Our Greatest Lessons from 2020, Our Greatest Hopes for 2021

[Music] we're going to just talk about a couple things that i think is going to be a blessing to you i have asked all of them to um i told him i'm going to ask y'all all one question and well one question and then we're going to go back and get a second question but the first question is going to be this the first question and a bishop i'm going to ask you to lead the way because you're you're the leader here so lead the way and i just want to know you know we we all we cannot have a year like 2020 and not uh say that we've learned anything and um we have to have learned something and if you have not been able to articulate that yet i want to challenge you between now and the beginning of the new year between now and midnight on the 31st of december i want to challenge you to just pause get alone silent your mind and just ask yourself the question what have i learned through all of this there's been so much that's happened and i i'm just declaring in the name of jesus that we will all come out of this having learned something so bishop just tell us what's on your heart where uh not so much about where we're going but let's just kind of look back about where we've been and what we have learned through this i think the question that uh you presented was what have we learned yeah in 2020 and i think the number one lesson is patience um god has a way of slowing everything down and in the process of slowing things down he's able to reveal to us what is necessary what's unnecessary what we can live with and especially what we can live without there's so many things in 2019 and 18 and 17 that became um habits and we thought it was so necessary and yet when we found ourselves [Music] being challenged time being challenged patience being challenged relationships being challenged we found out we could we can live without a whole lot of things that we thought was impossible to live with that that was uh more important we thought it was more important to us than it really was and so i think the number one lesson obviously is is patience uh what i'm able to live without yeah and you know what the bible says that tribulation and this has been a little bit since perfection yeah it's been a little it's been a trying year and through that yeah you learned that you can you need patience more i i don't think we need to forget i was just looking at psalms 24 and 1. the earth is the lord's when he says earth he's actually dealing with the planet the terra firma what we're standing on he said it belongs to the lord i was just sharing i think a couple of days ago there's not a cosmic war going on somewhere in space and based on who's got the upper hand is how i feel if i'm feeling good then god must be winning if i'm if i'm going through and i'm depressed or discouraged then the enemy must be winning there is not a cosmic war going on the earth is the lord's the fullness there i've watched the world so there's a difference here he talks about first the earth is the lord's then he says the world so now i'm a part of that cosmic existence that is a part of the world the cosmos that exist on the terra firma which belongs to god so the earth is the lord's the fullness of thereof the world and they they that dwell therein and so there's not i want to reiterate that there is not a no matter what we are experiencing trial tribulation or trouble no matter what 2020 has seemingly taken from us it cannot take the earth and it cannot take the world god still has the upper hand god still is in control he rules and super rules which means this thing is all going to work out it's all a process and just because god doesn't always give you a glimpse behind the curtain doesn't mean that there's not anything going on behind the curtain there's god is setting things in order and in place that when the curtain lives and we see the second half of the show after this intermission 2020 has been an intermission but the second show is getting ready to start the second half and when we see it it's going to be it's hard to say while you're in a tribulation or in trial it's hard to give god glory while you're in it but if we could see what's coming after this that it took this process to develop this purpose we could give god glory while we're still in it because the stage stage is being set and when the curtain lives we're going to rejoice because we could not step into what's coming without the process of what has been amen absolutely you answered both of them questions but you're the bishop do that really good you sure did so much of what you said i really resonated with dad because i feel like um this year has been full of lessons little less since because i think there have been there have been some high highs there have been some low lows and there have been just some mundane everything in between you know what i mean but one of the things that i had to just really settle in my heart i know i believe i believed it but i really just had to anchor down and trust that god is in control even in the areas that i feel like i can't control in the things that i can't control the circumstances that are around us the chaos that we saw so much in this year the the uproars and the just the low moments some of the lowest darkest moments we face as a nation it and for me i'm i'm a little bit of that i guess i'd say type a a little bit of that nina said control i'm not i wouldn't say control freak but i do like to have an idea right mark we like to have a knight come on why are you bringing me because you're my amen section over there we are type a's we're the a team you're not gonna shame us either um we i do like to have some some type of understanding or a glimpse of you know what i can what i can see and what i can touch and what i can firm up and and so while i know as believers so much of what we do it takes belief it takes faith it takes trusting in something that we cannot see a god that we cannot see with our own eyes um but i've had to settle