The Power Of Imagination 1

Let's wave our bibles around and make Jesus glad and the devil mad.

Let's say this together say heavenly Father, I'm so glad to be here today.

It is a celebration.

I celebrate the Word of God and the Holy Ghost moving in my life.

You know, the battle is the Lord's.

I remind myself the battles that I'm facing they're not mine, but they're yours, but the victory's mine.

I found out through the Word.

I've got plenty to celebrate today in Jesus' name.

Amen, you could be seated, hallelujah, yes, we got a shouting church, we got a running church, we got amen.

Let's look at our Bible Romans, chapter 12, and I might not even get through with this today.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

I mean, that's the great thing about being a pastor.

I don't have to give you the whole thing all at once.

Romans, chapter 12, we'll start with verse one, paul's writing to the church, and he says I beseech you, therefore, brethren, so it's to the believers, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

You present not God, no, god help me to present.

No, you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto you, unto God, which is your reasonable service.

One version says your spiritual worship.

And verse two and be not conformed to this world, or you could say to this world's way of thinking but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

And then in chapter eight, romans eight, two pages, back in verse five, for they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh or they're flesh-minded.

If all you can think about is the flesh, you're flesh-minded.

But they that are after the spirit, the things of the spirit, in other words, are spirit-minded.

Everybody say I'm spirit-minded, everybody say I'm learning to become more spirit-minded.

For to be carnally-minded or flesh-minded is death, and that doesn't necessarily mean physical death.

It means you're separated from God.

This is written to believers.

You mean I'm not safe.

No, you're not taking advantage of the fact that you have a connection to God, the Father.

And when you're flesh-minded you have a separation.

It's like you're dead.

Be carnally-minded is death, but to be spiritually-minded is what Life and peace.

That word life is the Greek word zoe, which means eternal life.

It means super, abundant and quantity superior in quality.

And so today I wanted to bring a message entitled A Power of Imagination, a power of imagination.

I know what some of you are thinking.

Well, you know that's what's imagination, that's that mind over matter.

No, it's the fact that we are three-part beings.

We are a spirit and we live in a body and we have a soul or a mind, a will and an intellect.

Three-part being the part of us that's gonna live forever is our spirit and we're born again.

When we're born again, our spirit becomes brand new.

We become new creations.

I don't recognize hyphedated Americans in this church.

Doesn't mean a thing to me about a hyphedated American.

We're new creatures.

That's how we approach everything in this church.

We are new creations, never a new species of beings, I think Corinthians 5, 17.

A new species of being that never before existed.

And it trumps our DNA.

All this stuff about going in on the line and getting your DNA and finding out who got what and who went and went, and there's a lot of unhealthy surprises busting out out there.

A lot of big surprises are happening and a lot of families are upset.

You know it's better to let sleeping dogs lie.

You know what I mean.

Surprise.

Daddy Mildred doesn't know anything about you.

No, we're new creations.

We, when we were born again.

We have heavens DNA, but we do have a mind, our will, our intellect.

God is not in mind control.

God is not a puppet master.

God does not go against human will.

Years ago I was preaching on Romans 12, 2, the transformation by the renewing of the mind.

He said when you say renewing, most people in the pew are saying oh yeah, I thank God.

When I got saved, my mind became renewed.

He said that's not true.

They are renewing and never stops, because if it ever stops it's going to dry up and go the other direction.

You get saved.

One time he said a better word for renewing would be refreshing.

I mean, doesn't your computer have to be continually updated?

I mean, every time you turn around, oh, got an update, oh, it's going to install in the middle of the night unless you want to do it right now.

And then you go ahead and say I'll do it right now.

Now you don't have your computer for about an hour because it takes about an hour for it to go through, and all of that.

Well, don't you think that your mind has got to be updated?

Don't you think that your mind has got to be updated and upgraded over the years?

I mean, if your spirit is growing, your mind has got to catch up to what your spirit knows.

And your spirit does grow, amen.

And so our body has its desires.

And so if your mind goes unrenewed or unrefreshed, then your body and your mind will team up against your spirit and you'll make decisions that are carnal, you'll make decisions that are not the best for you and you'll get out of God's perfect will.

In your life You'll take what looked like a promotion and move because the money was good, and what happened to you was that you got moved by the flesh.

Oh, I'm blessed, oh, I've got to follow that.

