The Courageous Faith Podcast

Finding Your Voice: Navigating Faith, Careers, and Impostor Syndrome

• Dr. Wendell Hutchins • Episode 92

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 1:06:56

Have you ever looked back at a moment in your life and regretted not speaking up or standing your ground? In this episode of the Courageous Faith podcast, we are joined by special guest Ciana to tackle a struggle many of us face: the fear of finding our voice and knowing our true worth.

In this episode, we discuss:

The Trap of Self-Improvement: Why the world's constant demand for improvement keeps you feeling unworthy.

Finding Your Prophetic Voice: How to push through the "invisible barrier" of doubt and speak with spiritual authority.

Knowing Your Worth: Real-life testimonies of God providing supernaturally in careers and finances when we boldly speak our expectations.

Faith vs. Trust: Why genuine faith must always materialize into complete trust in God's timing


SPEAKER_00

Welcome to the show. We've got to be here to break down what's happening in the world. We give you the tool to conquer the enemy. This is your moment. Your battle crime. This is courageous faith.

SPEAKER_04

Welcome to the Courageous Faith Podcast. Thank you for joining us today. We're so glad you'd have us with us and hearing our voices. Before we get started, Easter's coming up. So much going on over here at the Church of Champions. We would love for you guys to come. Palm Sunday is this Sunday. And then Good Friday and Easter. And then we have the kids right now making a video, Pastor. It's going to be so great to see that video come alive. I heard that. It's an amazing thing that they those kids did. And I uh I had the opportunity to actually be there while they when they recorded it. So I'm very excited for those kids and how that video comes out.

SPEAKER_01

That's awesome. They are the whole weekend is structured around uh the holidays and people enjoying Palm Sunday and um celebration Saturday and there they have a movie Saturday evening and this Saturday. Yeah, this coming Saturday. This King of Kings. King of Kings. And it's gonna be in the Champions Food Truck Park, and all of the food trucks are gonna be open and the desserts are gonna be flying, and kids are gonna be uh just entertained.

SPEAKER_04

So I love that though. I love that we have that for our community. Yeah. Just come by watching. For everybody. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And it's free. It's open to anybody. So come and and uh bring your kids, bring your family, bring your friends, bring your neighbors, tell everybody about it.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, it's a free family event. It's like the perfect thing. My parents saw it that it's a good idea.

SPEAKER_01

Of um the screen is huge. It is absolutely uh magnificent, and there won't be a bad seat in the in the house. You know, so bring your long chairs and throw rugs and get after it.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, King of Kings would be an amazing. It's an animated movie, too, so it's perfect for kids. Yes, young. Oh, yeah. And it's about Jesus. So it's exactly right. It's gonna be fun. It's gonna be a fun evening. I'll also have a shout out for Easter. So we have these two young women, Casey and Michaela, who actually decided on Sunday, I'm post put it up right now. On Sunday, they worked on this art form right here during service. Oh my goodness. Wow. And it came out incredible. Wow. They had a vision and they and they crushed it.

unknown

Wow. That is amazing.

SPEAKER_04

So thank you, ladies. It is amazing. And I someone had texted me today and I was like, Yeah, I'm gonna I gotta shout them out for that. Absolutely. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_01

And they're young people and they're look at that artwork, the talent. That's great. Yeah, that's awesome. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, yeah. Wait a year like Tayla.

SPEAKER_04

Macalia? Yeah. Nikalia is Casey. Okay, that's awesome. I think I messed that up. Beautiful.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That's beautiful. And then we had Dr. Greg Kuhn. Oh man. Water at the wilderness. Water in the wilderness. Oh man.

SPEAKER_01

Great ceremony. I love him. He's a um he's a good man. He's a great man and and uh just so down to earth, but he can absolutely parse the word. Oh my goodness. He had a he had a time. He had a good time.

SPEAKER_05

Everyone did.

SPEAKER_01

It's everyone was on our uh field trip for our college cohort. Oh, he did? Yes, he did. He he went down, he wanted to see it as well. So he joined the college cohort connect group, and I took them on a field trip on Monday morning. And uh yeah, it was a good time.

SPEAKER_04

That's awesome. We got to post some photos on here as well.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Well, the Connect group's going on throughout the week. Yes. And they have one for everything.

SPEAKER_01

You know, they're they have people that are stitching and knitting and reading the word, Bible studies. Yeah. And if you've if you've suffered loss or you've been through uh the traumatic experience of divorce, they have something going on for that. If you're looking for love, they'll teach you how to look for love in all the right places and not the wrong places. Not be a victim of a country western song.

SPEAKER_04

That's very good. Well, we have a guest. I've been rude.

SPEAKER_05

No, I'm so sorry.

SPEAKER_04

Not to introduce we have the prettiest guest we've ever had.

SPEAKER_05

It is a pleasure being here.

SPEAKER_04

We have a it's uh my co-host for the Root of the Rising podcast, my sister-in-law, and best of all, my lawnlady. Yeah. No way. Yeah, she does my lawn. She must be.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, sometimes when I go visit Seti um in in Nyla, and then I'm like, I see the grass needs to be mowed. And I feel, you know, yeah, I do it real quick. Oh, I see that. She's busy too, and I'm like, yeah, it's what the least I can do.

SPEAKER_01

Wow. There's nothing like family.

SPEAKER_05

Right.

SPEAKER_01

And when you are able to incorporate family members in uh in the vision and pursuits that you have, and and you have fun doing it, that that's the elixir of life. That's what makes life so special.

SPEAKER_04

So kudos to you guys for doing that. Yeah, when I fell off a roof, her dad and her, they took it upon themselves to get in my house, just mow the lawn for me. Yeah, what do you think? Out of nowhere. They just did it.

SPEAKER_01

Oh my god. Yeah, it was pretty cool. I'm so glad they talked to you out of not getting on anymore. That's very good.

SPEAKER_05

I know.

