Transcription
I want you to get your Bibles. I'm going to share this word with you tonight, and uh, I want you to get your Bibles and go to the book of Psalms. Psalms, the 23rd Psalms. I want to appreciate, I've got some family members in the audience. All my family members, wave at me. Thank God for you tonight. All of you elders and pastors and and leaders and singers and this choir. Saying, "Until I, I was trying to find my part." I put my friend in the ear so I could join in with your famous, world-renowned West Angeles Choir. We thank God for them. Can you say amen?
Stand to your feet, and I just want to uh, share with you just, just a little out of Psalms 23. Uh, I hope to stop by the table afterwards, the "Let It Go" table with you for a little bit. I'm going to be in Psalms 23. When you have it, say amen. If you can't find it, say, "Wait a minute." There's so much pressure on you to find the books of the Bible. You're getting that real spiritual environment, and everybody else finds it real quick. You don't look like no sinner or nothing. And sometimes you get real desperate, you know. And they preach a preaching in Malachi, you can't find it. You have to settle for Micah. Say, "That's close enough, Lord." It starts with "For them."
This scripture is so familiar, I don't even really need to have you read it. Most of you could probably quote it. But Psalms 23 is something you learned in Sunday school and Vacation Bible School, if you come from that background and that tradition. But I don't want to be presumptuous enough to think that everybody knows it. And so, for the benefit of somebody who may not have experienced it, the psalmist, David, now records his revelation of his relationship with God, predicated on his own experience. The thing that makes God amazing, one of the things that makes God so amazing, is that He can come to you on your level. You don't have to come from a religious tradition or faith background for God to reveal Himself to you. He can reveal Himself to you through a rock. He can reveal Himself to you through a piece of bread, because He is the Rock of Ages and He is the Bread of Heaven. He can take something that you do understand and use it to reveal something that you don't understand, so that nobody is left out.
If God were to make Himself available on the basis of intellect, it would not be just, because we don't all have the same intellect. God is not explained, He is revealed. He will reveal Himself to a two-year-old as well as He will a PhD, because He speaks in all languages, reaches all people, touches all people. What God wants to do in your life tonight is reveal Himself to you more clearly at this stage in your life than any other stage in your life, because many of you understand, you need Him more now than you have ever needed Him. Can I get a witness tonight? You need Him in your life, not just warn Him, you need Him in your life. Somebody shout amen.
All right, let's, let's read this together. I may drop out, but you continue. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want." [Applause] Ah. [Applause] [Applause] Ah. [Applause] Can you say amen? I like the way you said this. Surely, you got a little extra when you got to that "surely." Almost like you thought the devil might be listening at you, and let him know you don't have no doubt how your story is going to end. So when you got to that "surely," you piped it up a little bit and said, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever." Somebody shout amen.
I want to, there's so much here, there's so many wonderful things here. But, but I want to go back to the second verse for a moment. "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he maketh me to lie down a green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters." Somebody shout "still waters." I'm gonna talk about still waters tonight. I want you to remain standing, because God wants to put you in a place of still waters. He wants to put you in a place of still waters, not hurricanes, not tornadoes, not turbulence of any kind. He wants to put you in a place of still waters. There may be turbulence all around you, but He wants your center to be still, to be calm. You must have a calm place in order to deal with all the chaos in your periphery. You can deal with chaos around you until it gets in you. You can deal with chaos at work, but when the chaos at work gets in you, it becomes detrimental, because it begins to deteriorate what God wants to do through you. Ships don't sink because they pass through the water; they only go down when the water passes through them. It is not what is going on around you that's giving you the trouble; it's what's going on inside of you that's giving you the trouble. You have the power to deal with the conditions and the circumstances around you, if you could get what is around you from affecting what is inside of you, you could operate from a still place.
And the Lord sent me all the way from Dallas, Texas tonight, because together, you and I are going to go into that place of stillness and solidarity, so that you can take back everything that the enemy stole from you. So you don't hear what I'm saying to you. And, and I'm excited about it tonight. Shout amen.
Father, we stand in this sacred place and we honor You tonight, because You are God, and besides You, there is no other. And we pray, "Homies" today, because whatever we have done and whatever we have accomplished has not been through our own auspices or might, but by Your own divine power. You have enabled us to do what we do. Many have come tonight because they want to hear from You. They don't want to hear me; they want to hear from You. In fact, I want to hear from You. We are hungry tonight. Bread of Heaven, feed us until we want no more. And I thank You in advance for what You're about to do. Have Your way in this place, in the name of Jesus, we pray. Somebody shout amen. You may be seated in the presence of God.
I love to talk about David. I'm going to try not to get lost in talking about David, because I could spend all night talking about David. He's probably one of my favorite characters in the Bible. But I'm just using David's life as a metaphor to really talk to you, because my assignment tonight is to bring you into a place where you can have still waters. And you cannot have still waters until you release or let go of many of the things that are distracting you and invading your space.