Well, not necessarily.

So how do you prevent that?

Well, there's a way that you can be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

It says you know, you vote with your mind.

Whatever your mind, if your mind goes along with your body, that's what you're gonna do.

Your mind is gonna agree with your bodily, your flesh.

Your mind becomes carnal.

Then the word carnal means death, doomed.

That's the literal translation of.

Carnal Means separation from God's perfect.

I'm not saying you're lost and gonna go to hell.

I'm saying you're not gonna live at anywhere near what God has in store for you and you will not accomplish what God has for you to accomplish.

And so Philippians four tells you that we have to think correctly.

It says in Romans 12 too don't be conformed to the thinking of this world.

You adopt the thinking of this world, just like COVID and all of this stuff that's going on.

But if you adopt the thinking of this world, you're gonna crawl in a corner and be afraid.

We don't deny there's diseases out there.

We don't deny any of that.

We just refuse to be afraid of them.

We had the same thing when AIDS broke over.

Do you remember when AIDS came out in the 80s and everybody was mortally afraid?

I had to go to a church and talk to their altar workers.

The pastor lived in my neighborhood.

He wanted me to come over and talk to his altar workers.

He knew I went to Lakewood.

He said my altar workers are mortally afraid.

They don't wanna go and pray for the sick at the altar.

They're worried about catching AIDS.

I said well, I think I can help them.

I don't know how much I helped them.

Kinda skint the hide off of them a little bit.

I said you're in the wrong ministry If you're afraid.

Jesus was never afraid.

He laid hands on a leper.

Not only was he not afraid.

He wasn't afraid of the government and the church leaders saying that he's now unclean.

What he did violated the law.

And so, after we got the share in the Word of God, they saw the light, praise God, and they didn't turn away from how many people with AIDS do you really have coming to your church anyway?

Not that many, not like it was just everybody out there, and the science on AIDS was absolutely ridiculous.

They just thought that you could get it by just looking at somebody, and then it was if you had to go to the bathroom, and it was there on the facility there.

And then they, finally, finally, they found out.

You know, this is what we're.

We don't even hear about the science of this COVID-19.

Now they're talking about double masks.

So help me God.

Methodist hospital sent me an email.

Yeah, we're talking about double be thinking about the.

No, I'm thinking about it.

I'm not gonna do even a single mask.

In fact, I'm gonna keep doing what I'm doing, which is no mask.

I'm not saying you have to do that, I'm just saying I decided that's where my faith is.

Now you can get you can get that, but you have to do it by faith, right, all right.

So we're told to be renewed in our minds, have our minds renewed with the Word of God.

And so we do that by the proper way of thinking.

In Philippians four, eight and nine I'm gonna read it in the message Bible Philippians four, eight and nine tells us what to think and how to think and the power of our imagination so important.

We have a mind.

God wants us to do something with our mind.

If we don't renew our mind, we will never accomplish God's purpose.

I wanna get you can have spiritual revelation.

You can run around the church, you can dance during the music, you can do chocolate chocolate.

I like that commercial.

It's pretty, it's my favorite commercial right now.

Chocolate chocolate.

And the teenager comes in and sees mom back in the back and she is boogie and kind of like Karen was this morning.

She, she is man, she is, she is really getting into it.

And the teenager goes oh, I can't stand to watch this.

She leaves.

You know, pretty funny commercial.

Chocolate chocolate, chocolate syrup on your ice cream is what it's about.

All right, all right.

Well, if you can do that, but if you don't have your mind renewed, you're gonna miss God.

First eight.

Summing it up all up, friends, I'll say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating.

Everybody shout.

Meditating On things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious, the best, not the worst, the beautiful not the ugly, things to praise, not things to curse.

Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized.

Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

Isn't that good?

He will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

That's what we're to be.

We're to be a harmony, like we heard up on the platform in music.

Well, that's how we ought to act as the body of Christ.

There ought to be a symphonic harmony.

Here's the woodwinds over here, here's the horns over here, here's the strings over here, here's the brass over here, and I mean here's the percussion over there, and we're making a tremendous sound from heaven together.

Harmonies.

Are you with me now?

Yes, talking about having your mind renewed.

And so the product of meditation is imagination, or to receive an image.

You know that image has got to move.

Whatever God has speaking to you when you're praying, much in other tongues, it's got to be communicated to your mind.

