Weapons of Mass Distraction: Week #4 – Financial Pressure and Materialism

Hey, this is George Davis, and so glad to have you connected with us today.

Do I have an amazing series that's gonna be a blessing to you?

It's called Weapons of Mass Distraction.

No, I didn't say weapons of mass destruction, weapons of mass distraction.

In this season, where I believe God wants us to have a fierce focus, the enemy of focus is distraction.

And I want to walk you through and show what I believe are our four of the greatest distractions that we face as Christians or just as people in general.

And I believe if we can get our focus right, keep our eyes on Jesus and don't allow these distractions to take us off course.

God's got some amazing things awaiting us in our future.

In fact, one of the very reasons you know God's got something great is that the enemy's trying his best to take your eyes off of the future and look back to the past or look around at something else.

So buckle up, get ready for an amazing word today, because this episode today, this uh portion day is going to be a great blessing to you.

All right, I want to wrap up this series that we've been in for the last several weeks.

If you're just joining us, we've been in a series we're calling Weapons of Mass Distraction.

And the reality is God gave us a word for this year that it is a year for fierce focus for us.

Not a year to kind of be focused on God, not a year to kind of take a glance in his direction, but it is a year for us to have a fierce focus.

And if you don't know what we mean when we say fierce focus, let me give you a definition that we gave everybody at the beginning of the year.

Fierce focus is intense, unwavering concentration, where you boldly direct all of your attention, energy, and discipline toward what matters most.

It is the passionate refusal to be distracted.

It is the persistence to pursue, watch this, long-term purpose over short-term comfort.

And it is a commitment to stay locked in until the assignment is done.

God spoke to us at the beginning of the year.

He said, I need you to have a fierce focus for two reasons.

He said, number one, there's some stuff I'm trying to get to you, and you're not gonna want to miss out on what God has for you.

But then he also said there's some things that the enemy's trying to do, there's some toxicity he's trying to bring your way, there's some chaos he's trying to launch into your life, and you will miss it if you stay focused on God, but you might walk right into it if you let yourself get distracted.

So we got lots of motivation, lots of reasons to stay fiercely focused and not be distracted.

The word distract, we told you, means to draw the sight, the mind, or the attention in different directions.

It means to perplex and it means to confuse.

And we've been talking about weapons of mass distraction, which means I'm giving you some areas that may not just distract one or two people.

These are things that the devil uses as big-time weapons to try to distract the masses.

And we looked at the illustration of Peter who was out there walking on the water.

He's walking in a literal miracle on top of the water, walking toward Jesus, and he took his eyes off of Jesus and he got distracted and started looking at what happened when the waves were crashing against the boat.

He looked at what was happening with the wind that was blowing.

And the Bible says when he took his eyes off of Jesus, he started to sink.

And I'm trying to say to you today, the reason why the enemy is trying so hard to come up with a reason to get you distracted is because he can see the miracle God has you walking in.

He can see the hope of what God has out in front of you, and he's trying to get you to turn your attention to something else so he can get you off of your miracle.

But I got news for him, you're not gonna be moved by the devil's distractions.

And see, see, here's the thing: most people think, well, I'm sure when God speaks to me, I'll know it again.

I'm sure he's gonna speak to me loud and clear.

God doesn't promise to speak to us in a spectacular way.

In fact, you remember from the message last week, we talked about Elijah was in this place of depression and he needed to hear from God.

God told him, Go stand on this mountain and pay attention.

He said, I'm getting ready to come by, but I need you to pay attention.

And when he's standing there, the Bible says a hurricane showed up.

Now, hurricane is dramatic.

Maybe you ever seen pictures of a hurricane, wind is blowing, rain is is splashing, water's all over the place.

But the Bible says this God was not in the hurricane.

After hurricane, the Bible says those earthquake, everything's shaking and rumbling.

Surely God's gotta be in this earthquake.

The Bible says, but God was not in the earthquake.

Then they took off a blazing fire and an inferno stuff burning all around him.

And surely you expect God's gonna step right through that fire and speak to Elijah, but the Bible says God was not in the fire.

The Bible says this, he ended up speaking to him through a gentle and a quiet whisper.

Watch this, he wasn't in a hurricane, he wasn't in the earthquake, he wasn't in the fire.

Can I tell you what that means to me?

God is not obligated to do a bunch of spectacular stuff to get our attention.

It also says to me, watch this, everything that's flashy isn't always God.

It also says to me, everything that's popular, everybody's running to isn't always God.

It also says this just because there's a crowd doesn't mean God is in the place.

Sometimes God speaks when there's no flash, no excitement, nothing spectacular, but it's just a still, gentle, quiet whisper.

I wonder how many gentle and quiet whispers we have missed because something else had our attention.

Can I just say this to my single people in here?

Listen to this.

God will not send you the right one while you're still entertaining the wrong one.

Yeah, quiet in this Catholic Church, and I said that, didn't it?

God would not hear me out, single people.

God will not send you the right one while you're still entertaining, talking on the phone with, texting back and forth with, going out to the movie just to have somebody to be with, and you know they're the wrong one.

See, sometimes our single people want to hang on to the wrong one just to have somebody be around.

In the back of my mind, when the right one shows up, I'll cut them loose.

Hey, God is not a playa.

