Erwin McManus (Full Message)- Encounter Conference-2019

and it's an honor to be here with you guys tonight as you can tell I am NOT Patrick are Lance but just this week I was telling one of our interns I said all my life I have been Plan B I was telling him this week I said now don't worry about it I said all my life I've been humanity's plan B and I just keep telling me myself that even though I may be Plan B in the way people plan out their life that I'm always God's plan a [Applause] so I don't even know I don't know where I am and but I have heard of the father's house cuz Pastor Dave you guys are making an impact around the world and we're I am so honored to be here with you and so the only reason I tell you that that's because there's some of you here you may feel like you're you're a plan B or you may feel like your life is already on Plan B because you've made some huge mistakes in your life or maybe just because no one else sees the a in you but but I want you to know that you you you're exactly God's plan a for what he created you to do with your life so let's pray just thank God you guys are amazing girl your voice is like off the scale [Applause] and you're singing my daughter's song tremble and it just so cool I'm back there like ironing and and I'm hearing Trumbull like this is so this is the epic all right I know I should probably get to something father I don't I did not expect to be in Vacaville today and I know God you can find it it's just outside of Sacramento and so we're here in California but I also know that I have some dear friends here and god I just thank you for what you're doing because Jesus you came out of Nazareth and no one expected that and you have changed the course of human history from a place that no one else would have put on the map and god I just pray that at a Vacaville the movement of Jesus would be so powerful across the world that that they'd be talking about a place called Vacaville in Europe and in Asia and Russia and in Africa all over the world God in that distant multitude would come from Australia and New Zealand to learn what you're doing here at the father's house and father I know that in this room there are there are so many people who are longing to be chosen by you picked by you to do something that matters in the world and god I just pray that tonight they would have an overwhelming sense that they've already been chosen by you that you've already picked them that maybe they just haven't picked themselves and so god I just pray that tonight you would be overwhelmed by the number of volunteers to say Jesus take my life and do something extraordinary with me use me to do something in the world that wouldn't happen unless I was alive in Jesus we thank you that you would die for us so that we could live so we pray in your in ham amen coach thank God one more time for tonight and you can have a seat now I'm from a church called mosaic and we're right on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard in La Brea so we're in the the heart of Hollywood been there for almost thirty years of my life and it's it's kind of a perfect spot for me because la is full of people who don't even know if God exists they're not even sure if there is a God and and every emotion they have about God is really negative and they for so many them don't even consider Jesus as a real option for life and they're anti religion anti Church and that huge part of what I get to do all the time is to talk to people who are surprised by who God actually is and so I became a person of faith when I was around 20 years old I didn't grow up in church I didn't know anything I didn't know churches existed I'm from a small country called El Salvador and I don't know if you ever heard of it Spanish was my first language I learned English here so excuse me if you can't understand me and what's odd to me is that I'm actually from a country that the name is the Savior that's what El Salvador means now I don't know about other countries but no country has the name like that I don't even know what Australia means but but what I I know that else alvin's the savior so my birth certificate says place of birth the savior and I was born in the capital San Salvador which means holy Savior so my birth certificate says place of birth holy Savior and the Savior and I grew up on a street our house was on the street that was called Gaia descent side of the road which means the street of the holy Savior so I grew up with an address of the street of the holy Savior in the city of the holy saber in the country of the savior of the world and when I was a kid we would go play at a park now I know you couldn't even imagine what the name of that Park was but it used to play at a park in the name of the park was as but a kid that's how the Lord that Mundell which means the park of the savior of the world now I don't know where you were playing but I ain't we're playing on Jesus's part that's where I grew up playing and and what so odd to me is a group playing at the park of the save of the world and lived on the street of the save of the world and in the city of the Saviour of the world in the country of the Saviour of the world but I had no idea who he was and it's always a reminder to me that that we may perceive a person to be so close but they may actually be so far and we may perceive ourselves to be so far but we're actually so close I didn't know how close I was to what my soul was searching for it's almost as if the story was all around me but I could not make sense of it so when I first started hearing about who Jesus was and and began grappling with