SPEAKER_01

Well, we're glad you're here.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, no, thank you. I'm so excited. I honestly not shocked, but I was like, okay, this is this is a privilege, seriously, to be with Pastor and you know, Rocky and see you in a different element. Not on our own, right? Like our own podcast we got. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That's good. This is because I talk on our podcast on this one. I don't really talk that often. Well, you need to. You need to talk. Well, that's what we had talked about earlier, that imposter syndrome. Right. It's not even me. I don't even know if so much imposture syndrome. Well, it is a little bit. Well, morally it's like I'm l I'm learning.

SPEAKER_01

This is this is well, I think, you know, the um there's a a tremendous uh body of work and a study that that must be done, I think, by anybody that's in pursuit of truth and the discovery themselves. Uh when it comes to learning who you are and and whose you are, and then of course finding your voice. And I know for me I have some regrets. You know, they say you never want to live with regrets in your life. And I think there's a there's ample room in all of our lives to look back and say I wished I would have exercised my voice more profoundly there. I would have stood up for myself there. I should have said this there, you know? And you can you can find those waypoints in your journey where you said I would to God I I would have had a stronger voice in that moment. And I think that's an expression that people use to try to uh vocalize and to uh pictorially describe the need they have to say, I wanted to be confident and I wanted to stand up and say this there. And of course, that comes from a a world, a cataclysmic world, a barrage where you're every day being told where your deficiencies are. You need to do this better, you need to be this better, you need to have this better, you need to pursue that, you need to own more of that, you know, that kind of thing. And uh and for some of us, you need to lose some of that. You know, you know what I mean? You don't need three chins, you need one. So uh but that we're living in a world that that sells us a bill of goods for self-improvement. So if you're if you're in the in the kaleidoscope of self-improvement, if you're always in need of something, you feel like you're never you're never worthy to be something. Because you're not in your present state, you're not as good as you should be. The goalpost keeps moving. It keeps moving. So you can never enjoy the victory of today because you're in pursuit of the the victory tomorrow. And so I think that yes, there is a there is a um certain spectrum of people that fall within the the ranks of an imposter, an imposter syndrome. But m but my experience has been over all these many years of working with people, they don't suffer from imposter syndrome, they suffer from poor self-esteem. Or they don't know uh poor self-esteem may be a harsher way of saying it, but they're not they're unsure of um and they're they're not confident in who they are. And so when they're sitting on their heels and they're reluctant to speak up, the the absence of their voice nullifies their presence. Come on. You see what I'm saying? So if I could do anything for young people, it would be go fail boldly. Speak up. Don't mind, don't mind the crowd. Don't mind, you know, they say, well, you're gonna be foolish if you ask the a qu a bad question. Or there is no bad question. There is no wrong question. Yeah, that's how you discover truth. So be confident in who you are and and and you can do that if you're pursuing truth.

SPEAKER_04

That's so good. So our podcast we have that it started off as just kind of like uh something that we do in self-help, yeah, I guess kind of. Yeah, and then sec like the very first episode, it ended up we couldn't keep God out of it. You had to stay in it. And then just the center of it. Yeah, and the last one, I kind of I was kind of easy on God. You know, I wasn't easy, but I was like, He, I made him the base of everything.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

But the last one, I was like, if you don't go to church, you're you're and you believe in God and you're you're doing it wrong. Like you're lying to yourself, you've been lied to. And I I feel like that was my first time like stepping up and finally not holding back.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah. And there's a freedom in that because what you do is you you penetrate um, well, you could say a glass ceiling, or you penetrate uh an invisible wall. You know, it's like punching through the sound barrier. An aircraft will shake violently. You'll think the fuselage is coming apart because you're right at the at that moment of breaking through an invisible barrier. And then when you penetrate that barrier, it's like glass, it's calm, it's pristine, it's quiet, right? And uh and you've left velocity has left the barrage of sound behind you. You're you're ahead of sound. So uh that's the way it is in the spirit. When you're when you're developing and maturing and you learn to find your voice, and you step out and say something that you're not you're not yet sure yourself what the outcome will be, but you just have enough faith to say it and see. And so when you speak those things that are not as though they are, that's when you're in the front end of that um of piercing that veil, right? And so that that's where people learn how to step into through discernment. They learn how to step into and find their voice of prophecy. So most people speak from experience.

SPEAKER_03

Right.

SPEAKER_01

But the people that are peculiar speak from prophecy.

SPEAKER_03

Come on.

SPEAKER_01

Is that you understand what I'm saying? So I would encourage you to um not worry about if you have accountability in your life, you know, if you have um if you have spiritual government in your life, then throw off and cast off the care about uh becoming sequined in an imposter garment. Because those people that love you are gonna call your hand. Hey, hey, Rocky, that's not good for you. You know what I mean? That that that's laced with danger. That could lead you here. And you can receive, oh, okay. Tell me about it, you know? Um so you throw off that concern because your heart is not one of an imposter. An imposter has to willfully deceive. He has to pretend. What is that song before your time? There was a there was a song, The Great Pretender, right? You have to you have to willfully deceive by being a pretender of something. And you see through the record of human history where uh there was cataclysmic failure that happened in the hearts and lives of people that were pretending, right? They're the they're the uh memorials of sadness in scripture. But you're if your heart is after God and you're wanting to do the right thing, then most of your struggle is just going to be having confidence enough to say something you're not sure of the outcome. And that's where you move into the front end of of that pr uh that pristine territory and that precious place of learning how to speak the word of God against an avalanche of unknown and see what materializes.

SPEAKER_04

Walking by faith and not by sight.

SPEAKER_01

That's it right there.

SPEAKER_04

We talked about the other day how um everything we see is temporary.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

unknown

Yep.

SPEAKER_04

Well, absolutely, we talked about on the conversation the other day.

SPEAKER_01

That's right. It's it's it's living with such um high degree of trust. And that's where you know most people they spend all their life trying to perfect their faith. And if my my pursuit has always been trust, because faith, trust demands faith. So if you're per if you're pursuing your trust in God, you're you're inviting God to traffic with you through the journey of life, whether it be the lowlands or the high vistas, and you're gonna say, Lord, I trust you. If I if I'm going to prove my faith, it's always going to materialize and trust. There is no faith without trust. Come on, right?

