Living In The Gap

We talk about the gap between what we know is true and what we actually feel and experience, and why that space is not proof of failure. We explore how awareness grows over time through the Holy Spirit, changing how we see ourselves and how we treat other people who are still mid-process.

• Awake versus aware and why the difference matters 
• 1 Corinthians 2 and the truth that we have already received 
• Living in the gap as the space between belief and experience 
• Why the gap gets mislabeled as rebellion or unbelief 
• Revelation versus transformation and why they move differently 
• Romans 7 and the inner war that produces shame or patience 
• Truth versus feelings and the friction between old patterns and identity in Christ 
• Jesus as the model for slow growth without rejection 
• Spiritual maturity as a smaller gap in reactions over time 
• A healthier approach to evangelism, addiction, depression, PTSD, and mental health through connection and support 

Transcript

Episode Setup And Awareness

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I love to see God align things where we've been at, where we're going to, kind of what we're saying to, you know, when I'm preaching. Like I said last week, this was not something sometimes we preach a message and it's it's it's to us, but it's for us to take out. Last week I said it was for you. It was for each one of us individually to kind of start looking at and evaluating ourselves. Um so anyway, I want to start this more. Well, let me just real briefly uh talk, just bring up last week just a minute so you know where we're starting from and where where we're going this morning. Um last week we talked about not just being awake, but being aware. And there's a difference in those words, and I I was honest enough to say that I interchange those words a lot. And it really hit me last week when I, you know, when this message came up, because those are two totally different words. Uh we can talk about being awake, and that's what that's what we mean when we say like a revelation, like the light comes on, the light bulb comes on, and you get a revelation of something. But being aware is when you're able to just live it out in your life. You're it just becomes a part of your everyday life, who you are, and it's manifesting in your life. So we're gonna talk about go a little bit deeper today, and the reason I say that is because there's a thought that I had last week that I wasn't really able to get out as as much as I wanted to. So I really just

What God Already Revealed

SPEAKER_00 1:35

took one thought that I had from last week and said, okay, let's let's talk about this. Let's look at a sermon about this. And you can see the title of it this morning is Living in the Gap. And that'll make more sense to you in just a few minutes. Probably with these few verses I want to read you here. I'm gonna start out reading a couple of verses in uh 1 Corinthians chapter 2. I put verse 10 through 12, but Ronnie, if you can go back to 9 through 12. These verses right here, I think, is gonna we could read them and stop, and it would pretty much highlight everything I want to talk to you about. But I want to I want you to see something that's a little bit different. Uh oftentimes, you know, people will hear what we're teaching with the finished work, and they'll say, Oh, that's a new teaching, that's a new theology. This ain't this is not new. And I'm gonna show you right here in 1 Corinthians why it's not new and what Paul was saying to the church. He said in verse 9, but it is written, I have not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love him. But God, listen to this, but God has revealed to them, revealed what? Revealed those things, those things that your eyes don't see, those things that your ears don't hear, those things that we're unaware of, but God has revealed them to us. We could stop right there. And some people may not believe that part of the verse because they're they would honestly look and say, Well, if God has revealed them to us, why don't I see them? Why don't I feel them? Why don't I experience them? And the answer is in the next sentence. Through his spirit, he's revealed all of those things through his spirit. For the spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of a man which is in him. Even so, no one knows the things of God except the spirit of God. Last verse. Now we have received. Not one day when I get to heaven I'll receive it. One day when I get my life just right and everything's perfected and everything's going good, then I'll receive it. He says, now, now he's talking to the Corinthian church back then, and he says, now we have received. Not the spirit of the world, but the spirit of spirit who is from God that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. They've been given to us already. This this scripture, I love it, it does so many things, but one of the most important things it does is it breaks down that futuristic theology because it tells us that we've already, we have now received, and again, this was not written to you in 2026. This was written to the Corinthian church. And when I started reading this, I said, well, I really want to be able to talk about the context of it. What does Paul really say? And this verse is pretty easy to understand what he's saying. But just to go a little deeper into it, Paul is writing to a church full of believers who love God. He's not talking to a bunch of heathens out there who he's trying to convert into Christians. He's talking to a church full of believers who love God. Yet they were still being influenced by the culture that was going on around them. They were still being influenced by the men outside the church who were supposed to be the church, but were teaching something different. They were still being influenced by status, by comparison, pride, division, human wisdom. They had faith. Listen to this now, they had faith, but many were still thinking and living from old patterns. Cynthia said it perfectly this morning. Which one are you gonna believe? Because sometimes we've

