Transcription
My man sitting over here. He came to me and said, "It's, it's, it's a good thing to ask his questions." Not putting him down at all. He said, "Uh, man, I got these thoughts. There's just thoughts. I don't even talk about them. They're, they're terrible thoughts, and I don't, you know." And I said, "So, they're thoughts." He said, "I know. They're not in my heart." I said, "Well, then you already won. The battle's already won. They're thoughts, you know, they're not in your heart."
So we think we win when this, when the thoughts go away. So we go on this mad pursuit and get all this ministry, go through all these streams of ministry, get lots of oil put on us, go through the past a thousand times, walk through every trauma we can remember, hoping thoughts go away. The goal isn't that the thoughts go away. The goal is that you never believe them. When you know they're not in your heart, well, why won't these thoughts go away? Stop it. Why do you believe them? Why do they even bother you? They ought to spring you to truth every time. And if they're foolish enough to keep speaking and taking you to the truth, let them keep speaking. It ain't a problem.
"Yeah, but I just hate hearing it." I'd rather see you believing God. That's better. Instead of just saying, "I just hate here." Listen, I heard curse words in my mind. I had a couple people that are into delivering stuff. They said, "Well, if you had to come to us, we'd have got you free." I said, "I was never bound."
See, if you're in a line of ministry and you think having the thoughts is the problem, you're, you shouldn't even be a minister. Because now you're ministering to sensuality and you're trying to get results instead of build truth in people's lives. Because now they're sitting ducks. Because now they're going to think another bad thought two weeks from now, and they need your ministry more. And then a month from now, they're going to have another. And they think something else is wrong with me, and I'm still not healed. When are you ever free in that belief system? When do you ever have wholeness? When are you ever delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of the Son of His love? You never are. Because feelings and sensuality are dictating your life. And in good effort, we're trying to minister to feelings and mentalities and memories and flashbacks and dreams. And none of that is the issue. The issue is not taking it to heart and believing it's you and believing the suggestions are you.
When I sat on my bed and asked Holy Spirit, I told Him, "I don't feel this way about You." The thoughts were mainly directed to my friend, Holy Spirit, and they were not cool thoughts. And they were thoughts I didn't even. I was a cursor when I wasn't saved. I thought you had to swear in the warehouse to fit in. I'd say five curse words to say to English. I'm not proud of that. It's just weak and wimpy. It's just messed up. But that's how I talked. And these phrases were beyond what was in my language. And they were directed. Why? Because of my hunger. So I'm reading, and all of a sudden, I'm going to read, and I've blasphemed the Holy Spirit. Speak against Holy, and you'll speak against. And then this feeling come on, "You've done that." Oh. And then I remember the thoughts. Or the thoughts come as I read it. And next thing you know, I'm cut off. I just did the unthinkable. I just did that. But my heart's going, "No way. I don't want."
If I tell you not to picture, make sure whatever you do, when I say this, don't you picture an elephant. Don't you look. Don't you picture an elephant. No. Hey, you already did. Some of them have polka dots and pink. It's just suggesting. It's power of the mind. It's the tools Satan uses. Tries to get in your mind to reach your heart. That's why you got to know what's in your heart. You have to have confidence in your heart. You got to have your heart protected and guarded. When you don't keep your heart clean, you can't discern this stuff. When you're carrying issues and unresentment and and forgiveness and regret and guilt and condemnation and shame, then the way that seems right to a man seems right.
It's amazing how feelings about God, or lack of feelings about God, and thoughts are like the major struggles that people share with you. The way they're thinking and the way they're feeling. It's the two number one things that people struggle with when they ask for counsel. It's the number one attack of the enemy.
