SPEAKER_00: And how we water water we have broken.
SPEAKER_00: We have ready water.
SPEAKER_00: Fresh water.
SPEAKER_01: At the road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: For more information on the road, visit the road.org.
SPEAKER_01: We hope you are encouraged by today's message.
SPEAKER_00: This year, we started our year with breakthrough plastered on the back of the wall.
SPEAKER_00: And um that was a powerful word for me.
SPEAKER_00: And I and I took it seriously, and I began to pray about breakthrough, what that'll look like, and whatever God wants to do, just bring it.
SPEAKER_00: You know?
SPEAKER_00: And I've learned through Pam and others to be people of prayer.
SPEAKER_00: And I've always prayed, but I guess I look at prayer differently since my time at the road.
SPEAKER_00: And somebody asked me one time, they said, What's so different about your church?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, we pray.
SPEAKER_00: And I didn't mean that as an insult, and I didn't hear it until it came out of my mouth as if other people don't pray.
SPEAKER_00: But we do pray differently here than any other church I've ever been a part of.
SPEAKER_00: It's like that prayer is the thing that leads the way, and then we come behind it after we see what God has, what God has done, we kind of step in off the heels of prayer, and we really believe strongly in that.
SPEAKER_00: So I've learned a lot about that.
SPEAKER_00: So in order to have breakthrough, uh, my wife and I committed to some fasting time, and I was going to do 21 days of fasting.
SPEAKER_00: And the day before that happened, I had a guy call me and he he called me, and this is how the phone call went.
SPEAKER_00: I picked up the phone, he was like, Hey, dude, are you okay?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'm fine.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: He said, Nothing's wrong?
SPEAKER_00: I said, no.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Man, that's weird.
SPEAKER_00: He said, God told me to call you.
SPEAKER_00: I felt I felt sure something was wrong.
SPEAKER_00: I said, no, nothing's wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I hadn't talked to him in a couple of years, and he said, Well, we should get together.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, let's do it tonight because tomorrow I'm fasting.
SPEAKER_00: So if we're gonna eat, do anything like that, let's let's get it in.
SPEAKER_00: So we did that.
SPEAKER_00: And we sat down and we started talking, and he said, So catch me up.
SPEAKER_00: What's going on in your life?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, I think next year I'm gonna uh plant a church here in Falcon, and he looks at me and he says, I don't see it.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, You don't see what?
SPEAKER_00: He said, You really want to plant a church?
SPEAKER_00: I said, Well, I feel like that's what God's asking me to do.
SPEAKER_00: He said, No, that's not what I ask you.
SPEAKER_00: Do you, in your soul, really want to plant a church?
SPEAKER_00: And I was kind of getting offended.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, you know, there's certain times when you don't ask if you want to do it, you just ask if God wants you to do it, and then you follow the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I said, For instance, John the Baptist, I'm sure if you ask him, do you really want to lose your head?
SPEAKER_00: He could come up with like 10 million things he'd rather do other than lose his head tomorrow.
SPEAKER_00: And he looked at me, he said, Yeah, it's not the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: And so he kind of dropped it and we carried on with our conversation, and he's he's kind of an ideas guy.
SPEAKER_00: So I said, Look, I have this idea, and I want to speak to men, and I want to put together an event called a halftime event.
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, Okay, what's that mean?
SPEAKER_00: I said, you know how like at halftime in a game, you can be getting your rear end handed to you, but your coach can bring you in at halftime and say, guys, here's the things we need to change.
SPEAKER_00: And if we change these things and we stay the course, we can win at the end of this game.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I said, that's kind of how I feel like men my age really we're kind of at the halftime of our life, and we need some mentors to come in and say, hey, here's the things that you could change.
SPEAKER_00: And if you change these things, then at the end of this thing, you can say, I won.
SPEAKER_00: He's like, man, that's an awesome vision for a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: He said, now what's your vision for planting a church?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, I don't have it yet.
SPEAKER_00: I'm waiting on the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He said, So you have a vision as a speaker, but we're not doing anything with that.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have a vision as a church planter, but we're forging ahead.
SPEAKER_00: He's like, I just, it just doesn't make sense to me.
SPEAKER_00: And so I went home that night.
SPEAKER_00: I pretty much stayed up the whole night praying.
SPEAKER_00: I wrote it in my journal, I wrote his words in my journal, I wrote my prayers in my journal.
SPEAKER_00: And I just said, God, if you're doing something, let me know because my heart would be happy to be a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: I'm being faithful as a church planter.