Defining Living In The Gap

SPEAKER_00 5:55

got two different things coming at us. In this church, you always have two different things coming at you. You have what I'm telling you, and then you had what you come up believing. So we always have to ask that question. Which one is gonna start to be a revelation to me? And there's a process that takes place. I may be over here still believing, still hanging on to everything I've always been taught, and that's okay. You may be saying, well, he's preaching something way over here. I'm believing something way over here. Guess what you got in the middle? You got a gap. What was the title of the sermon? Living in the gap. How do we live in that gap? How do we believe something here, but we're trying to get to a different place? How do we maneuver when we're inside that gap, which I honestly believe is where most people are, including myself sometimes, because I don't know it all. You don't know it all. So we're always learning, we're always getting new revelations. So I believe that we're always living in the gap and trying to get to a place of understanding what God truly has prepared for us. So Paul reminds them that the Spirit of God was given not just to save them, but to help them understand and live from what had already been freely given to them. Not what they was going to get one day if they kept living a good Christian life, but what he had already provided for them freely. In other words, he was speaking to people who already believed, but was not fully aware of what was true about them. But they were believers. See, we get people to get mad sometimes at something I may say and say, oh, you putting down this person, or you putting down, I'm not putting them down. I'm just saying, we're talking to Christian people. Paul was talking to Christian believers. So we're not, we're not questioning anybody's salvation. We're not asking whether they're born again or not. We're just saying for the people that's living in that gap. And all we're trying to do is we're trying to bring more revelation, more revelation, more revelation, so that you can get to a place of truly understanding your identity in Christ. Because when you understand yourself, when you see this for yourself, now it changes the way you approach other people. Your evangelistic tool, I like it later, your toolbox changes. What you present, how you present to other people changes. And you're gonna see what I mean in a minute by that, because some people will take living in the gap as you're not quite here yet. We can't allow you to be a part of us until you are here. And they don't realize they're not there either. They just think they are. Kind of like these people that Paul was talking about in here. That they thought they were there. They were trying to teach the people that you're not where you're supposed to be because you're not on our level yet. And Paul said, no, no, no. See, they're going by human wisdom. I'm telling you about a wisdom that only comes from the Spirit of God. Why? Because that Spirit has searched the mind of God. And now he's living on the inside of us. So the title of this, Living in the Gap. There's a gap that most people don't want to talk about. And I'm saying most people in the church, we don't want to talk about that gap. It's that space between what you believe to be true and how you actually live. Come on, let's. We don't want to talk about that place. Because what we believe to be true

Stop Calling It Failure

SPEAKER_00 10:05

and how we're living or how we're experiencing things, I don't mean how we're living as in you're just going out doing bad things. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying we can believe something, but yet our life is not experiencing that thing. So that gap between what I believe, what I know to be true, and what I'm experiencing in life is the gap. If we don't understand the gap, you'll misread your entire experience. Sometimes you'll call it failure. Sometimes you'll call it weakness. Sometimes you'll call it inconsistency. How many times have we looked at people and said, he's a born again, but man, he's just really inconsistent with his walk with God? We might look at him and say, Well, he's on the right path, but he just ain't there yet. And we start looking at other people through that lens. Why? Because we don't understand the gap. We don't understand what's really going on in here. We look at it as a negative thing. And I'm telling you, the church looks at it like that. Because we believe you ought to be a heathen one day, and then you walk in and you get on your knees and you get oil poured on your head, and you say the salvation prayer, and then all of a sudden you skip all the way over here. And that is not reality for most people. I'm not saying it's never happened for anybody, but that is not the reality for most people. So there is a gap in there. And to truly understand ourselves and to understand how to deal and how to work with other people, we need to understand the gap. We need to look at it seriously. So, what if this is not about something we have to fix? What if it's the place where the real transformation is actually happening? But we don't see that. What we're talking about here isn't just truth. It's what it takes for truth to move from something you understand into something you're actually becoming. I said it last week. It's one thing to get a revelation, it's one thing for a thought or a revelation to come. You may read a Bible verse one day and something pop out of there, and you say, Wow, I've never seen that before. That's a revelation, and that's great. But if I can't see that revelation in my life, I'm awake to it, but I'm not aware to it yet. There's not an awareness that that's who I am yet. A lot of people can read and quote the scriptures on healing, but they don't see healing active in their life. They can read scriptures, as she said a while ago, on being and on having more than enough, but they don't see a more than enough life in themselves. Maybe it's for other people, but it's not for me. It is for you. It's for every one of us. But we've got to be able to see that, and we're stuck somewhere in this gap. So there's an experience, and think about this too now. When we when we mention the word awareness, I mean awakening, awakening doesn't mean struggle disappears. We said that a couple of weeks ago. Awakening, getting that revelation on something, does not make the struggle or the situation change automatically. It means bringing what's true into every part of who I am, how you think, how you feel, how you respond to everyday situations. There's an experience many people have but rarely talk about. And that's living in this gap. Everybody's experiencing this, but nobody wants to talk about it. I want to talk about it. I want us to learn it and understand it so we can talk to other people about it. So when people's out there struggling and they don't want to come to church because they feel condemned, because something went on in their life and they slipped up, they made a mistake or whatever, and they just don't feel like the Christian they used to feel like, and now they're out of church because they just don't feel the same. We can look at them and say, come on back. You're just in a gap right now, and we're gonna help you maneuver through this. Instead of saying, Well, get yourself straight before you come back. We look at people differently, we look at ourselves differently when we understand this gap. Because I believe that you can hear the truth, you can teach the truth, you can you can believe the truth and still feel like something in you hasn't caught up yet. It's not because of rebellion or unbelief, and that's the first thing that we say. Can I tell you how many people have called me rebellious? You wouldn't believe it. People say I'm rebellious all the time because I'm preaching something that is a little bit different than what they're preaching. It's not rebellion. I'm not rebelling against the Bible. I'm trying to preach the Bible as it really is in its true context. But automatically, when you think a little bit different than what I think, you do something a little bit different than what I do, then I automatically, because I don't know what no other word to put on it, I'm looking and saying, you're being rebellious. We've heard that so much in the church. I've been called that by a former pastor. You're being rebellious, son. Why? Because I'm not thinking like you. It's okay not to think like everybody else thinks. That's exactly what Paul was just telling

