The Power of Yes | Ps. Keith Pittman

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you for joining us to learn more about Celebration Orlando, a church devoted to reaching the lost, equipping the found, and helping the hurting.

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Continuing our service.

As I said, if we hadn't had an opportunity to meet, I would love to connect with you outside in the courtyard.

Thank you so much.

At the end of service, and we're going to create some space for us to be able to do that.

Today we're concluding our free indeed series.

Somebody say all.

We have an incredible series that's going to be starting next week, our summer school series, and I'm excited about what God's going to be sharing and teaching us in that time.

Our free indeed series over the past five weeks, this is week number six.

We've been unpacking this idea of what does it truly mean to be free in Christ.

And so if you've missed any of those previous messages, please go back onto YouTube or anywhere you engage content and make sure that you engage in what it means to be free in Christ.

Because there's been a momentum that's been developing.

Our theme passage comes to us from the book of John, chapter 8, verse 36, where it says, So if the Sun sets you free, you will be free indeed.

John 8:36

The idea of us really walking in the freedom that God has established for us.

Our teaching text is going to come to us from the book of Acts.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

Chapter 16, Acts comes after the gospels is written by Luke, the one who authored the book of Luke, and it's a continuation.

In fact, when Luke wrote the book of Luke and Acts, it was actually written as one continuum, and then it was later divided.

And Luke wanted to do an exhaustive study of the beginning of the movement of Jesus all the way into the church begin being given the batons, so to speak.

And so Luke has a very unique perspective of watching the kingdom go from 12 men to growing into what we have today.

And the book of Acts is a beautiful place that captures that.

Starting here at Acts chapter 16, I'm going to be reading this from the ESV translation.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

In fact, before I do that, let me do this.

Let me go ahead and dismiss our middle and high school students.

I completely forgot in the all the things.

Our middle and high school students, you guys can go.

We have a great service for you guys that's happening right now.

Acts chapter 16, verse 16 through 34.

Acts 16:16–34

There's a word that I believe that God has for our community.

Starting at verse 16, it says this.

She followed Paul and us, us being Timothy and Silas and also Luke, crying, These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaimed the way of salvation, and she kept doing this for many days.

Paul had become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the Spirit, I command you in the name of Jesus Christ come out of her.

And in that very hour she came out.

But when her owners saw that their hope of gain was lost, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the rulers.

And when they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, These men are Jews, and they are disturbing our city.

They advocate customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to accept or practice.

The crowd joined in in attacking them, and the magistrates tore their garments off of them, gave orders to beat them with rods.

And when they inflicted them with many blows upon them, they threw them into the prison, ordering the jailer to keep them safely.

Having received this order, he put them in the inner prison and fastened their feet in stocks.

About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundation of the prison was shaking, and immediately all the doors were open, and everyone's bonds were unfastened.

When the jailer awoke and saw the prison doors were open, and when the jailer awoke and saw that all the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing the prisoners had escaped.

But Paul had cried out with a loud voice, Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.

And the jailer called for the lights and rushed in.

And trembling, he cried out and said, What must I do in order to be saved?

And they said, Believe in Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.

And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and all who were in his house.

He took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds and baptized them at once, and he and his family.

And they brought them up into the house and set food before them, and he rejoiced along with his entire family that they had believed in God.

But then somehow ending up at the jailer's house and the entire family surrendering and giving their life to Jesus.

Sometimes we never know the domino effect and how God can impact us in the different places that we go in.

It all starts with us simply saying, Yes.

So today I want to talk to us as we conclude our series, and the theme has been get free, stay free, set others free.

What does it look like when we play our part in helping others to get set free?

And I have a title today's thought, The Power of Yes.

Let's pray and let's see what it is that God wants to speak.

Lord, we thank you so much for your faithfulness.

We thank you for your word.

We thank you for your truth.

And for us to have a moment so we can come together as a family.

Engage your word and be activated by your spirit.

Father, I decrease and ask for you to increase.

And Lord, we just ask for you to have your way.

Lord, we ask that you give us open eyes to see you, open ears to hear you, and open hearts to be transformed by your truth.

The incorruptible seed of the Word of God.

Let it go on good ground in Jesus' name.

Amen.

And amen.

I I still remember the date of April 25th, 1999, like it was yesterday.

For me, it was a it was a new birthday.

It was a transformation day.

It was a day that I had a radical surrender to Christ, is what I call it.

Now, being raised in a Christian household and in a Christian context, I have prayed the quote-unquote sinner's prayers multiple times.

