The Reaction Principle: How Your Responses Shape Your Life - Brandon Sims

Welcome to the Southwest Apostolic Church podcast.

This podcast is brought to you by the Southwest Apostolic Church,

located at 3161 South Rowena Street in Indianapolis, Indiana, 46241.

The podcast will feature preaching

from our pastor and from other ministers, so we hope you enjoy it.

Without further ado, let's get right into it. God bless.

Where the spirit of the Lord is, there's liberty. Hallelujah.

There's freedom, freedom to dance, to sing, freedom to shout.

Hallelujah. I'm free, praise the Lord, I'm free. No longer bound,

no more chains holding me.

My soul is resting and it's such a blessing.

Praise the Lord, hallelujah, I'm free. Hallelujah, Jesus. Can we clap our hands again unto the Lord?

Hallelujah, Jesus. Praise you, mighty God. Praise you, mighty God.

Oh, yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. Oh, yes, Lord.

Jesus' mighty name.

Jesus. Hallelujah. I'm thankful for freedom today.

Hallelujah. That's a concept that's here in America. And I don't like to talk

about the, what might be or the, what could be, but right now we're free and,

and we can, we're free to worship. We're free to live for Jehovah.

We're free to declare that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Hallelujah. He is God manifest in the flesh, justified by the Spirit,

seen of angels, preached on the Gentiles.

Can't do that in other countries. People fear their lives when they bring up

Jesus Christ, but I'm thankful I can bring them up right now and I could speak his name.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. I feel good in the Lord, even though it's cold outside,

it could be real nice and hot in here.

And so definitely thankful for the opportunity. We love and appreciate Brother

and Sister Young, Pastor and Sister Young, and we appreciate this church very much.

And we always, I know we say this quite a bit, but when we are here, we like to mention it.

When we were church homeless, y'all stepped in, and we'll never forget that.

We'll always testify about it.

We'll always tell others about it. And I know it's not about that with this

church, but I'm very thankful for this church. and we consider you guys family. Hallelujah.

If you have your Bibles, I'd like to direct your attention to the book of Jeremiah chapter 18.

Jeremiah 18 · chapter mention

Thankful some of our home folks came out. Good to see y'all.

Sister Hurley, Sister Becky. Thankful for my grandmother being down here with us.

Thankful for my beautiful wife. She's like, hey, I'm over here too.

I didn't say anything because you're part of me. We're one.

When you've seen me, you've seen... No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.

I don't have that, I'm not that great, but hallelujah.

Jeremiah chapter 18 and beginning in verse three, when you have it, say, praise the Lord.

Jeremiah 18 · chapter mention

And then I went down to the potter's house and behold, he wrought a work on

the wheels and the vessel that he made was clay, of clay was marred in the hand of the potter.

So we made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, O house of Israel,

cannot I do with you as this potter, saith the Lord.

Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.

And you don't have to turn there, but I quote from Proverbs 4 and 23,

keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.

You can set your Bibles down and let us go ahead and pray that the Lord would

have his way in the remainder of this service. Lord Jesus, we just thank you here tonight.

We pray by the authority of your word and by the power that is in your name,

that your presence, O God, would move in this house in a special way, O God, as only you can.

Pray that you would anoint our ears to hear and our actions to do.

Anoint my lips of clay and tongue to speak. With thus saith the Lord,

we pray a spirit of revelation and understanding in the house today.

In Jesus' mighty name, we thank you today.

In Jesus' name, hallelujah. If you could clap your hands unto the Lord.

Hallelujah, Jesus. Glory be your holy name. In Jesus' mighty name.

Hallelujah, mighty God.

Hallelujah, mighty God.

Jesus' mighty name. Hallelujah. You could be seated in the presence of the Lord.

I want to talk a little bit tonight about the reaction principle.

The reaction principle.

What you do in response to pressure, pain, or opportunity doesn't just reveal

who you are, but it determines what follows because every reaction sets another chain in motion.

Nothing in your life is random.

Nothing you're dealing with is accidental.

Nothing you're fighting is mysterious to God. God knows all things.

Your life is not just happening to you, but your life is responding from you.

And so there's some very powerful revelation in what I'm getting ready to display to you tonight.

But most people think God randomly blesses and that he randomly withholds,

but God did not design life to be random.

He designed it to respond.

And so response is very, very, very important. It's important to God.

It's also important to people.

