Generosity: The Key to Experiencing God's Miracles I Pastor Aaron Grijalva

Have you ever wondered what true generosity could unlock in your life? Through a compelling story of a San Antonio pastor's Christmas gift mishap, Pastor Aaron unveils how authentic generosity catches God's attention and makes the impossible possible. Drawing from the woman with the alabaster jar, he shares three transformative principles for generous living: giving your personal best, going beyond expectations, and believing for miracles. Ready to experience breakthrough? This message will challenge and inspire you to embrace a lifestyle of radical generosity that positions you for God's blessing. Watch or listen now to discover how your next step of generosity could be the key to your miracle!

📖 Key Scripture: Luke 7:36-50
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Transcript

All right, well, welcome, everybody, to Grace Church. So glad that you guys are here. My name is Aaron. I'm not Pastor Kendrick, which means you have to come next week. Everybody say next week.

All right, you got to come back. And so I am your Mexican cousin from San Antonio, and I come once a year. Now, my hope is that you would let Pastor Kendrick know that I did. Good, because I can come back. My wife and I love North Carolina.

I love this place. When we were going to plant, we actually were thinking about planting in the Carolinas because we love it here so much. And so anytime we get to come back, we really enjoy it. And so I brought my wife, and we're having a great time. So glad to be here.

Wanted to thank you again for having us. I love, love, love your pastor. I love his wife, Nana. They have been such a. Such a blessing to Erica and I from the moment we met them.

There was something unique about how many know, like your. Your destiny is determined by your relationships. And. And when we. When we met them, it was such.

Such a precious time. I actually remember. I don't know if you remember this, Nana, but we were meeting in a. It was like in a restaurant. I think we were all connected together with a bunch of pastors.

And he was sitting in front of us. You guys were both sitting in front of us. And there was a great moment where he said, we're in a sweet season of life. We're in a sweet season of life. And I remember saying to myself, one day, I'd love to be able to say that, because I'm not sure I've ever been in a sweet season of life.

And so they've always been somebody that my wife and I have looked up to. We're so honored to be friends with them. And your pastor right now is actually preaching. Funny enough, you know where he's at? He's preaching at my church.

And so he's there giving the word of God because we just love him so much. Funny enough, our church loves Pastor Kendrick, and he's a lot like me. We're both high seven personalities. We like people relational. He's a great storyteller, and so he's bringing the word right now.

But just wanted to honor pastor Kendrick, honor Ms. Nana, and all of the sacrifice it takes for a church like this to exist. One of the things we planted about seven years ago, you guys helped us, by the way, y' all gave $25,000. So y' all are shareholders and stakeholders in our church. I was talking to a church Planner the other day. Cause I helped coach.

And they were. He was like, well, you know, I said, what do you believe in God for? You know, and he's like, well, we're just believing we. All we need is God. I'm like, well, you need money, too.

And you know, how many all know that? Come on, somebody. And. And he goes. And so you guys gave, and so thank you for that.

And God's been nothing but gracious to our church. Last time I was here last year, almost the same time, about 725 people coming to our church this year, we have about 1250 people coming to our church right now. And so God's doing great things. So y' all invested in good soil, right? So that's you clapping for you.

And not because I'm not a good preacher like that. I just. It's like God's doing great, but just grateful for just the Vanar family and what they've been to us. If you can. I know this.

I know this is true because now I'm a senior leader. I didn't realize how hard it was and how much sacrifice it takes. Of course, you guys have your own sacrifices in your life. Everybody's got their own journey in battle. But I think being a leader of a church is unique.

And I didn't know the weight. I always tell people I was a great pastor before I became one. Come on, somebody. And you just don't know the weight that it takes to carry a place like this. And if you get.

If you get a chance, I know we just passed Pastor Appreciation Month in October. We just got. If you didn't get a chance to appreciate them, it's not too late. Come on, somebody. It's not too late.

So just walk up, let them know you love them, especially the pastor's wife. What I see my wife have to go through on a regular basis is heavy for them. And so love her. She's here today, so you should love on her a little bit. And while she is, just let her know you love her and appreciate her.

So we are in the middle of a series. Pastor Kendrick asked me to continue the series that you guys are in called Kingdom Currency. And I love this because we get to talk about what it is to be a generous people. And last week, I watch your pastor every week, and so I kind of feel like I'm part of Yalls church. And every week.

And so he talked about last week, really how to be a good steward of what God's given us. How many all know, like the Bible teaches us this. It says, the earth is the Lord's and its fullness thereof. That's the King Jimmy version. Come on, somebody.

But the Bible says that everything you have, everything, your health, your children, your money, your job, your house, all the things that you love and value, those are all the Lord's. And he's given them to you. To them. He wants you to have them. There's nothing wrong with you having things.

The issue in life for all of us is things having us. And so in order for us to really combat that, you don't combat greed with prayer. You combat greed with generosity. And so we're gonna learn about that today because last week, Pastor Kendrick talked about being a good steward. I'm gonna talk to you today about the heart of the matter, because if you don't get this right, it won't matter.

It's like, how many y' all know. Like, if I plant a strawberry seed, I'm not gonna get a watermelon. You know what I mean? And so I wanna plant the right seed in your heart, and it starts with the seed of generosity. So if you have your Bibles, we're gonna be Luke, chapter seven.