I said, "Oh my God." I said, "Holy Spirit, I don't feel this way about You." I already had a relationship with Him. I talked to Him all the time. I woke up in the morning. After I got saved that night, I, I woke up in the morning. I can't help it. I'm trying to rearrange my theology. I just woke up praying in tongues, and the Spirit of God was on me. And I can't do anything about that. I didn't want to. I was happy. So if you tell me He's not for today and tongues isn't for today, we got a little problem. Because I woke up, and nobody influenced me, and there was nobody in my room, and I didn't have a certain circle, denomination, or stream influencing me. I just woke up saved, and Holy Spirit was on me, and I was praying some loud, fast stuff that I never heard before, and it felt good, and I was happy. [Laughter] So you say He doesn't do that today? Well, maybe not with you. But what do you do with me now? Because that ain't true where I'm concerned. Well, He doesn't heal today? Well, maybe not for you, because you don't believe anything. What are you going to do with people that are healed? Everybody's a liar. I don't think everybody says, "Here's a liar, an exaggerator." Come on.
I said, "Holy Spirit, I don't feel this way about You." Now, this was fun. He said, "I know you don't." And that was a relief. Because in my heart, I knew I didn't. When the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart, revealed that He knew that it wasn't in my heart. So guess what I said? Probably what you just said. I said, "So, what do I do?" Because I'm still thinking this has to stop. I said, "So, what do I do?" He says, "Every time you hear it, tell me how you feel about Me." And I'll never forget it. I was sitting on the corner of my bed, and I went, "You are so wise. Oh my. You don't even care to stop the thoughts. You just care to make sure I never believe what they're suggesting." Wow. I was three months saved, and I understood it. I went, "Whoa. I'm so glad I didn't call ministries for help." I'm 27 years saved. I might still be going through them. I'm just telling you, I've seen people never get free from that mentality that they're only as good as they're feeling, and they're just trying to feel better. "Well, something's just blocking me. I just think I have a block. I just feel like I have a block." "Well, let's take you through another session. There's probably something we just didn't touch yet." I'm just glad I didn't call the ministry. I might not ever really knew who I was. I might still be looking to feel better. I'm sorry that sounds raw and rough, but I'm just being honest. I've seen people saved for years, and they're still asking for prayer because of their feelings. I'm not being insensitive. I'm not being mean. How you feel is not my priority. If I'm your minister, what you believe is what I care about. And if your feelings is your highest belief, then we're going to separate your belief from your feelings, and we're going to impart truth to your life, and you'll watch your feelings change. Oh yeah. When you don't believe God loves you because of something you did, what's that going to produce in the feeling realm? When you believe you're not forgiven, when you believe you're a failure, how's it going to affect your emotions, your feeling life? My goal is not to minister to your central life. My goal is to minister to your belief system and get you to get every lie out of your life.
Holy Spirit is so awesome. He said, "Every time you hear the voices, tell me how you feel about Me." And I got it. He knows. I know. Because He knows me. He knows exactly how to talk to me and handle it. And when He says it, it wasn't a mystery to me. It wasn't something I had to search out or call three ministers to get discernment. He said it, and I went, "Oh, this is amazing." Because none of these things are in my heart. This is a lie. So then their voices would come out of the blue. They would just come, and they were nasty phrases.
"Well, see, I just can't think that God would want to." And He's bigger than that. And there's a way to get that to stop. See, we think the victory is when the voices stop. And I promise you, the victory is when you never believe them and have influence in your life. What to submit to God and resist the devil. Mean to you. It's a one-step program. If it's a two-step program, that's trouble. It's one step. My submitting is my resisting. And guess what He'll do? He'll flee. It doesn't say in 30 seconds. It doesn't say in a week. It just says He'll flee.
I tell people this story. I had somebody come to me, and they said, "Well, if you'd have come to us, we could've got them voices to stop." Wasting. I said, "That's arrogance and presumption. You need to stop that. I wish you wouldn't even believe that." I said, "Because they said, 'Well, yeah, but for it to last that long, there's a way to get rid of.'" I said, "You're not even hearing the testimony. You're stuck in a mentality dealing with sensuality." Just so you know, the reason I talk so strong, I studied all those ministries for five years and I interviewed lots and lots of people, and I never found solid, lasting testimonies. I just found people that needed more ministry. And the people that were ministering those things needed ministry themselves because of their own belief systems. So they had the same challenges as the people they were ministering to. So they just called it normal Christian struggles. Just saying, I'm not talking out of turn. Five years I interviewed people and studied out and looked at every angle and talked to both sides, ministers and people that were ministered to. So I'm not popping off.