Typically before I was going to take a test I didn't study for.

Typically, when I found myself in a situation that I just needed God to rescue me from, I had a faith that was like, okay, I was raised this way, and so I knew to call on the name of the Lord.

But it was on that day, April 25th, 1999, when I knew that, okay, this changes everything.

This is not a decision that I'm making out of desperation of my circumstances, but it's a decision that I'm surrendering to out of desperation for my soul.

There was a reality of that that I needed to surrender my life to Christ.

And I remember that that moment is so vividly of being at the altar and and being filled with the Holy Spirit, and my eyes were just leaking, and I remember being just on my knees, and I and I'm weeping.

And I remember this moment of me opening my eyes up and kind of glancing off to the side and seeing my now wife, but back then that was my my boo, my baby mama, um, my rib.

Um I saw her having the exact same experience at the same time.

And and we didn't plan this.

This wasn't part of some strategy of like, hey, let's go down.

Like it was literally just an independent thing, but seeing God doing the same thing in us at the same time, it was it was it was jolting for me.

But I remember also, now I recognize it was this pressing that God had put on my spirit where he simply said to me, That this is the woman that I've called you to.

Your first ministry is to her, and as you are faithful to this, I'm gonna call you to do many great things in my name.

I didn't know what all that meant at the time.

I just was like, okay, step one, I guess we gotta get married.

Step two was beginning to figure out what it looks like to move forward.

And so I remember after leaving church, and both of us had this incredible experience, but but we have an entire life and lifestyle that had been built around living life on our terms, and so we had to begin to do the work of how do we how do we live for God when we've lived for ourselves for over two decades?

How do we how do we raise our children in the ways of God when our kids have seen us live in other ways?

Like we're just trying our best to navigate around what does it mean to live a life that that honors God and it was it was messy and it was challenging, but I can tell you that the first yes that I had to make was just saying yes to going to church.

Because up until that point, going to church was something that we did for special seasons and special circumstances, and I remember going home and going through the week and trying my best to figure out what my life was gonna be like that Saturday night, looking at her and saying, We're going to church tomorrow.

I don't know if we strung together two back-to-back Sundays ever, ever since I was a small child.

We're going to church tomorrow.

That's just that's just what we're gonna do.

And it was in that moment I knew like we're gonna prioritize the house of God.

That's just that's just what we do.

And so it started there.

And I would come to services, and the pastor would be speaking about Hebrew and Greek and mentioning people's names in the Bible that I had no clue of who they were, and I was confused, but but I kept showing up.

Then I remember about maybe four weeks into just showing up at church every single week.

The the pastor said to me, He's like, Hey man, I want you to come up and share your testimony.

I don't feel qualified to share my testimony.

I I still got the new car smell on me, bro.

Like, I'm still trying to figure this out.

Like, I'm four weeks in.

I cussed on the way here.

Like, bro, you don't want me on anyone's stage.

But I came from a context where there were no warnings, there was no emails letting you know, like, hey, we're scheduling.

You, you guys are so privileged with your planning center.

We got we got you scheduled, can you make it?

Can you not?

I was sitting in the service, the pastor was preaching, like, hey, Brother Keith, I want you to come up here and share your testimony.

I don't even know what the structure of a testimony is.

I'm still trying to figure it out.

And I remember as I was going up there and worship was going on, I said to him, like, hey man, I can't do it.

I got nothing to share, man.

I got I'm I'm still trying to figure this out because in my mind, perfection was a standard, but he looked at me and he said, God's not looking for perfection, he's just looking for obedience.

That's all.

I just I just need you to say yes.

I remember getting on the platform and stumbling through my words and trying my best, having witnessed testimonies my entire life of just trying to get to this point of this is how my life was.

There was a moment of surrender, this is how it is, and this is where I'm going.

And and somehow I managed to get through it.

Now, prior to me giving my life to Christ, like I was on platform and I was trying to become a music artist.

So I knew what it looked like to execute and do a good job.

That wasn't it.

I missed every mark.

I I stumbled, I stuttered, I lost my train of thought.

Like I was like, bro, like I'm terrible at this.

I'll never get on platform like that again.

And then at the end of service, this precious old mother of the church walked up to me with tears in her eyes, and she grabbed my hand and she had$5 in it.

They call it a Pentecostal handshake.

She put$5 in my hand.

They just I'm gonna sew into your ministry.

And she said, um, she said, You remind me of my son.

And if and if God can get a hold of you, then maybe he can get a hold of my son as well.

