Dealing with Your Past

God does what only God can do.

He literally takes that which is dead and resurrects it and brings it to light.

Is there any dead thing in your life that you think can't live?

One of the visions and the dreams that you thought have died.

I'm here to tell you God can bring those suckers back to life.

One of the relationships that have been killed and you think, man,

I will be single and lonely forever.

No, you won't if you allow God in.

Welcome to the City Light Church podcast.

Thanks for joining us today as we look into God's word and discover the hope and truth that he has for us.

If you want to connect with City Light Church, feel free to visit us at citylightnyc.com.

That's citylightnyc.com.

Pastor Boyan Jansik and his team believe that the power of the Holy Spirit is already working in our hearts and minds.

As you listen to today's teaching, remember that you are deeply loved by God.

That you are surrounded by His grace and that He has a real hope and a future for you.

So again, welcome to City Light Church.

My name is Muhammad Worry.

One of the pastors here.

God is really up to something.

The reason I said earlier that at City Light, we're not taking off for the summer.

We find that a lot of churches across the country, they go into auto-pilot during the summer months,

because people travel, it tends to get lean in churches, but we just refuse to abide by that.

Every day we want to believe and grow and get closer to Him and be used by Him and get a better glimpse

of who God is. Amen.

So if I'm in relationship with God in the same way that I don't take a break from my wife,

because I'm in relationship with her, I'm in covenant with her, I'm not taking a break from Jesus.

Amen.

All right, some people are, oh.

God is good. I'm excited.

We had an amazing time in the first service.

Pray that a Lord continue to move as He was.

Amen. But without any further ado, I'm just going to hop right into the word of God.

We're going to start in Genesis 11, we're going to read from 27 to 32.

This is the genealogy of terror.

Terror be got Abraham, Nahor, and Haran.

Haran be got lot.

And Haran died before his father, Tara, in his native land in Er of the Chaldeans.

Then Abraham and Nahor took wives.

The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife,

Milka, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milka, and the father of Iska.

But Sarai was barren. She had no child.

And Tara took his son, Abram, and his grandson, the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law,

Sarai, his son, Abram's wife, and they went out from there from Er of the Chaldeans to go to

the land of Canaan. How many people know that's the promised land?

And they came to Haran and dwelt there.

So the days of Tara were 205 years, and Tara died in Haran.

So one of the most overlooked stories in the Bible involves the father of faith.

People know that Abraham is the father of faith. We even sing songs about him.

Father Abraham, and many sons.

Hey, so we're not going to do that today, stop.

But people don't really know a lot about Tara, and I find it super interesting because

Tara, if you look at the scriptures, there's this

notation where it looks like God was pushing him, because specifically it says that

Tara wanted to go to Canaan. We know that God wanted to use this man's family ultimately

to build up the children of Israel to be his own people. But can you believe that God was going

to use Tara in order to do it? Because Tara was the patriarch of their family.

But the thing is, Abram's father, Tara, experienced the painful loss

that ended up preventing him from reaching his intended destination.

The Bible says that his son Haran died. That was his youngest son. This is lots of daddy.

And I just find it so interesting and it's very quick and you'll miss it if you don't pay attention

to the scriptures. Because what we look at, we tend to read line, line, line, but understand that

these were actual people who lived, amen? So what you look at is line, line, line was years and

years of life lived out. So he has this intention to go to the promised land. He's living in a land

full of idolatry and pagans. He's probably a pagan himself. But yet he has this inclination,

I need to get out of this place and I need to go there, the land of milk and honey.

And he endeavors to bring his entire family up out of that place. And he goes and it's so funny

that he gets to a place that has the same name and there's no insignificant detail in the Bible.

So he's traveling to Canaan. His end goal is the place that we know of in the scriptures as

the promised land. He's venturing like every one of us to get to the promises of God.

And then he stops at the name of his trauma. He stops in the place that is named after his

dead son. And the Bible says that he eventually died in that place and he never makes it to Canaan.

Do you see the significance already?

Although this family moved from their native land toward the land of milk and honey Canaan,

Tara never made it. Perhaps when he and his family reached the city that just so happened to have

the same name as his dead son, he couldn't go any further. Tara had to do what many of us have

failed to do which is passed through Iran in order to get where God was calling him.