What broke me one night is I went to the church because I left my keys on the on the steps of the altar at a healing service. And all the lights were out. And it was on a day when I saw two people blind get their sight in York County. One little girl was born blind in her left eye, and one lady lost her sight to glaucoma at age 62. And I watched two people in the same day get their vision. That's a pretty good day. That's a pretty good day. And I stayed late after everybody. "Man, do I feel the Lord right now? It's just good." I don't talk like that rarely because I saved that from the bedroom. But man, do I feel You right now. "Stop it, please. I'll be no good for nobody." "Oh, no. Don't say that. It's not good." I went down the back door. You know how you recollect something? Oh, my keys. It wasn't that. It was the Lord. He said, "Hey, did you know how you got the church in the lock? When you close it, you can't get back in. You have the door locked behind you." He said, "Hey, you're about to lock yourself out of the church. You ain't got your keys. Your keys are up in the steps." And I went, "Oh, thank You." It was totally the Lord. It wasn't, "Oh, my keys." It wasn't like, "I think I left my teeth." No, I was clueless. I'm just floating, and I'm heading out. And I get to the door. The Holy Spirit says, "Hey, your keys are up here. You're gonna lock yourself out of church." Gonna be funny. No keys to the kingdom. Guess He wasn't talking about the building. So I run up. I'm the A. I get to our doorstep sanctuary. They're they're wooden panel, wooden frame, double doors with glass in the middle. I opened it up. Just needed a little WD-40. I opened it up. It's dark. Everything's dark. Little exit lights. As soon as it went [Music] it instantly connected me with a familiar memory of when I was 12 years old. And I got sent up to the attic to sleep because my sister was born. And we were mad at her. That little baby. She kicked us out of our room. She took priority in our house. We were, we were a little upset at her. We were, we weren't that happy. Poor little girl. She knows we love her now. But I was 12. And I used to stay up late and watch Alfred Hitchcock. I watched Tales of the. They had that camera going through the house and down the steps into the coffin. You knew it was coming. You know it was coming. You watch it all the time. And then the thing opens, and you're like, you're waiting. You know it's coming. It still freaks you out. And I'd watch that stuff. And then I'd have to go open the door to go up to the attic. And this wooden steps and the door would go [Music]. It would just freak me out, man. This feeling.
We'll see if you don't have the right understanding, you, you just buy into that. You go, "Oh, see, you just need ministry, brother. There's that place in your life when you were 12. You need. You still have fear in your life." Wait a minute. You're going to tell me the two people blind got their sight today? A door creaks, and I remember being afraid at age 12. And you're going to tell me I need deliverance because a door creaked and I felt a feeling of remembrance? I know it's going to sound arrogant to some, but you're wrong. Way wrong. Way wrong. I didn't realize it was God answering my five-year study. It's five years I was studying because I was perplexed by all this and I didn't want to speak out of turn. So when that door hit, I instantly felt like when I was 12, 10, 12, somewhere around there. And my normal instinct when I was a kid, I would have to go past an open door, a closed closet, all wood floors to get to my bedroom. By the time I get there, I'm already thinking I'm jumped on, attacked, fang marks in my neck. I'm already scared silly. And I bust through the door, and I would run and dive in my bed. But on the way through, I would hit the light and make sure I could see. And then I'd get out and knew I was safe. I'd turn it off and crawl in bed. I always hit that light. So guess what I did? Just a familiar spirit. It's just a blast from the past. It's just taking me back to a place of remembrance. You're telling me fear's been living inside me all this time just because I felt the remembrance of what I used to? You're telling me I got some unresolved thing harbored down on the inside of my spirit, of my body, my life? Ah.