Revelation Is Instant Transformation Is Not

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the people in 1 Corinthians 2. Don't think like that. Because you have a wisdom that has come from God that is in the Holy Spirit, that has not come from man. You could go over there and you can be taught by man and you can think like man, but I'm giving you something different. That's not rebellion. We call it rebellion, we call it all kind of stuff. It it bothers me. Instead of just taking the time to listen to it and understand it, we automatically want to start judging people on it and start critiquing them and looking at where they are in their life. And I don't agree with that. And and I'm okay with being with people saying I'm being rebellious. I I know I'm not, and I know you're not. So I'm I've come to a point I'm okay with that now. So not only is it not rebellion, it's also not unbelief. Because I've heard that too. Think of it as a gap, simply. That's all it is. It's not rebellion, it's not unbelief, it's simply a gap. A space between what you know is true and what you feel is real. What you know is true and what you feel and experience as real. There's a gap in there. Sometimes it can feel like failure, it can feel like immaturity. Because I've been in church for X amount of years, I ought to be in a better place by now. You ever heard somebody say that? I shouldn't keep doing that. I know better than that. Well, Paul said too. And when we look at ourselves like that, because we don't understand this gap in there, when we begin to look at ourselves in that kind of way, it will feel like sometimes that I'm a failure, or sometimes I'm I'm being immature. Some may see it as spiritual weakness. But what if what if it's not any of those things? What if we can just take all those things and throw them out the window? You're not weak, you're not rebellious, you're not immature, you're not in a place of unbelief, you're just simply in a gap. That sounds so much better than looking at somebody and calling them unbelievers or rebellious. You're just in a place. You're in between two places. Simple as that. What if it's just simply a process? And I'm not trying to water it down, I'm just being real. What if it's a process of saying, This is what I've always believed? I have stood on this, and it ain't nothing gonna change my mind. I am just determined that this is the truth of the word of God. And then years later, a pastor comes along and says, Let me introduce something to you. And all of a sudden, I kind of start inching over this way a little bit, and then says something else, and a revelation comes, and I'm going over this way a little bit more. And it's not that this was wrong, but I start adding a little bit more context to it. I start going a little bit more in depth, more revelation comes, I become more aware of the truth of what God's really saying, and I realize I start moving a little bit. I'm not being rebellious, I'm just gaining some understanding and some wisdom. But I realize I'm I'm moving. That's okay. And we gotta realize that's okay to do that. It's a process. See, I think the church, this is my opinion here. If you don't agree with it, that's okay. But I believe as a church, we have put this black and white. It's either this and you're right, it's either this and you're wrong. And there's no gap in the middle that allows for transformation. See, we think transformation because revelation is instant sometimes. That light bulb goes off, and I get a revelation on something. Revelation can be instant. And we think because revelation is instant, that transformation is supposed to be instant. And transformation is never immediate. Transformation takes some time, some you know, often. It's a process. So rather than just saying a gap is a negative place or a bad place, why don't we say a gap is a process of transformation? I'm moving from where I was and I'm moving to the place that I want to be. I'm getting a deeper understanding of what God's saying. We tend to think as transformation is an immediate thing. Boom, you're there. And I think. We mess people up with that. It's not the same thing. Revelation, transformation, those two words is not, we can't put them together. They are not the same thing, and they do not, they often move at different speeds. You ever got a revelation? And I mean, a revelation comes instantly. You can be driving down the road and see a sign or see something, and boom, revelation will hit you. A thought, an idea, information. It'll come instantly. But that don't mean that that thing is in your life yet and you're living