But let me preface my remarks by saying that David is not the preferred son of Jesse. In fact, he is an ignored son of Jesse. He is the eighth child of Jesse, his father. He does not look like his life is going anywhere. He is a shepherd boy with a destiny locked inside of him. But at this moment in his life, at the early stages in his life, he is surrounded by mediocrity. Now, mediocrity is not a bad thing. Ordinariness is not a bad thing, until you have greatness inside of you. When you have greatness inside of you and you're surrounded by mediocrity, you can be tormented by what other people are satisfied with, tormented and taunted by the fact that there is a sense, there is an inner knowing within all of us, that we are people of purpose and that something is supposed to happen in our lives. The challenge is, how do we get that thing that we sense in our spirit to manifest in our life when we are constantly bombarded with adversity?
David is not the preferred son of Jesse. Seemingly, when the enemy knows that God is going to use you in a mighty way, he does everything he can to upset the very genesis of your life, to kind of set you on a path of destructive behavior, to limit any self-esteem that you might have. He doesn't do that. He doesn't fight anybody that's not destined to go anywhere. But when he senses that there's greatness inside of you, the attack comes early. It comes early. Somebody knows what I'm talking about. Somebody who's had to fight all of your life, had to struggle all of your life. You feel like Oprah in "The Color Purple." "I had to fight all of my life." [Applause] You've been through all kinds of stuff, and that is not a sign of weakness; it is a sign of greatness. And David has greatness down inside of himself, but he has to go through a process for that greatness to be revealed. And over a period of time, God begins to bring forth His purpose.
I've been on a tangent in my church about living on purpose. I've been teaching for weeks and weeks and weeks about living on purpose, because most people get up out of the bed in the morning to see what's going to happen. And then there are an elect group of people who get up out of the bed to make something happen. You have to decide which category you're going to be in. Either you're going to get up out of the bed and sit on the side of the bed and say, "Lord, what am I going to do today?" Or you're going to wake up with an agenda and an urgency and a direction and a focus. See, when you've got direction, you resist distraction. I said, when you've got direction, you resist distraction. You know what is and is not on your agenda. David had to find that place where he began to understand that God was going to do something in his life for which his background did not predict. You would not think that God would make a king out of a shepherd boy.
I want to take a moment and say, do not limit your vision to your situation. Your situation may not be an indicator of what God is going to do in your life. In fact, your situation and circumstance can be a direct contradiction to what God is going to do in your life. I have learned that God has a tendency to use the least likely people to do the most amazing things, so that when they do them, there is no question as to how they got to do what they did. It is absolutely a fact that if the Lord had not been on your side, you wouldn't be able to do what you do. Anybody who'd been through what you've been through should have had a nervous breakdown, should have thrown in the towel, should have blown their brains out. Anybody who had to fight the way you had to fight all of your life. I'd not even be here tonight. But when God is for you, I said, when God is for you, who can be against you? It doesn't matter whether you're the preferred son or you were the preferred daughter, or whether you came from the Ivy League school or not. When God is for you, He will push you ahead. He will set you in a position. He will raise you up, and He will do it in such a way that when it happens, this is why you have haters. Because when it happens, they can't understand how somebody like you could end up in a place like this. The problem with your haters is that they think that they're more qualified, and they may be. They think they've been groomed for it, and they may have. But when you walk in divine favor, God can execute a plan in your life that supernaturally imposes you into a position for which you've never been there before. And you're walking around like Gomer Pyle, talking about, "Go, holy!" You don't even know how you got there. But God can beam you up. And I don't know who I'm preaching to, but somebody, you're getting ready to be beamed into a position and a situation that is beyond human comprehension.
This is why you cannot afford to allow the turbulence of the times, the wickedness of your surroundings, the narrowness of your friends to deter you from your destiny. You have to have a sense in your spirit and in your heart that you have a direction and a purpose, and you're going to live on that purpose in spite of your predicament. Now, God reveals Himself. And God, God is something to reveal Himself. He is beyond human comprehension. If you can explain it, it is not God. God is a mystery. He is a mystery that whenever He gets ready to communicate with you, He has to reduce Himself down into a form that you can understand. Because if He were to come to you in the fullness of who He is, it would cause your brain to pop. Your mind couldn't comprehend what Paul calls the manifold wisdom of God. He has, there's so much to Him. And so He has to break it down to you real slow. So when you're hungry, He has to say, "I'm Bread." And when you're thirsty, He has to say, "I'm Water." And when you're sick, He has to say, "I'm a Physician." And when you're lonely, He has to say, "I'm a Friend." Y'all don't hear what I'm saying. And, but see, He's really all of that at the same time, but He has to bring it on you real slow.
