Stretched - Part 2

Amen.

You guys are too kind.

Thank you.

It is uh it has been a good run, but a long run, and I've had a great time and happy Mother's Day.

If you're a mother, raise your hand.

Y'all give them a hand, please.

That's awesome.

Uh if at any point in your life you've had a mother, raise your hands.

Okay.

I love there were people that did not raise their hands.

So bless the test two babies.

That's all right.

That's great.

Um, but it's it's so great to celebrate Mother's Day, and it's so good to be here as Justin was very encouraging, and thank you for that encouragement.

Um, it is just good to be back, just among the familiar.

And Justin would, he said, Hey man, I started to bother you on the road.

I'm like, dude, you have no idea.

It is so great to hear a familiar voice as I'm staring at a window or sitting in an airport or whatever.

So it is just today is rejuvenating to me just to get to be with you guys.

For thanks, thanks for that.

And uh coming up uh in June, actually, another piece of my world is that I'm the president of the Christian Comedy Association.

We had an actual conference here last year.

Uh his hands hosted it, it went incredible.

And on Sunday night, we did what I call a showcase where I just told nine of my comic friends, I'm like, you're gonna you're gonna do a short set, and uh all these people are gonna get to enjoy it, and it was a blast.

How many of you were here at that last year?

That was a blast, yes.

Awesome.

So we're gonna do that again this year on June 5th, and the tickets for that uh will actually go on sale next week.

And uh it if it was we actually sold out last year, so we're gonna bring in some more chairs this year.

But the tickets are$15, they are well, well worth it.

And I say that to say that if you get them here beforehand, you can get them for$10.

And then next week is the one day super special, and we only sell more than one.

So if you get two or more, because we want you to bring your friends, we want them to just have the funnest night of their year.

And I know funnest is not supposed to be a word, but it is, and uh it will be fantastic.

So uh June 5th, and uh so if you buy them next week, um, not only are they ten in advance, but you can get them for eight for one week only.

So that's next week.

I would encourage you to grab those, and it is gonna be a fantastic night.

I want to jump off this morning and just say uh twofold.

One, uh, I do love mothers, and I think that God reveals part of his character through mothers.

Because I believe when a woman gets pregnant that she goes to mom school, and I don't know where this school is, but every mother goes there because every mother in any language around the world says the exact same stuff.

And I'll give you one of my I'll I'll let you, I'll prove this to you.

Um, one would be keep your elbows, don't frown, and your face will freeze that way, stay that way.

If you can't say something nice, mom school, that's where they came from.

Now, there's another aspect of moms that I want to kind of lead into today, and that is that moms seem to live by a double standard.

They seem to impose on us, and that they they somehow are above that, and the truth is they are.

They are above it, they have the bigger picture and they see that.

And uh I'll give you a couple of my favorite examples.

My mom used to love to try to get us to eat vegetables.

Now, nothing wrong with eating vegetables.

I like some vegetables.

I like carrots, I love corn.

Um, I don't really like collard greens, I don't really care for spinach.

Have a simple rule about vegetables.

If it looks like it came out of a lawnmower, I don't eat it.

Okay, that's that's my rule.

All right, that's just my rule.

And then my mom would try to get us to eat, and she's actually here today, and she'll vouch for all of this, but she'd try to get us to eat uh spinach.

And at the time, do you guys remember the cartoon Popeye?

Yes, okay.

And uh she would just, I'm just like, oh, uh, uh.

She's like, well, if you'll eat your spinach, you'll grow up big and strong like Popeye.

I'm like, Popeye's a dork.

I don't, I don't.

He's got like no biceps, he's huge forearms.

I don't want to be like Popeye.

And so she tried a different tactic.

She says, Well, if you'll eat your spinach, and I was like 11 at the time.

She goes, if you'll eat your spinach, you'll grow hair on your chest.

And so I started to take a bite, and then it dawned on me, and I looked up and went, Why are you eating it?

And she said, It doesn't work on girls.

And I was like, Man.

See, mom always had the comeback.

But my favorite of all was when I was a little boy, about 11 years old, I loved baseball.

Loved to play baseball, go to the ballpark, I'd watch games, we'd have practice, then I'd go watch games and I'd just roll around in the dirt.

I loved baseball.

And uh our heroes were baseball players, and they had these big wads of tobacco.