and anchor like you were saying that there know that no matter what chaos is happening around us or what's going on that that god is still on the throne he is still seated um that we have to be able to trust him even in the things and know that he remained in control even when so much of what we're living through feels like it's out of our control yeah you know one of the greatest lessons i don't even know how many years ago probably 20-25 years ago we were in new york city and one of the pastors there had um bought some tickets for us to go see we never saw a broadway place so it was smokey joe's cafe or something whatever and when we got there to the wheel called the window and they gave us our tickets they escorted us up to the mezzanine or some you know like a special little uh area right above the stage you know it's a little private area box area and we're watching we're what we're up and we're we're in this elevated position looking down on the stage and down to the main floor where the people are seated and what blew my mind was we were at a height that we could see both sides of the curtain the people that were on the floor could only see what was in front of them on the stage but because of our elevated perspective we were able to see what was going on behind the curtain that while the audience was watching this side of the curtain and only seeing the actors as they projected that play we were able to see what was being set up behind the stage for the next scene and i believe this is where god wants to take us to a place that we understand god is in charge and the more we lean into faith the higher he elevates us and enables us to have a perspective of both sides of the curtain that if and that's what brings rest if i'm only looking from the floor to the stage then i'm i'm in tension i'm i'm nervous i'm shook up i'm anxious i'm like god get this over you know what's going on i'm perplexed but if i'm in an elevated consciousness and an understanding of elevated consciousness and redemption and i understand the complete plan of god hallelujah i understand and you cannot understand the present without understanding the origin and you got to understand the original intent of god and once you tap into the original intent of god he elevates your perspective into a redeemed consciousness of righteousness that you can chill you can chill because of your elevation you can chill because you see what's coming you see both sides of the curtain and so i i think that's where we're at i didn't mean to take up so much time but since i took up time i guess i can take up an offering too to say go ahead no i i love what you're you know i was you completely i'm not gonna say took mine because it actually came from you just you preached years you you preached the power of perception but i've heard you talk about the power of perspective as well yeah and um that whole story about the you know the the stage changing effort you know yeah you know that whole it's just really that is so true and and something like on a daily basis and here's how what that looks like for me on a day-to-day basis i have been in church my whole life my mom's a pastor blah blah blah all of that kind of stuff but let me tell you what covet and this whole racial unrest in 2020 it called everything that i called myself believing it had it made me come face to face and really question do you really really believe that do you really believe that god is in control do you really believe that that that in spite of everything that's going on around you that god has got you and so one thing that i've had to do don't take no more faith to believe that then it takes faith in your salvation go ahead no no no no that's no it's the same level i mean how how other than just good deeds how can you have a total comprehension of salvation it's by faith are you saved and it's the same principle that you're talking about now it's by faith that when there's no concrete evidence it's by faith it's by faith knowing that god has got me and when when contracts get canceled yeah and and streams of income begin to dry up and all of this faith stuff that we preach and it's like oh how am i gonna really be able to provide for my family i've literally had to on a daily basis say okay my mind is questioning everything i'm getting anxious i'm getting stressed out i'm trying to make things happen but i'm having to come to and say all right god i trust that you are in control and that you have me as a father as a husband as a leader in my home that i have to hold firm that in spite of everything that's going on around me my perspective has to be fixed on god you hold my world in the palm of your hand you're not gonna put more on me than i'm able to manage right right and that's a structural thing so um i love everything about that whole perspective because it really it helps me to get out of bed it helps me to take charge of my day and saying i'm not gonna let this day or what's happening around me control my perspective my perspective is controlled by what i know and that thing is settled so that's really what 2020 that's what i've learned uh from 2020. is now that's one of the last messages i preached in this church though it's the thing that you know that will get you uh through what you face and i don't mean it was the last message that when y'all were here with us uh and little little did i know okay i'm not going to stand here and say oh i knew all that this was going to happen i didn't uh i didn't know that that would be the last service that we would have here in this building and now here we are 40 what nine weeks or some odd weeks uh that we haven't been together but you're like you're right chris it's what you know that's why you got to know that you know that you know because if not when the enemy comes in like a flood it will wipe you off of your foundation and wipe you out off your feet and and so at some point we got to stop just i'm in and i'm grateful that we have come to this point but at at some point in your