Paul On The Inner War

SPEAKER_00 22:40

it out. It's just some information that comes, revelation. Let's look at what Paul said in these verses right here. Romans chapter 7, verse 22 and 23. This is really important. He says, For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. I know what I feel on the inside, but I know what I'm doing on the outside. Can I just put it in plain language? Warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members. I know what to do, I know what's right, but I always find myself doing something that is contradictory to what I know. That's Paul saying that. And we want to kick somebody out of church when they say it. It's amazing. Paul is saying at its core, his inner self, that he agrees with and he loves the truth of God. He wants to do what's right. This reflects his renewed mind and spiritual conviction. He truly knows what's right and he wants to do what's right. But in the surrounding verses, and that's why I added verse 23 here. I was only going to read 22, but then I started reading it, and I said, we got to say 23 too. He admits that sometimes something else is happening. There's another force or another pattern in him that pulls him in the opposite direction, which is what it says in verse 23. So even though he delights in what is right, he still experiences resistance and failure in practice, in life. I know what I want to do, I know what I should do, but man, I keep finding myself on the other end of the room. I keep doing stuff that I should not be doing. I don't know what that was. It didn't go into detail in these verses. Paul knew, and he knew it wasn't right because he says it right here. He actually goes in there and says, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, bringing him to a place where he is no longer seeing himself as a child of God. He says, which is in my members. Take that how you want to take it. He's talking about his body, though. He's talking about the things he's doing versus what he knows to be true in his heart and his mind. And here's the distinction. This distinction matters right here. Because one, what he's talking about, two different things right here. One leads to shame, and the other leads to patience. That first thing he was talking about there in verse 22 leads to patience. The part he's talking about in verse 23 leads to shame. It leads to condemnation. It leads to guilt. When truth arrives, the old system pushes back. Now, this is important. I want you to hear this. When truth begins to enter a person, it doesn't immediately replace everything else that you've always been taught. It disrupts everything else. It can drive you crazy at times. Because I've been there, I've believed something so strongly that I said, You will not move me from this. And then down the road, something happened. Revelation came, wisdom come, the Holy Spirit come, showed up, and said, uh-uh, you got to get off of that. You better let go of that thing that you said you'd never let go of. And the Holy Spirit brought something, some wisdom and understanding that changed my thought process. So it the truth don't always come in and change things immediately, but it does, it disrupts things in me. That old identity pattern, it don't leave quietly. That's the struggle that we're in in the rock worship center. That is the struggle that we're in. Because what we teach, nobody in this room comes up with this teaching to this degree. So therefore, a lot of this sounds a little bit different sometimes. It is contrary to what you've been taught in many areas. Now, when you really boil it down and get all the mess off of it, it's not as different as what we think it is. It's really not. It's the way we perceive it, the way we comprehend it. It's really not that different. And here's the thing. When truth arrives, a lot of times, this is what people respond. This is how they respond. This is who I've

