Sermon
A Year of Hopes Fulfilled
Publisher transcript
Transcript
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Over the last, I would say, I'm looking at my notes here, over the last 10 years,
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I asked the Lord to give me a word for the year to really declare something,
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to give you something to release your faith with and on,
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to get something in the atmosphere that will really change us from the inside out.
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And we started the church in 2011, and it was right around 2015 that I got,
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it was a deposited on the inside of me to begin to seek the Lord for a word
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to declare each and every year.
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And normally around November, I'll start praying about it. And sometimes the
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Lord gives it to me right away. As soon as I start praying, this is what I want you to declare.
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And then sometimes it's like right up in New Year's Eve, you know,
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I get up here and I just got what the Lord has said. But I want to recap some
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of the things the Lord spoke to us back in 2015.
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He said this would be a year of greater, a year of greater.
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In 2016, I heard the Lord say a year of health and wealth, a year of health and wealth.
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And we had a lot of testimonies in 16 of people receiving health and receiving
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unexpected income that year.
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A year, 2017, I heard the Lord say, declare this would be a year of joy and strength.
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A year of joy and strength.
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2018, I heard the Lord say this would be a year of manifestation.
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And the verse was, my work will manifest. Whatever you are working on will manifest this year.
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2019, the Lord said this will be a year of light, that there will be revelation
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and light and insight and ideas and concepts that we hadn't seen before.
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In 2020, now you guys know what happened in 2020.
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In 2020, the Lord said this will be a year of creative miracles.
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And we didn't know what was going
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to happen, but there were some creative miracles that took place in 2020.
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In 2021, the Lord spoke to me and said, declare this would be a year that perseverance
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creates possibilities.
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Perseverance creates possibilities. And so we had to persevere in that year.
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In 2020, the Lord said, this will be the year that you go forward.
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And that word for Stacey and I personally, I won't get into it.
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We had a lot of stuff happen and we thought, I thought this is the year to go forward.
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And the Lord said, this is the
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year to go forward. This stuff is happening and you need to go forward.
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And so we heard in our hearts, go forward.
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2023, we heard the Lord say, this would be a year of the visible display of his divine favor.
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We would be a visible display of his divine favor.
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2024, I heard the Lord share this with me, and I got this one just preaching.
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It came out of my heart, and the Lord said, that's it. How many of you know
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what the word was for 2024? Shout it out.
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Yeah, that's it. Pray more in 24. That's what the Lord said to me.
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And I have a word to deliver to you tonight for 2025 that I believe that will encourage you.
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The Lord's been talking to me about four different types of people,
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four different types of situations.
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Number one, he's been talking to me about the hopeless.
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The hopeless, someone feeling hopeless. The second person the Lord began to
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talk to me about is someone feeling insignificant.
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Third person is they're feeling invisible.
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And the fourth one was they're feeling forgotten. And as the Lord been talking
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to me about these four types of people in my conversations, if you dig deep enough,
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and if people are honest with themselves,
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they will begin to admit that in some area of their life or another,
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they feel hopeless, they feel insignificant, they feel invisible,
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and they feel forgotten.
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You know, you can have a lot of money in the bank, live in a 4,000 square foot
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home, drive nice cars, and discouragement could be sitting right there at your dinner table.
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You could have all the health that you need, doctor's report is clean, and feel forgotten.
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You can have every need met and feel like there's no hope,
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you could be in the best situation of your life and feel invisible as if nobody even sees you.
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And if you and I are honest with ourselves, I'll be honest with you,
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depending on the day, I could feel like all four in one day or one in one day
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and another in the next day.
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Because I think when we live in this earth and experience what we experience,
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I think we have to realize that life is hard.
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Life is not easy. I don't know how people live life without the Lord.
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I have no idea how they can be married without the Lord.
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I have no idea how you can go to work and go outside or just go to the grocery store without the Lord.
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I don't know how they can do it.
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And we have the Lord and it's still challenging to live this life.
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Don't shut me down when I'm preaching good.
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It's still difficult and hard, and we still have emotions, which are God-given,
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by the way, and we feel a certain way.
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Now, your feelings may not be real, but they are real to you because you feel a certain way.
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And someone that feels hopeless is someone that feels like you are stuck in
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a dark tunnel and the light at the end of the tunnel is gone.