Would you pray for me?

I don't know how to pray for people.

I don't know if I don't know if I've ever prayed for my family.

Like I've done the like now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord.

I've done that.

God is good, God is great.

You give me a rhyme, I can definitely do it.

You want me to piece together thoughts that are rooted in theology, I can't do it.

But I looked at her in her eyes and I said, Yes.

And I stumbled through a prayer, and I mean, my prayer was so like, listen, y'all got the very educated academic version of me.

The hood version of me was like, man, the devil ain't like I was all.

Whatever I said, it had an impact on her soul.

I hope she's still walking with the Lord.

But I remember that moment of seeing her walk away with so much hope, and it was right then I recognized that it's not about perfection, it's not about performance, it's just about saying yes to the places that God invites you to step into.

And so from that point forward, it was just a series of yeses.

My my pastor said, Hey man, I want you to come and travel with me and be my armor bearer in our world.

It was like just being with the pastor, ultimately being like his his number two person.

I don't have any experience with that.

There's a lot of people that were longer than have been there longer than me, but but yes, I'll do it.

Can you can you can you take me here?

Yes, I'll do it.

I I didn't understand it, but I recognized then that God was giving me exposure to what it looked like to be a shepherd, and I had no idea that he was preparing me for such a time as this.

Just a series of yeses, just a series of moments where you're invited into it, and it's not this overwhelming feeling of like, yes, I am born for this.

It's just like there's a need, there's a there's a there's an availability, and I'm gonna step into it.

And I've watched God over and over again through the course of my life do something exponential with simply saying yes to a need.

It all brought me to Isaiah chapter number six, verse number eight, where where the children of Israel were away from God and and God wanted to spark a revival amongst the community.

And so it says this, I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Who shall I send?

And who will go for us?

And then I said, This is Isaiah, here I am, send me.

There needs to be a revival.

Here I am, send me.

Paul follows up with this very same thing when they're trying to give birth to the church and trying to spread the gospel beyond the Jewish context and helping people to come closer to God.

Paul says it this way in Romans 10, verse 14.

Romans 10:14

He says, How will they know, how will they call on him if they don't believe?

And how are they going to believe if they've never heard?

And how are they gonna hear if someone has never preached?

And how are they gonna preach if they're never sent?

Paul was giving us this beautiful breakdown of recognizing that there are people out there that are called to be in the family of God, but they're not hearing the gospel because people haven't said yes to their assignment to being an ambassador for the gospel.

So he's saying, I need you to say yes because there are people that are in your world that I can never get into.

But the life that you live and your surrender can be the gospel and it could be the Bible that leads someone to saying yes to Jesus in a way that can transform the world.

It's the power of saying yes.

It's not about a feeling, it's not about my expertise, it's simply me saying, Lord, here I am, send me.

Whatever the need is, I'm willing to step into it because God will use our yes.

He's not looking for perfection, he's looking for obedience.

I believe that God has invited all of us into spaces where he needs us to say yes.

I believe there are people that he's assigned us to serve that we just need to say yes to.

That brings us to our passage.

Because I think a lot of times when we read the word of God, and specifically in church contexts, when we break down a segment, a narrative, and we do our best to unpack it, that we forget the nuance that's connected to it.

These are people.

These are people that had to say yes, these are people that had to show up, these are people that had challenges, these are people who had families, these are people that had to be inconvenienced, but now we read about their stories, and it all started with a simple yes.

For Paul, he he was a man who was very dogmatic with his beliefs.

He was he was a Pharisee, raised believing in the the law, and he was very legalistic about it.

In fact, when Jesus and the movement began to take place, he was one that was responsible for having the Christians persecuted.

He was literally there when the first martyr outside of Christ took place named Stephen.

He got a letter that says, like, hey, we authorize you to go anywhere you find Christians and drag them off to jail.

Paul had a reputation, and Paul was good at his job.

So he was hunting down Christians, and then he has an encounter with Jesus, and his whole paradigm gets shifted, and now God says, I want you to use that same energy that you had opposing me and put it into the kingdom context now.

I want you to notice this.

Paul, I don't want you to do anything that you haven't already been doing.

I just need you to shift your direction.

Many times what God is asking us to do is not something beyond what we're already doing, he just wants us to do it on fertile ground.

Take what you already do, but just put it in the kingdom context.

So Paul begins his missionary journey, and when he begins this, he has a friend of his named Barnabas who basically is his co-signer.