walk with god you have to stop just having church and you got to learn some things and you got to know some things and and truly it's not until we go through stuff that we really know what we know and 2020 has taught us some lessons travis tell us i'm gonna go instead okay neither i have the mic um well mine's a little bit more practical um mine is i think it's taught me how to be um more flexible i am definitely a planner and i love to plan a plan if that makes sense i enjoy doing that um so it has taught me that you know your plans are not always going to work out the way that you want you want them to and i've had to um just learn flexibility and i've also learned to not get so overwhelmed and to know that god gives us grace for the moment that we're in and if we think too far ahead and i caught myself doing that several times like okay well what are two weeks from now going to look like well we don't know that and if we we spend too much time um doing thinking on those thoughts then it will totally just wipe us out and overwhelm us and it did that for me and i just had to realize god gives us grace for for the day and um yeah with four kids and twins and having to take everybody out of school um just trying to take every day as it comes and um and that's that's my lesson i think uh yeah that's amazing i think it's in conjunction with her is that i realize that how much we are capable of adapting to where we are we are capable of change sometimes we we preach and we teach about change and don't miss it don't miss that don't miss this this change is going to happen you know you're going to miss this boat you know the ship's going to come in and you're not going to be on it but actually wired into our dna is the ability to adapt to change that's good and i feel like people um you know now we're gonna go kicking screaming some people you know cussing fussing cussing oh yeah but complaining along the way but we do have the ability to adjust to change we have a the ability to adjust to what's happening around us and and i think that we can find we can find the grace of god in that adjustment we can find the grace of god to say you know what god i just need help there's so many different times pastor i'll just say this i have i've never prayed so much this year in increments what i mean by that is on the hour gotta help me yeah like help me along i mean uh and shout out to all the teachers and educators yes you guys need an astronomical um i mean you need an increase yeah you need a paid increase ethic covered yes you need a pay increase you need promotion i mean we need to do it nationwide globally we need to increase their salaries some weight legislation needs to happen because what they take on for us yeah that's good trust is is you really do have to be passionate to do what you do and would you have ever really known what all they take on for you if this had not happened no we just drop them off that's right make sure and pick them up and make sure they have lunch money yeah and if they if they get their feelings hurt you're ready to fuss at the teacher but really this has been i've heard so many people say this has been this has given me a taste of what they go through on a daily basis and could that be could that be and i'll just add this could that be and this is my other lesson it's empathy yeah is really being able to step into someone else's shoes and know and get a sense of what they're going through not just because they're down and out but because of their role their responsibility uh getting into that role of being an educator making sure that your kids have the google docs have the printed materials out having all the things that they need to get on the zoom to get on this to get on that being able to step into those shoes of an educator it allows you to connect in a way that you would not have been able to connect before and i think empathy kind of it only it not only just goes into a racial thing it does not go into just a healing and a compassion thing from the church or finance or whatever it really does connect on empathy connects on all levels i saw a shirt the other day somebody had on sweatshirt and it was uh on it uh make empathy great again and i just sat back and you know just smiled and you know thought about that's that's what 2020 has done in the adjustment uh it's it's learning how to bear one another's burdens you know sometimes we get so caught up in our own personal conflict that we think we're the only one going through but if we would bear one another's burdens when i have empathy because of where you are in life and i really embraced that what happens in that moment is god adjusts my own conflict because my mind is not on my own conflict uh i'm having empathy uh someone because someone else is going through something and if we would constantly have a reminder to reach out to people even if we can't touch them pray for them even if we can't you know meet certain needs we can intercede for them and in that intercession god will always make sure somebody is interceding for you and if everybody forgets the bible said he ever liveth to make intercession for us so somebody's praying for you yeah that's good one of y'all jeffrey scope all right i'll go i'm not going to say that i made a list but i made a list that's all right because nina and i we're comparing how much over the this year we've had actual screen time and we're at the bottom of the whole fam family dynamic i'm at the very bottom because nina joined the praise team so her screen time is at a little bit higher than mine so i'm going to talk until i'm finished i'm just going to say this uh so here's some things that i learned in 2020. i learned that my goals will and can change at the beginning of this i think we all set a lot of lofty goals like i'm going to take all of this down time and i'm going to learn a new language and my goals have now changed to i'm going to take showers more often during the week than what i have been doing um i've learned that hats are a