So God's not gonna send you the right one when you booed up with and hanging out with and entertaining the wrong one.

You know the story of how God took Adam and He built, he created Adam from the dust of the ground, then he took a rib out of Adam and he built the woman.

When he built the woman, Adam was asleep.

And then God woke Adam up to present his wife to him.

Watch this.

Do you think God would have woke Adam up if he was out having communication with a rhinoceros?

She out here booed up with a chimpanzee.

Why would God watch this wake up the right one to introduce her when she's hanging out with the wrong one?

See, we gotta watch, you gotta be willing to trust that my hope is in God's future for me.

And I'm willing to let go of the wrong one because I absolutely believe God has better for my future.

And I'm not gonna stay stuck in fear to something that is not God's best for my life.

I'm preaching better than you are saying, Amen.

So we've talked about three different weapons of mass distraction.

Week one, we talked about we can't afford to get distracted by the strange man or the strange woman.

The one who's jumping into your DMs, the one who's trying to flirt with you at work.

He feels good for a moment because a little attention makes you feel like you're still got it.

But the truth of the matter is they are sent straight from the devil.

And everything about them is designed to destroy what God's trying to do if you let your attention head in their direction for a moment.

Then we talked about don't allow ourselves to get distracted by the emotional baggage, all the grief and all the disappointment and all the loneliness and all the offense and stuff that just kind of clutters our heart.

And we we know we shouldn't feel this way.

We know this is not God's best, and it's changing our whole personality because we haven't got healed, so we start to default to a personality that just protects ourselves.

God doesn't want us to live in default mode protecting ourselves.

He wants us to come to the foot of the cross so he can heal our heart and then restore us back to who he intended for us to be.

And last week we talked about don't get off track with the digital distraction.

That's all the stuff in our hand, the cell phone, the emails, the Instagram, the Facebook, the TikTok.

Now I'm not saying you gotta get off of it altogether because we're not going back to the old days.

All of you that are pride yourself, I don't do technology.

Well, you better get it with something because we ain't calling you on no rotary phone.

Anybody got time to be sitting there?

AI and technology is here to stay, and it's gonna become even more a part of our lives.

But what we gotta learn how to do is what we told you last week.

We gotta learn how to regulate ourselves.

Don't let myself become a slave to that, so it distracts me.

Let me learn how to regulate myself.

And then today I want to wrap this up with a distraction called the distraction of financial pressure and materialism.

The distraction of financial pressure and materialism.

I could give you seven, eight, nine, ten more distractions that are weapons of mass distraction.

But I really believe the Lord told me to wrap this up with this one financial pressure and materialism.

If you look around at what's happening around us today, prices are going through the roof.

I was in Miami down there, we have a church in South Florida, and so excuse me.

I preached down there at our church last Sunday and then spent some time doing some strategic planning with our pastor down there and his team.

And when we get off the plane, man, to to head to the church, we're coming out of the airport.

You know how the the gas station right at the airport usually tend to be a little bit higher.

The gas price at the airport was$6.93 for a regular unleaded.

Yeah, some of you almost cussed in your mind right there when I said that.

$6.93.

And even though thank God it's not that way here in Duval County, it's still way higher than it has been in years.

But how many of you have realized this?

No matter how high the gas prices go, your God is still able to supply you every need.

But the thing about financial pressure is sometimes financial pressure is that one distraction that if we don't catch it and recognize it, it'll cause us to default back to how we used to take care of our needs.

Because that fear kicks in and makes us think if I don't fix this myself, I'm gonna end up in trouble.

And I've seen it, man.

I've been pastoring this year, it will be 30 years I've been the pastor of this church.

And I've seen people that were serving God, husbands that were in church every week with their family, financial pressure hit, and they go grab a second job and a third job, it takes them out of church, and before you know it, the family is in trouble.

They got more money, but they got less God.

I've seen it, man.

I've seen people hit financial pressure hit, and the first thing they do, they they draw back on their generosity, they stop honoring God, and now they're dependent upon simply their own ability instead of having God super added to their natural.

Give me an amen, somebody.

I've seen people who were honest and people of integrity, but when financial pressure hit, they do a few little things at work that were squirrely, a few little things that might not have been illegal, but they were unethical.

And before you know it, they end up in trouble because they allow the financial pressure to make them feel like I gotta fix this myself instead of finally crossing that threshold and learning how to trust God through the financial pressure.

Now I want to read a story to you about a guy here.

He is he's known as we call him the rich young ruler.

And in Mark chapter 10, verse 17, it says, Jesus was setting out again, and a man ran up to him and knelt down in front of him and asked him, Good teacher, what do I need to do to inherit eternal life?

Mark 10:17

Verse 18, Jesus said, Why do you call me good?

Nobody is good except one, God.

He said, You know the commandments.

Never murder, never commit adultery, never steal, never give false testimony, never cheat, honor your father and your mother.

Now, if you're paying attention to what Jesus is doing, he's listing out the Ten Commandments.

He said, You know the ten you know the commandments.

Don't uh don't steal, don't kill, don't cheat anybody, don't defraud, don't lie, honor your father and your mother.

Notice what the guy said.

Verse 20 the man replied to him and said, Teacher, I have obeyed all of these since I was a young man.