I started walking up, and I left the light off on purpose. Turned to no light on. The light's in me now. And I'm just walking to the steps and singing the song. And I'm making it up. It's a new song. But I'm not really making it up because I found it in the Bible. So I'm singing a song about the blood of Jesus. I got to the altar, and they're sure enough. Holy Spirit always knows what He's talking about. There was my keys sitting right there, right below the little glass plexiglass pulpit. I picked him up and said, "Thank you so much. I didn't get locked out of the church." I turned, and when I turned, I saw two black objects for a millisecond hovering right at my shoulders when I turned, and they were right here. And they just disappeared as soon as I saw. And the Lord said, "See, Dan, they're outside trying to get in. Don't you ever, ever let them in." I prayed about that. "Ever let them in." Believing what they suggest. Here's what the Lord showed me. If I called Pastor Don and said, "Pastor Don, man, I know I just saw these eyes open. I was like, but man, I opened the door and it creaked. It was like I was a kid again. I felt this fear. I didn't know this fear was in me. I didn't know I still had fear. I didn't even relate to fear all these years." And all of a sudden, this fear just shows up out of nowhere. If he ain't sharp, which he is, if he ain't sharp, he says, "Well, brother, we need to need to pray to get the fear out of your life." And all of a sudden, I'm responding like I got fear in me. I'll promise you, in the next half a day, I'm gonna experience that same feeling three, four more times. I promise you, in a week, I'm sure I'm the most bound man there ever been. But if Pastor says, "Dan, listen. It was a feeling. A door creaked. It's just remembrance of familiality. It's just it's a thing taking you back to something when you were a child. Listen, you're born again. Old things are dead. That child you remember and is dead. He's buried in baptism with Jesus. Don't you let a feeling stop all the momentum and the growth and the maturity and the authority that you've been walking in, Dan." No, I'm not praying for fear to come out of your life because it ain't in your life. And I would hope that's what he'd told me. Can I be honest? There's not a whole lot of pastors that'll tell you that. They'll just pray for fear to get out of your life. And what the Lord will show me, when I believe it's mine, it becomes mine. So we might just be a flashback, a memory, an impression away from making a big mistake if we don't walk it out in truth.
How many people have flashbacks, impressions, and memories all the time? How many people wake up and have a bad dream? Well, you shouldn't wake up sweating and calling on your cell phone for prayer. You should lift your hands and thank God once you realize you're in your bed and you're fine and you ain't in hell. And you'll lift your hands right in bed, sweat still running down your face, 'cause the dream was so real. Wow. Father, I thank You. I'm sanctified, set apart, and free. I thank You that You live in me. And oh my goodness, You rule my life. God, I love You so much. That's your beach calling for prayer. Probably six months went by. Every time I heard those voices, I talked to Holy Spirit. "I love You so much. You're my best friend. I appreciate You. Thank You for the wisdom in my life. Man, You are the voice of God in my life. You showed me things to come. You showed me things about people." I had already started experiencing words of knowledge and prophetic stuff. It was just fun. I didn't have names for it. I didn't know I was reading someone's mail. I was just sharing thoughts and intentions, and people were falling apart and reckoning. And they're like, "Man, it's like you know me." And I'm like, "I don't know. I guess He knows you." And I didn't have any terms. I didn't know to call it a word of knowledge. I didn't even know what it was. But it was happening in my life. And at the same time, I'm hearing wretched phrases directed to Him. It's amazing. It's fascinating. I just kept talking to the Lord. I'm months in. You. That's where people forgot. Months. I'm not living as a man with a problem. One day I have an answer. "Yeah, but you're hearing them voices." I have an answer. See, if you're going to stumble over the fact that you're hearing them voices, you're just a little one little trial away from making a big mistake. We better have wisdom. The Holy Spirit told me to tell me how he, how I feel about Him when I hear them voices. That's all I'm doing. I don't care if it's 10 years. That's all I'm doing. So guess what happens? Somewhere around six months in, I just realized I haven't heard those voices since I can remember. It might have been a month. I don't know. I just wasn't thinking. I was in communion with God. I'm talking to God. My co-workers are freaked out. They're saying, "Why are you always talking to yourself?" And saying, "Never talk to myself." They said, "You talk to yourself every day. We see you talking to yourself walking down the house." I'm never talking to myself. Not guilty. It looks like I'm talking to myself to you, but I ain't talking to myself. I just realized the voices went. When I realized the voices went, guess what I really realized? What made me cry. I realized I had an intimate knowledge and awareness, fellowship, and union with a person of Holy Spirit that I don't believe I'd ever had close to if I wasn't hearing those voices. You see what God does? Right in the face of the enemy. So if you're the enemy, how freaked out are you now? How do you defeat that kind of wisdom? If we'll just live in faith, can you? You can't even defeat that kind of strategy. So the enemy actually provoked me to greater revelation. So the lie was actually a springboard to more communion, fellowship, and truth.
