Turning Ideas Into Increase 2

I'm going to get into the word tonight first, and then we're going to let.

This morning, I shared a message entitled turning ideas into increase.

I promise you that I would finish it up tonight.

It, of course, relates to 2023, the year of God's power.

Sunday before last, I shared a message, both Sunday morning, sunday night, about the power to get wealth due to Ronymy 818 and then, of course, 2nd Corinthians 8 9, where the Bible tells us that we, that Jesus, was made poor, that we might be rich.

He identified with our poverty so we can identify with his riches.

We are rich legally.

If you're around here very much, you know that there's two sides to redemption the legal side and the vital side in Vichy, which means according to life, or it means functional, or it means whatever we've experienced through our own faith and patience.

You see, something could be legal and yet you might not experience what's legally yours because you have not yet attached your faith, you've not developed your faith yet to receive.

And the context of all these messages about wealth is the end-time harvest.

We're not just having a success seminar, we're not just having wealth to have wealth.

We're not where there's a purpose for big wealth, and what I'm talking about is big wealth.

I'm not talking about nickels and dimes, I'm talking about big wealth.

And the church has not received it.

The church has what?

What?

In some cases, when we have received it, we've wasted it.

And it's for the purposes of the harvest.

You know, how can they hear unless they have a preacher and how can they preach unless they be sent?

And the word sent means to be supplied with money, doesn't mean bless your brother, be warmed and filled.

No, it means supply the financial need to get the preacher to his destination and back and supply his deed while he's there.

And what's been done in world missions has been done on the shoestring.

God is not pleased with the amount of poverty that's on the mission field, amount of lack, the amount of sacrifice that the children of the ministers have to put up with, all because the church is not, has not believed the Bible.

You know, just haven't believed the Bible.

They, they've cut, they shot low and make it.

You know, if you shooting into the ground, you can get, you can hit the ground every time.

You don't even have to aim, you just boom and it's you did it.

But when you hit a target, so you, that's a difference you got to make.

Take aim.

And I just want to encourage everybody there's there's nobody listening to me here tonight.

That's excluded from this message.

Everybody, whether you technically are retired or whether you're broke right now I've been there.

I know exactly how that feels, doesn't matter where you are right now tonight financially, this message is for you and I want us all to elevate our sights.

I aim higher in this year of God's power, because I believe that there's an opportunity for an unprecedented transfer of wealth out of the hands of the wicked into the hands of the righteous.

Thank you for two old me's and three grunts.

Well, pastor, I don't covet.

I'm not talking about covetousness.

I hate covetousness, just like God does.

We're talking about believing what belongs to us.

God owns it all.

Don't you understand?

And it's not his will that the wicked have control of the this world's wealth and resources?

Not God's will.

It never was intended for the unrighteous to control this earth, amen.

So the context that we're speaking about is not just wealth for wealth's sake, not just so we can show out and show off.

Oh, I guess there's a measure of that, because we really ought to be examples of how blessing a God we serve.

Our God is a blood, as he's a God that blesses, he's a God that's, that is, a rewarder.

So from that standpoint, I just think that, yeah, and from that standpoint, we ought to have it so good, so healthy, so wealthy our lives, so so clicked in to what God paid for through the blood of Jesus and receiving everything that was paid for at the cross, that the world then wants to have.

What we have.

That was God's plan for Israel.

That's why Israel was blessed.

God told Abraham I'm gonna bless you to and I'm gonna bless you and you shall be a blessing can't be a blessing without being blessed first.

Well then, we ought to look blessed, we ought to smell blessed, amen.

Well, to spend blessed, we ought to drive blessed.

What a living blessed.

If we're really blessed.

It ought to be, it ought to manifest, shouldn't it?

Otherwise it's just words, don't mean anything.

Well, words mean something in the Bible, every Bible word means something, because it came from who God came.

It came from him.

He said be blessed.

And so I just encourage you.

So this morning we, we got into, you know, turning ideas and increase.

Let's look at, look at our Malachi, chapter 3 verse.

Malachi 3 · chapter mention

Chapter 3, verse 8 Malachi.

I can't read preach everything that I preached this morning.

So if you weren't here, get the media, especially week before last, if you weren't here for Brother Mark Sunday morning he did a teaching on generosity that just as unmatched, I mean, it was just so powerful because he's lived it.

We got, we were.

You know, there was an impartation.

I believe this church came up a whole another level and there's a desire planted in the hearts of glorious way church that these other messages that I'm preaching this week before and last week or and this week, that you need all of it.

You know, our, our, our harvest, our financial well-being depends more on it, depends on all things working together.

For instance, you have to get, you have to tie to qualify, then they have to give over and above the time.

I mean, that's, that's Bible.

Yeah, I don't have to make that point, we've made it over and over.

But then, on the flip side, we have to know what belongs to us, we have to know where it is, we have to hear God's ideas, concepts and insights that he pours out upon us so that we can be at the right place at the right time with the right people doing the right thing.

I think that's repeated throughout the Bible over and over and over.

For those team wrote a little book called a place called there.

I think that might have been one of our classes in the membership class a place called there.

So if you belong at glorious way church as a member, this is your place called there.

You'll never be fulfilled, you'll never complete what God has for you on this earth if you don't get in the right church, listening to the right message, with the right people in the right pastor.

You never will, you never will, you never will.

There's no, there's no.