blessing when you can't go and get there you go uh i've learned that um always keep around some of your bigger clothes that you thought you were out of because yes god will find a way to use things from your past to bless you in your future those girls have always done that yeah well i learned that that's my lesson for 2020. um i've learned that that it's okay to try something new uh and if you haven't seen that the basically everybody on the internet became internet evangelists and uh everyone is now an evangelist there you go so thank you for that um and by the way if you do a facebook live and only one person joins you can just facetime them that's just another thing that i've learned so that's just something else i've learned to give myself permission to make mistakes and i've learned to give myself permission to say that i don't have it all together today and that just because i had a fantastic day the day before doesn't guarantee that i'm going to have a great day today and that it's okay that doesn't make you have a bad life you just have to you know have enough courage to start over the next day with it i've learned that hearing people other people's struggle normalizes mine so one of the things that i love about everybody that's been that's on this stage either things that we've posted or things that we've said to each other privately or things that we've said on zoom calls with each other is that we've never had a problem of saying uh i had a bad time with this or i had a struggle with this or even things that we've shared today and what happens is when all you hear is someone's good things you start to feel that that's the normality that we're all supposed to have yeah and it's when that you can realize that there are certain things as valleys and it hits all of us and that mountaintops can't be every single day of your life it normalizes so that you don't freak out yeah that's what that's one of the things that i've learned uh i've learned that my children are humans too and that things that mess with them even though it doesn't mess with me it's still exactly real to them yes so not being able to go to school not have their friends where they're at means a big deal to them and it's not just my job to say you know get with it it's okay it's just school they're humans they feel those same things i felt like i i have to get on into their turf i feel like i have to get into their rooms and find out what they like what they're into those are things that i had to learn and then i got to give them the space to reset to and start over and that just because they had a really bad day doesn't mean they can't have a good day the next yeah and then i learned to be grateful for relationships i learned to be grateful for people that remind me uh of my relationship with god i had a text with somebody yesterday that's a friend of mine and he's just started a new venture uh after pastoring for years and years and years and years and i just encouraged him that i had been praying for him and i thought he was he was just gonna have a great 20 21 and he said i'm learning to rely on jesus more and more right now that i have in a long time and that reminds me that i have to do the same thing with my relationships and then the last but not least um i've gotta rem and i also wanna say this i think relationships where people reach out to you for no reason but to check in are the ones that really matter i can't tell you how many times mark moore jr texts me and just says how are you doing and i go why do you make me feel like such a horrible human being because i haven't asked you how you're doing but that reminds me of that and then i've made calls the other thing that i've learned is that you have to make calls and talk to people that you love i've called relatives i've called an uncle of mine that had been going through a lot of stuff and and usually when he and i talk it's not a conversation that i love to have because all we do is cry the entire time because we love each other and we say things that we haven't said to each other in a long time but i have to do that because it's what's necessary right now and those are some of the things that i've learned in 2020. that's great well i don't have a list [Laughter] but i i do have lessons um i i feel like for me i have learned so much and it touches base with a few things that he has said but um that our own personal and the people that we love our mental health matters i've i've learned so much more and like i knew before this year that mental health matters but i i didn't take it into [Music] consideration how much my mental health matters sometimes i'm very concerned about others or you know sometimes we we research and we are reaching out to others um when we find out maybe that there's been a diagnosis but your mental health matters across the board whether there's a diagnosis or whether there's not mental health have our own mental health has to be a priority um and i'm learning that it's really okay to not be okay and to say that come on to break the stigma of that because you know i i know we know that the enemy's number one tool against us is isolation and if he can isolate us and if he can dumb us down and keep us quiet or make us feel guilty for feeling bad or even for failing because we've messed up we've made mistakes i've had to learn patience i've snapped up my kids from time to time and i'm like wait i shouldn't have done that i've had and you know well that's more often than the kids though no but learning to to to um to recognize that our mental health has to be a priority and we have to take care of our mind and our emotional stability just like we do the health of our body if we have medication for blood pressure for headaches or for whatever we take medication for we're consistent with that but sometimes we're not consistent to just have self-ref um self-reflection time or down time to just ask god to touch my mind keep my mind stable keep me in perfect peace when i sleep at night and keep me from