So what the Lord showed me to teach people back then is that when you hear these lies, when you hear these thoughts, and you know they're not your heart, you know they're the devil. He's a liar from the beginning, and there's no truth in him. Who knows that scripture? Who knows Jesus said that? Okay. So if he's a liar from the king and there's no truth in him, and he's saying something derogatory or wretched or nasty, then if you flip that 180 and you'll turn that, you'll probably find the side of the coin that says truth. So do you need the voice to go away, or do you need to know what truth is? Because if you continue my word, you'll know the. He didn't say if you continue my word, every voice will still in your soul. Who knows voice is never still? Did you ever get wacky stuff out of the blue like you're like, "What?" I know people joke and say it's a pizza dream. I'm telling you, it ain't pizza. Did you ever just go through your day and something you forgot about, something you repented of, something that wasn't even, and all of a sudden you were reliving it? You were just thinking it was just like it was there, like it was yesterday. Anybody ever having stuff happen? Anybody ever just think of something they wish they could forget, and it's just right there? Instead of wishing you forget it, just make sure you never, ever believe it and let it have one ounce of influence in your life. And as soon as that recollection comes back, man, you talk to Him and thank Him that you're free and vindicated. Don't even mention the recollection. Don't rebuke the devil. Don't bind the devil. Don't pace the floor and plead the blood. I'm telling you, look, I love the blood of Jesus, but He never told me to pace and plead the blood of Jesus over my thoughts. He told me to put every thought in submission and hold it captive and obedient according to Christ. Not demeaning the power of the blood. The blood is what it is. But the pleading the blood isn't your answer when you're having derogatory thoughts. Truth is your answer. Because the thoughts are a lie.
What people do is they do Christian calisthenics and they start doing all this. "I plead the blood. I devil, I take authority over your power. Rebuke you. I find you deaf. I rebuke you. I bind you." And as soon as they stop rebuking and binding and they get calm and quiet, what happens? [Music] And then they start believing, "I must be cut off. I must have gone too far. I wonder why God don't love me. When my prayers ain't working." Now you're calling a minister in despair because everything you're trying ain't working. Did anybody ever see anybody walk out this scenario in their life, or am I just coming up with this? It's all the time. It's all the time. The pastors, ministers are saying it's all the time. They're the ones you probably should ask because they're the people we run to. Not putting anybody down today. I'm saying, guys, we don't have the problem we think we have. We have an amazing answer. We really do. Because here's the deal. Having bad memories, having bad thoughts, thinking nasty stuff is never the problem. It's believing it's you and it's in your heart and in your life is the problem. When you're violated about what you're thinking, it's a sure sign it's not coming from the inside of you. Come on. You know if you're just dredging stuff up. You know if you're musing and meditating. You know if you're entertaining your own thoughts. Or you know if you're bothered by them. If you're bothered by them, they can't be coming from you. So you probably ought to rejoice in God that there's a higher truth and thank God that you're free.