If you don't know anything about the Scriptures, which. I love this church. One of the reasons I love, love, love this church, I'm from California originally. And so we. We come from a not a really churched area.

And. And what I love about Raleigh Durham is that, man, there's a lot of people that come to this church that don't know the Lord. And they're looking and they're seeking. And in a world we live in right now, you need churches like Grace to be open to the people who are seeking God. And so if that's you in here, you're in the right place.

Here's why you're in the right place. Because I know this church. It teaches the Bible in a way that makes sense. And so if you don't know anything about the Bible, it's not a book. It's a collection of books.

It's 66 books. It's split into two main sections. First is the Old Testament. Second is the New Testament. The New Testament starts off with Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

We call those the Gospels. The Gospels are really tellings or the stories of life of Jesus. And we're gonna be in that third book called Luke. Luke is a great book. If you're a physician or you're from the medical field.

Luke was a physician, and he was commissioned by a man named Theophilus. To write a story and go to talk to the. Talk to the firsthand accounts and give like a report, almost like a history report, like, hey, what happened with the life of Jesus? So this is a firsthand account. It's real, it's accurate, it's historical.

And it talks about Jesus ministry. He lived 33 years. He had a three year ministry. And when we get to Luke chapter seven, where we're gonna be at today, he's in the middle of his ministry. So he's.

He's got some disciples following him. He's done some miracles. In fact, he's healed a centurion, soldier's son, a servant. He's actually raised a son who had died from a widow. He raised him up from the dead.

And then John the Baptist, who's in prison right now, sends this message to Jesus to find out if he is, who he was, who he said he was. And then we pick it up in a moment where he's actually having dinner with a man named Simon, who is a Pharisee. And Pharisees get bad raps. So, you know, we always start, don't be like the Pharisees. But in that day, that was a good thing.

They were good that we had Pharisees because they taught us at least what the law was saying. So he's having dinner with the Pharisee. In Luke chapter seven, everybody say, okay, everybody say, I got you. All right, buckle up. I read fast.

All right, Luke chapter 7, verse 36. One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to have dinner with him. So Jesus went to his home and sat down to eat. Because you and I would probably be hungry. Somebody offers you food, you're like, absolutely.

When a certain immoral woman from that city was eating there, she brought a beautiful alabaster jar filled with expensive perfume. And then she knelt behind him at his feet, weeping. Her tears fell on his feet and she wiped them off with her hair. And then she kept kissing his feet and putting perfume on them. And when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, if this man knew what he was doing, if he was really a follower, if this guy was really from God, he would know better than to let this lady talk to him and touch him.

She's a sinner. Then Jesus answered his thoughts, saying, simon, he said to the Pharisee, I have something to say to you. Which is always dangerous because when you're around Jesus, he knows your thoughts. Anyway, isn't it interesting how we go to God and we pray to him. We Say, hey, God just want you to know what.

What's really going on in my life. Like, he doesn't know how many. I'll do that a little bit. Do you do that like I do? I'm like, hey, I'm not sure you're paying attention.

You got a lot of stuff going on, you know, you got a lot the world, a lot of people in the world just want to give you a heads up on my life. And I'm assuming I'm giving him information, which is not the way to pray anyway. So Jesus says to Simon, he says, oh, look, look, I'm gonna tell you a story. He loaned a man two people, loaned money to two people, 500 pieces of silver to 1,50 to the other. But neither of them could repay him.

So he kindly forgave them, canceling their debts. Who do you suppose loved him more after that? And Simon said, well, I suppose one that had the larger debt. And Jesus says, you're right. You get the gold star.

Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, look at this woman kneeling here. And he gives her three. He highlights three things. Number one, she's kneeling here. When I entered your home, you didn't give me no water to wash my feet.

And she washed them with her tears and wiped them off with her hair. You didn't greet me with a kiss. From the time I came in, she's not stopped kissing my feet. You neglected me. The courtesy olive oil for my head.

And she's anointed my feet with perfume. I tell you her sins, and they are many, which shows you this. Jesus knows your sins. It's not when you get forgiven that he just kind of, you know. Oh, I don't, you know, it's not a big deal.

No, no. He knows sin. Real sin is real. There are things you and I should not do. And Jesus highlights that.

He says, look there, she's got sins. There's a lot of them, but they're forgiven. So she has sown so much love, she recognizes she gets it. But a person who's forgiven little only shows a little love. Then Jesus said to the woman, your sins are forgiven.

The men at the table said among themselves, who is this man who goes around forgiving sins? And Jesus said to the woman, your faith has saved. You go in peace. I've heard this story a lot. You know, when you're a pastor, you listen.

I'm a sermon junkie, so I hear. I like to listen to sermons all the time. But one of the things I never hear, people Talk about is how her natural response changed. Right when you realize what he's teaching. The whole point of this parable was him teaching us that when you recognize where you came from, what God did for you, how much he gave you, the natural response to that is extravagant generosity.

And sometimes the one thing that keeping us from generosity is not that you, not the desire to do it is really that you don't recognize how good you have it. You don't recognize how bad you were. In fact, I always tell people you should go. If you know the Lord now and you are what we call saved, you have a relationship with Christ, go talk to your family and ask how, what kind of a person you were before that. Just tell them to give you an idea of what it was.