Are you with me now?

Joshua?

God said Joshua, moses, my servant is dead.

Now, therefore, rise, and everywhere the foot of your feet shall tread.

That have I given you.

As I said unto Moses, as I was with Moses, so I'll be also with you.

I will never leave thee, nor forsake you.

He said, this book of the law shall not depart out of our mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein, day and night.

Meditate, then you shall make your way prosperous, then you shall have good success.

So your mind is Involved in your success, your mind is involved in your prosperity, and if your mind is unrenewed, you'll be in the hundred and eighty degrees out of phase with God's plan.

Are you with me now?

I'm just.

I'm using these verses to show you that you're sitting in a church.

It was a product of much meditation.

Yeah, god visited me.

Yes, god gave me words over the years, but it was when I sat down and thought those things through and I thought about them and I pondered them.

And I the word meditation means literally to mutter or to speak over and over again.

And as I turn those words over and over, I mean suddenly it, an image was created and I had a pathway of action.

Are y'all with me now?

Something has to be converted out of the spirit realm into your mind, where you can actually Identify what it is that you're supposed to do.

I know people that have been praying, praying, praying for years and nothing has really happened in their life.

They're right back where they were 50 years ago.

Why?

Because they've never really converted their mind and got their mind renewed to the will of God, to the Word of God.

So the product of meditation is imagination or an image.

An Image God shows you what it is that he wants you to do and there's a course of action that goes with it.

We preached a couple of years ago about a pelican.

I watched pelicans out it in Galveston.

They were feeding right in front of me, there in the, in the channel, the Galveston channel, there between here's the Gulf on this side and here's, you know, galveston Bay, eventually over there, and there's the port of Galveston to my left, and here's all these tankers where here comes these pelicans one pelican it was a windy day and he is I mean, the wind was blowing like you can't believe.

It was blowing man out of the, out of From right to left, and this pelican was laboring man.

He's flying into the wind, he's having to flap and he's looking down and all of a sudden he just Just hit the water, come up, you know, I'm sorry, his head bob, and he swallowed a mullet and he kind of gave himself a couple, of, couple of seconds to get it down and then he lifted off into the wind again and he did about six times.

As far as I could see.

He just he dived right out of the sky and went down.

Well, what was he?

He had an image of what his food looked like, his prey, in his brain.

You know, if a pelican's got a brain, don't you have a brain, he wouldn't have known.

I mean, what if he don't?

What if he dove in there when he saw a shark?

He might not come out of the water.

Wrong, wrong image, right, but he see, in his, in his brain, in his pelican brain, he's looking for an image of a mullet swimming through the water, about four inches long, six inches at the most, maybe three inches.

And I mean he's got that image, he sees it, he goes for it, boom.

And he never missed, I mean he never missed.

He come up like that.

It's gone, man, I mean.

And then he was the only one, and Whole bunch of other pelicans were flying with the wind.

They weren't having to fly much, they were just kind of go like that, like that, like that, and they flew right over all the mullet dummies.

Maybe they had already eaten, I don't know, maybe maybe they already had breakfast, I don't know.

Well, god gives us the image of that which belongs to us If we will begin to meditate in the Word of God.

Are you, are you following me?

Wrong thoughts produce wrong words, produce wrong results.

Wrong thoughts.

I mean you can think on something that's true, but it's not lovely.

There's a lot of things I can think about our nation.

They're true, but they're not lovely.

So you know what?

I have to turn the radio.

I'll have turned the TV off.

There's only so much information I need.

I found that when I get Overloaded on that information, it misses my Imagination of then I start imagining the wrong things.

I start imagining that the giants are bigger.

I start imagining the wall cities are bigger and I begin to think of how in the world can we ever survive?

Yeah, I tell you what I don't.

I don't want to, I don't want to meditate on that.

It's one thing to be informed.

It's another thing to just let this load us down.

Listen, we've got to get over grief, we got to get over sadness about things that we, that we, can't do anything about right now except pray.

But then we have to speak up for the truth.

But in between, let's, let's think about the good things, let's think about what God is doing.

God's not through, god's not finished.

We're still here, I Said.

We're still here to make a difference, amen.

Let's look at Genesis 11.

I want to show you how powerful imagination is and and and it's the story of the, the Tower of Babel.

Genesis 11, verse 4.

Genesis 11:4

And Then you know these people, verse 3.

