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The Rock Family Worship Center
Taking The Church Outside The Walls
The Rock Family Worship Center
When The Gap Gets Triggered
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We talk about what happens when pressure exposes the gap between what we believe is true and how we actually react. We reframe triggers as messengers that can lead to healing, renewed thinking, and a settled identity in Christ instead of shame and burnout.
• authority to speak healing into sickness and darkness
• destructive thinking as a healing issue that drives behavior
• the gap between truth we know and life we live
• pressure revealing what peace can hide
• rejecting the idea that God sends storms to teach lessons
• learning to live from peace rather than controlling environments
• triggers as teachers that expose fear and unhealed wounds
• asking better questions to find the belief under the reaction
• stopping the habit of treating problems as regression
• pain needing exposure before it can be healed
• addiction cycles as emotional suppression and symptom management
• renewing the mind as the path to transformation and repentance
• changing perception to change response and produce real growth
• going to the root instead of only picking the fruit
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Worship And A Call To Healing
SPEAKER_01Good to see everybody. It's good to be here. Y'all excuse my voice this morning. I know it's gonna sound a little bit different. My beautiful wife, who I love so dearly, got me sick, gave it to me, and now I'm battling with it. So uh I'm gonna try not to go into a coffin spell up here. But uh I love the I love the worship today. I love just the the atmosphere that it created. It was it was such a and and as we was worshiping, uh I'm not a song person. I've always said that. I'm not a worship person, uh that but but during worship is when a lot of times God will speak to me, things revelation will come, different things will come to me. And one of the things that I kept uh as I was praying this morning during worship is is just getting into a place of healing, complete healing. And I believe we need that. I'm just talking to everybody, I believe we need that in different areas. I know we, you know, we Cynthia opened up this morning praying for our grandbaby Josie, who's been battling some stuff, and she's just a sick baby right now, you know. So we're we're lifting her up, and I say that, but I'm saying this on the other side. She's a healed baby right now. And I believe that we've got to realize the authority and the power that we have to speak healing into sickness, to speak light into darkness. And we have that ability because of what Christ done for us on the cross, and not just what he done, but what we done with him because we were part of the entire process. We we died with him, we were buried with him. That's why we say we it was we were co-killed, we was co-buried, we was co-resurrected, because we went through this process. And because he went to the Father, he said, Because I go to the Father, it's a good thing for us. He sends back the comforter to live on the inside of us. And he said, even greater things shall you do because I go to the Father. See, sometimes I don't think we grasp the concept of what that really means. Think about even greater, think about the things that Jesus done that we marvel over when we read them. Great things. And then he stood there and he said, even greater things than what I did shall you do because I went to the Father. It's not that it's that we can't do it, it's that we can't see ourselves doing it. And one of the things that came to me this morning was we talk so much about physical healing when we hear the word healing, and that's definitely a part of it. But I wrote this down because it kept coming to me. There's some people that need to be healed from destructive thinking. You know, some people say, well, he's got to stop doing that and doing that. We always look at behaviors. But see, we've got to be healed from destructive thinking because the thinking is what drives the behaviors. So I think that not along with physical healing, which we have the ability to do, we can lay hands on the sick and see them recover. Life and death lies in the power of our tongue, but we can also speak life into a situation where the thinking is causing somebody to struggle in life. This message today, and again, I didn't know what the atmosphere was gonna be like in here today, before when I was putting this message together. But I'm gonna say this, and it may sound a little bit bold, but I'm gonna say it anyway. You will get and be impacted as much as you want to be impacted this morning with this message. Or you will not be impacted if you choose not to. But I'm telling you, there's some things that I know
Healing Includes Destructive Thinking
SPEAKER_01is in here that aligns with just the atmosphere that was in this place today. So you can take as much out of this as you want to this morning, and it can change your life, or you can walk out of here the same as you walked in. It's totally up to us. And I that sounds crazy saying that sometimes, but it's the truth. You can sincerely walk out of here the same way you walked in, or you can grab on to what's gonna be spoken today and recognize it, receive it, and say, my life will change today. No more doing this, no more thinking like this, no more living like this. Something is changing today. See, sometimes we just gotta come into church and we've got to come in with a heart of expectancy. We've got to expect something when we pray for somebody and we speak life over somebody, we speak healing over somebody. It's not just words. We've got to pray and speak those words with an expectation that what I'm saying carries power. What I'm saying has already occurred, and I'm making it manifest because she said this morning, the manifestation of healing. The healing's already done. The healing took place 2,000 years ago on the cross. So the healing has already been completed. He said, By my stripes you are healed past tense, E. D. But a lot of times, let's be real, we don't see it, we don't experience it, and that's not because Jesus didn't do it, it's because we haven't looked at it and agreed to it and been able to manifest it in our life. That's the part that the mind comes in at. And a lot of people don't like to talk about the mind in church. We just want to talk about the spirit and the heart. But the mind is so important. The way we think, that's why it says be transformed by renewing of the mind. Because the mind controls so much of our spiritual life. Last week we talked about the gap between what we know is true and how we sometimes live life. And it wasn't a