Meaning we have to face the pain of our past to be healed before we can go on to that thing called

next. Today I feel like the Lord is leading us to a place where we have to discuss and deal with the past.

All right, you can unclench your butt cheeks. Because the minute you bring up the past and having to

deal, but why, Pastor Moe? I'm here. It's the present. Well, there are a lot of things in your past

that affect your present and in some cases hold you from reaching your future.

Because I believe that once they're Tara, I suspect he was triggered by some of the pains.

What was it that stopped him from continuing his journey onto Canaan? What made him stop in

Iran? Because again, there are no insignificant details in the scripture.

Haran was a mountain of sorts and here's the thing. We live in a culture today

with buzzwords of trauma and victimhood, things that happen in the past that hold people from

moving on to their future. Like Tara, many of us are shaped by negative experiences and never

overcome them to discover the destiny that God is calling us to. Too often we stop short refusing

to believe that we can catch our breath and enjoy an abundant life. We succumb to fears and false

perceptions. The enemy defeats us with the lies that bogus down causing us to lose energy and

hope. We get stuck in the doldrums. It's that dead zone from which you can't seem to emerge and

get back on track. I wish that sometimes life came with those big warning signs that they put

on the beach. So it's like, you know, rip tides. Be careful. I wish life had the big ocean level

beach-sive signs that says, life comes with hurts. Keep moving. Because in essence,

what really happens to folks is they experience something and they let that something keep them

in that one spot. Believe it or not, you have interacted with a bunch of zombies on a daily basis.

People that seem to be alive, but they are actually dead. Because although you see them at the

Starbucks and they're buying things and they're trudging around on their Monday mornings,

really they're dead and they're at the place of trauma. They're at the place of impact. They're at

that place of past pain. And you know it when you interact with them because they're not quite

able to live because of what they've experienced. Again, I told you, we live in an age of victimhood

for whatever weird, and I say a weird reason everybody's fighting for the victim chair.

It's like even within families, and one, two, three, go!

Got here first? Because you know my dad left me, and that's why I'm not as successful as I

want to be. And then it's like you get one member of the family's like, kicking the person out

of the chair. No, no, no, no, I want to get in the victim chair because, you know,

well, wait, you already said dad left us, so I can't use that one. So what it is is, you know,

I was raped. And they bring up these horrendous and powerful, and now here's the thing too,

these are powerful experiences, and I don't want you to think that I am minimizing the hurts

and the pains of yesterday. Amen? But I do find that we hold on more to those things

than we actually do the opportunity to get free of them. So many people today

are wrapping their entire existence around something that happened 20 years ago,

and it's stopping you from going forward into your destiny. Did you know that something from

yesterday year can show up and poison your future? You ever talked to somebody?

And you think things are going well, and then you hit a roadblock with them because there's

clearly something in their life that they never got over. You don't have to say, Amen, I know they're

sitting with you. But there is this thing called past pain, and I'm not again, my subtle

invitation to you today is to allow God to bring healing to what you thought was impossible.

It's not going to be a lot of amends today.

We let the past at times define the future and we never move on.

We think we're doing the right thing, but often we're simply doing whatever alleviates pain in some

way. People walk around actively living a life of pain avoidance. But did you know that

you can't heal what you don't reveal? I'll say it again and not just because that was bars

in Iran, but because there's significant truth to it, if you don't reveal the things that can,

and the reason why I say that is because we live in an age of repression.

You went through these things. It actually happened to you. Stop lying to yourself and saying that

it happened to you, whatever that thing may be, whether it be the abuse, whether it be that pain,

whether it be the heartache. Some people get left in relationships end and they refuse to move on

because they can't believe it happened to them, and they lie to themselves and say, no,

it was the other person. It wasn't me. I don't know what happened. No, no, it happened to you.

They left you. You got that divorce. That rape happened. That trauma happened. That abuse.

It actually happened. But the breakthrough and the healing will never come if you don't actually

acknowledge that it happened. And I know this is not a sexy run around and jump because if I

said everybody today is going to get a thousand dollars. You didn't know that. I'm going to get a thousand

dollars danced. It's not that word today, but it is equally as powerful and way more valuable.