being restless because sleep matters sleep matters to what we're doing for the next day and so i think that along with just the power of um togetherness has been a huge lesson and um leaning in on each other our voice matters and i think a lot of people this year um whether it's on facetime or facebook live or whether it's on a private phone call or it's through a text or an inbox i think a lot of people have realized that their voice matters more than they realize it did before um and the same thing i've had people just randomly inbox me or text me that i hadn't heard from in a long time and the smile or the weight that it lifted or the distraction of a challenge i was facing how it helped me to get through a tough moment to go oh my gosh they just thought about me that's so strange and so cool at the same time so i think the um learning that lesson that your voice matters and that it's also okay to get help when you need help is important yes and i um i was just gonna add you know i'll i'll be honest you know in terms of like this year there's been several days several weeks i just felt like i was drowning i was drifting i was not well you know emotionally um from grief uh from just the routine of life just changing and you know i don't know if anybody has when i first learned how to swim my cousin just pushed me in and so that was my first time learning how to swim was showed up at the pool and my cousin goes hey just pushed me on it and i felt like 2020 just pushed me into the deep end and i didn't know how how to swim because travis for people that don't know you might not know but travis lost his father right in february it's like we we we had your father's funeral and we went straight out of that came home and wow we are introduced to a pandemic so you have multiple issues that are going on you're grieving you're hurting you're trying to redefine your life and then here comes a pandemic that takes control of redefining your life and sorry and so that's that's a lot people people are dealing with so much grief in this moment and it's it's one thing for us to have to deal with just the pandemic and the restrictions and all of that but to have to learn how to deal with grief in the middle of it all that is huge i wanted people to understand yeah and i think i think the the only thing that i can describe it is is when you're sinking and you're trying you're drowning and you're trying to you're close to the edge of the pool you know underneath the water the only thing that could help me was gratitude and gratitude was that strength that allowed me if you're underwater to get to the edge and grab onto the edge and just hold on yeah that's great and that's the only way the image in my mind i can kind of describe it is is that it it gratitude never took me out of the water it it never took me out of the place that i was at but it allowed me to catch my breath it stabilized you yeah it allows me to catch my breath stabilize me along the way and i think you know just understanding the value of gratitude and gratefulness finding something every single day no matter how big no matter how small i mean this gratitude is going through my phone looking at older pictures old pictures of our kids and looking at their little peanut heads and no hair on their head and they're making the and looking through videos of when they were first born brought a sense of gratitude brought a sense of you know god thank you that our kids are healthy you know so i think i don't know if if if people have gone through the same thing i've gone through and practically some people have probably gone through worse people have lost their mother and their father and family members but find something to be grateful for and it doesn't have to be big you don't have to you know put it out on social media but you can go through your phone go through your picture for the goodness of the lord yeah that's good you've got to look for the goodness of the lord um at times because of what we're facing you you have to remind yourself yeah okay i'm dealing with this i'm dealing with that but you know what god was god has been good the very fact that i'm i'm still here is a sign that god has been good and that's what some of you today just kind of just look back over your life and say yeah i feel like i'm in a different place i feel like uh this this big shift came to my life we know we were always big about saying the shift is coming there's a shift there's a ship well hello we consider yourself shifted okay because that's exactly what god has done he has shifted us and yeah and and sometimes in the middle of it i'm like god i shouldn't have prayed that so hard i shouldn't have said shift lord uh but that's what he's done and and i want to tell you something you might feel like well this shift has set me back this shift has caused me to maybe lose a job or a lose a financial status or lose family members or whatever but i'm going to tell you that when it's all said and done if you'll just continue to look for the goodness of the lord i believe see i didn't get a chance to tell y'all because i kind of let everybody go first and they all kind of took something parts of what i wanted to say but because one of my greatest the lessons that i learned i'm gonna tag on with uh pastor travis right here it was being empathetic i've always considered myself to be an empathetic person um i kind of had that thing where i i'll cry with you i don't even always have to know what you're crying about but but i could cry with you and um i i found myself this year man when i saw george floyd laying in the street with somebody he was just begging for life i found myself crying every time i saw that no i've never been held down like that and most people haven't but when i saw him something in me it was the most conflicting uh emotions i was angry i i was ready to fight i was ready to cry i was ready to do all of that because i was moved by the feelings of his infirmities when i saw people uh out in the streets who were who