They said one to another let's go and make brick and burn them thoroughly.

And they had brick for stone and slime they had for mortar.

And they said.

They said knows what?

They said let's go and let us build as a city and a tower Whose top may reach under heaven, unless we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of men built it.

And the Lord said behold, the people are one and they have all one language.

And this they begin to do, and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do.

Who said that?

God said that.

God said that unredeemed Old Testament men that had no covenant with God.

This is the Gentiles, it's not Israel.

This is the Gentiles.

And he said because they were all of one language and one thought.

And he said nothing will be restrained from them that they Imagine to do.

You see, mankind is in the God class of being.

That's how God created the world and that's how man can create his own world.

But what does it profit a man if he gained the whole world and lose his own soul?

So God split them up, gave them different languages, scattered them through all the earth and Remove them out of the scene of being able to do something that, if he had not intervened, they would have done it.

Are you all with me now?

I say that it's a negative, but yet, at the same time, it should give us an the truth that we have a whole lot to do with our success.

We put it off on God all the time.

Well, you know God, god just didn't.

Well, god, god allowed this other to happen.

Well, you know, god did this and God, you know God didn't do anything.

He gave you the raw material.

You have the raw material, you've got the word, you've got the Holy Ghost, you've got his plan for your life.

You need to find out what it is and when you do it's your job.

And when you do, it's your job to create it.

Oh, come on, emily, let's lift our hands.

Glory to God.

That's what happened in this church.

It works created.

Thank God for y'all coming around, because I couldn't have done it by myself.

But I saw you, I Knew you were coming.

God told me you were.

Are you with me now?

That's how this church was built, just what I'm preaching this morning.

And your life can be built the same way.

If it's dysfunctional, if it's messed up, if, if you're all messed up financially, you're messed up, maritally, you're messed up Whatever you're, whatever the mess you have.

I'm telling you right, god didn't fall off the throne, he's got a remedy, he's got a way out for you and this is the way.

Praise God.

I Mean Moses received the pattern of the of the tabernacle in the wilderness.

I mean God showed this man, you know, and he, he built it.

He built it exactly what he's.

How did he do it?

Meditation David, the same way, except David didn't even get to build the temple.

God gave him the entire building plans.

It's written there in the Bible.

You've got all the plans, the ouches and the ouches and all the curtain thickness.

It's hard to read through all this stuff.

You don't really understand what you're reading.

All the jewels and the da da da, da, da, da, da da, what kind of vestments look like on the priest, and all that.

And he had the whole pattern of it and he didn't get to build it and he had to communicate that pattern to Solomon who built it.

How did it happen?

Imagination, see their imagination.

They meditate on the Word until they had the plans.

Are y'all with me now?

God has a plan, he has a blueprint for each one of us and they overlap.

It's kind of hard to see with those lights on.

But if you can, you can look up and you can see one of the lights.

I'm seeing one right now.

That light right there has got another light hanging next to it on an electrical cord.

It's just hanging there and it's dark and the light next to it is light.

That's our new lighting that we'll be on next week.

So next week we'll have all new lighting in the sanctuary and it's going to be a lot brighter.

No more dark spots over here, no more dark spots in the back, no more dark spots.

It'll all be and it's all controllable and all of that.

So my point is that God has illuminated.

He's got points of illumination that you haven't turned on yet he wants to show you.

Mark was talking about illumination last week.

God wants us not only to hear, but he wants us to see.

And when you see, you see an image.

All right.

Then you begin to see a set of plans, you begin to see a blueprint, you begin to see a course of action.

Are y'all with me now?

Yes, come on, let's lift our hands.

Father, we thank you that you've given us the tools, the raw material, to create a different reality, to lead us from where we are to where you want us to be, and that's where we want to go.

We don't want to stay where we are, we want to go where you want us to go.

Glory to God.

Isn't that right?

Yeah, yeah.

Well, it's not just going to happen one of these days, one of the sweet buying by thoughts.

No, we're going to be the ones that participate in Kingdom business.

So, anyway, I was meditating.

This is a good time 26 year anniversary to think about what God has done, his faithfulness.

Hard to sing these songs without weeping.

I've learned not to weep, I learned to laugh.

Used to, I'd sing about God's faithfulness and I'd get a lump in my throat and I'd want to cry God, you're so faithful, so.