If you would actually give space and allow God in to heal the broken parts of yesterday,

here's the thing that I want everyone in here who calls on the name of Christ. If you are a

Christ young, a little Christ, your new image and identity is not in your past failure,

you're not in your past mistake, not in your past trauma. Your new identity is wrapped up in the

victory that is Jesus Christ the Messiah. That's who you really are, not your pain, not your past,

not even the false image that you think of who you are now.

Sometimes people look at me and go, past them all, you're seeing a lot of these things and you

have this confidence and it's probably because of your rugged good looks. It was a fun.

But I tell people all the time, I'm not this confident because of my style and good looks.

I understand it's the burden that I carry. Pray for me.

I'm this confident because the only one person who could ever completely reject me and judge me

has accepted me thoroughly. He says that I am his forever, that I am loved and accepted, well-beloved.

Once you have that, you are free to stop worrying about what other people are thinking, even what

you think about yourself. Because let's be clear, I wake up on some days and I'm like, I don't know,

bro. And God is like, come on, you know what I said. All right, I'm blessed, I'm good looking,

I'm favored, all in you. Listen, sometimes you got to wake up and start the day, not

not declaring what you feel, because some days, I don't know about you, but the Mondays.

I don't know, I don't wake up and say what I feel, I wake up and say what God said.

I am blessed and highly favored, I'm blessed coming in and I'm blessed going out,

I'm blessed in the city, I'm blessed in the field. My children called me blessed.

My wife declares that I am a heartbreaker.

Was it, was the camera?

She's home right now. Her and the kids, they are actively boxing and prepping our entire life

so that we can move to a new place this Wednesday.

But my image, my thought about myself, I'm not getting that

from surface level things in my life. Validation is not coming from these things,

validation is coming from the freedom that only he can provide.

So the invitation today is to get you to actually acknowledge the things that have happened to you

and not just acknowledge them, but actually be willing to ask him to heal those things.

What sense would it make to have a healer on your side? He heals people just by being in their

presence and you wouldn't ask him to take a look at something.

Listen, we know somebody who is a millionaire because of Bitcoin. If you ever had any interest in

Bitcoin, it would be stupid not to go to your friend and go, hey, teach me.

I got embarrassed. Could you stand up, brother?

I'm going to embarrass you further. Could you show me at least one gun?

One gun. Can you show me too? Could you show me, okay, okay.

Now I'm going to share a crazy and wild secret with you. Stand up, stand up, stand up!

So, Cory and I go to the same gym.

It doesn't speak much for his gym. I know. No, no, no, no, no, don't say that.

But there is a difference in how we have utilized the same tools.

Thank you, sir.

Cory went to the gym. Cory learned everything that there was to all of the different machines.

And then he sought help. He found experienced people who knew even more than him so much so

that now he is a trainer of millions. He is a celebrity trainer as we put it in some circles.

You know how like your social media you got like 800 people and you're like,

why people know me? No, he's got millions. But he knows things so often I will call him up

because I know that he knows. Hey, what should I be taking about this? I don't know if you've

noticed, but I'm heading in the right direction, church.

See, some people like the gas, they're like, oh, you know, it's still a little fluffy, but pray.

But understand this, I used to be close to 400 pounds.

When I got married to my wife, when she gave me a hug, her hands didn't touch.

They do now, though. But there was someone in my circle

that had a greater knowledge than me that could help me come into breakthrough.

You have access to the God of heaven that knows all things and has a heart and a desire to bless you.

Why are you continuing to let your trauma and your pain from yesterday define you instead of

going to the God who can set you free and asking him to bring deliverance and freedom?

Does anybody actually want to be free?

Because there are certain things that happen in life that you should not want

nor stomach if you have the ability to not do it.

Hallelujah.

When we reach a debilitating place and the thoughts and the hurts of yesterday,

it's as the land of Heron was for terror. And one of the things we need is openness and honesty.

We need to put ourselves in a place where we can rely on others and invite in the

breakthrough, invite in the healing.

I think every one of us at some point can think to different situations of pain

that you've gone through. And here's the thing.

It doesn't have to be as severe and traumatic as an instance like rape.

I don't care if you were in the second grade and they called you buckethead for three years.

At some point, that took an effect on you.

I don't know what it was that you got to the seventh grade and you just believed that man,

I'm buckethead, my head big and I'm so ugly I got to cover it with a bucket, please God.

