Check Your Circle | Elevation YTH | Rich Wilkerson Jr.

if you have a Bible this morning go ahead and reach for it and quickly turn to the book of mark mark chapter 2 what an honor what a privilege it is to be here in Charlotte North Carolina at the world-famous elevation church I so love and admire this church and what God has been doing here and have been learning from afar for many many years and just counted an honor and a privilege to even get to stand on this stage and speak with all of you it's a real privilege for me today and I would be crazy not just take a moment just to thank God for your pastors pastor Stephen and Holly Furtick and I'm just so grateful for the both of you and it's it's a real honor to get to even be around you I feel like honestly every time I get in your presence I'll leave better I think better I dream bigger and your voice Pastor Steven I think is a once-in-a-lifetime voice and I just want you to know I'm always behind you you always have our friend in me and your life or your leadership has made a world of a difference in mine and thank you so much for letting me come and be here today and Holly I just think you're the greatest I just I love chat with you I love you so much come on PJ thank God for your pastors today [Applause] and I think you guys have got the best youth team here I got to meet Chelsea and my good friend Tim back in the day come on P make some noise for the entire youth team all the homes I mean I feel like anybody who goes to church at 9:00 a.m. on a Thursday morning you're getting like a massive mansion in heaven so congrats you're on the right path already but my name is rich I come from Miami Florida I pastor a church there called food Church vu is just short for the word rendezvous and we've been going for about four years my wife she sends her greetings been married to the same woman now for be 13 years next month praise God and my wife and I we actually went on a really big journey of trying to have kids and we couldn't have kids and last January January 2018 after eight years of trying to have kids our God who still works miracles my wife gave birth to our firstborn son come from somebody thank God able still work I wish I wish my son was here because you would love his name is Wyatt Wesley Wilkerson okay his initials are www we call him World Wide Web for sure you know talking about like he's a legend and being a dad has been the greatest privilege of my life I'm just I'm just into it like I'm getting real emotional I'll probably cry here a little bit talking about him because when you wait that long for a miracle then you get it it just matters even more to you and every day he just grows and I just enjoy being his dad I'll never forget the first day I was in the hospital and the nurse she came over said mr. Wilkerson it's so important that when why it's little that you spend time with him what we call skin-to-skin I've never heard of this before I'm 35 years old like I don't know think about babies and I guess this is a thing that when a baby is a baby like they need to take their shirt off I gotta take my shirt off and he supposed to lay on my chest skin-to-skin it's like for his nurturing and for his development I never heard of this but I'm obsessed with it we do it every day now poor kids me 15 years of age why take your shirt off get over your skin to skin I want to nurture you dad I'm 18 shut up I brought you into this world take you out take his shirt off let's go skin-to-skin I'm just I'm into being a dad and I wish he was here cuz you would love him and he's the greatest and pride and joy of my life but my family sends their hellos and I felt I brought a message with me today I want us to look at a few verses in mark chapter two and then I'm just gonna holler at you and shout at you and stir you up on this Thursday morning I don't come from the biggest church but I come from a loud church and so today I don't know what your background is but I give you full permission to tap into your inner Pentecostal you can say Amen you can say I like that you can say ask for my neighbor you can see what my church says preach it white boy I don't care okay in fact on the counselors just try it one of those so I know I'm in the right church ready 1 2 3 [Applause] so race this section right here pray for this I'm serious these people mark chapter two is where I want us to look and spend a little bit of time today have a very practical message but I think it's one that could change the rest of your summer and really change the rest of your life it says this starting in verse one a few days later when Jesus again entered Capernaum the people heard that he had come home so many gathered that there was no room left not even outside the door and he preached the word to them someone say word some men came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four of them since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and after digging through it lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on when Jesus saw their faith someone say their faith he said to the paralytic son your sins are forgiven now some teachers of the law were sitting there thinking to themselves why does this fellow talk like that he's blaspheming who can forgive sins but God alone immediately Jesus knew in this spirit what they were thinking in their hearts and he said to them why are you thinking these things which is easier to say to the paralytic your sins are forgiven or to say get up take your mat and walk but that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins he said to the paralytic I tell you get up take your mat and go home he got up took his mat and walked out in full view of them all this amazed everyone and they praised God saying we have never seen anything like this and I love that little last phrase I think that whenever we gather around the name of Jesus we ought to leave going we've never seen anything like this and I want to preach a