And I can give you an analogy. If you were on the phone with somebody and you

were telling them a story and you were trying to share your most deepest thoughts

and maybe your most severe wounds,

and you would say, you know, you would say something like, what do you think of that?

And they would say, man, that's awesome. What's awesome?

Well, you know what you just said. I just told you I'm hurting.

I'm in pain. I'm wounded. You're not listening.

And so sometimes we wait on a response.

A baby, a lot of times, will, even when it falls or something happens to a small child,

the first thing they do is they look to see who's responding,

and so if, depending on how you respond, will determine whether they scream

or just kind of sit there, because maybe they're not hurt,

maybe you didn't completely phase them, but if you if you show a strong reaction,

they're going to react to that.

So reaction can take multiple facets. It can appear in different forms.

But the reaction I'm talking about here tonight is about the change that needs to happen in our lives.

And I often tell our home folks, this is that if nothing changes, nothing changes.

But the moment that something changes, everything starts reacting differently.

Everything starts to change.

So this isn't a hype message tonight. I didn't come necessarily with a—I did

come with revival in mind. I always try to come with revival in mind.

But I'm wanting to declare understanding.

I'm wanting to declare it because when we can understand, we can actually change.

We can change the atmosphere around us. And so sometimes we try to pray for

the situation to dissolve. We try to pray for God to deal with our atmosphere.

And that's just not what God does. He won't do that. But what he does is he deals with us.

And then when we change, our atmosphere around us changes.

When we start thinking differently, things will start to develop and happen in our lives.

But because of our thinking, we're in prison, we're held back.

And sometimes we take on what I would call the prison of procrastination because

it's just not happening. So let's forget about it. Let's forget about it.

But we can't just forget about it. What we got to do is we have to allow for

God to start to apply some different pressures in life that come in all different forms.

So the potter didn't change and the wheel didn't change and the pressure didn't

change, but the outcome changed. Why?

Because the condition of the clay determined the results.

God is revealing something that is eternal.

He reacts to what he is given to work with.

And so whatever we give to him to work with, that is what he works with.

So God is consistent and results are not necessarily conditional,

but God didn't wake up one day and decide to be merciful.

He didn't suddenly become patient. He didn't adjust his character, but he's constant.

He is the potter. We are the clay. The wheel that he works with is constant.

The pressure he applies is constant, but is what changes is the yielding of the clay.

Sometimes when we're on the wheel, we want to get off, but it's not time to

get off. it's time to stay on because we need the potter to do his handiwork.

We need the potter to start to mold and to shape and to cut things off.

So anytime you feel pressure in your life or pain in your life,

it's because he's got you on the potter's wheel, unless you're living in sin.

If you are living for God and you're striving and you're advancing and you're

pushing forward, you're digging in his word and you're praying and you're walking

the journey of life, this faith, journey of faith.

It takes many winding roads. You come into the house of God.

You're faithful. You're consistent.

And somehow there's still pain somewhere. There's virtue somewhere that's going to happen.

There's virtue that you're going to get out of it somewhere in life, some way, somehow.

So we have to continue to yield this.

God isn't just trying to crush us, but he's trying to shape us.

He's shaping us because we're soft on his wheel.

When our heart gets hard against the things that happen in life,

that's when our molding and our shaping and the beauty, it kind of stops.

He can't do nothing with a hard heart. But when we yield it over to him,

we say, God, take out the stony heart of flesh. Give me a heart of flesh,

one that can feel soft in me, Lord.

Let me be pliable in your hands. Then he starts to work as only he can.

He, after all, created us from the beginning.

He created us from the dust of the ground, pulled us up, started to formulate

the structure, and then he breathed the breath of life into us.

So he is our inventor. He invented us. He created us, and he can help us,

and he can change us, and he can mold us, but he gives us a free will.

And so our free will sometimes gets in the way of this process,

and then we end up in nowhere land. We end up somewhere other than where God is calling us to.

We end up going to Tarshish instead, which Tarshish was not a real place.

So we end up going nowhere in life.

So no matter how great your business grows, no matter how...

Faithful you are in something out there, no matter how famous a person becomes,

no matter how great a person becomes,

they're heading nowhere if it's not where God spoke to them to go.

So obedience is a huge factor as well.

So he declares unto us to keep our heart with all diligence.

The heart, somebody say the heart is the core issue.

Everything flows from the heart. Your responses flow from your heart.

And by the way, it's not just the thing that pumps blood, it's referring to the brain.