message to beat on people or to make people feel bad. It's a very constructive message. Because I believe that a majority of Christians, churchgoers, know what the word says and they know what they believe, but then their life is experiencing something different. So if you take what you believe and what you know to be true, and then you take what you're living, there's a gap in there. I want us to recognize that gap. I want us to understand that gap. I want us to be able to look and say this is a process that we're we're moving, personally, we're moving through, but we're also getting an understanding so that we can help other people move through it. Without kicking them when they're down, without beating them up because they're not just right, without kicking them out of church because they made a mistake, that we're trying to realize this is a gap that we can help move people through. We talked about awakening, what it means. We talked about awareness and the slow process. And I believe it's sometimes it's a slow process. It's not slow because God wants it to be that way. It's slow because sometimes it takes us a little while to realize and to understand it. But it's a slow process of truth becoming a lived reality in our life. After a message like that last week, the goal and the hope is that people will leave encouraged. Again, it wasn't a message to make people feel bad, it was a message to make people feel encouraged. And sometimes I believe that happens. And then what happens next? Life. Monday morning, Tuesday morning, Wednesday, whatever. You feel good on Sunday, you encourage, you walk out of here with a few good thoughts and ideas, and then all of a sudden, boom, life hits you on Monday morning. Someone disrespects you. You get stressed out about something, bills start piling up, and you don't have the finances right now to cover them, you get disappointed, old thoughts start returning, old reactions start to surface, and suddenly the question becomes if I've grown, if I've really got to a place where I want to be at, if I've grown and I've matured, then why does this stuff still keep coming?
SPEAKER_00Why is it still there?
SPEAKER_01If I'm changing, why am I still being triggered so easily? Sometimes it don't make sense. But this is the question that we've got to ask ourselves. If we truly want to learn to get through this gap and help other people get through this gap, we've got to ask some hard questions that's normally not asked in church. Normally we just want to point our finger and tell you you need to change, but we're going a little bit deeper and we're forgetting all that, and we're looking behind the curtain and saying, why is this happening? Why are so many people struggling, even though they love the Lord, they're born again, they know who they are, but their life is not showing it. There's a gap. We're going inside the gap to try to figure it out. It's a little bit different. It takes a little bit more to get in there and dig around a little bit. But sometimes we're triggered, and old thoughts will come up. I said it the other day, somebody cut you off in traffic. You might say something you wish you wouldn't have said, and you have to all of a sudden pray and say, Lord, I'm sorry. I didn't, I don't know where that came from. I thought I was a good Christian now, but I don't know where that word came up from. But it came up. Something happens and you react in a certain way, and you're like, Why? Where did that come from? I thought I was way past that. But all of a sudden, there it is. It's
When The Gap Gets Triggered
SPEAKER_01there again. That's what I want to go into today. I want to look at uh the title when the gap gets triggered. We've done talked about the gap. Hopefully, you know what it is. If you don't go back and listen to last week's sermon online or go watch it online, you need to understand what the gap is. And now we're gonna talk about when that gap gets triggered. How do I handle it? So that's where I want to go today. Because growth is easy. It's easy to believe when life is calm. It's easy to see growth in myself when everything is just smooth. I mean, think about that now. I don't have these problems coming up. I don't have any situations I'm dealing with. I'm just cruising along. And it's real easy to look and say, man, I'm going somewhere. Things are really just going good in my life right now. It's a good place to be. But the real test of awareness is not what happens in peaceful moments, it's what rises in pressured moments. When somebody that you don't like comes up and says something to you. When something happens and you're pressured or you're stressed, it's those moments that I want you to stop and think, what rose up in me? This is where you got to get real with yourself. This is not to beat yourself up. This is not to condemn yourself. This is to be real with yourself because if I'm real with myself, I can transform it. If I keep it pushed down and hidden, it's gonna stay there. And every situation, everything is gonna trigger it, and boom, it's gonna keep popping back up. So this is to really evaluate yourself. Ask some tough questions. It's okay. God's not gonna be mad at you
Pressure Reveals Unfinished Places
SPEAKER_01for asking these questions. Think about this. Pressure reveals what peace can often hide. Pressure reveals what peace can often hide. Again, when it's a peaceful time in my life, you don't see junk coming up. You don't see all these bad words coming out, you don't see bad reactions. Why? Because everything's peaceful. But when when it's not peaceful, when pressure is applied, what's revealed? That's the question we want to ask. In James chapter 1, listen what in verse 2 through 4. I want you to see what James says right here, because it's really important. He says, My brethren, count it all joy. I used to think, I'm gonna be real honest right here, I used to think this was the dumbest verse in the Bible because I didn't understand it. My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials. And I was like, Is God crazy? He's telling me to rejoice when things go bad. That's the way I looked at it. Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. This is a powerful verse if you really dig into it and start looking at it. See, most people read this verse as God sends problems to teach you lessons. I know a lot of people who used to think that way, including myself. And then it hit me one day, and I began to think about a story of Jesus sitting in the boat. And he told the disciples, he said, We're going to the other side. And Jesus lays down in the boat and takes a nap. And all of a sudden we know the story, the storm comes, the waves start splashing around, the wind starts blowing, the boat starts rocking, disciples get scared, go crazy.