were just protesting this was what they they had a right to do this and yet i saw things uh they were they were things gas gas was thrown at their direction um people were trying to break it up i i began to cry because i'm like that's that's an unfair advantage that somebody is taking of those people i cry when they start interviewing frontline workers nurses and doctors who are on the job and tears are streaming down their face and it's a fight every day they go into work not knowing what they're going to take home to their family it moves me to tears and then it moves me to anger when other people say well this just isn't real well it may not be real for you but it's real for them and so i'm empathetic to all of that so empathetic that one of the nurses in our church yesterday uh she sent me a a picture and she had her sleeve rolled up and she was being vaccinated but you know what it you can have your opinion on that but when i saw her get vaccinated tears i was in a store i had a mask on but tears started immediately running down my face because it was relief for her and so i that whole empathy piece i think and i think that god i think that god kind of slowed down the world so that we could look at each other really and feel what our brothers are feeling how can you love people that that's the commandment that we have to love our neighbor as ourself but you know what you know how you do that is by walking in their shoes by understanding their story and that's been my biggest lesson of of 2020 is that i am i am to be moved and anytime i get to the point where i can't be moved by other people's infirmities then there's something wrong with that and if there's anything i'm grateful for i'm grateful that god slowed this nation down slowed the world down enough for us to take time and look at another person's life and and identify what they're going through that's that's been my big learn lesson learn in 2020 that people are hurting people are broken people are wounded people are longing for hope mental health was an issue before 2020 ever came along and now it's even greater and it goes all the way back to the fact that we got to be patient with people we got to trust the lord we have to stop examining everybody else and start examining ourselves having uh caring one another's burdens and that's what it's meant for me uh pastor chris can you tell me just what is your greatest hope as we go forward into 2021 because i think it's today the whole point of today is to help you walk out of one year and into another and i i just want to hear what what your hope is uh mine is simply to [Music] increasing my awareness of god's nearness at all times you know as we just came through christmas and you hear emmanuel god with us and so we've heard that for years and when you really think about it god he had to leave a place to come to where we were in the middle of our mess because we could not get to him and 2 000 years later is literally like i have to constantly tell myself when is not all together he's with me yes he is with me so just that awareness of his nearness is my greatest hope for 2021. i believe as long as he's with me i've heard you preach this i can face any storm yes i can go through anything as long as i know that god is with me the enemy fights that because thoughtlessness is the beginning of great loss so as long as he can make us think that god is somewhere waiting for us to get it right and to cross every i mean not every eye and cross every t no it's like no no right where you are going through covet going through grief pastor travis going through uh mark when you was talking about dealing with the kids and and being present wherever you are in whatever state that you're in he is with you hear that today somebody that's watching today needs to know that jehovah shama that's who he is the god that is here not the god that is coming but the god that is here somebody's watching us today and you need to know that that god is right where you are maybe you're not proud of where you are and and you know what that's okay but wherever you are just dare to open up your heart and believe that god is in that with you and he doesn't come just to sit with you he comes to walk you out of one place into another out of one dimension into another out of one season into another and you've got to know that today that god cares and he's present the bible tells us he's a present help in the time of trouble somebody's facing trouble somebody's family is in trouble somebody's marriage is in trouble somebody is your dreams are in trouble you feel like 2020 has robbed you of your dreams i i'm gonna go back to what i was trying to say a moment ago that shift that happened we felt like it dislocated us but you know what it's going to do i believe at some point with all of my heart i feel like i got to tell somebody you haven't lost anything you you haven't lost as far as your time you haven't lost anything god is going to restore unto you the years the years that covered 19 has eaten up the sleepless nights that colvin 19 has eaten up all of the things that we've lost god promised us in his word that he would restore them back to us restoration is coming to your house today it's coming to my house and i'm gonna thank him right now before i ever get to 2021 that restoration is my portion it's what belongs to me it's what belongs to my family it's what belongs to my church it's what belongs to the church around the world the global church you know what if we if we have learned the lesson that we were meant to learn in 2020 i believe with all of my heart that god is going to make it up to us i'm going to give y'all my greatest wish before i turn anybody else loose because i want to give it to you uh but i i want to give it to you it's really out of isaiah 58 and verse 6 and it says this it says no this is the kind of fasting that i want this is what god is saying i want i i want to free those who are wrongly imprisoned i want to lighten the burden of those who work for you let