Because when Paul began to be faithful to what God was calling him to do, none of the other Christians wanted to have anything to do with him.

They knew Paul's reputation.

There was no social media, but we knew he was a killer.

They're like, hey man, like I don't want nothing to do with Paul.

Like, this might be a part of some elaborant scheme.

We don't want him anywhere around us.

So Barnabas was like, no, no, I've I've seen the fruit of his life.

Like he really had an encounter with Jesus.

And so, based off of Barnabas' endorsement, Paul is now accepted into the fellowship with the brothers and he begins to do the work of the kingdom.

Paul goes on to write 13 of the books of the New Testament.

He we're able to have entire theology and scholar classes based off of Paul's writings.

And yet, in even these moments, Paul's not perfect.

Because the Bible tells us that him and Barnabas have this massive falling out.

A beautiful, messy argument.

Where on one of their missionary trips, one of the partners that were with them, John Mark, couldn't complete the trip.

So when they were ready to do another trip, and John Mark was like, I want to go, Paul's like, nah, man, you're not faithful.

You're not reliable.

I don't want to have anything to do with you.

And Barnabas is like, Yeah, man, he made a mistake, but this is what I mean, Jesus came to give grace, right?

Paul's like, no, I'm not giving anybody grace.

Isn't it interesting?

This is why I want you to see this.

The thing that I love about the Word of God is it doesn't rescue our leaders and our heroes from their flaws.

So Paul, who literally writes the book of Romans, which is rooted in grace, was not graceful to this man that it offended him.

That means that sometimes ministry is messy.

That means that sometimes things are complicated and complex.

Their argument got to be so intense, the Bible says they had to be separated.

Barnabas saying, like, no, he's still worthy in the kingdom.

Paul says, I don't want to have anything to do with him.

So these close friends now separate, but they stay on mission.

I want you to hear me.

A lot of times we approach church with a perfectionist mentality.

We approach church as if this is the ecosystem where humanity no longer exists.

But wherever there are people, there's conflict.

Wherever there's people, there's disagreement.

There's different personalities.

But the goal of maturity is can we coexist with our differences and stay on mission?

Paul was able to recognize that even though me and you aren't together anymore in this context, I'm gonna stay on mission and you're gonna stay on a mission because Jesus is worthy of it.

The Bible shows that Paul then picks up another partner, Silas, and now they begin their missional journey.

And while they're on this journey, the Bible says Paul's mindset was, we've planted some churches and we want to work towards Asia Minor.

He had an incredible strategy.

Paul was a, he was Jewish, he was also raised with the line of thought of Greek, but he was also a Roman citizen.

So when he says, I'm all things to all men, he was being very serious.

He literally was a brilliant person even in our current context.

His understanding of philosophy and religion and social context was something that we can still continue to study.

So Paul had mapped out an entire strategy of, hey, this is gonna be the most effective way for us to spread the gospel.

We're gonna work through this area, we're gonna revisit Galatia, then we're gonna go out to Asia Minor, and it's gonna allow us to have this incredible impact.

Paul had a strategy.

And as Paul launched with his team, the Bible says that he was prevented from executing his strategy by the spirit of Jesus.

I want you to catch that.

It wasn't that Paul's strategy had shifted because it wasn't well thought through.

It wasn't that his strategy shifted because the devil got in the way.

He literally says that the spirit of God stopped him from going the direction that he wanted to go.

He goes on a little bit further.

He said, Fine, if I can't go here, then I'll go here.

So he shifts direction just a little bit and it begins to go in a way that makes the most sense.

And the Bible goes on to say, and he was prevented from going there by the Holy Spirit.

So on two occasions, Paul has a strategy, he has this idea, he has a team.

He believes that he's doing the very thing that God has called him to do, and both times the door closed, and it was the Holy Spirit that was stopping him.

I'm talking about back then you didn't get a meeting with Jesus.

You didn't get a text message on saying, Hey, Paul, I appreciate your strategy, but we're gonna go this way instead of that way.

The way that you knew that God was shifting directions is literally when the wind of God, the same wind that breathed inside of Adam, the same wind that breathed inside of the army in the book of Ezekiel, the same wind that allowed humanity to be animated, was the very same wind that was blowing them in the opposite direction.

We call that in church term the grace had lifted.

What if the doors that are closing in your life are not the devil, but it's God shifting your direction?

What if the plan and the strategy that you put into place that you feel really good about is not the adversary, it's not the devil, but it's a divine readjustment for you to ultimately accomplish what God is calling you to do.