SPEAKER_00And Jesus gets up and he says, Peace. He's still.
SPEAKER_01I was connecting these two verses. But then it hit me, and I said, if God calls the storm, Jesus got up and rebuked the Father and stopped it. They are one, they are always in line. So God didn't cause it and Jesus stopped it. You know, God don't cause the problems. I can tell you, every problem I've encountered in my life, it was because of my immaturity or my stupidity. Okay. Now it's easy to blame other people and say, well, they got me into it, but most of the time it's truly because I made a bad decision. And I just got to, I got to suck it up and say, I gotta work on that. Okay. I think pressure exposes what is unfinished in us. It's not to shame you. Pressure don't come in your life to shame you, but to show you what still needs healing in your life. We've all got areas that we need to be healed in. I don't care how perfect you may think you are, you've got areas in your life that need to be healed. We're not just talking about physical healings, we're talking about mental and emotional, whatever. We all got areas that we need to be healed in. Most of us think we're patient. We like to think that we've got to a certain level of patience until we're inconvenienced. We think we're healed until the pain hits. We think we trust people until uncertainty arrives. Can you imagine how our mindset would would shift if we didn't look at problems as punishment from God, but instead we looked at it as revelation? Think about that just a minute. Problems come in my life, a situation occurs in my life, something bad happens in my life, and instead of blaming God, instead of saying, see, saying, well, God is just testing me, is is to me that's a cop out. That's my opinion. That's not biblical, that's my wording, okay? That is a cop out because I don't know how to deal with it. I don't want to deal with it, so I just put it back on God. And you know what happens? I never deal with it. But if I don't put it on God's shoulders, if I don't try to blame Him for it, if I take responsibility and say this is an opportunity for me, it's an opportunity for me to see what rose up during that time of pressure. Why? So that I can fix it now. Use it as an opportunity and not a blame game to try to blame God for it. It's a revelation to me. What is revelation? It just means a revealing. So every time a situation occurs, something's revealed in me. And it ain't always good. Let's be honest. But I've got to recognize those things. And when I'm talking about revelation, I don't, I don't mean revelation of who we are at our core, but revelation of what patterns that's in me still that's still attached to me that I need to be aware of. Because we all still got them. None of us were perfect spiritually. In the spirit, we're perfect. But in the flesh, none of us is perfect. We all make mistakes, we all make dumb decisions sometimes.
Living From Peace Not Control
SPEAKER_01So we've all got some some things that we can change. I started thinking about Jesus and thinking about different scenarios in the Bible. Jesus was calm in chaos. Sometimes I'm not calm in chaos. I'm trying to improve that. But I haven't always been calm when in chaotic situations. But during the storm that we just talked about, they're going crazy. They think they're going to die. They think the boat's fixing to flip over. And Jesus is laying over there sleeping.
SPEAKER_00He's calm in that situation.
SPEAKER_01Crowds, he's walking along, and crowds are pressing up against him. Everybody didn't like Jesus at the time. Let's remember that. So all these people's pressing up against him. Don't know if they're just trying to get to him, if they're trying to hurt him, or they're just oppressing.
SPEAKER_00He stayed centered, stayed calm. He was falsely accused. I'm not gonna go through it, but he was falsely accused.
SPEAKER_01His message was clear, he stayed calm. He was rejected by people that should have never rejected him, but he was. He stayed grounded, he stayed calm. Why? Because inner truth had become settled reality in him. He knew who he was. And that's the thing, that's why we talk about identity so much. It's important to understand who we are in Christ. It's important to understand our identity because of what Jesus done. See, sometimes we want to sit back and just be a spectator and say, look what Jesus done, and not include ourselves in it, and realize who we are because of what he done. Because we were part of the process. Inner truth becomes a settled reality when we start understanding our identity. See, he wasn't getting peace from his circumstances around, he was living from a deeper source. And that's hard to do sometimes, but that's the place we've got to try to get to. And it brings up a powerful question. And I couldn't help but I actually put this question on Facebook last night, too, when I was sitting here reading all of my notes. Am I trying to control my environment so that I can have peace? Or am I learning to live from peace no matter my environment? Think about that a minute. That's totally different. I'm trying to control the people I'm around. I'm trying to control the everything around me so that I can live in peace. That's one thing. Or am I living from a place of peace, no matter what the environment looks like? I can walk into any environment and I'm peaceful. And I'm telling you, it's amazing when you can get to that place and you're not always. I've been there and I've been able to do that in very bad environments. And then there's been other times I haven't been able to do it. But then I go back and say, okay, know who you are, recognize who you are. And our goal is to be able to walk into an environment that's chaotic, and because of simply our presence, the environment has to shift. That's not arrogance, that's understanding who we are in Christ. That's what Jesus did. He just walked into a place and it calm down. Because he was. The Prince of Peace. So he didn't operate, change things to have peace. He walked from a place of peace. And everywhere that he went into, he took peace with him.
