Handling Pressure - Pastor Holly Wagner

[Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] what's up everyone welcome to the live church online we're so glad that you're tuning in with us for sunday services come on no place i know that i'd rather be no place you'd rather be you picked a great day to tune in my name is kristen and my name is allison and right now we are in what we call pre-service and pre-service is where we hang out before the actual service have a bit of fun tell you what's going on in church life is going to be an amazing service today we're so excited so hey make sure you limit all distractions and stay throughout the entire service so you don't miss anything that god has for you yeah it's going to be a great service we got pastor holly wagner with us ladies if you caught her on zoey night you know you are in for a treat she preached an amazing message last night and she's going to be with us all morning long so make sure that you grab your bibles and notebooks make sure you limit all distractions and you get ready to just lean in to all of service today and while you're getting ready we want to make sure that you are letting somebody in your world know that church is happening so if whether you're on facebook or youtube jump on click that arrow button and share this service you know we talk about this every week and it's one of the things that we'll always ask you to do because when you share this service you're inviting somebody to join you for church and social media has never made it easier to invite someone to church with you and the cool thing about it is that your share could change someone's life we hear it all the time that people tune into services they make a fresh start with god and their lives are impacted because somebody shared it to their facebook feed or somebody texted it out so take a moment share this service it's going to be an amazing time and you know while you're sharing this service why don't you go ahead and comment in the chat we're going to have the chats pulled up in just a bit doing shout outs but hey we want to know where you're watching from where you are from where your family is from so make sure you say hello let us know where you're watching from guys it's going to be i'm really excited about church we got pastor holly wagner today bringing the word she was amazing over zoe knight so you're not gonna want to miss today but hey make sure you say hello yeah say hello it's a great way to build community you know we treat our chat like a virtual lobby you can see all these people behind us here at our houston levee location they're they're chatting and everything and i love that our online family does that with our chats you know you can say hello you can meet people who are in your community and it helps really build community within our online family because that's what we are we're one big family and if you've been a part of the life church online and you want to build that community where you're at we want you to know that life church socials is a way to do that really socials is an opportunity for people to gather it together in person to engage with the life church online so we actually have two socials that happen um every month it's one of them is in nashville tennessee so about three hours away from us here in memphis and another one is in tipton county tennessee but um if you are in either one of those areas you can scan that qr code that was on the screen or click the link that is in the chats and you can actually join a social near you and hey maybe you're not near a physical location or either one of those socials we want you to consider leading a life church weekend social so you can also do that by clicking on that link but what better way to really build community than saying hey i'm not near a life church location i'm not near a live church social that's already started so i'm going to be the one right who starts building community in my area so click on that link sign up to either join or lead a live church social today hey and not only can you get connected through socials but you can also get connected through discovery online i actually did my discovery experience online and it was absolutely incredible but it is a totally virtual experience you can do it from the comfort of your home and discovery is basically a way for you to know more about who we are as a church but also learn more about yourself there are different personality tests spiritual gift tests and assessments that you can take and it was absolutely it was mind-blowing to me how much i learned about myself through taking that course so there's gonna be a link that comes up in the chat and a qr code as well for you to scan so you can sign up for that you may be wondering like when well how easy is this to sign up hey it's as simple as a click of a button it's going to be amazing it's another way for you to get connected so make sure that you sign up for discovery today yeah well i think it's time to do some shout outs i love this part because we get to shout out some of our online family so if you haven't let us know where you're watching from take a second do it right now i've got facebook pulled up allison's got youtube allison who do we have on youtube with us this morning you know what we got vernon thompson we got bobby johnson bobby and janice they're watching from national harbor maryland we see you guys almost every weekend so we are so happy to see you this weekend we got kenya williams johnson we got bridget de beau from arkansas i know we got titan from caryaville we got pastor caitlin in the chat we got a lot of people in the chat this morning pastor katelyn's in the chat on youtube and she's in the chat on facebook she is everywhere my new definition of double dipping she's not only going to double dip the services but she's going to double dip the check the virtual stream she's watching let's see on facebook i've got laura i've got kashundra she said that zoe knight was amazing yeah i love it and hey shout out if you are subscribed to our youtube channel you can actually go back and watch zoe knight if you did not get to see it maybe for whatever reason you can actually re-watch it or if you want to just watch the message again but awesome we've got dawn we've got tammy let's see we've got let's see we've got kiera kara hey girl look we're gonna give the zoe the zoey verb we got um pastor parker he said allison all the way from new york last week he checked me because i haven't changed my last name i got married but i'm gonna change that pastor parker so it's good to see you in the chat but i love it guys we got some exciting things coming up within the life of our church serve saturday is next weekend next saturday october 9 10 a.m we have so many different opportunities as an online campus that you can sign up for and there's actually going to be a video that comes up right now and it will show you how to sign up so all you have to do is go to our live church website click locations scroll down until you see the online canvas you're going to click the online campus scroll down again until you see online outreach then you hit sign up as soon as you hit sign up there's going to be another screen that comes up you can find an opportunity we have virtual opportunities in-person opportunities our theme this year is actually clean your streets so we're going to be partnering with a local fire station in the city of memphis cleaning our streets and we're also going to be delivering lunch to firefighters and paramedics so make sure that you sign up today we love to serve as a church it's our passion so hey why don't you join in with us on that serve saturday fun yes so it's gonna be so much fun i know i'm gonna be here in memphis so make sure you sign up today and you guys know that we love some good pre-service fun so much fun i mean we do our team works really hard to make sure that we've got some fun segments where you can join in and today's is pretty fun um almost someone would say it was funny look she's already laughing she's already laughing we're gonna we're gonna play a little game called who gets the last laugh so how this is gonna work is alison and i have jokes that we're actually going to tell each other and we're going to see who gets the last laughs it will probably be her because i laugh at almost everything but we want you to play along so if you think one of our jokes is funny put some emojis in the chat if you've got a joke put it in the chat so we can see what you're saying we love to laugh here at the live church online so let's get started alice i'm gonna let you go first i'm gonna go first because i know i'm a win i'm real competitive y'all so okay r.i.p boil