Shawn Bolz | Living Your Dream | Expression58

thank you well hello good morning we were here together wasn't that new worship song so amazing I was gonna call it hot but can you say that in church hot it was so hot it was so I mean like I leaned over to hona in first service and I said oh my gosh like we are here when songs are being discovered together that are gonna go around the world which is so beautiful and so thank you worship team you guys always rocket um this week I'm gonna be talking about living our dreams that's much easier than what Jennifer Toledo has been talking about it are serious she's been doing apologetics over the last it was at four weeks we have four weeks so seven weeks I don't know how many weeks but she dismissed hona and I from having to do this because it takes a lot of research a lot of work and we were so blessed weren't we we were like so blessed I was like I gotta come in and do the inspirational stuff and I have taught on apologetics in the past but not as good as Jennifer Toledo did I mean she she's so amazing it's if you didn't hear it I'm gonna encourage you to go back and listen to it and I like several of the major theologians right now that are teaching the same kind of subjects but they don't teach it with so much humor and also the ability to smack your backside as Jennifer Toledo so Sheree and I were talking about last Sunday when you talk about her like over an hour and a half in the car we were out to get a present for gross I'm gonna drive out to get it and it was like an hour and a half away and we talked the entire time about how amazing Jennifer is and that just the whole service and we kept texting her and she's like are you sure so I love when you're preaching up here you don't always know like it wasn't okay was it's good right and I love how it was just amazing so I want to say two things about this message one of them is that I want to encourage you some of you have stopped dreaming because of life because of circumstances and I'm hoping that I'm not going to start out with how to develop a dream or how do you get a dream from God we don't have time to develop that message but it's important that you do and it's important that you find you know a group of people that you're connecting to here at the church or at your local church if you're visiting that you find people who are going to journey with you about dreaming in your life because I had several people say I don't even know how to dream like text me and and Instagram and stuff just in between services and that's that's one of the main things that God awakens in you when your new creation is the ability to have his dream and then the second thing I'm going to say is I'm living out one of my dreams right now which is a really wild one we started to record a TV show called exploring the industry it's very much like my exploring the prophetic podcast and we started to write some articles as a team my team helped me to just think of some subjects and themes and CBN News Network has there some of them that people who are involved in cbn who does the 700 club where they've gone through our transiting god materials and courses and stuff on how to hear God's voice in the basic way and they loved it so much they kept introduced me throughout the whole crew and they said you know this would be a good home for your television show we're launching a 24 hour news network we launched at the beginning of the year but we're just really launching it would you like to be a part of the cbn family and launch your interview show here and so we just did that and we did it faster than we can get everything up like they don't even have us they just barely got a website or us on their website but they've launched it as far as programming on their 24-hour news station which you can get here locally with rabbit ears which is really cool there's about 17 or 18 markets of rabbit ears a restaurant cable or satellite or on their their app but it's it's all about exploring the entertainment industry and it's all about sharing the story of faith-based Christians carried in that conversation where what God's doing and film television fashion all these different you know video games sports music and so it's been so much fun to record these and to hear the story and there's moments that our whole team the director producer all them they're watching it and they're like crying or they're going oh my gosh no one's having this conversation consistently on TV this is so important and then the CBN crews giving us the same feedback like we're so glad we got this up now we have to keep like they've given us extra slots all weekend long which is just amazing so like we you know we're not paying for our slots to be a part of cbn this is like their they've adopted us to their family which is really cool so I'll have the TV and show next year but the CBN show on exploit industry how many of you are in the entertainment industry you all need some people to have some mature conversations for your journey and this show will do it and so today who's on and it'll be on after the service and also tonight eight is Pat Boone so Pat's like my spiritual grandpa he was a Lister in the 50s 60s 70s he's had more platinum records more I mean like he's he competed with Elvis and the beach where's Elvis used to open up for him I mean crazy stories and so he shared he's on the show today you're gonna really enjoy the God stories that behind-the-scenes cuz no other a Lester's we're living for God and his time now we have a bunch of him but in this time but he was like the only one okay so that was just an advertisement to share that I've been dreaming and the dream is coming true [Music] thank you so I'm a dreamer and I've always been a dreamer and even when I was a little if you asked me like what do you want to be when you grow up you get like a 20 minute explanation at 6 so I wasn't like I want to be an asteroid B like I'm gonna do this and this and this I remember having a time I was like just one week I want to be a veterinarian and rescue dogs and so I designed the entire architectural II designed the entire thing with the budget and the whole thing prisoner to my school presents my parents and I I'm a dreamer and I'm a feasibility