David has no background to be king. There's no background to be king. He's not come from the upper echelon of Israel. He come from common people. His father was a common man. He was a shepherd boy, smelled of sheep dung, nuts and flies around him. He stanked. He was a little bit weird. When God found him, he was dancing on the mountainside, writing poems to God, just, just a little off-center. Yeah, peculiar, strange. One of our great problems today is that we resist being peculiar. We seek to fit in rather than to stand out. [Music] Not realizing that nobody ever follows ordinary, only extraordinary. And the more you try to fit in, the less eligible you are to be extraordinary. It takes courage to be extraordinary. You, you, you have to have the courage to be controversial, to stand out, to be different. David was different. He is sensitive enough that you might think he was soft, writing poetry and stuff, singing songs, all creative out there in the woods by himself, dancing, kind of strange. But he has the duality of personalities to be lamb-like in his creativity, but to be a lion in his passion. Because before you regulate him off to being soft and, and passive and genteel, understand that he is also the same guy that killed a hundred Philistines, cut their foreskins off, and threw them down in front of the king and said, "What else do you want?" David would go off on you. He would flip out. He would go mad. He would come right there up on you. [Applause] And in spite of the fact that this brother is lamb-like in his passion and his temperament, and yet he is, is as creative and as genteel as a lamb, his, his, his unusualness, his peculiarity, is exactly what made him eligible for an unusual anointing. You can't be an ordinary person and have an extraordinary anointing. People who walk in great anointings always stand out. There's always, John the Baptist came eating wild locusts and honey. You got to be willing to be different. Jesus hung out with winebibbers and prostitutes. He said, "How you gonna be a priest running around with people like that?" If you want to fit in, God can't use you. But if you're willing to stand out and celebrate your uniqueness, God can do so. I see this is going to liberate some of you that never did fit in with anybody. You changed your hair, they didn't like you. You changed your clothes, they don't like you. You moved neighborhoods, and they don't like you. You never could figure out why they didn't like you. They're not supposed to like you. You're not called to fit here; you're called to stand out.
Now, the God of the universe, the God who transcends time, the God who existed before there was the where or when or this or that, the God who existed before there was anybody there to tell Him He was God, the God who reigned before there was anybody to praise Him for reigning in the earth, the sovereign Yahweh God, the God who sits on the circle of the earth and has all power in His hand, the God who is Alpha and Omega, beginning and the end, the first and the last, He which is and was and is to come, all at the same time. I'm talking about God who has all power in His hand, who shakes out His garments and the world began, who said, "Let there be," and things started popping. Atoms and molecules start hooking up and obeying the voice of Him that spoke. The God who stepped out into blackness and said, "Let there be light," and there was light on the first day, and didn't make the sun till the fourth day. Sometimes God would do something and explain it later. Y'all don't hear what I'm saying to you. Slap your neighbor, say, "He talking about my God." I don't know who you worship, I don't know who you praise, but He's talking about my God. He's talking about my God. Heaven is His throne, and earth is His footstool. He's talking about my God, who didn't have a committee, didn't have a board, didn't meet with the Presbyterians, nobody voted, amen. Nobody can take Him out. He's gone all by Himself. He's never been counseled, He's never been advised, He never had to read a book, He never had to go to school. He's never asked a question that He couldn't answer, or made a mountain that He couldn't move, or found a problem that He couldn't fix, or seen a disease that He couldn't heal. He's gone. If there are believers in the house, shout, "He can do anything!" [Applause]
This God who runs not just the earth, not just our galaxy, but all galaxies. This God who spoke a word and said, "Let there be," and everything started spinning. This God who is a circle. Ezekiel says, "A wheel in the middle of a wheel." He's a circle because a circle has no beginning or end. A line has a starting place and an ending place, but a circle just goes on and on and on. This wheel in the middle of a wheel said, "Let there be," and wheels started coming out of His mouth, suns and earths and galaxies, and everything He spoke in a circle started spinning around and around in a circle, a circle in the cycle, and a cycle is a season. And God spoke it, and everything started spinning, and He stepped back and began to run the circles, because He's a God who sits on the circle of the earth. In other words, He's got everything up under control. Your life might look crazy, it might seem crazy, it might feel crazy. Everything might be spinning like you are a piece of clay on the potter's wheel, and you are. But what you got to understand is that when the potter spins the wheel, He controls the rhythm with His foot, and your life is in His hands, and He's got control of what's spinning.