message today entitled check your circle if that look at your neighbor and say yo check your circle look at your other neighbor the one you don't like so much and say yo check your circle my prayer is we finished this session today is that this would be a little anthem for you the rest of the summer that you would say check your circle and I believe the Lord's gonna speak to us would you pray with me now God we thank you so much that you brought us here we thank you God that you are moving on this Thursday morning Lowell we leaned in now to what it is that you're saying we haven't come to play games we haven't come to be distracted we've come to hear a word from you we open up our hearts Lord speak to us have your way well we don't want to be the same well I pray that right now God at the sound of my voice that you would begin to move that lives would be changed that people would be marked in this moment forever that people would go back on their faith journey and they would remember this Thursday morning as a day that they made a decision to follow you like never before we believe you can do it we believe that you will do it we love you we praise you and if you agree with that prayer all of God's people said come on all of God's people said come on if you love Jesus make a little bit of noise I did a um I did a study earlier in the year I was studying this theologian his name's aw Tozer and he has these seven rules for self discovery and the premise of his of his study is that you need to identify like who you are I think if we're not careful in church we can get really good at at talking about our projected self or or talking about stuff but not actually identifying who we who we actually are God's not interested in in your projected self he's he's interested in the actual self he wants to identify who you actually are so he can develop you into who you're called to be and I think in life like I don't have you notices but like some people just lack made your self awareness have you ever noticed this before like bit is I was on the airplane the other day and I had my ear pods in and I don't know about you but I kind of feel like the air pod is like International sign for I'm unavailable right now and so I'm like rocking on the airplane and this guy he keeps like tapping me on my shoulders I had to pull my ear pods I'm like what's up probably is like how you doing I'm like I'm doing good how are you he's like yeah we chat a little bit I'm like I thought the conversation was done I put the air pods back in and I'd be hanging out again and two minutes later he tapped me again where you headed I'm like bro I'm headed to Dallas we're both headed to Dallas what's up you know I started thinking to myself if I if we can miss it socially how many know we can miss it spiritually we can and the reality of it is is that you can't change what you fail to confront and today I've come in here and I don't want to deal with your project itself I want to do with the actual self who are you really who are you really because tozer would say there's seven different ways for us to discover that he would say things like you are what you think you are who you admire you are where you spend your money where your time goes I could talk about a lot of those but there's one rule that I think is perfect for us to chat about today aw Tozer would say if you want to discover who you really are he would say you are the company that you keep meaning your circle of friends is an indication of who you actually are who you are becoming you show me your friends and I'll show you your future you point out your five best friends and I will prophesy to you about your next five years and I'm not even a prophet hello because it's just true the people you surround yourself with are shaping your future someone say check your circle it's important who you are aligning yourself with this is why the scripture over and over again will talk to you about this kind of stuff I mean proverbs chapter 13 verse 20 says walk with the wise and become wise for a companion of fools suffers harm that's good news if you lack wisdom today the scripture says get around people that are wise but look what the second part says it says literally that a companion of fools suffers harm have you ever considered the reason why you're always hurt is because all of your friends are fools my god he's mean check your circle the scripture says in Proverbs go that other scripture you can go to first Corinthians 15:33 says do not be misled so it's like don't like don't sit around and be like I think this is what's going on no way this is maybe what's happening don't you have to come up with theories don't be mislead bad company corrupts good character have you ever stopped to consider the reason why you're never able to finish anything you start it's not because you're not gifted it's not because you're not talented it's not because God hasn't called you the reason why you can't finish it is because you lack character because every time you step out you don't have this stuff it takes to finish yet the only way they're gonna get rid of bad character is you're gonna have to actually go ahead and get rid of bad company the moment you remove bad company you're gonna start getting some good character somebody takes check your circle I'm not this one second Corinthians chapter 6 verse 14 do not be yoked together with unbelievers now I'm not talking about you don't know some people at school that don't know Jesus I'm not talking about we separate from the world the scripture says don't be yoked together with unbelievers for what righteousness and wickedness have in common or what fellowship can light have with darkness it says don't be yoked up now this is like a kind of a weird illustration because like we're not farmers and we don't like live on a farm we live here in Charlotte we go to like the coolest church ever it's amazing but like a yoke is a wooden object that was put on two