I promise you, every one of them are like, we're so grateful that you gave your life to Christ because you were kind of terrible before. You know what I mean? And, and, and you always recognize that when you, when you, when you recognize that, when you recognize where God brought you. Come on, somebody, you. Your natural response is to be extravagant.

There are some people in here who have forgotten how good you have it now because you forgot how bad you were before and where God brought you from. And what I love, some of the people I love the most are the people who recognize and remember. They remember. Oh, they remember where they came from. They remember, they're like, where I was, I was on my last.

I was on the end of my rope. I was at the end of my rope. I could not figure out what I was going to do. And then, boom, God saved me. And when you remember that, the natural response is always generosity.

So I'm going to teach you today three things real quick. Three things on how to be generous. Before that, let's pray. Father. Lord, I'm grateful for this church.

Thank you for grace. Thank you for this church. Thank you. That this city, this region, this area has a part to play in people's eternity. We're not messing around.

We're not playing games. This is people's eternity. And I pray that today, Lord, you wouldn't just. These people wouldn't just hear a good sermon. They would get information.

They would get impartation. From this moment, let that be the day. Let today be the day where we get encouraged, we get a little bit of courage in our and our souls to walk out what this thing is called generosity. In Jesus name we pray. Come on, somebody shout Amen.

Amen. How many are married in here? Raise your hand. Come on, shoot it up if you're married in here, y'. All.

All right. Awesome. We're all a part of the. I would call the fraternity or sorority of people just hanging on, you know what I mean? We're just making it.

Hopefully we can make it through. And I'm married. Love my wife. She's amazing. I have.

I have five kids with her. Five Cinco for those of you who speak Spanish. I love her. She's amazing. I love my children.

Can I show you. Can I br. Just a minute. I want. I'm gonna give you.

I'm give you. And you know, it's always kind of weird when a pastor shows you his family and you're like, what am I supposed to do? I don't know them. You know, it's like clap for you having kids. But I want to show you my family.

I'm really proud of them because, you know, it took a lot to like create a family. And so I'll just describe to you who they are. This is going to make sense in just a minute. Okay. I got twin 17 year old boys.

Let me just tell y' all something. It makes no sense to me that 17 year old kids can drive anybody else. I don't understand how they can get a license. Like, I remember I got my license. I was at 15 back in the day.

And I was like, freedom. And now I have kids who walk, drive off in thousand pound vehicles. And I'm like, who thought this was a good idea? I pray so much now. I thought I was holy.

I pray so much now. Good kids. Love them. Titus is in the middle there. In fact, we had just got back from a hunting trip with your pastor.

I brought Titus with him and he loved. In fact, I think we're gonna send him out here next summer, intern with you guys a little bit. And so you'll like him. His hair is long. He's gonna love it.

He's gonna be great. Judah's in the middle there on the left side. Love him to death. He's 11. Kind of getting in that world.

And then I got that little squid in the middle. Winston. He's great. Love them. Love my.

My kids are my favorite part of my life outside of my wife. I just love being a dad. And one of the things I love to do is get them gifts. And one of the greatest times of year to get them gifts. Come on, somebody.

It's coming up, it's coming up. It's Christmas. I don't know if you know this or not, but I felt like in July they Started putting up Christmas, you know what I mean? I feel like every year it's a little earlier. I'm like, it's July.

Like it's supposed to be 4th of July. Anyway, so anyway, a couple years ago, we were having Christmas, and my wife's so funny to me because I don't. Guys, be careful asking your wife questions, because if you ask her her opinion, she's gonna tell you the truth. You know what I mean? And sometimes I want her to lie, but she just don't know how to lie.

She tells me the truth. I asked her one day, I said, babe, am I a good gift giver? Cause I love gifts. Anybody love gifts in here? Like, I'm a gift giver.

I like to give gifts. I like to respect. And I asked her, am I a good gift giver? She goes, oh, man, that's a good question. No, I'm like, well, you're not getting one then.

You know what I mean? She goes, I'm sorry, baby, you just don't know how to do it. You don't know how to do it right. And she goes, I go, well, what do you mean? Tell me how.

And she goes, do you remember Christmas of 23? And I was like, Christmas of 20, oh, yeah, I'll tell you the story. So I've been saving up years, years to buy my wife a special bag. Ladies, y' all are a bag kind of people, you know what I'm saying? Like, y' all like bags?

Y' all like nice bags. She wanted this bag, and it's, you know, it's a fancy bag. It's thousands of dollars. I had to save like 10 years of my money. And I'm like, all right, I'm gonna save up.

I never bought her a nice bag. This is like a nice high level bag. So I'm gonna buy her this bag. It's the first one she ever had. I'm gonna give it to her at Christmas time.

So I saved my money, I got it all. I went down, took my sister, she was in town. We went down and bought this. This nice bag. I don't tell you what it is.

It rhymes with, you know, bluey, clap on. You know what I mean? Anyway, so go down and buy this bag. Don't judge me. Send me an email.

I won't read it. And so I save up my money. I'm buying this woman this bag. And I want to. I love her to death.