But without this heart pumping blood, this brain wouldn't work.

So these two are connected.

So when we say heart, it's not that this physical heart that's pumping blood

is thinking, but this is helping to pump oxygenated blood to the brain to think.

So the heart and the brain, it's one in one, it flows together.

But this is where our responses flow from. This is where our reaction flows

from. This is where our decisions come from.

This is where our direction comes from. And God doesn't just change outcomes first.

He addresses conditions.

And so how many know conditions are important?

I can't do hardscape construction necessarily in freezing, cold, snowy weather.

And you definitely don't want to plant bushes in that type of weather.

So the condition is not good. It's hard.

Sometimes that's what our life looks like. God's trying to plant some things,

but if it's winter in our heart, he can't.

And not that he can't. I can never say God can't. He just, it just doesn't work.

God has a will and God has a way.

So this reaction principle, every choice will create a chain,

every choice that we make in our lives.

I'm reminded in Galatians 6 and 7 that whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

You don't reap randomly.

When you sow in prayer, you will reap in peace.

Those that sow in tears will reap in joy. Those that sow in gossip will reap in conflict.

Those that sow in generosity will reap in blessing.

Those that sow in compromise will reap confusion.

So somewhere along the lines, there is something we're reacting to.

There's something that we're responding to. There's something that's happening

in our lives because it's mirroring our heart and our mind.

It's mirroring the darkness that we're involved with. So if you have these issues

of conflict and confusion, there is a seed somewhere that was sown that's causing that.

I believe everything in life, every problem, every situation,

we can live without problems that will just pull you down.

Sometimes we have issues in our body. Why? Because of what we maybe how we've

took care of this vessel, this temple.

Maybe some of the things we've ingested, some of the things we've done.

It's not God's fault, and it's not everybody else's fault.

It's not the devil's fault. Sometimes it's our fault.

And how do we change these things around? How do we make it to where we can live a happy,

peaceable life that's not full of conflict and fears and confusion,

but full of peace and blessings and loving kindness and tender mercies and joy? How?

It's by changing some things around.

Changing us, changing some of our decisions that we make.

Sometimes we make decisions based off of temporary emotions.

We make decisions because we say, I think it's the right thing to do.

I think, I think I need to help this person. But sometimes that person is not,

the person is just being a weight in your life and God never put that on your life.

You put that on, God said he would never put on me more than I can bear.

You're, you're right. He won't put things on you that you can't handle.

Well, and even if you're walking through this life and you're trying to handle something.

God is the one that lifts you up and he'll carry you through.

And even if we get ourselves in bad situations, we can pray.

And there are times that God will see us through, even though we got ourselves

there to begin with, because of our doubts and our fears and our frustrations and doing it my way.

But then when we start to do it his way, he expects for us to follow his way,

because his ways are not our ways.

His thoughts are not our thoughts, but they're higher.

And so when we understand that we get a hold of that, then we're properly able

to follow him and we'll follow peace with all men.

There will be peace, not only in the valley, but there'll be peace down here on earth.

He gives us the Holy Ghost, not so we could just be always down or looking down.

We gotta look up because our redemption draws nigh.

We have to have a stature and a, I guess, a, what's the word I'm looking for?

Somebody help me out, huh? Demeanor's a good one, but my stance, my position.

We can't have a defeated position and stance. We gotta have a victorious one.

We can't walk around like, oh, we're Christian and this is so hard,

but this is the cross I bear.

No, you're supposed to bear a cross, but he paid the ultimate penalty.

He paid death for us and so that we don't have to live in the mully grubs,

but we can live victorious.

We could say, I am somebody in Jesus.

And there's greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world.

And I am loved and I am wanted and I'm accepted in his kingdom.

And God's gonna do something great in my life. And I'm not gonna go down.

I'm not gonna be in the mully grubs. I'm not gonna be depressed.

I'm gonna get up and if I have to be the one to be the spark, I'm gonna do it.

Even if it hurts this physical body, I'm going to get up and I'm going to march.

I'm going to get up and I'm going to say, hey, let's go. Let's do this until I die.

Life isn't punishing you. It's responding to you.

You know, we often say things, well, I don't want to say often,

we often, I mean, I've said this. Yeah.

The Lord is not sending anybody to hell. People are already going there.

I was going there. I was going there before he came and visited me on my bedside.

I was on my way to hell. I was walking the path of unrighteousness and I was living in sin.