This God reveals Himself to David through something that the little psalmist could understand. He says, "David, I am to you what you are to the sheep." And David says, "The Lord is my shepherd." He's my shepherd. Somebody else would say, "He's a nail in a sure place." Somebody else would say, "He's my kinsman-redeemer." And somebody else would say, "He's my bulwark." And somebody else would say, "He's my fortress." And somebody else would say, "He's my peace." And somebody else would say, "He's my sword." And somebody else would say, "He's my buckler." And somebody else would say, "He's my shield." Y'all don't understand what I'm saying. But God is so multifaceted that He can show so many different sides of Himself. David reached into the revelation of who God is based on his personal experience and says, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want." I shall not want. I shall not, not, I'm going to try not to want. I hope I don't want. He said, "I shall not want." I'm not worried. I'm cool. I'm good. I got this covered. That's what stops me from being desperate for your support. If you give it, it's nice, but I don't want it. If you deny it, I won't suffer from it, because I don't see you as my source. You might be a resource my source uses, but you are not my source. If the resource shuts down over here, He'll open it up over there, because it might have come through you, but it was never you in the first place. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want."
Interesting thing here. He confesses that sometimes we are self-saboteurs, not resting in green places. Sometimes, because of what we went through early, we don't rest in green places. We might experience green places, but we don't always feel comfortable in them, because when you've been spawned in turmoil, you have an aversion for peace. It's not natural to you. And when God brings good times, you have anxiety. You can't really enjoy them, because number one, you're afraid they won't last, and number two, it doesn't seem normal. When you have been spawned on the breast milk of neglect, love seems strange. You'll run away from people who love you and invest all kinds of energy in people who don't. Can I mess with you a little bit tonight? We like to shout about the good times. We like to sing about them. We like to hear people preach about them. But when we get them, we don't lay down in them. We don't own them. We don't possess them like we should, because somehow we are so full of guilt and anger and hostility that when things go green for us, we get restless, because we've been fighting so long, we don't know how to lay down in green pastures, in green opportunities, in green relationships, in green moments in our lives. We like noise and turbulence. You can't be in the house and not turn on some noise, because you're hooked on drama. And when you are hooked on drama, you like the idea of calmness, but when the reality comes, you don't even know how to lay down in it.
So David is confessing here when he says, "He maketh me." Have you ever had God make you lay down? [Applause] Almost like a parent does a restless child that doesn't want to go to bed. And after a while, you have to make Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy, I told you, lay down in this and go to bed. God said, "I'm going to force you to rest in the blessings that I have created for you. I'm going to force you to relax and lay down until you understand that this is yours. I'm going to make you lie down in green pastures. I'm going to force you to open up your heart again and love again and live again and stop faking. I'm going to force you to be present in the moment rather than pretending in the moment. I'm going to bring your full self into alignment and make you lay down in a calm place and stop acting like you're happy when you're not. I'm going to make you lie down." And I'm talking to somebody. I don't know who it is. I can feel your toe up under my foot when I step on your toe. I'm not even gonna apologize for it, because after all the hell you've been through, it's time to enter into a season where you can lie down in some green pastures and experience what God has for you. "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters."
Sheep are heavy laden with wool. If you bring them to waters that are moving rapidly, they will bend their nose to drink from the water, but the wetness of the water with the heaviness of the wool will drag them under the current. They cannot drink in turbulent places. They cannot drink in turbulent places. They do not birth their young in turbulent atmospheres. They must find a calm place to deliver what is inside of them. And they cannot drink in a storm. So He leadeth me beside the still waters. He brings you to a calm place so that you can refortify yourself, because if you are in constant turbulence, you cannot drink. That's why you're so thirsty. Desperate people do desperate things. Thirsty people do desperate things because you went too long without a drink. And God said, "I have some still waters for you now."
Because you need stillness to operate. You must realize, I didn't just mention that the sheep give birth in calm places just to be saying it. I want you to understand that you were created by a Creator in His likeness and in His image. And if you are like the Creator that created you, that is why you are creative. You cannot be created in the likeness of a Creator and not be creative. Because if you are not creative, then you are not created in the likeness of a Creator. Adam was so much in the likeness of the Creator, he needed something to be lord over, because he was so much like the Lord that made him, that God said, "Okay, Adam, be fruitful, multiply, subdue, and I'm gonna make you boss over something, because you're so much like me, you need to run something. I'm gonna give you dominion over something." And when Adam was in a calm place, he could run the whole perimeter of everything up under his auspices, because of the calmness. He ran it all. His mind operated like a computer. God brought all the animals in the world to him. He named them, categorized them, and filed them without a laptop, an iPad, without a pen, without a pencil, without a piece of paper. When your head is clear, you can think, you can remember, you can evolve. But when the waters are not still, you can't do your best.