SPEAKER_00He changed environments.
SPEAKER_01He changed situations. And then before he left, he says, Listen, even greater things can you do. What you've seen me do, you have the authority to do. All the peace that I bring, you have the authority to bring. Everything that we read about Jesus in the Bible, we have access to as well.
SPEAKER_00We can do it. If we realize it. That's maturity.
SPEAKER_01I have to get to a place of truly understanding and maturing to a different level before I can recognize that.
Triggers As Messengers And Teachers
SPEAKER_01Think about triggers as messengers. Many people hate being triggered. And what I'm talking about is anything that happens that triggers a response, triggers a reaction, triggers an emotional response that I don't want to be there. I don't want it to come out. I don't want that attitude to come up. But something happens, and triggers can be people, it can be situations, it can be anything. Anybody can trigger that. But what if we started looking at triggers not as not problems, but as messengers? Think about that. Many people hate being triggered, but triggers can become teachers. What do I mean by that? Think about what a trigger often reveals. Where fear still lives. Do I still have fear in me? Triggers can show where identity feels threatened, where wounds haven't been healed yet, where old survival patterns still operate. There's still some stuff there from my past. I learned it from my past. See, a lot of us come up and we had to learn survival skills. Let's be real. We learn to survive. Especially if you went through some very traumatic stuff in your life or you've dealt with addiction or this or that. You learn survival skills. And it's hard. Even when you get born again and you try to change your life around, it's hard to just say, okay, let all that go. They're still there. They're back in your subconscious, and all of a sudden somebody says something, and boom, here it is. And you're like, where in the heck did that come from? Because it was still there. It was an old pattern.
SPEAKER_00It was an old hurt that never got healed. So instead of saying something like, Why am I like this?
SPEAKER_01What if we asked a different question? What if we look with a situation when I'm triggered? What if we said, What is this reaction trying to show me? And we had we had a conversation with ourselves. It's okay. Having a conversation with yourself don't mean you're schizophrenic. We can have a real conversation with ourselves and say, where did that come from? What is it trying to show me about myself? You can say, what belief underneath this needs attention? Maybe there's something I'm believing over here that is not lining up with where I want to be at, and I need to evaluate this thing. I know who I am, I know where I'm going, I know what I want to do, but this belief keeps coming up.
SPEAKER_00This old belief keeps, it's got a stronghold on me. I need to recognize that. What story am I telling myself?
SPEAKER_01I know what God wants me to do. I know where I want to be. I know what He's called me to be. But see, this story that keeps coming up says I'm not good enough. This story that keeps coming up says that I've messed up too much. I can't be what God wants me to be because I've gone too far back in my life. I've done too many things. I've failed too many times. I'm still making mistakes. How can I possibly be used by God? That's a story that is holding many people back. They can't move forward because they won't let go of everything back here. And it holds them in a place. And it makes that gap so hard to maneuver through. Because every time I take a foot, a step forward, the story grabs me and says, What are you doing?
SPEAKER_00You can't do that. You're not a man of God, you're an alcoholic. And all of a sudden, I move back again. We gotta learn to cut some of that stuff off. Because reactions are just symptoms.
SPEAKER_01The way I react to something is just a symptom. The deeper issue is underneath.
SPEAKER_00And the only way I figure that out is I ask these questions and I'm true with myself.
SPEAKER_01I'm not trying to be perfect, I'm being honest. And I recognize I got some issues, I got some mistakes, I've got some things that I've that I'm holding on to that I gotta figure out and I gotta let go of. I got some hurts that I've buried. Why? Because I don't want to feel that pain from that hurt.
SPEAKER_00So I buried it and I pushed it down for years and years. But I've never dealt with it. I've never let it get healed.
Problems Are Not Automatic Regression
SPEAKER_00One thing I believe is we have to stop always attaching problems to regression.
SPEAKER_01What's that mean? The church has done this so much. We look at people that's still struggling. They're still going through things. Maybe they got born again, they got baptized, they got they done all the church stuff. But when you see them during the week, you still see a little bit of struggling in them. They're not perfect. They're not living the life that we think they should be living. They just got born again. What's he doing going to that bar? We see little things like that, and we automatically attach the problems that we see to regression. We automatically say, oh, he's falling back. He's failing. So we take a problem and we attach it to regression automatically. And we begin to look at them in that way. But more than that, we begin to look at ourselves in the same way. Every time I have a problem, boom. I'm knocked back. Something else happens, boom, I'm knocked back. We look at regression and problems together. This is why so many people get discouraged. This is why so many churches are empty right now. Because people are discouraged and people feel like they're just not good enough.