SPEAKER_00: I come into the office the next morning for a one-on-one with Pastor Steve, and he said, Bobby, I need to talk to you.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Do you really want to plant a church?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, what is going on?
SPEAKER_00: And uh he said exactly the same thing that the guy the night before said.
SPEAKER_00: He said, You know what, Bobby, if I were to evaluate your giftedness, I would say you should be a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the same thing the other guy said the night before.
SPEAKER_00: And then he shows me this video of uh the legend of Bagger Vance.
SPEAKER_00: I still haven't seen the movie, but the clip is really good.
SPEAKER_00: So this guy who used to be a golfer kind of got away from it, and now a tournament's come in town, he's he's golfing.
SPEAKER_00: There's a caddy, the caddy is Will Smith, and Will Smith is kind of like God.
SPEAKER_00: And he's kind of telling the guy, the guy's lost his ball in the woods, he's having these flashbacks from war.
SPEAKER_00: It's like this crazy scene.
SPEAKER_00: I should have pulled it up today, but Will Smith tells him, Hey, you need to find your true swing.
SPEAKER_00: And the guy calms down, he swings and hits the ball beautifully.
SPEAKER_00: And Pastor Steve said, Bobby, I think it's time for you to find your true swing.
SPEAKER_00: And I knew what that meant, so I started crying.
SPEAKER_00: And I went home immediately in the middle of the day.
SPEAKER_00: I went home because I hadn't slept that night.
SPEAKER_00: I laid down, I uh started taking, I started to take a nap, and I said, when I laid in the bed, I said, God, this doesn't make sense.
SPEAKER_00: I've committed my life, I've committed my time to this church.
SPEAKER_00: If you're calling me somewhere else, I'm not gonna ask for it.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have to say so.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, if you're calling me to be a speaker, I feel like that means I should live in Nashville.
SPEAKER_00: That's where I used to live when I was a speaker years ago.
SPEAKER_00: And my wife and I uh really struggled with that because we were young in marriage.
SPEAKER_00: This was our first year of marriage, she married me after I was already a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: We we struggled and we came out of that through the grace of God and through a mentor just speaking into my life, and that moved me into the area of being a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: And I stopped being a speaker and I started being more of a pastor because I felt like I needed to grow up.
SPEAKER_00: That's honestly what I felt.
SPEAKER_00: And so I laid down, I said, God, if you want me to be a speaker, if you want me to move to Nashville, you're gonna have to tell Pastor Steve that because I'm not asking for that and I'm not doing that.
SPEAKER_00: I laid down, I woke up to a text from Pastor Steve saying, Hey, I need you to come to the office.
SPEAKER_00: I came into the office, he said, Hey, I was just working out, and dude, like if you're gonna be a speaker, and maybe you need to move to Nashville, and he said, and if you needed to do that today, hey, that's okay.
SPEAKER_00: And we will bless you in that, and we're with you in that.
SPEAKER_00: And again, I'm just a mess.
SPEAKER_00: Over the next 21 days, that was the first day of a 21-day fast.
SPEAKER_00: Over the next 21 days, I have recorded in my journal six people that came up to me and said, Hey, I don't know what this means, but you're doing something that you're not supposed to be doing, and God has created you to do something else, and you're supposed to walk in it and take that for what it means.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what that means.
SPEAKER_00: And they would say it different ways.
SPEAKER_00: I remember Anna saying, Hey, I see a river, a waterfall, and you're supposed to jump into that waterfall, but right now I see you in an old house, and that house is being guarded by a guard dog.
SPEAKER_00: But you're gonna have to get out of that in order to, you're gonna have to take care of that first in order to jump into the river.
SPEAKER_00: Things like that would continually be said to me over the next 21 days.
SPEAKER_00: And uh when we finally surrendered, I called a guy who I barely know.
SPEAKER_00: I just know he has kids my age and he lives in Nashville.
SPEAKER_00: So I called him to ask him about school systems and about churches and about good places to live that are affordable because Nashville is crazy expensive.
SPEAKER_00: And uh so I called him and I said, Hey, love to meet your family, love to introduce my kids to your kids because they're the same age, like to know about schools, like to know about churches, and if you know of anybody that is looking for a speaker for an event, I feel like God's calling me to be a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: I left that message on his voicemail, and then he calls me back and he said, Bobby, when I got your voicemail, I almost dropped the phone.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Because you said I want to meet your family, and I thought, oh, that's cool, that's cool.