Paul had a vision, he had an idea, but the spirit had begun to shift him in a different direction.

Instead of us rushing to cast out devils, why don't we consult the Creator?

Because sometimes God will say, Go into all the world, but not that part of your world.

Go to this place, but not to that place.

And sometimes we have a hard time wrapping our minds around it that sometimes a closed door is not a divine punishment, but it's a prophetic breadcrumb that's meant to lead us to a place of destiny.

That we see that God is shifting Paul's direction.

And so Paul then has to reconcile and rationalize the reality of there's a place that I want to go, and I've been dealing with resistance, and so I'm just going to stand still.

And it's in this space of resting in God, it's in this space of reconciling that I don't know which direction to go that God gives him a vision.

I often wonder in our current context, if if God is, if if God is withholding something, if God is adjusting us, if we're able to discern and recognize it.

That maybe God is closing doors in one space because he's opening up opportunity in another space.

But if we ever get into that room, maybe it will be the thing that can be an actual wet blanket on our fire of our calling.

I've seen too often where we've used our skill to get into rooms that God never called us to be in.

Because the gifts will make room for you, but it doesn't mean that every room is meant for your gift.

And sometimes because of the way we live our lives, there may be moments where we're invited to do things and we can see that there's a resistance to it, but we force our way in there anyway, and then we're wondering why God's peace isn't there.

Maybe God closed the door to that job because he knew it would have corrupted your soul.

Maybe God caused that breakup because they knew it would have led you astray.

Maybe God didn't allow you to move because he knew that you'd be isolated and that you wouldn't have your community that you need to be connected to.

Sometimes God is shifting us in directions and we don't often know where he's leading us to, but this is where we say, But Lord, I trust you, Paul.

He stood still and said, Well, I don't know which way to go.

Every option that I had hasn't worked out.

So I'm just gonna stand still and be in the presence of God.

And it's in this place he had an updated vision.

And the Bible says that a man from Macedonia had visited him in a vision and told him, Paul, we we need your help.

Come over here and help us.

And Paul had a new assignment.

He quickly redirected himself and he went to Macedonia and now gave birth to what we now know as the Church of Philippi.

And he wrote to them in the book of Philippians.

I want to share a couple of thoughts with us on how one yes can change generations.

Because Paul said yes to the assignment of being an apostle.

He said yes to going out and planting churches.

He said yes when God shifted his direction, and now he was called to say yes in an environment that he didn't plan for, but God had called him to go to.

Are you with me?

Yes.

Great answer.

Okay.

Here's the first thing I want you to write down.

When we say yes, it disrupts the darkness.

It disrupts the darkness.

Paul gets to Philippi, he gets to this area that's in Macedonia.

And when he gets there, the Bible tells us that he arrives and he meets this lady named Lydia.

Lydia is a successful business owner.

There is no synagogues there, there is no known faith there.

But what we do recognize is that there was a couple of women who were there just believing for a move of God.

Paul gets there, he leads them to faith, and then he plants the first house church there.

His impact is quickly seen with him and the team.

And so now they're beginning to go off into the broader parts of the city to continue to evangelize and win people for the gospel cause.

But then they have this encounter with this lady.

Scripture defines her as being a slave girl.

And it says that she was possessed with a spirit of divination.

But when you break that Greek down, it actually is the spirit of Python.

It's a python spirit that literally wraps itself around a person's soul and it slowly suffocates them.

It gives you the illusion of breathing until you have no wind left, and then it releases you that this woman was under the grips of a demonic stronghold, and she was able to do fortune telling.

And so what she begins to do is she's walking behind Paul and she's saying, These men are servants of the most high God.

They're telling you the ways of salvation.

Day one.

Day two.

These men are servants of the most high God.

They preach the ways of salvation over and over and over again.

She does it, and Paul finds himself getting annoyed and agitated with it to the point that he turns around and says, Come out of her in the name of Jesus, and she was delivered from that demonic spirit.

Now, this is where I say pump the brakes.

Because to me, it seems like that's free advertisement.

We're here doing work.

We didn't have to pay for any marketing plan.

And then we have a local who's here who's telling the people what we're up to.

Like, why would Paul be so frustrated and flustered by this woman loudly saying that these men have been called by God?

On a surface, it seems like it shouldn't be a significant thing until you understand the cultural nuance there.

See, people knew that that they understood that that python spirit, it was a theme there.

They also understood that when she said servants of the most high God, that Zeus was often referred to as the most high.