I was going in that path like a zombie and I was being pulled and I was so infatuated by what I seen.

And I said, oh, I got to do it this way because this is how everybody else in

the world's doing it until Jesus shined a light in my life and got my attention.

And I said, oh, that's just smoke screens.

Oh, that's just a facade. That's not real. I don't have to, oh my word,

that's what's behind the wall.

That's what's at the end of this path that I'm following.

Let me get on the other path. And he said, okay, follow me. And so as the preaching's

going on, this transition is happening in the mind, in the heart,

and then the physical movement begins as I have faith.

Because faith without works is dead.

So if I say, yeah, I believe, that's not good enough. I have to physically show

that I believe. Because when I am physical with it, it means I'm sincere.

If I know that I got the job, I'm not just going to say I got the job.

I'm going to go to the job the next day. because I got it.

So that happened. And I came to an altar and then at an altar,

he started to show the vision of life and life more abundantly.

And then that gravitational pool shifted. And then my heart was fixed and I sung praises unto God.

And I was drawn in that direction because he said, if I be lifted up, I will draw all men not.

I look at this like a big giant magnet and everybody's just chasing.

Attached and attracted to it. If I be lifted up, he said, I will draw all men.

Now I lift him up tonight.

The name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous run into,

he comes in like a flood. We know the Lord will raise up a standard.

We know that he is my shield.

I will lift up my head to the hills from what's come with my help, my help from the Lord.

All these verses of scripture has to do with us lifting up our heads to the

one that can draw us in to life and life more abundantly.

He said in James 4, 8, draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you.

Sometimes we say, oh, I'm waiting on God. God's waiting on you.

We sit here on one side.

I'm waiting on God. And God said, I'm waiting on them.

Sometimes God's waiting on you to move. So God responds to movement,

revelation, understanding.

You take one step in prayer, God steps toward you that's why anytime you come

to an altar you can't come to an altar without feeling the Lord because when

you're moving you just start to feel that presence,

as the atmosphere shifts and changes when people are praising him he starts

to encamp he just moves in and then he starts to set up shop and camp and he's

like yeah they want me here.

The greatest part of the service is the worship service to God.

That's the greatest part for God. The greatest part for man is the word.

God don't need his word. He is his word. We need that. But the greatest part for him is worship.

So we have to give that to him. We have to give that to him. He deserves it.

When you open up the Bible, the revelation opens back.

When I started reading the word of God, when I first got in church,

I had no idea what I was reading.

I could not understand it. I'm like, but you know what the spirit said? Keep reading.

I said, well, I'm bored. Read.

Well, I got some time off. Read, read, read. Okay. Okay. I just read and kept reading.

And then one day it's like it opened up before me.

It's like I could see it like a scroll, like a, like, like something like a, like a drama going on.

And I could see the characters and I started in visualizing these things and

God started opening up my understanding.

Why? Because I made a move.

If I wouldn't have did or listened or obeyed the beginning, that first voice

when he said, Hey, do this.

Well, if you don't do that, you ignore that. And he was like,

well, do this. and then you keep ignoring, God won't talk to you because he's

like, they won't listen.

I'm not gonna talk to them. They don't listen to what I say.

So where's, then he looks for another vessel.

He's like, who's gonna, who's gonna, who is going to do what I'm asking?

And he'll come to you as you're worshiping and say, run an aisle,

brother, run an aisle for your family. Run an aisle for your family.

And then guess what happens as he does that?

Then God will say something else. He'll say something else. He'll say, just start leaping.

He's like, okay, he's okay. He's listening to these basic commands.

He's like, all right. He's like, come up here and do a somersault and then 18

back foot. No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.

He'll never put on us more than we can bear, bro. I'll never put on us more than we can do.

But as we respond, as we listen, he, he continues that my friend is the person

that can hear the voice of God.

The clearest is the poison that the poison.

Where'd I get that from? It's not like Looney Tunes, the poison.

I guess I'm gonna have to preach the rest of this message. Looney Tunes style, the poison.

I don't even know what I was saying. So the person, the person that,

that, that agree comes in agreement with that, because here's the thing.

God's not just going to speak to you and tell you to do stuff that you want to do.

Sometimes he starts saying things you don't want to do.

He's like, Hey, go to the hospital and pray for a person.

I don't know. When you're out in the grocery store, you're in the line.

Might say, Hey, pay for that person's groceries.

I know you have it in your bank because Because I'm the one that gave you your

job and I know the hairs on your head, so I know every dollar you have. Do that.