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If you're feeling hopeless, you feel like no matter what you do, things will not change.
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When you're feeling hopeless, you feel like your dreams and your aspirations, they seem out of reach.
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Don't raise your hands, but who am I talking to?
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You feel like your energy is disappearing every moment you get.
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You have lost your hope. If you're feeling insignificant, you feel like just
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one tiny drop of water in a huge ocean.
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You feel like your presence, actions, or thoughts don't matter in the grand scheme of things.
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You feel like the voice in your head keeps telling you that you're small,
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that you're unimportant, and you will not make a difference.
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If you're feeling invisible, you feel like you're yelling in a crowd and nobody is even responding.
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You feel like no one notices you, even when you're surrounded by people.
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You feel like no one sees what you're going through.
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Like your pain or efforts, they don't even matter.
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When you're feeling invisible, you feel like if you stopped existing, no one would even care.
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And that's what feeling invisible feels like. Or you feel forgotten.
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You feel like God doesn't remember you. You feel like God doesn't remember what he said to you.
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You feel like people don't value you.
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When you're feeling forgotten, you feel like whatever you do won't matter at all.
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And a lot of people, Christians, saints, et cetera, included,
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feel this way and are committing suicide,
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leaving a community.
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This is why it's important to be a part of a community because when you're isolated
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and alone, the enemy will begin to talk to you.
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And it's just like the lion. I
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enjoy reading about lions. The lion is not looking for the toughest prey.
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The lion's not looking for the prey running in the herd.
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The lion's looking for the one that feels isolated, that feels insignificant,
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invisible, forgotten, hopeless, that's a straggler, that's hanging back,
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that's not being a part of the community, that's the one the lion is going after.
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And if you are feeling this way, I want you to know that you are under a demonic attack.
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Listen to me now. This is not normal for believers to feel this way.
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There is a demonic attack happening, and the enemy is trying to separate you
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so that eventually he can devour you.
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And the Lord told me, he said, I want you to talk to these four different types
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of people in this year because my people are feeling this way.
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And in some instances, you could probably convince someone else that you're
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feeling that way and that is a justified way to feel.
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In some instances, you could say, I'm 52 years old, and I always wanted to be
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married, and I never got married, and I'm feeling like, you know,
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God's forgotten about me.
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And somebody would say, girl, I know what you're talking about,
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or homeboy, I know what you're talking about. God has forgotten about you.
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Yeah, he forgot about you.
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There's no reason why you should exist. I don't think I should exist anymore either.
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And then that person separated from God, from life, et cetera.
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And I know that might have been a example that was far-fetched, but it's happening.
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People are getting separated because they're feeling forgotten,
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insignificant, hopeless, and invisible.
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Romans chapter 15, verse 13. Take a look at this. Romans chapter 15, verse 13.
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The apostle Paul said here under the unction of the Holy Spirit,
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now may the God of hope, say the God of hope.
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God of hope. Say it again. the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in
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believing that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
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Come on, somebody say amen to that.
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Let's read it together. Come on, ready? Read.
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Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you
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You may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
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Now, the word God is a name, but God is also a function.
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God's function is source or creator.
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God is the source or the creator. His name literally means creator,
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Elohim, creator, source.
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So he is the source of hope.
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What is hope? Hope is an expectation.
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Of something good going to happen to you rooted in the promises of God.
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And so now may the God of hope, the God of expectation, the God who gives you expectation.
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The God who has promises that have been given to you and all you have to do
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is maintain your faith in believing him.
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When you believe his word and you believe his promises, you are going to be
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filled with joy and peace.
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If you are lacking joy and peace, you are not believing God any longer.
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I got to get you to see this because even in my life, when I am sad,
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I'm rarely sad, but there are days that I do get down, right?
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I have flesh and I get down and thoughts come and emotions happen and I get down.
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I have to remember I have some way somehow stopped believing his word because
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joy and peace have been sucked up right off out of my life because I stopped believing.
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But this verse tells us that if we will continue to believe,
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the God, the source, the creator of hope, of expectation, of something good
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is going to fill us with what money cannot buy, joy and peace.
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But we have to keep believing. So the onus is on you to continue to believe
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whatever God has said to you in his word or rhema, whatever he has spoken to you.
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You got to continue to believe it because then you'll be filled with joy and peace.