But I turned that switch over to now I laugh.

Glory to God.

Thank you, jesus.

Joy of the Lord is your strength.

I'm not.

It's not wrong to cry about certain things, but I just like to laugh.

I laugh when I think about all the things that God has done in 26 years to keep this church vibrant and alive and moving forward.

And but there were turning points and I guess the biggest turning point was.

One of the biggest turning points for my ministry in this church was when Pastor Osteen went to heaven, january of 1999.

So it's been 22 years ago, the 27th of January, so that would have been last week.

It had been 22 years ago.

And God spoke to me that night.

He said Moses, my servant, is dead, now therefore rise.

And that whole chapter in Joshua.

God began to speak to me and and I mean Gladys got up to pray for him because I had gotten a phone call two o'clock in the morning that he had collapsed and then hauled to the hospital.

So we were going to get up and pray, except in the middle of our prayer, before we could even get started, gladys is up there, you know.

She's walking up and down in front of the bed, she's hollering at the devil, she's coming against death.

And then the Holy Ghost is speaking to me Moses, my servant, is dead.

I said honey, honey, honey, hold on, moses, my servant is dead.

Now they didn't turn the machines off till that afternoon, so I don't like to say this in front of the family.

I'm not trying to upset anybody, but I just know what I heard and what I saw and I'll just cut to the chase.

But I believe my importation came and the Holy Ghost came and told me.

He said you're going to cause your people to inherit their land.

He said be strong and of a good courage.

As I was with Moses, so I shall also be with thee.

And I know the Bible is talking about Joshua, but I knew God was talking about John Griner and Brother Osteen.

And so God began to change my ministry.

He began to move me into things that I wasn't necessarily prepared to go into.

I wasn't thinking that when we started this church as far as I was concerned, we're a local church on 1960, but God began to emphasize regional center, he began to emphasize governmental authority, he began to emphasize certain things that I, that emphasis wasn't really necessarily on me, that much.

Are y'all with me now?

Yes, and I remember at that time you know, I began just a few weeks after he passed March, march of 1st of 1999, five weeks after he went to heaven God woke me up and said wake up the church.

And so I started preaching about that.

I had to find out.

Well, what do you mean?

Wake up the church?

I found out the church at large, and I wasn't, I was asleep in that, I wasn't emphasizing it enough.

We emphasized it a certain amount and he wanted me to kick it up.

Wake up the church.

They're sleeping their beds with the covers pulled over their heads and when I speak to them they think it's the devil.

So you know, all those years later, here we are, waking up the church, waking up church members that are in bed, churches where the pastor is sitting behind the pulpit and tries to be neutral.

Well, god isn't neutral, brother, pastor, god has a side.

Get on his side, otherwise you are out of order.

Amen, god is not neutral.

Well, god's not a Republican.

I hear that, I see that all the time.

Well, god's not.

You know you're an idiot.

God has a side and let me tell you something he is not on the side of killing babies.

He's not on the side of lying.

He's not on the side of people who pollute to recruit.

I better not go any further.

You get the, you get the drip.

So I had to be strong and very courageous.

And I mean we had, just months after that happened, man, we had a major exodus.

Brother Osteen laughs.

He says well, you just had a back door revival.

Praise God Told me that one time before it happened.

So I remembered that when it happened again.

What's a back door revival?

When people go out the back door, they're offended, they're mad, they don't like you, they don't like you anymore, they don't like what you're saying.

When you start messing with people's vote, they tend to get pretty emotional and you start telling them.

You know what the truth is about, about electoral politics.

A lot of people can't bear it.

Thank God for y'all.

Y'all are here.

You haven't even locked the doors in case anybody.

I haven't said anything yet other than the Democrats are a demonic party.

I haven't said anything much.

Republicans not much better.

How's that one?

I've got a few bone to pick with them too.

We're going to hold them all accountable.

So after that, you know, in June I had June of 01, by that time we'd moved into the Seventh Day Adventist Church and God gave me the tsunami dream.

I've rehearsed that recently.

I won't go into it again.

And then a little bit after that and I've got this written down because these were big messages that I meditated on and got an image.

And so, after the tsunami dream, I was meditating on what that dream meant.

I was meditating on the glory.

I'm meditating on what I experienced riding that wave of glory and the fear that I had before it hit, because it looked like it was going to destroy me, but didn't it thrust me forward?