In other words, I've been doing all of those, and obviously he must have been telling the truth because we all know Jesus had no problem correcting you if he was lying in public.

Right?

You remember that woman at the well?

When Jesus said, Go get your husband, she said, I don't have a husband.

He said, You're right, you had five husbands.

And the man you're living with right now is not your real husband.

So I Jesus did not have a problem correcting you if what you said wasn't true.

So when this guy says, I've been doing all of those since I was a little boy, he must have been telling the truth.

Look at verse 21.

Jesus looked at him and he loved him.

Somebody say he loved him.

Come on, somebody say he loved him.

He loved him, then he told him, watch this, you are missing one thing.

How many would love for God in your prayer time this week to say, we haven't worked on a lot of stuff, we just gotta work on one more thing.

How many would be okay if God said, We worked on a lot of stuff?

I'm proud of you.

We just got five more things we gotta work on.

He said there's only one thing you're missing.

Now, he wasn't saying if you fix one more thing, you'll be perfect.

If you really keep it in context, remember what he said is don't steal, don't kill, honor your father and mother.

He's given him the Ten Commandments.

He says, I've been doing all of those, but what he was saying is, hear me out, he was saying there's one commandment you've still been messing up.

He's saying, Yeah, you you haven't murdered anybody, you've been honoring your father and mother, but there's he wasn't saying there's one more thing you need to fix in your life.

He's saying there's one commandment that I need to help get your heart right on.

Now he doesn't tell us what it is, but can I tell you, I know what the commandment was.

The commandment was the very first commandment which says, You shall have no other God before me.

So what he was saying is you're jamming with the rest of them, but the most important commandment of all, you've taken your money and made it into a God instead of trusting the one who's supposed to be your God.

So, and I need you to understand that because the Bible tells us Jesus loved him, so everything else Jesus said after that was from a heart of love.

He wasn't trying to hurt him, he wasn't trying to break him, he wasn't trying to make him poor, he was trying to get him to a place where he stopped letting his money be his God so he could finally get on course to walk in a real miracle with God.

Notice what he says.

Jesus loved him.

He says, You're missing one thing.

He said, Go and sell everything you own, give the money to the destitute or the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.

Then come back, watch this and follow me.

Come be on my staff.

Shocked at this statement, the man went away sad because he had many possessions.

Then Jesus looked around and told his disciples how hard it will be for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God.

The disciples were startled by these words, but Jesus clarified and told them again, children, how hard it is for those who trust in their wealth to get into the kingdom of God.

The Bible makes it very clear that the love of money is the root of all evil.

People misquote that all the time.

People say, just like the Bible says, money is the root of all evil.

The Bible doesn't say that.

It says loving your money is the root of all evil.

How many of you can be in love of money and have no money?

Some of y'all in love with Denzel.

You ain't never met the man.

He says it's a love of man.

And when you talk about distractions, can can you really see this man is probably one of the most distracted people that we read about in the entire Bible?

Because God gives him an opportunity for eternal impact, gives him an opportunity to be on Jesus' staff.

We might have been one day reading a book with his name on it, like we do Matthew and John and Peter.

But instead, when given a chance to choose God's purpose or hanging on to his idol God, he chose his idol God.

And now all we know, this is all we know about this guy, nothing else.

We don't know his name, we don't know anything else about him, except he had a chance to choose God over his money, and he chose his money.

I pray that the last thing we find out about you is not that you chose money over God or materialism over God or a job over job God or promotion over God.

I pray that we all grow to the place of understanding the most important thing I can ever do in this life is keep God first place in all that I do.

Amen.

Now listen to this quote: living a life of generosity and faith and contentment is what keeps us from giving into financial pressure and materialism.

If we're gonna stay out of this place of financial pressure, stay out of this place of materialism, we got to grow to this place where we live a life of generosity, live a life of faith or trusting in God, and live a life of contentment.

Now, when we really have surrendered our hearts to Jesus, there's a grace that helps us live that way.

Now, I want to give you real quickly four reasons I believe that people struggle to live this life of generosity and faith and contentment.

Then I'm gonna give you the problem, then we'll come back and give you the cure for every one of them.

The first one is this most people struggle with being generous and living in contentment out of a fear.

And in particular, it's the fear of running out.

The fear of running out is the biggest hindrance to living a life of generosity.

And I say it all the time.

When when folks have grown up like I grew up in an environment where my mother did the best she could as a single mom, but we we we never quite had enough.

I'm proud to say that we never got evicted.

I don't ever remember my mom's cars being repossessed, but we just never had enough.

And if you grow up and you live your life growing up without enough, then you can get to the place where you say, I'll never let my family be in that position again.

That's a good thing.

I I've made that declaration.

But if we don't watch it, we can make that declaration, and then a fear of running out will cause us to drift back and start feeling like it's my job to take care of everything instead of putting my trust in God to take care of everything.

The second reason that people struggle to live this life of generosity is because they've had bad experiences.

Sometimes they've grown up in a church environment where they misuse the money in the church.

Or sometimes they grew up in a church environment where they all they ever talked about was money, money, money.

And sometimes they've grown up in a situation where they've gotten bad advice, and because they've gotten scarred before, the hurt from that scar, the bad experience caused them to draw back.