I'd like I want to actually do it I want to see things happen and I I know that God himself he's a dreamer and he dreamed of each one of us before time began and he thought into our lives the destiny that we would have but also the works we would do to fulfill that destiny and he prepared us for them before time began that's huge that means that God in your DNA has put things inside of you that will let you see him in a way that he can only be seen as you pursue him this way and it's for this side of eternity dreaming is only for this side of eternity because in that side of eternity we will know not in part but in full but in this side we only have one life to give God this kind of life and go on a journey of dreaming it says in the Bible the only thing that pleases God of space well there's a thousand ways to exercise our faith you know there's so many different ways which I love so Sophie zones 2:10 is exactly what I just said I'm reading out of passion transition though just so you have the reference and I would encourage you the passion translations free online and Bible gateway comm or get one it's a really it has a New Testament Psalms and a couple of other I think proverbs Isaiah Genesis is now out I believe I get them ahead of time so I don't know what you guys have or what's available but I know it's amazing ephesians 2:10 we have become his poetry of recreated people that will fulfill the destiny has given each of us four joined to Jesus The Anointed One even before we were born God planned it in advance that our destiny and good works we would do to fulfill it so as a dream as a Christian dreams aren't just our desires of what would happen in our life dreams are the substance of what he planned for us in the first place we when you're born again you're immediately born and grafted into the fact that he has something for you to do and you're destined is the people you get to love so you have the plans and the destiny and you begin to have an awakening inside of a passion for his people you have passion for Jesus and a passion for his people and the thing about dreams is that a lot of times dreams come in an unusual way to a people who don't look like they could fulfill them and God purposely does that he put you in a position that you cannot fulfill his dream for your life without him not in the way that you want to inside and that the world may not see with his eyes what's inside of you and a lot of us have an expectation that we're gonna start dreaming that and we're gonna start you know sharing our dreams that we're gonna be fully supported and I think of Joseph and how he shared his dream with his family and not only did they try and kill him but when they decided not to come they at least wanted to kill the dream so he sold him to slavery this is his family and I know a lot of you come from good families some of you don't come from good families but even good families can actually accidentally try and kill your dreams but if they don't see with God's eyes over you I have incredible Christian parents when I told them we're gonna move to LA in 1995 I said we're gonna move to LA we're gonna start a Christian ministry I'm not sure what it's gonna be and I'm gonna pursue things in the entertainment industry with the poor and my parents both freaked out and my mom started crying like why would you do that you're in ministry you have all kinds of opportunity why would you go to LA I mean it's so weird to me if you're from LA you're like I've heard those reports but my parents we grew up in Southern California so la was not it was like in our backyard it's the fact that they were like la is so evil you know this is the place it will destroy who you are and I was expecting support from my parents but there's a point as an adult and this is important we hear there's a point as an adult that you have to parent yourself with God you have to actually receive the Bible and receive what he's saying to you through the father's heart and you're no longer accountable and responsible to have someone else make your decisions it would be ridiculous if your parents were still paying your cell phone in your 38 years old unless you're a trust-fund kid or something and it just works out that way that'd be ridiculous unless you had something really wrong with you it'd be ridiculous if they were deciding which job you're gonna have at 40 it'd be ridiculous if your parents were deciding who you're gonna get married to and you're in your 30s or 20s that just doesn't happen you don't need that kind of parenting voice at that time and many of us feel betrayed by the fact that we have great dreams inside of us but no one's trying to make them happen for us and that's that depravity where we don't realize that in faith God truly is a father and he's actually working everything around us the whole universe around us so that what is inside of us can come forth he's that good and so there's this gap sometimes even with our expectation between wanting the world to believe with us and want with us and actually having God and all of the Angel armies behind us if we would just see it right Jeremiah 29:11 for I know the plans I think toward you says the Lord thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you a future and a hope this is important because this thing I have plans for you and there to give you a hope there's no evil in me there's no evil intention in me and sometimes when we are going towards promises one of the first things that happened is we have failures or breakdowns or things don't meet our expectations and we cry out God why as if he intended this for us somehow as if he intended as we pursue dreams that there would be pain and I think if Caleb and Kalos one of my favorite stories in the Bible because one of the unsung heroes the Bible like I mean if you look at it and you look at the Bible in context he's not unsung but when you look at him just individually he goes with Joshua and they go into their promised land of Israel the promise then that God had just miraculously delivered his people so that they could have it they're wandering in the wilderness 12 spies going Joshua and Caleb come back and Moses is like well how is it I think it's so amazing it has milk it has