You don't join the army and choose the general and choose the outfit you're assigned.

Brother Pete, did you ever get to pick where you serve?

You know I'd like to serve in Hawaii.

Please just send me to Oahu.

I'll speak in tongues walkie key, walkie key, honolulu, honolulu.

All right, malachi.

Malachi 3 · chapter mention

Chapter 3 I'll lend my motor.

Verse 8 this is the last prophet for John the Baptist.

400 years between this prophet and John the Baptist, israel didn't have another prophet to talk to them.

They'd killed many, imprisoned many.

They ignored them all.

That was their record.

That's why they were dispersed into all the world, lost their land and and so God all the time was protesting.

God's all the time trying to get him to change, just like he's trying to get the church now to change, trying to get America to do what they said they would do.

See, america's got a covenant.

We've got a better covenant than America.

America's got a covenant they had.

They agreed to serve God, be one nation under God.

They went back on their word.

So Americans are in trouble now America's in trouble.

What's gonna save it with?

The church is gonna get to be the church.

The church has got to do the church's job because Americans aren't getting it done.

I mean they're letting spy satellites go all the way across the country and not even do anything about it.

Let them examine all of our nuclear side.

I mean it's just hard, to hard to live through this stuff.

All right, verse 8 will a man rob God?

Yet you have robbed me.

But you say wherein have we robbed?

The entides and offerings?

You were cursed with a curse, for you have robbed me, even this whole nation talking about Israel.

But he's specifically talking to the priests, the leaders, the pastors.

You, you're not even teaching the people to do it because you don't do it yourself.

You don't tied the tie.

See, they got the tie.

They collected the tie, the tithes was for them and they didn't tie the tithe.

And so you're cursed, bringing all the ties into the storehouse that there may be meat in mine house.

And prove me now, here with saith, the Lord of hosts, if I will not open up to you the windows of heaven.

Those are the same windows that the flood came through, that flooded in Noah's day.

Those same windows.

That's how big they are.

They're pretty big.

They're closed to you If you don't tie it.

So you cheat yourself.

When you don't tie it, you, you, you think in your saving the 10%, but you're cheating yourself because you're cutting yourself off from what comes through those big old doors and what comes through there.

It proved me now, here, with your time, if I will not open to you the windows of heaven, pour you out a blessing, a blessing, a blessing.

It just says a blessing, doesn't tell you what the blessing is.

I'll pour you out a blessing there's not room enough to receive, and I'll rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruit of your ground, neither shall your vine cast your fruit for the time and the field, saith the Lord of hosts.

Agricultural crop, in other words, they're, they're, they're businesses, they're, they're money.

I'll rebuke the devourer, the eater.

The devil is an eater.

He will eat your money, he will eat your job, he will eat your supply, just like a bull.

We will eat the cotton, like those little bugs, those little.

You ever see those tomato worms?

You ever grow tomatoes and see those big old worms?

Man, that's the part I hated about growing tomatoes is picking those worms up.

I still get, I go.

If you don't do it, they ruin your tomatoes.

He's, he's talking about their income.

I'll rebuke the eater for your sake, and an old nation shall call you blessed, for you shall be a delightsome land.

Saith the Lord of hosts, your words have been stowed against me.

Saith the Lord.

Yet you say what have we spoken so much against thee and you?

You have said it's vain to serve God.

What profit is it that we have kept His ordinance and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts?

In other words, what good is it if we give the tithe and offerings?

I mean, it doesn't do any good.

We're still cursed anyway.

A lot of people have that attitude, about 2% of the church, people that call themselves Christians.

I don't even say they are saved.

I don't know how many of people who call themselves Christians in America are actually born again.

I don't know the answer, god knows.

A lot of them are in church.

A lot of them aren't born again.

I was in church most of my life before I got saved.

I went, I was an altar boy, I did all that.

I was lost.

So I don't know how many people like that.

I wouldn't admit to being the other than a Christian.

I certainly wouldn't say I was a Muslim.

I sure wouldn't say I was an atheist.

What was I?

Well, I was lost.

I was a nominal Christian.

Well, that doesn't count as a Christian.

That means you're not a Christian.

It means you're an unbeliever.

You're not even eligible to use His name, the name of Jesus.

I hadn't been named with a new name.

I hadn't been born again yet.

So when Oral Roberts was mining his own business in 2004, in July, he had a visitation and I talked all about it this morning.

I can't revisit it, just get the media from this morning you can hear it all.

And plus, I have a DVD out in the media center with an hour.

We condensed it to one hour, but it was an hour and a half long interview.

He prophesied over me and Gladys and this church we were honored to get to.

Not only did he lay hands on all of us we knelt there in his living room and he laid his hands on us but then he asked us to lay our hands on him.

He said my shoulder hurts all the time from laying it.

And he'd sit in a chair and he'd stretch out his arm and lay hands on thousands and thousands and thousands of people until he worn his shoulder out.

And he said my shoulder hurts all the time.

Would you please just lay your hands on me and Evelyn?

She said oh, don't leave me out.

And Gladys went back and laid her hands on Evelyn and Evelyn shook with the power of God.

Oh, the anointing.

The anointing hit her like a ton of bricks.

I mean, how precious is that, how awesome is that to be able to minister to them, to give them a little taste of what they gave out to millions, really millions of people all around the world.

And two months later she was dead.

She went to heaven.

She got a taste before she got to heaven.