water you will be missed i'm trying really hard not to laugh so she doesn't wait that's you laughing at yourself cause it was funny m-i-s-t you go yeah m-i-s-t i got it all right parallel lines have so much in common it's a shame they'll never meet [Applause] do y'all get that do you get it yes i get it wait say that one more time parallel lines have so much in common it's a shame they'll never meet because they never okay i get it i get it now okay sorry y'all take me a little minute to get some of these jokes okay where did noah keep his bees like his b-e-s his b's yep i don't know in the archives [Applause] the arc high a-r all right i'm losing sorry all right um did you know jesus drove a honda but didn't talk about it [Applause] john 12 49 says for i did not speak of my own accord i you know you know what y'all saying in the chat man said the parallel lines is funny i didn't get it deidre i i really didn't get it all right we're gonna do a couple more i went to a wedding where two satellite dishes got married the ceremony wasn't that great but the reception was amazing oh my gosh you know what on that note we gonna call it a day guys weird i won i but y'all we are going to jump into pre-service make sure you are sharing this service engaging in the chat it is going to be an amazing day we can't wait to see you back here in just a little bit let's go ahead and jump into service [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] good morning everybody come on let's all stand up on our feet we're going to worship today [Music] you can take my morning turning into dancing lord take a broken vessel put it back together lord you can take my scars and [Music] that's just what your goodness does the more singers out today sing you make all things [Music] [Music] [Music] here we go [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] change [Music] [Music] are you glad about it this morning [Music] is [Applause] [Music] [Music] with everything [Music] thank you god you make all things beautiful jesus you make all things [Applause] [Music] [Music] wanting a [Music] but [Music] [Music] he picked me up and turned he changed [Music] [Music] deny what i've seen i got no choice but to believe my doubts are burning yes they are like ashes there's no plan i stay oh you ain't welcome here come on [Music] oh [Music] i thank god [Music] i [Music] is [Music] are you glad to be free today [Music] i am [Music] foreign [Music] come on if you're thinking for salvation [Music] come on [Music] [Music] come on god so good to us are you thankful today he's so good he loves us so much with an everlasting life thank you [Music] i'll never be more loved [Music] it doesn't take a trophy to make you [Music] oh [Music] so i wouldn't drown [Music] you are [Music] [Applause] [Music] forever [Music] on the top i can see so clear when it's on to stay by my side when the sun goes down [Music] oh [Music] [Music] forever [Music] i know who i am i know what you've spoken to me i'm already [Music] [Music] [Applause] is oh [Music] is is [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so i am [Music] [Music] [Applause] me [Music] and if he trusts is [Music] is [Music] how [Applause] [Music] you are [Music] come on let's give it up for a god who provides for us takes care of us good morning everybody come on who's glad to be in church today on beautiful sunday morning a big welcome to all of our locations we're all connected together for this moment and online as well and what a great song come on how many of you wave at me if you have seen god's provision in your life that he's taking care of you in every season that's what that song is all about of course it's the story of abraham and isaac and you know god provided for abraham in his biggest moment his biggest need that's when god showed up and he said on the mountain of the lord the lord will provide and i'm going to tell you what right now wherever you are and whatever you're facing come on turn to the god who can provide for you because he he can see you through think about these verses everybody psalm 103. verse 2 praise the lord my soul and forget not all his benefits who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases who redeems your life from the pit come on that means god can lift you out of a difficult situation in a dark place [Music] and watch this everybody sometimes the pit and usually in scripture the pit um represents uh something we've done mistakes we've made and so even if you've made some mistakes come on you're coming to the right place because we believe god is a good god he's a god of compassion he's a god that can lift you up yeah i'm excited today he redeems your life from the pit he crowns you with love and compassion and he satisfies your desires with good things so that this is for all the old people so that your youth is renewed don't claim it if you don't want to claim it but the lord can renew us [Music] the older saints [Music] so we're going to have our ministry time right now we do this across all our locations our worship team our amazing worship teams at every location will lead us in another song but i want to invite you to respond this is maybe what we would call response time a time for you to respond if you want to stay standing right where you are certainly you can do that but let me just encourage you to give god some great worship in this next song we're going to open the front of the stage at every location we call it the altar just a place for you to come and pray and seek god you know maybe there's something really hard going on in your life and you just need to lay it at the altar and pick up you know god's answer or god's a strength or god's encouragement whatever it is so we encourage you to do that and you'll see at every location a lot of people moving toward the altar we're also going to have people on either side of the stage at every location these are people who are ready to pray and we read a little earlier didn't we in psalm 103 that he is the god who heals all our diseases and so i just want to say this that the um the people that are down front ready to pray uh they'll they'll if you come down and you have a mask on they'll they'll put a mask on but more importantly you know they'll sanitize their hands and they will pray a prayer of faith with you because jesus said where two or three are gathered and you pray about anything it shall be done and and in the book of james the book of james says that we should call for the leaders of the church the elders of the church and they'll anoint you with oil so if you want to be anointed with anointing oil it's in the new testament uh in the book of james they'll pray for you today and believe god for your healing and then finally we're going to have some communion tables set up you just need to look around wherever you are whatever location you are down front here at houston levee they're down front i think there may be some other ones toward the back and we're not going to do it all together as a church family but you can take the elements and come back to your seat or stand off to the side and just remember the price that jesus paid for you two things we ask is that you're a believer you're a christian and that you take uh those elements and you you you know you just have a sacred moment paul said examine yourself uh before you partake and so they've been set out they are anointed set out by our pastors and leaders and you can have an amazing moment of communion listen if you're moving to the front or you're moving for prayer for communion or the altar awesome if you're not can we just build an atmosphere of faith with our worship can we really like lean in right now in fact why don't we do that every everybody why don't you just lift your hands the bible talks about lifting up holy hands we're going to create a moment right now come on we're creating a moment our worship teams are getting ready they're going to lead us the presence of god is coming come on the bible says he inhabits the praises of his people father god we ask you in the name of jesus come down and meet with us we praise you and we forget lord none of your benefits toward us your compassion and your mercy your healing and lord the satisfaction that you bring our soul father god we lord we want to encounter you in a fresh way today we don't want to leave this service the same meet with us in this moment we pray we ask you for it in jesus name amen come on let's respond everybody [Music] this is a house of worship this is [Music] this is [Music] come love in the name of jesus come love in the name of jesus this [Music] to the is of jesus everything in the name of jesus this is [Music] [Music] there's resurrection [Music] is [Music] this is in the name of jesus of jesus [Music] god [Music] come on is [Applause] in the name of jesus come alive in the name of jesus this is this is a house this is a house it's a house of miracles so god is still working miracles [Music] come alive in the name of jesus come alive in the name of jesus this is a house it's a house of miracles and we bring everything to the feet of jesus everything in the name of jesus this is a house of miracles i still believe you're moving i still believe you're speaking god i believe you're working all things [Music] [Music] oh is [Music] god welcome to the life church on behalf of our senior pastors john and leslie sibling we're so glad you're here with us today each weekend we have services at multiple locations around the mid-south new york santiago chile and online where you can be a part of worship hear an encouraging message and enter an environment that is welcoming and friendly we have fun and creative services specifically designed for kids on our kidslife youtube channel kids ages 5 years through 5th grade can also participate in online small groups via zune every weekend these age-appropriate small groups help kids engage their faith while building life-giving relationships with other kids and leaders you can register your child for a small group online at thelifechurch.com we're all about helping people get connected and move forward in life and one of the best ways to get started is by taking your next step stay connected and build life-giving relationships by joining an online life group we have lots of different options to fit a variety of interests and schedules just visit thelifechurch.com life groups to find a group that's right for you if you would like to know more about the life church or get involved our discovery experience is the place for you through discovery you will hear from campus leaders learn how you can make a difference and get planted in church you can register for discovery at thelifechurch.com god has an incredible plan for your life and we love for you to be a part of all that's taking place here at the life church [Music] so [Music] hey everyone welcome to the live church online maybe you just started tuning in with us we just want to say welcome we're so glad that you're joining us for church today yes and maybe this is your first time here we want to say welcome to you we love new people here at the life church and on behalf of our senior pastors pastors john and leslie sibling we want to say welcome and that we're so glad that you are here tuned in with us today there's actually going to be a link that comes up in the chat as well as a qr code that you can scan why don't you scan that code or click that link let us know who you are our team would love love love to get connected with you so if this is your first time welcome welcome welcome yes welcome we're also going to send you a free gift yeah so what's better than a free gift is going to come straight to your inbox so let us know that you're tuning in with us for the first time today right now we're going to take a moment to be generous and receive our regular ties and offering and not only are we receiving our ties and offerings but this weekend is vision weekend and maybe you've never joined us for a vision weekend well what it is is really our tizen offerings allow us to operate as a church but our vision offering allows us to reach beyond our operations and really push for everything that we feel like god is calling us to as a church and there's two easy ways that you can give you can give online at thelifechurch.com it's safe it's convenient it's super easy so where most of our church family gives and you can also send in your tazzan offerings or your vision offering to the address that's coming up on the screen if you would rather mail that in but if you've never given on online giving a try i want to encourage you to do just that and in fact our team put together a short video to show you how easy it is to give online let's check this out online giving is easy safe and convenient to give online click the link you see in the chat or visit the lifechurch.com giving and select your region you'll have the option to give one time or set up recurring giving to fit your preferences you can also give by mail address to 650 houston hill road eads tennessee 38028 all donations are tax deductible we appreciate your generosity and thank you for investing in shane's lives such an easy way to give online you can even set up your giving recurring so you can really make generosity a priority in your life and this weekend since it is vision weekend we wanted to highlight something um that god is doing in our church that we're really excited about that your generosity is allowing us to do we're actually getting ready in a few weeks to launch our massachusetts location yes it's going to be amazing we've got another northeast campus coming and really our goal here as a church is just to reach as many people as possible and we're getting to do just that so in a few weeks that campus is launching if you live in the massachusetts area and you want to come check it out you can actually do that you can go online and find out some more information but we've got a team going up there we've got outreaches happening so many exciting things happening in the massachusetts area and your generosity is allowing us to do all that we're doing in all the regions that we're reaching so thank you so much for your faithfulness thank you for your generosity and we're going to pray over the offering as we give today god we just thank you so much for each and every person who is prioritizing generosity god we thank you that your word says that when we give it to you you multiply it god and we just believe that everyone's offering this week in god is going to be multiplied and used for your vision and your purpose for our church lord and i ask that you would just bless everybody who is giving today lord we thank you that you're going to bless their family their finances as they prioritize your house above all else in jesus name amen amen amen well guys it is going to be an incredible day in church we got pastor holly wagner gonna be amazing he was actually our guest speaker over zoe knight and everybody has been talking about how amazing that was but she's actually here with us today so as soon as we leave this segment we're gonna hop into service see what she's gonna bring today so make sure you tune in limit your distractions so you don't miss what god has for you this morning so hey let's jump into service oh yeah exciting season coming up actually next weekend kind of kicks off our vision season and we're actually celebrating over the next couple weeks 25 years as a church and so really exciting lots of cool things coming yeah we can clap for that and also a big welcome again to all the locations that are connected in with us come on one big happy family right here houston levy those watching online germantown parkway highland austin p jackson downtown we got places meeting all over the place we're glad that you're connected and get your bibles out get your notebooks out i have the honor of introducing our speaker this weekend we've been having a fantastic weekend with pastors phillip and holly wagner from oasis church in los angeles california pastor holly was in for our zoe night which was friday night for all the ladies come on shout out to all the ladies it was an amazing night and she did an amazing job they've been been such a blessing this weekend we recorded a podcast with him yesterday she preached a great message last night and so i know you're gonna love her get your bibles out get your notebooks out get on the edge of your seat come on let's let's be responsive let's take some good notes and how about we do this in all of our locations can we show some honors stand to your feet help me welcome pastor holly wagner come on let's go hey [Music] hi oh it is so good to be with you in the room it's so great to be connected with all the campuses you know i'm from l.a we haven't really gotten to be in a room with people this is awesome i love the south i love the biscuits in the south this is my undoing it is i'm pretty sure somebody says what's going to be your last meal biscuits are going to be on the plate and they just taste better here that you didn't need to know that but just trust me anyway i am so honored to be here i love your pastors you know john and leslie have been friends to philip and i for a long time john actually was on the board of oasis for a while and just you know we've done a lot of ministry life with them they're good people you know there's just something about friends who are the same whether they're on a platform or sitting at your dinner table right they're just the same and i live in the city of fake everything's fake right so to have friends who are not is so refreshing so you're in good hands here at live church all right why don't you look at that person you're standing next to just have a look at them yep they need prayer okay um either that or a coffee and i can't really help with that so we're just gonna take a moment and pray for that person you're standing next to and or sitting next to on the couch or whatever you're doing father i thank you so much that i have the awesome privilege of standing next to sitting next to this person and father i asked today that they would know you better that today they would experience your favor that any plans the enemy has over their life those are the ones that fail i thank you god have your way in their life in jesus name amen amen all right you can have a seat anybody ever been under pressure the last couple of years maybe right been in the middle of a hard time where you felt like there was so much coming at you whether it's in your relationships or your job or finances well one of the most challenging verses in the bible it's actually annoying and there's a few annoying verses in the bible and this is one of them and it's never really made it onto a t-shirt or the front of a journal it just doesn't and it's this james 1 beginning in verse 2 it says consider it pure joy my brothers and sisters when you face trials of many kinds whether that's you know marriage collapse or financial problems or loss of job it says because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance let perseverance finish its work so then you'll be mature and complete not lacking anything now the interesting thing about this to me is that this shows us that maturity doesn't come from how old you are maturity doesn't come from how much you know maturity comes from what you actually persevere through and i think perseverance only applies to the hard stuff right i've never had to persevere through a massage right philip said never had to persevere through a baseball game he just wants to watch the whole thing right so perseverance only applies to the hard stuff and so to me when i read that verse what it's saying is basically let the pressure let whatever is going on that might be considered hard let the pressure produce good things you know when we evaluate our presidents or our leaders whether it's you know scholars historians or just us the average people the greatest presidents are determined by the magnitude of the crisis during which they led right george washington for his leadership during the american revolution abraham lincoln for his leadership during a time when our country was being ripped into franklin roosevelt for his leadership during the depression when most of the country was suffering and when the shocking news of the attack on pearl harbor occurred he provided guidance that actually got us through that challenge and then you know martin luther king jr is certainly aware of him in this city for his guidance during civil rights well when we go through difficulties like all of these men dead we think life is terrible and it and it certainly feels that way but i just want to suggest that it was the difficulties that these men faced that actually led to their greatness and i want to say to you i think there's greatness within you and it will be revealed under pressure greatness or its opposite will be revealed under pressure and wow have we seen that in the last few years right well at one point in his life the apostle paul was a prisoner in rome and he's imprisoned for his faith now ultimately he would be beheaded but while he's in prison under pressure he writes some letters and these letters became the books of ephesians colossians and philippians which are a part of the new testament they're called the prison letters the prison epistles well in the last chapter of the book of colossians he encourages people with three thoughts now this is someone who had navigated some incredibly incredibly difficult times and ultimately he would give his life for his faith and so i'm thinking we should pay attention to the man right if you've got if he has some advice to us about how to handle pressure we should pay attention don't you think so do you want to hear some three things that he says this is what you should do under pressure are you ready are you ready are you ready in the chat put your hand up all right in fact why don't we read this verse together all of us colossians 4 2 ready one two three pray diligently stay alert with your eyes wide open in gratitude okay so the first thing he's saying when you're under pressure he says pray diligently now diligence persevere it means courageously persistent it actually comes from a word the root word of the word devotion he's saying pray with devotion now think of some of the things that you're devoted to your family job baseball my husband is a yankee fan we live in los angeles go explain that well we also are a dodger fans but really in his heart he's a yankee fan he's devoted so i've watched so many yankee games we go to new york and watch yankee games he's into it he's devoted or maybe you know football is your thing for pastor john his team lost yesterday should we have a moment of silence anyway there's devoted fans right and my mom is a dallas cowboy fan my eight oh look there's a few of you my she they're crazy these cowboy fans like she yells at the television like she just as if they hear her she's just committed i just thought that's how everybody was no it's my mother i'm just a serious cowboy fan and then there are fans who would camp outside ticket gates to get in to see their favorite you know musical artist or they would get in a line so that they could see the opening day of a movie remember when you could go to theaters remember that part um i've actually done that now the only movie i did that was in 1980 some of you weren't born so shut up but the only movie i ever did that with was for star wars the empire strikes back yes yes i have family here i am a devoted star wars fan i mean then i got all of the figure you know the little figures back then and then i said they were for my son yeah really but and then recently i've watched all of the new ones i can quote the movies and you know why was kylo ren so mad at so like all the things i was a devoted fan well paul is saying that that's actually the kind of attitude we're supposed to have when it comes to prayer that kind of devotion so maybe you know maybe you grew up in a home where you didn't pray or maybe in your home prayer was more of a religious obligation or it was something you know that you should do and maybe you struggle with what to say you know you should pray but you just don't know what to say or maybe when you pray you find yourself distracted right that's easy we're busy we're in a hurry i i that's oftentimes my situation i just as soon as i start to pray i think of the nine things i need to get done right we get distracted we move fast and so it's just sometimes hard to do it or maybe maybe you're a little cynical maybe a little suspicious about prayer because maybe you've prayed for something for a long time and you didn't get the answer you wanted and so you're left thinking god why didn't you do something about that and i imagine every one of us in this room has a that that we've prayed for and some of you you know are still waiting for that some of you are dealing with that some of you are sitting next to that right and some of you are wondering if god listens to us if he's really if he really cares but you know if you look through the scriptures regardless of your religious background if you look just look through the bible if you open it up and read it you'll notice that it's almost all a form of prayer from adam and eve talking to god in the garden from then on the bible is full of men and women who talk to their god and he answered them moses cried out to god and god sped spirit israel from judgment joshua's prayer made the sun stand still hannah's prayer was answered with that baby boy solomon got wisdom and answered to his prayer jonah's prayer brought him up of the belly of that big fish lepers prayed and they were healed the door of the philippine jail fell off when paul and silas prayed and then the book of psalms is almost all about prayers i love the book of psalms because it makes me feel normal right david he just went through some challenging moments and listen to some of the things he said to god things like help me listen to me god where are you you know david boldly went to god and just shared his heart shared his fears shared what was going on with him he shared what he was feeling and that's what i want to encourage you prayer it's just you being real with god it's not like he doesn't know what's going on in your life he just wants you to talk to him about it you don't have to pray a certain way just talk to god and if you look at the life of jesus the one thing that jesus did more than anything else he prayed i mean he was perfect son of god perfect and he prayed so i'm thinking if he did maybe we should too right and even when the crowds would gather there were moments when he would step away to pray take that take that time and i believe it mattered which is why the disciples more than anything wanted to become students of prayer and in luke 11 they came to jesus his disciples came to him and said jesus teach us to pray and did you know that in all four gospels there is only one recorded request of the disciples asking jesus to teach them anything and it was teach us to pray now i find that interesting because these are the people that had seen him walk on water and raise the dead and heal the sick and preach amazing sermons and calm the wind and the waves and they didn't ask about any of that instead they said jesus teach us to pray because maybe that's they realize that's where his power came from okay so when should we pray in james 5 it says this are any of you suffering hardships you should pray are you happy you should sing praises are you sick then you should call on the elders of the church to come and pray over you anointing you with oil in the name of the lord such a prayer offered in faith will heal the sick i love that that's you take that time in worship to do that you know pastor john mentioned that earlier just in the service today that and then you had people over here willing to pray for you don't don't ever if you're here with a need don't ever let that pass you by that's the promise in the word here that we can stand on he says and if you've committed any sins you'll be forgiven he goes on he says confess your sins to each other and pray so that you may be healed the earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results so don't miss what james is saying here basically no matter what the situation is talk to god with talk to god about it and so he highlights a couple areas when we should pray right i have some emojis that are going to help me tell the story so he says in verse 13 we should pray when we're in trouble right when life feels a little bit like that so funny my mom used to send this to me going you love chocolate ice cream here it is no mom that's not chocolate ice cream anyway interesting this is the only place in the new testament where this word for trouble is used and it means suffering through tough times not related to physical problems so this is a time when you know a storm destroys your home this is a time when you don't have enough money to pay the bills james says pray when your friend is acting like a real jerk and trying to destroy the friendship james says talk to god about it when your marriage is at a rough place pray when your child is hurting pray when you feel like the rugs being pulled out from under you pray when you feel confused pray when you're overwhelmed pray when you don't know what to do pray that's what he's saying right so we're to pray when we're in trouble and honestly sometimes that's the only time we pray but he's saying how about some other times and here's another time he mentions we should pray when we're happy when we're happy i mean we teach our kids to say thank you when they receive something and we should but if that's the only time that we give thanks to god or the only time we give thanks to god is when we're in trouble then we're forgetting a really valuable part when we're living in a season of blessing and we have those times just remember to thank god for him or just remember to turn your attention to him and honor him god doesn't want to just be there to lift us up in times of trouble he wants us to acknowledge him when the blessings come so he says is anyone happy then you thank god okay so we're to pray when we're in trouble when we're happy and then we're to pray when we're sick when we're sick now listen do whatever treatment you're going to take take whatever medicine you're going to take but i'm just suggesting that our first response to sickness should be to pray our first response that's it then do whatever you're going to do but how about we turn to god first all right so we pray when we're in trouble when we're happy when we're sick and then when we sin when we mess up and you know what i don't know you personally but i'm pretty sure you've messed up we all have so the bible pretty pretty much says that all of us have sinned and fallen short right but the problem is sometimes when we miss the mark when we sin we find ourselves stepping away and when you step away that's when shame gets in but what he's saying is when you sin when you make a mistake come on come back to me tell me because my response is always to forgive you and i know the culture of this church is that so don't let the mistakes and the failures in your life cause you to withdraw they should cause you to run into the house of god where you'll be embraced so when we sin talk to god about it all right so under pressure the first thing he challenges us to do is to pray with devotion not a religious attitude not the big fancy words but pray with devotion talk to god all right the second thing it says pray diligently and in colossians 4 2 pray diligently stay alert staler is the second thing all right luke 12 54 it says then jesus turned to the crowd and and said when you see clouds beginning to form in the west you say here comes a shower and you're right when the south wind blows you say today will be a scorcher and it is i love jesus he goes you fools you know how to interpret the weather signs of the earth and sky but you don't know how to interpret the present times i think you and i need to get good at interpreting the time on planet earth that we've been entrusted with you know in southern california where i live we don't really get to experience the seasons palm trees just don't change colors and i have never built a snowman on my front yard you know we live basically in perpetual spring and summer i'm okay with that i'm good with that however there are other people in the country and around the world that are way better at preparing for season change they start to recognize it like oh here comes a cool wind i better winterize my garden i don't even know what that means right put away the pool toys bring out the snow shovel i mean they just learn to do things to prepare for coming season change and you know if you live along the atlantic coast then you're preparing for a hurricane seasons you're alert for a season change well the apostle peter challenges us he says in first peter 5 8 be alert and of sober mind why because your enemy the devil he prowls around like a roaring lion he's not a lion he's like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour be alert alert means vigilant it means sleeplessly watchful and i don't think it i don't think it means we don't we can't ever have a nap but i do think it means that if we want to be victorious then we have to be vigilant we have to be aware of what's going on around us i'm sure you've seen those television shows where you know the police shows where there's officers and they're on a stakeout and the officer has to be alert and ready to catch the criminal whoever it is they're waiting for they can't just sit in their patrol car and play video games and i'm sure that in the dark quiet moments i'm sure that in the dark quiet moments it would be so easy to fall asleep it'd be so easy to get bored and i'm sure there are moments perhaps when the officer thinks ah the guy's not even coming and i'm sure there are moments when they just want to leave but what if they do what if they fall asleep well then they'll miss the moment that they were sent there for i want to suggest that we are on a stakeout and we can't get distracted and we can't fall asleep we have to be alert to why god has us here we have to be alert to the times to what is going on around us our world is not well there's never been more pain and more heartache and more division and unrest but god trusted you with now you could have been born anytime but he chose now so rather than us putting our heads in the sand going no he's saying i need you to be alert to the time because you're supposed to be a part of the solution i'm trusting your hands and your feet and your mouth and your heart to bring solution to what's going on on planet earth so you got to be alert to what's going on around rather than wishing it wasn't be alert to what is going on so that we can be part of the answer does that make sense so alert to what's going on around us but also we have to be alert to what's going on in us in our own soul a lot of hurting people inside i remember um about 15 years ago i was in the middle of a breast cancer battle and i spent two weeks in a holistic hospital and one of the the treatments that or the test that was given to me was a stress test and so this doctor hooked me up to all sorts of things and before he administered the test he said tell me holly um how are you feeling i said well actually i'm feeling okay i mean i know i got this diagnosis but i'm okay i feel confident i'm gonna get through it he goes all right so he did the test and then after the test was finished he comes to me and he looks me in the face and he says holly he says let me tell you about the stress going on in your body he said the stress levels are at such a level as if you're staring a roaring lion in the face he said the problem is that you don't know it so i was unaware i was not alert to the stress going on in my own body i was so busy putting it down that i wasn't aware of it so i had to learn what is it that creates stress in me and how do i get rid of that stress i had to learn to become alert to what's going on in my body and so there's so many people right now who are dealing just with challenges in their soul so rather than pretending it's not there let's be alert to what's going on and get help so that we can get through it right because when the pressure's on what's in there is going to come out right alert alert so the apostle paul is telling us to be alert alert to what's going on around us and within us back to colossians 4 2 says pray diligently stay alert what's the third thing ready one two three with your eyes wide open in gratitude okay the third thing is determined to be grateful now everyone wants to be grateful no one wants to be ungrateful but the question is what's your plan right what's your plan to become a more grateful person are you going to do that because nobody just drifts into gratitude right we have we have this problem when it comes to gratitude we say thank you when someone does something for us or when we're you know given something and we should but if we start to think we'll be grateful to the extent that we receive things or good things happen to us then gratitude becomes a product of our circumstances and gratitude is always always always a decision of the heart always always it is not a result of circumstances i mean have you have you ever noticed that two people can be in the same situation the same church the same job the same school the same long line at the coffee shop and one of them is just complaining and the other one's just grateful i think it's because what one person sees as a gift someone else sees as their right right you know in another letter paul teaches us in first thessalonians 5 16 he says rejoice always pray continually give thanks in all circumstances it doesn't say give thanks for the circumstance it just says in the middle of the pressure in the middle of the challenge in the middle of the heartbreak give thanks while you're in the middle of it says for this is god's will for you in christ so many people want to know what the will of god is and as a pastor i've been asked that a thousand times what is god's will for my life what does god want me to do and everybody thinks that the will of god is this mystic cloud that just descends but it is not the first step toward being in god's will be grateful it's not complicated be grateful in fact turn to the person next to you on the couch in the chat and just say thank you look right that moment you were in god's will doesn't it feel good [Laughter] so i don't know what would help you be more grateful maybe it's a journal gratitude journal some people love journaling and and then i have this one friend she says when she gets out of the bed she just puts with one foot says thank you so i don't know what will be for you in our house we have this jar and my husband put it in the kitchen during a really challenging hard season it's probably the hardest season in my life and certainly the hardest season in ministry i never really wanted to quit until this season and it started with my father dying and he died suddenly he fell and hit his head and i was very loved by my dad i was told every day i was loved and i was every dream i had was encouraged and i'm very aware of what a gift it is to be loved by your dad he made it very easy for me to love a heavenly father so i'm and i'm aware that many people don't have that experience i'm aware what a gift and a blessing that is so i'm grieving the loss of my dad and then philip's identity gets stolen and they kind of hacked when they when they were hacking into gmail accounts and his was one of them and then they sort of through that got into our bank and stole our savings account and the fbi got involved in all that but because of how it was done the bank wasn't liable so i'm grieving the loss of my dad processing this financial loss and then philip my husband gets diagnosed with cancer so we start the journey with him and then the treatment that he has to undergo is so brutal that it just destroys his immune system and then he starts getting other things because he has no immune system and one of the things he gets is shingles and he gets like the worst case of shingles he couldn't really walk and he couldn't function for about five months and my daughter is making a really heartbreaking decisions it's hard and so i so here i am i'm trying to help lead a church and i'm trying to be a wife be a mom and i'm pretty sure i wasn't doing great at all of that and so i'm just kind of trying just trying to figure it out i'm under pressure here and there were some people who in my world who should have had my back these are people to whom i had shown grace when they had been a hot mess and instead of having my back they just stabbed me in the back and i just had to deal with the pain of some really brutal betrayals and um it was painful i'm i'm a i'm the biggest extrovert in the room like i'm peopley i like people i want to be with people i want to talk to people i want to hug you that's just how i am but in this season i just found myself sitting on the couch and i didn't want to talk to anybody and it wasn't just a root of bitterness that was growing up in me i had the whole flipping tree and um it was not good so this is when my husband brings this jar into the kitchen and he says every day holly we're gonna write something that we're grateful for we're gonna put it in the jar and i'm thinking no we're not see he's the christian um every marriage needs one and so he's it so i'm like no i'm not doing that and then he bought like colorful posters thinking that's going to help make it easier for me and i'm like no it's like i hate this whole thing and but okay god showed me a picture of who that woman sitting on the couch with bitterness growing in her would become she was ugly so i knew something needed to happen so i day one walked down to that kitchen and i wrote i was looking for you know something to write on that post it and i had nothing nothing and now i'm just mad that i'm having to do this so i'm thinking okay coffee anybody else grateful for coffee okay yeah and then on day two i came down and and i know i have to do it because you know he's gonna count so um so i'm looking and thinking i got nothing i got nothing no no feeling nothing like coffee and i'm pretty sure for about four or five days it was coffee and then i don't know maybe the second week i looked up and oh sunshine sunshine as if that's unusual where i live right and then eventually it became my home and a and a good book and but let me just tell you there wasn't one day that i felt gratitude it was a decision of my will to begin to communicate something i'm grateful for there was never a cloud of gratitude that descended i just made a decision to be grateful and that's what broke that bitterness that was growing within me you know there's a man named dr dale robbins and he wrote this he said i used to think people complained because they had a lot of problems but i've come to realize they have problems because they complain complaining doesn't change anything it doesn't make the situation better it just amplifies frustration it spreads discontent and discord complaining makes us miserable david put it this way in psalm 77 i complained and my spirit was overwhelmed so maybe the fact that i was feeling overwhelmed was because i spent so much time over here complaining now i know that applies to none of you just me you know paul's