And so I was meditating on that.

And in June, or July 30th, 01, that day I was out on my patio, I remember it.

It was hot, sticky, like it is in July, and I was praying much in the Holy Ghost and God gave me three words advancement, promotion and enlargement.

And I began to meditate on those words advancement, advancement and I thought about go.

Advance means to go.

And then I got the word incursion, where you actually invade a foreign territory and take over, and I began to think about incursion.

Wow, god's got new territory.

Keep in mind, we're in the Seventh Day Adventist Church.

They're there on Saturday.

We're there on Saturday.

It's not our building.

I mean, we have to set up every Sunday morning Early in the Sunday morning Jay gets up for the chickens, goes by and picks up Stan and picks up Lee and they go to the church.

They haul the speakers to the church.

They have to put the sign out front, they have to put the speakers up, they have to haul the keyboard and the drums out from the back and set up the entire platform for Sunday morning.

Sunday night we have it through Thursday night prayer.

Then we got to break it down.

So we usually would break it down Wednesday night after Wednesday night service, because we didn't need all that for Thursday prayer.

But it was their building all the rest of the time.

So we were just kind of.

You know, that's four and a half years, folks, four and a half years.

I needed a word from God.

I needed to know that we were in the will of God.

I needed to know that what we were about.

We were on the right track.

Just looking at the natural, it looked like we were dying on the vine.

I'll just put it like that.

We had no visitors.

First of all, nobody knew we were there.

Somehow we had a handful of people that heard about us and they showed up.

Thank God for that.

But it wasn't because they saw our sign, because our sign was only there Sunday through Wednesday and then Saturday they're there Seventh day.

You know they worship on Saturday, so they went our sign up there all week.

So if you were looking for a church and you went out Saturday and you're looking for a church, you wouldn't know that Gloria's Way Church was there, because it's their sign is out there.

It's like we were hedged about and yet God was incubating, god was building.

So advancement, advancement, incursion, take new territory.

Promotion and enlargement.

God gave me Isaiah 54, where, you know, enlarge the place of your tent, let them stretch forth the curtains of your habitation, for thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left.

Gave me Isaiah 54.

So in order to grow this way in a tent, let's just say you're in a tent.

It was kind of prophetic too.

I didn't know we were gonna have a tent glorified tent.

He said if you're gonna have a tent, you've gotta have a taller center pole.

The center pole has gotta be taller because if you grow this way and this way, then the tent roof is gonna get flatter, it's gonna hold water and the whole thing's gonna fall down.

So you've gotta have a taller pole.

So in order to get bigger, you've gotta have a promotion.

Are you with me now?

I'm talking about meditating and God bringing an image into my heart that I could know that God had a blueprint for our church to go forward.

Are you with me now?

God has got a blueprint for you, he's got a blueprint for this church between now and the time we get out of here in the rapture and we're gonna do the same thing we've been doing for 26 years.

We're gonna follow those words and we're gonna meditate and get them, amen.

So here we are.

The end of July, I get that word.

I'm thinking, wow, this is kind of cool.

Wow, this is kind of man, the glory's coming.

Oh man, five weeks, six weeks later, 9-11.

9-11 hit man.

I miss God a million miles.

See, I didn't recognize, had meditated long enough, I thought, oh my God, I didn't see that coming, but I did see it coming.

A lot of times when God speaks to you, we have our own little interpretation of it, and that's why we've gotta meditate on it long enough for getting God's perspective and we don't go off and assume something that he said and put the wrong spin or the wrong inter.

Are y'all with me?

Now?

It looks like I'm going over your head.

Are y'all getting this?

It's so important because it's our anniversary.

We need to know how we got where we are and this is how we got here.

And that's why, when people criticize and when people have ugly things to say on Facebook and all that kind of thing, I don't give a rip.

Well, pastor, you're so bold?

Well, I'm bold because he spoke to me in bold terms.

He gave me the blueprint.

I don't care whether you like it or anybody likes it.

I want him to like it.

He's the one, not about me, anyway, it's about him.

Praise God, but I do want you to like it.

I want you to get hooked into it.

So I went to Galveston after 9-11 and God began to speak to me.

He said well, I'm about to send a hot, dry wind, I began to realize that we were in the final throes of the nations, the judgment of the nations written in the book of Matthew, 24 and 25, written in all the prophets, isaiah, jeremiah.