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If we take a look at Romans chapter four, you got Abraham and you got Sarah.
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They're believing to have a baby. They're 99 and 100 years old at this point,
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believing to have a baby. It's impossible, man would say that,
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impossible to have a baby at that age.
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They're believing, and Scripture says that Abraham grew in faith.
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He got stronger in faith. Why is that?
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Because he kept believing what God said, and he did not look at the external conditions.
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He did not focus on what he can see, touch, taste, smell, and hear.
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He only focused on what God said.
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So expectation is going to fill you with joy and expectations are going to fill you with peace.
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Now, Romans 15, 13, put it back on the screen if you don't mind. Romans 15, 13.
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Now may the God, the source, the creator of expectation, he's going to fill
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you with joy and peace in believing.
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Notice it's not going to be if you don't believe. This verse
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doesn't work if you don't believe you're going to have to believe whatever he
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has said to you now watch this that you may abound somebody say abound say it
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again abound say it one more time abound that you may abound in what hope.
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God wants us to abound in hope. What does that mean?
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We are to abound in expectation that God is going to do what he said he's going to do.
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We're to abound in that. That word abound means that we're to have more and
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more hope, that we are to overflow in hope, that we are to bubble over in hope,
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that we are to have an abundance of hope.
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What does that mean? I'm supposed to be overflowing, expecting God to do things
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that he said he's going to do in my life.
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I'm supposed to be thinking about, God, you said you're going to do that,
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and I'm expecting today is my day.
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Today's my day that this is going to come to pass in my life.
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I don't care what the bank account says.
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I don't care what the doctor says. I don't care what your children are saying.
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I don't care what Pookie and Ray Ray is talking about. I'm going to believe
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God, and God said it, and that's my expectation.
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And I'm increasing, I'm overflowing, I'm bubbling over, and I'm abounding in
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this expectation that today is my day.
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Say that. Today is my day. Today is my day.
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This is the expectation that we're supposed to carry each and every day of our
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life because hope is confident expectation of something good happening rooted
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in the promises of God. Thank you.
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I feel like when I talk to people, myself included, okay?
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I am not excluding myself. I feel like when I talk to people,
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myself included, I feel like people have put their hope down,
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and now we're just existing.
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We used to be excited about something. We used to be thrilled about something.
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We used to get full of joy about thinking about something.
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We used to get excited and celebrate and rejoice just hearing about it,
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just the anticipation that it might happen, just the thought that it could happen.
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We would get really excited about it.
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But I feel like when I talk to people, we've kind of put that expectation,
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that hope of something good, and we've placed it right here.
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And now we're over here just existing. Well, today's Monday. What do I do on Monday?
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Well, Monday, I brush my teeth, brush my face. I go eat, come home,
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sit down. Okay, what day? Is it Tuesday?
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Okay, Tuesday, I got a meeting. I do this, and I go sit. Is it Wednesday?
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I just can't wait to Friday.
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Wednesday, Friday. I just can't wait to Friday. Wednesday, I got this. I got this.
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Thursday, okay, Thursday, I got this. Oh, I just hate my job, and I just hate living.
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There's got to be something more to life. And we've put our hope and our expectation aside.
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And we've said, whatever happens, happens.
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And I want you to realize that although you may have put it aside,
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the truth of the matter is,
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in your heart, you've never stopped thinking about it.
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We lost something one time, something of value, and I believe we lost it in
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our home. It's valuable.
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We checked everywhere. Checked the kitchen, checked the living room,
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checked the upstairs, downstairs, couch, drawers, cabinets, closets,
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dresses, drains in the sink.
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I mean, we checked. It's in the house somewhere we checked. That item has been lost for a long time.
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I finally got to the place where, you know what, I need to move on from it. But guess what?
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I'm always still looking for it.
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I mean, subconsciously, I'll go to an area that I haven't checked.
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Oh, there might be an app.
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Oh, that wasn't in there, but I did find $20. Hallelujah. You know,
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or whatever, you know, or an old receipt or something, a stick of gum or something.
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Or Pooh found something the other end.
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She said, yeah, look what I found. And I thought that might be what we've been
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looking for Oh no, it was her little toy that she had lost And she was looking for, right?
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I've never put it down.
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Although I don't talk about it, although I've moved on from it,
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I'm still in my heart looking for it.