Now, if I were the enemy, and I wanted to stop you from stepping into your creativity, I would want to stop you, because if you release the creativity that is locked inside of you up under all of that drama, you could think your way out of every circumstance that is confronting you. I would attack you with busyness, because you would become so busy that you wouldn't have a calm place to operate from. I would put your phones going off and and your buzzers buzzing and all kinds of stuff coming to you, so that you would be so busy that you would become a survivor and not a succeeder. All you're trying to do is survive the latest storm that has hit your life. And while you've been surviving, the days have turned to weeks, the weeks have turned to months, the months have turned to years. Your hair is turning white, your back is getting stiff, your knee is going out, because you have been in a defense mode, fighting so long, that you haven't had a still place to be able to think from, so that you can get out of your circumstance and your situation. "Whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things appear, if there be any virtue, think on these things." Can I go deeper with this?
Now watch this. If I were the enemy, I would let so much, so many things happen to you along the way, like it did to Adam. His marriage went crazy. She started tripping. His kids were crazy. They started tripping. One of them killed the other one. The first family experienced the first murder by people who were related to you. There is no pain like the pain you get from people you are related to. Mmm-hmm. If I were the enemy, I would keep you so full of pain and stress and bitterness and anger and unforgiveness to distract you from being creative, from birthing concepts, from releasing the prosperity that's down inside of you. Your prosperity is a reflection of your inside. He says, "Beloved, I wish above all things that you prosper and be in good health, as your soul does prosper." You cannot have a whirlwind in your soul and not have hypertension in your body. You cannot live with stress and anger and hostility and be creative when you need to be creative, because what's ever inside of you, that's what's going to come out.
So when they asked Jesus, they said, "If somebody does something to us, how many times are we supposed to forgive them?" And Jesus said, "Seventy times seven." I didn't want to do that, because I associate that kind of forgiveness with weakness. I say, "If you start forgiving people every time they do something to you, they're gonna run all over top of you." I thought my unforgiveness was a defense. Sometimes I used it as a punishment. "I ain't gonna forgive you till you do right by me." I never knew that forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. I never realized that to not forgive you doesn't hurt you; it hurts me. And for me to use unforgiveness on you, it's like me drinking poison, waiting on you to die. Now, whenever I minister about this subject, church people act like they have no unforgiveness. But let me help you locate this unforgiveness. Whoever is in your life that when they come in the room, they can change your mood, that's unforgiveness. When you see them, they can disrupt your attitude, that's unforgiveness. Whoever can come in and disrupt your peace has become your master. Uh-oh. I'm gonna mess with you a little bit tonight, because while I'm talking to you, I know them faces is coming up in front of your face right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Those faces are appearing before you right now as a sign that these are areas in your life where Christ is not Lord. Dear Lord, because when they walk in the room, they take control over your inside. I think that's too much power to give to somebody else. I think that's too much power to give to somebody else.
And with it, the anger. We're not forbidden from being angry. Anger is good. I spent a chapter in the book talking about anger. Anger is good. Say, "Anger is good." We're commanded to be angry. I'm not trying to turn everybody into these little Pollyanna's, wife. No, no, no, no, no. Anger is good. In fact, you're commanded to be angry. The Bible said, "Be ye angry, but sin not." So there's a difference between anger and sin. He said, "Be angry." God told you to be angry. Look at somebody, say, "God told me to be angry." [Applause] But then He says, "Don't let the sun go down on your wrath." He said, "I need you to be angry because anger stirs your glands, your adrenaline glands, your fight and flight mechanism. I give you the anger and the protection so that you can have the sensitivity to deal with issues. You need anger so you can define parameters and let people know you're going too far. Don't go no further." Okay, parameters. You need anger. That's what, that's what animals do to control their turf. You, you control your parameters. He says, "But when anger stays in you, it becomes destructive, because the Bible said, 'Anger resteth in the bosom of fools.'" So it's all right to have it, but when it stays, it becomes a cancer that is eating up your energy and your creativity and your vibrance and your happiness and your peace. Anger resteth in the bosom of fools. It affects your finances, because you can't be creative. Because if you're going to stay angry, you have to keep putting energy in it to maintain it. That's why you keep bringing it up, because anger has to eat, and you have to feed it with your thoughts and your mouth. What you don't understand is, all the while you're feeding it, you're not feeding your dreams, you're not feeding your destiny, you're not feeding your creativity, you're not feeding your purpose. And the enemy is distracting