So what was happening is the people that were there in the community who knew about her demonic strongholds, who knew about her dabbling in fortune telling and all these other things, they knew this.

So when they see her saying the words of Jesus, but behaving in the way of the world, it was causing confusion.

Because people were beginning to believe that I can say and do whatever I want and just say the name of Jesus and it's okay.

The lines began to get radically blurred.

It got very confusing on what it meant to be a disciple of Christ as Paul is approaching and confronting paganism and demonic activity.

And this woman who hasn't shown any fruit that she surrendered her life to Christ is saying the right things, but her behavior doesn't match it.

It was calling confusion in the body of Christ on what it meant to be a follower of Christ.

She was a fortune teller.

She was dabbling in universalism.

And if you put it in the current context, it's the idea that there's many ways to heaven, and I'm not here to bust anybody's bubble.

I don't want to defend anybody, but but Jesus says that there's only one way to heaven, and that's through him.

Jesus said that there's only one way to experience wholeness, and that's through him.

So so either Jesus is telling the truth or he's not.

If you are a follower of Christ, there's no room for anything else.

Because why would Jesus claim he's the only way?

So the confusion that was happening there was causing people to be concerned about you can you can still dabble in universalism and I can I can burn sage, I can do all these other universal things, and then still follow Christ.

And Paul said, no, it's causing confusion.

He wasn't trying to step on anyone's traditions, but he wanted to make sure there was a clear separation between what it meant to be a disciple of Christ and being a person who was confounded and stuck in the systems of the world.

Listen to me.

For the love of all that is holy Christians, please stop taking your belief in Jesus and entangling with your politics.

Stop taking your belief in Jesus and declaring that it's a part of your political structure.

I I can't stress this enough how many conversations I've had with people who've walked away from the faith, not because of anything that Jesus did, but when they're hearing you say, I serve Jesus, but I've made my entire identity around my politics that don't exhibit the fruit of Jesus, it makes people confused.

They're trying to rationalize how can you say that you love Jesus, but you're cosigning something that isn't even showing kindness or the fruit of the spirit.

And I want you to hear me before you clip this and put it on social media, neither side has it right.

The kingdom doesn't force you to compromise.

So when I see Christians get into this debate of, well, it's the lesser of two evils, in the kingdom there is no evil.

It doesn't require you to compromise.

Have your convictions, have your beliefs, believe Jesus out of it.

Because what it does for believers who don't understand and they're looking at the fruit of your life and they're looking at the fruit of your lips, but they're looking at the things you attach yourself to, it causes confusion.

And so Paul says, Come out of her in the name of Jesus.

Come out of that confusion so that way you can clearly see people the way that God tells you to see them and not the way your politician does.

Because sadly we have Christianity that has lost its empathy.

I literally watched a podcast where someone said, You know what's wrong with Christians?

They're too empathetic.

What are we talking about?

We love too much.

How do we get here?

How do we get to a place where it's popular to be mean and vindictive and spread vitriol, and we also can say, God bless the Lord.

The Bible says that that life and death come from the power of the tongue, and we have a responsibility of making sure that who we are and what we follow doesn't get conflated.

Listen to me, keep your bumper stickers, keep your shirts, but just be very mindful of making a political ideology your entire identity because it causes confusion to people who don't understand the rationale behind how you can cosign this when it's inconsistent with God's word.

Let me move on before everybody leaves.

Okay, here's when Paul confronted this situation, he was attacking a system of oppression and control.

He was making sure that those who were exploited was set free.

This woman who was oppressed by this demonic stronghold was then set free.

Whenever you say yes, you're going to be confronting some darkness.

You're bringing light to areas that may bring some people uncomfortability, but it's always going to bring a place of breakthrough.

Here's a second thing that I want to share with us really quick: that when we say yes, it opens prison's doors.

It opens prison's doors.

Paul and Silas, as a result of them stepping into this, this hotly contentious environment, what happens is they end up getting arrested because now they couldn't monetize the dysfunction of this young lady, and so the system collapsed on them and they find themselves in jail.

And so the Bible says that while they were in jail, they were beaten, they were put inside of the jail, and the intention was to keep them there and to continue to make a mockery of them and ultimately lead them to a place where either they deny Christ or pay restitution to the men that benefited from her oppression.

So the Bible tells us that in this place of back still swollen from being beaten, from all the discomfort that they've experienced, that the scripture says that at midnight, at the darkest moment, when there's a transition of day but not a transition of season, the Bible says that they began to worship the Lord.

It says that they sang hymns unto the God.

