Defrost Your Faith

Let's lift our Bibles up.

Thank you, worship team Boy.

That was powerful this morning, as usual.

Hallelujah.

Let's lift our Bibles up, wave them around live stream audience, get your Bibles out and let's say this together Say heavenly father, I'm glad to be here on this beautiful spring day.

Things are looking up, Everything's up in the bloom, everything's coming forth out of my spirit.

I'm so into a bountiful harvest.

My eyes are on the fields and they're ripe with harvest, and we're thankful for that.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Let's look at Matthew 14.

And we'll read, starting with verse 22.

Hallelujah, in straight way, jesus constrained his disciples to get into a ship and to go before him onto the other side while he sent the multitudes away.

And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray.

And when the evening was come, he was there alone.

But the ship was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with waves, for the wind was contrary.

And in the fourth watch of the night, jesus went unto them walking on the sea.

And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying it is a spirit, and they cried out for fear.

But straight way, jesus spake unto them saying be of good cheer, it is, I be not afraid.

And Peter answered him and said Lord, if it be, thou bid me, come to thee on the water.

And he said come.

And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water to go to Jesus.

Everybody say Peter walked on the water.

Peter walked on the water, but when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid and beginning to sink, he cried, saying Lord, save me.

And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught him and said unto him O thou of little faith, wherefore dits thou doubt.

And when they were come into the ship, the wind ceased.

Then they that were with them in the ship came and worshiped him, saying of a truth thou art the son of God.

Now, today, I wanted to share a simple message with you, entitled to defrost your faith, defrost your faith.

What about your faith?

Is it hot and ready to be used, or is it still in the freezer, frozen solid as a block?

I mean, is it ready to seize the opportunity at one word God speaks, or is it just immovable?

And so it kind of reminds me of the young bride preparing her first Thanksgiving turkey.

She was so excited that the family trusted her to fix the bird and she was so excited she went to the freezer, she put that baby right in the oven, put it on 350.

And of course she know what happened.

I mean, she forgot that number one, that's not a great way to cook a bird.

And number two you've got all those gizzards and stuff wrapped up in plastic in the inside of that bird.

So her bird was not ready for prime time.

Let's just put it that way.

And really, if we're honest, our faith sometimes is not ready for prime time.

When everything's on the line, our faith is still frozen and immovable.

We need to make sure that our faith is hot and ready to use.

So here in Matthew, this whole thing that happened.

It happened really, if we read it all the way to the beginning.

This is right after Herod beheaded John the Baptist and they came and told Jesus they've slain him and so he went away to pray.

That was his whole deal.

He got in a boat, went across and went to a place to pray to gather his thoughts.

I mean, this was a tragedy, this was bad news for him, and but he couldn't pray because these people followed him over there to the.

He looked on them and one version says he had mercy on them.

They looked like a sheep without a shepherd and he began to heal their sick.

And then the hour got late.

See, instead of being able to go and pray and rest and recharge his batteries for himself and get back in contact with the Heavenly Father, he had to keep giving out, giving out, giving out.

And he gave out some more.

And then it got late and the people got hungry.

And his staff.

They were just wonderful, jesus, we're in a desert place getting late.

We don't have anything to give these people to eat.

Send them away.

They can go to the 7-Eleven down the street.

And Jesus said handle it.

And really, if you really read it, jesus said handle it, give you them something, give them something that you do it.

Oh, we've got five loaves in a couple of you do it.

See, he had given them power in chapter 10, matthew 10, over all demons and to heal diseases.

They already knew they had the power of God.

They already filled with God's authority.

They've had it demonstrated to them over and over.

You handle it.

So many times we're looking for somebody else to handle what we can handle if we just open our mouth and get our faith on the line and get it out of the freezer to make sure it's fully defrosted and ready to go.

Are you with me now?

Yeah, and so what's that among so many?

We don't have enough.

We don't have enough, jesus, you don't have enough.

He said, now, just bring it to me.

And so the miracle of the loaves and fishes.

He fed 5,000 men, at least 20,000 people, and showed them again how to take what you have and make it be enough.

I'm telling you, whatever you have is enough for a miracle, amen.

I said whatever you have is enough for your miracle.

