Pastor to Pastor
This podcast is dedicated to iron sharpening iron, current events, and culture trends. You will hear pastors perspectives on a variety of topics including leadership development, evangelism, outreach and so much more.
Pastor to Pastor
Season 3 Kickoff: Pursuing God’s Presence and Discipleship
Welcome to the season 3 premiere of Pastor to Pastor! Join hosts Pastor Jason Watson (Cross Pointe Church, NC) and Pastor Seth Odom (Reliant Church, NC) as they dive into the theme of pursuing God's presence and living out true discipleship in 2025. This episode reflects on:
- Sermon Reviews: Insights into their New Year messages, including Pastor Jason's exploration of Ezekiel 47 and the progression into deeper waters of faith and God's presence.
- Fasting and Seeking God: Why fasting is more than a seasonal activity and how it aligns with discipleship.
- India Mission Reflections: Stories of powerful encounters with God’s presence overseas.
- Navigating Change: Pastor Seth's practical wisdom on trusting God through life's transitions.
Be inspired as they share heartfelt discussions on repentance, humility, and the importance of being a presence-driven church that seeks God's face above all else.
Don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe to stay updated on new episodes of Pastor to Pastor. Your support helps us bring these powerful discussions to a wider audience.
#PastorToPastor #GodsPresence #Discipleship #SermonReview #FaithJourney #ChurchLeadership #ChristianPodcast #HolySpirit #Ezekiel47 #SeekGod #MinistryLife #IndiaMission #NavigatingChange #PresenceDrivenChurch
I can't believe it. It is another episode of Pastor to Pastor. Here we are in season three. Come on, man, pastor Seth man. Look, hey, I'm Pastor Jason, if you're not familiar, pastor Jason, crosspoint Church here in North Carolina. Along with me, co-host Pastor Seth Odom Reliant Church here in North Carolina as well.
Speaker 2:Look, we're so excited to be having the third season can you believe that we're still friends at the third season?
Speaker 1:man, I'll tell you hey, well, you know it is what it is. But uh, look, man, I think this year we've kind of talked about it and kind of looked over some different things and and and knowing what we preach on sundays is just the kind of the surface, I think, of what we really are getting into with our congregation anyway, having like a sermon review is really a good thing to get into, and so that's kind of what we talked about doing for season three, at least initially, is just kind of doing some sermon reviews, kind of recapping, and digging a little bit deeper into what we preached on Sunday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's some trending things that are happening around the community and things like that around the world that impact people's lives. We'll definitely add those things in there. But it's kind of like you know, podcasting becomes this thing that you manufacture, but when you do the sermon, reviews and things, it's things that are already on your heart, things that God's already revealing, and we want to make it a little more widespread than just our congregation, because I don't know about you, but I think my sermons can help other people as well.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Not just in my flock that God's entrusted me with, but with other people as well. I think. The same thing with your sermons. I think you do all right preaching I do.
Speaker 1:Okay, you know I do what I can you do. What you do what you do, you can do it. Actually it's funny. I preached today. I said I'm not ferdick and I'm not billy graham, I'm jason and I'm just, I'm giving you what god has given.
Speaker 2:Uh, and anyway it ain't coming from the refrigerator, coming from the refrigerator.
Speaker 1:manual sermon centralcom you know what I'm saying? I ain't typing my sermon. That's right, i'll'll tell you that I hear you, no, man. So let's kick it into gear, man. Let's talk about how was your holidays.
Speaker 2:It was good. Yeah, I know that holiday season gets like the Christmas. It gets so hectic for people Christmas and New.
Speaker 1:Year's, all this kind of stuff Especially. Not only are you going to holiday events, but you know when it comes to ministry, you're planning holiday events. So now you're you're wide open during the holiday season.
Speaker 2:Yep, all your teams are wanting to have their own individual Christmas parties and give stuff. Yeah, I get it. It's pretty hectic for the most part but as far as our family and stuff, man, we had a great time. It wasn't hectic for us. We kind of have our schedule and our things that we do, that we don't run ourselves to death. But we had a great time. Man had the family together and New Year's. I don't know about you but I didn't party hard like you probably did.
Speaker 1:I was in bed over like 10 o'clock. You know what I'm saying. I'm a little bit dude. When the bedtime comes around, it comes around, and if I want to be worth anything the next day, I better go to bed when it comes around.
Speaker 2:That's right. You could have just took a day off, like you do any other day.
Speaker 1:You wake up and decide you don't want to go to work. I hear you Now what about you?
Speaker 2:Did you have a good time?
Speaker 1:Man, we had a great time Holiday season, full of family man, full of of fun, but yeah, very busy but very blessed. That's that's how I pretty much sum up. Anytime somebody says how you doing, we're busy, but we're blessed, amen, and so that's that kind of wraps it up. Man, we had a great time with family, great food, of course, you know I like the food so you know you do.