the reality of his sacrifice on the cross first 2,000 years ago I'm trying to make sense of all of this it was almost overwhelming to me and then when someone actually gave me a Bible I didn't even know there were Bibles I thought there might be like one Bible in the world and it was locked in the Vatican or stolen by Indiana Jones I I knew that there was an epic story around the Bible but I didn't know that everyone could have a Bible and and so when I began reading the scriptures I was really surprised I find a lot of you guys if you grew up in church you just pretend you understand the Bible because you don't want to admit you don't understand it yet you ever just pretend because everyone else is pretending you're not gonna be the one person that says I don't get that or do you ever read the Bible you go really see I still have that mindset because when I opened up the Bible is the first time I was like whoa I don't know my experience isn't like that and so there's a particular place in the scriptures I want to kind of go to because I've always tried to figure out what does it mean to be human I'm a part of a community called Ted and Ted stands for Technology Entertainment and design at or if you guys familiar with the TED Talks so I've been to like 20 TED conferences I'm in a part of a community for over a decade and all over the world with them and I kept hearing all these world-class speakers talk about but everything you can imagine from flowers to insects to bacteria and in fact what's incredible to me is that that you're around these people who are all experts so I wasn't typed in a particular species or just one manifestation of a flower font and and I'm gonna go how do you spend your whole life studying one thing and whenever people would come up to me because they're always you know you're always talking to people and and and and they I would say what do you do and they say oh you know I whatever I cured polio or you know or you know I won an Academy Award for this movie and and it would make me really anxious because they would say to me finally what do you do and I didn't know what to say because I was a fashion designer and it was a filmmaker and it worked futurist but I couldn't really say that because you can't say you're a fashion designer when like I don't know Ralph Lauren might be there or you can't say you're a filmmaker when Steven Spielberg is there and so you can't say you're a writer when Stephen King is there so I was like I don't really get a career choice here and and I didn't want to see him a pastor because most of the people at Ted are atheists and if you say you're a pastor it's like saying hi I'm a cannibal do you want to have lunch and just so it was really hard and and my first moment at Ted I remember I went to Africa to experience Ted because I kept applying the Ted in the US but they never accepted me because I didn't qualify and and I applied a second time and they turned me down again and I applied a third time and it kept changing my story because I'm a writer and I just couldn't get into Ted oh so frustrated because my friend said you need to get into Ted do this before there were TED talks it was all private and exclusive and I wanted to be in the room with the brightest minds in the world but you have to do something special to get in so I couldn't get in and and then they did this Ted in Arusha Tanzania and I had this thought I can get in over there because fewer people will go to Africa and if they have fewer applicants I'll become more attractive see because the I'm a Latino so you can lock the door but I will find a window and inside I found my way and I applied the Teddy nourishes hands in the eye and I got accepted I was so excited but now my wife's like okay now you have to get to Africa and I said I'll get there I'll get there and so I went to South Africa to go to Tanzania and when I got the South Africa they had a notice you can't go into Tanzania because they have yellow fever and if you don't have yellow fever shots you can't go into you know you can go into Tanzania but you can't come back out I thought that's next week's problem so I just got on a plane flew ins and hands in the air without any vaccinations and figured if I'm gonna get yellow fever I'm gonna get yellow fever so I went there and I lost my luggage and so I'm going to Ted and I have no clothes and you know how when you look to a new space you want I like to feel good about yourself and and I and I had the same clothes for like five days and so my first moment at Ted I walk in and my kids are on the phone because I'm I'm a social introvert and I'm really socially awkward and my kids are coaching me on the phone my son the errands like dad you've wanted to be a part of this community now now don't blow this moment make friends talk to people and my daughter is like giving me pep talks dad you're likable people will like you people want to meet you you need to get in there and and as I'm walking through and they literally said to me don't go hide in the corner which is where I like and they said don't just grab something to drink and hide the quarter in what corner and watch people and wish that you could have a conversation and my daughter says dad make eye contact make eye contact that's that's hard because if it's not enough it doesn't work if it's too much it's really creepy and and so I I don't know how that exactly plays out and then my daughter says something I'll never forget you said dad look for someone who looks like they need a friend more than you am I really that needy and so I developed a better strategy I looked for the kindest person in the room because one things I've learned being a part of the church is that kind people can't turn down awkward people they don't know how they just sure I'll be your friend and you're sitting right next oh right now add and so I saw this woman she was older than most of the people there and she was getting a line getting food so I got right behind her and I and I said hi my name is Irwin and she told me her name and I said this is my first TED what about you and she said it was her first TED I said they have anyone to to have lunch with she said no and I said you want to eat together yes we set this table that seated like 10 people and it was like human contact I was so excited I had an eight other people set with us right away for the next hour me and her just talked and everyone listened but have you ever talked to someone that all they want to talk about is what they want to talk about and says no matter what you talk about they always go back to what they talked about it was like that the whole time you know like here you could say you know I don't know what's going on with our country and you're like yeah I don't know what to happen to the Kings you know you can I get it you say oh man my you know my girlfriend you know yeah she's not she's not really committed to me I don't I don't know yeah I I don't know if the Kings are coming to the Sacramento no matter what you talk about they always go back you know to that subject then no matter what I talked about she just kept talking about chimpanzees what job that was really strange and and I talked about you know human relations who you know chimpanzees have relationships and I said well you know there's this huge like you know cultural dilemma and in China and she was you know chimpanzees have these kind of complex cultural dilemmas and no matter what I talked about she just always good to go back to chimpanzees which was fine for about five minutes but I ran out of everything I knew about gems and after about an hour I looked her nice said Jane can I ask you a question because I knew there were only two women in the world who could know this much about chimpanzees what was the name Jane and she was married to Tarzan and I didn't think she'd be there and and the other one is a woman named Jane Goodall and I looked her I said Jane are you Jane Goodall and she goes of course I am and I said that explains this whole chimpanzee thing and and this happened time after time after time after time and I finally went to my wife and I said I need a species I don't have a species everybody has a species I'm embarrassed I don't I don't have a species at it and and so finally I realized I've been studying a particular species all my life they're called humans and I've been a human almost all my life and so I have both personal and objective experience with humans and and I started wondering what makes humans different than every other species what makes you different then or an antelope what makes you different than a polar bear or a platypus because you see we can see a lot of human characteristics and animals but what makes a human different than every other species and I want to take you to a passage of scripture that I don't think you've ever seen from this particular perspective but I want us to take a moment and ask the question what does it mean to be created in the image of God and Hebrews chapter 11 verses 1 through 6 but I'm gonna start with 6 was I like starting with the end and working my way backwards in verse 6 it says and without faith it is impossible to please God because anyone who constantly must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him and when I first read this I thought this was incredibly unfair of God I know I'm not supposed to say that but do you ever be anything the Bible you think why let us go back it says again without faith it is impossible to please God I think that's kind of unfair do you know if there's no other species on this planet that's help to that standard only humans are required to have faith in order to please God and then likewise ammon don't have to live by faith they just fight their way upstream to give birth to the next generation then they die it isn't required faith just hard work I mean that there's no other species I mean kangaroos they live on that back they carry their young in a pouch with massive feet but they don't need faith to survive rattlesnakes don't need faith polar bears with all climate change don't need faith there's no species on this planet that is required to have faith except for humans so why are humans required to have faith with no other species on this planet is required by God to have faith and they please God just the way they are think about this spiders please God just the way they are without faith I somehow think that's wrong rats somehow please God without faith so why do humans have to have faith to please God well first of all I need to have you understand that everything God creates has intention see God creates everything with intention and we already know as we understand the environment that if you eliminate one species it affects the entire ecosystem that even insects that we thought were incidental actually have value to the whole because God has created everything in the universe with intention including human beings but we are the creatures created with the highest intention but we're the only species that can actually live against our intention so every other species whichever one they are will actually live out the intention God has for them but humans could actually violate the purpose for which they