Truth Versus Feelings

SPEAKER_00 28:55

always been. This is what I've always believed. And I'm not letting go of this because I believe it's the truth. Even after truth arrives, those patterns don't disappear immediately. They argue, they resist, they try to reassert authority. But when truth arrives, those words, when truth arrives, listen to that. When truth arrives, that is not an arrogant statement. It is not meant to be an arrogant statement. What do we mean by that? Some people may say, you know, I feel like I've been doing this and I've been going to church, and I've been, and I feel like I'm getting closer to God. Nothing wrong with that. But you know what truth says? Truth says you're already one with him. So you may feel like you're getting closer to God, a feeling, and then truth shows up and supersedes the feeling. That's what I mean by when truth shows up. We can feel a lot of things that we call truth. And it's nothing more than a feeling. When truth shows up, what is truth? It's the scripture, it's the word of God. When truth shows up, it's not being arrogant saying, I'm right and you're wrong. It's basically saying that what I've always believed, what I've always held to be truth, and now the scripture actually shows up and contradicts it. I love when that happens. I love being wronged. I love when something comes up and hits me, and I'm like, wow, that has changed my whole thinking on things. I'm okay with being wrong on that. Why? Because new revelations come. I'm at a new level of understanding. I want to be wrong. I want everything that I've ever held on to and said I'll never let go of. I want something, some type of revelation and awareness to kick in that says you gotta let that go. I'm taking you higher. I'm taking you to a different place. We should all want that. It's okay to be wrong. It's okay for some things to change a little bit. So what most people experience in life is not confusion about truth. It's friction between two operating systems. And she said, which system are you gonna believe? You got this that says this, and you got this that says this. Which one are you gonna believe? You got a person over here saying, I want to be healed, and I believe that one day God will heal me, and you got another system over here that says, by his stripes you are healed. Which one are you gonna believe? If I believe this one, then I'm gonna keep waiting. And I may get that healing one day. But if I if I can grab on to this one and get an awareness that what he did on the cross already brought that to me. And I've got to get my heart to align with that truth. Again, truth, feeling. Feelings don't always is not always the truth. That's why I say the quote all the time: feelings are liars. Feelings can be liars because they don't always tell us the truth. They're real to us, but they don't always tell us the truth. And then truth shows up. So again, what most people experience is not confusion about truth, it's friction between two different systems. Sometimes we make the mistake of confusing resistance with failure. This is what makes learning new information so difficult sometimes. Because some people assume that if I'm still anxious, then I must not be at peace. If I still struggle with this, then I must not be transformed yet. We've all been there. I'm sure we've all made that comment. But see, that logic misunderstands how change actually happens and how it occurs, how it works. Feelings are often lagging behind slow indicators. And what do

Resistance Does Not Mean Absence

SPEAKER_00 34:20

I mean by that? They're not, we should not be led by feelings. They often show us history rather than our true identity. Somebody may say, Well, this is the way I've always felt. Exactly, always. That's history. But what does the word of God say? That shows me my identity. I want to connect with my identity, not my history. So resistance doesn't mean that that truth is absent. It often means that truth is presenting itself against resistance. Truth is there. How do I know? Because he is the truth. And he went to live with the Father so the Holy Spirit would do what? Come back and live in me. So the truth is already in me. That's why the Bible says that I know all things. But every time he tries to speak, I'll speak for myself here. I won't include anybody else because I don't know what you've been through. But I can tell you many, many times, the Holy Spirit would try to speak, and my own understanding would basically say, Shut up, Holy Spirit. I got this. Just be real. I would go on what I thought, on what I felt, on what I thought I knew was best. Instead of just allowing the truth, you see where feelings overrode truth? The truth is in me. The truth is already in you. We're not waiting on truth to show up. We're waiting on an unveiling of it. We're waiting on an awareness where we can see what's already there. The Holy Spirit's on the inside of you. So we're not waiting on Him to come one day. He's already there. Truth is already there. One of the most overlooked aspects, I think, of Jesus' ministry. And I've never really thought about this until I was reading this. One of the most overlooked aspects of Jesus' ministry is how slowly, think about it, how slowly he transformed people. Now think about it. I'm not going to go into all the examples, but here's just a couple. He didn't just declare truth to people, he walked people into truth. Peter still reacted out of fear even after Jesus looked at him and said, You're the rock. He still acted out of fear after that. Thomas still doubted. After years of walking with Jesus, he seen the miracles, he heard the sermons, he heard all the revelation and the quiet moments when they just sat by the campfire and talked with Jesus. He was there. And then after all of that, he still doubted. The disciples still misunderstood. Even after all the teaching they had from Jesus, they still misunderstood. Why is this important? Why does it matter to look at that? And there's many more examples. That was just a few. Jesus never took away their identity because of their failures. He never took it away. He never took away their identity just because they hadn't fully grown into it yet. He knew who they were. He knew what was in them and what they had the capacity to be. And because they were still messing up and had not grown into that identity, he didn't just kick them to the side and say, let me find somebody else who wants this a little bit more. He hung on to them. And he walked them out of what they was in straight into who they were supposed to be. He had patience. It was sometimes a process. Go back and study out how what how long the process was for Peter or for any of them. It didn't just happen because Jesus stepped on the scene. These dudes still messed up. Even when they were walking with him and talking to him and eating with him. And they was with him every day and they still messed up. He never let them go. He never kicked them out. He had two, he he did two things at once. That's what's amazing right here to see about Jesus. And that I think we always talk about what would Jesus do? This is what Jesus did. I'm fixing to share with you what he done. And we need to do the same thing Jesus done right here. On one hand, he held what is true about them, that they were knuckleheads. And he held that in one hand, but then in the other hand, what they are still becoming, and what they had the potential to be. He held both of them right here together. I mean, think about some of the things, the stories that we've heard about some of these folks. Jesus would have had ample justification to kick them to the curb and say, let me grab somebody else who I think can be a little bit more what I want them to be. He never did. Some of the worst of the worst, he took them at their worst. Because I see something in you. See, what if we could look at people instead