Third reason sometimes that people don't live a generous life, a life of contentment, is because they don't really understand the purpose for their prosperity.

They think that God blesses them on their job and blesses them in their investments so that they can just take care of their own needs.

Truth of the matter is, God has a purpose for our prosperity.

I need a better amen than that somebody.

And my good friend Miles Monroe, before he went home to be with the Lord, he used to say this if you don't understand the purpose of a thing, abuse is inevitable.

If you don't know why God created a thing, then the natural thing that happens, we'll end up abusing it because we don't use it the right way.

I'm gonna teach you this.

God has there's there's a reason why God wants you to prosper.

Now, I don't know what church background you came from, maybe you came from no background, but let me be the first to tell you if you've never heard this before, God wants you to prosper.

I thought you would have shouted amen when I said that.

Let me say it again.

God wants you to prosper.

I thought you would have got a little bit more excited when I when I'm trying to tell you that that your heavenly father, the creator of the heavens and the earth, the one who owns all the silver and the gold and the cattle on the thousand hills, listen to me, you're not trying to talk him into prospering you.

He wants you to prosper.

But there's a purpose for his prosperity in your life, and it's not just so that we can heap up more stuff for ourselves.

And here's a fourth reason that people struggle to be generous and content is because of just pure selfishness.

If we live our lives with this entitled mentality, we think that everything around us exists so that we can have more, we can do more, we can experience more, then we won't live our lives the way God intended, which is looking to be a blessing to good people God put in our lives.

So I get I give you the problem.

Let me let me turn around and give you the cure.

What's the cure if you're living with that fear of running out?

Here it is right here.

We gotta learn how to command our hearts to trust in God.

Now, I need you to check your own heart.

If you if you know you've struggled with that fear of running out, oh my God.

Every time things get a little tight, I find myself drawn back.

Because I don't want to end up in this position again.

If you struggle with a fear of running out, hear me out.

I can't do it.

You've got to command your heart to trust in God.

If you read throughout the book of Psalms, David was constantly talking to himself.

Why are you so cast down, oh my soul?

Put your trust in God.

He would speak to his soul and command his soul to stop being cowardly and start trusting God.

And for some of you, I'm just gonna be honest again, I hope you don't get offended when I say it this way.

The devil keeps punking you out.

You get out here, you decide I'm trusting God, I'm gonna tithe, I'm gonna tithe, I'm gonna honor God, I'm gonna be a blessing, I'm gonna look to help other people.

And the moment things start to get a little tight, you retreat back to let me protect what I have so I don't run out.

And the devil knows all he's gotta do is apply a little pressure, let them start having rumors at work that they may be laying some folks off, maybe closing a department, and it'll send enough fear down your spine to make you stop believing that God can take good care of you.

I'm preaching better than you are saying, Amen in this place.

Here's the thing you gotta understand the fear of running out is not something that's just limited to those that are considered poor.

The University of California Berkeley did a study that showed that actually lower income people donate a higher percentage of their income than wealthy people.

Now, the amount that wealthy people give is more because they have more, but percentage-wise, people that are considered poor have less income, tend to donate a higher percentage, which does away with this myth that says, well, as soon as I get more, I'm gonna do better by God.

No, if if I don't ever learn how to trust God, what I have right now, it is unlikely that when I get a whole lot more, I'm gonna be willing to trust Him with that because I never learned a lesson when I had a little.

Come on, say amen, somebody.

2 Corinthians 9 10 says this it says, God who supplies seed to the sower and bread for him to eat, will also supply you with, watch this, all the seed you need, and will make it grow and produce a rich harvest from your generosity.

Listen to me.

We got to believe that God will provide us with all the seed we need for sowing.

But we also got to learn, watch this, to discern that when God puts something in our hand, we have to discern when it is seed for us to sow and when it is food for us to consume, for us to eat, for us to live off of.

And the truth of the matter is, when he puts it in our hand, it all looks the same.

When I get one paycheck or somebody blesses me with a thousand dollars, or I walk into a ten thousand dollar blessing, it looks the same.

I've got to be able to discern, and I gotta go back to God and ask him, Lord, give me clarity.

Is all of this supposed to be seed?

Is some of this supposed to be seed, and some of it I should be able to live off of and increase my ability to live, and God has no problem with us increasing our ability to live as long as we don't start trusting in what he put into our hands.

Listen to this.

Oftentimes we eat, wear, spend, and enjoy what God has actually given us for the purpose of sowing.

Give you a good example.

If you're hungry, man, and I walk up to you, and then let's say we're on a deserted island, I walk up to you and give you an apple.

I found this apple, I give it to you.

And you got a choice.

If you're really hungry, you can sit there and eat that entire apple.

You can eat the skin, you can eat the meat of the apple, you can eat the seeds, you can eat the stem, you can eat the whole thing, you can devour it, and for the moment your belly will feel full.

But the problem is this if you sat there and ate all the seeds, you're full for the moment, but you just sabotage your future.

Because what the wise person will do when I give you the apple, you're gonna eat the skin, eat the fruit, but when you get to the seed, you're gonna take why you're gonna take the seed out.

Because if you plant like if you plant the seed, not only will you get another apple, you'll get an apple tree that gives you multiple apples to keep eating for the future and allow you to give an apple to somebody else.

I'm preaching better than you saying, amen.

So what so every time, why hear me out?

Every time God puts something in my hand, I gotta ask myself the question how much of this is for me to eat and how much of this is for me to sow so I can set my future up the right way.

When I was in Bible school, man, you know, thank God God has blessed us today.

This July we'll be married 33 years.

God has blessed us, and and I can tell you the the the primary reason why God has been able to bless us is even when we had very little, we still trusted God with it.

And I remember being in Bible school, I had just left Michigan State and I was 20 years old, so I didn't I didn't have suits and all that stuff.

I'm wearing jogging pants and jeans.

That's what I wore in school.

And and when I get to Bible school, as a 21-year-old kid, they tell a 20-year-old kid, they tell me you got to wear a suit to class every day.

And we didn't have class one day a week like we do impact college.

It was five days a week, Monday through Friday.

And you had to wear a suit.

If it wasn't a suit, it had to be at least slacks and a blazer and a shirt and tie.

Well, I didn't have that.

So I went and got, I think I had one little black suit that I wore and and I went to a little thrift store and I bought a another little suit.

I paid$30 for this suit.

The suit was clean.

This little brown tweed, nice.

I mean, to this day it would still be a nice suit.

But the problem is at that time my waist was like a 28.

And whoever owned this suit before I got it had a waist like a 42.

But I like the suit, man.

I said, I'm gonna look good in that suit.

So so I took it to I bought it,$30, took it to this alteration shop, asked the lady to alter it, she put she had me put it on and swallowed me up.

So she started making markings here and then markings right there.

She told me to turn around, she'd make markings in the pants, and and she said, Come back in a few days.

I came back in a few days, I put the suit on.

Man, the suit fit good.

I mean, I don't have pictures, but trust me, you just gotta trust me, I look good.

I ain't lay, I ain't lying, I look good in that suit.

But the problem is the lady had to cut so much material out of the suit that when I put the pants on, I turned around and looked in the mirror.

You're supposed to have two pockets, but I had one long pocket because they were touching like this.

I mean, I can literally put my wallet in my pocket like that right there.

But I wore that suit, man.

If you didn't know what my pockets look like in the back, you would say I look good too.

And every now and then we'd be in class and they get warm in class, and the instructor would say to all the guys, you know, you can take your jackets off if you want to.

I was like, No, I'm good.

I ain't gotta take my jacket off.

When I graduated Bible school, I came on staff four time.

I still didn't have a lot of suits, but I was getting a check, so I bought a couple more little suits.

And then one day somebody walked up to me and said, The Lord told me to bless you with a brand new suit.

They handed me a brand new suit, never been worn before, man.

You talk about exciting.

I got a brand new suit, but then before I could get it home, the Lord, hear me out.

Before I get it home, hear me out.

Before I get home, the Lord spoke to me and said, That suit's not for you, it's for so-and-so.

I've never worn it before, man.

It's one thing if you got 15 suits in the closet, and the Lord tells you to take this brand new suit and give it to somebody else, that's easy.

I only got two or three, and I need another one.

I'm on staff full-time as a pastor.

But I obeyed God, took that suit, gave it to who God said it belonged to, with tears in my eyes.

Wasn't long after that, though, somebody came back around and blessed me with a couple more brand new suits.

And then, right in the same in the same breath, this lady walked up and said, You know what?

I want to be a blessing to your wife.

She took April, she flew April to New York with her.

They went to the garment district, took her on a full-blown shopping spree.

She came back with probably 15 or 20 dresses and pantsuits.

You cannot tell me that that didn't happen because I took that one seed and instead of eating it and consuming it and wearing it myself, I did what God said to do with it.

Come on, I planted it, and through that obedience, God gave me a harvest.

You better give God a shout and a praise in this place.

Listen to this.

The only way to overcome the fear running out is to finally trust God with our little until he turns it into a lot.

Here's a second the cure for bad experiences.

If you've had a bad experience with money, the cure is this you've got to learn how to present all of our giving to the Lord.

Everything we give, I'm not giving it to people.

You may, I may hand it to you, but I'm really giving it to the Lord and I'm allowing him to present it to you.

One of the things, listen, that stops us from blessing people when God talks to us is we tend to look to see if they look like they need it.

Not act like you don't know what I'm talking about.

You know you've been in that drive-thru line before, and you see something tells you pay for that car behind you the food for them, and you're ready to pay for it till you look in that rear view mirror and you see a Mercedes-Benz emblem.

You're like, they don't need this money for me.

Or you sit down at church and just something on the inside, tell you, reach in your purse and give that lady next to you$100.

And you are ready to reach, give it to her.

Then you look down the floor, she got a Louis Vuitton back.

Like, she don't need this.

One of the first reasons watches that people use for not attending church is what people say, all they want at that church is your money.

I guarantee you probably know somebody, that's that's their reason.

Sometimes it's just a front, it's an excuse for not wanting to come to church, so it's just gonna cast a bad shadow on all churches.

But can I tell you, sometimes it's because people have legitimately come out of bad situations.

So some of you don't understand.

I I grew up in a church environment where the offering was not something we did at the end of the service and told people to worship God, and the offering was like 35, 40 minutes, longer than my whole sermon ends up being.

And so I remember growing up as a kid.

We you know, you we'd have you could come to church, and I remember sitting there and the pastor would say something like this I I believe the Holy Spirit's telling me 25 people supposed to give a hundred dollars.

And then have a I'm gonna be a hundred dollar line right here.

Anyone know what I'm talking about?

Then it didn't say then they say, and then I believe there's ten people supposed to give a thousand dollars, and they could get a thousand dollar line right here.

And I literally remember sitting in church where the service would be extended until enough people felt pressured to get up.

I think some people got in line because they just want to go home.

I I'm I'm not I'm not trying to make fun of other churches, I'm trying to help you understand.

Sometimes people have legitimate reasons for why they don't like the money discussion in church.

I remember some folks are going to church where they have a building fund for 25 years and never even built a doghouse out behind the house behind the church.

So if you had bad experiences, watch this, we can end up getting scarred by that.

I remember when I first came to Word of Faith, the church in Detroit that our church was birthed out of.

It was my wife's church, she went there since she was 12 years old.

We started dating and I went to her church and I walked in.

It was a big church, man, lots of people in there.

They had all this nice stuff, it was well organized.

The first thought came to my mind is I know they take up a lot of offerings here.

Because I grew up in church, man.

We we didn't do just one offering like we do.

We did the main offering.

You had to get up and march around the front, and you put your money in the front.

They had a little collection box that was shaped like a cross, and you put your envelope in that.

And the deacons, I think they were looking to see how much you put in there as you walk past, you march around to the back, back to your seat.

And then there was another offering that would happen later on.

It was like it'd be like the pastor's anniversary offering.

Then they did a missions offering later on.

And it was like four or five offerings before you before you finally got set free and got the chance to go home.

So when I went to her church, I was like, I know this gotta be a seven-offering church.

Ain't the way in the world they're paying for all this stuff with just one offer.

So I had prepared myself ahead of time.

I grabbed me three one dollar bills.

This is a true story.

I had three one dollar bills in my pocket because I said, I know what I'm gonna do when they come around with their first offering, I'm gonna shhh, pay.

I hit them with one offering, one dollar bill, and then I waited because I said, I know they come with another one.

The pastor preached an amazing message, did an altar call, they dismissed us, there was no other offering.

And guess what?

It slowly started to repair.

Literally, what caused me to fall in love with that church is that the pastor taught the word really well, and they did not have an over-emphasis on money.

Can I tell you one of the things I'm most proud of in 30 years?

We we have never had a financial scandal in this place.

We pass all of our, we get an audit every single year with an outside accounting firm.

We pass our audits with flying colors.

In fact, the auditors sometimes say, can we take the practices your folks use and use it to teach other churches how to have good fiscal responsibility to make sure the money never gets messed up?

Can I tell you we've never had to beg people for money?

We've never had an over-insuffance of money, but God always supplies every need and takes care of it.

Come on, shout amen, somebody.

Come on, shout a man, somebody.

Many of us have had bad experiences, but you've also had a bad cheeseburger, but you didn't stop eating cheeseburgers.

I can look at you and tell you you didn't stop eating no cheeseburgers.

Guess what?

You just found a different place to get your burger.

We don't disobey God because we've had a bad experience.

We should hold our leaders accountable, but we got to have this mindset.

Once I've given it, it is God's job to make sure that it's handled the right way.

And here it is.

Watch this.

I I never give to a church, I give through a church.

I'm giving it to Jesus, and I just happen to be giving it through my local church.

Here's the third, here's the third thing.

The cure for not understanding the purpose of our prosperity is we got to learn how to see every resource we have as impact seed.

I'm gonna teach you a good lesson right here.

We have to understand every every dollar God gives me, I need to see it through the lens of Lord, what part of this dollar do you want me to use to help impact somebody else's life?

See, when Israel left Egypt, you remember the story, God told them to go and borrow jewels of silver, jewels of gold, fine linen from the Egyptians.

They borrowed all this stuff and then they left town with it.

And God knew he had no plans on them going back.

The Bible literally says they spoiled or took from the Egyptians really their own stuff because they had been slaves for 400 years.

But they left there as a wealthy nation wandering now.

And I want you to get a picture because they they leave there and they got all of this money, but they cannot buy an army to protect them when the Amalekites attack them.

So God has demonstrated them, even with all your money, I'm the one that protects you.

And he defended them against the Amalekites.

They have hear me out, they got all this money and they're in the middle of the wilderness and they cannot find any water.

So God's got to bring them water out of a rock, or they were getting ready to die of thirst.

Are you here?

They got hear me out.

I'm trying to help you understand the money that you have is not designed to take care of you, it's a resource that God uses, but God never wants that to become our source.

He wants to always teach us that he's our source.

They got all amen.

They got all this money and they cannot find a Publix or Wendyxie to buy a sandwich.

They're about to starve to death.

So God has to demonstrate to them that even with all your money, I'm your source.

So, what does he do?

He rains down manna food from heaven so that they realize it's not your money that takes care of you.

I'm the one that takes care of you.

And then finally, God comes back around.

He said, Let me tell you the reason why I had you leave Egypt with all that stuff.

He says, So that when the time was right, watch this, you can build me a sanctuary.

Oh, I'm gonna blow your mind with this.

He said, I want you to understand.

I didn't give you that money to buy your protection, I didn't give you that money to buy your water, I didn't give you that money to buy your food.

I've demonstrated to you I can do that.

I gave you all of that, so when the time is right, you can build me a sanctuary.

Now I'm gonna hit you with something.

The reason why God blesses us today, and the reason why he'll bless you more than he has already is because what he's given us should always be viewed through the filter of building God a place to live.

Now, let me correct your thinking.

I didn't say building him a church building.

See, the Lord doesn't live in church buildings now, he lives in the human heart.

Every time a person lifts their hand and says, Yes, I received Jesus Christ, we just gave God a brand new home to live in.

We gave him a brand new house to dwell in.

And for the person that uses their income and always has a kingdom mindset, always is willing to use their resources to help build God a new place, a new heart to live in.

God will never let you go broke because he'll always provide for you so he can provide through you to be a blessing to somebody else.

Amen.

Look at Ephesians chapter 4, verse 28.

Ephesians 4:28

It says, If you used to rob, you gotta stop robbing and start working.

Why, God?

In order to earn an honest living for yourself and so you can be able to help the poor.

Listen to this.

When we come to Christ, we cease working for a living and we begin working for a giving.

2 Corinthians 9 11 says this, he will always make you rich enough to be generous at all times, so that many will thank God for your gifts, which they receive from us.

Lift one hand towards heaven and say this out loud.

Say, My generosity causes thanksgiving to God.

Say, my giving makes an impact.

One more time, say like you mean and say, My generosity causes thanksgiving to God.

Say, my giving makes an impact.

Every time we give, it opens up the door for somebody to hear the gospel and have a chance to say thank you to the Lord.

At our last building before we moved here, I remember the story, man.

I was standing up one day ministering, just like I am to you right now.

And out of nowhere, man, I stopped and I turned this way and I said this.

I said, No, you will not walk out of here and kill him.

In the name of Jesus, you will not leave here and kill him.

And I turned back, I mean, this isn't that an odd thing to say.

I just make that declaration.

I turn back around.

I go right back to the message.

I think nothing else of it.

Apparently, this woman gets up, storms out.

I didn't even see it.

She walks out.

She's about to leave the the building, but one of our female ushers was out there.

She saw her leaving and didn't want to just let her leave without at least seeing she's okay.

So she stopped and asked her, Hey, is everything okay?

And this is what she said.

I can't believe he said that.

Then she said this, who told him?

And then she goes on to tell the story that she woke up that morning and she had decided that she was getting she was going home to kill her boyfriend, and then she was gonna take her own life.

She got up that morning, she called her mother.

Her mother lived in California, and she was calling her mother to say goodbye.

She said, I'm getting ready to go kill him, and then I'm gonna take my own life.

Her mother on the phone was pleading with her, baby, please don't do that.

Baby, please, whatever you don't do.

She said, No, I've made up my mind, Mama.

I'm killing him, I'm killing myself.

She said, Will you at least do one thing for me?

Will you just go to somebody's church?

And she she agreed to go to a church just to appease her mom before she went to kill this guy.

And she said, I don't know what church to go to.

Her mother had visited her one time and had gotten a flyer from our church.

Her mother went and grabbed and said, There's a church over there on Lone Star.

She gave her the address.

She said, I'll go just because you asked me to.

She comes and sits down in the service.

And in the middle of my message, God intervenes and gives her a word to tell her, No, you're not gonna kill him.

She tells our the story to this, our ministers, our security team come, they pray for her, they go to her car, take the weapon, and in one act, God spared her life, her boyfriend's life.

Come on, and cause thanksgiving to rise to God.

Here's the last one.

The cure for selfishness is we gotta take everything we have and make it available for God to use.

So when you live with a mindset that I don't own anything, that car I have out there, it's not my car, it's God's car.

That means if God wants me to pick somebody up to drive them to church, I'm willing to go out of my way, spend a little extra gas, a little extra time because it's his car.

That house that I have is a blessing.

It's not my house.

God gave it to me.

Watch this.

That means I'm willing to have a small group at my house.

I'm not concerned about somebody spilling something on my precious rug.

If it opens up a door for somebody else to come up closer to Jesus Christ, everything I have belongs to God.

And my mindset is like Philippians 2:17.

Philippians 2:17

Even if I'm offered like a drink offering, giving myself for the cause and work of your faith, I am glad and I have joy with you all.

We grow to the place to everything in my life, man.

I'm using it for God's glory.

30 years in ministry, I'm not even tired, man.

I'm excited.

I'm fired up.

We get gifts and applause and appreciation from people, but can I tell you, I don't I don't do what I do for applause, appreciation.

I don't do it for money.

I take I take speaking engagement sometime where the church can't afford to do anything extra for me.

But I go where I'm sent, not where somebody's willing to be spent.

Why?

Because every hear me out, everything about my life is available for God to pour it out.

Lord, every gift you've given me, use it.

And when you live that way, it's impossible to get stuck in selfishness where you're only really concerned about what's in this for me.

And when you live like that, I promise you, God always sees to it that you have more coming your way.

There are people that look are looking for me to be a blessing to me.

I have stuff that comes to me from the north, south, east, and the west, things I haven't even asked God for.

And I know it's because I'm going on over 30 plus years of trusting God, even when I didn't have it to trust him with.

But when you put your trust in him, he will never leave you, he'll never forsake you, and he'll always provide everything you need.

Come on, give him a shout.

Come on, give him a shout.

Come on, you're getting a better day.

Give him a good shout.

Thank you, Lord.

Thank you, Lord.

Now, if we're gonna grow to this place where we actually trust him, it's not even possible to get to that place where we trust him until we come into union with him.

My wife and I have been married for 33 years this year.

I trust her more today than I did when we first met.

Why?

Because we're in union together.

We're in covenant together.

When you come into covenant with God, that's what unlocks the ability to really put your trust in him.

But the very first trust, I gotta trust you, Lord, with my life.

I gotta trust you, Lord, that the only way to the Father is through Jesus Christ.

I gotta trust that you sent your son to pay the price for my sin, and I could never be good enough to work my way to you.

God's not mad at you, he's madly in love with you.

And whatever you have done wrong, whatever you might be doing that's wrong right now, God already knew it before he created the earth, and he still chose to love you.

So, what does he really ask for us?

He didn't ask you to write out a manifesto of all the stuff you promised to fix, all the stuff you promised to do better.

What he asked for Is one thing.

Take your entire life.

Don't hold any of it back.

Surrender your whole life to him.

He'll take you right where you are, whatever mess you think you are, he'll take you right there.

And he'll make a miracle out of your life when you surrender it to him.

So here's what I want you to do.

If you're in this room, if you're online, if you're in the overflow room, you've never had that moment where you surrendered your life to Jesus Christ, today is your day.

It's not next week.

Don't say, let me get myself together first.

Today is the day.

If you're sitting here and you can understand what I'm saying, God is tugging on your heart because he's ready for you to surrender it all to him.

I want to ask you to do something for me.

In a moment I'm going to have everybody close their eyes when we do, there's a little card in the seat pocket that just says say yes to Jesus.

If you're ready to surrender to him and say yes, when we close our eyes, grab that card and hang on to it.

We're not going to embarrass you.

I'm going to pray for you, but I'm not going to ask you to stand up, not going to ask you to come to the front.

Right there at your seat.

I want to lead you in a simple prayer, but it's a prayer that will change your life if you're ready to surrender to him.

So go ahead and bow your heads all over the room, please.

Nobody leaving out until we wrap up the whole service, please.

If you're ready to surrender to him, reach out and grab that card.

Hang on to it.

I'm getting ready to count to three.

When I get to three, I want you to lift that card high in the air.

By lifting that card, what you're saying is, Pastor, include me on this prayer.

Yes, I'm ready to surrender, God.

Yes, I'm tired of doing things on my own.

And I'm gonna ask you to do it quickly because the devil's gonna try everything he can to talk you out of this moment right here.

But this is your moment.

I'm getting ready to count to three.

One, two, three.

Lift it up.

Lift it up all over the room.

Thank you.

Thank you.

See those cards?

Beautiful.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Multiple cards going up.

Anybody else?

Lift it up.

If you're on the front row and don't have a card, just lift your hand.

I usually be glad to put a card in your hand.

Anyone else before we pray?

This is it.

I'm not going to ask you to stand up.

I'm asking to lift that card and be bold for Jesus.

Alright, every one of you that lifted that card in here, I want you to repeat this prayer after me.

Say, dear God in heaven, thank you for Jesus.

Thank you for sending him to die in my place.

He paid the price for my sin, but I know you raised him from the dead, and he's alive right now.

Jesus, come into my heart, save me, forgive me, make me brand new.

I surrender my life to you for the rest of my days.

And according to the Bible, I am right now born again.

Amen.

Did you just make a decision for Jesus?

Welcome to the family.

We're so excited.

Trust me, we're clapping for you.

And we believe that you've made an important decision today.

We'd like to help you on your journey.

So if you'll follow the directions that are on screen, there is a free book you can download.

It's going to take you five to ten minutes of your day for the next seven days.

But our pastors have put together some amazing resources that we believe will help you on the journey ahead.

If you don't want it, nobody's going to email you, text you, bother you, anything like that.

We just want to make sure you are successful in your walk with Jesus.

Now, let me tell you, one of the things you should consider is baptism.

And if you're in the Jacksonville area, we do baptism after our first weekend service every month, and you can just scan the QR code that's on the screen.

Sign up for that.

I'd love to be a part of that journey with you, or any of our ministers would.

If you don't live in town, we do believe you should find a Bible teaching church and at least go get baptized, even if you're still going to watch our service.

But download that book, it's free.

We're excited for your journey ahead, and we can't wait to be a part of that.

Now, this is a part of the service where we also demonstrate our generosity.

If you're just checking us out today, you don't feel any pressure to give.

But for those of you, this is your church, you know that we are generous is one of our core values.

And so you can give online or you can give through our app, which I really like.

You have the Apple Pay option right on our app.

Just go to your Google store or your Apple store, download the We Are Impact app.

It's also a great way to study notes that um come from the sermons that you watch on here.

And there's a lot of events on there as well.

But you can give through that app.

It's super easy, and we're just grateful that you partner with us week after week.

Well, we're so excited you joined us today.

Hope you have an amazing weekend, and we'll see you next time.