When we were kids, we couldn't have tobacco, but we'd get these big wads of gum.

And we just walk around and spit, just and that drove my mother insane.

She's like, that is disgusting.

Quit, quit that.

We'd wait, and the next day we'd forget, and she'd be like, stop, that is gross.

That is just stop that.

And one day I'll never forget it, come out for practice, and I've been down there playing in the dirt.

Literally, the whole field was dirt.

And I'm covered head to toe in dirt because I'm a boy and it's baseball.

And we're gonna go out to eat.

And my wife, my mom, she she came, she goes, Okay, you ready to go?

Oh my goodness, look at you.

And I'm like, okay, she goes, look at your face.

Now, have you ever tried to do that?

It's like it's it's impossible.

And she said, Come here.

And she took my face in her hand, took out a Kleenex, spit on the Kleenex, and began to wipe my face.

I'm like, oh, oh, oh, that's gross.

That's gross.

She's like, hush, it's not gross.

That's it.

It's magic mom spit.

It's not gross, you know.

So moms get to live by this double standard.

But the truth is, is that she has a perspective and she knows what is gross, when it's gross, when it's not, when it's appropriate.

And moms just have that ability.

And I say that to say that God has this perspective that we don't have.

And I believe that he shows us that through our parents, through those who are older, but he has this ability to see.

And this morning, what I want to do is kind of pile on what Elon shared last week.

I was blown away.

I had prepared this morning's talk, and then I thought, you know what, I want to just hear what Elon shared last year.

So I'm sitting in an airport last week.

I mean, so I'm sitting in an airport and I plug it on, listen to it on the podcast, and I was blown away.

And if you were here last week, you you were blessed.

And there was one word she shared over and over, and one concept that I took away from it.

Just that God longs for us to be stretched.

He longs for us to be stretched.

And she had a great uh illustration about her pants.

And if Elon, if you're here, sorry about your jeans, and uh that was funny, but just this idea of being stretched, and I love the line she put.

She said, in the Bible, stretching was always followed by the miraculous.

And I was like, man, what an incredible principle.

What's really amazing is what God laid on my heart, and as I wrote it down and I heard that, I'm like, God, this is you.

This is you, and you put these together.

So if you're one of those, like, you know what, I know I need to be stretched, I know God is stretching me, I think today is going to be a validation and some uh ideas on how that really works and how that can happen in my life, wherever you are, whatever you're doing.

And I've actually written out the verses and in bigger type because I don't have my glasses.

So, but I I'd realize this about God that we we oftentimes pray.

And I want to change one part of one phrase today, that's it.

And I'm gonna share it at the very end.

If we'll change this one perspective in prayer, it changes everything.

And oftentimes we pray, God, keep me safe, keep us safe, protect us.

And there's nothing wrong with that, but the truth is, is God's going, hey, I don't want you to just be safe.

I want you to be free.

It says, Well, we'll know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

I didn't come to make you slaves again, but to give you freedom.

And if you ever want to see a beautiful picture of freedom, watch bear cubs.

They have freedom.

And I love to watch them frolic around and trumble and wrestle and play, and they're just the cutest things.

But let me just tell you this: if you're ever out hiking and you see a bear cub and you think, oh, how cute is that?

I want to go pet the bear cub.

Don't.

Why would I say don't?

Because Mama Bear.

You may not see Mama Bear, but Mama Bear sees you.

And you don't mess with her cubs.

If you see a baby cub, run.

Run the other way because Mama Bear is there.

And and God is kind of that way with us.

And I want to read a couple verses just to solidify this in our hearts.

Not that we shouldn't ask for protection, but he's already given it, so he wants us to ask something different.

And I'm gonna share that at the end.

But in Isaiah 49, 15, and 16, he really draws this sense together of motherhood.

And he writes this can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has born?

Let me go ahead and stop here and answer.

No, she can't.

Though she may forget, I will never forget you.

See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hand.

Your walls are ever before me.

In other words, your your security is everything to me.

They're always there.

You're on the ex palm of my hand.

Now I'm thinking that one, I think that is a reference to Jesus going to the cross, but think about one of the most painful places, and I've never had it, but one of the most painful places you could ever get a tattoo would be on the hand.

And you would never forget that.

And it's he's like, look, your name, you're you're on my heart, you're on the palms of my hands.