SPEAKER_04

I was conversation the other day. We talked about Lazarus. I brought up his sisters. Yeah. Martha and Mary. Yeah. They were heartbroken. They were heartbroken, but they never went to Jesus, like, if you would have been here, my brother would have been oh, like he would have been slain.

SPEAKER_01

And they were pronouncing their faith. Exactly. So think about that. They were they were pronouncing their faith against the obvious. They had ultimate faith that if he had been there, their brother would not have died. Because they've seen Jesus work too many miracles. But because he died, they saw finality in that. And uh, and so that's a perfect example of God pushing you to a place where he wants to prove your faith. Yep. So he didn't um he didn't dishonor them or disown them or cast them out or rebuke them because they had an expression that didn't seem faithful or faith-filled. But he understood they need to learn how to trust, trust, even in in possibility. And so that's a that's a beautiful portrait of them. Yeah, trust in God's timing. Absolutely. Well, and and to and to think that his timing is so supernatural, so powerful, that time doesn't have any influence on it. Come on. Mm-hmm. In the natural and in time and space, a body decays on the fourth day. It's irrecoverable. In fact, the Jews teach till this day that by the third day, within 72 hours, the soul completely departs. The soul and the spirit of a body completely departs, can never be retrieved. So Jesus was upending that teaching. He was proving to them, I am the one that can call life back into a body that you claim can never live again. That goes so much to the baptism and things like that. So you have you have a God that wants to put you in places. Think about the distress of that. The Lord wants to show you something glorious about himself, but to do so, he has to permit you to walk through a valley so deep you don't know what way is out or which way is up. Right? And it doesn't look like any good thing can come from it. And he's sitting, if you'll trust me, I'll show you my glory in it. Yep. Come on. That's that's what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I mean, even when they going back to the last, when they sent word to Jesus, hey, the Lazarus, your friend who you love. That's right. That's right. He's sick. That's right. Someone you love.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

It's like he loved your your child, he loves you. And so you should be re it kind of opens the door when you so I I know when I was first coming into God, I was like, when I go to God, everything'll be great. Sunshine and rainbows, give my life to God. Yeah. Little did I know it's yeah, it's not the opposite, but it's like a be ready for opposition.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Because he loves you.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Well, that's the way you grow, and that's the way so He saves us in the world. And we are um we are I hate to use the word, but the scripture uses the word alien. So that's talking about we are um not a naturalized citizen, right? We're as we're a citizen of another kingdom. So we are alien to this this country, Abraham said. I'm I'm a member or I'm a citizen of a far country. I'm on a journey to see something I've not laid eyes on. And so when you uh think about that, and when you're thinking about the um the transport of your life moving through places where you're alien, you have to get to that place for him to show up and show you his glory. Look at what he did with Israel. Yeah, he Abraham and Melchizedek. Their house was full of false gods. They didn't know who God was. They had hundreds of gods. Wow. And uh and Melchizedek shows up and he gives him his tithe of everything he's just conquered. Where did he get that understanding? Where did where did he gain that teaching? So Abram was was called uh the father of the faithful because he acted in faith by trust in something he could not he could not describe it and he could not articulate it. But he said, God said, and I will. So when you think about breaking down faith to that level, the the end result of faith that God wants us to get is trust. Can I trust you? And you see that that wrestling match of that in every hospital room where where terminal illness has been announced. You know, we we panic and say, Oh my god, what happened? Do you trust me? You know what I mean? So yeah, it's a it's a world of invitation to the mur to the miraculous. And you see that I I was in a position this this very week where I I was up walking the floor late and praying and saying, Lord, because uh we're trying to do so many things and we have so so many limitations. And I said, God, you are my supply. And uh I woke up to an email and said, Brother, I love you. Check your e check your mail. And then I get uh the the I guess you do too, but the US mail sends me a picture of everything that's coming to my box so I can know ahead of time, I guess. It's a safety deal or something that you don't have to open it if you think it'll blow up. But there there he is a letter there and it's got a check in it. Wow. And I hadn't opened it, I haven't me I haven't received it yet. But God was just letting me know I'm taking care of you from resources you didn't even count on.

SPEAKER_04

Man. I got a testimony. Tell it. So we did that funeral.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That funeral that we had did that we spoke about on Sunday.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, last week.

SPEAKER_04

Mm-hmm. We did the funeral in And I knew nothing about that. That was so great that you guys did that.

SPEAKER_01

I had no idea.

SPEAKER_04

And I didn't never, I didn't they said the church was struggling like to the streaming and all that. Yeah. I didn't realize how much work it was gonna be. Like, yeah, it was a lot. We were and we were, I think me and Stephen got here at 8 a.m., didn't get home, I didn't get home to 5 p.m. Oh my lord. Full day. Oh my goodness. And uh I texted James, I was like, James, next time this pops up, minimum price, fifteen hundred dollars.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

I told my wife, I was like, if I do because the funeral service was like, I need a business card from you guys.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That's why my price, fifteen hundred dollars. Yeah. And you know, I I I gave it to God. I didn't, you know, nothing, take nothing from it.

SPEAKER_01

That's right.

SPEAKER_04

That's all you can do. Yeah, Sunday morning at church, I get a Uh I get a text message from I get a text from from my from my favorite lady other than my wife Zelle. Yes, amen. I love her too. Yeah, Ms. Zell said.

SPEAKER_01

I didn't know anything about her till last year.

SPEAKER_04

$1,500. And then I get a text from a very close person, very close friend, not related to the church.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

God told me to send you this. Really?

unknown

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_04

Talk to me, man. $1,500. What I told Jane, what I told my wife, God told him to send to me. Look at that.

SPEAKER_02

That's cool. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

It was, I mean, my faith wasn't lacking.

SPEAKER_02

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01

So you put just out of your spirit, you spoke your expectation.