SPEAKER_00This church is going to change that.
SPEAKER_01We're not going to look at people like that. That's what we're teaching. We want people to see who they are in Christ. Aside from the problems, aside from the mistakes, who are they?
SPEAKER_00What is their identity in Christ?
SPEAKER_01Something old resurfaces in us. And we think I'm back where I started at. That's why we got so many people coming up in some churches getting saved every Sunday. Every Sunday they feel like they got to go to the altar and get saved because they messed up sometime during the week. And just to be sure that I don't miss heaven, I need to be at that altar every Sunday.
SPEAKER_00I used to be there. Because that was my thought process.
SPEAKER_01Is every time I messed up, I lost what God gave me. So every Sunday I had to get it back. Or I thought I had to get it back. Because I didn't know who God was. I didn't truly understand who he was. I knew God, but I didn't understand who he was as a father. I didn't really know who I was. I didn't recognize my identity in Christ. I just looked at myself as a Christian. I was just doing what they told me to do. Things change when understanding comes and recognition of your identity.
SPEAKER_00Some of that thought process changes.
SPEAKER_01So I don't have to go back to the altar every Sunday. Nothing wrong with it if you feel like you need to, that's cool. But it's not necessary. So what surfaces may not mean that you went backwards. This is hard for some people to catch. If something surfaces up and resurfaces, it may not mean that you regressed. Sometimes things surface because you're finally strong enough to face it. You ever thought about that? Maybe you're at a time in your life where it's coming up now and you can deal with it where a year ago it would have broke you. It would have knocked you back years. But now you've matured a little bit. Now you've got a little bit more understanding. Now you've got a better understanding of your identity in Christ. And when this thing rises up now, boom, I can attack it. Why? Because it's no longer going to react, it caused me to react the way I used to. I'm different now. So that's why it's not a regression. Sometimes I believe it's coming up
Exposed Pain And The Addiction Cycle
SPEAKER_01at the right time. But we just got to see that we're in a place now we can deal with it and not let it move us. Pastor Ron Carpenter made a quote that I heard years ago, and I've always used it. It's amazing. He says, pain has to be exposed before it can be healed. Pain has to be exposed before it can be healed. I've really talked about this already, but that's so powerful. If I keep pushing it down and pushing it down and pushing it down, and that's human nature to do that because I don't want to deal with it, because why? It's so emotional. We've all got some traumatic events, some things that's happened, some maybe worse than others. We've all got those things that come up that we push down. Why? Because it's painful and I don't want to deal with it. So we push and push and push, and we never deal with it. And then all of a sudden, next season, something triggers it. It comes back up again, and I don't know how to, what do I do?
SPEAKER_00This happens a lot in the addiction cycle.
SPEAKER_01People suppress things, they push things down, they're doing good. Something triggers, boom, it pops back up. An emotional state happens. I don't know how to deal with those emotions. I'm tired of dealing with this. So I grab a drug or I grab a drink. Why? Because it suppresses the emotion. And boom, there's my cycle. Then I push it back down. I might leave the drug for a little while, leave the alcohol for a little while, boom, it comes up again. Same step, same step, same step. Drug, alcohol. Why? Because it relieves it. That's a cycle. That's the addiction process. And we look at people and say, stop doing that. Stop drinking, stop using, stop. Instead of saying, no, let's get down to what's really causing it. Let's get down to the thing that is being suppressed. Let's get rid of it so it won't keep coming up and it won't keep flipping me over here to the thing that's helping me. I say this so much in counseling when I'm counseling with people, and some people don't believe it and don't like the way I use it, but it's the truth. People use drugs because they work. People drink alcohol because it works. It does exactly what it's supposed to do. It relieves emotions. I'm feeling a certain way. I don't want to feel that way, or I want to feel a different way. And when I take the drug or I take the alcohol, what does it do? It changes my feelings. Do you know what a what a Tylenol does if I have a headache? The purpose of a Tylenol is to cause a change in the headache. What does it do? I take it and my headache goes away. I'm not trying to oversimplify it, but you gotta look at the whole picture. You can't just tell people stop doing this or stop doing that. You gotta look at what's driving it through the whole process.
SPEAKER_00Some issues stay buried while we're distracted.
SPEAKER_01Then when truth deepens, what was buried will come up. It didn't come up to defeat you. It's not there to defeat you, but again, it's there as an opportunity. This is I want you to understand too, this today is not just motivational self-help, self-help advice. It's more than that. I mean, it sounds like I'm reading a self-help book up here. It's more than that. It's scriptural. I've always said it. My counseling and my preaching go one-on-one. I can take a message to a counseling session, and I can take a counseling session and preach on it.
SPEAKER_00Because they're connected. I believe God was the first psychologist.