And then the Bible says that the other prisoners were listening to them.

Other people who were bound had begun to listen to them.

And as a result of the worship and the surrender of their life, the entire foundation had gotten shaken to the point that everyone was set free.

You'd be amazed at when you show up and that when you worship, and that when you lift your hands, and that when you declare the goodness of God, that it can shake the foundation for somebody else and set somebody else free.

The Bible tells us the power of our praise.

It gives us the power of our surrender, the power of our yes in worship.

The Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians chapter 20, when the army of Judah was surrounded by the adversary, that God didn't send out the best fighters.

He didn't send out the best warriors, but what he did was send out the best worshipers.

And when they began to declare the name of the Lord in the midst of their most heated battles, that literally the foundation had shaken and they had gotten success over their enemies.

I'm telling you now that there is power in our surrender and our ability to worship.

That when we can declare God's goodness, that it will open up prison doors, it will set the captives free, it will change the atmosphere of wherever you are.

When you can worship in your home in midnight, in the darkest hour, when it hasn't changed yet, when you haven't got the phone call yet, when you haven't got the job offer yet, but you can worship God in that space.

There's a freedom that allows you to begin and walk in the things of God.

There's a joy that begins to come up from the very pits of your soul.

They were able to worship in such a way that it brought freedom to the entire community.

It's inside of this space that when you recognize that I'm free to worship, that it opens up prison doors and it allows all of the others to be set free.

Here's my my third and final point that when we say yes, it demonstrates the gospel to everyone.

It demonstrates the gospel to all.

And I think this is the most beautiful, uncomfortable, challenging, complex aspect of all of this.

Because when the prison doors are opened and there's like a massive prison break, the jailer, they had a system back then where it simply said, hey, if anyone escapes on your watch, kill yourself.

Because you've dishonored your family, you've dishonored your position, and if you don't kill yourself, we'll kill your entire family.

So the jailer, when he sees that everyone is escaping, he's like, Man, I'm done for.

He gets out a sword and he's prepared to stab himself.

And Paul says, Don't do it.

Paul's aware of the culture, don't do it.

We're all right here.

Put the sword down.

And that act from Paul literally allowed this man to recognize, like, bro, you had a chance to escape.

But you stayed here to make sure that me, the man who's responsible for putting you in chains, the one who's responsible for for keeping you oppressed, you you stayed and you checked for me.

Let's let's be real, man.

Like, I don't know if I could have done it.

And I mean, and I love God, I love people.

But like, if you cut me off and then I see you down the road with a flat tire, I'm like, beep beep, I'm favoring fair.

I guess you should have had run flats.

Like, I don't, I don't know.

I don't know if I have it in me to be able to turn around and be kind to the very people that were oppressing you.

But it was when Paul said yes to that, it led that man to saying, There must be a God because you have no reason to be kind to me.

There, there must be a God because you you're literally putting your life on the line to help me.

Man, what do I need to do to have that kind of confidence?

What do I need to do to have that kind of peace?

What do I need to do to have that kind of joy?

Paul says, Man, let me tell you about Jesus.

In fact, man, I would love to tell your whole family about him.

Bro, come on.

Come on.

I want you to come and talk to my whole family.

And and and while you're talking to them, man, can you get him something to eat?

And bro, I'm so sorry about these wounds on your back.

Let me let me help to let me help to serve you, man.

We're so sorry for that.

But but his life was transformed because Paul said, Yes.

I often find myself thinking about this passage, and I and I think through the lens of like, man, when when Paul had the vision of the Macedonian man, who did he see?

Did he have a vision of Lydia?

Who was just this woman who had no belief context, but something inside of her allowed her to know that there was a better life?

Was it Lydia that he saw?

Or maybe it was the maybe it was the girl who was oppressed by this python demonic spirit and and was being oppressed and trafficked to different areas and being monetized and and and somehow maybe her crying out to God that God said, Hey, I'm gonna send someone to help you.

Maybe it was the jailer.

Lord, like I'm I'm just stuck in this place where I'm oppressing people, I'm trapped in this system.

The Bible never makes it clear who Paul's assignment was, but what we do see is that because Paul said yes to the assignment, the entire area got changed.

It's amazing what can happen when one person simply says yes.

I believe that all of us have a yes on the inside of us.

When I moved to Jacksonville almost 20 years ago, and I started attending what I guess we would define as a mega church, thousands and thousands and thousands of people.

I remember thinking to myself, am I calling all the years that I put in under my pastor, preaching and traveling with him?