oxen and this this device was put on their shoulders so that they could plow a straight line when they were farming yet you would never put a strong ox with a weak Ox because if you did they wouldn't go in a straight line they would go in zigzags or at worst they would start going in circles some of you already understand this illustration because you've been coming to youth X now for a couple of years but every time you get back here in the month of July you're like dang and I've been hearing these messages but why is it I'm still in the exact same place maybe it's because you keep joking yourself up to some people you have no business with and so you're going in zig zags you're going in circles but today maybe it's time to check your circle so you can head to your destination I wish I could get a witness on a Thursday morning somebody give God some praise someone say check your circle and this whole premise I'm talking about is not like a Thursday morning talk topical one-off message this is a central theme of God's Word but you need to understand that God is a relational God that literally think about this the first problem in the Bible was not sin it was solitude meaning God created Adam and then he said yo it's not good for man to be alone you ever consider the fact that like Adams walking around with God like you think he would have everything but gods like no no you you need relationship you you need partnership you need people in your life for you to fulfill the calling I have for you and literally like we know the story of like what happens in the garden like he eats the fruit and sin enters the world and what happens when sin enters the world it's not just that they're gonna result in death it's that relationship with God is severed in relationship with each other is severed this is why God sent Jesus to the earth just think about this Jesus was known as the friend of sinners out of all the nicknames he could take on we serve a God who wants friendship with us Jesus when he went to the cross the cross is the most heroic act of friendship history has ever seen for when Jesus died on the cross he wasn't just restoring our vertical relationship with God but also when he died on the cross he was restoring our horizontal relationships with each other he was saying if you follow me I can show you how to have healthy relationships come on if you believe in somebody give God some praise where's I think there's someone's gonna help me really quick where's my man can you come up here oh quick bro what's your name Jared get over here bro you're amazing man make some noise for Jared really quick get up here how do you how oldie 18 18 where you from Charlotte Oh Charlotte you single yes well what's your cell phone number no I'm kidding um Jared okay Jared you look you go to the gym yeah you look strong yeah hop up on this bench liquid here's what I always want to show you the quick Jarrod's gonna hop up here real quick he's the man just up up can you stand up there I'm sorry and just be careful because we don't have insurance and stuff so okay um here's the deal this is what happens a lot of us in friendships is that we get this whole like Savior complex going on that we think we can say people and help people and we can bring people up and so I want to remind you today that you the scripture Jesus said come follow me I'll make you fishers of men our job is to fish it's God's job to catch two totally different things and a lot of us what happens is we come to use X and we get in this atmosphere full of faith and God starts changing us and we start walking on a new path and we start living out purpose and living for our Colleen but what happens if we get back to the school in the fall we're like all right I'm gonna save everybody but like you're pretty strong Jerry I just want to see can you just just pick me up to you can you just pick me up there okay just hold me like a baby I love you all right all right so he's very strong like it's a basic illustration like he can struggle and maybe maybe he could maybe get me up there but if there's two of us down here he's have a hard time but watch this watch how easy it is not you're pretty strong so just try to stay up there but like watch how easy it is for me just of just for me to get Jarrod to come down be careful it's always easier to pull someone down than it is to pull someone up give Jared a big round of applause give Jared a big round of applause you're amazing you're amazing a lot of us today it's a really really simple message we have to check our circle because we keep getting pulled down it's not because God doesn't have a plan for you and it's not because you're not amazing and it's not because you're not gonna change the world it's simply because you got the wrong circle around you and they keep pulling you down I want to take the next 22 minutes and I want us to examine Mark chapter two mark chapter two is a really cool store in the Bible that throughout the years I've found myself preaching the texts but but today I want to take a different different perspective on it the story is about a man who's paralyzed we don't know how he became paralyzed we just know that he's unable to walk and then these four guys one day they come by and they see him and they pick him up and they take him to where Jesus is and he gets saved and he gets radically healed it's a beautiful story yet you've gotta know the context of mark - I think it's important that the thinking in that day is that if you were paralyzed it was because of your sin this is what they thought the theology was that God's mad at you and therefore if you're paralyzed you've done something wrong and because you were seen as a sinner traditionally people that were paralyzed or had disease they weren't allowed to live in the city they were pushed outside of the city they would live oftentimes in the desert of the wilderness and they were allowed to come into the day to beg for money but they were