And it could be random. How many has God spoke to like that and said those kind of things?

How many has did it? How many at times didn't do it?

How many felt, oh, Sister Young's like, me, both hands.

How many felt so bad after they didn't do it that they're like,

okay, next time you ask, Lord, I promise I'll do it.

Because when he calls you to do something, he starts with the little things.

Everybody wants to raise the dead. everybody wants to go and do something where

it could just, it's just wow.

But he starts with the small things.

So you start sowing in these small things and then you start reaping bigger

things because those seeds start to grow and start to germinate. Things start to happen.

When you lift your hands, his presence will begin to lift you.

That's why when you worship, you start to feel good.

You move in worship, and then he starts to move in power in your life.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. That's it. Clap your hands unto the Lord.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

Acts 3.19, repent that the times of refreshing shall come. Refreshing doesn't

come first. Turning comes first.

You turn from sin and then your guilt will leave you.

You turn from bitterness and then your joy returns.

You might not have joy in this place because you're bitter.

There might be something deep down that's so embedded in your heart that you

can't move forward and that the joy is just not there. You are like in auto mode.

You are doing all the actions.

But in here, there's no uplift.

There's no building up. You just kind of go through the motion.

But it's important because the Lord spoke to me about this specifically,

even with our church, but like with the world in general,

is that people don't move forward because they have a wounded spirit.

When the Lord spoke that, I immediately started doing a specific class on Monday

nights called Healing Hidden Hurts.

And every single person that did this class, there were seven that I had coming

on Monday nights to my house, one hour increments.

That very first lesson, every last person made a major breakthrough and released.

When I say breakthrough, I mean sobbing at my dining room table.

I mean like the greatest weight in the world lifted off of them.

And they just would like lay every last one of them. I'm like,

hmm, that's what the spirit does.

And then all of a sudden, a little bit by little bit, they started allowing

God to mold them. Oh, wow, I can do it.

Wow, I could think clearer. I feel better.

This, and it was because of that. I had no idea. Yeah.

People don't. People will blame everything else. and people,

definitely the devil. It's always the devil.

Give them too much credit because it's definitely not the devil. A lot of times it's you.

Our greatest enemy is us, the will, our human will, decisions that we make.

But when we say not anymore, I'm done, Satan.

I'm done because you are looking at me giving you praise for everything bad.

He wants to hear it. He wants it.

He wants you to say, man, the devil, he likes that. That's praise to him.

He's like, keep mentioning my name.

We need to mention the name of Jesus.

We don't even need to mention the devil. Let him stay alone.

Quench that spirit out by not even mentioning his name.

Just continue to lift up Jesus and he'll lift you up out of your problems.

You don't have to focus in and zoom in on what the devil's doing.

That's why I don't care about what the news says, because I don't care about what the devil's doing.

I care about what God is doing, what he's going to do in my life,

not what he's doing in all the bad stuff. I'm tired of hearing about that.

All that's going to do is weigh my mind down. And then I'm going to say,

I can't, I might as well give up because evil's winning. No, evil's not winning.

The church is winning. God is winning.

God's will is being done. The Holy Ghost is still being poured out.

People are still being covered in the blood.

When we turn from these cycles of our life, new seasons start to open up.

Have to not be distracted because distraction will fog our mental capacity and

allow for us not to have clarity of thought.

So therefore, we never really know. We just guess.

We guess in everything. We just guess. You know that God could give you step-by-step

direction, day-by-day direction, where you can make the absolute perfect will of God every day?

You say, I don't know, Brother Slims, about that. I promise you.

You think he's just going to let you fall by the wayside?

Deliver us from evil. Let thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

God is wanting to give us the ability to be able to change directions so that

the atmosphere around us will react to that change.

Three quarters of my family got in the church when I started to live for God.

Because when God changed this vessel, the atmosphere started to change.

I didn't even have to say anything.

Everywhere I went, God was with me. And people noticed. I didn't have to say,

yeah, man, I'm a Christian.

Never even mentioned that or said that. They just said, hey, you're glowing.

Something's different about you. What's going on? et cetera, constantly.

And I just said, I went to church and I got the Holy Ghost and like the Holy Ghost.

And then I started going over the whole thing. I'm like, man,

yeah, you should have seen what I was before.

But the atmosphere starts to shift, starts to react to your change of direction.

In Proverbs 3, 6, he declared, in all thy ways, acknowledge him and he shall direct thy path.