I'm going to be single forever because you know all buckethead, please God.

Or how about this? You grew up in a family of alcoholics so you feel like your only option is to

be an alcoholic. You are not what you experienced. You are not even where you come from.

Out of the mouth of babes.

You're not those things. And here's the thing. For the strong person, I go, well that's not me at all.

I don't got none of them. The patch hurts you. Nobody touched me because if they did,

I go, all right. But the one thing that I know that every one of us share, even if we don't

share the particular traumas is we all make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes are so devastating

that we can't get past them. Has anybody ever been divorced? Can I just remind you that your life

is not over? Can I give you hope that God has more in store for you despite, come and listen.

All these different things that we encounter, the pains, the heartbreaks, the mistakes, the sin,

it's not over just because you experience that thing.

Prasmussah!

Listen, we have to make sure, don't worry, she'll be paid after.

We have to make sure that we're not letting the baggage of yesterday continue to hinder us,

but here's the thing too, you also are in danger of polluting your current relationships.

Your baggage from yesterday will make it so that you ruin your future, or your present and your

future with other people. Listen, how many of you have ever been on family trips before?

It doesn't even have to be family trips. You haven't been on a girl's trip, you haven't been

on a guy's trip. There's always the one friend. Everybody packs a simple carry-on, roll it through

a little, put it in the overhead, sit down, have a good time, wear my peanuts.

But there's always that one person. We only go for three days, everybody only got the one carry-on,

they got two suitcases full, they got the huge duffel bag, and now this portion, you give them

the duffel bag, and they're fighting to get this thing inside, and you're just sitting,

drinking a little diet coat. So now you've got to check your two huge bags,

fight the lady to get this thing on the inside, because it probably should have been checked too.

And now we all get off the plane, because we're ready to go, Jetset, hey, let's go!

And we got to wait for you. You notice I have to remain laughing because they're the one?

Well, I don't think the pastor needs to be talking about me like that. Well, maybe you need to stop

being that way. So now the whole everybody, the whole retina of people, we now have to wait

as this carousel waiting for your bags. God forbid, I've never lost my luggage, but I've been with

people who have, and it's not like you can just abandon them in international waters and go figure

it out, meet me where we're going, bro! It's not the Christian thing to do, although your mind tells

you it is the appropriate thing to do. But when they are there and they've lost their luggage,

and now we got to figure that out before we make our connection and go where we're going,

they have now affected you, or for this story, that's you affecting them, praise God.

Your baggage can affect other people. Did you know, again, and I say this so many times because I

pray that you get it, God made you to be a key that opens the prison cell to somebody else's door.

But the problem is, when you don't allow God to bring you to that place of healing and

wholeness, you cause more people to be locked up than you caused them to be free.

I love Aze, Oive. No, listen, I get it. It's not going to be a lot of A-Mids. I'll take

an Oive. I think it out, as well. I've been in that point with my speech and I'm like,

you need a back off. It's like, sir, I'm not talking to you. Yes, you are.

The same is true for us. The more baggage we carry with us, the more it slows us down and our

relationships are affected. When we can't handle our own issues and constantly force everyone

else to deal with them too. Our wounds get transferred to the people close to us and unless they

are vigilant, vigilant, excuse me, and correctly know how to handle us, the pain becomes contagious

and it compounds into heartache. We make decisions that aren't good for us and it creates

defense systems that ensure that we're never hurt in the same way again. We become controlling

and rigid, suspicious, and skeptical of others motives. Our insecurities accumulate from an

ocean wave into a tsunami of paranoia, fear, and distrust. And it's crazy because the tragic

result of unresolved pain is not only the effect it has on the horizontal, but it even effects

our vertical. He's a funny part about terrorist story. He stops at his pain and you never hear

of him again. You never hear about him in conjunction with the promises of God. You never hear

about him period. We don't want that to be our life. I want them singing goofy songs about me

because Father Abraham, amen, he's up, amen, he's up, amen. All right. As you can tell, VBS is fresh,

fresh. But I don't want my story to end. Not with God. I want a rich, vibrant relationship with him

that goes and spans all the generations of my life, that all of my children's children will be

connected to him. And I want to give you something. This is going to be fun because this is not just

let me tell you what's wrong with you. It's not that type of message. God calls us and tells us

that we have to let go of the traumas of yesterday, right? But he gives us the solution on how to

get there. The only problem is the solution that he gave us to get there is one that actually

annoys you. It's people. I knew it was coming. I knew it. People, I've been trying to get away from

people all day, past them all. I'm well aware. I saw you time it just so perfectly.