Speaker 2:You talk about food when you got in the studio yes, yes, pizza, yeah, yeah, well you know we're coming in out of all the eating season and now most ministries are going into a fasting season. I wonder if that's by design.
Speaker 1:Is it really because we're going into a new year, or is it? Just like you feel bad about the gluttony you did from Thanksgiving to Christmas. Right yeah, Right.
Speaker 2:So our ministry, we're going to launch a seven-day fast starting next Monday, and we're excited about that. Teaching on fasting what's the purpose of it? Why prayer is strategically involved in fasting and really fasting being a reality of that, we're not getting more of God, we're giving God more of us so that he can take the things that we have and really make some changes in our lives and stuff. So is your ministry, you guys, guys, going through some fasting and stuff.
Speaker 1:Currently no, and I know that we're probably one of the very few churches not like pushing a fast right now. Man, look for me at the end of last year and I can't believe we're already saying last year, it's already what? The 5th of 2025. Yeah, christmas will be here again for you, you know it. But going into the new year at the end of last year, going into this year, just God impressed upon me the importance of his presence and seeking his face and discipleship, and so our focus for this current year and there will be I'm trying to create disciples in the sense that it's not a seasonal thing we do, but it's something that's a part of our lifestyle, and so that's kind of what I'm growing. I was talking with another pastor, our worship leader, our worship pastor Cedric. We were talking this morning before service and I'm like I don't want to be, I don't want cross point, I don't want my own life, I don't want us to be like a flash in the pan.
Speaker 2:We're hot one minute, the heat's off and we're cold the next.
Speaker 1:Like I, want to create like a slow burn, if there's a if that's the only way I can say it but create a sustainable fire. Where we are, we are constantly like we're fasting all the time, Not because it's it's the cool thing to do at 21, but because it's a part of who we are. Um, and so that's kind of really our focus. We are focused right now on the presence of God, seeking his face, and that requires a fast. I think we'll certainly hit it as we talk about discipleship over 2025, which is the focus for us is discipleship. We'll talk about it, but currently that's a long way to say no, we aren't starting a quote-unquote fast, but anyway how about you?
Speaker 2:It's such an encouragement because when we talked about this pre pre-recording is that fasting shouldn't be just one thing you do at the beginning of the year and then that's it. Yeah, we, we need to be people of fasting once a month or whatever. What get get this continual fast going, um, and there's all types of different fasting and we're going to break that down for our church of biblical fast and stuff like that, that. But I think it's so important as Christians that we, when you talk about pursuing the presence of God, some of the greatest times and the strongest presence you could feel is in those moments where you take away things that you've been chasing every other day of the week and set aside and say, in that time I'm going to be chasing after you, pursuing you in prayer and worship. So, yeah, I think it's important for all of us to continue to fast, not just once the first year, but, hey, at least 12 times a year.
Speaker 1:There's some type of fast happening in your life, right right and we started doing this thing called Friday Night Fire.
Speaker 2:Oh my God. Well, you know something's going to happen there. You throw fire in there, friday Night Fire. In fact, we had Friday Night Fire.
Speaker 1:We had it this past Friday yeah all the strangers we had a decent turnout, you know, for the first one, but it was quite interesting. Some people showed up and they're like I thought there was going to be like a fire outside and I said no, no, no, the fire's on the inside. That's right.
Speaker 2:So it's kind of comical. You had the Pentecostal church too.
Speaker 1:You had the Pentecostal church. That's right. But yeah, so we do. And my encouragement to our Crosspoint people here is that when we especially I mean, this is a one-time-a-month thing, but I want you to do it all the time but specifically what I'm asking is, on the Friday night fires, that those days you fast, you pray, you seek the face of God. So, when we come in here to pray.
Speaker 1:You know your mind is right and you're focused, and so there are times where we are preparing for a fast, but, like I said, man, I want this to become a part of our lifestyle and not just something we do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love it, man. So let's talk about some sermon content. Man, I know you're excited to kick off the first sermon of 2025. You put the gas pedal down, son, and laid it down, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, in fact, my head's still kind of hurting from preaching earlier today.
Speaker 2:I hear you, let's hear about it, man. What did you talk about?
Speaker 1:So, again, we were going into 2025, and our goal really is to seek the face of God. So for us, I kind of opened up. I've been in this book called God Chasers and this is a very it. It's a. I can't remember when it was right I want to say 90s, written in the 90s, so it's an older book and but, man, it is. It is full of insight, it is full of fire, and if you read that book and it doesn't make you want to seek the face of god more, then I don't know. I don't know what it's to tell you to read.