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What I believe the Lord is asking us to do in 2025 is to pick our hope back up.
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I believe he's asked us to grab a hold of what you feel like is impossible now.
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Get it back in your hand, put it back in your heart, and believe me for it to
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happen this year. I believe God is asking you to grab a hold of something you've
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forgotten about 12 years ago.
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Get that back on the forefront of your thinking. Get that expectation back.
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Get excited about it and believe that this is the year that it's going to come to pass.
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I'm telling you, I believe the Lord is telling us to get it back.
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Pick it up. Some of you are going to have to find out where it went.
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Some of you are going to have to go back and spend some time meditating.
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Saying, what do I want to do? What am I excited about?
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But grab it, get it back, put it back at the forefront of your thinking,
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get excited about it, get some joy with it, get some peace, and expect it to
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happen this year. Come on, somebody say amen to that.
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It's time to grab ahold of our hope. What have you put down?
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What have you forgotten about? Because the reason why you're feeling hopeless, insignificant,
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and invisible, and stuck, and
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forgotten, is because whatever you were excited about, you put it down.
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You put it down, and you're no longer thrilled about life anymore.
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I thought this would happen.
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I thought that would happen. Look at this verse in Proverbs chapter 10,
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verse 24. Proverbs chapter 10, verse 24.
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Watch this. It says, the fears of the wicked will be fulfilled.
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Huh. The fears of the wicked will be fulfilled. The hopes of the godly will be granted.
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Glory be to God. Are you catching what I'm saying here?
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This year, the hopes of the godly, that's you and I. will be granted.
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This is the year that your hopes will be granted.
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And this is what the Lord said to me. Put it on the screen, guys,
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the image that I sent you that the Lord said to me about this year.
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And I'll talk a little bit more about it.
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This is the year of hopes fulfilled. Hallelujah.
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Hopes. Now, Stacey and I were talking about it. She's like, well,
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do you want to say hope fulfilled?
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And we were trying to look at, does that sound right? I said,
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I heard in my heart, hopes.
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That's plural. That's not just one hope.
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That's a lot of hopes. So I looked it up. Is hopes a word? Well,
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hopes is a word because, just look it up yourself. You'll find out it's a word.
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Hopes,
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fulfilled. 2025, a year of hopes fulfilled.
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Pick your hope back up. Get your
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hope dust it off. You buried it in the closets in the attic somewhere.
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You hid it. Some of you then buried it outside. Get your shovel.
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Dig it back up. Get your hope back to the forefront of your thinking.
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Put it on your table. Get a verse behind it and say Lord, pastor said this is
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the year of hopes fulfilled.
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And so I I'm getting my hope back up.
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I have always hoped to start this business, and I'm getting it back on the table. I'm not too old.
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It don't matter how much money I got I don't have.
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This is what I've always wanted, and this is the year that I'm going to start that business.
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I've always wanted to get married. I prophesied those of you who want to get
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married, you're going to be engaged this year.
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Hallelujah. I'm telling you those of you that want some things That God has
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placed in your heart I'm not talking about selfish desires.
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I'm talking about things God placed in your heart. I'm talking about things
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God told you in your secret place.
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Things in his word, things that he communicated to you.
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These things is what we need to get back to the forefront.
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I'll preach on this later, but I saw something on social media that really bothered me.
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A pastor that I know, he put on there, and it said, God, he said,
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God will not disappoint you is a lie.
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And it really bothered me. And everybody was like, hey, man,
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brother, you're right. God will disappoint you.
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And they were all going on a thing and I've been disappointed and God,
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no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You had your hope in something else.
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I don't serve a God who is in the business of disappointing folks. He's a faithful God.
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He's a consistent God. He's loyal and reliable. He's not in the business of disappointing people.
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Your hope was in something else. You had your hope in Pookie and Ray Ray and
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they abandoned you. Put your hope back in the Lord.
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And let the Lord fulfill what he said he would do in your life.
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Come on, somebody say amen to that.
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Give the Lord a shout of praise. Hallelujah.
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Glory to God. Say this out to me. This is my year of hope fulfilled.
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Everything I've forgotten about.
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Everything I've buried. Everything I gave up on.
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I'm bringing it back. Putting it in the face of God.
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Telling him this is my year of hope fulfilled.
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Do you believe that? Hallelujah. Thank you.
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Music.