SPEAKER_00: Well it's schools, all that.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, the whole time you're talking, I'm thinking, I wish this guy would just quit his job and be a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: And then you said, I'm quitting my job and I'm gonna be a speaker.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, I just got a new role uh as a tour director, and I want you to apply for a job as a speaker for our tours.
SPEAKER_00: I applied for that job, I did the interview, and um in September, at the end of September, uh go on tour with David Crowder to be his speaker.
SPEAKER_00: And that's just the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: All of that happens through words.
SPEAKER_00: Do you hear how words have just weaved in and out of my life?
SPEAKER_00: Someone has spoken a word, another person has spoken a word, another person has said a word.
SPEAKER_00: I've said words to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The power of words to completely change or alter your course.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to open up to James chapter 3.
SPEAKER_00: James chapter 3.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 1 says this, my brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.
SPEAKER_00: Let not many of you become teachers, because teachers receive a stricter judgment.
SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that is?
SPEAKER_00: Why do you think teachers will receive a stricter judgment on Judgment Day?
SPEAKER_00: It can only be for one reason, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's because your words matter.
SPEAKER_00: The things that you say, the things that come out of your mouth, have profound impact to alter your life and to alter other people's lives.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm telling you, had my friend not said anything to me when I said, hey, I'm feeling called to, or I'm I'm planning to plant a church.
SPEAKER_00: Had Steve not said anything to me, had Anna not said anything to me, had George not said anything to me, uh so many people can come up to me, had my wife not said anything to me, um I'd probably just be staying the course.
SPEAKER_00: But their words, along with what I felt like the Spirit's already leading me to, has changed my course.
SPEAKER_00: Words have an incredible amount of power.
SPEAKER_00: I remember some words that were spoken over me as a kid.
SPEAKER_00: I was a bad kid.
SPEAKER_00: In third grade, I feel like I did retire one teacher.
SPEAKER_00: I saw her years later working at a convenience store, and I thought, I did that.
SPEAKER_00: And I looked at her as I paid for my items, and I thought, I hope she doesn't know me.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm sure she knows me.
SPEAKER_00: I was bad.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember being so bad one day that if you know how they like like schools can kind of scam your kids into selling everything to you, you know?
SPEAKER_00: So they come home with all these magazines and you gotta buy all this stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And so I did that.
SPEAKER_00: And it was the first time I ever really applied myself to try to, I just wanted to do it.
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to achieve this goal.
SPEAKER_00: And they sold us on this idea that if you sell all this stuff, they're gonna have this big assembly, and then you get to come up in front of everybody and get acknowledged, and then you get to pick an item based on the amount of stuff that you sold.
SPEAKER_00: So I was all in, you know.
SPEAKER_00: But that day I was really bad.
SPEAKER_00: So my teacher said, I will pick your item for you.
SPEAKER_00: And so I had to sit in a room by myself while the rest of the school went to an assembly.
SPEAKER_00: I had to sit in an empty room, and then she came back from the assembly with all these kids excited, and they all had all their toys and all their junk.
SPEAKER_00: And she comes in with a poster, and it was a poster of an orangutan.
SPEAKER_00: And the orangutan, on the orangutan poster, it said, When I do right, no one remembers.
SPEAKER_00: And when I do wrong, no one forgets.
SPEAKER_00: And I never forgot it.
SPEAKER_00: I can quote, I can see it right now.
SPEAKER_00: Those words have stuck in my head, and I'm telling you, it marked me.
SPEAKER_00: Because it said, you know what, you're right.
SPEAKER_00: Don't even try to do right, because nobody remembers that stuff.
SPEAKER_00: You're just a failure, you're bad, and that's all anybody's ever going to remember.
SPEAKER_00: No one forgets the bad stuff, and no one remembers the good stuff.
SPEAKER_00: I remember that.
SPEAKER_00: And that marked me for a long, long, long time.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not saying it's her fault, but I went through all of school believing that I was stupid, that I was, that it was not possible for me to be a good learner or a good student, and that only the bad things are remembered.
SPEAKER_00: I truly believed that.
SPEAKER_00: Now, uh, fast forward to the seventh, eighth, ninth grade, and Polly McDuffie was my bus driver.
SPEAKER_00: And I got on her bus and she used to call me beautiful Bobby.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I get on the bus, she's like, here's beautiful Bobby.
SPEAKER_00: And I acted like I hated it, but inside I loved it.