outcasts in society yet I know who this man becomes and I know this man's breakthrough and I know this man is gonna walk and I know he's gonna get saved but I want to take tours concept for a moment and aw Tozer would say you wonder who you actually are not who you say that you are but who you actually are one of the ways you can tell you actually are simply by the company that you keep what was it about this man who was paralyzed that he was able to attract such strength even though he was considered to be an outcast I know what's gonna happen in his life but I think for a lot of us we can relate today with somebody I want to know who you are before your breakthrough I want to know what you did before you got your miracle I want to know how you were living before you found success before you got the desire of your heart because something about this man we can learn today when it comes to getting the right circle around us someone say check your circle the first thing I see about this guy in mark chapter 2 and is that is this man he didn't he didn't tolerate being treated like a victim this is big he did not tolerate being treated like a victim society said you don't belong he didn't believe them this is important because it doesn't really matter what other people believe about you it matters what you believe about yourself this man is being pushed out of the city sanyo you're a sinner you don't belong here you don't get to live in this world so you need to go live out there doing your own thing but something about this man that was different from most people he's like nah nah nah you can say that about me but I'm not gonna believe that about myself see it wasn't because of this man's sin that he was paralyzed it's just called life life is going to happen I wish I can tell you that you're gonna be here today and because you came to use X your entire life is gonna be better and perfect now but it doesn't actually work that way sometimes following Jesus it doesn't get easier it gets harder and the question you have to define today is how are you gonna respond when bad things happen to you that you did not cause because a lot of us when it comes to our circle of friends we would rather be coddled instead of being challenged I am coming down your lane today my son Wyatt I just love this kid he's amazing he's 17 months old right now and he's in swim lessons I've missed kids a prodigy I didn't even know you could take swim lessons at 17 months and he's amazing like he is Michael Phelps watch out Wyatt wesley is on the run he's Aquaman - this kid loves the water and literally every day he's in the walkies in the water we wake up in the morning it was death pooh pooh Dada Dada pooh pooh and he always goes pulling and he puts his knuckles out he goes knuckles you know he wants to knuckles and we swim every day and yesterday we were out in the water and he held his breath for eight seconds I've got 35 year-old men in my Church that can't do that I mean it's kids special and he's swimming and his mom was gone out of town a couple weeks ago in England she was gone for like a week and you know there wasn't much bath time in the Wilkerson home but there was a lot of pool time dad's like yeah the chlorine he'll kill it you know that's that's how I live my life the koi know got it you know so why he's swimming and they had this funny experience with him because that's what you get this he's 17 months of age and he's he's in a pool of water like he's swimming the pool of water and we're sitting on the steps together and all of a sudden the sprinkler system turned on and you know the sprinklers oh and these drops of water started hitting my little boy and when these drops of water started hitting Wyatt he started to freak out it was it was interesting moment we're sitting in a pool of water these been swimming in and now drops of water from the sprinkler are coming and hitting him it's screaming and I'm like Wyatt dude put me in such a baby you know like like what's up you know is I screaming him I want to be honest like of course I took a moment to to coddle my son and oh I love you you know sorry I'm so cute yeah but just I mean just for a moment just just for a moment and then I said get up and I made him walk over the sprinkler hi scrying nice triangle we're gonna go over the sprinkler because I don't want to raise a victim in my house I don't want to raise a little kid that anytime an obstacle comes that he starts being a French to get up we're going to sprinkler then we walked up this pair I said put your hand in the sprinkler and gets his hand as soon as he gets it in he goes ha ha ha because if I'm not careful I'll coddle him instead of challenging him like you do realize how insane this is why you're 17 months and you're swimming in a pool of water and you're gonna cry about some drops of water I'm getting there I just I take my time I want you see this why it doesn't have a problem with water why it has a problem with this thinking about water a lot of you you think you have a problem it's not your problem it's the way you think about your problem it's here it's here because why it has already conquered water the only that's change about the water is the form of the water but last time I checked my Bible said no weapon formed against you shall prosper I can't promise you that the weapon won't form but I can't promise you if you'll make a decision today to stand firm that weapon will not prosper in your life you are not a victim you are more than a conqueror can I get a witness this morning the forum is gonna change but you have to predetermine your response I'm not a victim I don't want to be caught give me some people who will challenge me get some people who won't actually just let me become what my situation is but give me some people who will speak to my future I'm not trying to excuse that some of you in this room have gone through real pain and real tragedy some of you had to crawl yourself just to get into this room today and I commend you and I honor you but I am trying to tell you that your legs can be paralyzed but if you don't get your mind free you're never gonna get past that place see we attract who we are and I look at this man in society would have put him out in the wilderness meaning his proximity would have been around other broken people he would have been around other people of disease and people that are hurt that's who he would have spent the majority of his time with but somehow there was something about him see a lot of us in this room for being honest right now is simply this is like you don't like the people you're hanging out with but instead of like blaming them you ought to blame yourself because we attract who we are and misery loves company but this i something was different about him he said I'm not gonna be treated like a victim I don't want friends who enable me I want some friends who empower me I don't need you to enable my apathy I don't need you to enable my negativity I don't need you to enable my brokenness I don't need you to enable my addictions I don't need you to enable my frustrations you know what I need you to do I need you to empower me I need you to empower me to be more I need you to empower me to get back up I need you to empower me to believe that I can still move forward I do not need your sympathy I need your strength I need your strategies I need you to believe that God is not done working on me yet I'm not a victim I'm a Victoire my current situation is not in charge of my future destination life does not happen to me life is happening for me I am more than a conquerer in Christ Jesus come on somebody if you believe in go ahead and give God some praise come on [Applause] someone say check your circle this man's legs were broken but his mind was free and if your mind is free today you're on the right path to becoming who God has called you to be it wasn't just that he didn't let them treat him like a victim the second thing is is that he he wasn't insecure around stronger people I wish I had time to because this is this is so very very important because I what I'll see is I'll see a lot of people in our generation it they'll conquer a victim mentality but if you're not careful of if you conquer victim mentality if you're not careful it won't result in humility it'll result in pride so there's a lot of people are generous like yeah I'm good I got a dream I'm good make it on my own all me everyday let's go but actually a god dream is not supposed to be carried on your own a God dreams not for a person it's for a people and you need to share the weight with other people around you that you need others to help you carry that thing and accomplish that thing but so many people they start to develop arrogance and their arrogance is like yo I got this all on my own see this man who's paralyzed he could have not had a victim mentality but how many of you know his thinking could have been free but all the positive faith thinking in the world wasn't going to get him to where Jesus was he actually needed some men who had strong legs to take him there and so he was humble enough to say yo you're stronger than me in a category I need your help I need your help I quickly learned when we were launching our church and getting ready to start our church that the only way we're gonna build a church to that's gonna impact the world is that I'm gonna have to get secure with being around people that are stronger than me and smarter than me and and better than me I got to learn how to lead people that are further than me you say but rich how do you do that well I'm reminded of what Paul says as he says his grace is sufficient for me for even when I'm weak he's actually strong that word sufficient an interesting word it means just the right amount meaning that God's grace is just the right amount for your race for your story that you're not called to run my race you're called to run your race and if you'll run your race God has just the right amount of grace for the season that you're in so that even when you feel like you're weak you're actually strong because of him listen to me I want to be as clear as I can if you are intimidated by people stronger than you smarter than you better looking than you wealthier than you taller than you more educated you know I don't know what your list is if you are you will live paralyzed forever you got to start getting good right now reaching up to stronger people if you're the smartest person in your group you need another group if you need another grown us and leave that I'm gonna say you need another group you need to get some people around you that are thinking bigger than you and being better than you and doing more than you that are stretching you and growing you cuz watch this man he goes from having two bad legs but all of a sudden these four guys show up he goes from having two bad legs to have an eight good legs because he had the right people around him come on somebody give God some praise in this place someone say check your circle number three what we can tell about this guy simply by the company that he kept is that we know that he and tolerate being treated like a victim we know he wasn't insecure around stronger people but thirdly this is very very important he surrounded himself with faith he surrounded himself with faith we don't know if he had faith although I could make a case for that but we do know that these guys he got himself around they certainly had faith because how many of you know doesn't matter if you have the right thinking doesn't matter if you've got good strong friends around you the real question is what are they pointing you to where are they taking you to and these four guys they picked this man up and we see that they had faith there's two ways that we see they had faith first is they take them to this place where Jesus is then the scripture says that as Jesus is preaching this house this house