I think it's fascinating that's at least five months of those thoughts came to my mind. And after those five months, I had a more intimate relationship with Holy Spirit than I believe I would have ever had if it wasn't for the faults. Why? Because Holy Spirit told me to come to Him all the more, and it springboarded me to relationship. I tell the story. You've probably heard me tell it. I'll close with this. I know I'm late. Baptism is late. Day. Are we okay? Are we way too late? You guys are rowdy. That's why you come to the late service because it's always late because he's your pastor. He's your pastor. So let me tell you this quick story. I'm in the school of ministry. I'm the preacher. I'm supposed to be anointed. I'm supposed to impart and teach students. Supposed to be. I'm standing there with a microphone. The worship was amazing. The team was there. It was a holy moment. It was one of those special moments. The real moments. They're sometimes rare, unfortunately. But it was a real moment where you get guitar players are laying down their guitars like Jesus is in the room. I'm not against car. I think it's awesome. They love to play garage. When a guitar player lays down his guitar and he's on his knees and he's weeping, something's happening. I want nobody drumming. There wasn't nobody making no music. There was this tinkering of high keys. Sounded like rain. And when you look back, you got one little girl down like this. That's all you got. And everybody else is prostrating, wiped out. And when she touched that one little key, it was like this is crazy amazing. And it was a holy moment. When you're in the position of having a microphone, you want to be very sensitive. And you don't even know when to talk. And you don't even want to talk. You know what I'm talking about? It's a holy atmosphere. And you're like, you don't even want to step into this thing. So that's what it was. Holy husting, people weeping, prostrate. Everybody's just like this. I'm supposed to be the teacher. I'm supposed to be the one anointed and impart some to students. That's why I'm there. And in the middle, this is why it happens. Then because our spiritual mind say, "Now, how can that happen in that level of the presence of God?" And how can? Well, if you read your Bible, it's, it's, it's amazing. I don't understand the story. But there was a gathering of the sons of God, and somehow the devil was in the lineup. Look at Job. Somehow he was there. Now, I ain't saying he has the right to this and that. And I understand some of the stuff that that we preach and go after. But listen, this is why it happened when it happened. Because my temptation to say, "Now, how can this? This must still be." What happened was, I probably, I'll just be humble and honest. I was never bound to porn. Pornography was at our workplace. Magazines laying everywhere. They were in, they were everywhere. But I never was given to porn. I never was hooked to porn. I never even viewed a lot of pornography. But there was like this one video. I was in this position where it was playing. And I was in a position where I ended up watching this one video. It's the only video pornography video I've ever watched in my life. In that holy atmosphere, with that little girl taking them keys. Once you know that video started playing in my head. I hadn't even remembered ever watching this. Last thing on my mind is that stinking video. It's on purpose. It's to catch me off guard. It's to get me to repent for something that ain't in my heart. It's getting me to lose confidence and a shorty and certainty and step out of my anointing. It's to get me to take something personal and start confessing and call the brothers. "Listen, I got some stuff going on in me right now, man. I need you to pray for me. I need clean. This video is going through my head like I'm watching it fresh." It's a holy moment. You don't speak. Everybody's laying out. Matt. I'm standing there. I got a video playing in my head that ain't gone. So guess what I did? Forgot about the atmosphere. Because you just poked me now, and I'm a soldier. Guess what I did? I scared everybody in the room. No, I'm not joking. This is intense warfare. You're going to suggest that that stuff's in my heart in the presence of God? Oh, see, you know what I did? I'm standing there, and I see this video, and I go, "Huh." It didn't take long. I'm like, "Huh. Father, I thank You that You love me, that You've watched me, that You." This is when nobody's talking. Nobody's playing. Everybody's wife down. There's high keys from a girl. Madman stuff. Father, I thank You that I'm pure, that You've washed me and cleansed me. You have put Your life inside of me. God, You have forgiven me of everything I've ever. And I started to preach and declare Romans 6 and righteousness and freedom. And ah, and people were like, "Whoa, what's going on with Dan?" That ain't where the room was. They went, "Wow, God must be so." People started standing up. And Father, I thank You. And God. And we started getting shouts and confessions and decrees. And I thought, "Oh my goodness, God turned this into something so." So I get up. I'm supposed to be teaching school ministry. So on words and knowledge and stuff