Yes, hallelujah, if your faith is defrosted, Amen.

And so he said handle it.

And so then it says here in verse 22, he constrained his disciples to get into the ship.

When he was all done, he said, I tell you and the word constrained means to compel, in other words, he gave some orders.

He said okay, boys, get in the boat and get over to the other side.

I'm gonna send these people away and I'll see you later.

Now, they didn't.

They had to wonder how he's gonna see them later.

I mean, they're the means of transportation.

The Uber driver's taking off and he's without Uber.

He doesn't have any, he's over there.

Well, I'm sure they were wondering.

He said, no, just go on and I'll see you later.

So they left, they obeyed.

So what did they have?

They had a word from God, didn't they?

They had Jesus word.

Go to the other side.

He didn't say go out in the middle and struggle, go out in the middle and go around in circles because of the wind is blowing so hard.

They had power to overcome every obstacle that they had in front of them.

They just didn't use it.

Are you with me?

And so Jesus went up and he did his praying and then he starts off across the lake.

You know, that lake is not that big.

I've been there.

I mean you can walk across it just a few miles.

It's not like an ocean and so.

But it was stirred up, the wind was blowing, so he goes walking on the sea.

I mean that had to be a sight.

And they're afraid out of their mind.

They saw oh, it's a ghost, it's a spirit, oh my God.

Oh, chill, chill, it's me, it's me.

And so Peter is one out of 11.

You got 12 in the boat.

One person out of all of the 12 was thrilled to see Jesus walking on the sea and he thought man, I wanna do that.

You have that kind of attitude.

See, that's somebody's got defrosted faith.

That's somebody that wants to do the works of God.

That's somebody that's not intimidated by the supernatural People that just wanna use this life as an excuse to fail.

First of all, you don't need an excuse to fail.

Failure is natural.

Just keep doing what you're doing and you will fail if you're walking in the flesh.

But when you walk and you get thrilled, when you get thrilled with the Word of God, it'll work for you.

When you get thrilled with the works of Jesus, when you get thrilled with miracles, you can have more of them.

When you get thrilled, praise God.

And he was.

He was thrilled.

He said Jesus, if it's you, bid me, come to see thee on the water, bid me come if it's you.

What's Jesus gonna say?

It's not me, I mean, he put Jesus in a little bit of box, didn't he?

Yeah, come, one word, come.

And before you could say lickety-split, here's Peter over the side and he's walking.

I mean he didn't take the time to analyze and he didn't take the time to trivialize and agonize.

I mean he just got out there and started moving.

He started walking on the water.

The Bible says he walked on the water.

A lot of times we forget that he walked on the water.

Little faith walked on the water.

Before we start criticizing Peter too much, I mean he was one out of 11.

The other 11, what they were?

Frozen turkeys in the boat, both full of frozen turkeys.

You know I love this story.

It's not a story, it's a testimony.

I mean he didn't analyze, agonize or rationalize Boom, his faith.

I mean it got him over the side.

Got him over the side.

Let me tell you the word is the answer to your stroke.

Your faith is the remedy to your contrary winds.

How many had got contrary winds?

I know that, I know Not trying to speak something bad over you, but this word that we got about this being the greatest year.

Yet I'm telling you every demon is lined up to stop it.

I'm telling you they don't want you to get into that place where you can testify.

They don't want this year to be the greatest year, yet they want to be the worst year.

Yet they're working overtime.

They're working all night long to blow contrary to what you're thinking and what you're believing.

They're gonna try to get you persuaded that you're the lone exception.

They're gonna try to get you persuaded that this is not for you.

It's not for you.

I'll tell you they work on your mind.

I'll tell you I said they work on your mind.

That's right, miss Ruth, if I got your permission to tell that testimony, miss Ruth's sexting.

She called me a couple weeks ago.

She's a pastor got a question for you.

She said you know, I had some health issues and I got all the way over them, but I've got this Walker.

I'm still on this Walker and I'm tired of being on this Walker.

I know that Jesus paid for me to be able to walk normally and I don't want this Walker and I feel like I'm missing something.

And I also kind of feel like people are looking at me like why is she still on that Walker?

And I know nobody's acting like that around, not at Gloria's Way Church.

They might do that at first, but no, they wouldn't do that at first.