SPEAKER_02

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01

And you frame that. So could it be possible if you if you follow that line of thinking into the revelation of who Jesus is and what his word says, is it possible that you could have shorted yourself if you would not have had faith to speak 1,500 but said 200? Wow.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_01

And so that's the limitation that people put on themselves because they have a very small Jesus.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

They don't ask him very much. Right. They don't expect from him anything. He's last. He's after Visa, MasterCard, Chase Bang. You know what I mean? They'll use all of their resources before they ask, and then when they ask, they ask something small. And he said, I want you to, in the Hebrew, it means to fasten hold of him. And the Hebrew letter used there is Vab, that that stake, that peg, that nail. I want you to be nailed into me with your petition and don't let go. Hold on to me. And he said, he uses that same illustration of nailing our trespasses and transgressions that were spoken against us, the indictments that were written against us in sin. He's nailed them, he's pegged them to the cross. Well, he wants us to nail our petitions on him and say, Lord, I expect $1,500. I'm thanking you for $1,500. You know what I mean? And you did that. You put a price and a value on what you thought that service was worth. And God said, Joe, over here, send that to him.

unknown

Gosh.

SPEAKER_01

That's how big God is.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That's how God works, man. Like I I have the screenshot of me texting James the night before $1,500. So I sent it to him, and I was like, you have no idea. I just told this, like, what I told him what I did, and I was like, I and he was like, that's so crazy. God told me to send you $1,500. He's like, he felt it. I was like, thank you for submitting. I was very happy that he submitted to God.

SPEAKER_01

There's a gentleman in this, and we were just talking earlier about this line of business with uh about him. But I had a conversation with him, and I said, What what volume of business did you do last year? And he said, This number. And I said, You want me to tell you how God works? I said, Hey, you gotta be able to handle it. And he said, Yeah, tell me what to do. I said, You pray this. If you believe that was your last year, pray that for one month. Come on. And he did this number all of 2025. He made in excess of over 200,000 more in January of 2026. That is in the middle of a rough economy, high interest rates, pressure in the housing market, all of the excuses that Wall Street says we've got to be cautious about. God says, I have no limitations. If you believe it and you're speaking my word and you're standing in trust, my word can't fail. And and uh the vicissitude of that that texture of that truth. You know what I mean? It's like it's reality. So when I when for example, when I give my tithe, I don't I don't want anything to come in first. That's gotta be first. And the reason is is because I don't look at it like it transactionally. I look at it like, God, I can't wait to see what you're about to plan in my life. You see what I'm saying? And so um for me, that's the way I worship him in Thanksgiving as an expression of trust. And so going back to what we said earlier is if if so many books have been written and everybody, you know, I've heard it, I've been everywhere in the world, and I've heard people get up in front of me and preach, all you've got to do is have more faith. And I'm I want to stand up and go, time out. What is more faith? How do you get more faith? Right? The word produces faith. Is there a better faith? Is there a gold standard faith? You know what I mean? Like am I if am I delinquent or because I've got bronze faith and don't have gold? Well where are you getting these differentiations? He said if you have faith as a side of a mustard seed, move mountain. So it's not the amount, it's the expression. And the only way you can do that and to um see that faith materialize into the physical is to completely trust God. And you only get that through experience. Trust trust him with that baby. Yep. Couldn't eat this, couldn't eat that. Now she's doing it.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

What happened? Medical science didn't fix that.

SPEAKER_05

Right.

SPEAKER_01

Time and time again.

SPEAKER_05

I know. Um, I want to uh talk touch base on a little quick story because we kind of were talking about imposture, but I also have a little bit of a testimony as well. Um so I've struggled with kind of like owning my so I have some regrets with not speaking up, you know, like I can I know how to get taken advantage of and being, you know, nice for a long expended, you know, extended period of time. And so with that, there's like different categories, but this one, the route I'm kind of going with is like my career. And so at the time, I don't know, about a year and a half ago, I just got a new house. So mortgage and stuff is, you know, the bills I was renting before, apartments and then a house. And and then now I was like, okay, finally homestead. This is the goal, right? In life for me. And I I work, you know, in title insurance. But I was like, man, to start paying the bills responsibly for me to like go enjoy life. It's also at the same time, I was like needing a new, I was like, I might need to look for a new job. I might need more money, you know, to just to kind of survive and live and happily, right? So then all of a sudden, randomly I get this phone call. Um, still real estate related, but like in in uh home insurance, right? So floods, when floods happen, you remove all those things. I got it in some way, it was a recruiter and saying, Hey, such and such uh referred me to you, thought you'd be a great fit for this like management position to like manage employees and their sales team. That's always been a goal of mine. However, I always struggled with some type like a confidence as to do I deserve this, right? Like kind of just beating myself up in my own head.

SPEAKER_02

Right.

SPEAKER_05

And um did the whole interview process, had like three different interviews with them. Um, the salary was literally what I had been asking for. And then I genuinely was going to resign from this company that I did not want. Like I that was, I just didn't want to leave. Oh, I love who I work for. So I had a conversation and the route was going that I was gonna have to like turn in my two weeks. And then he was like, Well, how much did they offer? I was honest. I was like, I did the interviews, he's like, How much did they offer you? I told him, no hesitation. He was like, Okay, done. Like, I want you to stay with me. I don't, don't leave, type of, and he's like, What are you wanting? I was like, I want more of a more of a role, as in like management role. I don't want to just do sales and stuff. And so then that just kind of happened. I was like, wow, if I would have had the confidence to, I can't, I don't want to, you know, what if, right? I don't want to dwell on the what if.

