's love." And see, I couldn't see it because when everybody says all these wonderful things about you, when you're helping all these people, when God's using you, and your prayer life's right, and your word life's right, and you've not gone back to the immorality, you've not come back to the pornography, and you're walking in integrity, and you're walking in purity, you think the other person's always the problem when conflict comes in your relationships. And the problem is a religious stronghold has been so built, you can't even see it. And though you preached against religion, I become the older brother, never failing to keep a command of his, but not knowing how to go into the Father's house and have a party.
So I took my wife to a Healing Life's Hurts conference to get her life straightened out. I didn't have a problem, she did. And as a last resort, she agreed to go. And it was a pastor's afternoon session, a question and answer time. And the speaker, one of the the wives said, "I want to pray for the women here who've been hurt in ministry. Would you please stand?" Of course, every wife in the building stood. And my wife stood. And I said, "All right, maybe God will get her now and make her appreciate what a mighty man of God I am." When they started praying, my wife's crying uncontrollably, as were many other women. She ended up on the floor in a ball, just crying and weeping and wailing. Then a man stood in the pulpit and prayed a simple prayer. He just said, "Father God, I want you to come to these ministers here whose dads never held them as a child, and I want you to take them in your arms and give them the love their dads weren't able to express." And I started crying. I couldn't understand why I was crying so hard because at 38 years old, I'd helped my father find the Lord. We'd closure. I'd asked him to forgive me for my rebellion. He'd asked forgiveness for the abuse he put me in, and all the pain, and we, we had closure and forgiveness. So I'm healed, right? Wrong. You can forgive and let live oppress the rest of your life because forgiveness and trust are two different things. I can walk by Jerry in my size 15s, I can step on his foot. "No, forgive me, Jerry." And hopefully he forgives me. And oh yeah, it wasn't intentional. But the next time I walk by, what's he going to do? Withdraw his foot. You see, many of us in this room learned a pattern of withdrawing our heart as a child. We risked opening our heart to mothers, fathers, friends, boyfriends, girlfriends, only to be hurt again and again. And we build a stronghold, a destructive habit pattern of thinking of closing our heart when people get too close. And isn't it wonderful that the day we get born again, we're new creations, and we never struggle with independence or closing our heart again? That was the theology I made straight A's on in bible school. Once you're saved, you got it. Now, there's a stronghold in our soul, our mind, will, and emotions. It teaches you about these mental strongholds and and breaking free. The CD series back there, you, you can't come to our retreat center and go through prayer ministry or deliverance until you listen to that and realize it's a stronghold in the mind. It's not demonic. It'll give an open door to demonic oppression, but you've got to deal with the open door of the mind.
So as I'm sitting there crying, I can't understand why this 44-year-old guy is crying so hard when they're praying over the father relationship, when I've had closure to all of that. And then God took me back to the 10, 11, 12-year-old boy that is my mom and dad's marriage is breaking up every Friday and Saturday night. It was the house from hell because when the alcohol started flowing to medicate their pain, the violence would begin. Lamps flying across the room, and people being taken to emergency rooms, and children being beaten. And and every Friday and Saturday night was terror of what alcohol would do. My parents, very successful, very loved, my mother, Woman of the Year in Daytona Beach, my father, one of the most respected men. But neither had any idea how to be a parent. Good people that loved us, but did not know how to express that love to where we felt like we had a home, a safe and secure place in a mother and father's heart. And so I would hide in the closet. And at 12 years old, I'd be in that closet, and I felt like my heart was going to explode through my chest from fear. And some of you, it was like a vice wrapped around your head as a child. Others, it was like a boa constrictor wrapped around you, smothering you, and you couldn't even breathe. At 12, 13 years old, others, it was like an elephant, me, like an elephant standing upon my chest. And I thought for sure I'm gonna die from that pain. Until 12 years old, I remember so well one day crying in the closet. I came out of that closet, oh, not let them hurt me again. And I shut down, and I stopped hurting. And Spock on Star Trek became my hero. He didn't feel pain. He