SPEAKER_00: I acted like I hated it because I wanted all my friends to think that I thought she was lame.
SPEAKER_00: But inside, man, I felt like there's I have one fan in the world.
SPEAKER_00: One person that thinks I'm a good person.
SPEAKER_00: And she would say, There's beautiful Bobby.
SPEAKER_00: And I would get on the bus and she would have Bible verses taped above every seat on a public school at a public school.
SPEAKER_00: Bible verses taped above every seat, and you could sit in one seat, and if you wanted to move to other seats, you had to memorize the Bible verse of the seat you wanted to sit in.
SPEAKER_00: And if you did not memorize that, you could not sit there.
SPEAKER_00: And she was very firm on that.
SPEAKER_00: And we drove all the time and she discipled us.
SPEAKER_00: She was constant, she was real, she was genuine.
SPEAKER_00: I actually heard her say a cuss word one time, and that threw me into a tailspin because Christian people don't ever say anything like that, and if you do, you're kind of disqualified from it because everything is like this uh performance-based to be seen.
SPEAKER_00: And she was just honest and genuine and who she actually was.
SPEAKER_00: And for the first time in my life, I felt like I saw an authentic person that loved Jesus versus a Christian person that was performing for the church.
SPEAKER_00: And I began to fall in love with the Lord on her bus route.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember asking her about what kind of how did you come up with these verses?
SPEAKER_00: How do you memorize scripture?
SPEAKER_00: How do you know what scripture you should memorize?
SPEAKER_00: And she asked me, she said, Do you ever talk to God?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Of course I talk to God, like you moron.
SPEAKER_00: We all talk to God.
SPEAKER_00: It's called prayer.
SPEAKER_00: You know, that's what I'm thinking.
SPEAKER_00: And then she says to me, Does God ever talk to you?
SPEAKER_00: And I was completely stuck.
SPEAKER_00: Like, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Does God ever talk to me?
SPEAKER_00: Like, what does how would that even work?
SPEAKER_00: And I thought what happened was you did the best you could to follow God and on judgment day, he would tell you if he was pleased with you or if he wasn't pleased with you.
SPEAKER_00: That's how I thought it worked.
SPEAKER_00: I thought that was your first time hearing from God.
SPEAKER_00: And she said, that's not how it works at all.
SPEAKER_00: She said, This is how it works.
SPEAKER_00: Go home and pray.
SPEAKER_00: When you pray to God, that's you talking to God.
SPEAKER_00: But when you read the Bible, expecting God to speak, that's God talking to you.
SPEAKER_00: And I went home and my mom's Bible was on the table, nobody else was home.
SPEAKER_00: I picked up the Bible, I said, God, my bus driver said you could talk.
SPEAKER_00: So if you can talk, I don't care what you want to say what you need to say, I just want to hear you say it.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is, it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00: So I read and read and read and read and read, and he wasn't talking.
SPEAKER_00: And I felt like he wasn't going to talk.
SPEAKER_00: But in my spirit, I felt like I'm supposed to keep reading.
SPEAKER_00: So I kept reading, I kept reading, and then bam, it happened.
SPEAKER_00: God spoke.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what I did.
SPEAKER_00: I bowed down on my knees and I said, Oh great God.
SPEAKER_00: And I took communion.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't do any of that.
SPEAKER_00: I threw the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: I threw it across the room because it freaked me out.
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't expecting that he could actually talk, but he spoke and he said, Get your life right and keep it right because I'm coming back really soon.
SPEAKER_00: So I threw the Bible across the room.
SPEAKER_00: I stood there for a minute.
SPEAKER_00: I got scared to be in the house where God talked.
SPEAKER_00: So I ran outside.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not joking.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not making this up.
SPEAKER_00: I run outside, and then while I'm outside, I feel safe because God's in there.
SPEAKER_00: And then I got so much energy and I got so excited I didn't know what to do that I just started running circles around my house.
SPEAKER_00: Because I was just full of this energy.
SPEAKER_00: And then I'm not making this up.
SPEAKER_00: My pastor, my pastor from my church, he pulls up on visitation.
SPEAKER_00: That's like an old school thing, I think.
SPEAKER_00: But he pulls up on visitation.
SPEAKER_00: He asked if my mom and dad were there.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, no, they're not here.
SPEAKER_00: But God just talked to me.
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: I said, in his Bible, I was there, and he just spoke to me, and I was trying to talk to him, and he left.
SPEAKER_00: Like, he didn't know what to do with that.