They'd get you a stretcher, but anyway, great.

So I'm really digging a hole now.

I'm really digging a hole now.

I'm really digging a hole now.

So she went to the Lord.

She began to pray and pray and she got a verse of Scripture.

Holy Ghost gave her a verse of Scripture Train up a child in a way that they should go, and when they grow old they won't depart from it.

She wrinkled up about that, she furrowed her brows.

And what does that mean?

Train up a child and when they grow old, they won't depart from it.

So she started thinking about what she had as a child.

She was a preacher's kid as a child and she wasn't a child yesterday.

She was a child some time ago we won't say how long ago and when your family was in the ministry.

In fact it's still true.

It was true when this church started.

But you have people that you associate with in the church and if you're a preacher you've only got this standard of living and if you get a little further than that standard of living you're gonna be criticized.

That car better not be brand new and it better not be a nice car.

It better be kind of back off of the car.

It kind of has to be a little worse than everybody else's car and your clothes have gotta be a little more raggedy looking than everybody else's clothes.

Now, she didn't say all this.

I'm just thinking about what she must have been exposed to.

Her dear parents didn't mean anything by it.

They were probably treated the same way.

I mean, it's tradition.

The traditions of men render the word of God to none effect.

They raised her as best they could, but she anyway, here, she is growing up, and when you're a preacher's kid you're expected to have perfect behavior.

You can't do anything.

That's the slightest bit controversial.

Otherwise, oh my God, everybody is yappity, yappity, yappity, yappity, yappity, yappity, yappity, yappity.

Not in this church, no, all the other churches out there, but not in this one.

And so, and so she developed this attitude kind of in her mind that oh, that's not for me.

That new dress that Sally's got, that's not for me.

At least I was given some pale revenues that Elizabeth has on that, that's not for me.

Oh, that nice car that the Joneses are driving, oh that's, that's not for me.

Everything is not, that's not for me, that's not for me.

So she said, you know, for a lifetime pastor I didn't realize it till I got that word a lifetime, and it's in the back of my mind, it's not like it's out in the forefront.

It was uncovered, this little phrase that's not for me, that's not for me.

She said how in the world am I gonna get rid of something that I've had all of my life?

That's not for me.

How can I get rid of that?

I see it where she's.

The first major step was she had to know it was there.

I began to shout, I began to rejoice.

I said, oh, ruth, I said the same spirit that revealed it to you.

I mean, when you start to speak against that thing, it's gonna go running for the hills, it's gonna leave you.

Oh, that's for me.

Oh, healing is for me.

Oh, that new car.

I said you live in a beautiful home.

You know, their kids have provided this beautiful place.

I've been to at her apartment.

It's just so lovely, so luxurious.

I mean, when she wants to come to church she has a ride.

They give her a ride to church on prayer day and a ride.

You know, I'm telling you right now she lives first class.

I said that's for you, that was for you, that's for you, this is for you, healing's for you, getting rid of that, walkers for you.

Glory to God, hallelujah, I'll tell you, the devil trying to exclude you, he'll try to get you to say that's not for me, that's for pastor.

Oh, wow, well, that's for so-and-so, that's for Micah and Amber.

I got heard, heard their testimony, but that's not for me.

Yes, it is, it's for you.

So defrost your faith in three areas.

Are you getting anything out of this now?

Number one defrost your prayer life.

You know, prayer is not a duty, it's not a burden.

Prayer is simply a dialogue with your Heavenly Father and I'm, and not a monologue.

It's not just you getting you know, as a Catholic I was raised and we had little book called a missile and had little ribbons in there that you, you know, would you save the spot and everything.

And you get to reading that missile and some prayers, the same kind of prayers, every mass that you go to and you read these same prayers after decades and then pretty soon they just you just come out of you automatically.

You don't think a thing about praying it kind of like the rosary.

You just yeah, I'm a crazy lord and fifty, fifty, hail Mary's.

I mean, who can even stay awake during the rosary praying the Mary never didn't like the rosary anyway.

So sorry, sorry Catholics, but that's not prayer.

You know, that's religion.

I said that's religion.

People trying to check a checkbox.

You know, check the box off.

I prayed and so no, it's a dialogue.