you with all of that drama, distorting your personality, changing who you are, locking you out of the still waters that God has for you, and stopping you from giving birth to your next creative concept that would open up the windows of heaven and pour down a blessing in your life. He's robbing you, and you think you're doing it because you're strong and you're tough and you're smart. And all the while, he's robbing you of the days you got left, of the thoughts you got left, of the energy you've got left, of the next thought that you could think. You're one thought away from millions of dollars. You are one thought away from the cure of AIDS. You are one thought away from turning your entire life around. But you don't have any energy to put into that, because you're putting your energy into unforgiveness, anger, frustration, defending yourself against somebody who doesn't even care. [Applause]
Now, I need you to help me preach a little bit to three people. Say, "Let it go." Let it go. Let it go. Let it go. Let it go. Let it go. Let it go. What you're gaining is not what you, what you're losing. Let it go. What you are getting is not worth what you are losing. Let it go. What you are doing with your energy, since you have a limited resource of power anyway, you are fueling your history at the expense of your destiny. Because whatever you're angry about is something that has already happened. And whatever God has promised you is something that is about to happen. But you don't have the energy to step into what is about to happen, because you're spending too much fuel funding what used to happen. That's why you keep going back to the same things over and over again, because you can't drive forward looking in the rearview mirror. But I hear God saying to somebody in this room tonight, "It's your night for a supernatural release." You're about to touch your neighbors. "I'm gonna break this cycle tonight. I'm gonna break this cycle. I'm gonna break it tonight. I'm gonna break it tonight. I'm gonna break it tonight. I'm too old to keep going through the same stuff. I'm tired of arguing with you about the same thing. I'm trying to let you control me. I'm gonna break that thing tonight." Take 15 seconds and give God a liberated praise. [Applause] [Music] [Applause]
Sit down. Let me, can I give you a little bit more? I'm gonna give you a little bit more. Just a little bit more. I've been working on this for a year, so I got a whole lot. I'm just gonna give you a little bit. It makes you wonder where did this come from? They didn't teach it in school. You didn't get it out of a book. How did you end up in this cycle of grief, anger, bitterness, hostility, unforgiveness, even against yourself? You don't even forgive yourself. How did you get like this? It, it, it, we don't see it in the animal kingdom. Animals do fight, but they either fight over turf or food. They don't fight because, "She thinks she's cute. You took my boyfriend 25 years ago, and I'm still mad at you 25 years later, and I'm gonna hop across this fence and bite your neck." You don't see animals having feuds. You don't see that in the animal kingdom. As long as you don't mess with what I'm eating, we could, we don't see it in children. You can punish a child, and 30 minutes later, they're hugging your leg, down by Mommy, "I love you, Mommy." They can get in a fight with the kid across the street, and the grown folks are mad for six weeks, and the kid just wants to go outside and play. You didn't come here being unforgiving. It is a learned behavior. [Applause] Where did I learn it? I didn't go to school for it. I didn't take a class on it. I didn't get a tape series on it. You learned it in your house from your parents or family or people who nurtured you. You learn conflict resolution by the people around you. If your mama got mad and broke stuff, now you get mad and break stuff. If your daddy would get mad and walk out and stay gone for two days, now you have avoidance issues, and rather than confront an issue, whenever you get mad, you leave or sulk or bring up things over and over and over again. This is a vicious cycle that passes from generation to generation to generation, because we learn our coping mechanisms from our early childhood development. We all have the same feelings and experiences, but how we express them is taught to us. If you are an unforgiving person, you have come from an unforgiving atmosphere, where they define unforgiveness as strength. So you said, "I'm a strong black woman." What does that mean? [Applause] Or a strong white woman. I mean, you know, pain is not prejudice; it is an equal opportunity experience. [Applause] Where did you learn how to sulk and shut down as a man and not communicate for months or years, avoiding confrontation, but holding on to unforgiveness? Oh, I lost them. Jesus, they were shouting so good. Lord. [Applause]
So now God says, "I want to bring you to still waters, but in order to give you what I have for you, you've got to release what you are holding on to, because you cannot hold on to who you were and snatch who I want you to be. You can't beat those people at the same time. You have to decide. This is personal. This is private. It has nothing to do with your church, your pastor, your denomination. You can go to a great church, be in a great denomination, experience great work. This is a personal decision where you say, 'Wait a minute. I'm too old to go through this again and again and again. I must have peace. I don't care who's crazy around me. I don't care who's unforgiving around me. I gotta have some peace. I gotta have some still waters. I gotta have some tranquility and quietness, and confidence shall be your strength.'" Somebody shout yes.