didn't let the taunts of McCoy get to him. And I stopped feeling. I stopped caring. And then I'm crying uncontrollably at 44. And God's taking me back to that boy that stopped feeling at 12 years old. And God walked in to the closet. I'd known the power of the cross through Jesus Christ. I'd known the power of the Holy Spirit. But I still have a stronghold of fear. And Father God sat next to me. And there's only one way I can describe it. It was like the day I sat in Mr. Mullen's. I experienced the fullness of God's love at salvation. Those three days at sea. But then I came back and started trying to hit the ball right. And it's like you lose that first love and that sense of rest. He's not left yet. He's still forgiven you. But you start striving through self-assertion, thinking somehow you can please God and get closer to him. How do you measure how close you are to God? It never changes. When Christ did it, he did it all. You didn't perform or do anything to get in. You don't do anything to get out. When you invite Jesus Christ in your life, he's home in you. And if drawing close to God is hard for you, you are trying to do it in the flesh and not in the spirit. And God came into that closet and sat there. That 44-year-old man, 12-year-old. He reached over, took me in his arms. And it was like a hand reaching in my chest, pulling out of fear of trusting, a fear of rejection and abandonment, a fear of opening my heart to love, a fear of failure, a fear of the look. And for 45 minutes, I lay there crying uncontrollably. And then God just walked me out of that closet of fear. And he said, "Jack, from this day forward, you never have to hide in a closet of fear." And I realized fear is our hiding place that produces shame, that produces control, independence, self-reliance. You never have to hide in that closet of fear again. From this day forward, my love will be your hiding place. Now go tell the world about it.
I mean, I tried to get up off the floor, and I was just completely shattered and undone. And I looked around, and everybody's gone. Just my wife sitting there. She said, "What has happened to you?" I mean, up until this point, I'd have every emotion in control in my life. I don't fall down. I don't get slain in the spirit. I'm in control. All right. She had to help me back to the motel. And our 17-year-old son was there, my 13-year-old daughter, and a 9-year-old son. I saw Mom trying to help get me in the door, and they went running to Mom, "What has happened to Dad? What's happening to that?" "I don't know. He can't do anything but cry." They'd never seen me weak. I had been strong my whole life. My whole body language, tone, posture, everything was of strength. And see, when we're strong, we make walking with God about religious duties, disciplines, and do's and don'ts. And all of our relationships are built on that. What did Paul say in Corinthians? Second Corinthians, it's when we're weak, God's power is perfected in our weaknesses. And then I saw it for the first time in the eyes of my children. Have you seen it in the eyes of the people that are close to you? I'd never seen it before. I was so blinded. I saw the same fear that I carried for 44 years as hearty taken root and become a stronghold in my children's lives. The fear of being in their dad's presence, the fear of the look, the fear of trusting. And I realized my children had become like me. My worst nightmare. I started crying uncontrollably. Crawled over on my hands and knees to my children, begging for forgiveness. They couldn't understand me. I was blubbering so much. Four months, every time I looked into the eyes of my children, I'd have a flashback or memory of when I devalued them, disdained them. Disdain, the rolling of the eye, it comes across with superiority and condescending tones. And I'd have a memory of when I treated him like that. And I, I'd feel the pain of when my dad had done it to me. And I realized the pain they carried. And I'd crawl over to him, begging and pleading for forgiveness. Interesting thing, for those four months, they stopped living in their bedroom. They started coming out in the living room to be entertained. They just want to catch eye contact with me, knowing that Dad's going to just start blubbering again. But then after a few months, Sarah gets up one morning, "Are we going to cry again today, Daddy?" My oldest son, "Just get over it, Dad." It was several years before he forgave me. Several years before the heart of the Father was restored to the children. And Trisha started saying, my wife started saying, "Chuck, I believe now this move of God. Before I couldn't believe it was from God because it wasn't restoring the heart of the Father to the children. But I see the heart of the Father being restored to the children, and the heart of the children being restored to the Father. And I want to dive in, and I want this for me. I want this so that my children are healed of the mother pain that I've inflicted."