I started plugging in to Sister Billy.

She helped me a whole lot about what was going on in those days.

I won't get into all of that, but what we're having right now in America is absolutely forecast in the Word of God.

So our job right now is not to pray.

God bless America.

Our job right now is in wrath.

Remember mercy.

America needs mercy.

America needs a church, the church to plead its case.

Because every nation, america included, every nation will be judged on their behavior.

Number one, how they treat Israel.

Number two, what they do with their children.

We're in deep trouble and we have been for a long time, long time.

The best we can believe for at this stage of the game is for God to either delay judgment for America or to reduce its severity.

We need to know how to pray.

Then we're gonna do some praying tonight over these things.

Tonight is power hour plus.

It's valuable to know how to pray.

I see people that don't know anything about how to pray for our nation.

They're still trying to pray us out of the trouble.

They're still trying to pray America out of the trouble.

It's not gonna happen, folks.

There is gonna come a day of reckoning.

We're here and all we're talking about is how severe it is or when it happens.

But it's coming because every national sin of any nation has to be judged, and judgment is God's mercy, because he brings partial judgment.

Look what he did in Egypt.

He brought the blood.

The water turned to blood.

They had a chance to repent.

They didn't.

He brought the flies they didn't repent.

He brought the lice they didn't repent.

He put the frogs everywhere and they didn't repent.

I mean 10 plagues.

They had 10 chances to repent.

The judgment is God's mercy here.

Please, I want you to repent.

God's not sending the trouble.

It's already written.

It's already written.

It happens when we get out from under God's protection.

The America is out from under God.

Right now.

We're out from under God.

You can talk about why, you can talk about an election that had all kind of trouble.

You can talk about all that stuff.

It's just really that all of that is kind of irrelevant right now.

What is relevant is that that's who we have in charge right now, and so the nation is at risk right now.

We gotta have a church that's not afraid, that's bold, that will speak against evil, cry against evil, cry against evil laws, cry against evil policies.

We're gonna do that in this church.

We're gonna keep doing that.

Well, what do you mean?

Well, how does that help?

Well, god wants the church to be the church and then when we pray, we can pray in wrath, remember mercy.

We can plead America's case, because there is a lot of good about America.

We know that, a lot of good that we can plead their case.

Are you with me now?

Power of imagination?

And so during that trip to Galveston I'll finish with this and God began to talk about the hot, dry wind.

And I was still meditating on advancement promotion.

Lord, I still don't understand that, how that has anything to do with 9-11.

9-11 looked like a demotion.

I mean, some of our people got unemployed, some of our people were retired folks and their 5401 case took a hit.

I mean it looked in the natural, looked terrible, but I still held on to what God's Word said and he told me.

He said the responsibility, the authority and the bounty of another is being transferred to you.

He said it was destined for another.

It was destined for another has been transferred to you, and so that spoke to me of promotion.

You know Psalm 75, I'll put down one and set up another.

So he said that to me in the heat of 9-11.

I'm talking about everything has come unglued.

I'm talking about it's terrible, and God says, okay, I've got something reserved for you and it's coming your way.

He led with responsibility, authority and bounty Reserved for another's coming your way.

And then he gave me Revelation 3-11.

Take heed, let no man take thy crown.

So there was a crown.

The crown is like a symbol of domain or dominion.

Let no man take thy crown.

Because I took somebody's crown by being available.

That had happened in my life before, without me being ambitious.

God gave me my first job at Lakewood you know opening services and prayer and he took that job away from some guy that wasn't faithful and gave it to me.

It already happened, in fact, it happened several times, and so this was not new territory for me, and so that let me know that.

You know what God is no respecter of persons.

If I'm not faithful, he's liable to take what he gives me and give it to somebody else.

So my job is to say humble, my job is to realize it's not about me, it's about Him.

Are y'all with me?

This is how this church was built.

This is how we've got to where we are right now.

It didn't happen last week, I think it didn't happen last year.

It's been happening for a lot of years and we've got so much more to go, so much more wonderful things.

And so I didn't know it at the time.

But our ex landlord who now we're making payments over the property, we're making payments every month, $5,700 a month, land payments To go along with a $16,500 rent payment.

And we realized then that that's the money that's going out and we're seeing a contraction coming in.

And you know, you have to know you're following God's blueprint or you're gonna go belly up, right.