Jesus Trains People Patiently

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of rejecting them, instead of kicking them out, instead of saying you're not good enough that we could take them as children of God, we could take them aside, we could connect with them and say, I see your potential. Yes, you may be in a bad place right now. Yes, you may be doing some crazy stuff right now. But I can hold that along with holding what I know you are and who you are at the same time. Why? Because Jesus did it. And he said that once I leave, he said, even greater things can you do because I go to the Father. You know what? He's given me authority to do the same thing. I don't have to reject you, I don't have to kick you out. I can deal with your issues while also looking at your potential. That's what I feel like we're called to do. That's not always what the church has done. Let's just be real. We want them cleaned up, washed up, smelling good and looking good, and then you can come in and be a part of us. So it wasn't about rejecting them, but allowing transformation to happen. So what does maturity, and I'm gonna get ready to close here, what does maturity actually look like? Spiritual maturity isn't about it isn't about no longer having old relations or reactions. Spiritual maturity doesn't mean that I never make a mistake again. That's called perfection, and you ain't there, and I'm not there. Spiritual maturity does not mean you'll never mess up. It's about decreasing the gap between what you feel and how you respond. Getting us closer to that place that we want to be. And most of the time we react before we even realize it. But over time, something starts to change. You begin to notice your reactions. You ever do something, you know, when you when you first start out when you were young and immature and didn't really think about things, you just reacted. I remember I used to do things and I never thought about it, I just did it. It never crossed my mind again. I didn't question whether it was right or wrong. That was just the way it was. And then later on, as I matured a little bit, I would still do those things. But then maybe a couple days later, I'd say, maybe that wasn't the best. Thing to do. I would start questioning that reaction. What was I doing? I was progressing. I was moving to a different place. So you begin to notice those reactions. And then you pause before they take over. And eventually you'll find your way back to clarity more quickly. I'm not doing the same stupid things I used to do. Or maybe I'm not doing them as often. Maybe I'm still doing them, but not as often. That's progression. There's a steady return back to who he wants me to be. That's what real change looks like. There's a shift that takes place from automatic response to awareness. Remember, we said awareness is being able to live this out, being able to see this in my life. This is where change begins to show up in everyday life. It's not that we never fear again. It's not that we never make mistakes again. We just don't let those things control our life. We get up, we recognize it, and we get back to who we are. We may still react in certain situations. I don't care how long you've been a Christian. You ever had somebody cut you off in traffic, you might have said something you didn't want to say. We're human. Things are still going to happen. But they won't be the same as they used to be. I don't just do things now and just overlook it and don't just forget about it. Now, if I do something crazy, at least there's some conviction that comes along. And then later on I'll start thinking, you know, I got to really work on that. So there's something there that's, there's a change process that's happening. It's not automatic anymore. That stuff's not just happening automatically in me. So here's the challenge. Can I see this transformation the right way? We talk a lot about transformation. But this is a really important question. Can I have the patience to allow people to go through the process of transformation? I believe that's what we're called to do. Have patience. Patience doesn't mean acceptance. That doesn't mean I have to agree with what somebody's doing and say it's right. I don't have to get involved with it, participate with them. But it don't mean I have to reject them either, because I see deeper than that. I see something bigger than the problem. Rather than questioning why I'm not where I want to be, can I stay patient with myself while change is happening? If I can do that in myself, then I'll begin to do that in other people. If I can't do that in myself, I will never do that with other people. I just won't. I'll always condemn them, always reject them, and always put them down. But when I can begin to see this thing inwardly inside me, and it begins to shift and begins to change, now that same thing is going to go to the outside, and I'm going to begin seeing other people and responding to other people in the same way that I respond to myself. That's why it's important. That's why it's important that we get this here first and then we take it to the outside. And I'm not talking about going to another country and evangelizing. I'm talking about evangelizing in the grocery store, on your job, in the community, with your family. Anybody you come into contact with, we should always evangelize. Even when we're not trying to, my life should point in a certain direction, even when I'm not preaching to them. We should always try to do that. Because there's a gap between what you're learning and how you're currently living. And that gap isn't the problem, it's part of the process. So what usually gets in the way, and what usually becomes the problem, I think, is how we relate to that gap. How do we see it?

What Spiritual Maturity Looks Like

SPEAKER_00 48:45

If you judge yourself, then you're going to try to force change to become a reality. And force change never sticks. It works for a little while, but it never sticks. If you shame yourself, you start resisting the process. If you ignore it, nothing really changes. But when you can simply notice the gap without fighting it, something subtle starts to happen. Pressure drops, awareness increases, change begins to take root on its own. But we've got to realize it don't happen all at once, it is a process. Our overall goal is to get to the point where something shifts on the inside of us. Not just on the outside. See, we've been told just to make the outside look pretty. No, something's got to shift on the inside of me. Not because we tried harder. Not because we we stayed patient, but because we stayed patient during the process. And all of a sudden, change started happening. Nobody made me change, nobody forced me to change, but I stayed patient during the process. And now I begin to see things changing. Sometimes we have to just stay in truth without demanding instant alignment. Sometimes we got to realize some folks are not going to get there as quick as you did. It may take some people a little while longer. There's people I've been talking with, ministering to, evangelizing to for years. Not one time. But guess what? I still talk to them every time I see them. I still witness to them every time I see them. I still encourage them. I still tell them what I see on the inside of them. Aside from what I see on the outside of them, I don't focus on that. But what do we see on the inside? What do we know the truth is about the inside? Then one day we'll notice that I don't respond the same way anymore. And again, not because it was forced, but because truth finally became familiar enough to feel like home. That's the key to it. When truth can become so familiar that that feels like home to me. Because if you think about that on the other end of the spectrum, the reason we kept doing stupid stuff for so long is because that stupid stuff felt like home. It felt good. People don't go out and use drugs just for no reason. They do it because it feels good. They drink and get drunk because it feels good. If it didn't feel good, they wouldn't keep doing it. Now I'm not advocating for it, but I'm just saying it. There's a feeling. And the feeling is superseding truth. And it will for a little while. But even in the face of that, can we keep speaking truth to them? Even when we don't like what we're seeing, can we keep speaking truth? And one day we'll notice a slight change. And then another slight change. And then another, and we'll start seeing something begin to shift. And maybe that's what transformation really is. I'm beginning to see transformation a little bit different. See, I'm not becoming something new. We're not asking people to transform to become somebody they've never been before. But finally learning how to live without resisting who has already, what's already been true all along. Transformation now, it's not about behavioral change. It's about an inward shift that will produce an outward change. But it's got to start on the inside. When you see that little caterpillar crawling around that hadn't become a butterfly yet, how many times do you look at that caterpillar and truly think everything that caterpillar needs to be a butterfly is already in there. It's already there. But the process is still ongoing. That's transformation. That's why we use the caterpillar and the butterfly analogy so much, because that's exactly what it is. That caterpillar can't just boom become a butterfly. Certain process has to occur. So in closing, let's remember this. Awakening isn't about becoming someone new. It's when what you already know is true settles in you so deeply, so deeply in you that it begins to shape how you think, how you feel, and how you respond. How you think, how you feel, and how you respond. I don't think like I used to. I don't feel like I used to. Even when I do, I quickly realize those feelings are liars, and I get back to truth. Come on, we we've all been there. You may be there today or tomorrow where some feelings are gonna come up that don't align with who you are. That don't mean you have to come back and get saved next Sunday. It just means you need to recognize that that is a feeling

Helping Addicts Without Condemnation

SPEAKER_00 55:40

and it does not align with truth. And get back up and keep going. If more people can hear that message instead of the one that we teach so often that scares the crap out of them, if we could just be part of the process, we're not condoning the behavior. And see, let me say this because I think this is one of the problems. People are so against this teaching because they feel like it's condoning behavior. They feel like we're looking at the addict out there and saying, it's okay, you keep using as long as you want to use, God still loves you. Well, guess what? God does still love them. We're not telling them keep doing this as long as you want to, but I truly believe that if we cannot reject them and not put them down and not beat them up and not kick them when they're down, but we can speak something positive, something real, something true into that mess, it changes the mess quicker. I really believe that. If we can speak positive even while they're in that, then I see I think we see change happen quicker. But it's hard to do because we're trained and we're taught that the first thing you gotta do is you gotta get them to stop. And I'm a counselor saying I think that is backwards. Yes, ultimately we want them to stop. We all know that. That's the overarching goal is we want them to stop using. And God bless Nancy Reagan. I've said this so many times, but just say no. Don't work with a lot of people. Something's got to happen, something in them's got to shift before they have feel like they have the power and the authority just to put that down now. And speaking positive and speaking truth and speaking life into them in the midst of that, I think helps change that situation. So it's not condoning behavior, it's being real about the behavior and saying it's it's happening, it's real, but in the midst of it, I'm gonna speak life into them. In the midst of it, I'm gonna speak truth into them. And I'm gonna help them because they're in a gap. I'm gonna help them through this so that their life can be transformed. I believe if more people could hear that message, I really do. I believe more people would be open to that. Because I can tell you from experience, and I'm not just talking about addiction, I'm talking about addiction and depression and PTSD and mental health overall. The reason most people run away from the church that's dealing with things like that is because they think the church is going to condemn them and look down on them. If we can just tell them we're not looking down on you, we're here to build you up. We're here to show you who you really are, because that is not you. It feels like you because you've done it for so long, but it's not. You got your feelings, but I'm bringing truth. And when truth meets feelings, feelings will bow every single time. That's evangelism. That is the gospel. That's changing people's hearts. We can worry about all we can worry about an altar call and the dunking them in the water later. Somebody get mad about me at saying that. But I I'm just being real. There's some people's situation is so out there that they just need to be loved and supported. Because what we try to do is automatically save them. And they not even up for that. Just being real, they're not even up for that. It's a process. And we automatically try to save them when we when we try to save them, we force them to say a prayer. They are in the middle of using, and we force them to say a prayer, and then we can't believe tomorrow they go out and they use again. Because the prayer didn't change them. The prayer will never save them. But it's us being like Jesus. It's us stepping into their life in the midst of their hell and bringing a little bit of heaven into it. Bringing something that they don't see in their life, and we introduce it. I'd like to say we introduce them to their self, to who they really are. I'm not beating them down to an altar. That's why they don't they keep running from the church. Because they know that when I get there, man, all they want to do is get me to the altar and then dunk me under water. And I'm struggling with some things right now. I could go on this forever. We just need to see this thing differently. We just got to see it a little bit different. That's not saying salvation's not important. That's not saying they don't need to be baptized. I'm just saying we need to see the order in it. And that's not always the first thing that they need. That's my opinion. From experience. We're running them off. We're running people off instead of bringing them in. What they need is to know that somebody loves them. To know that they haven't lost everything in their life, to know that somebody still cares, regardless of how bad the situation is, that somebody's still there. That's what's going to form a connection. And when I form the connection, now I got their ear. See, if I don't have a connection with you, you don't listen to me. But when I've got a connection with you, I've got your ear. So why don't we form a connection with them first? So that now we can be begin speaking to them.

Prayer For Community Impact

SPEAKER_00 1:03:30

And they hear it. I didn't mean to get on that. But I think this is where this is going. I mean, this is this is who we're called to be. I don't say that arrogantly when I say we're called to be different. I mean that. I want us to take pride in the fact that we are called to be different. It's not the same. We don't want to be like every other church. Some churches have great youth programs. Great. If you got 14 kids, take them to that church because they got a good youth program. But if there's other problems you got, you might want to come to this church. We don't have to be like every other church. They don't have to be like us. We need to embrace the different that we have. Let's pray. Father God, we thank you. I thank you that we're different. I thank you that you've called us to be set apart, to stand apart from any other church in this area, Father. That don't mean better. That just means different. You've anointed us with a specific anointing. You've called us to do certain things. And Father, I pray that you will begin to open the doors up in this community. The doors are always open in this building, but Father, begin to move the hearts of this community. Open up doors in this community that we have that have been shut. And the ones that need the message that we're bringing, Father, bring them into us. Bring us to them. Whatever needs to happen. Bring the people in this church into contact with them. Build a connection in whatever way that it needs to be done. Father, we just ask you to do that in whatever way you see fit. But we believe in what you've called us to do. We know what you've called us to do in this area. We know the people that we can touch and the people that we can impact in this area. And Father, I just pray that your will be done. And the calling and the gifting that you've given us, that we'll rise up, that we'll no longer just be ashamed of it, Father, but we'll rise up, we'll step into what you've called us to, and we'll be. To seek out the ones that you've put in our path. Father, we thank you for what you're doing in this church. We thank you for every person that's here that's connected to this ministry. We ask you to bless them, their homes, their finances, their families. Father, we pray health and safety over every one of them. Father, we pray for provision over every person in this house. We pray for wellness. Father, if there's sickness in the home, Father, we pray healing for every family here. If there's addiction, we pray, Father, that they're brought in and they see that you have anointed us for this. You have called us for this. And I pray that you will lead them into this place, Father. And we'll be careful to give you the praise, the honor, and the glory for everything. In the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.