And God began to powerfully impact our lives. My daughter came to me after four months. And we're winding down. She came to me after four months, 13 years old. Her homework assignment in ninth grade was, "Complete this sentence: The greatest influence in my life is..." And see, we can hear a lot of spooky testimonies, but I'm pretty skeptical of them anymore. I don't know about you. Because when I hear one now, what I want to know is, what's the spouse say about it? Because it doesn't make any difference what haven't you been to if you hadn't brought heaven back to your family? What good is it? Doesn't make any difference how many sick you've laid hands on have been healed, because it's pretty clear in First Corinthians 13:1, 2, and 3, no matter what faith you've got to move mountains, if it's not working in your relationships, what good is it? Don't make any difference how many hours you spend on the floor. It's how you get up and go home to the relationships that you have. Has it begun to change the way you walk with others? If not, then there's a stronghold in your life exalting itself above the knowledge of God's love. And so let me give you the evidence. If my wife could have been here, she would basically summarize it up like this: For 15 years, my husband spent all those hours in prayer and the word and fasting, but in 45 minutes in the arms of God's love, it changed my husband more than all 15 years combined of being saved, filled with a spirit, fasting, prayer. 45 minutes in love transformed him more than anything else. You see, I'd been through every type of deliverance and counseling, hundreds of hours of prayer to be free. And I had much freedom in many areas. But in the ability to have intimacy with my spouse, you can't cast out fear. Can't cast it out. There's just some things in your life you can't cast out. Trying to cast out fear is like trying to cast out darkness. When you go into a dark room, you don't cast out darkness, you turn on the light, and light dispels darkness. You can't cast out fear because fear is simply the absence of feeling loved, accepted, and like you belong. And anywhere in your life you did not feel valued and loved, fear came in. And you can take authority over that thing and you can cast it out. First John, where's the set in the Bible? First John 4:18. "Perfect love casteth out all fear: because he who fears worketh torment and he who fears has not been perfected in love." You can try casting fear out, but if you don't have a supernatural breaking forth of God's love in that area of need, Romans 5:5, the Holy Spirit pouring love of God abroad in your heart, fear just comes back. And fear is measured by the fear of trusting, the fear of rejection and abandonment, and the fear of intimacy, intimacy, opening our heart to love.
So let me give you the evidence here, and then we're gonna just destroy you. My 13-year-old daughter that hated me, was wishing that I would die. "My need to go home and get her to break those death wishes. Says the greatest influence in my life is my daddy. Through him, I have seen the eyes of Jesus and felt his unending love. At one point, not very long ago, my daddy was a man to fear. He was Captain Bly off the H.M.S. Bounty. Now he's as gentle as a lamb and not to mention just as loving. Through watching my daddy change from being a hard man to being a tender man, he has influenced me to change. His new patience has helped bring me through a very difficult year. Seeing my father love and cherish God like never before has done miracles for me. Instead of referring to God like some holy being, my dad now refers to God as his daddy. Now, instead of fearing my dad, I crawl up in his lap and I find a very cherished peace. What I cherish most about my father now is his smile. I also love the way he sits with me and helps me with my faults in a loving way. Whenever I do something good, he notices that too. My dad is changing in so many areas. I'm so proud of him. Every time he looks at me and smiles, I explode inside with joy. My daddy has been my greatest influence these past four months. I forgive him for being Captain Bly in my early years. I loved your daddy. Our direct result of this experience and Father's love was a restoring of the hearts of the Father to the children, the hearts of the children of the Father. And all my children and their spouses are walking with God today with the passion for the world to experience this kind of love. It's transforming love. My wife hasn't suffered depression again in the ten years God's changed and transformed her. And what's the key? No self-assertion. For 15 years, I added to the finished work of the cross, thinking through my hitting the ball right, I'll somehow see God smile at me. But when I came to the place ten years ago of destroying everything precious to me, my family, for the sake of ministry, I resigned being super Christian and I accepted myself for who I was. My pastor, board member, my closest friend, master's degree in counseling, and pastor said to me a couple of months ago at lunch, "Jack, you're about the most messed up, broken man I have ever met." I said, "Well, I appreciate that, Chip." And he says, "But you have made more peace with your brokenness than any other man I've ever met." No self-assertion. You.