life was filled with so many difficulties you could complain about i mean how many of us would put up with the stress that he did the from shipwrecks and persecution and and beatings and injuries and i mean his life was not fantasyland and yet he was thankful how because he learned an important secret to life in philippians 4 verse 11 he said i've learned to be content whatever the circumstances i know what it is to be in need and i know what it is to have plenty i've learned the the secret of being content in any and every situation whether well-fed or hungry whether living in plenty or in want i can do everything through him who gives me strength now we love quoting that last part that part makes it on the t-shirts it makes it on the journal we love that part but how could he say that how what things what things he had learned the secret of being content in any and every situation that's the secret whether well fed or hungry he could be content in prison as he was at home because his joy his contentment was not based on circumstances it was based on his relationship with jesus so god is saying to you and to me don't postpone being grateful don't postpone gratitude until your situation changes or until you get whatever it is you're wanting to get because as soon as you get that you'll just have another long list he says be grateful now be grateful now because if you can't be grateful now you won't be grateful then so for me in the middle of the pressure i had to determine to be grateful and so i wrote this list you know even the things that i found myself most often complaining about i tried to flip it this is my list you can borrow it or you can make your own but i did this i'm grateful for i'm grateful for the traffic i'm driving in because it means i have a car i'm grateful i'm grateful for the spot i find at the far end of the parking lot because it means i can walk i'm grateful for a bad hair day listen if you've navigated cancer you'd be grateful for a bad hair day because it means you got hair grateful i'm grateful for my water bill my electric bill because it means to get water i simply turn a faucet and to get electricity i simply flip a switch i'm grateful i'm grateful that i live in a country where the chances of me being beheaded for my faith are fairly small i'm grateful for the mask i have to wear because it means i don't have to worry about lipstick i'm grateful i'm grateful for scary feel like throwing up walk-on water moments because it means i get to use my faith i'm grateful i'm grateful for dealing with challenges in relationships because it means i have relationships worth fighting for and i'm grateful for the alarm that went off early today because it means god's trusted me with another day i'm grateful grateful so when the pressure is on and life on planet earth right now there's a lot of pressure from a lot of places but when it's on i just want to encourage you alongside my brother the apostle paul pray with devotion talk to god real real talk he's not afraid of you or your words or your fears or your doubts or you're worth any of it pray with devotion stay alert to what god is doing it's what he needs you to do stay alert to what's going on and determine to be grateful so your homework for the next 24 hours no complaining not about the weather the humidity the person next to you any of it nothing for 20 can you do it 24 hours see i actually think we can change cultures with gratitude what's been so heartbreaking for me is to see how much complaining is happening in the world right now i mean social media that's all it is one big fat long complaint but how about if the people of god stop it we stop if we can stop that could change things let's just determine to be grateful find something to be grateful for right i'm just gonna ask you right now to close your eyes just give yourself a little private moment here and i'm gonna pray for you maybe there's some of you in here and you've never actually surrendered your heart and your life to the god who loves you so much that he sent jesus and jesus paid the price for every sin every failure every mistake you've ever made or will make and he offers you forgiveness for your past and a hope for your future but so maybe you've never actually surrendered your heart in your life to this god who loves you so much or maybe at one point you were following jesus but if you're honest in your heart you'd have to say you've grown a little cold or like me bitter cynical and you find yourself sitting down maybe one foot in one foot out going through the motions but your heart is hard i know what that's like i've been there and so if you're honest you'd have to say you're not really following jesus not with that grateful heart not with determination you're not following him so i want to pray for you too because this is your day to get back up and once again start the journey so if you're in here for the first time you need to surrender your heart to this jesus who loves you so much or you need to get back up then i want to pray for you so i'm simply going to count to three i'm not going to embarrass you or anything i'm just going to pray for you from up here but if you're in here and you know it's time it's not an accident that you're in here you don't have to change anything about yourself you just have to receive the love of jesus today so i'm going to count to three and if you're ready for the first time to surrender your heart and life to the lord or get back up and begin following him once again then i'm going to pray for you so i'm going to count to three and then just put your hands up and put him back down just so i can see him okay one two three just put the hands up so i can see it great i see like one two three four five six seven eight nine i think i see some up there in the balcony 10 11 12 13 over there i see 14 15 i got i see the hands most of them but you know their name you know the situation and circumstance that they're in the middle of you know what's going on in their life and i thank you god that they were brave enough to lift their hand acknowledging their need for you and so i thank you god that they will experience your presence right now spirit of god do what only you can do i thank you god that you bring healing and peace joy now in the middle of their circumstance and i'm going to lead us in a prayer and i'm going to pray and everybody's just going to repeat it all of us together and those of you that raise your hands you're praying this as well and you're believing these words in your hearts but let's all pray this prayer together everyone say father thank you for loving me thank you for forgiving me and from this moment on i choose you i surrender my heart and my life to jesus amen amen so good so good so good [Applause] and someone will at this park in just a minute we'll come and just sort of give some directions about what to do but don't let that step pass you by i just want to it was an honor to be here with you today i love this church it feels like home and family so letting me uh let me just thank you for letting me just share my heart and my story a little bit and i i did bring a book it's called find your brave and um uh the sort of the biblical story of this book is the apostle paul i'm a little bit uh i'm obviously studying him and at one point in paul's life he was in a shipwreck he was headed to rome and experienced a shipwreck and everyone's lives were saved and they were saved because of some decisions that were made he made some and some of the leaders on that boat made some decisions and so i just think there's some decisions we all need to learn to make when we're when the waves are coming against our life and i spilled my guts in this book kind of talk a little bit about some of the heartbreak and the challenges and just i think it might be an encouragement to you just certainly in the season that we're all kind of facing so if that would be a blessing to you i think it's out there somewhere and again thanks for letting me be with you love you guys make it a great week [Applause] come on what an incredible message by pastor holly i know i took a lot of notes i hope you did as well and congratulations to anyone who made the decision to make a fresh start and pray that prayer with us today literally making a fresh start is the best decision that you can ever make in your life over choosing a job choosing a career what college you're going to go to making a fresh start is going to change the trajectory of your life and hey if you made a fresh start there's going to be a qr code that comes up on the screen as i'm talking about it but also a link in the chat if you click that link or scan that qr code fill out that form letting us know