SPEAKER_00: But God's word.
SPEAKER_00: And God Himself speaking words transformed the way I live my whole life because of the words of a bus driver.
SPEAKER_00: So we can speak negative words like when I do right, no one remembers.
SPEAKER_00: When I do wrong, no one forgets.
SPEAKER_00: Or we can speak kingdom words.
SPEAKER_00: Like, God will redeem you.
SPEAKER_00: God loves you.
SPEAKER_00: God died for you.
SPEAKER_00: His Spirit wants to have fellowship with you.
SPEAKER_00: His son died to make that possible.
SPEAKER_00: And if you read His word, you can have these kind of words spoken into your life, or you can have negative words spoken into your life.
SPEAKER_00: And so where Scripture says in John 10, 10, I've come, he says, the devil comes to steal, kill, and destroy.
SPEAKER_00: I've come that you might have life, and that you might have it more abundantly.
SPEAKER_00: You can also say the Holy Spirit, God, and Christ speak words that you might have life.
SPEAKER_00: The enemy speaks words that you might be stolen, killed, and destroyed.
SPEAKER_00: And so words have an incredible amount of power.
SPEAKER_00: Look in verse 2.
SPEAKER_00: It says, We all stumble in many things.
SPEAKER_00: If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body.
SPEAKER_00: If any man does not stumble in what he says, he's a perfect man.
SPEAKER_00: And he's able to bridle his whole body.
SPEAKER_00: So words have an incredible amount of importance.
SPEAKER_00: But not just the words that you speak out to other people, not just when you're rude to people, not just when you're kind to people, not just when you're positive and faithful when you speak to other people, or faith less when you speak to other people, but actually speaking to yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Because when he says able to bridle, he's saying your body.
SPEAKER_00: You ever talk to yourself?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you do.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, I used to think that meant you were crazy, so I would try to do it real low where no one could hear it.
SPEAKER_00: Then I realized everybody does it.
SPEAKER_00: We all do it.
SPEAKER_00: We all speak to ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And we all speak to ourselves on a daily basis, whether we speak it out verbally or whether we just hold it right there in our minds.
SPEAKER_00: You ever call yourself stupid in a day?
SPEAKER_00: Well, you're speaking death.
SPEAKER_00: Do you ever speak the words of God and say, by the word of God, this is how I'm living my life?
SPEAKER_00: See, we speak words not just to other people, but we speak words to ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And those words that we speak, they actually shape how we live our lives, what we believe about ourselves, what we believe we're capable of, what we believe we're not capable of.
SPEAKER_00: We speak these words, and I'm not so sure that the most negative person in your life might not be yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Speaking to yourself.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why it's important that we know what the Word of God says and we begin to speak the Word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Look in verse 3, and we're gonna go three through six here.
SPEAKER_00: Even so, the tongue is a little member and boasts great things.
SPEAKER_00: See how a great forest fire, see how a great forest, a little fire kindles.
SPEAKER_00: And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity.
SPEAKER_00: The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body and sets on fire the course of nature, and it is set on fire by hell.
SPEAKER_00: So what he's saying here is the power of the tongue to do a couple of things.
SPEAKER_00: There's a couple of things that a tongue can do.
SPEAKER_00: He says it's a little member.
SPEAKER_00: It's little.
SPEAKER_00: Me and my daughter, I don't know why we did this this morning.
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of weird.
SPEAKER_00: But we were both brushing our teeth in the same bathroom, and she sticks her tongue out, uh, and she says, Whose tongue do you think I have?
SPEAKER_00: Yours or mom's?
SPEAKER_00: It's like, well.
SPEAKER_00: So we stick our tongues out and we start looking, and I said, I don't think you have any of our tongues.
SPEAKER_00: You have your own tongue.
SPEAKER_00: Your tongue is so small.
SPEAKER_00: But is it not true that your tongue, for many of us, has done a world of damage?
SPEAKER_00: Your tongue is what you use in an interview.
SPEAKER_00: Your tongue is what you use in an argument with your wife.
SPEAKER_00: Or your tongue is when you just fly off the handle while you're working with your kids, and you can just look and you say, Wow, I just deflated them.
SPEAKER_00: Or your tongue, you ever spoken a word to someone and you just see life coming into them because you just said something that's like, I needed that.
SPEAKER_00: We all have great power and great destruction right here and in this little thing that can make great boast about all the things that is done just through the power of words.
SPEAKER_00: And the scripture here, look in verse 3, it says, Indeed we put bits in horses' mouths, that they may obey us, and that we turn their whole body.
SPEAKER_00: Look also at ships, although they are large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by very small rudders wherever the pilot desires.
SPEAKER_00: And then he begins to go on to say it's it is also that small, small spark that can burn down an entire forest.
SPEAKER_00: Now we've all seen that, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you've lived here any amount of time, you understand how serious we get about small sparks in our community because we've seen how much damage it can do in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: It can mess with the entire community, just a small spark.
SPEAKER_00: What he's saying here is the tongue has either great control and the ability to guide, or it can get incredibly out of control like a wildfire.
SPEAKER_00: And so some of us have learned the power of words so much that we now use our tongue for the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: And we're beginning to guide people.
SPEAKER_00: And so, Pastor Steve, in his spirit, when he discerned something about me and he decided to show the video clip of the legend of Bagger Vance, or my friend, or Anna, or George, or whoever saw something that said something because they had it in their spirit, that completely aligned with what I felt like the Spirit of God was saying to me, and it began to change and alter the way I do things.
SPEAKER_00: But sometimes we can use words without thought.
SPEAKER_00: We have no strategy behind our words.
SPEAKER_00: We just fly off at the handle and we just say really, really, really bad things like my high school football coach.
SPEAKER_00: I had my son, my oldest son, who is in the sixth grade yesterday.
SPEAKER_00: We measured his height, and we realized that he is the exact same height that I was in the tenth grade.
SPEAKER_00: He's five foot five and a half.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what I was.
SPEAKER_00: I was five foot five and a half.
SPEAKER_00: I weighed, I weighed about as much as wind weighs.
SPEAKER_00: And I was trying to play football.
SPEAKER_00: And I had a coach, like everybody's hitting everybody.
SPEAKER_00: My brother was the exact opposite.
SPEAKER_00: This massive guy, by the time he was 16, he's benching 365 pounds.
SPEAKER_00: He's six foot tall.
SPEAKER_00: He's just this massive guy.
SPEAKER_00: And the coach in front of the whole team said, Sanders.
SPEAKER_00: I said, Yes.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Is Chris your brother?
SPEAKER_00: I said, Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_00: He said, You would never know it by the way you play football.
SPEAKER_00: I was like, Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: I needed that.
SPEAKER_00: And so we line up against uh man on man, and I hit this guy, and I hit him pretty hard, and I'm finally feeling proud of myself.
SPEAKER_00: And the coach says, Guys, I want you to look at this.
SPEAKER_00: And he takes a pause for a minute and he said, We got two guys here.
SPEAKER_00: One of them's scared and the other one's glad.
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Well, I don't know what to do to make this guy happy.
SPEAKER_00: But he said, one of you are scared and the other one's glad of it.
SPEAKER_00: And I just felt like he said, You coward, you sorry little kid.
SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't long after that till I said, Here, you can have these football pads.
SPEAKER_00: I don't need them.
SPEAKER_00: And for 25, 30 years now, I've regretted quitting football.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what more effective way to take a little kid, put your arms around him and say, You're a good kid.
SPEAKER_00: Probably not going to the NFL.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, you're probably not going on the field this year.
SPEAKER_00: But you're a good kid.
SPEAKER_00: Stick with it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be intimidated.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna grow, you'll be fine.
SPEAKER_00: It's about who you are inside.
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine the altering of life if the guy would have just stopped for a minute?
SPEAKER_00: Because he didn't mean to hurt me.
SPEAKER_00: He that wasn't his intention.
SPEAKER_00: He just said something without thinking, and it created a forest fire.
SPEAKER_00: And he could have said something thinking, and that could have created great direction in my life.
SPEAKER_00: We all have that ability.
SPEAKER_00: We all should stop and just think about what we say because I'm telling you right now, your tongue, everybody stick your tongue out.
SPEAKER_00: It's the most powerful tool that you have physically for the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Now, obviously, your spirit, your ability to pray to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But your tongue is probably at the end of the day, either what's what you're gonna say, I'm thankful for how I use that, or you're gonna say, I have some great regrets.
SPEAKER_00: And many of us have great regrets because of our tongues.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just our tongues, it's also our ears.
SPEAKER_00: It's our ears.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 7 and 8.
SPEAKER_00: This is a hearing test.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read it and you tell me what you hear.
SPEAKER_00: For every kind of beast and bird of reptile and creature of the sea is tamed and has been tamed by mankind.