She's amazing. Give me five kids. She's short, Mexican, dynamite. I want to get her something so I'm like, all right, get her some dash. So I get her a bag.

I take my sister and I get this bag, and it comes in a big. So it's a fairly big bag. It comes in this big orange box. And I said, well, how do I put it under the tree? But I want to surprise her.

And she goes, well, let's go get one of those Christmas giant bags you put. If you buy a tv, they sell these giant Christmas bags you can put a big TV in. And so we went down to Walmart, bought this TV bag. I put it in, zip tied the top so she couldn't open it. About to walk in, my sister goes, well, what are we gonna tell everybody?

Cause this is kind of a big present you're gonna put under the tree. And she goes, why don't we just tell them and say, hey, it's from Auntie Nikki. And I bought the kids a giant Lego set. It's kind of the similar size. We can just say, that's what it is.

We'll tell your wife that, and then we'll tell the kids that, and then everybody will be good. I'm like, sounds great. So I walk in. My wife's the first person who greets me. She goes, what's that?

And I go, it's not for you, babe. It's not even from me. It's for the kids. Auntie Nikki bought her some Legos. And so she goes, oh, okay, great.

That sounds great. Sounds good. So I go and put it under the tree. A couple hours later, my kids find it, because, you know, the kids see the giant bag like that, and I'm like, oh. And they're like, dad, whose is that?

I go, guys, it's for you. But check this out. It's the biggest present for all of you. It's a combined present, and you guys get to open up the last present on Christmas. This is the one to look forward to for three weeks.

They every day would come and touch it, feel it. They're, like, smelling it. They're like, oh, my gosh. You know, they were so excited. And I'm like, all right, fast forward to Christmas Day, Christmas morning.

It's amazing. Sky's blue. We're wearing our pajama jammies. It's great Christmas. Cocoa's out.

Cinnamon everything. Everybody's happy. We got Christmas playing in the background. We read the Christmas story, Luke, Chapter two. Being Christian.

You know, we got the fireplace going. All the families are around. Everything's great. So we get ready. So we're like, all right, and what we do, how we do Christmas, is we get everybody get their presents, right?

They get. Everybody gets their presents. We're all sitting around in a circle, and then we go, 1, 2, 3. Because when you have a thousand kids like that, going one at a time is basically tantamount to torture. So we just like, all right, just everybody open up.

One, two, three, boom. They all go, great. And if you ever had watched a kid who knew that there was a big gift on the end of the other little gifts, they don't care about any of the other gifts. So this is how they open their presents. They would open up.

All right, what's the next one? They got through it so fast. It was like 2 minutes, 36 seconds. They were done with all their presents. And they're like, dad, we're ready for the big one.

And I'm like, all right, is everybody ready? So I did the big dad thing. I grabbed the big thing, and I put it in the middle of them. They all get in a circle, and they're all excited, and I'm like, all right. On the count of three.

And so I get my phone out because I want to videotape this. And my wife's on the right side. She's videotaping. And I'm like this. But I kind of have an angled towards her because it's about to surprise her.

I want to get her reaction. So I'm like this. I'm videotaping her just like this. And I'm like, all right, here we go. Let's go, guys.

Here we go. 1, 2, 3. She open. They start opening up the thing. They're ripping into it, and all this kind of stuff.

They get to the bottom of the bag, and they're like. And they look at me, and I look over at my wife, and she knows what it is because she knows the color of blue eagle blood on. And she's looking at it, and she literally. This was her reaction. I saw her.

She had her phone in her hand, and she goes.

Runs over. Like, runs our children over, pushes them out of the way, grabs the bag. She's walking around with her bag like she's super happy. And I'm like, videotaping her. And what I didn't realize is how it affected my children.

So I looked over at my kids, and they're sitting in a circle. And guess what? I have a gift for you today. I took a picture of what they look like. This is an actual picture of them Christmas morning.

I mean, this is what disappointment looks like, and so anytime. Just be careful asking your wife if you're good at something, because she goes, do you want me to talk about Christmas of 23? And I'm like, okay, yeah, you're right. I don't know how to do that.

Anyway, they still bring it up. They're like, dad, you remember that one time you lied? You're a liar. You're mean. You know?

And I'm like, but she got her bag. So anyway, why'd I tell y' all that story? Oh, okay. I've been a pastor for, you know, a little over two decades now. What I realized, when it comes to generosity, when we say the word generosity, everybody hears something different because we don't really know what it means.

We don't know how to do it well. Like, I don't know how to give gifts well. We don't know how to do generosity well. And some of it's not your fault. If I'm honest.

Can I just. I can apologize on behalf of churches and pastors everywhere. We sometimes get this wrong. We say weird things. You maybe saw some weird pastor on the.

You know, you were late, late at night at 1:30 in the morning, and you turn on the television, and some dude was saying, if you send me $1,000, I'll give you a handkerchief that's blessed by God. And something happens like that, you know, or we teach it weird, or we make it transactional. We make our relationship with God transactional. Can I just. If I'm just honest, we do it wrong sometimes.

Now, I'm not talking about this church, and I'm not talking about your pastor, but I'm just saying sometimes the church at large gets it wrong. And so because we teach it wrong, you do it wrong. And so anytime. In fact, I bet you last week, when Pastor Kendrick brought it up about generosity, and everybody's like, oh. Oh, here it is, Elsa.