But I knew I was following God's blueprint.

We just held our own, we just kept on.

Somehow, god, the money came in every time, every time.

But anyway, that guy that we're making these payments to made a bunch of money in the stock market.

I didn't know it until the next year.

Within the next year, that was the manifestation of this land miracle.

We were able to give that land back to him forgive the $600,000 debt and take this $9.7 million piece of property as a gift to the ministry.

And that's another reason why we're right here, praise God.

I'm talking about an imagination, I'm talking about image, I'm talking about something that came out.

You mean you knew that was gonna happen.

No, I knew generally that God had given me something that didn't originally belong to me.

It belonged to somebody else, and they were unfaithful.

So what did that do to me?

Well, it didn't puff me up.

In fact, it put me on alert.

You better be faithful.

You better be faithful, or I'm gonna do the same to you.

God's no respecter of persons.

Glory to God.

Aren't you glad you're here?

Aren't you glad you made your way here?

I certainly am glad it's not my family, or certainly glad amen.

So three things about the power of imagination.

Number one harness your thought life.

I mean you can think about things that are true, but they're not lovely, so don't think about those things.

I mean you can be aware without meditating on the negative, and I've had to learn this the hard way.

The more I hear and meditate on the trouble I get down, I get negative, I get angry.

That's not God.

The wrath of man worketh, not the righteousness of God.

I mean, if it's gonna make you angry, then you're going the wrong direction.

It's wrong to stick your head in the sand and act like nothing's going on.

No, you need to be informed of what's happening and then, once you know, that's it.

I don't want to hear any more about it.

Thank you, I don't want to hear three hours of Hannity and Laura and Tucker and everybody else.

Give you a complete autopsy.

No, I don't want to hear all that, I just want to know the bullet points and then I'm going to praise God.

Number two cast down negative and self defeating imaginations and memories.

A lot of times our own memories are our biggest hangups.

You've got to cast them down First.

Second, corinthians 10, four and five the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but they're mighty through God.

To the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, in other words, bad imaginations, not every imagination.

Casting down negative imaginations, your memory, say I.

You know I can't think about my failures If I sit around and meditate on the things I've done wrong.

It just it.

It robs me of my strength, it robs me of my faith.

No, I'm going to think about God's victories that he's given us over and over again.

I'm going to meditate on those.

We've got these weapons the name of Jesus, the word of God, the blood of Jesus, the Holy Ghost.

We've got supernatural weapons to use to harness our thought, life, and then finally meditate on the word and the word.

Of course, the word, but also the words that come forth, prophetic words that are from God, like that's just how he's always done me.

I, I'd be praying in the Holy Ghost and I get words.

We were praying for weeks about, you know, when I realized that we, we had this land and we needed to build a building on it, you know, and that was the, the, the property next door.

We were having Thursday night prayer and we began to pray and pray in the Holy Ghost and, and I don't know, for weeks and weeks, and we'd get these phrases.

And one night we got two phrases at once.

It was non institutional and center friendly.

How many of you were in those prayer meetings?

Some of you are in those prayer meetings right here on the front row, right here.

Non institutional, center friendly, and it takes too long to describe all that.

But, in other words, god didn't want to build a cathedral, he didn't want stained glass windows, he didn't want this big, big, you know.

He wanted something that wouldn't be intimidating.

And so we got those words and he said first class, state of the art, high tech.

See, we had five phrases that we arrived at how to select.

I've had many people why did you build this thing?

Why did you do this?

I've had people say it looked like a mosque.

Well, it doesn't look like any mosque I've ever seen.

It's made out of vinyl, but anyway, regardless.

But that's the reason God gave us a specific blueprint.

Are you with me now?

And so meditate on the word, think about it, talk about it.

Meditation produces imagination, and when you meditate on the word of God, you'll make your way prosperous.

You'll have good success.

Come on, lift your hands right now.

Praise God.

Hallelujah Glory to God.

Thank you, jesus.

Come on, let's praise him this morning.

Hallelujah Glory to God.

God's got good things in store.

Has nothing at all to do with the economy of this nation.

I mean, that's the reason I wanted to give this testimony.

The economy couldn't have been worse than look what God did.

He provided for us, and then he also provided the beans by which we built this church.

It's amazing what God has done.

He'll do the same for you individually and do it all for us again, amen.