SPEAKER_00: But no man can tame the tongue.
SPEAKER_00: It is unruly evil full of deadly poison.
SPEAKER_00: That's as a hearing test.
SPEAKER_00: What did you just hear?
SPEAKER_00: Did you just hear that this is a losing battle?
SPEAKER_00: It cannot be done.
SPEAKER_00: Or did you just hear you better depend on the Holy Spirit to rise above what humans are capable of?
SPEAKER_00: If you sit in a space that says, I can't do this, no man can do it, no man can tame it, then you're gonna look at your wife and say, See, I'm not even accountable to this.
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing I can do about it.
SPEAKER_00: Or are you hearing the Spirit of God is powerful, He's mighty.
SPEAKER_00: With man, this is impossible, but with God all things are possible, and this can be done.
SPEAKER_00: And did you lean into the kingdom or did you lean into the flesh?
SPEAKER_00: A lot of what we say has to do with what we hear.
SPEAKER_00: What do we hear?
SPEAKER_00: And if you're anything like me, I have stuff in my journal that like I'm super proud of.
SPEAKER_00: Things that God has done.
SPEAKER_00: And then I'll turn to a page and I'm like, because sometimes I'm honest in my journal, and I'm like, how could I have had this day on Monday and this day on Tuesday?
SPEAKER_00: How is it possible that I could live strong for the Lord on Monday, and on Tuesday I've said or done something that I'm embarrassed of that I have to repent of?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in the similitude of God.
SPEAKER_00: Out of the same mouth proceeds blessing and cursing.
SPEAKER_00: My brethren, these things ought not to be so.
SPEAKER_00: Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening?
SPEAKER_00: Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives or a grapevine bear figs?
SPEAKER_00: Thus, no spring yields both salt water and fresh water.
SPEAKER_00: You know, when we were in Guatemala this last month, there was a spring that was yielding salt water and fresh water.
SPEAKER_00: But what happened was there was an earthquake and it created a fault line, and the two came together from this brokenness, and the water was no good.
SPEAKER_00: Even though there was fresh water in it, it was no good.
SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of how we bear fresh water and salt water, is we have brokenness in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: There's something in our life that we're wrestling between the spirit and the flesh, and when the spirit wins, we yield fresh water.
SPEAKER_00: But when the flesh wins, man, can our tongues not be destructive, terribly destructive.
SPEAKER_00: And God wants to heal you, and God wants to have more and more and more of you to a place where your words are fresh water, man.
SPEAKER_00: It's just fresh water.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the deal: there's three kinds of words, and this is what I want to end with here.
SPEAKER_00: There's three kinds of words that I want you to guard.
SPEAKER_00: And the first one is the words that you say.
SPEAKER_00: Whether it's the words that you say to yourself, the words that you say to others, the words that you say in prayer, the words that you sing from a song.
SPEAKER_00: Guard your words.
SPEAKER_00: But the next one is the words that you hear and believe.
SPEAKER_00: The words that you hear and believe.
SPEAKER_00: Because someone can speak into your life that you're a loser or God's done with you, or whatever that is, that doesn't mean you have to receive it.
SPEAKER_00: A person that begins to get mature in the spirit can begin to think of scripture and think of the words that God says and says, Whoa, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.
SPEAKER_00: You're saying one thing, but God in his word has said something completely different.
SPEAKER_00: I don't believe that.
SPEAKER_00: I actually don't believe you know what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_00: And you can just hold that thought captive as the scripture says, you hold it captive and you make it obedient unto Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So when someone says, you're a loser, you're always going to be a loser.
SPEAKER_00: You hold this thought that says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son for me.
SPEAKER_00: That whoever believes in him will not perish but will have eternal life, I must be really valuable.
SPEAKER_00: There must be great value in who I am.
SPEAKER_00: Because God gave his son for me.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore you're wrong.
SPEAKER_00: So if you're out to eat and your dad tells you you should try the pork chop.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus tells you, you should try the salmon.
SPEAKER_00: Get the salmon.
SPEAKER_00: Because he knows.
SPEAKER_00: He knows.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know opinions for us vary across the board?
SPEAKER_00: But God's opinion is fact.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know why two plus two equals four?
SPEAKER_00: Because that's God's opinion.
SPEAKER_00: If it was God's opinion that two plus two would equal 17, no one in here would doubt that.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone would say, well, of course it equals 17.
SPEAKER_00: Because all of God's opinions are our facts.