I mean you know, when you pray in other tongues of 1st Corinthians 14, for your spirit, praise.

I mean your spirit is engaged in spiritual activity.

In your spirit is where you want to hear from God.

In your spirit is where faith resides.

Learn to lean on your spirit.

That's where the truth is.

Your mind can think all kind of thoughts.

Your mind can be susceptible to every kind of influence.

Oh, the world is filled with negativity.

How many of you figured out I mean you, you watch the news and they've gotten 19 lousy stories about death and destruction and one little story about a heartwarming story that lasts about one tenth of one second until they can get to the latest bad news.

Are you with me now because they found out that bad news sales people are?

There's something about the negative part.

People want to, even they want to see people that got it worse than they can, so they can just say, man, I don't have it so bad.

Look at them and really I'm telling you we, it's negative.

So we get over here into the spirit realm, look to the inside for answers, be still and know that I'm God.

1st Corinthians 14 for edify.

When you spray another tongue.

You edify yourself and pray in your understanding, to pray the word.

I like to pray with my Bible open in my lap.

I'll read my Bible and I pray some of it and I just talked to the Lord.

Sometimes, when I get through, you know, why don't you ask the Lord what?

Why don't you ask yourself what did God tell me today?

He wrote you a love letter.

What part of it stood out?

Sometimes we'll read our Bible, try to check a box.

We'll pray and check a box and we leave our prayer time and we never think about what did God tell me today?

Because I'm telling him he's talking all the time.

He is.

He is bringing things to your heart.

If you would stand, just stand still a long enough to hear it and start asking yourself what did God say today?

What did he say to me?

What stood out in my reading?

What stood out in my prayer time?

And you discipline yourself after you start hearing things, defrost your prayer life.

I mean praise God in prayer, worship God in prayer, stir yourself up to hear what God is saying.

I mean what, if, what?

If Peter hadn't asked you Lord, if it be that, did they come?

And he heard Jesus say come, all the other 11 turkeys.

They heard come, they heard come.

But what happened?

Well, they just bounced off that heart.

You know, frozen turkey, golly, it just bounced right off.

They didn't go inside, it didn't go in to penetrate, it didn't go inside and pull the gizzards out it.

You know, there, there, it is just, and it's just a one out of 11.

See, store yourself up to hear what God is saying to you.

Come on, let's lift our hands.

Father, I thank you.

My prayer, my prayer life is fully defrosted, it's ready, it's hot and ready to be used.

Oh God, it's a dialogue, it's not a model.

Oh, all right, defrost your prayer life.

Number two defrost your attitude.

The 11th attitude fear.

And Then there's a certain comfort zone that you can get into in a struggle.

You know, if you're not careful, you'll get used to the struggle, you'll get used to the waves and the wind.

You're fearful of it, but you're, that's normal and you like normal.

You don't want anything different.

Really you're, because the something different is unfamiliar.

Something different, you don't really know how it's gonna turn out.

At least you know You're gonna go around in circles and there's certain certain comfort about just going around circles.

Well, I've been here before, I'll tell you.

And then you've got something to complain about.

You've got something to get some people to kind of oh poor thing.

Well, I'll be remembering you in prayer this week.

Yeah right, you ever know any Christians that tell you that I'll be remembering you in prayer this week?

Yeah, you have to hate the status quo.

Listen carefully, I mean, if you get used to the struggle and you find you find some kind of sick Comfort in the fact that you, your world, is Defineable and you know how it's gonna be tomorrow morning, it's gonna be just like it was this morning, which was just like it was yesterday morning, and every day is the same, same old, same old.

I mean, you know, you have allowed yourself to just get frozen solid.

That's the 11, frozen solid in their inability, frozen solid, never delighting in the things of God, never thrilled with the supernatural, intimidated.

Oh, I hope he doesn't call my name Whoo and if I pray he might tell me to do something.

Oh, then what?

Oh?

my god, please don't talk to me.

Wigglesworth Smith Wigglesworth the apop, but he was known as the apostle of faith 23 people raised from the dead under his Ministry.

One guy was fully embalmed, pulled him out of the casket, leaned him up against the wall, raised him from the dead.

I mean, wigglesworth said if I can make a sick person righteously indignant, I can help them.