When you ask God before the decision, peace will follow.

That's why anytime you start to make a decision and there's no peace,

you're making the wrong decision.

Peace will always follow the decisions that is in God's will.

When you ask God before you make that decision, when you bring God into the

conversation, it breaks the confusion down. People can be talking about all

kinds of junk and junk that's not good for our ears or our heart,

but then you start referencing God.

You start bringing God into the conversation and it crushes and it breaks that confusion.

Then God enters into the room. When you surrender your will,

guidance becomes so clear that you know the path that is set before you.

When you honor him in your plans, the doors open without striving or trying to kick the doors in.

I've had that issue where I've tried to kick doors in. Like,

this has to work. This has to fit.

This square has to fit in this circle.

And I could just imagine God just saying, oh, these humans that I created.

And then finally, oh yeah, that doesn't fit there.

There's a will for the circle. There's a will for the square and it fits just

perfectly when I can get it right. But I got to ask him for the pieces.

He's got the pieces that are missing in my life. And I've got to,

got to ask him for daily bread, daily pieces to my life daily.

Doesn't give you 30 pieces. He gives you a piece a day.

Be happy and content with that piece that he gave you and click it in,

connect it, put it in place.

And then guess what? Get excited for that next piece.

I wonder what, is it going to

be an end? Is it going to be towards the center? Where is it going to be?

And he keeps giving those pieces until it's complete in our lives.

Science confirms what scripture has always said.

So in physics, there is action and reaction.

So for every action, there is a reaction. If you push the gas, the car moves.

If you throw a ball, your arm recoils.

If you jump, the ground pushes back. If you hit a wall, pain responds.

When I first had this thought.

Was struggling with a particular thing, not sin.

And God was asking me when I was going to stop beating my head against the wall

because it was causing me so much pain.

He said, if you stop beating your head against the wall, the pain will go away.

Your headache will leave.

That was the very first thought that I had before declaring this word.

I said, oh, that's easy enough.

That's what a lot of us look like when we force things or when we try to do

it our way. we're beating our head against a wall.

And then there's pain constantly in our lives and we're miserable and everything stinks.

And God's just like, Hey, stop beating your head against the wall.

Okay. Oh, wow. I'm already feeling better.

That's all I had to do was stop. That's what doing it our way looks like,

but motion always produces response. So that's in physics and neuroscience,

which most of you know, especially our home folks, I love neuroscience.

I could be a neurochemist. I love it. I love the study of the brain.

Your brain responds to repetition. Your brain rewires itself based on what you repeat.

When you repeat fear, fear becomes automatic.

You repeat scrolling, focus weakens.

When you repeat worship, peace becomes easier.

When you repeat prayer, strength becomes more powerful.

You're training your nervous system every day. This is neural, this neural.

Feedback move. I think that this is dying.

I don't think that would be shallow, never. I'm trying to...

Two hours later...

So you're there's something called a feedback loop and this is psychology so your thought,

becomes a behavior your outcome becomes a belief and your belief becomes a thought

so let me put it this way i can't when you see that i can't how many said that i can't,

how many have said that in your life then you avoid the effort When you avoid the effort, you fail.

When you fail, you believe, I'm a failure.

And then you don't just say, I am a failure. And that is the worst thing you

can put after the I am. Because the I am is part of us.

Anything you put after the I am can become prominent and relevant in your life.

You can be in existence, even if it wasn't.

You say you're a loser. That is what you'll be.

Because you're speaking this into your own liar.

So it's important to understand these things because this is what can create

a major breakthrough in a person's life.

When God is near and you pray, you feel God.

And when you feel God, then you believe and faith continues to rise.

When you think negative, you speak negative and you expect negative.

The people that always think negative, they're used to living in the negative,

that's comfortable for them.

So guess what? When they're around positivity, they don't know what to do.

They feel awkward and weird and mad and they wanna leave and they wanna try to start something.

Why? Because they need some frustration to go on around them because that's

what they're used to. They're used to that loop.

You get pulled out of that loop.

And I'm saying these things tonight because I was once in that place.

Everything I'm telling you, I've experienced. I'm not saying anything that I haven't.

And thank God it was horrible at the time, it was negative at the time.

But when I had the understanding, when it started to arise in my life,

I started to realize I've got to change this loop. So I started to think victory.

And when I feel victorious, I will react and act boldly.

When I act boldly, then I will see wins in my life. I'll start winning.