And if that's not enough, even in the New Testament, he comes and he writes and and and literally says, hey, if when you accept Christ and you invite him into your life, you you don't have to pray for his attention anymore.

He's there.

He's there.

And this morning we're gonna really decide and make a determination in two different determinations that really open our eyes to see how that stretching works and how we can experience it.

Because he writes in Romans chapter 8, verses 35 through 39 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Romans 8:35–39

Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

As it is written, for you for your sake, we face death all day long.

We are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loves us.

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angel nor demon, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of Christ.

Nothing can.

Yes.

Now, what I want to dive into is we can look at that and go, okay, but how do I reconcile that with where I am, where I am today?

And if I really do want to be stretched and I want to experience the miraculous in my life and in my world, if we're honest, we can get in the middle of those situations and just go, I don't hear God.

I don't hear his voice.

I don't see him working.

But the truth is that not only is he there, but he cares and he has never stopped working.

And I heard this great phrase, I think it was Chuck Sandal, he says, When you can't see his hand, trust his heart.

Take that truth and say, This is what I'll do.

But here's what I want us to really look at.

The first determination we have to make is to adjust our focus.

Adjust our focus.

And what I mean by that is if I'm in a situation, and you, if you're not now, maybe you will be at some point, where you're thinking, I don't understand what I'm supposed to do.

Or I don't know what I'm supposed to do in this situation.

Either I don't understand or I don't know.

Take heart.

That means, and that is the determination that we are in the place to be stretched.

That's where it starts.

And if I'll change my focus away from, wow, I wish these circumstances weren't here, I wish I didn't have to deal with, I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish, then instead adjust my focus, God, you are with me.

Nothing can separate from me, you from me.

And I realize that, wait a minute, I need to change that a little bit.

Because I can take this and say, I don't understand, I wish, Lord, please let me understand.

And I miss it.

Lord, I don't know what to do, and God would be like, I know.

I know you don't.

But we have to make a determination.

Here's the determination.

Do I want to be safe or do I want to be significant?

And I love the way that Elon put that last week.

Do I want protection or do I want to experience power, the same power that raised Christ from the dead?

Which do I determine in my mind?

Am I focused on safety and protection?

Am I focused on understanding?

Lord, I just want to understand, or do I want to be used by God, whether I understand or not?

Which is it?

And I begin to struggle with this, and I think that God gives us a very clear step.

And I want you to notice this one preposition.

I don't think God is so much interested in us doing for him as he is with us doing with him.

He has a plan, he wants to use us, but it's up to us.

And that one little difference, I think, is just projected where he's like, hey, I'm not forgetting you.

I'm not separated from you.

I'm with you.

In Isaiah 41, 10.

And I would encourage you, if you're in this place where you're feeling like, I don't understand and I don't know what to do, this may be the verse you need to just dwell on all week and memorize.

It's one of my favorites.

It says, So do not fear, for I am with you.

I want you to say that word with me.

So do not fear, for I am with you.

Do not be dismayed, for I am your God.

I will strengthen you and help you.

I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

And when we take that focus and we adjust our focus off of the circumstances, off of the fact I don't know and I don't understand, and instead say, God, I want to adjust my focus to be on you.

I want to be on you.

There's one of my favorite verses is Proverbs 3, 5.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, don't lean on what you understand.

So when I'm at that point where I'm like, I don't understand, that means God is in the process and giving me the opportunity to stretch beyond what I can understand.

Stretch beyond where I am to where he wants me to be.

But God, I don't know what to do.

I don't know what to do.

There's a great story in 2 Chronicles 20, King Jehoshaphat.

He's the one where, if you ever heard the term jump on Jehoshaphat, that's where it came from.

He's the king.

I've read it several times.

I've never seen him jump, but apparently there was jumping in there somewhere.

But I love this story.

He's being obedient, he's following Christ.

He is being a great, obedient servant of God.

And in that, circumstances arise where all these armies get together and they're coming to attack them, and they are overwhelmed.

All he did was it was supposed to do, and he literally says, I don't know what to do.

But he adjusts his focus.

He said, God, we have no way to stand against this army that's coming against us.

I do not know what to do, but my eyes are on you.

Stretch me.

Stretch me to see what I cannot see.

Stretch me to experience what I could not experience apart from you.

And God shows up and does a miracle.

He does the miraculous.

And if I will step that point, not only are we to really adjust our focus, there's a great verse in Romans 12, 1 and 2, where after where he says we're not separated, he goes on a couple, a couple later, a couple chapters later, and he says this, I want to read it off the screen.

Therefore, I urge you, this is our choice, our determination, brothers, in view of God's mercy, that he will not be separated from us, to offer your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God.

This is your spiritual act of worship.

Do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

It is a determination of our mind to take what we don't understand and what we don't know and submit.

And the second determination is I'm going to take initiative.

I'm going to take initiative.

I don't know what to do, but my eyes are on you.

Lord, I don't know, I don't understand, but here I am, a living sacrifice.

God, I I realize now when I feel like I don't understand and I don't know what to do, that is your invitation for me to stretch beyond myself.

And at that invitation, God says, I will show up.

Here's what I've discovered, and I continue to discover.

When I take initiative towards saying, God, just show me one step, and I take that step, it leads to another.

I've discovered this one, it will be harder than I ever thought.

See, I came under the premonition that when I came to Christ and God lays something on your heart, or you see a need, or you see some area that, man, I might want to do that, and we do it.

We're under this misconception that everything's supposed to work out perfectly and all the circumstances fall into place and there's no problems, and it's yay.

No.

What I've discovered is it will be harder than I ever thought.

I, in the midst of that, will fail multiple times in the process.

Mentally, uh motivationally, and other ways.

But here's what I also notice.

When I determine that I'm going to take initiative, I've found as I look back in the wake of this that I have been part of accomplishing something more than I ever imagined.

That's where I want to live.

I really don't want safety as much as I want significance.

I don't want protection as much as I want power.

I don't really want to understand.

I want to be used.

And and I really want to give you a very real-life example from the past couple weeks.

It's like, Lord, I want to be a tool.

I mean, not like a tool, but I want to be a tool to be used.

I've been a tool, and I really believe the tool prayer is protect me, give me understanding, give me what I want.

But the tool prayer is, God, I don't know what to do.

I don't understand.

Use me, empower me, show me what you're doing, and let me be a part of it.

I I share that, and let me share a very real example of that.

Uh, a few a couple weeks ago, I was in Ukraine, and I had put this trip off.

I'd been invited several times.

I'm like, yeah, I don't, I don't get it.

You know, and my father-in-law, a very successful businessman, had been over there, he's been over there multiple times over 10 years, and he goes, Oh, you really need to go, you really need to go.

And I really thought, no, I really don't.

I don't need to go.

And on many levels, I don't.

God's working.

And I thought of many excuses.

And I thought, you know what?

I don't speak Russian.

And I have no clue what they're going through.

And he goes, Yeah, but we do these business seminars and there's curriculum and we teach it to the students, and we have guys go over and they love it.

And I'm like, well, then let them go back and love it more.

He says, but I just really, and this got me, he says, I really sense you need to go on one of these trips.

And I'm thinking, what would I do?

And finally I just said, you know what?

I'll go.

And he goes, Oh, good.

Now you don't have to do the curriculum, this, that, and the other, but but I just know God's gonna do something, and I'm like, okay.

Two days after I committed.

To going.

I'm watching TV as I'm ironing in a hotel room getting ready for a show.

And it's a documentary, not a documentary, it's like modern day news story about how Russia is invading Ukraine.

And so I called my father, hey, did you know there's a war in the Ukraine?

And I'm not making this up.

He goes, Oh, that's on the other side of the country.

I'm like, they have airplanes that fly and drop bombs.

I've seen them.

And he goes, No, it's not like that.

I'm like, okay.

And literally, I am on the plane flying to Ukraine.

We stopped in Amsterdam flying over, and I'm literally, the thoughts that are running through my mind, God, I don't understand why I'm going.

I have no understand why.

I have no idea what to do.

I have none.

I literally, God, I only I have no preparation because I don't know what to do.

And I really sense God going, awesome.

Because now you have to totally depend on me.

And as I prayed through that, it was as if God said, Ken, I've been preparing this.

All I want you to do is to be a tool in my hand.

You've been a tool for years.

Now I want you to be a tool in my hand.

Just be you.

Okay.

Talk about freedom.

I thought, Lord, if this is a total catastrophe failure, it's on the other side of the world.

Nobody will know.