Isn't that something?

If I can make a sick person righteously indignant about their condition, I can help them.

But if they're so busy saying well, you know, I get disability.

Yeah, the government gives me a check every month.

I've got free physical therapy.

I've got people come in to help me and yeah, it's really you know it's.

If you've got to go through where I'm going through, I guess it's kind of nice to have.

No, you've got to hate it.

You've got to hate the status quo.

You've got to hate sickness and pain and disease and lack in poverty and inability and Inefficiency and everything else.

Lack of excellence.

There's a spirit of excellence that this generation has got to adopt.

Good is the enemy of best, enough is the enemy of more than enough.

Jesus came that you might have life and have it just barely enough, just Right up to the edge of the cup and no further.

No, it's gonna.

You're gonna waste it.

There's some waste, it's gonna run over the cup.

No, no, no get on me it's just so much, I have enough.

The Lord just gives me enough.

See my little teacup.

I have my little finger up.

Glad it's just complaints, because I always drink my coffee with my little finger up like that.

I Mastered over 52 years.

I've mastered the art of making her dissatisfied the way I drink coffee.

No, john 1010 says I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly, super abundant, super abundant in quantity, superior in quality.

No, that's for me, that that's for me, right there.

Super abundant, superior, that's for me.

That's yeah.

Yeah, my father wants me to have that.

My father wants me to have that.

Are y'all getting anything out when you get thrilled with the Word?

I mean it's not working for you.

When you fall in love with the Word and say, oh, it's a treasure, and you get out and say you gotta defrost your prayer life, you gotta defrost your attitude.

Last one is defrost your inaction, defrost your inaction.

Frozen turkeys don't move.

Actually, even defrosted turkeys don't move because they're dead.

But anyway, hopefully someone will move them into the oven at some point.

Point is you're not turkeys, amen.

You're live.

You're live, in fact.

You're not even sheep anymore.

You're soldiers of the Lord.

You're not even a sheep anymore.

You're not even a sheep anymore.

You're not even a sheep anymore.

You're soldiers of the cross.

We need to quit looking at ourselves as sheep.

Sheep is babyhood.

We're past babyhood.

The King of glory is coming and he's the one coming on the horse and if you're a sheep, try riding the horse.

If you're a sheep, I haven't seen any sheep riding any horses lately.

So defrost your inaction, john, excuse me.

James 2.20 says faith without works is dead, being alone in the way it says, faith without corresponding action is dead, being alone.

As the body without the spirit is dead, so is faith without corresponding action.

Faith without corresponding action, it's just a cadaver.

It looks like a person, it was a person, it was a person's earth suit, but when the spirit left that body, it's no.

That person's not there.

I said that person's no longer there.

What happened to that person?

Well, if they're saved, they went to heaven.

The earth suit's behind, they left the earth suit behind.

We love the thought of that person living in that earth suit, but they're no longer there.

Where are they?

They're in heaven.

If they're saved, they're in heaven.

All my relatives my mother and my father, aunts and uncles different ones, most of them are out at Forest Park Cemetery.

I don't go to the cemetery to visit their graves because they're not there.

Sometimes, when I'm trying to think about who lived when and when they died and when they were alive, I'll go to refresh my memory by looking at the stone, find out when you know and I'm always shocked I said I can't believe my grandmother died in 1970.

I don't remember that.

I don't remember my grandmother dying right after I got out of A&M.

I don't remember that.

There's a lot of things you know, details of life you kind of lose.

The graveyard is kind of nice for that.

You kind of keep yourself understanding where you are and who went when and all of that.

But I don't go out there and visit them and talk to them.

Fact is, I don't talk to them at all.

Talk to the Lord.

I visit with him.

Are you with me now?

They frost your inactions.

Faith isn't a thought, it's an action.

Faith isn't an endeavor, it's a leap.

Peter, I mean he jumped over the side of that boat.

I mean he didn't think, oh, I don't know.

No, he didn't thought and think about it.

I mean, that's what faith does.

You know it's good to consider what you're about to do by faith.

I'm not saying you ought to be rash.

I'm not saying that you ought to be compulsive, but when you know it's God, you don't listen anymore.

Whether you don't take into account flesh and blood, you go yeah.