SPEAKER_01

This is a fantastic um conversation to have for a lot of young people. And actually, this just happened in the last 24 hours with um a member of my family. And so what this is part of that thing I was talking about earlier, finding your voice. Part of that, and this is a large part of it, is knowing your worth. And so, especially if you're raised in a home where you have very well-meaning parents that love you immensely, but they're hard on you. And they're they think they're serving you by reminding you of what all you're not doing.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_01

So subconsciously, that fashions and forms uh the cerebral vortex of that whole philosophy is is ingrained in you that you're always second guessing, um, is this enough? So the result of that is it puts you on your heels, and so you don't ask first, or you don't explore your value, or you won't believe what somebody says. And so very much a similar thing happened. I was actually uh moved on by the Spirit of the Lord Sunday, and I prayed for this individual, and I just spoke to them very softly, but I said, The Lord is going to show you his glory and his favor, and he's gonna prosper you because you've chosen to love and to trust and not be bitter. And he looked at me like I was speaking from Mars. Like, where is that coming from? I thought I don't know. That's just what I'm hearing very clearly. So you can receive it or you can leave it. But I'm telling you, that's what the Lord spoke to me. That was in the sanctuary before he exited the interface place. A man walked up to him and said, I have a new company that's looking for a person like you. Would you come to work for us? And this is the salary. Come on. And it's double what he makes. Wow.

SPEAKER_02

Come on.

SPEAKER_01

And he got in the car and started crying. He said, This is not, this can't be real, right? And so his retort was, Well, you send me some information on your company. I said, That's a lies. That's a lies. But my point to you is that's when we talk about in the in the um church world, and people get you know funny and freaky and oh, that's the spooky stuff. You know, when you talk about spiritual uh things or spirituality or supernatural, I say that word a lot. What we're talking about is literally what that means is a above and beyond normal blessing. It's it's something that uh is outside the parameters of what man can do for himself, right? It's beyond reasonable, it's beyond logical. You expect incremental blessings, but she someone outside of her arena said, Hey, you're worth this to us. And it awakened her a desire in her to say, Hey, I don't want to leave this. I'm happy here, I fit in here, I love this, this is my passion, but I just found out someone else thinks I'm worth what you don't understand. And so it opens the door for you to find your voice and say, hey, just like you did, I I would have done the same thing. I'm so sorry. I love it here. But and to see them say, without hesitation, you're that you're worth that to us. And it's almost like, you know, the um the way my mind works is I want to step back and go, Well, my God, if you felt that way, why didn't you do that today last year? Like, why did I have to say something? But but it's interesting how through those interactions you find your voice and say, Absolutely, I'm believing that for myself. You know, and if you step back and you throw your the typical nuances of your life, if you throw them back into an arena of thinking and criticism, critical thinking, more than likely you would have talked yourself out of asking for that on your own. For sure. Because you would have been an incremental. Maybe I can get a 25% raise, or maybe I can get a 15% raise. I don't want to ask too much because I don't want to be ridiculous. Well, here comes a stranger who says, Hey, we'll give you twice as much. And that's that's the way God works. That's what he did with the children of Israel leaving Egypt. He said, I'm not going to allow you to leave until they pay you for all of your free labor. And it requires all of the wealth of Egypt. Think about that. So it's very fascinating. I was in a a meeting the other day, and they were talking about this very thing, was the divers have now discovered some some archaeologists have really been honing in on uh the wheel structure and the weight and uh the remains of some of those chariots in the bottom of the Red Sea. And they've been studying the the compression and the depth of compression and all of this, and been doing some, you know, as only scientists can do, coming up with extrapolating these what how much weight were they bearing, what were they carrying? Was it was it uh uh were they carrying soldiers, or was it car and and they were coming back with these uh findings that suggested they were carrying so much weight that it was almost impossible for them to be trafficking with that kind of load on that muddy ground. Yeah, and it's well it's supernatural. It's like there's not even the animal kingdom is not even able to transport this kind of load. It was a it was a supernatural currency and it was a supernatural blessing, and it was a supernatural wind. You know, and so I would rather traffic in the economy of God every day than trust in Wall Street 30 minutes. You had a substack about the economy and how they try to And I think it comes back, you know, so many people focus on the external blessings, but it comes back to that internal stand of trusting God and and and believing and say, you know what, I'm trusting you with my health, so I'm gonna do right. I'm gonna be as I'm gonna do right, I'm gonna be as good as I can and eat the right proteins and all that. I'm gonna do that to the best of my ability. I'm gonna take care of that, I'm gonna be a good steward of that, but then I'm asking you, God, and I'm trusting you to supernaturally keep that and bless that. And I I've never seen it fail. Amen.

SPEAKER_04

Amen to that. So, Pastor, I want to kind of switch subject a little bit. So you had a substack on Thursday. I had to bring it up. That's why last Thursday, yeah, last week, and it hit home. What was it? It was the uh how we're we're chasing popularity over priest over being priestly.

SPEAKER_01

Like it was Yes, yeah, I remember that.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, so um what do you want to know about it? Well, it was so it was kind of perfect because I feel like right now is this time of so many people coming in to be Christians. People are turning into being believers, but they're kind of going with someone who uh I guess for lack of a better word, it's always easy to kind of go to someone who either looks like you, talks like you, and is like you, and like, oh man, this guy must be it, trustworthy. This guy must be the guy.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