I mean, she got drunk right there in her living room.

I was so holy.

But he recounted this visitation he had and God told him the church is not ready for the second coming.

And he said the church is a wasting of power in the church and people are not tithing, they're cheating themselves and they have wrong expectations.

They're not believing me for the right things.

He said tell my people.

And he started quoting Malachi, chapter three.

He said tell my people to bring all the tithe into this doorhouse and I'll open the windows of heaven.

Pour them out such a blessing there's not room enough to receive.

And oil robbers lifted his hands and interrupted.

God interrupted this visitation and said now wait a minute, god.

I've tied 50 plus years and I have never yet been in a position where I had more than I could stand, more money than I needed.

I'm not talking about money.

I don't have money to pour out through those windows.

I have ideas, concepts and insights.

He said, and I'll protect your assets, I'll rebuke the devourer, I'll protect your assets that's how he put it to oral and I'll give you favor.

So the benefits of tithing belong to all who tithe.

Well, I've been around.

At that time it's been 18 years ago.

I didn't know then what I know now.

I've got another 18 years of experience under my belt, I know a few more things than I did back then.

But I knew quite a bit back then.

And I'll tell you what I never heard anybody say ideas, concepts and insights were the blessings that God would pour out.

I've always assumed that we just kind of fell short, that God desired to fill us up so much we didn't have room for it.

But I mean, it just was kind of an ideal and nobody ever reached the ideal.

And that's kind of my attitude.

But that's not what he's talking about at all.

He's talking about these ideas, concepts and insights so many that you say, lord, you're gonna have to hold that up.

I've got more than I can process.

I can't hold anymore.

I'm chasing down all the ideas you've given me up to now and I don't have anymore.

I can't handle anymore.

Lord, right now, would you put that on hold and give it to me later?

I never even prayed that.

I never knew it was a factor.

I never knew it was a benefit.

I never heard anybody say that he would protect my assets.

I kind of like that.

Have you got any assets?

Is your house an asset?

Is your family an asset, your children, your parents.

Your career, your business Is that an asset?

Get protected and he'll give you favor, not just 360 degree favor in every direction, but favor in a direction, a favor toward a place called there Got another message.

I'm not preaching that tonight, so he gives this to me and I'm thinking during the interview and I never heard anybody pre-sist.

This is pretty amazing.

And my question was since you believe there's coming an end time harvest, do you also believe there's an end time transfer of wealth out of the hands of the wicked into the hands of the righteous?

That was my question and he answered by saying what God told him about the church being out of position in these last days.

They're in debt, they're living hand to mouth, they're not tithing, much less giving, and they're out of position so and they're Believing in the wrong direction, they're not believing correctly.

Wrong expectations, he said my people are cheating themselves.

That's what God told brother Roberts to tell the church.

A Corrective word, a wake-up call, is what he called it wake up call.

It's identical to what God told me wake up the church in March of 1999, three, three or four years before this Visitation that I had with brother Roberts.

I mean, it's big enough miracle just for me to get to interview him.

I didn't go to ORU, I didn't have any direct connection with him in the years that he came to Lakewood.

Nobody knew me and I didn't know anybody, so there was no introduction.

I didn't wind up meeting a lot of preachers and and I was honored to get to hang around certain people that that I used to listen to on the radio Charles Capson, rw, shambham I mean just, it's amazing, until Osborne, you just name all these, these giants that I got to see and meet In some cases pray for, in some cases show for around town when they came.

It's an amazing thing, but or Roberts wasn't one of them.

Another curious thing is the last, a year after that interview, god sent us Lonnie and Betty, rex and Royce, who put oral Roberts on television in 1953, or some some.

I think that the re-year 1953, you, you see, god has a plan sometimes that we we're just not acquainted with, and it's people that that follow, ideas, concepts and insights that go to the place called there where they can reap the blessings, not always financial, sometimes it's other things.

Are you with me now?

All right, so he said, one idea can make you rich.

So on the way back to the hotel after the all of that, I Asked the Lord.

I said, lord, I believe everything you said, but I need to see it in the Bible.

I don't see that.

I don't know what scripture says that.

That scripture he quoted doesn't say ideas, it says blessings.

And how do you know?

That's what he mean, means I mean, I believe him.

I believe you said that, but I've got to have the word.

I can't preach his visitation, I can't tell everybody what you told him I.

I gotta have a direct word.

And he said, just like that I'm looking out the window and driving down the street, newport Beach, california, a day like today, sunshine, you looking at the golf course, looking the Pacific Ocean of distance, talking to the Lord, exhaust.

I Was so tired, it took everything out of me to do that interview.

The Holy Ghost was so heavy in that room.

And Lord said what about Jacob?

So we talked all about Jacob.

I hope you got a chance to read some of Genesis, chapters 28 through 33 and you get that.

Genesis 28 · chapter mention

But you know, god gave Jacob ideas, concepts and insights.

He had the idea to go through the flock and get the speckle ring-straight and brown cattle, that's, goats and sheep and said and he said, I'll take these as my wages.

I've worked 14 years for these two women.

Can you imagine Two wives?

I can't handle one.

I don't know what I do with two.

Work for 14 years.

I work 14 years for Rachel and Leah.

I have a got a thing and now I don't want anything from you.

I'm gonna go through these, through these flocks, and I'm gonna get all the undesirable cattle and there'll be my wages.

I'll still watch yours, I'll still take care of yours, but then I'm gonna have my own, I'm gonna separate.

So he separated them and he had his group over here down down the road away from laban, so they weren't together.

See.

So we had that idea to start with.

Where that idea came from.

It came in a dream.

We find out later, a couple of chapters later.

He tells his wife how he got that idea.

Came from in a dream, all right so.

And then later on it developed.

You know you've got to have an idea, but you've got to study that idea.

You think about that idea, meditate on that idea, pray about that idea until you have a concept.

And the concept was he needed to whittle sticks.

Got that in a dream, stick them in the ground, right outside the feeding troughs, and when the Cattle came up to mate mating season, they made it looking at those spotted sticks and they reproduced spotted, ring-straight, speckled Goats and sheep.

I mean, that's just crazy, isn't it?

I mean, whoever heard of that?

I mean, is that in the animal science literature?

Probably not.

But God is God.

God knows how To make things happen if you just obey him, simple faith.

And so, suddenly, then and then, the next insight that he got was Take the strongest of your cattle and make sure they're the ones that mate.

So they Produced strong.

You got to understand.

There's no science back then, there's no textbook back then on how to raise stuff.

This is God who authors everything telling, giving him an idea, turns it into a concept, then finally perfects it with an insight as to having a strong herd.

His herd was stronger than Laban's.

He took all the wheat cattle and let Laban's cattle be weak.

They were weaker.

They might have looked nice, but they were weaker than and lower in number.

So hit it.

Laban's wealth shrunk, jacobs swelled and in six years he was a very, very rich man.

14 years of nothing.

It committed to being a tither.

Six years He'd accelerated.

How many of you believe that God can accelerate you from where you are right now?

How many of you have been flat broke and can't even you're homeless for 14 year.

Anybody homeless for 14 year, that's like, hey, he was home.

He didn't own his own home.

Hey, I mean he'd he'd got two wives and 12 kids.

That enough is gonna break it.

He had nothing of His own, or do you get the picture?

And from nothing to rich in six years.

I take that.

I Said I can take that this is God.

Have any favorites?

Is God a respecter of persons?

If he did it for Jacob, is it impossible for him to do it for you?

That's why we give this.

I mean, I mean, as soon as I read that start and when God spoke that to me, I just soared.

I mean I just couldn't get over it.

So Everybody say ideas, concepts and insight.

I'm believing for more of them.

In fact, I'm believing for so many that I'm gonna have to hold up my hands.

They, lord, stop it down for a while.

Wouldn't that be a good position to be in?

Because one idea can make you rich.

I gave you two examples this morning John D Rockefeller and Henry Ford.

One idea made them rich.

They were among the richest men on earth and their foundations are all fouled up.

They didn't take control of their wealth and now their wealth is used to spread all kind of garbage.

Both of them, I know they're twisting around in their graves.

Shame on them.

All right, so I have a couple more examples.

You know your job is not your source.

Good, I said that this morning.

Say it again your job isn't your source.

Ephesians 428 says that you know.

You have you labor with your hand, the thing that is good, so that you may give to him who doesn't have.

So you don't.

You don't earn a living, you earn a giving.

That's the purpose I Said.

That's the purpose.

You, you should be a lot richer than your salary.

You should have lots of lots of income.

You ought to have multiple streams of income.

You ought to.

You ought to have so many ideas working for you that you've got this account and that account.

I mean, think about the woman with the jar.

She filled up out of just what she had.

She started filling those jars up and she feels so many up.

She was able to sell all the oil and pay her debt and lived off of the rest.

That's in there for a reason.

What was that?

That was an idea that didn't make any sense.

Where did the idea come from?

Well, it came from the prophet who stood for God.

Second Kings, chapter 4.

2 Kings 4 · chapter mention

Are you with me now?

Here's a couple other examples.

How about in Genesis 26?

Isaac Sold in the land in the time of famine and he brought forth a hundred fold.

Now what farmer Would go out to the field in the time of famine?

In the time of famine, the field is bone dry.

It means it hasn't rained and you can't plant in dry Park soil.

Why?

Because the seed must have residual moisture in order for it to germinate.

So you would be wasting your seed.

You'd be planting that seed, all the labor, all the cost of the seed, and it's just gonna sit there and rock.

It's not gonna grow, it can't grow.

There's no moisture.

Except God gave him an idea go out there and sow the seed in the time of famine, and he reaped a hundred fold as if it rained.

Sometimes God's ideas are kind of.

It takes faith to follow some of God's ideas.

They don't make sense.

They don't make natural sense.

It gets back to the time of prayer, gets back to knowing who God is and praying and hanging out with him and finding out Well how he's, what he's like, getting you know, getting a dialogue going.

It's not about hearing a voice, it's about knowing.

I mean, you hang out with God, you just know something.

You don't have to hear a voice.

I hear a voice, ever great.

Once, while most of the time he communicates with me through the word or he communicates with me, you know, just by knowing, just by witness.

Another one Genesis 13 Abraham and lots herdsmen were having arguments.

First of all, it wasn't God's will for lot to be there.

Period, he was supposed to be left at home.

Abraham disobeyed God and brought his father, his, you know, who was an idol maker, and he brought lot.

Both of them were troubled and so he wasn't perfectly obedient in that area.

But the fact that he left or of the Caldees and went to a land he didn't know where he left, not knowing that was enough for God to bless him.

That was enough for God to say he had faith.

And so he gets out there and he's very rich, and cattle, silver and gold.

And because Lot is his nephew, well, you know lots doing pretty well himself.

He does what Abraham does.

He just kind of mimics Abraham.

But all of a sudden, now his herdsmen, lots herdsmen, start fighting with Abraham's about, about the water and about, you know, competing flocks.

And Abraham had to solve the problem.

He had an idea.

He said lot, you know, it's not right that we have this breach here.

We're family.

It's not good that we're arguing or herdsmen are arguing.

Tell you what, just pick, pick where you want to be.

If you go this way, I'll go that way, I.

Or if you go that way, I'll go this way, you pick.

Isn't that amazing?

How in the world could you do that?

Wouldn't there be a better place to go?

I mean, wouldn't you want to get to go in the best direction that you could go in?

But see, abraham had faith in God.

Abraham already told him I'm gonna bless you, to make you a blessing In thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

See, he already knew that God had blessed him.

He already knew that God was gonna bless him, no matter what.

He was gonna be blessed.

He had more faith in what God said than the circumstance.

And so, sure enough, what did Lot do?

Lot chose to go and live in Sodom.

And of course, the rest is history, isn't it?

Abraham went on, he went on getting blessed, he got bigger and better.

And then the five kings of the east came through Sodom and Gomorrah and took everything that Lot had cleaned out the cities, took all the spoil, and Abraham went after him.

Abraham defeated him.

And now, by the fact that he defeated the five kings who had everything Lot owned, it now belonged and everybody else's it now belonged rightfully.

To who?

Abraham?

Well, abraham didn't want it.

He didn't need it.

He's rich.

He didn't need any of that.

And the king of Sodom comes out and says oh man, thank you, thank you.

I tell you what I'm gonna let you keep such and such.

I'm just gonna take the women and the children you can get, and I don't want any of you.

I don't want nothing.

I'm not taking a shoelace from you, unless you say that you made Abraham rich.

I don't want nothing.

I just want some wages for my boys here.

That's all I want, just food, the land they took them about three days and they're gonna have to eat, but I don't want any of you.

See.

So he restored everything that Lot I mean.

Just look at the kingship, look at the leadership.

One idea from heaven.

Are you with me now?

The Bible is filled with these.

You got all night.

I can give you all these ideas out of the Bible, or you convinced right now that ideas, concepts and insights are in the Bible, so then you can have faith for them, without being presumptuous.

You don't listen.

You can be comfortable knowing that you're not doing anything different than Jesus.

Jesus had an idea about the fish.

Peter.

Pay our taxes, go and go fishing and take the first fish mouth, open his mouth, take the gold coin and pay your taxes in mind.

That was an idea.

Well, he's the son of God.

He didn't get that as a son of God, he got that as a tither.

We separate what Jesus did and we always kind of ascribe it if we're not careful.

I won't do that in this church because I don't let you think that way.

You've got to think that Jesus was a man anointed of God.

He did everything he did as a man, our representative.

He laid aside his deity and took upon himself a form as a man.

So all of his ministry was as a man anointed of God, not as the son of God.

He was a man of God, but that's not how he ministered.

So he's a rightful person that we can emulate.

I'm not gonna emulate Oral Roberts.

I'm not gonna emulate John Osteen.

I'm not gonna emulate any of those men of God that I love and respect.

I'm gonna only emulate Jesus.

He's the only one that was perfect.

Everybody else is not perfect.

I might use him as an example.

I might respect them and honor them and all that.

I might honor them.

I might honor them and honor them and all that Talk about them.

But the one we follow, the one that we copy, if you will, is Jesus.

And if Jesus needed ideas, how are we gonna feed these people?

What have we got?

One idea Little boy's lunch.

He did it twice.

See, we don't look at it that way.

We don't look at it that he had the right because he was a tither.

We look at it like he's Jesus.

It's Jesus.

It did no well, our example.

We should do the same thing.

So cancel that load of rice for the next packing event.

We're just gonna believe God's gonna multiply what we've already got.

I'm just joking, I'm just all right.

Let's lift our hands.

Father, we thank you for ideas, concepts and insights.

We're not satisfied with a little bit.

You know, god is not the God of a little bit.

He's the God of exceeding abundantly above.

He wants your finances to be exceeding abundantly above he does.

He does not want you living paycheck to paycheck, barely able to pay your bills, not knowing how you're gonna stretch.

You know, and you've got this unscheduled situation that hits you in the face and you don't know how you're gonna pay this obligation.

You know debt itself is not wrong.

It's just when it's presumptuous, when we go into debt for things that we didn't pray about and didn't believe for.

You know that you can get yourself in trouble with debt that way.

Some preachers just preach that all debt is a sin.

Well, I don't agree with them.

Neither did Brother Hagan.

So if I've got, I listen to this preacher, this preacher A, or Brother Hagan.

I'm gonna listen to Brother Hagan, because otherwise then I would have to admit that my whole business that I told you about this morning, building houses was illegitimate.

Well, it wasn't illegitimate.

It's nothing wrong with borrowing money to buy a house, to buy a car.

Nothing wrong with it.

In fact, the Jewish concept of debt is you're not in debt as long as you can make a payment.

If you're current on your obligation, you're not in debt.

So I borrow $500 from Slo-Mo over here and I said, slo-mo, I can't, I'm gonna pay you back $25 a month and it's gonna take me two years to pay it back.

And Slo-Mo is not gonna charge you interest because you are a brother I mean, you're a Jewish and the law says he can't charge you usury.

He's gotta give you the 500 because he's got it and you need it and you borrow it and as long as you pay him that $25 a month, you're not in debt.

You're not in debt.

Why?

Because you're current on your obligation.

But if you skip a payment now you're in debt.

Do you see that?

So we got preachers and people come out here and just make you feel guilty for just having debt and we say debt alone is not a sin, it's just presumptuous debt.

When we just go out willy nilly without praying, without knowing what God's will is about certain things, when we just wanna be led by the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, lust, those kind of lusts, if that fuels your debt, that is a sin because you're gonna get overextended.

And especially now that they've raised credit card interest rate, like you can't believe, you can get in trouble pretty quick.

Charging, charging, charging.

So I'm just saying that.

But debt alone is not wrong, it's not a sin by itself.

In April of 1988, 1988, I was laid off from a remodeling job.

I was the head of a remodeling company that a builder home builder in the Woodlands had hired me to run and it wasn't making any money and so he I was hoping he'd rolled it into his building business and try to maybe stake me in building some houses.

I was interested at that time in West U and I have to say it was like an idea that I felt like it was from God.

I read newspaper articles.

Let me just say this about ideas.

Let's just say you have an idea about your finances and it relates to your career.

Let's just say you know you're in real estate.

Well, you know it's not likely then that he's gonna give you an idea in rocket science.

You don't know anything about rockets.

See, it's usually an idea is related to your career, it's related to your experience.

Otherwise you'd have to just go back to school and relearn and retrench and take a whole lot of time.

And you know in the Bible the ideas they had related to what they were used to.

They were used to goats and sheep.

They were used to agriculture.

That was where their ideas were.

Are y'all with me now?

So my ideas always related to construction, it related to to real estate, it related to that type of thing.

So anyway, I was interested and I and I could see the end of this, of this deals, hoping he wouldn't just shut it down.

But he, one day he called me and I was it.

He laid me off and I had no severance and no, I mean just zip, you know chop.

And I remember leaving his house to go home and tell Gladys that we were once again unemployed, been working there about a year and a half, and I said, you know, I can choose to believe that the devil just stole my job, or I can just believe that this is God's promotion Because I'd been thinking about home building.

I've been thinking about trying to get back in the building business.

I didn't think when I got out that I'd ever want to go back in.

But one day, while I was still working for him, I had to go across town.

I went through West University Place and that was where they were tearing houses old houses down and building new ones.

It was a really unique kind of an opportunity and that's pretty common.

But back then it was pretty, it was a new thing and I got on a street and I I saw that they were Pouring a slab and I got out of my car, walked across the street and I smell that dirt that had been overturned.

So they had to.

They had to tear the old house down, they had to clear off the lot, take take all the trash off, and then they had to prepare for the for the slab to be poured and it had that smell, that smell of Fresh, you know, kind of soured Dirt.

It smells a certain way.

It's kind of not pleasant.

It's kind of sour taste smelling and and I smell the concrete coming out of them, out of the concrete trucks, and I and I smell the lumber they had lumber laying there and all those smells Hit me in the face and I started weeping and I just knew God wanted me back in the home.

You know how do you explain it?

I can't explain.

It wasn't emotional, it was just it.

Just it made me yearn for what I hadn't done in a while and Then I got laid off so we had $35 in the bank.

I Sat down and said, well, I don't know, home building might be gonna have to come later.

I might have to do something else.

Maybe I can help a bank finish up Abandoned property.

That's what I had done.

I told that story this morning and where there was a whole lot of abandoned property in 1988 one such subdivision was called Hope.

You know, hope you don't live there.

Being an insult, I won't mention the name, but anyway it's not very far Bear Creek Village.

Okay, I'm just gonna say it.

They had a double whammy, they also flooded.

So anyway, bear Creek Village had 1100 houses vacant at one point, 1988.

I mean it looks like a ghost.

I mean all those yards growing up.

I mean it was a disaster and if you live, you still live there.

I mean you can imagine what that would do to your home value.

Nobody want to live there In a ghost town.

I thought you know how can I go to the, the banks and and show them that I can help them refurbish these houses, cut the yards, fix the glass, get them ready to sell.

They're gonna sell to somebody.

They're gonna auction them off.

They're gonna get rid of them sometimes somewhere, and they're gonna need somebody like me to take care of them.

And and I thought you know If I could have $25,000.

I figured it.

I just sat at my dining room table and just did some calculation.

I I could live off that 25,000 until I could get my company up and running and Charge the banks what I need to charge them to get fees to make a living.

That's just how I approached it.

I really wanted to be in the home-building business, but that's a bridge too far with what I had.

I had $35 to my name and I'm gonna give $25 of it in the, in the offering, and I'm gonna believe for a thousand fold return, like in Deuteronomy.

What, what, what.

Moses said the Lord, make you a thousand times more numerous than you are today.

He talked to.

He wasn't talking about money, he's talking about numbers.

But anyway, that's what I needed.

I need a thousand fold return.

You need a thousand fold return.

I Found it.

So we gave in that offering.

I Said, okay, lord, we gave.

We sold her, said, left ten dollars in the bank.

I don't know how.

I still had a bank account, but I did.

I Said all right, lord, what's next?