SPEAKER_00: But you have to be able to guard against what comes into your ears because sometimes even well-meaning people can say stuff that later they wish they could take back.
SPEAKER_00: It's like shaving cream, though.
SPEAKER_00: Once it comes out, it's out.
SPEAKER_00: You can't put it back in there.
SPEAKER_00: I want to show you a quick video clip uh illustrating this example.
SPEAKER_02: Hey, you know what today is?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: What?
SPEAKER_00: Saturday.
SPEAKER_02: You know what Saturday is, right?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: What?
SPEAKER_00: Basketball.
SPEAKER_02: You wanna go play some basketball?
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
SPEAKER_02: Alright, then we're gonna go sell the bone density scanner.
SPEAKER_02: How about that?
SPEAKER_00: So sometimes even well-meaning people just say stuff sometimes, they they get a chance to go back and think, man, I wish I wouldn't have said that.
SPEAKER_00: Man, I wish you could have that back.
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, like I said, with shaving cream, you can't put it back.
SPEAKER_00: And the words are a lot like that, but you can.
SPEAKER_00: You can determine whether or not you use that shaving cream.
SPEAKER_00: Or whether or not you just wash it down the drain and just say, that's not.
SPEAKER_00: But do it based on the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: So there's the words you speak, there's the words you hear, but none of them are more important than the last one.
SPEAKER_00: And that is the words that you plant.
SPEAKER_00: The words that you plant.
SPEAKER_00: Scripture tells us that those who build our house upon God's words withstand many storms.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the words that you actually take from God and you say, I'm gonna live my life based on this.
SPEAKER_00: So just go with mom or Uncle Joe or my teacher or my pastor.
SPEAKER_00: Just because they said this, that's I'm not going to allow that to stick to my heart.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to go to the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: And here's why it's important because the word of God will actually shape what comes out of your mouth.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
SPEAKER_00: So you want to allow the Holy Spirit to tame the tongue, just go to the Word of God and begin to live your life based on it.
SPEAKER_00: It also talks about holding captive every thought.
SPEAKER_00: Well, where do those thoughts come from?
SPEAKER_00: Those thoughts come from words and make it obedient to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Well, how do you do that?
SPEAKER_00: You make it obedient to what Christ said.
SPEAKER_00: What did he say?
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's super important that we live this life in the way that my bus driver said.
SPEAKER_00: Just pray.
SPEAKER_00: Just talk to God.
SPEAKER_00: Just do it and do it a lot.
SPEAKER_00: And she said, read and pray.
SPEAKER_00: Read and pray.
SPEAKER_00: Seek God.
SPEAKER_00: And let that begin to build what you believe about yourself.
SPEAKER_00: So when I started this process, I said, God, I don't know what you this message.
SPEAKER_00: I said, God, I don't know what you want me to talk on.
SPEAKER_00: And I felt like immediately he said words.
SPEAKER_00: So I don't know who in this room your life has been shaped or a wildfire has been started, either because of words you've said or words someone else has said over you.
SPEAKER_00: But I am confident that God wanted a word for you today.
SPEAKER_00: So if words have set a wildfire in your heart in a negative way, just go to the Lord and say, God, you take care of it.
SPEAKER_00: You put that fire out.
SPEAKER_00: I yield to you.
SPEAKER_00: Or if you've said something that has harmed someone and God wants you to get it right, we're getting ready to do communion here in a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Scripture would tell you, go get that right.
SPEAKER_00: Get that right.
SPEAKER_00: Even if they're in this room, even if you just need to text, whatever it is, make sure that your words actually guide you instead of lead you to an abundance of chaos.
SPEAKER_00: And then if I could selfishly say this as I get off the stage, could you pray for me?
SPEAKER_00: Could you pray for my family?
SPEAKER_00: Because I was just sitting here worshiping and I thought, oh no, the next time I do this will be with a bunch of people I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll stand up in front of people and I'll talk, and I might not have the grace of Pastor Steve saying, Hey, what was that thing you said?
SPEAKER_00: Or one of you guys, somebody said it even last week, came up to me and asked me a question about the sermon.
SPEAKER_00: I may not have that benefit.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a frightful thing to stand up in front of people and try to shape with your words.
SPEAKER_00: And I just hope that it's guided by the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: So if you guys could pray as you think about me and my family, and just pray that God not let me say anything, nothing, come out of my mouth that would embarrass the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you guys.
SPEAKER_01: You've been listening to The Road.
SPEAKER_01: We hope you have been blessed by today's message.
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