Here it is. I knew it. Church just wants your money. God doesn't want your money. God don't need your money.

The church don't need your money. God cares about the church more than he cares about you. Let me say that again. It came out wrong.

He cares about the church more than you care about the church. He loves the church. He's his bride. He's not worried about whether he's gonna take care of the church. In fact, he's not worried about whether he's gonna take care of you.

I was talking to somebody recently at our church, and he was like, well, I don't know about my job. And I was like, well, who's your provider? He goes, my job? I go, that's not true. God's your provider.

Now, you get your money from your job. That's just the funneling system. That's just the conduit. But God's the one who provided everything to you. And if that's true, then whether it comes from this job.

Come on. That you might lose, or another job that you might get, God's your provider. And a lot of you know this because if you look back on, you remember the last job you had, and when you lost that job, you didn't know what you were going to do. Come on. Isn't that true?

Like, when we lose our jobs or something happens, we transition and we're like, I don't know what I'm going to do. This is it. This is it. Was it it? No.

And what that proves to you is that God's your provider. God can use anything. God can use anything and anyone to get you to where you need to get to. So since we didn't do it right, we didn't hear it right, we don't tend to act it out, right? So what I want to do for the next time, little 14 minutes and one second we have left, I want to give you three quick ways on how to be a generous person.

Because what I love about this story, what I'm so encouraged by the lady, that. Of the alabaster jar, is that she caught the attention of God. In fact, the only reason we even talk about her, why we even read about her, come on, y'. All. Is that she was generous, right?

She was so generous to the point where she caught the attention of God. And that's what generous people do. And if that's true, I want to know how to be generous. If I can ask you a question, Is there anybody in here other than me? I have two.

But, like, I need, like, a miracle, like, I need God's attention. Is there anything that you've tried where you've tried everything but you need the attention of God right now? Other than the guy who's preaching this message. Raise your hand. Raise your hand.

Just like if I need, I would love the attention of God right now. Okay, great. If that's you, then generosity could be your step today. And I'm gonna teach you how to do that in three ways. Number one.

Number one, how to be generous. Number one is this. This is. I'm gonna give you maybe some characteristics of a generous person. Number one, generous people, they always give their personal best they always give their personal best.

Luke, chapter seven says like this. When a certain immoral woman from that city heard he was eating there, she brought a beautiful alabaster jar filled with expensive perfume. I find it interesting that the Bible goes out of its way to say number one, it was beautiful. Number two, it was filled so it wasn't halfway. Number three, and it was expensive.

Like it was something that was of value. Now, I researched this. Theologians, most theologians and scholars believe that it would have been worth about 300 denarii, which for her, in that day and age, would have been a year's worth of wages. I want you to think about that for just a second. If a pastor showed up in the area and you wanted to bless them, and you went to your bank account, if you could.

If you could, and you took everything you out, which was a year's worth of your wages that you make right now, and you laid it at the feet of Jesus, at the feet of that pastor. I want you to think about that. That's what she did. She didn't give her second, her third, her leftovers. Come on, somebody.

She gave her personal best. And when I noticed this about generous people. Anybody you know who might be generous. Think about in your mind if you know somebody who might be generous in your life. You just know them as generous people.

They always give their personal best. They give their personal best financially. They give their personal best spiritually. They give their personal best physically. They give their personal best emotionally.

They all the least right. They give their personal best. They don't know how to do things halfway. They give. If they're gonna give.

They're gonna do it at the best of their ability. Why? Because they believe this one principle, that this is important. Their output reflects their belief. Their output reflects their belief.

My son Titus, the middle one there that I'm gonna send to you guys, and y' all are gonna be. He's gonna be your problem.

He loves baseball. I love baseball. I'm a baseball dude. I watched baseball till midnight last night to watch the worst team ever win the World Series again. So, anyway, if you're a Dodger fan, don't come talk to me.

Cause I don't want to talk to you. But they're ruining baseball. I'll get on a. Never mind. Okay.

Anyway, so. But I'm a baseball guy. My son Titus, out of all five of my boys, he's kind of the big baseball guy. So he plays spring and fall ball. He's in a season right now, and a few weeks ago, he He.

We play on Saturday mornings, his games. And Friday, he stayed up late. Now, you guys have teenagers. You know, it doesn't work well when they stay up late on Friday to wake up early on Saturday. And I told him, you better go to bed.

But I'm not gonna look, I'm not gonna babysit this kid. It just is what it is. Like, you're 14. I'm gonna let you. If you're gonna.

You're gonna sail or fail. You're going to do what you need to do, but I'm not going to make sure you. Whatever. So he stays up late. Wake up in the Saturday morning, he wakes up.

No lie. He wakes up, and he's, like, sluggish and slouching. And I'm like, dude, all right, you better wake up. So we're driving there. He's falling asleep on the way to the baseball field.

And I know, like, a good dad might be. Hey, buddy. Hey.

You know, rub his face. How's it going? Are you okay? Are you gonna wake up? That's not how I do things.

I'm like, wake up. Wake up. Like, turn the wheel kind of violently so his head goes into the window. You know, like, it's time to go. We're about to play baseball.