Speaker 1:We need to put a link somewhere for these people yeah, we should, but it was man, it was an awesome book and it really gassed me up, I think, going into this because I already knew discipleship was where we were headed Right and his presence was where we were headed. So this book hit at the right time, the right nerves, the right scriptures we needed and I just kind of pulled from it and for this particular sermon and we were going to went to Ezekiel 47, where he talks about the angel, or the angelic man, the heavenly host, like carrying him to the front door of the temple. And from the temple was flowing this, this living water. And the further they went out into the water, the it touched the, the first his ankle, and then he went a little bit further, another thousand cubits, and it hit him in the knees and then he went out another thousand cubits. He was in water up to his waist and he went out another thousand cubits to where it was uncrossable because the flow, the stream, the river was so strong, the current was so strong he said you couldn't pass it.
Speaker 1:And so what we were talking about was the presence of God and how some people will stop when they dip their toe in the water.
Speaker 1:Some people will stop when they let their ankles get in the water, they'll stop at their knees, they'll stop at their waist, because we still have control Right, because at that point, at any moment, we still have our feet on the ground, we still have our feet in the soil, so we can maneuver, we can back out of the river if we want to, we can do whatever. We're still in control. But I said, what if a church became so saturated with God? We saw, we, we sought his face so hard that we just jumped into the river and allowed the Holy spirit to take us wherever he desired for us to go. And so that's really kind of what I, in a quick sense man, it's kind of what I was talking about today, about how we need to be seeking the face of God, like in Romans 11.33,. I'll read this real quick. Hold on. Let me hit him real quick with the first one of the 2025.
Speaker 2:Come on back to Bible.
Speaker 1:Come on, somebody, give it to him, give it to him. So in Romans 11, 33, Paul says this. He says oh, the depth of the riches of both the wisdom and the knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. And that's really what I talked about.
Speaker 1:I dug into the deep things of God, how we will stop at the door. We won't go in. And even Jesus talks about some of the Pharisees You'll stand in the door of salvation and you won't let others enter in. He calls them hypocrites. And so I talk about how, when God shows up, when we get a message in tongues, when someone's shouting, whatever the case is, we stop right there because we think man, god's here, and then we start looking for other signs or we start looking for other gifts. I said but push past the gifts, stop seeking the hands of God and how he can minister to you, and seek the face of God and how you can minister to him. That's right and that's really man kind of. The topic of today was how do we do that? Isaiah said this we talk about the presence of God in services. You remember India? You remember that service in India where the presence of God was so strong. I haven't had a service before it like that, and I ain't had one after like that.
Speaker 2:It was amazing.
Speaker 1:And for that lady, for me to have that vision of Jesus standing behind that lady, and then for that lady to give that message in tongues, then translate it in Telugu, for me to have that vision of Jesus standing behind that lady, and then for that lady to give that message in tongues, then translate it in Telugu, for it to be translated to us, and then another pastor come off the stage, come over and say I heard exactly what she said, but he heard it in English, and then translate it in English. It's like we were in Acts. Yeah, I mean, it was like wave after wave after wave of God's glory, just feeling the space where we were. I remember, pastor, that we were concerned that the building was on fire because we were smelling smoke, and it wouldn't have surprised us, I don't think, had we found the building on fire because the presence of God.
Speaker 1:I've never been in one of those services, man, and I haven't been since and I just, I wonder, I long really for the presence of God in that capacity, because, even though we were scared, we knew we were right, where we were supposed to be, we were, we were in the presence of the father in that moment. And I wonder? I've wondered so oftentimes why don't we experience that anywhere else we go? Why do we have to cross the ocean to go to places that are hungry and thirsty? Why can't we be hungry and thirsty here? Why can't we seek the face of God so strongly? Because I'm telling you, if people were to experience today what we experience there, you won't have to market your church.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the way they would approach the presence of God would be completely different. Now, I'm not saying that we do it perfectly at all times when it comes to approaching the presence of God. As pastors, we miss it all the time. But once you taste and see once you get involved in that. There's always this hunger for more and honestly, it's like kind of what you you're saying, it's like never satisfied here because you've experienced it over there and it's like man, we're missing it, like we think we have these throw down services where god is everywhere, but it's like it's not this, not, even touch, dude.
Speaker 1:When in the presence of god it's like. It's like isaiah said. When isaiah comes into the, the vision in the presence of God, he says he's like woe is me, for I'm a man of unclean lips. In Isaiah 6, I covered that today. Man, I talked about it in Isaiah 6, 1, where he said I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple. His glory, his power, his sovereignty, his majesty filled the temple.
Speaker 1:And we skip down to verse 4.