is overflowing with people there's no room left sort of looks like elevation Church just a packed place wherever Jesus says I think a crowd should be showing up man and they got there they couldn't get in but but these guys I love them so much they didn't take no for an answer this is always a great sign of faith because many times what happens to us on the faith journeys we step out and when we step out and we face resistance many of us quit but real faith it doesn't stop at no it keeps trying to find a way and the scripture says if they go up on top of this house and they dig a hole in the roof can you get the picture of this Jesus is preaching imagine right now someone gets a jackhammer and starts jackhammering through this roof and they start lowering this man down I mean it's quite the scene she mentioned how messy it is can you imagine how how much noise is making but see this is the truth is that faith that hasn't been tested his faith that can't be trusted great faith keeps pushing great faith keeps believing great faith does not quit it keeps digging holes in the roof and some of you in this room you need to get a revelation that the best way that you can be a good friend is by bringing your friends to Jesus now I love the mess of it I don't want to be called too easy I want to be called too difficult into messy I think if we're gonna get people to Jesus it's gonna be messy man if you come to our church in Miami it's it's just messy I know when Sunday morning starts it's like oh it looks nice but man people show up at 5:45 in the morning 50 people there out of us semi truck pulling out cables it's just messy but everybody's doing what it takes to get their friends to jeez I'll do whatever it takes just to get my friends to Jesus I want to be a part of a messy church I want to be a part of a church that we're ripping roofs off the place to get our friends to Jesus hasn't called us too easy in fact some of you right now in this room you know what your greatest mistake is your greatest mistake is that you keep giving up cuz you're like it's hard like you just got back here last night you're like I don't know man it's just hard it's hard what God's called me to it's it's hard to be a Christian it's it's hard on the faith journey hard if whatever you're doing is hard I would say quit right now give up dude cuz he hasn't called you too hard hard you need to change your vocabulary it's way worse than that it's impossible you don't serve the God of hard you serve the God of impossible and if it's not impossible I'm not quite sure it's a God dream and I'm not quite sure it's the thing that he's called you to do for you serve the God who takes the impossible and he makes it possible I'm not trying to do something hard I need something bigger than that you need something more difficult than that we're called to impossible dreams getting our friends that Jesus will dig and we'll cut and we'll open and we'll get in the mess of it I'm not leaving I'm gonna get you to where Jesus is you can sit down I got five more minutes I promise I'll finish on time it's messy it's messy it's messy it's messy but we know that these guys have faith because they don't give up we can't solve your problem but we know one who can they get this hole in the roof and this guy starts coming down the roof and the second reason why we know they have faith is because Jesus looks up I want you to see this in your Bible and Jesus says doesn't look at the man looks at the friends he says because of their faith someone say their faith your sins are forgiven in that crazy [Music] this is I'm not trying to mess with your theology Jesus says because of their faith your sins are forgiven meaning because of these man's faith these friends the reason why this guy's getting his sins forgiven is because these guys had the faith for him it's kind of weird because when you read that story like if you're anything like me like you're reading it and you're like ok cool Jesus his sins are forgiven I thought you're omnipotent I don't think that's why he's there he he's there because he wants to walk but happen to be know that Jesus he'll always deal with the interior before he deals with the exterior he deals with the spiritual need before he deals with the physical need what good is it to have two good healthy legs but have a broken soul he's not concerned with our projected self and our body is our projected self he's concerned with the actual self who we actually are and so he says your sins are forgiven because guess what this man even if his legs do get healed his body's gonna wear out one day and he will die on the physical sense but because of this moment right here he has now had his soul redeemed and he will spend eternity in heaven and it's the greatest miracle you could ever ever witness yet there was a problem right because all the Pharisees they're the teachers of the law the critics they're like oh yeah oh this is crazy no who does this man think he is forgiving sins doesn't he know that only God can forgive sins you can kind of see Jesus like haha that's who I am but whatever but they were really confused why were they confused because number of the thinking of the day is his legs are broken because he's full of sin so how could he be forgiven and still have broken legs it's not computing it's not they don't understand it there's no context for this now something's wrong here there's no way he could be forgiven but still be lying on his back yet how won't even know the route has to set before the fruit can appear and I pray that we would never be a church or people that get more obsessed with temporary modifications than we do with eternal transformation I pray that we could be a church that we could play the long game with people that even if people's lives haven't fully shifted over in their behavior that we wouldn't stand on the wayside and judge and criticize but rather we would be people that would partner and say we believe the