like that. So I stand up and I'm like, "Father, we thank You." And and I'm like, "God." And I was going to explain to him what happened and teach. But I looked at this lady, and I said, "Ma'am." She was like, "Right where you are, second row, right on in the middle." And I said, "Ma'am, I said, you've had something growing on the inside of your right ankle. It's been pinching, bothering the nerve. You've been concerned about it. You're getting it looked at. I said, feel. You'll feel. You'll see it's not there." She goes, "Sir." "Yeah. Middle your back. Herniated disc. They don't have real good report for you. And you're in a lot of pain. The heat you're feeling is God just making it all new." He's like, and it just bang, bang. God just started moving. Watch. I don't think that would have happened if I didn't see the video. I'm not saying I hope this stuff keeps coming. What I'm saying is the response and springboard to truth. So crushed it and put me in a place where I might not have been if I wasn't provoked. Am I making sense? I'm not asking to see the video. Are you kidding? That's ridiculous. I'm saying seeing the video isn't a problem because I have an answer. Because the video is not in my heart. It's in my memory. Jesus is in my heart. So you're not going to condemn me with the video. You're just going to make me closer to Him. And then all of a sudden, I'm closer to Him. And all of a sudden, I see His concern for her. And I see His heart for him. And there was something over here that took place. And I thought, "Ain't you something, Lord?" All because I saw that video. Boom. And You taught me what You taught me when I first got saved and heard them voices. And You just ramped everything up. Probably beyond where it would have been. Now, I'm not saying God wouldn't move with word of knowledge because that's what we're teaching on. I was going to teach, but it wouldn't went down like it went down and had people up confessing and shouting and decreeing to God. It was fun. I hope I made sense to y'all today.
Don't live thoughts. Don't let feelings ever, ever, ever identify your life. "Well, I don't feel like He loves me." Stop it. He does. He sent His Son. You're asking for a feeling. And you're in dangerous ground. And you're asking people to pray for you till you feel the love of God. I have a better option for you. Believe the love of God. And let everything you feel come through the belief of God's love. So if you ever have a season where He doesn't seem close, you already know He is. Are you hearing me? The stronghold of God is your faith in Him, not your feelings in Him. Feelings are fun when they're in God, but you don't live by them. Are you with me?
I was in Oklahoma. A lady came up to me. Then she said, "I minister on something. Righteousness. God. The love was used on me because it was just, it was a bedroom almost kind of message for me." And that lady came up crying. She said, "You need to lay hands on me so that I feel the love of God. I see His love in you. And I have never experienced His love." And I know that sounds so Christian to us in ministry, like, "Yes, she needs that experience." And she said, "I've been prayed for by." These were all people. Everybody knows. "I've been prayed for by." I mean, she was starting to run out of fingers. And I looked at her and smiled gently. And I said, "Honey, I'm not praying for you for that. I said, first of all, you're not going to put me on your list. I said, it's time for you to believe Him. And just believe He loves you." She got so mad at me because I'm a preacher and won't pray for her. I said, "Please, don't get mad at me." And she just stormed off. She's not going to put me on her list. I wasn't, I wasn't happy she stormed off. I pleaded with her. She just chose to be mad. Dangerous ground. Living for an experience when truth's right in front of her through the cross. I never have to feel the love of God to know He loves me. My heart knows. Never ever have to feel the love of God. My heart knows it. And there's times I really feel it, but it's safe because my heart knows already. Are you with me?
Father, help us to just walk in You. Just lead us by Your Spirit. And let us walk through every trial, trap, scheme, and while the enemy. We're not giving him glory. We're giving You glory. But we are not unaware of his devices. And we are not going to give him place. So Father, even if He's looking for opportune time and trying to do something right in the midst of the outpouring of Your presence, we're not going to reason it. We're not going to rationally. We're going to look to You and find truth in the midst of it. I said, every person would find that confident place in their own heart where they know their own heart. My biggest prayer this morning is that this afternoon now is that we would just live unveiled before You and really know what it means to just be unveiled before You and be Your unveiled children, unashamed, accepted, and loved by God. Father, I ask for that to be in every life here. And I pray what was shared this morning would guard, protect, and keep every person. And I ask it all in Jesus' name. Pastor, however you want to close, I just feel like I said what I should say. Thank you.