were created and in fact on top of that the reason we have to have faith to please God is that the faith is some kind of magical power that makes you superhuman it's not that faith has the capacity when activated to move mountains although it does what makes faith essential is that faith makes us human again see the reason humans need faith to please God is that we're the only species living beneath our intention and so we've learned how to live a sub human life and I think a lot of us say you know ie Idol of superheroes my wife hates superhero movies I loved every single superhero movie I mean I grew up on Marvel in DC I grew up with with daredevil and Superman and Batman I grew up with with the x-men I cooked all is it and before that I read every single mythology book in the library of the Roman the Norse the Greek and they were just superheroes before our time and a part of the reason we tell these stories is that we somehow have the sense that we as human beings are living beneath our god-given capacity we know there's something inside of us it's supposed to be awakened that's supposed to come out of us but we don't know how to get to it so god says without faith it is impossible to please God because without faith you live a life beneath your intention you live a life that is not fully human and we have a language for that isn't it odd ever heard someone say that that was really inhumane isn't that odd that a human can do something that's called inhumane I mean you ever you ever watched national Geographics you ever seen like a tiger go after an antelope just grabs it by the throat shakes it and tears at the pieces and eats it Lots robbing no one ever goes that's in the animal right they go what an awesome tiger you ever seen a killer whale eat a seal they put it in its mouth but they don't kill it they throw it in there and the seal comes flying but it's her swimming and the killer whale just slowly comes up puts it in its mouth so delicately so gently throws it there and it comes flying back picture and starts swimming away and this goes there playing a game but the seal doesn't want to play and when the seal is so exhausted it could no longer play then the killer whale kills it and it's it's a dangerous world out there and we don't go well that's an animal we don't think why is that killer whale evil when you get bitten by a mosquito you may slap it and destroy it but you don't think that's the devil instead get behind me mosquito because that's doing what it's supposed to do but you see when human beings live beneath our intention that we instinctively know it's inhumane because with human beings begin to live like animals we are violating the image of God in us so I want to talk to you for a few minutes about what it looks like to become human again when faith fills us again and so we have to go back up the verses 1 and 2 it says now faith is confidence and what we do not and what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see all right let's not going any further does that make sense to you okay see when I read that and I measure that against my life I go not really see that's not really the life I have you know what I discovered we have more confidence in the life we have than the life we hope for see here it says faith is confidence in what we hope for but my life experience is that we have so much more confidence in what we have and in fact we lack confidence and what we hope for in fact most of the bad decisions we make in our lives are because we don't have confidence what we hope for and we have too much confidence and what we have and so there's a shift it says that faith actually shifts us it moves us from confidence and what we have to confidence and what we hope for now how does that change you and here's the curious thing what you have is in the present but what you hope for is in the future and in fact hope only exists in the future have you ever hope for something and then you got it see what the Scriptures actually tell us is when you hope for something and you get it it's the longer source of hope now some of you your hope is facing backwards your hope is in the past and that's called regret see when you're living with regret it's because your hope is in the past which you cannot change past that some year they're trying to fix the passage cannot fix the past but you can create a different future hope is this unique ingredient that only lives in the future see human beings are supposed to be connected to the future we are future creatures I have a dog and my dog is really lazy unambitious my dog is not driven by any dreams or aspirations my dog is a lab and she's never woken up once saying I wish that were a husky there's not one day she goes I'm gonna be a German Shepherd and in fact my wife thought there was something wrong with her dog because all she does is sleep and eat she goes I think she's like sick because she's not sick she's a dog and she lives in the present you know the crazy thing about dog you can forget to feed your dog and it doesn't remember all right you've noticed that you you can neglect your dog and the day you're there they just treat you just like you're awesome don't you just wish humans were like that they don't remember what you did yesterday see animals live in the present but humans are supposed to actually live in the future from the present so you're supposed to be connected to the future but here's part the problem is it that we followers of Jesus don't really understand our relationship with the future I hear a lot of Christians they say things like well you know if God wants it to happen it'll happen you ever hear that well you know if it's God's will it's gonna happen we actually treat the future like it's magic like we can't do anything about it like we have no effect on the future and in fact we think the future is only God's domain hey wait a minute window gods the god of the future God is the one who creates the future has ever occurred to you that God created you to create the future now I've been doing some research and my kids think I'm a little too fixated on animals but but you know beavers that that beavers out here say I feel like we should spend more time thinking about beavers because beavers have one occupation they build dams that's it it's like multi-generational they don't get other options like when I grow up if you're a beaver like I want to build dams you never think I don't know I don't know if I want to build dams i I want to be a dancer like it doesn't work like that you know there there there's never been a beaver who has had an identity crisis what do I do well maybe one beaver but but not a but the only beaver they could actually think about who they want to be is the human one see beavers are instinctively created to build dams and be really awesome if we went out and found all these beavers they're building this dam but there's like this one like hipster Beatle beaver that is like building a bridge right it would be kind of cool like I don't want to divide I want to unite you know okay hey he's so confusing cuz this dad would be like I told you you were coddling him treating him like an otter hahaha and his mom's like it's just a phase it's just a phase he'll come back he'll build the aunt and his his granddad's like doesn't even get it like that's the worst damn I've ever seen it can't hold water is it sea beavers cannot reimagine themselves but humans can there are worms that creates silk I used to be a fashion designer I think it's so cool that there's a worm that creates a product we wear but silkworms never decided to make silk they can't get up one day go you know I'm going polyester so firms create silk because that's what the created to create and once you understand something that humans have been designed in the unique way in the same way that that bees create hives and ant creat colonies humans create futures but you creep future so naturally you don't even understand you don't even see that you're creating futures every time you make a choice you're creating a future it may be a future you don't want but you're designed to create so the question is not whether you will create a future it's what kind of future you'll create but we don't understand that relationship to the future because we've been living subhuman lives and so we act as if we're trapped in time and space and we hope that somehow God will create a future we long for and we keep saying God do something God do something and got shouting from attorney I did do something I created you you do something and once you hear me I don't care if you're 14 or 2484 if you're a human being you're created to create you're designed by God and you need to understand the power of your choices you ever been around someone who who says something like um I don't know how this happened to me you were there the whole time you're the only one who was there the whole time [Applause] you ever found yourself living a life done this is not the life I expected but it is the life you chose it is the life he created and you may be here going but I didn't create this life you don't understand I was born into the world with massive disadvantages and and then there's there's abuse and there was pain and and you don't understand the life I have is not the life I've chosen and I understand exactly what you say see what the problem is that we don't live disconnected from each other you're making choices right now that will hurt or heal someone else and some of you've been wounded and some of you were broken and some of you are damaged because of the choices other people made and so you had to live in the future they created but is this what I want you to know you don't have to live in the world they created you have the power to create new world in a new future right now see what space does is it shifts you from having confidence what you have to having confidence of what you hope for if some of you late let's just figure this out like you ever you ever you ever been around like a girlfriend who's dating a jerk huh she's like he used to be so attentive I used to pick me up early he paid for the meals he'd bring me flowers he was like so amazing now he just he doesn't even call he doesn't show up he says he's coming five hours later he shows up and I think he's I think he's texting this other girl and all your girlfriend's like well why don't you just break up with him won't you dump them like I can't use my man right you know and let me let me tell you why you're gonna end up at the wrong guy cuz you have more confidence in what you have than what you hope for and I meet people all the time and we have jobs they hate and they complain about their boss all the time they complain about the job all the time and in fact I I know a lot of people who have the job their parents wanted them to have and they hate their life because they're living their parents life not their own I'm 60 I'm allowed to say that now see and and you're gonna end up in a job you hate because you have more confidence in the job you have in the job you hope for and I meet people all the time who hate their life yeah I I've experienced that the pain of people I love and their lives I've seen an epidemic of suicide and for every friend I have who did and their life I have so many who tried and failed because I can't imagine one reason to get up tomorrow and love you know what is driving me just mad that me crazy that rather than ending your life you don't choose a different one see if you hate your life you have the power to choose a new life but but here's the dangerous thing you might have more confidence in the life you have then the life you hope for because without faith you can't pivot from what you have than what you hope for but when you have faith you become a creature of the future you know that the future is waiting to be created the future is waiting for the person who has the courage to create it you were imagined to imagine you're created to create you are both the work of art and an artist at work do you know what's inside of you Oh bet that goes on not we're not making it very far it says now faith is confidence what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see I have more sure to what I see than what I don't see how about you in fact if I don't pay attention all I have assurance in is what I see and not what I don't see but it says what faith does just the weight moves us from having confidence that we have the confidence in what we hope for it moves us from having confidence what we see to confidence and what is unseen and so in the same way that we're creatures are designed by God to be connected to the future we're also supposed to be this creation who knows how to live in the invisible so you're not supposed to be trapped by the material world what you see is not everything there is and in fact what you see is the smallest part of the resource God has for your life but if you only have assurance of what you see you will actually never live the light that creed you live because faith opens up endless resources that are invisible to those who do that have faith I I thought okay wait a minute he goes on he explains verse 3 by faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command okay now he's talking about God I thought I liked it when he's talking about us now he's talking about God he says so that what was seen so what is seen was not made out of what was visible now why does he go back to creation he's not trying to teach us something about God he's actually trying to teach us something about us he says now we know this by faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command so that what is seen was not made of what was visible now this is what science does I love science science says everything came out of something and that something came out of nothing but everything has to come out of something except for that first something it came out of nothing which is really something and then people who believe in Jesus believed in God go that's so ridiculous this is what we believe everything comes out of something and that something came out of nothing but God was there than nothing and he created out of the nothing something with from which we have everything so we're saying the same thing that the Atheist is saying except we're saying God was there but you want to know what's really interesting neither one of those positions are the biblical position the Bible says something different which i think is kind of important see the Bible does not say that everything came comes out of something that something comes out of nothing Bible says something different it says we understand that the universe was formed at God's command so that wood is seen everything was not made out of what was visible see the Bible is not saying everything came out it came out of something and something came out of nothing the Bible saying everything came out of something and that's something that his visible came out of something that was invisible now something being invisible is different than something not existing in this room there's oxygen it's not visible but it exists see we know it's here because it actually gives us life we would know the moment it was gone so even though it's invisible it is real and what the scriptures are actually telling us is God created everything that is visible that which was invisible so then I go what is the invisible the God created the visible that's what I want to know years ago I wrote a book for the first book ever wrote the subtitle was called becoming the people God dreams of and my publisher a Christian publisher said you can't use that and I said why and I said because God doesn't dream I said hey I think he does there you go no he doesn't know I'm sure he does and you go no no God does the dreamer says all right so you're saying that we can do something God can't do because we dream and if God can't dream then we have a power God doesn't have and that doesn't work for me and and then they came back with this it doesn't matter if God can dream Christians don't believe it can dream so you can't use that so I changed it to becoming the people God has in mind just little shift you know what God has in mind dreams now listen see what the Scriptures actually tell us that everything that is visible came out of that which is invisible see what was invisible were the dreams of God God imagined the universe God dreamed all this up it was in God's invisible arena before he spoke it into existence in the visible arena here's what's crazy God has created you in His image with the same ability human beings have a superpower we materialize the invisible stay with me we have assurance and things not seen you ever had a dream a vision if you had a an ambition a passion you ever seen something that the world so desperately needed that you had to create it do you realize that human history is the awakening of the human imagination everything in this room is the manifestation of someone's imagination I'm holding a microphone that did not exist at one time but someone imagined this tool that could amplify a voice it did not exist except inside of someone's imagination and they materialize it into reality this is always light but someone imagined they could capture light here we are we can't even move at the speed of light but we took quite captive imagine that my friend Jerry imagined these shoes I'm living inside of the imagination of my friend you don't realize that right now you're living inside of someone's imagination see hundreds of years ago for better or worse with all their faults and flaws a group of people imagined this nation it's still working itself out but we're living inside of the imagination of Jefferson and Adams and Hamilton and in fact somewhere in the mid 60s there is a young man who stood on a platform they Martin Luther King jr. and he said I have a dream imagine that a human being do you know we're the only species that gets up and says I have a dream no other species has a dream like this he says I have a dream right and he dreamed that one day in this land a man would not be measured by the color of his skin but the content of his character and do you realize wherever you stand politically at the moment that Barack Obama took that oath of office had became the president of the United States he was literally walking into the imagination and dreams of Martin Luther King jr. see we're all living inside of Steve Jobs imagination some of your more affected by him right now than by me and we've now created a tool that can take the human imagination and materialize it for the world to see that's called the Internet human beings have this unique capacity to imagine what does not exist and create it to make it reality and I hope you're paying attention to this because throughout human history most of the individuals who tried to force their imagination of us became humanity's nightmares and good people sit around and go I hope God does something the church goes around saying man I hope God fixes this I hope God ends it all soon and we're hiding inside of her imaginations rather than creating what we can imagine when I was 12 years old I am I was put into a psychiatric chair I had nightmares for like five years in row and I had dark dark Amish dreams and nightmares that just ate me up inside and I had a lot of effects from that and one day I walked in my mom and stepdad we're talking about me and saying they need to send me to a psychiatrist and I freaked out I started screaming I'm not crazy I'm not crazy I'm not crazy that I had my first moment of self-awareness and I realized I look crazy and so I looked at them I said they were like you don't have to go you don't have to go I said no I want to go I want to go I wanna know I wanna know I want to know if I'm crazy and the thing is that if you're crazy just like really never know and I don't know if I'm crazy I just know that crazy works because what was happening is that I was disappearing inside of my imaginary world because the world around me was too painful and I didn't feel equipped for it it had to make a decision one day I'm either gonna use my imagination to hide from the world around me or I'm gonna use my imagination to create the world we all desperately need so I was at Columbia University and I didn't know as a debate but it was a debate between a scientist at a humanists and me and I felt so sad for God being represented by me and the event was called was on what can be known which I thought was a huge topic and the scientist he was the senior scientist he said what can be known as what can be empirically proven I thought that's good I agree and then the humanist who was a Content philosopher said what can be known as human actions thought that's good too and they read their opening statements I did not know there would be opening statements they're reading their opening statements and it's my turn and after I quietly apologized to Jesus I I said you know what can be known is I should have been better prepared but I'm not an expert on knowing I'm kind of more an expert on what is unknown and what we can't explain that we know it's a fact humans are so layered we know things we don't even know how we know I know that two plus two equals four and I know there's green there's blue but I know my wife Kim in LA loves me and they're not all the same kind of knowing there are different layers of knowing is it possible that in all those layers of knowing there's there's a knowing that goes beyond knowing where we're supposed to meet the creator of the universe and know him and he knows us and and we had this long debate conversation dialogue and at the end they had questions and answers on these little cards and it's like 500 questions I think for me and then one for the scientists and one for the humanists and I think that the Columbia faculty and students were curious to talk to a person who believed in God still and I had a question I'll never forget this was the question when you were a child you had imaginary friends Santa Claus the tooth fairy and God why did you get rid of your other imaginary friends and keep God isn't that a great question that's a great question to be asked without any advance warning in front of 600 people at an Ivy League school thank you God for this moment yeah this is awesome oh man you know it's just not that long before that my wife and I took a vacation to Ireland and we drove around the country for a few days and after three days of having the most awesome time in my life my wife screamed I can't take this anymore I got really nervous so take take take take take what she was I can't I can't do this anymore I thought oh no this is where it's all ending in Ireland and and I said do what do what like babe traveled the world with me the guy who loves you you know and she goes you haven't said one word for three days she was I can't take this I need a conversation you have to have a conversation now I'm a very like introverted person and and I said well honey we've been married for 20 years at that time and I said you and the kids have been talking for like 20 years I just been listening this is the way it was before we're married and how it's like it's the way it is now and uh that shows are you gonna have to change because I need you to have a conversation I said that I have been for three days I've been talking to all my imaginary friends and I said I didn't know you wanted to join us all you had to do was ask can't so when they asked that question at Columbia University about giving up my imaginary friends I answered it like this I said you clearly don't know me if you think I've given up my imaginary friends they're the only friends I have I'm keeping them that you know me I know them I'm safe with them and I said but you're right you know I I didn't keep Santa Claus I didn't keep the Tooth Fairy and it didn't keep the giant rabbit who hid in my closet and but I didn't really have God as an imaginary friend he was an occasional visitor but it didn't really know him like I knew Santa Claus in the tooth fairy I said but here's the thing just guess you have imaginary friends who did not exist doesn't mean there isn't a friend who created the imagination who does exist said in fact if there is a God then the imagination makes perfect sense because it's the only place God could meet you to share his dreams with you to whisper but you cannot see you or imagine it's the playground of God and I said you know when my son was a little boy he wouldn't eat his vegetables but he would sit in the backyard and eat dirt then my wife would put the food in front of him and you wouldn't eat it and then he'd go in the backyard and eat rocks and one day I said that my wife came I said honey if he noticed that our son will eat dirt and rocks but he will not touch your cooking that didn't go well I still don't know why but she was worried trying to say no I'm not not the same evening I'm just saying I have a strategy she was what's that and I said I think we ought to just throw the food in the backyard and let him play and she said you should you should not be a parent and I told the students at Columbia and the faculty you know just because my son couldn't distinguish between vegetables and rocks between it was good for him and not good for him we didn't give up on eating we just helped him learn to eat the things that made him healthy and strong to spit out the things that would hurt him she just because you had imaginary friends when you're a child you don't give up on the imagination because it's the imagination that makes us different than every other species because you see I want to remind you one more time where you come from matters you were imagined to imagine you're created to create I hope you can see it you are a work of art but you're also an artist at work the God created all that is visible out of that which was invisible but real because the dreams of God they are us I don't know if anyone's told you lately but God's not just dreaming about you God dreamed you and he's just trying to reclaim the dream he created you to live and maybe you're here and you've never crossed that line of faith and trusted Jesus with your life maybe you've never understood why do you need God why do you need Jesus in your life and I want to know the most beautiful reason is because God is dreaming about you and he's imagining you and he is seeing a future that you will never be able to see without him and when you open up your life to him God steps into the space of your soul and he begins to whisper to you his dreams for you and he begins to show you his imagination for you and you begin to see the world around you through the eyes of God and you begin to see the beauty and the wonder of life and you begin to see the power and capacity within you and you begin to see yourself differently and oh by the way there's a strange phenomenon called phantom pain if you lose an arm you imagine having that arm for years and years and years even though it's gone see right now the some of you and you may be depressed and maybe you're anxious and maybe you're afraid do you know you can't be depressed if you can't imagine a better life you can't be anxious if you can't imagine a better you you cannot be disappointed or discouraged if you can't imagine that things could be better but God has whispered into your soul you're not supposed to live like this your life is supposed to be more than this you're created for more than this I want you to know all that depression and all that anxiety and all that stress and all that fear that's just a phantom pain of the soul letting you know you were never intended to settle for less there's so much to be [Music]

Channel: TFH Youth

Views: 10,932

Rating: 4.9033818 out of 5

Keywords: Church, Bible, Jesus, The Father's House, Youth, Rally, Encounter, Encounter Conference, Vacaville, Erwin McManus, Mosaic, Mosiac MSC

Id: oxui5BbeYpQ

Length: 52min 31sec (3151 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 20 2019