seed of God has been planted in your soul and we're gonna stand with you and water it and believe that God's gonna do a miracle but you gotta love Jesus Jesus like I I'm not gonna always do this but like oh just to prove to you who I am like this is I'm so sick and tired of your criticism like don't you know that's much harder to forgive sins and is to heal the body but just to settle this whole thing right now he says like yell bro get up get off the mat walk out of here and move on dude gets up walks out in front of all of them and the scripture says everyone was amazed and they've never seen anything like this before what does it show us it shows us that our God is able to heal but he's also willing to heal and if he did it back then he can certainly do it again in 2019 don't get me wrong this whole story only one gets glory his name's Jesus only one should impress you his name is Jesus only one should cause you to lift your hands and sing a song and to consider and to think about it's all about Jesus but I think we would lack wisdom if we didn't pause and look at the context that these four friends we don't even know their names but they played a significant part in this man's story for this man we don't know a lot about him but we can certainly tell if tozer is right that who he actually was based upon the company that he kept was he was a guy that did not let the world treat him like a victim he was a guy who reached up and said I'm not gonna be insecure around stronger people and he was a guy whether he had faith or not he said I almost surround myself with faith in fact I want you to look down your row from it I know it's awkward but church should be awkward something I just looked down your row just look down your row yeah look at people it's really weird look in their eyes super weird super creepy make it even creepier you know and I want you to look down your row because I want you to see what faith looks like but that there's faith all around you in here [Applause] but I haven't been preaching to you about check your row I've been preaching about check your circle because this program that we're doing right now is awesome but this is a catalyst for your growth this is a moment every one of us need to have a group because the group turns a row into a circle and it's the circle that's gonna get you and help you in your time of need when you get the right group what happens in life is you might be going through something you might be having some thoughts you might be anxious you might be feeling depressed you might be afraid and all of a sudden you got the right group around you you're like yo dude I'm not doing so well but all of a sudden your group shows up it's like yo we don't know exactly what to do and we ourselves don't actually have the answer but y'all tell you this much we're not gonna let you stay right there we'll pick you up and we're gonna take you to one who does have the answer his name is Jesus Christ author Perfector and finish of the faith check your charcoal I hope you're surrounded by thing it's not enough just to have a road you need a circle you need a circle I'm closing I'm gonna get Jared back up here I'm gonna get my man right here can you come out me my man right here and uh I think you can help me - can you come out me get up real quick J we're gonna close this thing out right jump back up there all right what's y'all's name what's your name Naz oh you're the story [Applause] that was beautiful man thank you for being vulnerable and sharing that and you're a preacher like like your ability to communicate I didn't miss a word I didn't miss a word everyone's worshiping Jesus like okay that's what we do it now I was like yes what's your name bro Caleb what's your name Madison you guys are amazing here's the deal so Jared's back over here hopefully this works I'm very nervous I don't usually use props but everyone so I gotta try it here's what you see if you got a circle I don't know if Jared can get me up to his level but I got a feeling that four friends a circle not just a row a circle real people knowing our names knowing our story being vulnerable being honest I feel like I get the right circle around me I got a feeling that all of you do you think all of you guys could get me up there I like this guy yeah all right let's just see how many y'all believe these guys can all get me up there let's just see if y'all can get up there all right let's go can y'all try Jared you can help too man we gonna need I don't don't I don't wanna fall can you help Matty here we go [Applause] can I preach to you for a moment this summer you don't need another BSS you know what you need you need an sss a faith-filled friend that when you don't have them say don't have the faith for you when you don't have a worship song inside of you don't stand next to you say you don't have to worship alone oh my god and that was a word so many knows my hand hurts my hands cramping up if you made this far far give you boys shout on the comments big JD doghouse out if you're not subscribe subscribe the channel everybody knows that subscribe to are on notifications as well like a life send this message is somebody who needs to hear it that's a great awesome I just came to my head that's up karna stupid every all it keeps you Roman to do is do it did so it

Channel: Elevation YTH

Views: 39,632

Rating: 4.9340658 out of 5

Keywords: elevation youth, elevation yth, elevation church yth, elevation church youth, check your circle, rich wilkerson jr, ythx, ythx19, vous conference, vous youth, youth ministry, student ministry, college ministry, Summer camp, Youth camp, swimming prodigy, sunday service, friend groups, Miami, Kanye West Pastor's, show me your friends, who are your friends, summer camp youth experience, youth summer camp, youth messages, teen best advice, friends are future, future friends

Id: 3j9NixxcGZY

Length: 43min 27sec (2607 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 26 2019