And then when I start winning, guess what? I start really trusting God.

God's got this. God is doing this. I'm winning. I'm on the winning side. I'm victorious.

Victory, victory shall be mine because of my thought process.

So if you break the thought, then the cycle will collapse.

Some of us need to get our minds straight.

Don't always look or assume or think the worst because sometimes you're absolutely wrong.

And thankfully you are. You go to that place. You're like, man,

I already know this and this and this and this and this is going to happen.

And you get there and it was never not even half as bad as what you thought.

If you've had that experience, that's where you need to go back to the drawing

board and say, oh, I see some major issues in my life. I need to,

I need to change this way of thinking.

This is even in our biology, your body reacts to choices.

So how many know that worry, when you worry, you release cortisol.

How many know that? And when you release cortisol, all, then your anxiety rises.

How many, how many just love anxiety? Just love, man, that feels so anxiety, man.

Yeah. I want to get up and eat a bowl of anxiety cereal.

Anxiety is horrible. And you know what anxiety is? It's fear.

The kingdom of fear. We use the word anxiety or anxiousness,

but it's the kingdom of fear.

It's the spirit of fear. When the spirit of fear is on your life, anxiety will be there.

When you bind the spirit of fear, anxiety leaves.

When you're in the presence of God, your neurotransmitter chemicals start to raise.

Your dopamine, your serotonin, your neuroepinephrine, every aspect of your brain

starts to raise, elevate.

And when they elevate, you walk out of this place feeling like,

man, I could walk through walls.

I'm going to get that job tomorrow. And not only am I going to get that job,

I'm going to get more than what I asked for pay-wise.

When I go up to that hospital, I know that they're gonna be healed.

Man, I feel good about going to that place where there's gonna be a lot of people

and I have a lot of social anxiety, but I don't care because I feel good in the Lord.

And that's what we all need because when you're at that place,

you can gain that absolute victorious stance and mindset and mind frame and heart. Amen.

Release, when gratitude is released, there's the dopamine that's released.

And when dopamine is released, then your joy starts to lift.

So when we start to express more thankfulness rather than what we don't have

or saying, man, I wish I had this, or I wish I had that. And we're just thankful for what we do have.

You'll feel a whole lot better. You'll feel a whole lot better.

Worship will release the serotonin and then peace floods your soul.

I'll never forget the first time that I had this experience and that serotonin

dopamine effect where I went home and I just felt amazing. Wow.

Ghost was there that night, touched my soul. The word of God,

I raised my hands. I shouted his name.

I danced. I run an aisle and I went home and I felt victorious.

I felt victorious.

And then there's something called inertia. And I'm sorry if I'm keeping you too long.

Inertia is why nothing changes until you do. So the objects remain the same until acted upon.

So when you do the same routines, you get the same results. How many know what

that is? It's called, what is that called?

Insanity. Insanity. I don't want to be insane.

The same habits, same bondage, same schedule, same dryness.

Got to change stuff up. We just recently had somebody come down to an altar

right at the beginning of the service.

I mean, people started flooding the altar at the beginning a service last week.

And right before we were, we were going to start our, I guess our program, you know, our pattern.

And God's like, nah, I don't want you to get up there and say a prayer.

And then he's like, this is what I'm going to do. So you just kind of back up. I said, okay.

People started coming down, asking for different things. And then one came down

with their cigarette box and a lighter after all this time. And finally they said, I'm done. And,

And I said, here, let's, let's kick that into the light. There's like a big circle light.

And I don't know, really know what they use that for, but it's just right there

in the center. So I was like, let's put that in the light.

And then we showed everybody at the beginning of the service.

I'd be like, Hey guys, devil's losing.

He's losing. Hey, God's showing us that everybody's going to get victory in this house today.

And then a victory march started and, and, and, and people started stomping

the enemy under their feet and the thoughts under their feet and,

and the old manner of lifestyle under their feet.

Like I can do it. I can do it. And then, and then the spirit of the Lord just

arose and there was a roar in that house.

And then the next service, somebody got the Holy Ghost that's been praying for

the Holy Ghost for six months.

It's got it. Boom. Said, man, there's something to this.

There's something to this. Let's dig into this. Let's dive into this.

When we introduce prayer and fasting and repentance, the trajectory immediately changes.

Somebody tonight that the potter is still working. The wheel is still turning.

The potter is still faithful. And the pressure in your life is still purposeful.