Speaker 1:It says and the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out and the house was filled with smoke. And then he says the first thing that he notices in the presence of God and I shared this in a sermon today it's not, oh, I'm going to ask God this or I'm going to ask God that. No, the first thing that Isaiah noticed was his sin and he's like woe is me, for I'm a man of unclean lips and, if you remember, we've got an actual video clip and I don't have to do some digging to find it. But there are people at the altar during that service and they're screaming yes, say I, yes, say I, yes, say I. They're screaming the name of Jesus in Telugu, because that's what they witnessed. They're asking for Jesus because the first thing you notice is your sin when you're in the presence of God, like that. And so, man, if we were to experience the presence and it's still filtered, because you know there's no way we could be in his full presence and live.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:But even if, man, if we could experience that, what the house of God would be like?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think some of our issues as the modern day church is. There's two key components that we need when we approach the presence of God. I believe one, that is, repentance.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And that is humility.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And we're in this trending and following grace field all this stuff where we make it about us Right, and when you start making church and services and the presence about ourselves, we're very selfish people. It's about us and not about Christ. You're going to get this filtered version of the Holy Spirit. It's this manufactured is what I like to say. A lot of churches have, where when I say manufactured, I mean it's nothing but emotion.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's just nothing but hype. It's nothing but just us building ourselves up instead of just humbling ourselves at the feet of the Father and just letting him minister to us. That's the difference. That's where we're missing it. The humility, the repentance, the making it about Jesus. Yes, say I, yes, say I. All we want, all we need is you. I don't care who is going to persecute me when I leave right now, because they see me worshiping jesus here in this church. I don't care what who's around me I'm all I need is jesus right now.
Speaker 2:That's when you know that you're in the right vein. That's when you know you're in the right place, when all you care about is what jesus has for you in that moment being in his presence yeah, and that's that our hearts not burned right when we, when we heard him speak. When he was with us, man, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so, man, I go back to that moment. I've been to that moment several times, thinking back through it. I remember, leading up to that moment, we weren't even going to preach that night and you were like no, we're here to preach, I'll preach, you know so.
Speaker 2:Y'all were like hey, we talked while you were down there While you were in the bathroom. Okay, I'll preach and I remember I know y'all are tired, but we'll preach and we were exhausted.
Speaker 1:We were exhausted, that's what I was going to say I don't know if you remember or not, but yeah, you do. We were so exhausted and we had been there for a few days.
Speaker 2:So it's not like I.
Speaker 1:I think it was something in the spirit. We were so tired. And then, while I'm thinking about this, the other day it came to me when Jesus was on the top of the mountain of transfiguration, the disciples were doing what? Sleeping, they were falling asleep. And when we were on the way to that service, we were falling asleep. And so I don't know what is in that. I don't know. There's something there, though. There's some lines, some strings. I need to research in that.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I was the only saved that day. Y'all were just sleeping and I was trying to embrace the presence of the Lord.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you remember, man, our buddy's nose just started pouring blood in the middle of the service. We had to leave because his nose wouldn't, and so when you get in the presence of God like that, you realize all this. We stop at the gifts, man. We stop at the gifts and we look for his hands and the gifts that he has us instead of seeking his face, man, I don't know If we could have bottled that up that day and brought it back here and shared with people. It would have it for me, solidified that we don't have. We think we know who God is, but he is just too indescribable. He's too powerful, he's too sovereign, he's too holy. We cannot begin to fully fathom and understand the power of Yahweh, the power of God that we serve.
Speaker 2:Amen, yeah, we need it.
Speaker 1:But man, that's what we talked about. We just hit on that and not talked about what being in the flow does for people. Basically, when you get further in Ezekiel 47, he says when I return, talking about along the riverbanks, he said there were many trees on one side and on the other. And he said to me, the water flows toward the eastern region, goes down the valley and enters into the sea. When it touches the sea sea, its waters are healed and it shall be, uh, that every living thing that moves wherever the river goes will live. I told people today you know what, if you want a healing, your healings in his presence. If you need a, if you need a blessing financially, your that blessing is wrapped up in his presence. And so, instead of seeking the healings, instead of seeking the blessings, instead of seeking those things, seek his face seek him, because those things come with him but they're not him.
Speaker 1:There are benefits and blessings to being tapped into the vine, and blessings that come with the Holy Spirit, but the blessings are just a byproduct of his presence. Let's seek his presence and then let's go further. Let's go from his presence and be like Moses and let me see your glory. Take me from here to there, from glory to glory, from faith to faith. And I didn't even share this, so you're getting a little extra, but I prayed, man, I'm like Lord. What is 1,000 cubits? Why are we measuring? Why are we measuring? Why are we measuring? Because it's a measure of faith. You go further in faith and further in faith and further in faith, and to the point where you're like. You know, you're like Smith Wigglesworth. Everybody thinks crazy, but he's operating at a level and he's in the presence of God, at a level that nobody else is, because he's operating in that measure of faith, that gift.
Speaker 2:It's that gift of faith.
Speaker 1:Are you trying to make me that?
Speaker 2:might be when you reach the gift of faith. Hey, come on man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah yeah, you know, I'm tethered here on a cord, I can't go so far.
Speaker 2:So don't get me gassed up anymore. Don't leave me now. Don't take a lap around the church while we're here.