the oppressed go free remove the chains that bind people look right there uh let let those who have been lightly in prison whether they've been imprisoned uh falsely whatever they whatever they've went through maybe it's just because of the color of your skin that people have put you in a prison my prayer is that in 2021 we are going to be able to to to lighten the burden of people that we're going to be able to break the chains that have people bound to break the chains and have people feel like they even if it's a chain in your mind you're not physically bound but your mind says i can only go this far and no further i want that to break off your life this year i want those limitations to lose you this year i want god to change what he's got to change whether it's in our society whether it's in the white house whether it's in my house i want god to change everything he's got to change so that every yoke every yoke that says you'll never go any further you'll never be any better you'll never do any greater i want that to be broken off of the lives of people that's my desire that god will grant us hope i said i was never going to call another year the year of hope because the year that we called the year of hope back in 2017 was difficult for me but that's what i feel like god this is a year of hope but you know what i'm not going to sit up here and i'm not going to say like some people i'm not going to get up here and start trying to prophesy a prophet lie to you to try to make you think i'm spiritual we've all seen enough of that people that have said that the election would go this way and the other and the some would say it's going to go that way they'll all get up and prophesy and say this that and the other well y'all didn't hear me get up and say any of that because i'm not trying to not trying to impress anybody this is my commitment to you is to love you and tell you the truth it's to love you and tell you the truth and my truth about 2021 is i'm gonna walk into 2021 as softly as i'm walking out of 2020 and i'm going to trust that the lord is going to continue to do what he's done which is keep us here's my scripture for you psalms 37 and verse 4 says fix your heart on the promises of god and you will be secure feasting on his faithfulness make god the utmost delight and pleasure of your life and he will provide for you what you desire the most give god the right to direct your life give god the right to direct your life in other words cooperate with him give him the right to direct your life and as you trust him along the way you'll find that he pulled it off perfectly quiet your heart in his presence and pray quiet your heart y'all hear that today those of you that might be anxious about 20 21 quiet your heart quiet your heart and trust your god quiet your heart and keep hope alive as you long for god and god will come through for you now i'm tell you something this year may not have been like we wanted it to be but god has come through for us and i am so grateful for that today as we walk out of 2020 and we put our feet into 2021 my desire is that you can quiet your heart and we just trust god that we don't just get oh well we got a vaccine coming now we can just go back to way to the way things used to be absolutely not if you do that you have missed the entire lesson weird god just got our attention because he wanted us to say hey listen i i just want to talk to you a minute i want to remind you that i'm sovereign i want to remind you that i'm god i want to remind you that even that the breath that you just took i'm the one who gave that to you ain't nobody gave that to you but god y'all better hear me today nobody has given us the breath that we have in our lungs and the ability to breathe today but god himself i don't know who's watching and i don't know where you are in your walk with christ i don't know if you need to take this moment right now and acknowledge him as your savior but if that's you i want you to do that i want to ask i want to tell you i want to tell you that the greatest gift that you will ever get you thought you got the greatest gift on christmas let me tell you there is not a gift any greater than when you get the gift of salvation god has a plan for you he has a plan there's a reason you're watching there's a reason you've survived there's a reason even though you might have lost a lot the very fact that you can hear me today the fact that you woke up this morning is a sign that god is not through with you and i'm grateful for life but you need life with purpose you need life with purpose and god is the one that holds the purpose to your life why don't you pray this prayer with me invite him into your life say lord jesus come into my heart i'm not waiting to 2021 i'm going to accept you right here in 2020. and i'm asking you to be the lord of my life to forgive me of my sin and help me find the hope and the future that you have for me in jesus name amen i hope you prayed that prayer if you did i want you to click the button in the chat and i want to know because i got a special gift that i want to give to you and we'll connect via the chat but i want you to know more than anything you got the greatest gift in the world because you got jesus and as you walk with him and as you commit to his word and as you commit to being connected to the body of christ he begins to unleash your purpose and he begins to help you to understand why he has given you life i've come that you might have life but i want you to have it more abundantly and the way you find out how abundant how that abundant life starts to work for you is when you understand your purpose whoa i've enjoyed this today listen i want to hear real quick tina tell me what your greatest hope is my god i wanted to just take yours after everything that you just said you had to do i'm just going to tag on that because i think you covered it all everything that you said it just resonated with my heart in so so many ways so i'm thinking y'all okay your hope is big enough to