Wake up. He's like, all right, dad. So he jumps out the thing, and I'm like, let's go. Let's go. And we have, like, this statement in our family.

We have, like, family value statements. One of our values is, we're Grijalvas. We do hard things. Cause I wanna teach my kids that life is not gonna be easy. Life is going to be what?

It's gonna be hard. Y' all know that you live in. So the world's not easy. The world's harder. The world's not gonna.

By the way, food for thought. Things won't get easier. They're only gonna get harder. You need to get stronger. Stop asking God to make life easier.

He's not gonna do it. That ain't how it works. You get stronger, we get better. Period. I told him.

I said. I said, hey, we're. We're Grahavas. And he finishes off. He always finishes off.

We do. We do hard things. All right, go. So he starts the game. He's the first baseman.

I'm on the bleacher. I gotta be honest with you. I'm not the greatest dad on the bleacher. I am that dad who kind of screams and yells and get kicked out of games. I'm not saying it's A good thing.

I'm telling you, I'm flawed as a human being. I need you to pray for me. Anytime you are in your prayer closets at home at night, put me on the list. Hey, I'm praying for that Mexican pastor in San Antonio. He needs you right now.

Desperate help his kids, not judge his father, please. So I'm on the bleachers, you know, I'm trying to keep quiet because I love the game. I love baseball. I talk a little bit. I chirp a little bit at the umpires.

I talk a little bit to a different thing. I'm like, I look like a strike. Bloop. Stuff like that. He gets up, he's playing first base.

The first batter. First. First. Not sec. First.

First batter hits a ball to him. It's not even a hard baseball. It's a dink, it's a dunk, it's a blip. Comes off the bat, heads right to him, the ball. He's so tired and he's so lazy.

He's like, oh.

And he watches it go through him. I'm like, what is hap. What is happening?

You know, I'm screaming at him, you know what's happening? All this kind of stuff. He's two batters later. The batter hits it to the shortstop. Shortstop.

Throws it to, you guessed it, first base. Where he's at. He's on the base. He puts his glove out. I've never seen this in all of my years.

I'm 41 years old. I'm in baseball. I love baseball. I've seen so many baseball games, so many play. I've never seen this.

He puts the ball up, the glove up to catch the ball. The ball literally just goes by his head. He doesn't move the glove. He just flies by his head and he goes. And then he squeezed.

I'm like, what are you squeezing at? The ball flew by your head. I'm like, I don't understand. What do I scream? You guess it.

What do I scream? Wake up. Let's go.

Fast forward to the next inning. He gets up to bat. She walks up to bat. And I'm like, he better do. By this time, I'm off the bleachers.

I'm pacing the bleachers. My wife's ignored me. She doesn't even come with me because she don't want to be known that we're together. So she's sitting on the opposite side. I'm pacing it.

I'm like, okay, he better do something because I gotta be honest with you. I don't mind sending him to North Carolina right now. He walks up. He looks. I've never seen anybody do this.

He walks up and he just looked like he fell asleep while he was standing there. He was a little like this. He doesn't even bat like this. He just bat like this. The ball goes by and he kind of, like, strikes out.

I lose it, lose it. I'm all tight, tight. I walk over to the dugout because coaches love that. And so I walk over the dugout and I said, come here, come here, come here.

And so I get him out of the dugout, and I said, what is happening right now? Help me understand what's happening. And he goes, I mean, dad. And he literally said that. I thought this was the craziest.

Honestly, I was shocked by his response. He goes, dad, I mean, I love baseball.

Any of y' all have teenagers who has teenagers up in here right now who have a teenager right now? Don't they say it's not. Kids say the darndest things. Teenagers say the darndest thing. I'm like, you make no sense.

You speak in a foreign language. I don't understand what you just said. Because I said, if that's true, you love baseball, son. He said, yep, then your output should reflect your belief. Don't tell me you love baseball and then go out there and perform like that.

People who love baseball, they don't play baseball. Come on like that. And I have people who walk up to me and tell me all the time they love Jesus.

I love Jesus. Jesus is my homeboy. I'm down with Jesus.

But your output. Come on. Doesn't reflect your belief. Some of y' all say this all the time. Jesus is a miracle working God.

Jesus can do anything. Jesus is amazing. I'm like, do you really believe that? Because the way you live does not reflect that.

You don't live. Like, if I believe Jesus gave it all. Come on, Jesus. Y' all here. Remember that song, Jesus Paid It?

Oh, they don't sing. Jesus paid some of it.

Almost all of it. Now I'm gonna have to work for a few things of it. I'm gonna get all the way to the gates, and whatever I did today is gonna help me get into. No, If Jesus paid it all, that means in the Greek, he paid it all. And so if you believe that.

Come on, baby. Your output's got to reflect that. You're not Biblians. I love the Bible. I follow the Bible, but I follow Jesus of the Bible.

Jesus, he was the one who had interpreted The Bible. He was our great rabbi. He is our God. We followed you. You're a Christian.

You're a Christian, so you don't fall. Here's. You're not generous because the Bible says so.

You're generous because Jesus was so and so because he was so. Our natural response is to be like Jesus. Just be generous and give your personal best. Number two. Number two.