SPEAKER_01You look at scripture and you see so many things in scripture that psychology borrowed from scripture.
SPEAKER_00Because it's about the thinking. No, no, brother, it's about the feeling.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it is about the feeling. But what causes the feeling, what changes the feeling is my thinking. That's different. That's behind the curtain. The feeling's up front. The thought process is back here. That's what we're trying to get to. Paul said in Romans 12, 2, and I gave it to Ronnie to put up there, but most of us know this. Do not be conformed to the world, but be transformed by a renewing of your mind. This is this is, you know, everybody's asked questions sometimes. It says, What is your favorite verse in the Bible? This is mine. This is my go-to verse right here. No matter the situation, no matter the circumstance, this is my go-to verse. Do not be conformed to the world. Do not be molded and shaped after the people around you. But be transformed by a not by the spirit. It don't say be transformed by coming to an altar. I'm not discounting the altar. Listen to me though. This verse, though, is not talking about
Renewing The Mind Changes Perception
SPEAKER_01that. This verse is talking about being transformed by a renewing of the mind. That you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. I cannot prove what is the perfect will of God and live out what is the perfect will of God without transforming my thinking, without repenting. That's what repentance is: changing the way I think. That's it. It's as simple as that. So Paul said, be transformed by renewing of the mind. Romans 12 doesn't say try harder, it says be transformed. That means transformation often happens through a new perception. Perception is the way I see things. We all have a different perception. We can look at a picture. I could post a picture up here on the screen and say, what is your first thought of this picture? And everybody in here would probably have a little different perception. Because what you see is going to be based off of what you've been through. I've used that example so many times, even in a sermon. If I say the word father, and I say he's a good father, you know some people don't agree with that. Not because they don't think he's a good father, but because they don't know what a good father is. They've never had a good father. They had a father who beat the living crap out of them. They had a father who was an alcoholic. They had a father who was never there, who abandoned them. They had a father who was never what he needed to be. So when you say good father, they say bull.
SPEAKER_00Okay. If I say the word love, love to me and love to you is different.
SPEAKER_01How did you experience love? Some people never experienced it in a specific kind of way.
SPEAKER_00Some people don't know how to give it because they never had it. Some people can't receive it because they don't feel worthy of it. So perception is so important. Maybe you always see criticism as rejection. Now you can see it as information. That's what I mean when I'm talking about asking questions.
SPEAKER_01Asking these hard questions about myself. It's not to criticize myself or condemn myself, but it's information used to improve myself. Some people see delay. I'm not where I want to be yet. I figured I would be this far yet. They see delay as abandonment. God's abandoned me in my hardest times.
SPEAKER_00But now you can see it as a process. You see what I'm talking about?
SPEAKER_01Perception? You perceive it as abandonment, or you perceive it as a process? You perceive it as rejection or you perceive it as information and opportunity. That is totally up to me. That's why I started off this morning and I said, you will be impacted by this message as much as you want to.
SPEAKER_00It's totally up to you.
SPEAKER_01That's why you can preach a sermon and somebody on this side of the room is over here, and you can just look at them and you can see they're like a sponge. They're taking it in, taking it in, and somebody on this side is over there snoring. It happens. I don't ever say nothing. I ain't gonna call somebody out, but it happens. I mean, I can remember out at first community one time. Somebody said right beside me, fell back in that head, hit. I mean, you can hear it. It echoed in the church because her head hit the back of the pew. I didn't bust her head open. It woke her up. But anyway, perception is so important. How I perceive things. That's why when I preach something, I am not naive and dumb enough to think that everybody in this room is gonna see it like I see it. That's the part of teaching. That's why you try to break it down and teach it in a certain way. I can't listen, I go through this thing, I read it, whatever, I go through this hundreds of times. And I keep thinking, even during church, when praise of worship, something comes to me, I'll go over there and start changing something. Because I'm trying to bring it out in a way that makes sense. It may make sense to me, but just because I say it like that it makes sense to me, don't mean you're gonna get it. That ain't nothing to do with intelligence. It's just I see it a certain way. And maybe you may not see it that way yet. So I try to break it down in a Way that makes sense. Maybe you've failed at times, so many times that you've taken on failure as part of your identity. A new perception lets you see this thing as an experience rather than I'm a failure. It's not your identity. That's not who you, I don't care how many times you failed. You are not a failure. You are somebody who has failed in the past. But you are a child of God created in the image and the likeness of God Himself. Yeah, but brother, I've been an addict for so many years. No, you are somebody who used. Again, I say it all the time, that's why I don't like AA. Because I don't want to walk in and say I'm brown and I'm an addict. No, I'm not an addict. I used to be somebody who used, but now I'm a man of God. Now I know who I am. Now I recognize my identity. And I will not stand up every day and call myself something that I'm not. I got in trouble before because we job that I worked, we had to teach AA groups, and they, I just about got rolled up because I refused to make them stand up and say they was an addict. I refused it. Why? Because my bel I understand where it comes from and why they say it, stuff like that, but my belief in understanding my identity in Christ challenged that. And I couldn't, I just can't do it. I'm not going to look at myself that way, and I'm not going to look at somebody else that way. And I don't want them to continue every day to see themselves like that.
SPEAKER_00Why is this important to see? Because when perception changes, my response will change.
SPEAKER_01That's growth. That's what we're trying to get to. We're trying to get to a place of growth, a place of maturity. When my perception changes, my response will change.
What Growth Looks Like In Real Life
SPEAKER_01So what does growth look like in a practical way? Because you may sit here and say, Well, this sounds good, but how does it really impact my life? It may look like this. Instead of being angry for three days like we are sometimes because something happened, now you calm yourself down within 30 minutes. I still got mad, but guess what? Boom, took 30 minutes, I'm calm. Well, there's been times where I listen, I used to have a bad anger problem. I had a horrible temper. And if I got mad, I'd stay mad for days. Now I can take a couple of minutes, calm down, and I'm good to go. That's growth. It's not perfect yet. I still got mad. But I'm making progress. It went from three days to 30 minutes. That's progress. Situations that would normally cause you to panic instantly. Now you're able to pause, breathe, and go to the truth and use the word to calm yourself. That's growth. That's practical, that's life. Other people no longer control your emotions. One setback no longer derails your life. That's growth. When we have to realize this, and it's not about perfection, it's not about being perfect, it's about making progress in the right direction. I want you to see one more verse with me.
SPEAKER_00Luke 6, verse 45. It's an important verse right here.
SPEAKER_01A good man out of his good treasure of his heart brings forth good. An evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
SPEAKER_00Why in the world did I say that? Because it's in your heart. It may not be words that you use every day. It may not be your normal language.
SPEAKER_01But it was in there because out of the heart, the mouth speaks. Sometimes what I say just is an indication that there's still something in there. That I need to I need to take inventory and say what's on the inside. Sometimes we don't like what comes out under pressure. But instead of condemning, let's be curious.
SPEAKER_00Let's ask questions. If bitterness comes out, ask what hurt remains.
SPEAKER_01If fear comes out, where do I feel unsafe at? If pride comes out, ask what insecurity is it protecting? These things actually mean something. What comes out is often asking to be healed. But we have to take the time to see that. We can't just push it down and ignore
Go To The Root Not The Fruit
SPEAKER_01it. So what do we do when the gap gets triggered? That was the what this message is all about. I'm gonna get ready to close right here. What do we do when the gap gets triggered? Just notice it. Without judging yourself, beating yourself up, condemning yourself, putting yourself three or four years back.
SPEAKER_00Just notice it. Be aware of it. Name it. Figure out what's underneath, what's pushing it, what's driving it.
SPEAKER_01Every just about every session I do in counseling, I use this, and y'all have heard this before, but maybe you somebody hadn't. I use this little example, and I draw a tree, and I ask people what kind of tree it is. I just draw a trunk and draw, you know, and they say, I don't know. And then I put dots on it, and I say, What kind of tree is it? And they say, Oh, it's an apple tree. It's not really an apple tree, but because I put dots on it, it looks like an apple tree, so that's what they say. And that's exactly what I want them to say. Why? Because a tree is known by its fruit. We know it's an apple tree because it's got apples. We know it's a lemon tree if it's got lemons. You're never gonna see an apple tree with a lemon on it. So we know the tree by its fruit. I know people in their life by their fruit. I can tell what kind of life they live and what kind of person they are by their fruit. And what we do a lot of times is we take that fruit and we start naming it, and we say addiction, uh, depression, anger, whatever. We start naming it, and then we want to say, okay, we got to get rid of this fruit. So we go up there and we say, addiction, send him to rehab. Boop, picked it off the tree. Depression, put him on medication, boop, we picked it off the tree. Anger, send him to anger management, boop, picked it off the tree. And then next season, you know what happens? The fruit grows back again. So if I want to kill the fruit of anger and aggression and uh addiction and depression, I can't just keep picking it off. Yes, it's great. I gotta recognize it, like I just said. But I can't just pick it off. I've got to go down to the roots of the tree, kill the root. Why? Because the root is feeding the tree, nutrients and water. I cut the roots up, the tree dies. When the tree dies, the fruit dies. So what am I doing? I'm killing it, but I'm going to the source of it. That's what we're talking about here. When these things come up, I can't just keep pushing them down, pushing them down, pushing them down. I gotta go to the source of it. And say, what is driving this thing? What is feeding this thing? I gotta practice new responses. Small, consistent shifts matter. You're not gonna get healed like that sometimes. Sometimes you might, but most of us is progressive. Stay patient. Deep patterns usually shift gradually. Listen, if you're if you've been in this church long enough, you know. I teach a lot of things about that. There's old patterns of learning that we gotta let go of. There's things that I was taught and I learned back years and years ago in church about the Bible, that now I gotta let go of some of that stuff that I believed because it ain't lining up with the truth. But to let go of those patterns is a process. You can't just look at somebody and say, don't believe that no more. It don't happen like that. I started out thinking it did. Now it's like, you gotta stop. You gotta stop believing that. But now I realize it's it's progressive. You got to keep showing truth, keep showing truth, keep showing truth. And that old pattern begins to fade. So,
Closing Charge And Next Steps
SPEAKER_01in closing, let me say this. Last week we said the gap is where transformation happens. Today I want to add this. Sometimes pressure is what reveals the gap. And when the gap gets exposed, don't panic. It may be the very moment that growth is becoming visible. Sometimes we, it's hard to see growth sometimes. Healing is not proven by never being tested. Healing is revealed by how differently you move through what once ruled you. These things that kept me down and kept me pushed back. And now I'm in a place where they're not affecting me the same way anymore. That's growth. See, I look and say, well, the problem's still there, so I'm not growing. No, the problem's not affecting you like it was. That's growth. Is it still there? Yes. But guess what? We're gonna kick that thing sooner or later if I keep moving forward. But if I stay back here and let it keep a hold of me, I'm never progressing forward. And it's gonna keep taking control of me.
SPEAKER_00That's what's happening in the gap.
SPEAKER_01Because healing, again, is not proven by never being tested. I know people who feel like because they don't have any problems, they're doing perfect. And they're just life is great. No, I don't I don't believe that. Number one, I don't believe they never have any problems. They're just really good at hiding them.
SPEAKER_00We all have issues. We all have problems.
SPEAKER_01So maybe maturity is not that nothing ever gets stirred up again. It don't mean that I'm mature because no problems ever come. No, that's not it. Maybe that's not what we're talking about. Maybe maturity is when something does happen, it no longer owns me like it did. Things are gonna happen. But see, I have the authority over those things now. When I understand my identity in Christ, those things do not hold me anymore. Those things do not control my life anymore. They don't own me anymore. I take authority over it. That's why I've I adopted this mindset a long ago.
SPEAKER_00Every problem is a stepping stone. Every problem is a stepping stone.
SPEAKER_01It may take me a little while to get through it, but when I do, I'm gonna step up on that thing and step up on the next one, and step up and step and what? I'm going higher. What is our goal? To get to a higher place of understanding, get to a higher place of revelation. So every opportunity doesn't beat me down.
SPEAKER_00I may have to battle a little while in it, but I'm going to defeat it because I know who I am.
SPEAKER_01And then sometimes I just have to stop and realize the battle is not mine. I'm over there battling and fighting this thing, and finally I gotta say, God, this is what your word says, and boom, I see the thing handled.
SPEAKER_00This gap is so important. I don't know why I'm stuck on this gap, but I'm telling you, this is I believe this is a missing part of what a lot of people are missing.
SPEAKER_01I really do. And I don't say that arrogantly. I just I really this makes so much sense of where people are. And it also helps us to see that when people's in this gap and they're in this process of where I think I am or what I believe, but where what I know is the truth, and I'm caught somewhere in the middle, that we're not beating them down because of it, that we see it as a process.
SPEAKER_00And we help them maneuver through it instead of pushing them back.
SPEAKER_01These two sermons, last week and this week, they they go together. You need to go back and read it. If you'd like to read or listen or watch or whatever, you need to see last week's and understand the gap and then look at this week and understand what happens in the gap when I get triggered. I don't know where we're going next week, but I bet you, almost bet you, it's gonna be something about the gap. Because I'm I'm seeing this process now and we're walking through it. And how do I maneuver through this? How do I see this thing differently so that I can help myself but also help other people?
SPEAKER_00That's what matters. There's hurting people. And it's like the old saying goes, you know, hurt people, hurt people. And we have a chance to heal people.
SPEAKER_01We have a chance to help people. And if we understand this part of it, we understand this process, it's easier to go in there and do that because we see what's going on. We're not condemning them, we're not putting them down, we're not rejecting them. We see what's going on, we understand the process, and it's so much easier to help when you understand it. So go back and listen, watch, read, whatever you want to do. Ask questions on this. Challenge me on this. Because if you challenge me on it, it's gonna push me to look at it even deeper. Ask questions, come up with questions. If it don't make sense, say, hey, this don't make sense. Because I I truly feel like this this is a I'm not even, I don't, I don't preach series, but if this is probably about as close to a a series as I would say, that because it's something I see so clearly.
SPEAKER_00Ask questions about it. Understand it. And let's move forward because I believe this is important.
SPEAKER_01I believe this is a is a pivotal point for this ministry of who we are, who we're called to be, what our purpose is. I'm not talking about another church, I'm talking about this church, what our purpose is as as ministers in this church, what we're called to do. I believe this defines right here clearly who we are and what we're called to do.