I got to do something.

I got to act.

My faith, I want to act like this Bible's true.

I want to do something else.

What do I do?

I Want you to call three business man and get them to agree with you for $25,000.

I want you to call this one, this one and this one.

He gave me three names of Guys that I knew at Lakewood that were successful businessmen and Said Lord, now wait a minute.

If I call them and ask them to agree with me, they're gonna think I want them to give me the money and I don't want to do that.

I'm not prophesying and asking anybody for anything, I just want.

He said no, you go tell them that I told you to call them and that I had come, that you, that I had confidence that $25,000 wouldn't intimidate them, that they would be able to really believe with you for that kind of money.

And they were all three blessed that.

I said that they didn't take it wrong.

Nobody tried that.

Nobody was insulted like I was coming around the back door with my hand out.

I made it very clear, and so all three of them were two of what.

Two of them prayed with me over the phone and the third one wanted me to come to his house.

I Want, I want my wife and I to pray with you.

So I've been to his house before mansion.

So I went cross town and went to his house and we stood in the music room have you got a music room?

He had a music room and and with a piano, a grand piano, $50,000, grand piano, anyone.

So we stood there.

We stood there and they prayed and they both sobbed and cried in Agreement with that prayer.

They were just the Holy Ghost, filled the place up and I was shocked and Blessed and thanked them profusely, made it clear again now, look, I'm not looking for the money from you, I'm just wondering.

God told me you wouldn't be intimidated.

I mean you get somebody that never wrote believe for $25.

They're not the people to agree with you.

You got to get people to God's $25,000 faith and as far as God was concerned, they were it.

You see what I'm saying.

So, man, I mean you know it was a blessed blessing, all right.

So Two weeks later, nothing has happened.

Man, I mean you know it's getting kind of dicey $10 in the bank.

I really don't know how we made it.

It's just not even can't even explain how we made it.

I don't know how we made it.

One idea, I Guess the same way Jacob made it.

Anyway, he calls me the third guy that cried John, can't get you out of my mind.

Every time I wake up, your face is before me.

I can't get rid of it.

We need to meet.

Well, okay, but I told you I'm not looking for a partner.

Well, I don't know, I just don't know, I just can't get you.

I mean, I just keep seeing you and I, god just won't let me alone.

I said, okay, well, after church Sunday we'll, we'll go to lunch, then maybe we go to lunch, then maybe we go to lunch.

So we did, we went to lunch.

And he said you know, the other morning I woke up and I was right between waking up and sleep, just at that foggy time when you're just waking up, kind of just, you see the light, you know, and your eyes aren't quite open yet.

And he said I heard these words and he was looking at me across the table.

I heard these words and the word that I heard said prosper, and that's the expression on his face, like that, and he breathed it out across the table, hit me in the face with his breath Prosper.

And I said instantly, without thinking about it, I said that's a command appointed back at him that's a command.

And his eyes got big and said that's what Brother Osteen said.

He said, john, I think we're supposed to be in business.

I said I'm not looking for a partner, I just don't need a partner.

I just need $25,000.

And I didn't ask you for it.

I didn't ask you for the 25.

I don't, you know.

And so he tried and taught me into going business.

I said what do you know about home building?

Well, nothing.

I said well then, I don't need you as a partner and you know, I just need $25,000.

He said well, I don't know, I'm just telling you what I heard.

I said, well, I'm listening and I'm going to pray about it.

So I went to the Lord about it and I was reluctant.

I didn't really want a partner and I didn't want him to be my partner.

Really, I mean, I liked the guy, but I'm, you know, I just didn't.

I mean, you know, you get rid of a partner you've had and you didn't want another one.

You know, and if you like somebody, being a business partner is a good way to not like them after a while.

Sometimes Are y'all getting anything out of this?

I keep going on.

Y'all are my therapy session I get to talk about all these things.

Let me lay down Where's that recliner.

We got little.

Got brother Mark a recliner.

Let me recline in that so.

So a couple of weeks went by.

He said I'm going out of town but when I get back let's meet again.

I said all right.

And so the Lord says I want you accountable to somebody and I want you back in the home building business and you're going to need more than $25,000.

I said your plan was going that other route, but I want you back.

I want you back in West University place.

I'm saying that was God's idea.

My idea was something less.

God's idea was way up here, beyond any possibility of me being able to do it.

See, bridge too far.

Remember what I said Bridge too far.

No, can't get the.

Oh.

No, god can get there.

God can get you where you need to be and he can hook you up with the people you need to be hooked up.

He can give you favor where you need to have favor.

He can make things very, very easy for you.

That's what he wants to do.

He doesn't want to make it hard.

So I finally got used to.

And then God gave me a scripture.

I was there in 45.

Let's look at it real quick.

And I'd gotten the scripture now before we had this meeting where he said prosper.

I had this scripture right after we gave the $25 in the offering with $10 left in the bank account.

I was there 45 one.

Thus saith the Lord to his anointed the Cyrus.

When I read it that day, I are John Griner.

Thus saith the Lord, john Griner is anointed, whose right hand I have holding or I have strengthened, to subdue nations before him, and I will loose the lords of kings to open before you the two leave gates, and the gates shall not be shut.

I will go before then, make the crooked places straight and cut us in pieces, the gates of brass, breaking pieces the gates of brass, cut us under the bars of iron and I will give thee the treasures of darkness, the hidden riches of secret places, so that you may know that I, the Lord which called thee by thy name and your God that's quite a word and I started meditating on that word.