that you made a fresh start our senior pastor pastor john sibling wrote a book with you in mind and we're going to get that gift to you if once you fill out um the link in the chat so congratulations to you if you made a fresh start this morning right best decision that you will ever make and another great decision that some of you have made was tuning in with us for the first time today so we want to send a special shout out if it was your very first time with us whether you're on facebook or youtube or maybe somebody invited you send a personal invitation or maybe you just saw our stream pop up on your feed we're so glad that you jumped into service we hope you felt like part of the family because really that's what we are we're one big family and on behalf of our senior pastors john and leslie sibling and our entire team we just want to say thank you and we would love the opportunity to connect with you so we've got that qr code that's on the screen right now we have a link coming up in the chat it would mean a lot to our team if you would fill that up send us some of your information we won't overload you with emails or phone calls or texts or anything like that but we really just want a chance to connect with you to learn how to serve you and your family better and not only that we want to send you a gift just to say thank you for tuning in with us so click on that form fill it out for us so we can get connected with you this week and you know what guys we've got some exciting things coming up within the life of our church next saturday is actually we're dubbing it serve saturday october 9 10 a.m come out serve with us there's actually going to be a video that comes up now to show you how to sign up all you have to do is go to our life church website click locations once you click locations you can scroll down until you get to the online campus click the online campus scroll down once again until you hit online outreach once you get there click sign up there's going to be several opportunities that you can sign up for whether in person or virtual we got so many things that you can do and one of our things that we're doing is actually called clean your streets so whether you are in person here in the mid-south area or you are in new york shout out to new york washington state louisiana you can serve right where you are locally we're actually partnering with a local fire station here in the city of memphis and we're going to be cleaning up the streets around that fire station but also the firefighters don't know this but we're going to be delivering lunch to the firefighters on duty as well as a paramedic so why don't you join in with us it's going to be a lot of fun our church is passionate about serving and we would love for you um just to get connected in that way so serve saturday is always fun we did this back in july and it was just so great to get out into our communities and serve people and really get the opportunity to be the church you know we talk about it all the time we get to have church now we get to be the church so sign up today i know i'm going to be here in memphis so if you're signing up and you're in memphis i'll see you this saturday for serve saturday and we hope you had um a great time listening to pastor hawley and the message i know i took a lot of notes and we want to hear from you right now what stood out to you we're going to have a little message discussion talk about all the amazing things that god really just spoke through pastor hawley to all of us so if you are in the chats right now put what stood out to you in the chats we are going to have the chats pulled up but i want to hear from you alison what was what was one thing that really stood out to you this morning she first of all the whole message was incredible but in the very beginning she brought up amazing american leaders and how when they were leading they always what made them great is that they led through crisis yeah um she talked about difficulties breeding greatness so that really you know stood out to me because so many times we'll have difficulties come and plague our minds and make us feel like man this is the worst thing ever ever but actually difficulties lead to greatness so i thought that was such a mind-blowing point that i can still choose to have joy and gratefulness in such a hard time so that was one of the things that stood out to me yeah that was really powerful i also loved how she tied gratefulness into all of it and she said this one phrase she said you know gratefulness is not gratitude is not a result of our circumstances but it's always always a decision of the heart and i love that verse that she pulled out of psalm because i agree with pastor holly i love the book of psalms because it does it feels so real you know david was so real with his feelings with god and talking to god about his situations and i love it when when um she mentioned psalm 77 about how david was like uh what did he say i wrote it down let me pull it up y'all bear with me take your time i'm taking i want to get it right it says i complained and it made my spirit overwhelmed and i really was like man david said that that's so powerful because i'm like how many times am i facing a situation and i feel overwhelmed and it was really a good heart check of okay if i'm feeling overwhelmed in this situation is it because i'm complaining or is it because i'm choosing gratitude over that so do you have anybody on youtube who who mentioned anything you know what you got so many people just saying how much they love the message you got shnika saying no complaining um paulette saying lord i'm so grateful sometimes you just gotta stop and just say lord i am grateful so we got people saying preach and and thank you so much pastor holly for an amazing message so people are really impacted today what about you yeah kelly on facebook says don't wait for the circumstances to change be grateful now come on kathleen said while in the middle of it give thanks a lot of people gratitude that was it's a game changer it is a game yeah errands that have the same devotion to prayer like you do towards your favorite sports team music artist amen have that same devotion to prayer like you do for that awesome well keep commenting keep letting us know what stood out to you in the chat we love reading these each and every single week yep and guys if you consider yourself a part of the life church and haven't already gone through discovery online this course is just for you it is totally an online virtual experience i said it in pre-service but i actually did my discovery course online and i learned more about our church learned more about myself i was able to take personality tests i had a spiritual gifts assessment and it really helped me um just just navigate more about church as a whole so if discovery is for you there's a qr code that's on the screen right now also a link that's going to come up in the chat click that link scan that qr code and sign up for discovery today i promise you you won't regret it you definitely won't regret it such a great next step if you're wanting to get connected into the life church as a whole and our online campus and we're so grateful that you tuned in with us today but we're not done we've got one more service happening we'll actually be live here for pre-service allison and i are going to be home same place with you guys right at 11 o'clock and then we'll jump into our 11 15 service pastor holly will be back with us so hey if you missed out on any part of the service come back double dip this weekend make sure you get everything out of the entire service but not only that maybe god put somebody on your heart while you were listening to pastor hawley send them an invitation send them a dm a text an email whatever you got to do to share the stream and get them on service with you but before we sign off for this service i want to pray a prayer of blessing over you as we go god we just thank you for each and every person who is watching with us today lord we thank you for the word that was imparted god we believe that those seeds will be planted into our heart that they will bear fruit in our lives god and we just thank you that your your face is going to shine upon them god we thank you that you're going to keep them as they go throughout their week lord we speak blessing and we speak favor into their lives in jesus name amen all right guys well if you're double dipping we'll see you back here in a few minutes and if not have an amazing week and we'll see you next weekend

Channel: The Life Church

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Length: 100min 13sec (6013 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 03 2021