Jesus said, "Forgive them seventy times seven." That's a lot. In other words, whatever life throws on you, throw it off as quick as you can. Whatever comes up in your spirit, as soon as you can release it, because when you release it, you say, "That's not mine. I'm not gonna hold on to it. I'm called to something better. I'm called to something higher." Only chickens eat off the ground. Eagles fly through the air. I'm too high to eat that. Look. Are there any eagles in here tonight? I said, "Are there any eagles in here tonight?" Oh yeah. This is your year to go to higher ground. This is your year to go to another dimension. This is your year to step over petty stuff and simply let it go. God says, He says, "You have been through so much that in order to put you back on track, I need to restore your soul. I'm going to restore you. I'm gonna bring you back to who you were meant to be before you went through everything you went through. I'm gonna restore you. I'm gonna fix you so you don't look like you've been through what you've been through. I'm gonna restore you. I'm gonna restore you until you pass through the fire, but you don't smell like smoke. I'm gonna restore you till nobody will believe that you've been through what you've been through." I declare restoration in this house. God said, "I will restore to you even the years that the cankerworm, and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, and the locusts have eaten." I'm going to restore all the years you lost being frustrated and upset and angry. God said, "Your latter days shall be greater than your former days." Who am I preaching to tonight? Touch three people, say, "I gotta get it back." "I gotta get it back." Find somebody else, say, "I gotta get it back. I gotta get me back. I gotta get my life back. I gotta get my peace back. I gotta get my joy back. I gotta get my deliverance back. I gotta get my creativity back. I gotta get my happiness back." Somebody give me 30 seconds of Holy Ghost cry. [Music] [Applause]
"He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness." Test three people, say, "I gotta get right." "I gotta get right." "I gotta get right." "I gotta get right." "I haven't been right for a long time. I haven't been myself for a long time. I've been in survival mode for a long time. I've been angry for a long time. I've been upset for a long time. But I got to get it right. I'm somebody. I got to get right." It sounds like he's an idealist and not a realist. So he says, "Yea, though I walk." He said, "I know the real deal. I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. I may walk through it, but I'm not going to let it walk through me. I shall fear no evil." I'm about to feel like preaching now. "For thou art with me." Slap somebody and say, "God's got your back." [Music] "Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me." The rod is the stick that the shepherd uses to beat back the wolf. I don't have to fight you; God will fight you. The battle is not mine; it belongs to the Lord. Thy rod and thy staff. When I get too far out, thank you, Lord, for that staff with the hook in it that pulls me back in line. Look at your neighbor, say, "I gotta go. God is pulling me back in line. Bringing me back to myself. Bringing me back to still waters. Bringing me back to my peace." [Applause]
He said, "Anytime you've got an enemy, I will send you a table to distract you from your enemy." You have to decide, are you going to eat at the table or fight with the enemy? The fact that you've got an enemy is a sign you've got a blessing. For God said, "I prepare a table before you in the presence of your enemies." Somebody say, "Feed me." Love you. [Applause] [Music] Look at somebody, testify. Tell them, "I'm getting ready to eat this here, press down, shaking together, and running over. I'm getting ready to release my gifts this year. I'm getting ready to release my creativity this year. I'm getting ready to take it to the next level this year." If I'm talking about you, give God [Applause] [Music]
I didn't understand this next one. He said, "Thou anointest my head with oil." And I thought that meant that the sheep was shouting. I didn't understand until I talked to a shepherd, and he said that sheep are so dumb that they have a tendency to stick their nose down in the holes in the earth where the snakes hide, so the shepherd can't watch everything. So what he does is anoint their head with oil, so that if they do stick their nose into something where the snake would bite them, that the oil is a snake repellent. [Music] [Applause] [Music] I wish I had somebody in here that had stuck your nose into something you didn't have no business in, but God anointed you, so that when the devil tried to bite you, he had to draw back, and it's by God's mercy that you're here tonight. Identify yourself, give God some kind of praise. Touch seven people and tell them, "I got all of me." [Music] "I got all of me." Every time the devil thought he had me, I slipped out of it. Every time they tried to crush me, I slipped out. [Music] [Applause] "Thou anointest my head with oil." Slap everybody you can reach and say, "My cup runneth over." Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. [Music] The cup running over says, "God says, 'I'm not just gonna bless you; I'm gonna bless everything connected to you. Everything you touch, I'm gonna let your cup run over. I'm gonna make your kids the salsa. I'ma bless all your friends. Everywhere your feet tread, God said, 'I'm gonna give it to you. I'm gonna set an open door in front of you.'" [Applause] [Music]
And, and I hear you saying, I hear you saying this. Stand on your feet. I hear you saying something. "What if He's gonna do all of that, why hasn't He done it?" And God is saying, "I can't do it because you won't let it go." But as soon as you let it go, I'm gonna give you your rest back. I'm gonna give you your creativity back. I'm gonna give you your life back. I'm gonna release favor in your life. I'm gonna feed you right in the face of your enemies to let you know that My power is greater than their power. You don't have to defend yourself. You don't have to fight. [Applause] And I hear somebody saying, "Well, I'm willing to forgive them as soon as they ask for forgiveness, as soon as they pay me my money back." If that is the criteria, doesn't that mean that they still have control? Suppose they die. Some people are angry at dead people. "You didn't love me. You didn't raise me. You weren't there for me. You didn't believe me. I told you my secret, you didn't believe me." And they're never going to get to apologize because they're dead. Jesus, when He was on the cross, He only had seven things to say before death took Him out. He'd been hanging on the cross, bleeding. He'd been beaten at the whipping post until most
Historians conclude that his entrails, his guts, his intestines were hanging out. They had plucked the beard from his face. They hadn't just hurt his body; they hurt his feelings. They put a crown of thorns on his head and mocked everything he stood for. In your pictures, he has on a loincloth, but in reality, he was naked. They embarrassed him. They nailed him to a tree and stuck around to watch him die. He only had enough strength to say seven important things, and one of them was, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
[Applause]
Now, the thing that gets me about that is, number one, he says, "Forgive them," and they had never asked for forgiveness. Why would you release somebody who never asked to be released? Maybe it wasn't about them. Maybe he knew that three days later, he had a big job to do.