But they're my age, yeah, you know, and I'm I'm young. Yeah, but I don't have that much experience yet. I'm still learning in the world. I messed up so much. I'm still I think if someone lives their life perfect for 30 years, they're still got so much to learn from zero to 30, because you're really coherent when you're 12, like you're 13, there's only 15 years of being every that's perfect. That's the perfect exam. Best case scenario of someone my age preaching. But that we're going to someone in their 30s, young, low 30s, and to me, I'm I mean, I'm I'm young, but I don't think I'm ready to lead a church. I don't think I'm ready to do all these things. But if I get a microphone in my hand, I dress nice and get a following, I'll start doing, you know, and people go to that, but I don't have the depth. Right. That's why when I'm with you, I'm quiet because I'm learning. I know that I need to submit. Yes, I need to you, I need to take from you what you got to keep pouring into me. And there's a time, and I feel like right now we're we're so focused on the right now with social media, the following. Just get the following in the middle.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I well, I think there's a there's a lot of truth to that, and I'm and I hear what you're saying. Um I will tell you that I think um out of the revenant remnant of of the church, I think people such as ourselves are are saying, you know, we we don't care what people think, we're not worried about um decorum or all of that. We're we're gonna tell the truth, and we're gonna tell the whole truth. So it's the whole gospel to the whole world. And before that, especially before 2020, there seemed to be um this Christian, this American Christianity that was being fabricated around personality. And so the danger of that is, especially for young people, they grow up in that entertainment-driven church culture. And so they don't they don't see the midnight prayer meetings, they don't see the needs and the and the desires and the and the want for souls to be born again. You know, they don't they don't have some of those spiritual battles that their fathers had and their grandfathers, the generationally speaking. So, um so they they come into a church I call church anity. It's a it's a a spiritual expectation for a Christian religion and a Christian experience that it's not even biblical. It's like concert. It's concert, orientate, you know, that kind of the spectator stuff. Uh to me it reminds me of how uh like a music festival. Right. Well, you you go with an expectation and you leave feeling good, right? But you can do that being entertained. So we can't compete with Hollywood. You can't compete with Walt Disney. And you can go there and spend a lot of money and come out feeling good about spending it, right? It gives you uh the elixir of life and the joy of the moment. So we have raised a generation or two of people that think church provides candy and uh they're overdosing on sugar, and so they're they're a thimble deep and a mile wide, right? They don't have any belief system, they don't know very much, but they're Christian. And so um the sad reality of that is you can never have priesthood in that arena. You can only find a personality, and ultimately a personality will fail you. Because if you build if you build your experience around a personality, that personality is going to become human enough to you that's gonna disappoint you. Right? And uh and that's where we have to fall back in love with the holiness of the office, right? The sanctimonious nature of and the sacredness of uh the gospel work that God called his church to. So yeah, uh this this is a a huge dilemma today, is because you have people that are chasing spiritual affirmation through personal aggrandizement. So they're doing it and and they're and they're not wrong. Uh well, I say they're not wrong, they're not wrong believing it because they've been told it, right? But if you get a if you get a podcast and you're you have five million views, it logically and reasonably and and uh data-wise, everything would say you've done something right. You've become an expert in that field. You've done, you know, you hit a home run. And so there's a there's a uh an ascension to that, and there's a there's this belief that now I have become an authority. Well, in spirituality and in in Jesus Christ, that doesn't make you an authority. See. That gives you the pedestal, but that doesn't give you the weight of the scepter. So you can be elevated to a place where you don't have matching authority and you will ultimately fall from that place. Come on. You see what I'm saying? Because the enemy never attacks you at the level you're at. He attacks you at the level you're going. Don't ever forget that. Come on. Repeat that.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

The enemy never attacks you at the level you're on. He's always attacking you on the level you're ascending to. He sees your future. He sees the greatness in you. And it's his job to abort it. Before it even starts. So how am I going to attack this precious darling, right? I'm going to tell her what all she's done wrong. I'm going to condemn her. I'm going to remind her of every failure, every misstep, every red light she ran. I'm going to tell her everything I can to get her to believe in a lie. That's what he did with Eve. Did God tell you that? Well, Eve didn't know because God spoke to Adam. She just heard it third person. See? So she had some doubt, some legitimate, I'm not sure. Well, that's what the enemy does with us. Rocky, did God tell you that? Are you sure? And if you don't have the weight of praying over that thing, of walking that thing out when it when the test was on and when the trials were heated, right? And you you haven't seen God answer a prayer, but you've been captured in the elixir of a moment, then all you're going to do is have the bright lights, and the bright lights are going to fail you. But if you have a walk with God and it's experientially certified with apostolic anointing, and you go, oh no, no, no, I know God's going to show up. Right? I may not know how and I may not know when, but I know God is going to deliver me. You can't, there's no enemy that can defeat that.

SPEAKER_04

Come on. It's like a loving-lust thing, like I want to lust God, I want to love God and truly and culture has twisted that, inverted it.

SPEAKER_01

So uh we're driven by lust to acquire things, to want things, to desire things, right? And of course, that the negative connotations that go with that word, we all know that. But uh when you love something intimately, then you trust it. Yep. And that's the problem in relationships today. You see a lot of people that are trying to practice the mechanics of love in a lust-oriented relationship. And it's not uh it's not because they're bad, it's not because they're wrong. They don't even think like that. But they're convinced by their secular indoctrination and the culture they've grown up in, they've been told that was love all their life. Right?

SPEAKER_03

Yep.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, you have a you have a guy running for a state office in the state of Texas right now that will convince you that if you love him, you'll agree with him that there are six different kinds of species, genders. That's uh I don't know that's that's a that's maniacal, man. That's my only trigger is that person right now.

SPEAKER_02

That's the only thing that gets me easy. You understand what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, like if if you love me, well, no, uh, that's not love at all. That's certified lunacy. And it and I'm I'm old enough to say, if you want to go to the nut house, I'll drive you to the front gates, but I'm not going in with you. You can go crazy by yourself.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

You know what I mean? And that sounds crass and harsh, but it's it's applicable to him.

SPEAKER_04

Well, just like well, it's a lot of words now. A lot of words, but no, no power behind it, no dominion.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

No understanding of what you're getting into. This warfare that is actually real if you open your eyes. It's there. And it's not it's the level of the city.

SPEAKER_01

Well, you're talking about a generation, and and let's be clear, not the not the whole generation, but those um those agents within that um they approach the sacred things of God as though they're improvisational. You know what I mean? And um they don't have any appreciation for anything deep theologically. So the theological depth is unnecessary. It's just I just need to know a few things, and God knows my heart, and He knows I'm a good person. That's not that's nowhere near truth. So that's what you're talking about, right? So you just have to steer clear of that and be careful and and and find your voice when that comes up, because people trap me all the time. They'll try, they'll try to um because I'm present, they'll say, Well, don't you believe that? And you have to learn too. I should have learned this younger. It would have I would have probably not gotten into so many skirmishes, verbal skirmishes that I did. But I didn't learn it until later in life. You do not have to answer somebody just because they ask you a question. We've been taught all of our life that courtesy, yeah, you respond when you're spoken to. But just because somebody asks you a dumb question doesn't mean you have to give them an answer. You can look at them. And you can look at them long enough for them to catch on that I just asked something that's not right. And then they'll say, Well, what do you believe? Then you can do it without offending them. You know, I don't know what how this is helping anyone. No, it's helping me.