You give more than expected. You give more than expected. I like this. You neglected the courtesy of me. This is verse 46 of olive oil.

And to anoint my head. But she anointed me with rare perfume. Jesus highlights. The expected custom wasn't even fulfilled. There was a custom.

When you walk in, you give them water to wash their feet. That's the expected custom. And then you kiss them. You give them a little creeting. And then you give them a little anointing oil to give with their head.

That's the expected custom. You didn't even do that. And she didn't just do that. She went above and beyond. Come on, somebody.

Because why? She's trying to be. She's trying to be generous. Generosity changes the atmosphere. Doesn't just change the person, it changes the people.

The olive oil would have just anointed Jesus. The perfume. Come on. When you break. Have you ever dropped perfume?

You ever broken a bottle of cologne or perfume in a room? It don't just stay with her. You. It walks around. It permeates.

Baby. Come on, somebody. Like, it gets around. It gets in all the cracks and crevices. Like it's everywhere.

It affects a people. And so when you're generous, it's amazing how it'll affect the atmosphere. Have you ever been out to dinner? I'll prove it to you. You ever been out to dinner with your friends?

You go out with, like, a bunch of friends, you know, you all. Let's go out to dinner. Y' all go to some place. The Sizzler or whatever. I don't know What's.

What's a good restaurant around here? What's a good restaurant? You tell me. I just. Anything.

Applebee's, I don't know, Whatever. So you're at a good restaurant and you guys are having a good time. You order a bunch of stuff, and then the bill comes by. And then it's funny how, like, every time the bill comes, there's always one person in the group has to suddenly go to the bathroom real quick on that time. Y' all know what I'm talking about.

And so. But let's say the bill comes. You Pull out your wallet. You're like, all right, here's my card. I'm gonna be a part of.

Split it up or whatever. But then one time, your friend. Come on. Pulls out the American Kin Express Platinum. And he goes, don't worry about it.

Today. I got it. Come on, everybody, say it. Say it. Say it with me.

Say it. I got it. None of y' all have ever said that. But if some of y' all just. I like, you got it.

You said, you got it. You got it. I was like, I got it. And they. They.

They paid for everything. What did that do to the group? None of the group went like, oh, man, that's messed up. Every one of you. Like, let's go.

Where are we going next? Where we go? Let's keep this party started. Like, let's get it going. Where we going?

Like y' all wanted to go to another thing. Let it go all night long. Why? Because generosity changes an atmosphere. It affects everybody.

And when you get around people who are generous, man, you just. You. There's something bad. There's something great about them. You want to go out to dinner with them all the time.

Come on, somebody. And when we're generous, it changes the atmosphere. And can I just be honest with you? Be careful, because the moment you start to act generous, people who are not generous, are we going to have something to say? Even happens in this story.

Did you notice that In Luke chapter 7, verse 39, it says, when the Pharisees invited him, saw this, when they saw the generosity, he said, there's always a. He said person. They're gonna walk up to you, and they'll be like, wait a minute. Let me get this straight. You go to church twice a month?

Like, I only go on Christmas. And we call them creasers at our church, Like Christmas and Easter, like the fire insurance, keep us out of hell. Like, you go every week.

Let me get this straight. When you go to church, you serve one and then you stay another two services? Are you trying to be a priest? You know, that's what a lot of people say. You know, they don't even know if it's like, Christian church, Catholic, whatever.

They're like, what? You want to know why they do that? It's because generous people, non generous people don't understand generous people. You're speaking a different language. They don't know what you're talking about.

They're confused. They think church is a religion. You know it to be a relationship. So you're like, I don't. They don't know what you're talking about, so just be ready for that.

When you give more than is expected, God can move. My wife and I, we have called hamper wars. Hamper wars. Y' all know what a hamper war is? You know what a hamper is?

Does anybody know what a hamper is? They come in all shapes and sizes. Square, circle, some are tall, some are short. Plastic, wood, wicker.

All kinds. We've had them all in our house. And I'm really good. I got a lot of problems, but I'm really good at one thing. My wife informed me this recently at our last fight, that I'm really good at taking my clothes.

I pick them up.

You're welcome. And I take them over to the hamper and I lay them next to the hamper.

Guys. Anybody else are really good at that other than me? Anybody else want to admit it in the house of God right now? Come on, now. Yeah, yeah.

You're like, jesus is looking. Okay, now start raising your hand. Some ladies are raising their hand for their husband, okay?

And she asked me, she goes, I'm confused. Like, I'm generally confused. You can pick them up and walk them all the way. 90. 90.

You get 90% all the way there, and then for some reason, your brain shuts off and you throw them next to the hamper. Like, why can't you just put them in the hamper? And I said, babe, I don't understand what you're talking about. I feel like I got it. 90.

10. Can't you take the. Don't judge me. Don't judge me. It's like, can't you just pick up the rest of the 10?

You know, like, it's just 10. I mean, I got it 90. She goes. And she walked away. You know, that's our fight.

That's how it started. And the truth is. You know what's funny is. The truth is, like, if I really wanted to be generous in that moment, not only put it in the hamper, but what if I. What if I took the hamper to the dirty clothes.

Come on, hamper. Like the laundry room. Maybe I. Maybe I even. I know this sounds crazy, guys.