You'll never not have pressure.

Every level, there's a new devil.

God is always not only molding and shaping and making, but then he's a painter as well.

God is so many things.

But the only question tonight would be the clay.

He's not asking you to work harder.

He's asking you to yield deeper, yield deeper.

That's yielding. You know what a yield is?

I had asked somebody that the other day. Well, actually, I asked my sister-in-law

from California. She mentioned that over and over. I said, you know what that means to yield?

In traffic signs, you always treat a yield as a stop, but there's another part to it is when you yield,

you're stopping and then you're checking out your surroundings.

And when you yield to God, like surely the presence of the Lord is in this place.

So my mind, my racing thoughts, we're going to stop it right here.

Are you trying to speak to me, God?

When you yield, you stop talking, you stop making movements in directions you

think is the direction, and you just give an ear to the Lord.

When you yield to God, you're walking in one direction, you start walking in the other.

And that's why I think it's so important sometimes to run an aisle or to do

some kind of movement of I was walking in darkness, I was walking in my way,

but now I've yielded to God, I've heard his voice.

I felt his spirit. He's pulling me.

He's calling me. Many are called, but few are chosen.

You get to choose whether you're chosen or not. He'll call you.

And if you're chosen, that means that you're answering.

You're answering the call.

So if we could stand, music could come.

If you change the condition, God will change the outcome. It's not about emotion

tonight, but it's about a response.

Soften, God will shape. If you turn, God will refresh.

If you move, heaven will react. And the wheel is spinning and the potter is ready.

And the altar is where reactions began to change.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. What do you want to happen in your life?

What do you want to see? What victory do you need?

What do you need? What do you need the hand of God to do in your life?

What would you like to see done in your life, in your family, in your ministry?

Have you prayed about what God wants you to do?

All these things are a part of our reaction and response to God's word.

The word of God has came forth tonight.

God speaks, but who will listen? Who will say, hey, I hear it. I'm with you.

I want to grow. I want to grow the church. I want to be the vessel that God

uses. I want to multiply.

I want to tell my family. I want to get my family in the New Testament arc before

the Lord comes back. I want to be ready to go, but not only myself.

I want to be ready so that I can help others to come in and to experience the

goodness of God. Hallelujah.

Hallelujah. Whatever you need in this house here tonight.

You believe God can do, he can do it here. Faith is here. Hallelujah.

The presence of the Lord is here.

How will you respond? With every eye closed, what is God wanting you to do right now?

Are you going to let him whisper to you? Does he want you to march around this.

Sanctuary like the walls of Jericho?

Maybe there's a wall in your life that needs to come down and you're sick and

tired of it being there. Maybe you ought to march.

Maybe there's something you need to turn from. There's an altar that you can come to.

Maybe you need a physical healing in your body. God wants you to say,

I want it, and I believe you can do it, and I'm gonna pray until it happens. I'm not gonna stop.

I'm gonna keep believing God, because regardless if you're healed tonight, God's still a healer.

Regardless if it can happen tonight, it can still happen. And I'm believing

for it. I'm believing for it.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

Hallelujah.

Hallelujah. Maybe you have just been stuck in procrastination.

Maybe your mind and your heart feel so weighed and pulled down.

Like what, what do I got to do? I've been trying, I've been pushing.

Let's seek out answers here tonight. Because revival is here.

The presence of the Lord is here. The truth is here.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. How will we respond?

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.

Me. Guard my heart, God. Glory, Hayato Koshata, in the name of the Lord Jesus.

In the name of the Lord Jesus. It's freezing outside.

We can make it nice and hot in this house with prayer.

Hallelujah. How bad do you want it?

God, we're yet holding on. We're enduring. We're pushing.

And sometimes it seems it's all over. It's all lost, but it's.

God wants to uproot, let him hear tonight.

Release your spirit to him, release yourself to him.

God, here I am, I stand as a vessel, as a baby before you, God.

Stand here, Hayato no Koshatam. Jesus mighty name, Jesus mighty name.

You may have even fallen. You fall seven times, you get up eight.

Whatever the missing ingredient is, it can be found here today and once it's added,

In Jesus' mighty name, in Jesus' mighty name, O God, O God, O God, O God, O God, O God,

Thank you for listening to our podcast. Southwest Apostolic Church is a place of refuge.

If we can help you, we'd be glad to do it. Pastor's cell number, 317-469-3100.

If we can help you, we'd be glad to do it. God bless.