Now I'm in an environment where, man, they seem like they got it covered.

They got plenty of people.

They're good.

So I'm at this mega church and I'm literally sitting in the back row.

Shout out to my people in the back.

And for three years, I'm sitting, coming to church, going home with my family, and listening to messages about, man, we all have a part to play.

And I'm like, yeah, that's cool for them.

That's that's good.

And but they have everything they need.

Until one day, God made it unavoidable that the Lord has need of me.

And you know what I did?

I just started serving as an usher.

And then usher led to leading a prayer meeting.

And then that led to me being in outreach.

And then outreach led me to serving in youth.

That led me to being the groups pastor, coming on staff.

That led me to being the next gen pastor over everything from zero to thirty.

That led me to going to DC being coming an executive pastor.

That led me to being a senior pastor.

And it all started with saying yes.

Yes.

Yes.

But every yes was an upgrade.

Yes?

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

It wasn't about what it meant for me.

It wasn't about career advancement.

It was just about thank God for your glory.

I believe that there's a yes for all of us.

And what I can tell you is that yes can be outside of the doors of this church, absolutely, but that yes can also be inside of our church.

So we're going to conclude our service today in the same way that we started it.

With us commissioning you guys to go out and identify what is the area that God has called you to say yes in.

Outside, we have just our serving expo with the different teams we have, and you'll see on the screen the teams we have, the needs we have, the gaps that we have.

You can scan the QR code and get a digital essence of what it is that God is leading us to do, where we are, where we're going.

But there's also a handout that you can go and get.

But what I want you to do is just simply say, God, what are you leading me to say yes to?

I I I can say yes to, I can say yes to showing up early once or twice a month.

I can I can say yes to going in and serving in kids a couple of times a month.

I can I can say I can say yes to that because we're all hands church and and someone said yes, that allowed me to experience Jesus.

And so, yes, I can say yes to that.

I can say yes to to being on the setup team.

I can I can say yes to being a part of like God's giving me this gift anyway.

Like, man, I I there's always an opportunity, and there's never such an abundance that there's no room for you.

So, quite frankly, yes, your yes matters.

And so we want to create space for you to go out and explore and be sensitive and obedient to the thing that God is telling you to say yes to.

So let me get you to stand on your feet.

We went a little longer today, but it's okay.

I want to pray for us in just a moment and ask that God stir our hearts into what our next yes is.

Maybe for you, your next yes is simply say yes to Jesus.

And if that's what you want to do, man, we would love to celebrate that with you.

We would love to connect with you outside in the courtyard and pray with you, give you some resources.

Um, maybe your yes is to join one of our teams, whatever that looks like for you.

Let's just be sensitive, let's be obedient.

And to make matters even better, we got Kelly's ice cream for y'all.

But you can't get any until you say, Yeah, I'm kidding.

It's free for everybody.

But the Lord is watching.

Let me pray first.

God, we thank you so much for your faithfulness.

We thank you for today being a day that we've witnessed a series of yeses.

There was a moment when when Amy simply said yes to being a follower of you, yes to serving, yes to uh to being in leading groups, yes to these varying roles that has led her to the space that you've called her to say yes to.

Lindsay said yes to going to youth group and working her yeses all the way up to the point where you've called her for such a time as this.

We thank you for Vinny's yes.

These moments of saying, yes, I'll leave, yes, I'll move, yes, I'll serve, yes, I'll do it, and how we've seen lives impacted through it.

God, we thank you for every yes that is a part of our church's history, our present, and our future.

And I pray for our future yeses so that we can continue to grow.

Your word reminds us that the harvest is plentiful, but it's the workers that are few.

There's not a deficit in people that need to hear the gospel.

There's not a deficit in opportunities for us to preach the gospel.

But my prayer has always been God, don't send us more than we can care for.

But God is calling us to reach more, which means we need more hands.

So, Father, I just pray and commission this incredible church that as we go out and find our yes, that it activates gifts.

It'll sometimes be uncomfortable, it may be challenging, we may have personality things, but we're committed to you and we're going to move this church forward.

So may the church, may the Lord bless you and keep you.

May He make his face to shine upon you and give you everlasting supernatural peace.

In Jesus' name, God bless you guys.

We love you, and I can't wait to see you outside.

Thank you for joining us to learn more about Celebration Orlando, a church devoted to reaching the lost, equipping the found, and helping the hurting.

Follow us on social media using the handle at celebrationorl or visit our website, celebrationorl.org.