Maybe you even take them out of the hamper and put them into the washing machine. I'm not even saying start it. Come on, ladies. That's a shouting amen moment right there for you. You were waiting for it.

I set you up. They could put it in the washer.

I'll get off that number three, and I'm done. You can play the pretty Music. All right.

Y' all better tell Pastor Kendrick I can come back. Can I come back? All right, number three. Number three. Ms. Nana, I apologize.

I love you so much. Okay. All right. Number three. Give to see the impossible possible.

Generous people give to see the impossible possible. Luke chapter 7. It says, I tell you are sensible. I like 48, verse 48 says, then Jesus said to the woman, your sins are forgiven. Did you.

Did you. Do you realize what happened? See, we get. We get this. We're like New Testament Western thinking Christians.

But back then, for her sins to be forgiven were impossible. Y' all hear that? Y' all hear what I'm saying? They had to go to a temple. There was rituals involved.

There was like levels of stuff that she couldn't even get into to get her sins forgiven. Let's just be honest. They would have saw her coming. And Jesus looks at her and goes, your sins are forgiven. That's impossible.

You want to know why she thought it was impossible? Because she's crying, literally bawling her eyes out before it even happened. She realizes I'm too far gone. This is never going to happen. It's impossible.

It is what it is.

And her generosity. Come on. It caught the attention of God and it led to her salvation. Do not hear what I'm saying. You cannot buy your salvation into heaven.

You cannot give your way into heaven. But generosity catches the attention of the one who can get you into heaven. I'll do one better. It's not just get into heaven. I think we cheapen the gospel.

Sometimes we just say, don't. Jesus gave us his life to just get us into heaven. That's pieces of it. But most of the statements he started with his teachings were, the kingdom of heaven is like, you want to know why he said that? It wasn't.

What he was saying was, hey, one day when you get to heaven, this is. Is what it's going to be like. He was saying, actually, you can have a piece of that right now so that when you get to heaven, you don't have whiplash. You can live like that now. You can be generous right now.

You can receive right now. You can see the impossible possible right now, not just in heaven and not just one day. And. And she recognized that her generosity created a moment and it positioned her for the blessing. And the impossible happens.

I want to ask that question again. Is there anybody in here right now other than me where you believe right now? You need a miracle. There is an impossible situation in your life. Raise your hand.

Touch it. Like you put Deodorant on. And you're happy to be here. Come on, raise it up. Okay, okay.

It could be. I'm just saying. Food for thought. Could it be generosity is your step.

Where could you be generous? Where could you get the heart of giving? The heart of. I gotta let go of what I have to see God do a miracle. There's a great story and I'm done.

It's 10:35, if you're taking medicine.

Matthew 14, Matthew 14, Matthew 14. There's a great parable, all four Gospels. All four Gospels. And it's. It's the parable of the feeding of the 5,000, where Jesus feeds 5,000 men.

It was just men, but they had kids and women, so they had more than 5,000. And so he. It's an awful. All four. And he teaches and then he has a moment where there's all these people and there's no.

There's no Denny's. There's no, like, you know, the Jewish IHOP down the road where everybody can go get some food? They're all waiting on him. And he needs a miracle. I mean, to feed these people, they need a miracle.

And I find it fascinating that Jesus didn't just go, Let me ask you a question. This is food for thought. Do you think Jesus needed the little kid's lunchable to feed him? Do you think he needed that? It's a trick question.

Just shake your head no. He's God by definition. He doesn't need anything. Jesus can make everything come from nothing. All he needs is nothing.

Come on, somebody. And. And so that's not how the story goes, though. In four Gospels, a kid walks up with his lunchable and says, here, here you go, Lord. I'm gonna be generous.

I'm gonna give my personal best. Hello. That was his personal best. That might not have been your personal best, but that was his. He gave more than expected.

I mean, most people would have been like, all right, at least give a bread or a fish or, you know, just something. Keep a little bit for yourself. No, he gave more than expected. What was he doing when he did that? He was on the front lines and got to see the impossible.

Come on. Possible. They all fed themselves with leftovers. Come on, somebody. They all had doggy bags ready to go.

And. And. And the only way that happens. Come on. It's generosity.

Generosity. Generosity, Generosity. Generosity. Your step today could be. I need to be generous.

My impossible might only come when I'm generous. So if you've never given to the church, guess what your step is.

You can get mad at me. I ain't going to be here next week.

I've never heard anybody. I've never heard it. Never heard it. 24 years of ministry, Ms. Nana if you've never heard it. I gave to the church and I regret it.

Never heard it. Never heard it. I gave to the church and God didn't show up. Never heard it. I gave to the church and miracles happen.

I hear that all the time. And if that's what you want to happen in your life, we got to learn to be generous. That's my prayer for you. Let's pray. Father Lord, I thank you.

I thank you that you're here with us today. You are here with us today. The impossible is always real in our lives. But it's always behind your mirror. It's always behind your plan.

You have a plan for us. And I pray that today would not just be man just a good sermon. I pray that it would be a lifeline for us. May we be a generous church of generous people. To you in Jesus name we pray.

Come on, somebody shout amen. Amen. Give God a hand clap of praise in this place. Come on, church.