bother all of y'all say that though okay nina what's your greatest hope uh i think my greatest hope would be that every lesson that we've learned in 2020 that we don't forget them and that we take them into 2021 yeah um you know empathy patience our mental health the face time and you know facebook live [Laughter] yes that we just take those and we don't forget them but we put them into practice as we go into the new year yeah pastor travis what's your greatest hope my my greatest hope um comes comes with this conviction that i have is that god is not finished yes no matter what you lost no matter what you face no matter what has pushed you down that god's name is not finished and that's my greatest hope is that we would walk in that we would walk in the finish worked god being performed and perfected in our lives absolutely atlanta um my greatest hope is that empathy continues to grow and like nina said that we never go back to the same but we get better and better through this and that we again put it into practice the lessons that we've learned and that we don't take for granted ever again what we used to just have so easily yes that's that's great lana i'll tell you one thing another thing that i thought of was i don't i didn't realize how much a hug i mean i always knew a hug meant a lot but sometimes i think we do it so subconsciously that we are that that maybe we take it for granted but i've thought about so many of your faces i'm not kids i've thought about so many of your faces and how i could embrace you and how that hug meant the world to me but you know what my one of my greatest hopes is that we're going to be able to do that again sometime soon mark tell us my hope for 2021 is that i will have my own parking space in the parking lot for i have this hope thank you can y'all believe that in the middle of all of this god put up a parking lot from the potter's house north dallas he's a wonder bishop tell us that was your greatest hope that we don't ever abort a promise because of a tough process don't ever abort the promise because of a tough process we we had promises going into 2020 that all of a sudden when we least expected it we entered into a tough process but uh still hold on to that promise the promise didn't go anywhere you god put it in you you're pregnant with that promise you're pregnant with that purpose and don't abort it just because of the tough process that's so good bishop thank you so much hold on to the promises of god if you were here i'd say touch your neighbor and say hold on don't you ever let go because god is going to yes what he said he was going to do and the great thing about god is he'll give you the grace to go through it if you would have asked us one year ago if you would ask yourself one year ago uh would i be able to make it through a pandemic and not lose my mind you know we might not have thought we could have done it as we look back over our life little by little every day mercy was new every morning and let me tell you something i i hate to say this but i told you i'm gonna be honest we're not through with this yet we're not finished with this pandemic yet many of people will tell us that the worst days are ahead of us but i believe that we will have a voice in the matter by us being careful by a socially distant distancing ourselves by us wearing our masks listen we have to do this we can quarantine this crazy virus rather than the virus quarantine us so but we have to we have to be careful to listen to those who are in our government listen to the scientists listen to to our our incoming president make sure that if they tell us to wear a mask we're going to wear one why because it ain't just about me well that's not me i would i don't think i'd like to wear a mask well nobody likes it listen us girls we like lipstick and all of those wonderful things and it messes our makeup up we don't like it but if it will spare somebody's life or possibly spare my own then that's just what we have to do that's what we have to do because we are at the end of the day our brother's keeper and that's another thing i got to stop because i could just go on and on when i think of what y'all have enabled the potter's house north to do in the middle of a pandemic i mean i want to hug every last one of y'all for that and you know we're going to have our new year's eve service coming up on the 31st of december which is just a few days away and uh in in that we'll be able to show you some more of the things that we've been able to accomplish throughout this pandemic but i believe you're going to be you're going to be blown away at the goodness of god and how he's used you to help us meet the needs in our community we've partnered with uh recently we've partnered with children's advocacy center of collin county these are families that were suffering from abuse neglect domestic violence and and you know what we we we were able to do after we met the needs in our local church we were able to take christmas presents to them we took diapers and pajamas and uh cozy socks and toys and we were a blessing to them you were you were because you were faithful can i tell you this i want you to hold on to this right here proverbs 52 verse 24 says generosity brings prosperity but withholding from charity brings poverty to those who live to bless others they will have blessings heaped upon them and the one who pours out his life to pour out blessings will be saturated with favor the one who pours out his life to pour out a blessing to somebody else will be saturated with favor so i just believe that yeah we've had some bad times in 2020 but i believe that there's some blessings and some favor that's on us that we may not visibly see right now but i'm going to tell you it will reveal itself over time

Channel: Sheryl Brady

Views: 2,168

Rating: 4.9444447 out of 5

Keywords: Pastor Sheryl Brady, Sheryl Brady, The Potter's House of North Dallas

Id: iRphmGEG1a4

Length: 59min 1sec (3541 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 27 2020