And okay, and I lost all these inhibitions, and then I found out, as I thought back, about two and a half weeks before we went, this is just one of those moments.

When God chooses to stretch and we choose to allow him, he's going to do that which is beyond what we're capable of.

Two weeks before, they said, Oh my goodness, Ken's coming to speak to the entertainment and uh the uh broadcasting schools, and he's in communication.

He teaches me communications.

Wow.

Ask him if he would do this.

We're doing an international symposium on communication within the IT world.

Would he speak on the symposium?

I didn't even know what symposium meant.

And now I'm sitting here in a suit at a table with six doctors from all over Europe that are going to be speaking on communication in IT, and I'm sitting there going, why am I here?

And I really sensed God going, because you're a tool.

In a good way.

Finally, you're a tool.

And I literally I shared at that symposium, and I'm not, I'm not making this.

The next morning I'll have coffee with some of the professors at one of the universities, like, it's so great, you have to see this article.

And they showed it to me on their phone, and it was picture as a picture of me and the interpreter, and then it was the panel, and they said the write-up was unbelievable.

You've got to read this, and I'm sending it to you, and as she's sending it, I'm like, awesome! And I felt like I was back in first grade when I had dyslexia and couldn't read because I just look at the pictures and it's in Russian.

I have no idea how to read this.

I'm just like, oh yeah.

And I'm at this symposium, and I did some different classes, and it was stunning to me the opportunities that opened up for me to just share my life.

I was not there to preach, it wasn't a revival.

I was just in a class, and they said, How did you get into performing?

And I said, Well, I was in the corporate world, and I had just kind of a crisis in my mind and in my heart.

I don't want to do this the rest of my life.

And I said, I don't believe that I am just some mistake in the evolutionary line.

I believe that I was created for a reason.

And I felt like this is not something I want to do, it's something that I am.

And as I really thought about it and prayed through it, I realized this is who I was meant to be.

And that's all I shared.

And then I got question after question after question.

Tell us more.

How did that work?

What do you mean by pray?

What do you do to do that?

And they just, these conversations, and I said, listen, I'm I'm not trying to proselytize anybody.

This is just my, I know God personally, and and that's where it comes from.

And I saw this amazing desire and craving for hope and connecting with hearts, and I realized this was amazing.

I also, about a week and a half before we were over there, this is God-sized preparation that I have no clue how it happened.

A student who was at the university of one of the professors that I worked with had said, Hey, would Ken be interested, or would he be available to go to this city about a four-hour train ride from Kiev?

It's in great disarray.

And half the people are like, we want to be communist again.

Where's Russia?

Come on in, take us back over.

And the other half, 45 and under, are like, that that doesn't work.

And all they can see is what they don't have and the oppression of hopelessness.

And they said, Well, Ken, come and just speak.

And we, sure.

And we get there, and there's this room seats about 200 people, and they're standing on the walls.

It's every deputy, which is like kind of senators in that area, and the mayor who's like the governor of that area.

All of them are there.

All the leaders of the schools, hospitals, every leader in that region was there.

And and I get up and I'm just like, Why am I here?

I don't even speak Russian, and they said that, and half of them were just, hmm.

And I just started to share kind of experience and where hope comes from.

And I shared some stories, and they went from there to here to by the end of the time.

I closed with a story, and I had I've shared this story before.

If you haven't heard it, it's worth repeating.

I was at the Georgia Dome one time.

A buddy of mine had invited me to a Falcons game when it first opened, and uh, we had great seats.

We were in the fifth row from the roof.

Okay, we were up there.

And I'll never forget my other buddies like, which team are we?

It's just, we're the little red dots.

Okay, that's us.

All right, that's it.

And at the end of the game, you have a choice.

And I walked to go down those ramps that spiral down to the bottom, and by the time you get there, you have vertigo.

And I started to walk there, and my buddy says, No, no, come here.

He knew the dome.

We walked around a corner down a short hall, and there was an escalator, an express escalator goes from the top level all the way to the street level.

It's like a hundred yards long, and we got on like this is great.

Only problem halfway down.

It broke.

And then we stood there.

And we stood there.

We stood there two and a half, almost three full minutes, stranded on this escalator.

People grumbling and complaining, leaning, I couldn't see, and finally a guy in the very back, I wish it was me, out of frustration, just screams, walk! Just walk.

And we all started walking down the escalator.

And I share that story corporately that you know what, everybody knew what to do.

But it took one guy with an attitude says, You either walk or get out of my way.

And I shared that story to these leaders who had bought in and were now literally some on the edge of their seats, going, Yes, yes, we need to not focus on what we don't have control over.

We don't need to focus on circumstances we don't have, look at what we do have, look at who we are, and they're excited.

And I share that story, and I had the interpreter teach me how to say that punch in Russian, and I tell that story, and then I just at the end, I'm just like, Iditya, prosta idia, and the place went nuts.

And they were just like, yes.

And they went from this to literally high-fiving each other.

And it took us, oh, probably 30, 45 minutes just to leave.

They just had this hope.

And by the time we got back to Kiev, their community bulletin board had thousands of hits of people saying, This is what's going to happen.

And it was all because a professor had a student who had graduated and gone back to that area, and he said, things have to change, and everybody told him it can't change because there's turmoil, there's nothing we can do.

So this 22-year-old kid said, I'm running for deputy, which is like a 22-year-old in our country running for senator.

And he won.

And he said, I need help.

Will you ask?

And will he come?

And it it was literally one of those, like, God, I couldn't have understood it.

And I and I don't need to know.

All I know is that something very significant just happened.

Something powerful beyond me.

I just got to experience you.

And I felt used by the very hand of God.

And it was humbling and encouraging and amazing all at the same time.

And as amazing as that was, the highlight, one of the highlights of the trip, was God just orchestrating.

The gentleman who interpreted for me a very real fear of mine in it.

I'm like, Lord, I don't speak Russian.

Comedy, there's a lot to timing in comedy.

And talking it through somebody is not, you know what, Lord?

I don't know what's going to do, but I'm going to trust you.

I get to the airport.

I'm literally walking out of uh customs, and there's Sasha.

Sasha's this incredible Ukrainian guy in his early 30s, and he's got my name.

He says, Are you kidding?

I am Sasha, I am a big fan.

And I've seen all YouTube you have done.

You are very funny.

I will interpret for you.

And I was like, Well, I hope you're good at it because they're gonna laugh at you, they're not gonna laugh at me.

And he goes, I am ready, I am ready.

And we went through this, and I asked Sasha after day one, I said, Sasha, your English is amazing.

Where did you learn English?

And he goes, From America.

And he told me his part of his story.

I said, Well, he said, I was an exchange student when I was 14.

I'm like, that's amazing.

And I started hearing pieces of it finally, and I realized in retrospect, this was one of the main reasons.

God had just seen his heart and he said, I want to speak encouragement into him after our day, and we were a little bit tired.

I said, Sasha, is there any way you can go to dinner with us?

He goes, Do you need me to interpret?

I said, No, I want to hear your story.

And he's like, Really?

I'm like, Yes.

And if I ever thought for a second that determining to take initiative is hard, God just blew my mind through this story.

Sasha was 14, his father was a police chief.

The Soviet Union disintegrated, the mafia had come in, and they were establishing their stronghold in every way, and specifically within the police.

They would threaten these captains, saying, if you do not do what we say, if you do not take a small bribe and do whatever we say, we will kill your family.

So he sent Sasha to Golden Colorado.

Sasha was in Golden Colorado.

He had never heard one word of English.

And he comes to Golden Colorado at 14.

Anybody here, 14 or 15 years old, raise your hands real quick.

Awesome.

Awesome.

Now I want you to imagine this because this is going to hit you in reality.

He went to school.

He's trying to learn English.

He hears these words and he says, in Ukraine, if you point at somebody and say something about their mother, that means they want you to beat them up.

He said, So I heard mother and pointing and laughing, so I beat them up.

And he said, after the second ordeal where I beat up several people at once, they ganged up, I still beat them up.

He said, uh, the principal said, you have two strikes.

Here you get three, and you are down to one.

If you beat anybody else up, you go back to Ukraine.

And he's like, I didn't realize that's the way it was.

So I learned how to talk, I learned how to speak, I learned how to joke, I learned how to talk my way out of situations.

His family, his host family, said, You know what, Sasha?

It's been a trying year.

You can go to school here, but we can't be your host family.

You're gonna have to find somewhere else to live.

Don't miss this.

He turns 15, he gets his learner's license.

They tell him that.

He finishes out two months.

He takes a paper route, he saves up, he goes and cleans out stalls at a local horse farm.

He saves up$600 and buys a car in which he lives in and continues to work and go to high school.

And he said that year he went and finished that year of school and he saved up enough and did some extra work.

And that summer he did landscaping.

He started doing uh irrigation with this landscaper, and he says the guy was an alcoholic, and he said, I ended up having to learn his business and run his business at 16.

He said, I got good enough, I actually was able to rent an apartment and get a better car.

And he said, I started that part of his business, continued with that with the newspapers, with the stalls, and he says, then I had then I had enough money to be able to get an apartment.

And he says, then I would go to school, and and I'm just thinking, 16.

How many of you at 16 held three jobs, put yourself through school?

And at the time he's sending money back to Ukraine so that his brother can go to a nice school and be safe.

My mind was exploding, and he says, then I graduated, then I went on to community college, and and he says I'd gotten to know the police in the area during the year I lived in my car because I would time it to where I could sleep in a couple different parking lots, and they knew me, and I would just be like, Oh, yeah, I'm waiting for the newspapers to get ready, and I'd sleep for two hours, and I'd get the newspaper.

Oh, I'm waiting for the stables to shut down, and they want me to do some stuff, so he'd stay in that parking lot for a year.

And he saves up and he saves up and he starts and he says, I got to know the police, and they said, Man, you should go to the police academy.

And he said, So I went to the police academy.

I qualified, and he says, at the end of that, I got word from back home that my father had become a full-blown alcoholic and was beating my mother.

And he said, So I dropped everything.

He says, I got on the plane.

He said, I got on the plane, and here he is, I think it was six, seven years later from when he came over, that he had not seen his mother in in seven, almost eight years.

He gets on the plane and they said, Sir, do you do you realize that you've been here illegally?

And he says, No, I've been in school.

And they said, No, that's not the way it works.

Now, I'm sure they didn't explain it to a 14-year-old, and all he did was survive.

He flies back, he honors his mother and father.

He had come to know Christ in that process.

He put his dad in a house away from his mother and his brother, and he continues to provide.

He's now just got multiple businesses, he and just an amazing man.

And yet I could sense in his heart something was missing.

And he says, I have a girlfriend, but I want to do this for my mom and my brother first.

I want to set them up better, I want to do this.

And he says, I'm just I'm just trying.

And I want to get all this set up.

I said, Sasha, don't wait.

And we talked about his girlfriend, and I said, She knows who you are.

I said, Sasha, you are a man.

You are a great man.

And you were a man at 15 years old.

And you're a great man, and she knows that.

And she will go through this with you if she really loves you.

Well, she's she does love me, and I'm like, you don't have to wait.

You have nothing else to prove.

And I could see his countenance just go, huh?

And it was as if God said, I need to speak into his heart.

And I know you're gonna understand some of his struggles, and I'm gonna move around the world to set up a dinner so that you can speak into his heart and that he can hear that how I've made him.

I can't wait to see what happens next, but I know without a doubt that the stretching process starts with I don't understand.

I don't know.

And it comes when we determine to change our focus and take initiative to let God move in our hearts.

And here's the one phrase I want us to twist today.

Too often our prayer is, God, take away this situation, take away this problem, take away this pain, take away fill in the blank.

If we're so bold, if we want to see God stretch us and see the miraculous, see God change us from the inside out, his power, his using us, we say, Lord, what do you want me to take away from this?

That's where change happens.

That one small twist.

If we'd be so bold, I know God will move and do that.

Let's pray.

Father, I I thank you for your truth.

I thank you more that you are with me and you're with us.

And Lord, we don't have to beg your protection.

You give us mothers to show us a glimpse of that.

But Lord, instead, you want us to experience your power.

You want us to experience you using us in your plan.

And Lord, if if we would just take the time to say, God, what do you want me to take away from this?

Because I know you have a purpose in it.

Father, guide us, direct us in that.

And it is only through the gift of Jesus and the power of your Holy Spirit we can pray.

Amen.

As you stand, I want to just encourage you to do this.

Nathan, the guys are gonna do one more song.

Go ahead and stand up.

As they do this song, I want you to think what part of life right now do you not understand?

You don't know what to do?

And and consider praying that prayer.

God, what do you want me to take from this?

Because I want to experience you.

God bless you.

I can't wait to see you next time.

Thank you.