One, two, three. All right. Second song. Let's get it. Right there. Oh, Mauricio almost got me.

You know the deacons. They smile hard, man. They full of the holy ghosts. So when you come in,

you got to like, you know, our deacons, they are filled with love and they will come for you.

Like if you're into this isolationist thing where you just want to come and not see anybody and

not be provoked and not be loved on and have people inquire about you, you are in the wrong place.

Literally from the door, like I remember one time, I watched this happen in real time.

I invited somebody to church and I didn't play the whole thing where I was going to wait at the door,

like, listen, I told you what time to be here. Get here. And I look back and I watch them get

confronted by our volunteers. And when I say confronted, it was in the most loving way possible,

but they brought them in and they made them feel loved from the jump so much so that they

testified to me later like, yo, I feel like I can make friends here. That's one of the most

powerful things you can say about a church. And I hear people say that about city light all the time.

But the thing is, some people don't realize that people are the breakthrough.

Because when you think about, well, how do I get free of my past hurts from yesterday? Your

mind doesn't often think I need more people in my life. Because what you're really thinking is,

I need less people to hurt me less so that I can be free to seek after God.

I am saying what you have thought. You need more people. You need more people that are filled with

the Holy Ghost. Notice I didn't say you need more perfect people because they don't exist.

Because if in some way you actually found a perfect church, you messed it up the minute you walked in.

Maybe you'll get that for the third surface.

God actually intended people to be a source of life, a community of support and fellowship,

taking care of one another, bringing healing and freedom. I want to show you something in the

scriptures. John 1143. Now, worship team, get ready. We're going to wrap up soon.

Now, when he had said these things, he cried with a loud voice.

Lazarus!

Come forth. I always loved the little distinctions that the scripture makes because Jesus

understanding what was at stake made sure that he had to yell Lazarus's name or it would be full

on zombie apocalypse on the earth. Because he's standing in front of a cemetery with a bunch of

dead people and he can't just say come forth because there's life on the inside of him,

this power of life and death and the power of the tongue and those that love it shall eat the

fruit thereof. And he knows if he says, come forth, the whole place breaks out. So yes,

the specimen, oh, not over you. Sit down. Okay. Lazarus, come forth. All right.

And he who had died came out bound hand and foot with grave clothes and his face was wrapped with

a cloth. Jesus said to them, loosen him and let him go. So think about this brilliant picture.

God does what God does. God does what only God can do. He literally takes that which is dead

and resurrects it and brings it to life. That is a whole separate message that a priest,

is there any dead thing in your life that you think can't live?

One of the visions and the dreams that you thought have died. I'm here to tell you God can bring

those suckers back to life. One of the relationships that have been killed and broken and hurt and

you think, man, I will be single and lonely forever. No, you won't if you allow God in.

You know, there's a very interesting Bible trivia fact. Nobody ever died in the presence of Jesus.

The thieves on the cross were crucified. It's the most excruciating death

humans have ever created. It's actually where we get the term excruciating from the crucifixion.

Even those two couldn't die until Jesus left the building. He showed up to funerals and the

dead person couldn't stay dead. If there's anything dead in your life, he can.

All right. Don't get me too excited. Don't get to the point. Don't get me too excited.

Yes, God does what God does. But take notice of what he said. Lazarus comes out. Lazarus is

literally wrapped up in burial clothes. He looked like a mummy. There were pieces of strips of

linen that had different ointments just to subside some of the stench and things of that nature and

is a grave napkin that was tied around his head. So the actual picture of what it looked like is

he said Lazarus come forth and Lazarus was like, oh wait, no, no, I got to make it right.

But it's crazy, crazy, crazy because it points the picture to what I'm talking about today. Jesus

doesn't, excuse me, brother. You want to take all that anointing today? That's you. No, no, no,

you want to take it. I said you want to take it. Jesus doesn't come and go, okay, let's take off

the first strip. Let's take off the second strip. Jesus doesn't do that. Jesus does what God can

only do and he raises him to life. But then he gives the job to the church. He raises him to life

and then he says, lose him and let him go. You do it. The church, you do it.