[Applause]
And he couldn't afford to have to face the resurrection if there was an issue still pending from the crucifixion. When you know what is in front of you is more important than what is behind you, you let it go. Not just for them, but for you, so that you can operate at full power when you need to operate. I feel like, I don't know, I feel like I'm talking to somebody tonight.
Now that you're standing on your feet, I want you to join hands with somebody. Do you have any idea who you were created to be?
[Music]
Do you have any idea what you could do if you were clear all of that stuff out of your heart, your mind, your spirit? Anger with God, anger with yourself, anger with people, angry about opportunities you didn't get, angry with deals that went bad, and you can't get the deal in front of you because you're still bitter about the deal behind you. When Jesus told them to forgive, they said the weirdest thing. They said, "Increase our faith." And I thought, what does faith have to do with forgiveness? You have to believe that what's in front of you is bigger than what's behind you, or you'll never let it go.
Squeeze that hand. The person you're touching has a destiny. I don't care whether they're 17 or 75. If you woke up this morning and you wasn't dead, God didn't finish with you.
[Applause]
Yet. He's got something for you to do, to say, to build, to be. He's got a purpose for your life. Your challenge tonight is to let go of everything that's standing in between you and your destiny and get yourself back, and your guard back, and your creativity back, and your purpose and your power back.
Squeeze that hand. The person you're touching has a surely hanging over top of their head.
[Music]
Surely, after all the hell you've been through.
[Applause]
After all the times you could have been destroyed, God is still saying, "Surely."
[Music]
Goodness and my sister, shut down my quote, shall follow you.
[Applause]
[Music]
God said, "I've been chasing you around with the blessing, trying to get your attention." Slowly, I feel the anointing walking up and down this church. Somebody's getting a breakthrough. Squeeze that hand and shout, "Surely!" I don't care what you've been through. I don't care what they did to you. I don't care how tough it's been. I don't care what the enemy said. I don't care what the finances look like. Somebody's outside.
[Applause]
Goodness and mercy.
[Music]
Yes. Yeah, that's devil chasing stuff right there. That's fear chasing stuff right there. That's anger chasing stuff right there. Squeeze your hand and shout, "Slowly!" I feel somebody's faith getting stirred up right now. Goodness and my son shall follow you all the days of your life. He said, "I just want you to dwell in my presence." Not dwell in fear, not dwell in frustration, not dwell in unforgiveness. He said, "I want you to dwell in my presence all the days of your life."
Father, tonight, I gave him just a snippet, just a little taste.
[Applause]
[Music]
I need you, Lord.
[Applause]
To give them the courage of the faith to let it go. To put them back in the still waters where they can drink again, and live again, and move again, and flow again, and speak again, and draw again, and write again, and act again, and build again, and lead again. Put them in still water. Yes. I believe you for it tonight. Let miracles, let miracles happen right out of Psalms 23. Take your stick and drive back the enemies. Take your hook and bring your people back into who they were created to be. Give us the courage and the faith to let it go. There's some marriages you want to heal in here. There's some relationships between mothers and daughters, and sisters and brothers, and fathers and sons that you want to heal tonight. There's some church drama you want to heal tonight. There's some office politics you want to heal tonight. Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. Tonight is the night the devil that you've been afraid of for years. Tonight is the night we simply let it go. We don't have to get even. We don't have to get revenge. We don't have to talk back. If they never get right, if they continue to act however they want to act, we're going to let it go. It's not about them. It's about us. Father, I believe you tonight that we're going to walk in Psalms 23. I believe you that you're going to anoint somebody's head with oil. We stuck our heads into some stuff we should have never got into in the first place, but thank you for the anointing, the snake repellent that stops the snake from being able to do what he wants to do in our lives. Squeeze that hand. Let our cups run over tonight. Let it run over to the person I'm touching gets blessed. Let it run over to the person I'm touching comes into a fresh anointing. Let them be delivered and set free tonight. If you know how to praise God, if you know how to worship God, if you know how to pray in your prayer language, I want you to give God some kind of praise right now.
[Applause]
Come on. Come on.