For instance, some of you have heard my testimony about starting this church.

I heard in August that it was time for Gladys tonight to start our church.

There was no way I was leaving Lakewood and leaving Brother Osteen without his full, unreserved approval and blessing.

So I met with him.

He was shocked.

I could tell he was absolutely not prepared to hear that news.

God had not paved the way before me with him, even though just a few months before he had told me how proud he was of Gladys and what great pastors we would be, that he's just believing that somebody will call and he'll just be able to refer us.

His idea was that somebody was gonna call, needing a pastor, and he gave me this long story about a church that he knew of in Arlington, texas, and about a thousand people and a friend of his that he'd known for decades and he retired and he didn't call Brother Osteen.

He said, man, if he'd have called me I would have given him your name.

Y'all would have just fit right in there.

Instead he got some yahoo and he busted the church up, you know, split it three or four ways and though there were no longer able to support his ministry, he wanted to travel and teach and all of that.

So the whole thing fell apart.

He had to get, you know, 75, almost 80 years old, had to go back in there and take a hurt church over again and rebuild it that he had already built once.

See, I don't wanna build something again, but anyway.

So he was not prepared for the news that I gave him because I had a different plan than what he had planned.

Well, you gotta hear from God.

I heard from God and I could tell.

I said I'm not leaving.

Oh no, I'm just telling you, wait until after the first of the year.

It's not a good time right now.

Right now it's September.

By the time I met with him in September he said in just a couple of months it's gonna be Thanksgiving, christmas.

Not a good time to start a church, john, you'd be better off waiting till after the first of the year.

I said I hear you, brother, those things, but that's not what I told the Lord.

I told the Lord it's a yay or nay.

Fail safe.

That's safe for me and my family.

I don't wanna start a church without your full blessing.

It doesn't sound like I have it.

Oh, it's not that, john, it's just the timing.

I said, well, it doesn't matter why, let me just say I'm not leaving.

And then we went on our trip together.

When we got back, a couple of weeks went by and he called me one day.

It was December, middle of December, december the 14th of 1994.

He called me December the 14th of 1994.

And he was talking to me about some things and he said, by the way, john, that matter that you talked about.

He said if you wanna start that church at now or at any time, you have my full blessing.

And then I thought about Paul.

I conferred, not with flesh and blood.

I didn't talk to anybody after that, I mean, I jumped out of the boat.

I immediately began making plans to get this church started and six weeks later we had our first service.

And the rest is history.

25 years have come and gone and we're still going strong.

Because I waited on the unreserved blessing of my pastor.

Are you with me now?

So you know?

But you listen, my faith was defrosted.

I was ready to jump as soon as he gave me his blessing, I didn't think well, man, I don't know, well, I don't know somebody.

Ah, man, man, that's why this church has been lasting 25 years and on till Jesus comes.

As far as I'm concerned, defrost your inaction.

Faith is a leap.

Peter jumped.

He was around analyzing, building a long bunch of lists of reasons why he should and why he shouldn't you, just his faith was defrosted.

So you just keep on acting on the word until well, pastor, I've been acting on the word.

Keep acting on the word.

You know, if Gladys waited till she felt really good and normal, she'd never come to church.

There are times when I don't feel like coming to church, but I come, I get up here under the anointing and I don't even know I have a body.

See, because, why?

Because I'm acting on faith.

I know that I'm healed.

She knows she's healed.

It doesn't matter what it feels like, doesn't matter whether there's a pain there, it doesn't matter whether there's this or whether there's that.

I'm telling you, the devil will always try to get you tripped up and get you to just sit there and your inactivity.

But I'll tell you, if you act on faith, you can't lose.

Defrost your faith.

Come on, lift your hands and receive the blessing.

Glory to God.

Come on, let's give the Lord a big shout of praise.

Come on, let's stand to our feet and let's give God a big glory offering this morning.

Come on, praise Him.

Hallelujah.

Everybody say I'm hot and ready.

I'm thrilled with the word.

My faith is defrosted, I'm ready to be used.

Glory to God, hallelujah.

Where'd you get anything out of this this morning?

Amen, amen, amen, yeah, praise God.

You can be seated.

Hallelujah.

Thank you Lord.

Thank you Lord, praise God.