Be the sandpaper. You ever notice you have a whole sandpaper in your hand? I know,

not everybody's a home depot type of guy. I get it. But it's that rough course thing. One thing

that I've learned about being in ministry is that people are funny. You've learned it too by being

a person dealing with other people. People are like sandpaper. They're so rough and grating and

annoying. But there's something about that type of roughness that when it gets on you, you end

up being smooth. And you don't realize it because you never think of yourself as anything but

perfect, but you're rough too. And your roughness brings out the smoothness and other people.

And God knowing this raises this man to life and then he calls him and says, church,

set him free. I've brought him the life but now the job of discipleship, the job of accountability,

the job of community, that's yours. You take off the grave clothes. I gotta go get lunch.

The freedom that you're looking for, the freedom that you need God to give you. I guarantee

here's the thing. I want you to ask God into your life so that he can take and first off reveal

to you the hurts from yesterday, right? And ask him, Lord, heal these hurts from yesterday that

you've revealed to my heart. Regardless of how severe or minuscule they are, ask him in and say,

God, reveal these things to me. And now that you reveal these things to me and how they're impacting

me and not allowing me to go forward, I want you to heal it. But here's the funny part. I guarantee

part of that healing and that solution will be people. This is why we want everybody to connect.

This is why we want people to have a place where they can find healing and love and safety and

support. Don't shun the people factor because God will bring amazing revelation, freedom and peace

to you through other people. I'm always fascinated by Paul shout out to his friend

on a on a cipherus when he described, he described this man as a breath of fresh air.

Let me read this to you. This is 2 Timothy 116. It says, may the Lord bless ones cipherus

and all his family because he visited me and encouraged me often. His visits revived me like a

breath of fresh air and he was never ashamed of my being in jail. My challenge to you is to

let the Lord in but then my challenge is also to allow him to use you in such a way that you become

the key to their prison door. That you be that breath of fresh air. That you not shun the

uncomfortability of dealing with imperfect people because as you keep endeavoring to do this thing

called community, the more you keep rubbing shoulders with people, it's actually going to reveal

the parts that are broken and hurt. Help me Luke. So I'm talking about rubbing shoulders, right?

This is why God brings accountability. This is why he wants community because it brings out the

things that we don't think we need because fellowship is this. We're brothers, we're singing, and we're

rubbing shoulders. But here's the thing, when we rub shoulders, often this is what it looks like.

Ah, man, you rub too hard, bro. Stop. Now, that looks like a very inordinate reaction

to a simple brushing of shoulders because what if I'm wounded underneath my clothes and he doesn't know?

So sometimes we're wounded and we don't even realize it but it gets exposed because we rub

shoulders and then, ah, and now if he's a true friend, if he's a true lover of Christ who's looking

for not just his benefit, but my benefit, he's going to be like, what do you got going on

under there, bro? Because that was a little bit too, like you screaming at me now. That was a bit

too much of a reaction for something really little that we could have forgave and moved past and

went into got some chicken. So let me know. And that's the thing, and thank you, bro. That's the

thing about accountability. Like it exposes the hurts. It exposes the parts where, now these are

the things that make you get real honest and brutal with God. So God, I had some interactions this

week and they seem to look like a lot of the interactions that I've had in the past in my life

where for some reason, when I get close to people, I kind of turn into a rageaholic

and I don't really treat people the right way. So I'm just wondering, is there something

that this is connected to in my past that maybe you want to highlight to me? Because I came to be,

I seem to kind of keep pushing people away and I know that you've called me to community and

life. So you got anything? That's the type of honesty that you need to come to God with.

Why am I such a jerk? Why is it that after every interaction people keep doing this?

What does that face mean, Jesus? Is something wrong with them?

Okay, okay, you don't have to answer. I know you brought the person with you.

Just look down. No, don't look down. Don't look down. Look at me.

I gained a new level of appreciation for that type of friendship because it exposed me to the

things that I wouldn't honestly admit about myself. Yo, getting married was dope and not just because

you get a license to have sex. You hit that clap, that's a newly married person in the back. Yeah,

it was dope. All right, slow down. But the more powerful part about marriage,

I have somebody to call me out on the BS. I have somebody that wakes up with me every day and

sees me and knows me when I'm in a funk and in an attitude for no reason going, you good?