SPEAKER_04

That's good stuff right there. Uh Easter's coming up, Pastor. Yeah. This is it. The last few days for Palm Sunday. I guess the quick question as a for someone young, going in faith, what is Palm Sunday?

SPEAKER_01

That's a great question. Uh, and I'm not sure we have enough time to to get into, but to the the simplistic uh nature of it is it's the week before uh it's recognizing and celebrating the week and the things that happened during those weeks or those days preceding his death, his crucifixion. So Palm Sunday is uh honoring the day that he rode in to Jerusalem on the donkey, and they waved palm leaves. Hosanna. Cried, Hosanna, you know it? Oh, no, I just asked it for someone who knows. No, but that's what it is, is it's it's it's recognizing the jubilation of his triumphant entry. And he's coming in uh and they're shouting, Hosanna to the highest. He's the king of Jerusalem. Uh this is the fulfillment of Isaiah and Jeremiah and the prophets of old who said he would be the king of Salem, the king of the city of peace. So uh Palm Sunday traditionally is a day where people are celebrant, just the celebrations are high, lots of fanfare, festivity, lots of chocolate, good food, leading up to uh that week, you know, and um and then of course you get into Maundy Thursday and um uh Good Friday, and and I don't know how we call it Good Friday, but it's yeah, it was a tragedy. But we recognize uh incrementally the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the most important week. Uh it's the Super Bowl of Christianity, right? So it's the most important week of celebration for us. And uh it's it's the fulfillment. Jesus in type is the fulfillment of the Passover. You know, in fact, he in in our Easter, what we would call Easter celebrations, we recognize the fulfillment of every feast except for the Feast of Trumpets. The Feast of Trumpets is the only feast that we have not yet celebrated because it hadn't happened. That's good stuff. So uh yeah, and when you come out of Egypt, we talked about Egypt earlier, is that they brought out four cups of deliverance, and so you you had your four cups of um testimony that went with uh the Passover meal, and they recognize, and so that fourth cup is the cup of trumpets as well. So it all correlates and corresponds. So it's very, very interesting. And those are the kind of uh nuanced truths, the weight and the gravity of that that gives you uh real anchors of faith, where you're not just floating around with a you know, the sound of and soloquy of a of a new gospel song and or some new hat or something, but you you're anchored in tradition and says, Oh, I know what I believe. Come on. And uh so it's very precious. So Palm Sunday is gonna be a great day. We're gonna get up and and have a fantastic time. Uh people are gonna celebrate and go out, and hopefully we'll have good weather. And usually that's when you start seeing the beautiful colored attire of all the ladies, and they've got hats and they're doing all the it looks like the Kentucky Derby, man. That's a good weather. That's coming up too. Yeah, so I love it. I love that period of time. And then uh Good Friday is where we traditionally would gather and celebrate uh and remember his death. And uh usually in in a in a typical uh Christian service, you would see Passover represented there with communion. And you would see the culmination of that uh communion and and the real recognition that his body was broken for us and his blood was shed for us. And so that's a high time for a real somber moment. And generally here we we try to do those services maybe an hour long, not much music, you know, just enough worship to color and complex the atmosphere and come into his presence. And then we just want to somberly and and uh purposefully remember what he did for us and think about the price. And that again anchors us to the reality that we're chosen and he paid the ultimate price for us. That's how much we're loved. And that's what we bat it back against the wall of condemnation and says, Oh, you can't do it. Oh, there is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus who walk after the Spirit and not after the flesh. I'm walking after the Spirit. Devil, get your hands off of me. You know what I mean? And so you can you can you can be anchored in what he paid for you. And then of course, Easter Sunday, man, it's just it's the uh it's the day of rejoicing and celebration and love and laughter. Everybody's kissing each other and hugging each other and taking pictures of each other and all of traditionally used to uh earlier in earlier times people would would save up all year for specific suits and clothing and and shoes and they would dress up and uh the little girls would have ringlets in their hair and carrying big purses and stuffed with eggs and chocolate treats and all that stuff. So it was a it was a big time. Usually that's when, if I remember correctly, the white shoes come out. Yep, yeah, white colors. Yeah, pastel colors and white shoes, yes. So that's just that's that's what it means to in a in a very vivacious way. Uh now historically and and uh scripturally, it's of course much broader and deeper than that, but for American Christianity, that's a good way of thinking about it. After the more questions now that come in my head, but with time. Come on.

SPEAKER_04

Get it.

SPEAKER_01

Ask me.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I guess what I got two that come to my mind automatically was it's gonna be a long time. Maybe another, but okay. Communion. Yeah. We don't do that every Sunday. No, we don't. Some people do. Why is that?

SPEAKER_01

What is the great question? And it's one I'm happy to answer. And there's there's arguments for pro and con, right? So I don't assume to have the right answer. I'll just tell you what I feel is uh we have we have had rhythm, different rhythms of that. And I got into a a rhythm uh sometime back before 2020 uh where we were doing it very regularly, a couple times a month. But with just like with everything else, I started noticing that people weren't staying as long in the spirit of contemplation and really thinking about sobriety, thinking a moment, thinking about the the real sacrifice that he made for us. So to me it was becoming too common. And so I backed it up and where we did it once a month, right? And then of course when 2020 hit and we weren't gathering the way we were typically gathered, we kind of broke that rhythm. And so we're trying to get back to that place. But m what I love, what I think is a good w way of approaching that is to have a communion service every month. And then of course, Easter and uh Christmas and different times, those are special times that you do more than than once a month. But if you do that, it still retains a very serious and it's not just something I come and do and practice and it's it's it's part of church and I'm out of here. You know what I mean? It's it's something that I'm contemplating and I'm thinking about and I'm taking a moment to reflect over. And I think that his sacrifice requires us to do that. It's not an option. You know, it's a very serious thing.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_01

So I just want to keep that as as much as we can. And it it may come a time that we uh we design and and discern we need to move that to every week or every day. We could do that, right? There's nothing, there's no prohibitions. It's just finding that place and that rhythm to where it retains its holiness, its sacredness to us, and it means deeply something uh that anchors us and saves us.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, so my next question was so you say you said we're chasing that the spirit, the holy spirit, holy ghost.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

That is uh to my the breath of God?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, the rulak of God.