And, lord, I thank you.

I thank you for loosing lords of those kings.

I thank you for giving me favor.

I thank you, lord, that I have supply.

I thank you that I've got that $25,000.

I'm just walking up and down broke but calling that money in.

And here's a couple of other versions of that verse Verse he will verse three.

He will give you, I will give thee the hoarded wealth of secret places, the treasures that are hidden in darkness.

The Knox translation I will give you their hidden treasure, their most secret hoards, I will hand over to thee.

So I, I'm and I'm, I'm.

I'm got a word from God about this 25,000, but what in?

25,000 is more than that, but in my mind it's what I'm calling and I've got that word.

And two weeks go by and then, like two and a half weeks, I didn't hear back from him.

He didn't get back in town, he didn't call me, we didn't have a meeting and I'm thinking what's going on?

What's the deal?

So I called him.

I'll never forget that morning.

I called him that morning it was cloudy and summertime raining outside, and I mean we're broke and a half now.

I mean it's all.

This time is going on.

You can't write any more checks $10 in the bank.

And so I said okay.

Well, you know, I got a release from the Lord.

Well, I've been wanting to call you, john, ever since I just lost my peace.

I don't think we can, I don't think I can, I don't think I can do it.

I said you what.

I said I can't do it.

I said, oh okay, all right.

Well, you know, I just I was so mad I wanted to bite the phone into you.

I mean, I didn't want to do this.

I didn't in the first place, I didn't want to do it.

You had to talk me into it and the Holy Ghost finally gave me peace to do it and said he wanted me to be accountable to somebody.

I'll more about that in a moment.

He wanted me to be accountable.

I had owned my own business.

I was accountable to the banks, but nobody else.

I didn't have any partners.

The last several years of my building career, before I went down, I had my own, with no partners.

So this time I'm going to have a partner.

I'd gotten okay with it, had peace about it, and now he's backing out.

So I you know I didn't slam the phone down because I didn't want him to know.

I was mad, but I was mad.

Gladys is staying right there.

She's right there the bachelor bedroom of my sister's house, by the way.

We live with my sister and I started walking up down and said well, lord, you know, you got me to say okay to a partner.

Now the partner's backing off.

I said you know, lord, you're the one that gave me this word.

You said thus saith the Lord that John Griner might anointed, whose right hand I've strengthened the subdued nations before.

You said you'd go before me and make the crooked places straight.

You said, lord, I didn't say it, you said it.

You said that you would lose the loins of kings.

I got to that part.

You said you would lose the loins of kings and I took a breath and before I could speak, the rest of it and I was mad.

He said where do kings live?

Huh, what, where do kings live?

Made me shut up and I thought it oh my God, they live in Kingwood.

In fact, they live in King's forest in Kingwood.

And then I saw the man's two leaf gates.

He has two leaf gates in his driveway that I drove into that first day.

We prayed and he cried and his wife cried about our prayer together.

I said well, it's him then you're talking about.

He said call him and tell him.

I said I can't do that.

I can't prophesy money out of his pocket.

Come on God calling.

I said what have I got to lose anyway?

You know.

But you know, whatever, if he thinks bad of me, he just gonna have to think bad.

He thinks I'm prophesying money out of his pocket.

We'll go ahead.

I said well, you know, I'm calling you back because I was praying a verse of scripture that I was praying and I told him the whole story and I said God just wanted me, wanted you to know.

I said no pressure, you're still out, you're out, but I want you to know.

And God just insisted I call you and tell you what the verses were that I've been praying before I even knew you were interested in such an idea and he started crying.

He said John, it's just fear, the IRS is after me, threatening, threatening letters.

He said I know I'm supposed to do this, I just have been so under gun with all of this, and so you know.

He repented and two weeks later we had $100,000 in a bank account open and we were looking for lots in West University place.

And that's another idea I could go into, but we're taking up a lot of time.

So I'm going to end the ideas.

But my life has been, you know, looking back on my life, god used ideas, concepts and insights, without me understanding what that was.

I just say, well, I'm led by the spirit.

Well, we are that's being led by the spirit.

But yet on the flip side, what I wanted to get over to you than in the area of your finances, there is specific promise made for tithers and givers, and that is ideas, concepts and insights, so numerous.

Keep in mind, one idea can make you.

You know, one idea made me, got me down the road about four years, until the IRS caught up with him and took everything he owned.

It did happen.

He did lose it all.

He lost it all.

It's unjust, it was wicked, he didn't deserve it, but it happened.

So you know, I've lived a few things through the course.

Then I had to find another partner and I had to.

You know it was.

It was it was pretty wild, but we had.

We had three good years.

We made profit, made a good, made a good profit with what we did together, and that got me down the road a little bit further down the road financially.

Amen, hallelujah, let's lift our hands.

Father, we thank you for ideas, concepts and insights.

All of us, as tithers, have a divine right to have your information on things that we couldn't possibly know without you, and we walk by faith, not by sight.

I wanted you to catch the faith that took to do what you know.

I think you could see that that took faith for me to obey God.

It took boldness for me to stand when someone was attacked by the devil and I agreed with him as far as I could.

There was several things I was able to to change for him.

He had the wrong representation and I won't get into all that.

It takes too long.

I'm just talking about you tonight.