Speaker 1:But anyway, man, that's been our vision. That was a sermon today. This is our vision going into 2025. I'd love to tell you, man, that the walls fell and that everybody was slain in the spirit and God showed up, but his presence it was almost like lighting a match. I can't tell you that we were engulfed by any stretch by any means compared to that experience that we had in India, but I'm starting to realize that it's like John Wesley said. He said I will set myself on fire and others can come and watch me burn. And that's where I'm at. I'm seeking the face of God so hard this year that people may think I'm crazy. People can think whatever they want to think. At the end of the day, we have to stand before God.
Speaker 2:And none of these people looking at us will be there with us, and so the beautiful thing about his presence, jay, is that your experience in his presence can change based off the need and based on where you are spiritually. There are moments in his presence where all I do is cry.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:All I do is just embrace him. There's moments where all I do is just talk. There's moments where I'm just silent, I'm just listening.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:There's moments where I'm just silent, I'm just listening. There's moments where I'm just fired up. What you're talking about, there's no cookie-cutter way when you're in the presence.
Speaker 2:This is what happens Because God looks at the individual. There's different ways that the presence is expressed to you, based on your need, and so I want to encourage you. Pastor Jason's encouraging his congregation, we want to encourage you today to start seeking the face of the Father. Seek his presence. Pastor Jason said the blessings are found in his presence. Don't just go look for the blessing. Actually, the blessing is his presence.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Who is the man that you are mindful of him?
Speaker 2:He is our reward yeah, who is the man that you are mindful of, him, that you would even consider dwelling with us? That is the blessing, right. And we know that the greatest blessing we have is that God is with us at all times, that his presence is tangible at times where we can feel him and sense him in the midst of our troubles. Seek him today, yeah, pursue his presence.
Speaker 1:In the book of Exodus and I think it's chapter 20, because in one verse, a few chapters before, they're told not to go to the mountain. But a little bit further in chapter 20, there's an opportunity where the people have an option with Moses. When God descends on the mountain and there's a cloud, there's thunder and there's lightning, there's all these different things where they could go and see God, where they could go on the mountain and go see God, they get scared and they send Moses. They're like no, no, no, no, no, you do the talking for us. We're going to stay back here where it's safe and safely distant from God. But man, look, I'm encouraging our people that when God shows up, we run in, we run into his glory, we don't run away.
Speaker 1:That's right, and so, man, that's kind of a nutshell of what I preached on today.
Speaker 2:I love it, man, that's good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's where we're headed in. 2025 is right now. We're talking over all the year about discipleship, becoming true disciples of Christ. We had a leadership meeting right after, and that was my question to them Like what areas? When you think of a disciple, what does that remind you of? What comes to mind when I say disciple?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And then, where are you in your discipleship? What are you lacking? To be like Peter. What are you lacking to be like Paul?
Speaker 2:I got a question for you. Go ahead. Okay, you know most churches. When you look on their website or you look up who they are, their vision and things like that, you'll see this phrase a presence-driven church. What defines a presence-driven church? What defines a presence-driven church? I know I'm throwing this question to you off the cuff, but you're in a topic of presence and what your church is pursuing. What defines a church being a presence-driven church?
Speaker 1:And I would assume and then I don't know, because I can't think of any websites that I've seen any churches say that.
Speaker 2:But when I hear presence through— Well, I ain't about to call them out, but they are there. Well, I don't know man, I don't know because— you see it a lot in the charismatic churches.
Speaker 1:I would say, because they would think that it's a spirit-led or a church, an apostolic kind of. We speak in tongues, we do this, we do that, and so all the gifts, shema.
Speaker 2:Lema Ding Dong. We believe. Well, easy now.
Speaker 1:We believe in the gifts right, but I would assume that that's what they mean. It's really more of a gifting church than it is a spiritually gifting church.
Speaker 2:So what would define a church to actually be a presence-driven church? What does that church look like?
Speaker 1:I think to me, man, when I think of a presence-driven church, it's a church where we create space to let God do what God wants to do. Amen, when I have an outline. But you know what? I'm going to stand here until I feel God move.
Speaker 2:You don't give him room, you give him the room, the room exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, to me, me, that's a presence driven church. Yeah, and, and, and. When we closed that 2024, I told him things are going to probably look different 2025 because and not to say that we don't have, uh, an outline, and not to say that we don't come in with a plan, but at any given moment I told him this if god doesn't show up, we might as well not show up.
Speaker 2:Might as well, go home, son.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because if he doesn't show up we are wasting our time. And even if the gifts show up, dude, I have seen people man wallow around in the floor and talk about, oh man, that was a service that was good, and then go and start gossiping at lunch about somebody that is not you. The presence of god changes us. We will never be the same because of that service we were in right and, and we will never be the same because christ lives in us. But when, man, when you are, when you are, when you truly enter the raw, real presence of god, man, man, when you have a true encounter, it changes who you are.
Speaker 2:Yeah, amen. And the reason I ask that question is because I know that people are still looking for churches and looking for ministries and I wanted them to be able to determine what—we're talking about the presence, when you see that I'm a presence-driven church be able to determine what is the true presence of God, what are we looking for? What determines that? And just give people some clarity of what we mean by that. It's not just the gifts operating and people shouting, but it is people who are humbly coming to the presence of God, pursuing him, giving him the room to do whatever. It is Unapologetically Right.
Speaker 2:Don't apologize for anything that the Lord does that interrupts the service. Because here's the truth we are very limited in our own self but we give space to the Holy Spirit to lead us in moments God can do the impossible, in the people that come to these services.
Speaker 1:In my prayer, man, even last night, this morning it's like God if you don't do it through me, do it through somebody. Come on, what's that?
Speaker 2:song, whatever you're doing in this season.
Speaker 1:Don't do it without me. They ain't heard the real good verse. They ain't heard. Yeah, that's right, I love it, man. But, brother, tell me, man, tell me, that's a little bit about crosspoint.
Speaker 2:I don't know if we need to hear my sermon boy, that's what I'm talking about, but anyway, yeah, I'll tell you briefly what we're at right now. You know we were. This is the season of change it's the season of transition.
Speaker 2:Everybody's got a New Year's resolution. I tell our church January 1, we'll start resolutions and January 4, we'll figure out that we are powerless and we will break them all. And it's a season of change and everybody's making these commitments and stuff. So we're going on a series called Navigating Change and I hit five points of change and uh, I hit five points of of change and things, and uh, because what we know to be true is that change is going to happen in everybody's life, whether it's good, it's bad, it's ugly.
Speaker 2:Change is going to happen and, um, uh, the one thing I said you've got to look for god and change every change that is happening in your life. Look for god in it, god, what are you teaching me? What are you showing me? What is the things that are happening in my life that you are part of? And let me see you in it? Jeremiah 29, 13 says that if you look for me in earnest, you will find me. When you seek me, earnest means to long for or to with intensity. So if I'm looking for you in everything of my life, I'm going to find you.
Speaker 1:Right, that's being intentional.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you look for Jesus, you'll find him in everything, and so we talked about that. Second thing we talked about was asking God for wisdom While changes are happening and transitions are happening in your life. Ask God for wisdom. Ask God for wisdom. What am I missing here? You know the things that you didn't plan, the things you didn't want, the things that happened just out of the blue. You have to say this to the Lord what are you wanting me to get out of this situation? That is wisdom asking God. Don't let me miss, don't let me waste this situation. Let me see what it is that you're trying to do, and you know, when you ask for wisdom, what you're really doing is you've got to change the way you think. This is how I put it. To our congregation, I said to do what you've never done. You've got to think like you've never thought. Right, the renewing of the mind, are you?
Speaker 2:transformed by the renewing of your mind, because what we know is, every action that takes place was a thought first, no-transcript, and we have a problem with somebody or a situation. Why are we going to the world to get opinion Right? Why are we going to people who are unbelievers trying to get their opinion about things that Christians are going through?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, because you no longer take your instruction from the world. You take your instructions from God.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:From his word. So how does that? Should be the question. How does the word say I should handle this? Yep? That's the renewing of your mind.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And so when you're seeking wisdom from the Lord, you'll always look at things, these situations wrong. I mean from the world. You look at the situations wrong, but when you ask wisdom from the Father, he'll give you a clear line, a clear sight of why this is happening this way, to see beyond what your flesh can see. And you've got to change the way you think. Be Christlike in your thoughts. Your thoughts become actions. Before you said the thing you should have said, before you done the thing you should have done, all those things were a thought first Right and let's be honest, we are horrible judges sometimes at what really is the problem.
Speaker 1:Sometimes we are worried about the symptoms of what we see and not the source of what we see.
Speaker 2:That's right. Well, you can preach that thing a little bit.
Speaker 1:I preached it, don't you worry.
Speaker 2:I laid it down. You, I laid it down, you get a little you get a toddler version of this thing, that's right. And so then I said the third point was don't ask why, but ask what. Don't ask why, why is the question of explanation what?
Speaker 1:is the question of education. God, what are you teaching?
Speaker 2:me in this situation, in this change that I'm going through right now. What are you teaching me? It's an opportunity for us to grow in every situation, when you're not questioning why, but you're questioning okay, god, what? Because we know God doesn't waste anything the good, the bad, the ugly, all those things God does not waste. And so you've got to ask God what is it that you're trying to teach me in these moments right here? And you know, here's the truth You'll either grow bitter or you'll grow better, and a lot of people are spending their whole life trying to change one letter. Yeah, bitter, from bitter to better, right, and you waste your whole life trying to change that one letter because you look at it the wrong way.
Speaker 1:Well, eyes, the bitter is looking at eye, exactly Right.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 2:Look at you preaching my sermon hey come on somebody and the way you respond would determine whether or not you'll grow from it or it'll take things from you. So what we don't need to focus on is the circumstances. You've got to focus on your character. I'm going to read this verbatim what I taught our church Don't focus on the problem. Focus on your personality. Don't focus on the other person. Focus on your response. Don't focus on what's going on around you. Focus on what God is doing in and through you.
Speaker 2:That's the difference when you view change in a way that it's not the why, it's the what. What am I trying to learn? We talked about learning through contentment. We talked about learning from character. Because here's the truth by nature, you're content with yourself. You think about yourself. It's not your nature to be content. It's natural for you to only care about you. And so I'm not by nature content. You're not by nature content. By nature, I want to take care of my needs. I'm not thinking about you, I'm thinking about me. I'm thinking about my needs, my hurts, my pains, my wants, my desires. I could care less about you because life is about me. That's naturally. But when you give your life to Christ, god changed what is natural fleshly and now puts kingdom fruit in you. That makes you now change the way you think and change the way that you act. So we talked about that and character learning to care what your character is. And we talked through that how change exposes our character. People say when you get money, it exposes who you were in the very beginning.
Speaker 2:Character. Situations expose your character, how you respond, where you are with the lord and um. So we talked through that and then we, we hit, we hit with two more. We said become a promised person. Again, we're talking about change. How do we navigate through change? And with situations that we don't like things, we didn't plan things, we didn't uh, it just happened, whether it was because of a person or we lost a job, what those things are become a promise for a person. Don't focus on the situation. Focus on what never changes and what never changes.
Speaker 1:God.
Speaker 2:God. There are three things that are found in Jesus that doesn't change. It is God's love, it's God's promises and it's God's purposes for you. None of those things change, and so, when you focus on the things that do not change, what is changing around you doesn't change you Right, because you're focusing your identity on Christ. Your purpose is in Christ. Christ is love for you. All those things are yes and amen, and we went through a list. I don't know if our listeners know this, but there are more than 7,000 promises in the Bible for you and I.
Speaker 1:Let's go ahead and hit number one.
Speaker 2:All right number one Number 6,790. That's been a long podcast, bro. My wife called me. Where are you?
Speaker 1:at.
Speaker 2:Hey, I'm only on 1,287.
Speaker 1:We only got 5,000 more to go, yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I talked about how you can bank on the promises of God. And so I talked about how you could bank on the promises of God. But you know, when I talked about change, one thing that I really hit on change that I really believe really steps on people's toes it stepped on mine as well is that when change comes, what happens is you have an issue with a person or you have a problem with this situation. Instead of looking inward on what God is trying to do with me, you're always trying to point and blame the other person. And I talked about this. I said the reason why many of us go through the same cycle of problems.
Speaker 1:It's a victim mindset yeah it's a victim mindset.
Speaker 2:I talked about not being a victim, but be a victor, and I said the world is full of victims. Be a victor, right, yeah? And so what happens is you go through this cycle of the same problems. Let's just think logically, pastor Jay. If you have the same problem with multiple people, you can't keep blaming people. That's right. You've got to look inwardly. This is where you look at the wisdom of God. Okay, god, what?
Speaker 1:is it.
Speaker 2:So if I'm going through the same cycle of the same problems, I need to start asking okay, what about me? God's trying to change and the reason why we go through the same cycle of problems is because we're yet to change in the problem. We're yet to actually look inward. Well, we've heard the story of this preacher who has preached the same sermon for four weeks in a row and his congregation says why in the world are you preaching the same sermon? He said well, when I see that you've actually understood and got this sermon, I'll change what I'm preaching. But you haven't got it yet.
Speaker 2:That's the same thing, that sometimes I think You're going through the same cycle of things because you haven't learned anything from it. There's been no change in you at all, and so we've got to mature as Christians, spiritually mature. Look at our situations different. Don't have this. Woe is me mentality.
Speaker 1:One thing my dad always taught, and he's not a theologian by any stretch. But one thing he did say and when we're talking about you said, think of it logically is one thing he always said was, if everybody around you is the problem, then everybody around you is not the problem. And so at that point you need to look inside and say, okay, am I the problem? Yeah, and so at that point you need to look inside and say, okay, am I the problem? Where am I not growing in what? Where? What area of my life do I need to grow in?
Speaker 2:yep so anyway yeah, yep, and so the last thing that we talked about was no matter what trust in god and, uh, I talked about the journey of of being in ministry for 12 years. Church planning is not what I thought it was. Being a Church planning is not what I thought it was being a lead pastor is not what I thought it was, the stresses all the things that you walk through in leadership and in ministry.
Speaker 2:You just never know what one week's going to be like. And I talked about the weight of it I said but what I know to be true is that God knew all this before. God had a plan. We can trust God, no matter what we face, no matter what we come in, God has a plan. God has ordered our steps. The Bible says he delights in those steps and so he has ordered those steps. And when he's ordered our steps and we know that, whether it's good, it's bad, it's ugly God has been in it. He's graces for. Okay, God, I can trust you, no matter what, because I know you've got a plan. I may not understand it, I may not see it right now, but when I look back from years ago, I can look back all over my life and see, okay, God had a purpose. God used that situation for this and it made me stronger. And so we talked about no matter what, you trust in God.
Speaker 1:No matter the situation, no matter the changes that are happening in your life. I don't know if man, and maybe I don't know if many, and maybe I haven't talked to enough of them, I don't know, but I don't know of any pastors that I can think of that if I went and sat down and said, do you feel like you're qualified to do what you do? I don't know many of them that say, yeah, man, I'm ready. Yeah, woohoo. It requires you to depend on the Lord.
Speaker 1:Oh, for sure it requires you to submit to him and say Lord, this is too heavy for me, because it is, it's got to be done by God. I told somebody we had a meeting with a nice couple who's been coming to the church for a while now. I wanted to sit down with them and do some one-on-one and so we met Anna and I met with them at Starbucks yesterday and this is Sunday, we're recording. So we met with them Saturday and we were talking. I said I've done law enforcement for almost 20 years and pastoring is way harder. It is so much harder. And even when you're the associate pastor, if you were on the board, if you were Sunday school superintendent, it don't matter what you'll be, I've had them all right and I'm telling you you are not prepared for pastoring until you are in the seat of pastor.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, and then you even man. I think Mark Anthony preached it perfectly. It is what did he say? Sweet slavery. It is a calling. God calls you to this. If you do this for money, if you do this for fame, if you do this for any other reason than it being a calling, you are going to fail.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah. Because none of those reasons are good enough to do it yep, I had a guy come up to me a few few months ago. He uh had some questions and things about the church and just he was like he started off saying he said, listen, I know you have the hardest job on the planet yeah and then he said I think teachers have the second hardest.
Speaker 2:he said, but you know, I don't. I would never be able to do what you do. He said I think teachers have the second hardest. He said, but you know, I would never be able to do what you do, he said. So don't take this as criticism. I'm just trying to learn and understand and, you know, put a perspective in me, because I really never thought of it that way. It's the hardest job on the planet, but you know, the more I think about it, man, Well, I think it's like this.
Speaker 1:It's pretty tough.
Speaker 2:I think it's like this. It's pretty tough.
Speaker 1:It is man and I think it's like this man when God puts a flock under you and you're the under shepherd. You're trying to marry God's will and God's presence with people and you're constantly trying to connect those two, your conduit between those two, and it's like having a family that you see better in than they see in themselves.
Speaker 2:You want more for them than they want for themselves. Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And it's just like you're trying to connect those two ends, but you're just one man.
Speaker 2:And you can't give everybody a knuckle sandwich or nothing. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:I said we should bring back the pasta's paddle. That's right, yeah, that's right, but anyway, yeah that was our sermon.
Speaker 2:We got one more part for this three-part series, but I'm super excited for where we're at as a church and where we're at as a body of Christ.
Speaker 1:So, yep, yeah, I'm looking forward to maybe us getting to partner on some projects this year and doing some things, some joint services or something. Man, I think it'd be great.
Speaker 2:I can't wait to lay you out on the altar. Hope you got a big boy to catch me now. Your holy ghost hurt Anyway, heavy holy hands. Brother, if you're good, we're going to bless them and send them on their way.
Speaker 1:Hey you know how we do here at Crosspoint. We like to wrap up with giving you the priestly blessing.
Speaker 2:Well, that is not Crosspoint, okay. This is pastor to pastor.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, it is we at Crosspoint.
Speaker 2:Look at him. He's shouting out his church. You know what we like to do A reliant church. Oh, we're at the reliance. Okay, at 15501.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no.
Speaker 2:In fact it's funny because, bro, I say Crosspoint point so much. I went to your church, was preaching.
Speaker 1:It was like here at cross point and they were like oh, yeah, I'm at reliance.
Speaker 2:I was in india. It was like not jason up here, cross pointians right, I love it.
Speaker 1:Brother, let's bless you here on the pastor, the pastor how about that? Yeah, we read from numbers uh 6, 24 through 26. It says the lord bless you and keep you. The lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you.
Speaker 1:The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace amen hey, we're so grateful that you have tuned in today, that you decide to listen, look like, share, follow, subscribe, whatever it is, look and share this with people, because there's no doubt if this blessed you, this will certainly bless other people. Hey, but join us again next time on the next episode, episode two, season three past of the past past of the past. God bless you, guys.