SPEAKER_04

The rulak of God. So I never that's kind of one of my newest revelations I find. I I was my head, Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost. I never thought the breath of God. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So that's where you find that's where you find in Genesis 1 and 1, in the beginning, God's what? Said. Let there be light. Oh, said, yeah. Breath. So the the um the word for um the breath of God is without sound. So that's why you see even the name of God, Y-H-W-H, Yahweh. We call it Yahweh, but it has no vowels. So uh you can't pronounce it. You have to you have to breathe it. So the sound of Yahweh is that's right. That's our first word. That's right. So your first breath is is is naming God in you. Come on, your DNA. So that's a sidetrack. But uh yes, the the the Greeks call it pneuma. He breathed into them. So um, yeah, the the ruach of God, he he breathed into them the breath of life. It's the same spirit that you meet in the holiest of holies. Okay, so the visible expression of the ruach of God is the shekinah of God. Jesus. And that's the name of that of God, other gods. The Spirit of God appears as cloven tongues as a fire, sitting upon the mercy seat, accepting the sacrifice. Okay? So then you have in the Acts, the second chapter, the cloven tongues of fire again appear, not sitting upon the mercy seat of the Old Testament, because now Jesus Christ has rent the veil, and both Jew and Gentile can enter in, and so the Spirit of God sits upon each person. Come on. The second baptism. That's right. So that's the manifest. So the Old Testament is the school teacher, it's the school master. That's what the Bible says. And it teaches us by typology and by ordinance. And shadows and type. It's shadows and types of what's coming. And so that's why you look at the Alif and Tav. Uh you look at the at the first letter in it's again in the Hebrew alphabet is Alif. It doesn't have a sound.

unknown

Alif.

SPEAKER_01

That's how you say Alif. So Alif is always attached to something else. But it's the life of that thing.

SPEAKER_04

Come on. So I knew that was going to take time. So did that make any sense? It did.

SPEAKER_01

Hopefully for other people listening, but it did for me, yeah. So if you uh if you break that down, uh the rook the rule of God is when he breathed into Adam the breath of life, he became a living soul, right? And so every every one of us are born with the DNA of that that breath. That's that's the spark. And that's why when you think about terminating a life, the danger and the absolute uh abhorrent nature of that is that you're literally taking and killing the expression of his word or his or his breath.

SPEAKER_04

Two things. One, eat a mandate. If you haven't got that, go and get it. That's you talk about that breathing Adam. Second, you had a sermon a while back where I I think I've already talked about it on a podcast where you said things like we're trick we're we're we're touching holy things with ordinary hands.

SPEAKER_01

That's right.

SPEAKER_04

And you said every person is a holy thing, we're messing with them with holy, we're all rooted in there for no reason, things like that. And you're right. That goes with that breath that they have inside of them.

SPEAKER_01

That's right. Well, and and it it it we have to fall back in love with the idea, and I use that word elastically, but we have to really be oriented around this thing because the world is becoming more calloused by the hour. And uh social media has done much to harm the way we treat one another, you know. Uh, but we have to we have to get back into becoming men and women of faith-filled love and build up one another with holy words of affirmation. Like, Rocky, you can do that, man. Go do it. And um, I don't know what it's gonna take for this world to to recognize and realize that love is the supreme rule and law of the universe. And there's so many people that are functioning in everything called love, but it doesn't match what 1 Corinthians 13 says love is. You're not saying very much.

SPEAKER_05

I'm l I listen, I'm soaking things in.

SPEAKER_01

Don't take my excuses.

SPEAKER_05

No, I'm so serious. I want to like be myself.

SPEAKER_01

I'm doing all the talking. Yeah, yeah. No, you did great. If James was here, he would be talking. We know that, right?

SPEAKER_05

Really?

SPEAKER_01

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04

But we are an hour in. Yeah? Yeah. I think if we want to keep going, we can. No, I'm in our team, man. I'm riding with you. Okay. I appreciate you letting me be here. Guys, thank you for tuning in. Don't forget, Palm Sunday is right here. King of Kings this Saturday. Here at the Church of Champions, invite someone, bring your kids, bring your wife, bring your husband, bring everyone you can.

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_04

Uh it's always best to invite somebody, especially with Palm Sunday Easter coming up. Like Pastor said, this is the Super Bowl for this religion, like for Christianity. This is the big, this is where it all, right here. This separates us from every other religion. Our God died, but yet he came back. He died for our sins, but yet he rose again. Name someone else who has done that.

SPEAKER_01

Well, and our our God rose from the dead so that we could live. Every other God requires you to die for them. Come on. Yep. Come on. And all of them are in their tombs. His tomb is empty. We have a legitimate right. We have a legitimate right to praise him.

SPEAKER_03

Mm hmm.

SPEAKER_04

So come on down here for Easter, invite somebody, fill a seat next to you. Every like fashion. That person that you see at work, your coworkers see someone at the gas station, that is someone who has the living breath of God inside of them. They are not ordinary, they are holy. So allow them, come teach them, come show them the way, come help them out. Invite someone to church. Invite someone you know who's been on your heart lately, who you know you've been trying to help out. This is the time. This is the easiest way to come on. It's Easter Sunday. You can't give them an excuse for that. That's every everyone will go to church. Everyone will go to church on Easter Sunday. So come on down, please. And uh if I should want to praise out.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, sure. Lord, we thank you for this discussion. We thank you for this podcast, and we thank you for the opportunity to share your word and exploit the grandeur of your favor upon the lives of people who trust in you. We ask you for your anointing to break every yoke and for your peace to abide in every heart and heal everybody in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen.