From Fig Tree to Breakthrough - Leaders' Talks

One of my favorite quotes I came across as a quote in uh college in the leadership program.

Well, I hope that Minister Steve was still going back to from time to time.

On the battlefield of the feet, where the black and bones of the capitalist familiar to which is the honored victory stand down the rest and then western time.

Others are not.

But the point is that we don't fail unless we stop fighting.

At The Road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ.

For more information on the road, visit theroad.org.

We hope you are encouraged by today's message.

This year, we have the theme of breakthrough.

And so I thought it was fitting and where we're going to go today in the notes, with on the heels of Bobby's announcement and kind of what he's experienced.

This guy's on the on just the other side of the breakthrough in his life and where God's taking him.

And I thought that there was a uh there's this passage that just jumped off the page at me.

Sometimes, and I know Pastor Steve's talked about this, you know, you journal, you read, and sometimes it's just the discipline of getting in and doing that, and nothing really jumps off the page.

And those days happen.

But I was in John and I was at the end of John, and this story jumped off the page, and I feel like the Holy Spirit gave me insight and it blessed me tremendously.

And so I hope that it blesses you and uh we can pull something from the scriptures.

So I'm just gonna open our time in prayer.

Father God, thank you for your word, God.

Thank you that we can turn to this in times of uh need, in times of refreshing, God, that your promises are in this text, Father, and that we can pull from that, Lord.

Thank you for revealing some things to my heart.

I pray that you bless this time, that you would open ears and hearts, Lord, to your message from your word today.

In your name we pray.

Amen.

I was originally gonna speak on pride and tell you that I was proud to be with you guys today, but that didn't feel right.

Sorry.

That's about as good as it's gonna get today for you guys.

So, on the theme of breakthrough, here's where we're at.

Jesus is just coming out.

I'm gonna set a little bit of uh context here, a little bit of baseline.

Uh Jesus is just getting ready to enter his time into ministry.

He'd just been baptized, come out of the wilderness, and he's getting ready to call his disciples to him.

He's already called the first couple.

He goes to Andrew, calls Andrew, and then he tells Andrew to go call Peter.

And then where we pick up the story for our purposes here is we're gonna be in John 1, verses 43 through 51.

John 1:43–51

And this is gonna be the story here where we're gonna talk about Nathaniel's experience with Christ.

And so, let's see here, let's start.

We're gonna pick up right here in 33.

The following day, Jesus wanted to go to Galilee, and he found Philip, and he said to him, Follow me.

Now Philip was from Betheta, the city of Andrew and Peter.

Philip found Nathaniel and said to him, We have found him of whom Moses in the law and of Nazareth, the son of Joseph, also the prophets wrote, Jesus.

Now, what's interesting here is uh let me just quick note in this particular script uh text in the Gospel, Nathanael is believed to be referred to as Bartholomew and is referred to him in the other three Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and he's found right next to Philip.

So this is considered by a lot of the most theologians to be the personal name of Bartholomew.

And that's important as we get into the story a little bit here.

So, initial reactions from Nathanael's response to Philip's invitation.

We found the Messiah, he's from Nazareth.

Nathanael's response can't be ignored in verse 46.

And Nathanael said to him, Can anything good come of Nazareth?

And Philip said to him, Come and see.

Now, what's interesting here is that Nathanael's from Cana, right?

A close cousin or a close city to Nazareth.

Also about 200 or about 2,000 people.

Not exactly a boomy metropolis, not exactly sure why he big leagues him here and kind of goes that route.

But what he is is he's a little bit uh snarky in the moment, but he's also ignorant of the fact that actually Jesus, as we know from the story of the nativity, goes to the hometown of Joseph in Bethlehem, the city of David.

So not quite understanding the full text here.

Pick it up here.

Nathanael goes down the road, and so he's greeted by Jesus.

Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, Behold, an Israelite indeed in whom there is no deceit.

Jesus greets Nathanael very enthusiastically, pays him a high compliment.

For sure, he's probably aware of the other moment.

I mean, he is the Lord, so he probably, you know, in a spiritual context, had heard Nathaniel kind of dog him.

But he doesn't come back and say, hey, here's Nathanael.

Can anything good come from Cana?

No, he actually compliments him in a very tremendous way.

He he calls out his identity as an Israelite first, and then he says there's no deceit.

He's not a he's not a false man, he's honest.

Right?

He doesn't, he does not full of trickery, he's full of truth.

This stuns Nathaniel.

Sudden, he's going, How does this guy know me?

Where I never we've never met before.

What's going on here?

You know, I don't I don't quite understand.

We haven't met before, but you've just paid me a big compliment.

So how how do you know this?

Verse 48.

Nathaniel said to him, How do you know me?

Jesus answered him and said to him, When you were under the fig tree, I saw you.

So this this goes back days before, maybe years before.

But it's a moment in his life that he's identified in Nathaniel.

There was a moment here under the fig tree where Nathanael had to wrestle with.

There was a transaction of his heart, right?

He had to.

The text doesn't go into the examples or like what the detail was under his fig tree moment, but I think we're led to believe because there was an opportunity for deceit for him to be false, but he chose to handle that situation and guard his heart correctly.

So Jesus gives an insight to a very intimate moment that only Nathaniel would understand.

Instantly he remembers.

He's taken back to his fig tree moment.

And I think because it's exactly the way that Nathaniel navigates his fig tree moment in that in the text here.

Jesus finds him most excellent among his countrymen.

He recognizes him enthusiastically as such and calls him out on that road.

And Nathaniel instantly realizes what God saw.

He's sovereign, and he responds as such.

Nathaniel answered him in verse 49 and said to him, Rabbi, you are the Son of God.

You are the King of Israel.

He is just as enthusiastic as the way Jesus greeted him in his reply back to Christ.

Quite different from his first initial reaction.

Can anything good come of Nazareth?

Right now he's like, whoa.

Okay.

He calls him his teacher.

He calls him the king of Israel.

And then he also refers to him for the first time in scripture by the apostles as the Son of God.

That's important to note here.

We don't hear a lot about Nathaniel after the fact, but in this text here, he's noted as being the first apostle to actually recognize Christ as the Son of God.

My teacher, my rabbi, the Son of God.

I think there is the deeper story because to have such a response, I think that gives depth and that gives insight to what he was dealing with, what he was grappling with in his life when he was underneath that fig tree.

We all have fig tree moments in our lives, and I think that's where we're tested.

That's where the blessing can come from in our lives.

That's where God wants to bless us out of.

Because what's really on the horizon for Nathaniel is he's about ready to be called into the majors.

He's about to be called into the intimate twelve.

He's going to be a part of Jesus' circle, and he's going to watch this guy do things on earth that he's that's never been seen before.

He's going to watch lepers healed, the blind see, the lame walk, and he's going to watch, he's going to watch him raise Lazarus from the dead.

He's going to then watch himself, he's going to watch Jesus be raised from the dead and then ascend into heaven.

And so this guy's about to get the most intimate discipleship opportunity anybody walking the earth at that time could have.

He's going to be called closely unto Jesus and walk with him.

What's interesting here, and I think this is pretty cool because here comes the invitation in verse 50 from Christ, is he goes, Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree.

Do you believe?

You will see greater things than these.

And he said to him, Most assuredly I say to you hereafter, you shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.

The fig tree isn't a big deal, dude.

You're about to see some amazing things.

And I'm about to call you on the team.

This this isn't anything yet, right?

The interesting part about this story, and I just think it's kind of cool how Jesus does this, is in the very next scene, like in the very first part of John chapter 2, a little kicker for the boy or the kid from Cana.

John 2 · chapter mention

Oh, by the way, dude, we're gonna go back to your hometown, and my first miracle that I'm gonna do is we're gonna go to a wedding party, and I'm gonna bring, they're gonna turn some water into the best vintage they have on the shelf.

And that's what we're gonna do in your hometown.

And that's where it's gonna start.

So here's something I want to take us through.

How do we wrestle with, how do we prepare, how do we meet ourselves in our fig tree moments so that we can come out on the other side and really receive the full blessing and the breakthrough that God has for every one of us.

And I have three things here I'm gonna share with you guys.

And I think what I would just say is I want to use Bobby as an illustration.

I know he's preparing for the barbecue, but in so many ways, I watched my brother walk through these uh this process in a very short, condensed time.

And I don't know how long Philip was under that, or sorry, Nathaniel was under that fig tree.

Could have been a day, could have been an hour, could have been a lot longer.

But the point was, is how he handled himself in that moment, how he handled the posture and the position of his heart is how he was able to find the breakthrough and the blessing that was ultimately gonna be called into.

That's the value that Christ saw in him to bring him on the team in the intimate 12th circle.

Let me just say this as we get into this in the first, in the first, uh, and we go through the next three things.

Uh, my disclaimer to you guys is that if we approach our fig tree moments half-hearted, not prepared, we're gonna fail, we're gonna miss the ultimately we're gonna miss the blessing, the full blessing, and the breakthrough that God has for us.

And these are surprising moments.

Sometimes uh it's very obvious, sometimes we don't know, and we find ourselves in that moment under a fig tree, trying to make a decision.

The first thing that we have to have, and I think this is crucial, this is fundamental, and this is where we all have to go, and sometimes we have to be reminded is that we need fellowship.

We need fellowship with the Father, and it has to be daily.

Lamentations 32.

The faithful love of the Lord never ends, his mercies never cease.

Great is his faithfulness, his mercies begin afresh each morning.

If you don't write anything down and you put that on your bathroom mirror, and that's what you wake up to, before you get busy in the brain and you go up and you're brushing your teeth and you read that scripture, that should fortify yourself, that should fortify your spirit that that's the Lord of hosts, that's the Lord of creation, that's who I serve, that's who I'm in the kingdom with, right?

And so I have new mercies from him every day.

Now, some of us are married here, some of us know mercies aren't refreshed every day.

Sometimes, what happened yesterday follows us into today.

Alright?

And some of that, most of that time, is my fault, to be fair.

My wife's very gracious and forgiving, and usually it's me that has to wrestle through some things.

You guys are silent, so by your silence, I just agree that you agree with me that you know you're wrong.

Alright, so there you go, man.

Um it's good.

Um, the other thing, right?

And so because his mercies are made afresh, and this is the promise that we can build our lives on.

If we know nothing else, we can wake up the next day and know God's ready to receive us.

He's ready to have a fresh day with us.

Refreshing is an open invitation for us, and it's us who decide not to follow through with that, not to receive that refreshing, not that into moment, where we're renewing our mind and our heart and our soul and our strength for what's ahead and the days ahead and the battle that the enemy's got for us.

You hear us talk a lot about this.

I joke about this sometimes in our seven-minute pit stop.

We actually need a dictionary of definitions for vernacular that we have here at the road.

Blood-stained allies, wholehearted.

Um, you know, these are things that we actually aren't just slogans here, we do believe in them.

And so the next thing in fellowship, besides your intimate daily walk with the Father, and that's who's really restoring you, is you need a blood-stained ally.

One or two.

I mean, if you have one or two solid people that are on speed dial that can pull you out of some junk, speak truth to you, tell you some realities, tell you who you are in Christ, and remind you of that, pray for you and encourage you, that's huge.

We're not desperados, we're not meant to be.

Sometimes, as guys, we all too easily go that direction.

But here's the problem is that when we get into that mode and we're alone, this is where the devil is most effective.

It's where he's gonna get alone with you in your head, and he's gonna put some assignments or some agreements on you, and you're gonna walk in that false identity for a while, and you're gonna walk out of the strength that you have available to you in Christ.

Now, what's weird about this, it's not weird, it's just it's the way God is faithful to us, is when I was preparing for this, God had a little way of kind of helping me deal and prepare for this because I had a moment of my own about a week and a half ago.

And kind of we talk about uh at our men's events where we go from you know alert and oriented times, you know, when the first responders have it, time zero.

Steve talks about this, from zero to four.

And I had a moment where I was a little bit shaken, and I found myself in this moment of I got some news, and I'm like, how am I gonna deal with this?

How am I gonna process this?

Where am I gonna go?

And immediately I went in my heart to holding tight to the, you know, tight to the wheel, tight to the rope, and I'm going, Yeah.

Um I'm trying to figure it out in my mind, in my own understanding, in my own flesh, and my heart, I could sense my heart starting to get sour.

And if I let to go that direction, if I went too far, bitterness was gonna start to creep up, and and I was gonna deal with that moment in a very wrong way.

But I got with the Lord.

I was encouraged.

I picked up the phone, I called my buddy, he encouraged me, gave me insight.

He said, Hey man, I was just on the other side of this thing, and here's what I encourage you to do, and here's who you are, by the way.

This is who God made you to be, and this is how I see you.

And I love you, and I'm gonna miss you, and I'm like, dude, sucks that you're moving to Nashville.

Whatever, bro.

But he's he's awesome, and he really helped me in that moment, and I love him, and I'm gonna miss him, but you guys have to have that.

And you know, we're still gonna talk, we're still gonna have that connection, but he won't just be a knock on the door.

And and that's that's been uh both ways.

And and so he's had to come in, and and it's been an honor and a pleasure to be a friend and an ally with Bobby, too.

So um it's important that we have those in our lives.

Worship to the Father.

For me, when I'm stuck, I have to unstuck myself.

Yeah, think about that.

Unstuck yourself.

Um worship is how I get there.

Worship is how I get there.

And I didn't really understand that in my own heart and myself until I started experiencing it consistently.

Because sometimes I can get in the word, sometimes I can get in the prayer.

But if the posture of my heart isn't reset and realigned through worship, and I love Pastor Steve's word last week, as we define our culture here at the road with worship and word and spirit here.

We're develop, we're experiencing a fresh work of the Lord in our spiritual posture and our hearts when we come before him at the end of the service.

That's where work, that's where work and blessing, that's where the work happens, but that's where the blessing and breakthrough will flow from.

So it's huge.

And so when I get stuck, I have to worship with the Father.

Ephesians 3, 3, or sorry, 3 through 5, all praise to God, the Father of your Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms, because we are united with Christ.

Even before he made that world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy without fault in his eyes.

God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.

This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.

I mean, there's a lot of promise there.

There's a lot of restoration, there's a lot of renewal in that passage as we chew on that, we soak on that, to say, before the world was made, he knew what he was going to do, he knew how he was going to call us into his world, into his family.

There's freedom there, and when you take these scriptures and you meditate on them and you give your all in a moment of worship, freedom comes, restoration comes, and for me, now I'm speaking to the guys here, and women, because women are warriors too.

Okay?

Worship to him with him restores my soul.

It brings courage and strength, right?

That is needed for me to be a warrior in the moments when a warrior is needed.

I can't just be a warrior until I've had a heart reset in worship posture.

My heart has to get reset, realigned, and from there I can move out in the strengths of Christ that he has for me, and who he's made me to be, and who he's made each and every one of you to be.

Because this isn't unique to me.

Everybody here has the same opportunities, and that's the beauty of it.

This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure to do these things.

That's hard for me to wrestle with it a minute because he gave his only son to go and redeem us for all eternity, but it gave him great pleasure to do that for you and me.

Secondly, focus.

Talked a lot about focus in the last couple months.

It's it's interesting.

Had a chance to speak on focus at Men's Fire.

Talked to my uh junior hires about uh focus as well in their lives, but focus is huge.

Beware of the distractions that the devil will bring to throw you off course and bring confusion.

He'll bring you out of your focus.

He's got a lot of tools to do that.

He's pretty crafty that way.

One of my favorite quotes, I came across this quote in in uh college in a leadership program, but I I hope that it ministers to you.

It's something that I've gone back to from time to time.

On the battlefield of defeat lay the blackened bones of countless millions who at the dawn of victory sat down to rest and in resting died.

Authors unknown.

But the point is that we don't fail unless we stop trying, right?

Uh I was talking with Dean Allison, and she told me that she has that, not not the longer quote, but that we don't fail until we stop trying, quote, on her mirror every day as a reminder to stay in the fight, stay in the battle.

It's only that we fail is when we quit, when we give up.

That's where the devil wins.

So we can have amputations all over ourselves, spiritually, physically, but we have to have a focus about where our strength comes.

How do we refocus in?

How do we get our hearts right again?

So from worship, then we go to the promises.

And in Psalm 121, 1, I look up to the mountains.

Does my help come from there?

This is a great visual because we live in a mountainous place.

So I love this particular verse because I can look out and see Pikes Peak pretty much anywhere I'm at in the city.

And it's awesome, it's beautiful, it's breathtaking.

I was just commenting to my wife the other day.

We've been here now like eight plus years, and every, every, like at least once a week, I'm driving somewhere in the city and I look and it's breathtaking views, and I'm just so blessed to call Colorado Springs a home for us.

It's a beautiful place, and the mountains are magnificent.

But, second part of that verse, my help comes from the Lord who made the heavens and earth.

So my help doesn't come from the mountaintop, it comes from the heavens and the Lord of the earth, the Lord of creation who made those mountains.

So it's a reminder for me when I look at the mountains that, and yesterday last week was so great.

We prayed.

Uh Steve woke up and had a start about the mountains in our lives.

And we prayed about the mountains in our lives.

And I'm thinking, well, God made the mountains.

Of course, he can move the mountains.

Hope he doesn't move Pike's Peak.

I actually kind of like it here.

Uh it really kind of uh fits the landscape.

So, but I think the mountains in our lives, absolutely, and so if we're reminded of that, then that's where we have our hope.

PBJ, right?

This is another one of our vernaculars that we just have to remind ourselves.

It's one of those uh terms here at the road, prayer Bible journal.

Worship with the Father, daily communion with him, be in his word.

This is where he guides us in his word, he gives us his focus.

He pulled me to this scripture, this particular text, and brought some things back into focus for me.

If you don't deal with this thing in the right way, Ryan, if you don't protect your heart, if you don't change the posture of your heart, if you don't trust the Lord with the posture and the position of your heart into the heavenlies, you're gonna get off base, you're gonna get off skew.

And there might not be blessing.

There might not be the full blessing how I want to bless you and what I want to bring you into.

The other distractions that we get are, you know, can be physical pain.

Now, this is becoming more and more aware for me personally.

The odometer is about to click 40 for me, and the manufacturer warranty is about to expire.

And so I had a very acute experience with this two weeks ago for Mother's Day.

Honey, what do you need?

Uh I'd like you to focus on our yard.

Uh I'm embarrassed.

That's fair.

That's a fair statement.

I said, to your point, I have neglected it.

And uh we should not be the bane of the neighborhood.

So I went out, prayed for strength.

I'm gonna warrior in my yard today.

I'm gonna battle those stumps.

And I've been I've been a little neglectful of the stumps because I know that you have this little thing above the surface, but we all know what is really below.

You have to deal with the root system.

And I was reluctant because I wasn't ready for that battle.

But I went out there, be the man of the house, show her.

Hey, I got this sweetheart.

I want to make this beautiful for you.

And I'm out there, man, and this thing, I mean, this stump is winning the battle.

Stumps plural.

Like this was like, there was probably like three or four of these things, and I'm just smacking this thing, had the sledge maul out, wham wham, and I'm like, ah, out in the sunshine, Mother's Day, doing the right thing.

Neighbors seeing what I'm doing.

Hey, yeah, see what I'm taking care of.

That's for my wife.

Yeah, what are you doing?

Yeah, I see you over there, not doing anything.

So, no, I didn't have that heart.

Love my neighbor, right as myself.

I love when I'm done with my stumps, I'll help you with yours.

Um, I get in the car, I'm trying to drive home.

No, I had to run to Home Depot, right?

Because there's always at least one trip, if we're being honest, at least three trips to Home Depot for every project.

I'm trying to grab my wheel so I can steer the thing, and I'm like, oh my gosh, like this acute fireball shoots up my my my my uh whatever this part of this is, the forearm.

Thank you.

And and I could hardly grip the wheel, and I'm looking at my son, I'm like, man, you dude, you might have to drive.

And I'm going, well, what's going on here?

This has never happened.

I was a I was a collegiate athlete, Division I.

I've done a lot of great things.

I'm physically fit.

I I am a captain at Turkey Bowl every November.

You know?

So it's like, why is my body failing me right now?

But it was in a big way, and I was like, ugh, steer with the left hand.

Um but I realized that vitamin I is a real part of vitamin A, B, C, and D and E, ibuprofen.

And I needed some vitamin I to set some things right.

And I have like had, you know, like I feel a little bit uncomfortable.

I've never really taken those things before, not for any particular reason other than I didn't have a reason to.

Well, the warranty's expiring soon.

And let me just say that I needed relief immediately with some vitamin I, and I was thankful to have it, and uh the Lord showed up through vitamin I and deflamed and brought back to normal the tissues in my forearm.

And I was like, it was funny going to Home Depot with my son.

I'm going, dude, I don't even know.

This is weird.

And I was mad.

I was like, this sucks.

I don't like getting pain and sore.

And I was just, you know, like, what's happening?

And then um coming back, it was a lot better.

I'm like, hey, vitamin A is a real vitamin I is a real thing.

And um, so I guess my point is is that I'm as I'm coping and dealing with my own um humanity, my own mortality.

And I know everybody I talk to like, oh yeah, just wait, just wait.

And I go, listen, man, one step at a time for me, I'm still grappling with this because it's you know, things are you know starting to wear out a little bit.

And I get that.

I mean, we're all on a different journey, and I talked to my uh mid-20s nephew, and he's like, Oh yeah, man, feel great.

It's good.

What's wrong with you?

Let's go do this.

I'm like, dude, I'm still like hurting from like last week's basketball game, dude.

I can't I had to stretch, I had to pre-stretch to start stretching.

Um so I'm reminded of this, right?

In Paul, I am super encouraged by Paul in our lives, 2 Corinthians 12 9.

And he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, my strength is made perfect in weakness.

Therefore, most gladly I will rather boast in my affirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

Therefore I take pleasure in affirmities.

I re and in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ's sake.

For when I am weak, then I am strong.

And that was definitely reassuring for me.

And I've and I've definitely hung there in the last couple weeks.

Uh thirdly, faith, right?

Our faith in Christ and his eternal goodness will see us through if we're obedient.

Hebrews 11 1.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

I heard another illustration that I love so much.

There was this illustration of a guy, he was a tightrope walker, he was a tightrope walker, and he was up on the stage and he was on his rope and he was looking at the crowd, and he's like, Who here thinks I can do this?

And everybody's like, Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, you got this, and everybody wants to see him do the rope.

And he grabbed his stick, he's like, Who here thinks I can do it with the stick?

And everybody's like, Yeah, yeah, you got this with the stick.

And he goes, wait for it.

And he pulls this wheelbarrow up, sets it on the rope.

He's like, Who thinks who wants to see me do it with the ware barrel?

And everybody's like, Yeah, yeah, do it with the wheelbarrow.

And he goes, Okay, who's gonna get in the wheelbarrow?

Nothing.

Silence.

Faith would be getting in that wheelbarrow and trusting that that dude's gonna deliver you to the other side without falling or bailing, right?

So, Proverbs 3:5, trust in the Lord with all your heart.

Proverbs 3:5

Do not depend on your own understanding.

Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take.

I have this quote on my desk that I have to look to and remind myself from time to time, and it's by Albert Einstein.

It's a short one, it's a one-liner.

In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity.

In the midst of difficulty, there's an opportunity for me to grow my faith, for me to trust the Lord, that he is good, that he loves me, that his mercies are made new every day.

When I come to things in life, the natural response is fists.

I have a one-year-old.

Sometimes he carries around things that he shouldn't.

He finds things that are left out.

We have other children who leave things that aren't really one-year-old appropriate.

Knives, scissors, other things.

And so I go up to get those things from him, and I'm like, hey, buddy, hey, I'd rather him come to me and teach him that he should, out of obedience, hand these things to me.

When I go up to take him, which, to be fair, my other children, out of safety and concern for him, go up and just rip them out.

And so he's kind of like he's learning in his heart, if I like this and I don't know what it does yet, but I want to find out more about it, I'm gonna hold it tight, I'm gonna grip it.

And so it's been a little bit more of a challenge as he's gotten older.

The things that he really likes, but he shouldn't have, I'm like coaching him.

Hey, buddy, come, give it to me.

I want to, I want to see him hand it to me versus me rip it out of his hand.

Sometimes he does, other times it's more like this, and he's developed this new move, and I don't know where he saw this because he's not even seen the Heisman Award trophy yet.

But he kind of comes in like this now.

Kind of like boom, he'll bring it in and Heisman me.

And he does that to mom.

And I'm going, where'd he learn this?

It's a natural instinct in our flesh that maybe sometimes we're gripping things that we shouldn't, when really our posture, and this is the obedience and this is where the blessing comes, is instead of this, we come like this.

God is showing me some things this year on multiple fronts of my life where I've been like this, and I'm hanging on, and I've got this, and yeah, Lord's behind me instead of in front of me, and really what I need to be doing, instead of being in the backseat or even beside me, is come at him like this.

Open my hands.

That's a sign of obedience, that's a sign of a posture, that's the sign of your heart being in the right alignment with the Father to where he says, I love you, thank you.

This is for your best interest.

Give this to me.

Don't hold on to this.

My burden's light, my yoke is easy.

Why are you hanging on like that?

Because our natural flesh and tendency is to do so.

I had an opportunity to walk this out a little bit.

I was returning something that had been bought in for the church, we're tax exempt.

The new guy at the register, I had kids in the car, had to go.

Came up, here you go, we did the transaction, and noticed that he put like four bucks of tax back on the deal.

And I'm going, huh?

Okay, kids in the car, I gotta go, gotta go.

Wait a minute.

Tax?

I didn't pay for tax.

Bring it to his attention.

Sorry, sir, tax exempt, you just refunded me tax.

Can I give you cash back?

He goes, uh really?

I did?

Oh yeah.

Wow.

He goes, seriously?

I go, yeah, man.

I said, I'm not gonna take something I didn't pay for, whatever.

I go, I've never been blessed that way in my life.

I said, not to say I haven't done it, but I'm gonna say the times when I've done it, I've never been blessed, and I know better now that if I'm gonna do that, there's gonna be something down the road because of this little silly moment right here, because of convenience or time, over three dollars, I'm gonna cheat myself from the full blessing that the Lord has for me.

I might be cheating myself from the bigger moment of the breakthrough that he has for me in my life.

Over three bucks.

I come back out of the car.

Well, so he had to get the manager, and what turned into like a three-minute transaction was turned out to be like 15 or 20.

Come out of the car, Sam, thanks for your patience.

Everybody here is still alive, everybody got their arms and limbs attached, you know.

We tore each other apart while I was gone.

That's a risk when you leave them alone for a little while.

Came back, they were together, everybody was playing as a team.

And I said, took that a little bit longer, and here's why.

Guy tried to give me something that wasn't mine, and we had to go through the right way to do this.

We had to take the time to do it the right way, because that's where the blessing is for us.

Don't cheat yourselves from trying to take the shortcut, right?

There's blessing on either side of that.

And I want to leave this with you guys.

Another example that wasn't mine walking.

I was on the outside mentoring this person kind of from a distance, and this young man, this gentleman had come to me, and he had made a pretty specific decision over this last year to get real focused on God.

Be real intentional with that.

And he went all out.

He was making an impact, he was making a kingdom's difference in the lives of young men and women.

And he came to me and he said, you know, there's this girl that showed up on the scene all of a sudden the last couple weeks.

And and I and it's just been kind of uh been a hurricane, it's kind of taking me off my game.

I've lost my focus, I really like her, I've been praying about the right woman in my life.

And he was on a quick trajectory with the wrong person to take him out of the game and off his focus.

And I said to him, I said, dude, if you follow this, if you follow this, you could be leaving a different legacy from all the hard work that you've done.

And that's not what God has for you.

You could be limiting the breakthrough and the continued blessing that you're experiencing now where God really wants to take you.

You think you've seen some things, there's something on the other side of this that's very real for you.

So I said, don't cheat yourself.

You already know in your heart it's not right.

And and he confirmed that.

And he knew.

He knew, but that's where we can be blood state allies for each other.

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