Well, because you're being a jerk. Oh, okay. See, real friends will tell you the truth about

yourself and go, hey, you seem to be overreacting to things that are very minimal and not deserving

of this reaction. Maybe we need to take a look at that. Let's have a talk. Let's pray together.

Let's fast together. Let's get some freedom on this thing. That's what God is calling you to.

Oh, hallelujah.

If you want to find freedom from the wounds of the past, the first place to begin is by identifying

the issues, the hurts, the past bagages that are weighing you down, invite him into heal these

areas and don't be surprised when he uses people to do it. Don't limit yourself in how you see

yourself. Don't see yourself according to the things that you've been through and experienced.

See yourself according to what God says about you, amen?

It is never easy to be honest about your mistakes, your secrets, your flaws, or your sinful behaviors,

but in order to receive God's grace, peace, and joy, you have to let go of your fear, your shame,

and anger. In the Bible, we know how King David knew he had disobeyed God, but couldn't come the

terms with the fact that he had committed adultery with Bathsheba and had her husband, Uriah killed

to cover up the sin. Only after the prophet Nathan rebuked him, did the king confess before God

and repent of his sins. Now, one of the things that you're going to have to do, I'm going to read

you a scripture, but then I'm going to give you a disclaimer that goes with that and we're going

to close for the day. James 516 says this, confess your trespasses to one another and pray for one

another that you may be healed. The effective fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

We confess our sins not only to God, but also to each other. This system provides spiritual support

as we pray for each other and help each other, which facilitates healing. Notice the big picture here.

We go to God for forgiveness, but we come to the church for healing.

But this is the disclaimer. This is ain't for everybody.

What do I mean? When it says confess your sins to everybody, these are to the mature

individuals in which you can fight and trust. Don't just be walking up to my first time,

guess, talking about, yeah, remember, I can kill these three people before in Bronx, you know what I'm saying?

No, the people that you can fight in as a leadership, the people that you can fight in to

call actual friends, you confess to those people that the people who do life with you.

Don't just be calling up random people talking about, yeah, you know, I use to smack my wife in

everything, but we good now. She punched me back, so I learned.

We welcome you to enter community, but to be wise, to let the Lord use the people of God to

bring healing to your life. Be open and honest and allow him in, amen? I'm going to read you this

last Psalm, and then the sweet Psalmist is going to play us some some some some sweet summary.

In Psalm 51, David expresses the cries of his heart after recognizing the depth of his

transgression. As we read through this passage, think about the one issue or the one person or the

one wound or the struggle that comes to mind. Make David's words the prayer of your heart as you

seek forgiveness, as you seek to accept more of the grace of God, as you seek to receive a fresh

start in the freedom that God is giving you, amen? Have mercy upon me, everybody close your eyes

and rock with me. Have mercy upon me, oh God, according to your loving kindness. According to

the multitude of your tender mercies, blood out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my

iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions and my sin is always before me.

Against you, you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight that you may be found just

when you speak and blameless when you judge. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin,

my mother conceived me. Behold, you desire truth in the inward parts and in the hidden part,

you will make me to know wisdom, purge me with his own and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be

wider than snow. Make me hear joy and gladness that the bones that you have broken may rejoice.

Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, oh God,

and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence and do not take

your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me by your generous

spirit that I will teach transgressions your ways and sinners will be converted to you.

Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, oh God, the God of my salvation and my tongue shall sing

aloud of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips and my mouth shall show forth your praise.

As we sing this song, reflect on God and let him show you the areas that need healing.

Be blessed, church. Again, we're not taking off for this summer. We're going higher and deeper into

God and part of that includes getting free. This is the City Light Church podcast. If you've missed

any part of today's message or if you would like to find out more about Pastor Boyan Jansik in City

Light Church, visit us at citylightnyc.com that's citylightnyc.com. Feel free to visit us online or in

person anytime. We would love to connect with you. We pray that you have been encouraged today,

that you have been reminded how much God loves you and that you are surrounded by grace.

Thank you for listening. Make sure that you subscribe to City Light Church podcast wherever you find

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