honey as everything we've ever dreamed of and beyond it's so much better than we thought and the other guys are going are you kidding me it was the worst place we've ever seen there were so many armies and giants there was such an infrastructure we could never even penetrate that there's no part of us that could ever even come nearer to that that that land there no way we're little people of two million how could we ever enter into a place there's millions of people and occupy it yeah right and Caleb and his heart didn't change or waver in his passion he's like no you don't understand our God he just took us out of Egypt so he can give us that how could you not believe so he has to go with them even though he's in belief he has to go with him and his dream is hibernating in a spirit not asleep not dead hibernating in a spirit for 40 years can you imagine for 40 years you're alive with something that God put inside of you and then in his 80s they're already crossing over to the promised land and now they're in you know and Caleb goes to Joshua he goes the mountain that God promised me and Moses promised me I want it now the mountain that he had been promised from Moses had five giant kings on it there are five kings that were known through all the Philistine lands all these lands that they were the giant kings he's in his 80s he doesn't care he says I'm like a young man I'll take him all because he was so on fire it was his time it was what he was living for and it's such an example to us of someone who dared to dream with God there's lots of processes along the way but God honors those who dream 1st Corinthians 1:22 for all God's promises find their yes and fulfillment in him and as his yes and our amen ascend to God we bring him glory there's something about the yes of heaven that's coming down and the yes and a min of our heart that's going up at some point they meet and divine synergy happens that could never happen from any opportunity to a man that you pursued at some time when you're yes even the midst of everything looking the opposite says yes I believe you yes is big and when those things kiss universes are born you know there's there's men like Walt Disney who said if you dream it you can do it and and he did have a Christian foundation but then there's others we see biblical prototypes who created things even like Peter who everybody looked at and thought he's just a fisherman like Jesus picked all kinds of normal people like you and I so he's just a fisherman his family's looking at him they're going Peter Jesus that guy Jesus picked Peter to be as this I put her they not know how hot-headed he is do they not know how dysfunctional he is like Peter like he yells at people all the time he fishes naked every day like Peter's ridiculous I can't believe that guy that guy Jesus must not really be the Messiah because that I mean this is stupid to pick Peter his family's probably like that you know maybe his Jewish mom was like oh yes Peter but his cousins were like oh my gosh is joined a cult you know there's no way this guy is real if you picked Peter and in the end of us Peters life as Peter dreams with Jesus as Jesus says your name is no longer Silas but it's Peter and I'm gonna build my church upon the rock of who you are and as Peter shares some time in some auditorium I deny Jesus but he came back to many restored me he'll restore you to and probably some of his cousins and auntie's were there and they're listening and they're looking at Peter and they're saying he's ours he is our Peter he came from our family we're like Peter because when you follow your dreams you might be met with resistance in the beginning but we see Joseph's brothers when Joseph and they saw him in the fullness of the dream they immediately humbled themselves before the dream and they just couldn't believe it because they not only knew that Joseph's stream made their life save because the time of famine he brought his family in and all the Israelites in but also they became servants of his court something that was so great that they began to serve something that was a greatness that their family had never touched before they were little farmers they were little you know they had they were sheep herders they had a minor wealth in the Israel place but now they're he's the second most important man in all of any Kingdom and he brings us family into that position I've had a few people I've met through the years who they're married into like a famous family and even one of the guys like he took on the famous family's name because it gives you something if you go into a restaurant you say I'm a this person they would be like oh well there was a 30-minute wait but come on in you know like there's something that happens with entitlement of our names and over someone else's accomplishment when you're linked to it and I'm not saying you should use entitlement at all but I'm just saying you and you're dreaming cause you're causes your whole family your in your friendship structure to come higher into the glory of God to come higher into their identity and who they are dreams are the lanterns by whose light we pass through the darkest Valley God gives you a dream because knows this world's dark he gives you a dream because it's supposed to light your path he gives you a dream because as you love people that he loves and as you dream with him that something happens that can't happen through normal dreamers it can't happen through people who are just ambitious but all of a sudden his love has a landing strip to land on in a dark world and he can't wait to land on you dreams are alight in our soul to fight through the obstacles and dreams are the stuff that life is made of second Timothy 1:4 God will never give you a spirit of fear but the Holy Spirit will give you mighty power love and self-control now the context of this is Paul's looking at Timothy who's a spiritual son and he's saying I need to remind you of something you have to fan into flame that gifts that are inside of you and then he says this because at this point even Timothy having one of the greatest spiritual fathers of all time besides Jesus himself he has Paul who's launched him who's speaking into his life who is helping him he's birthing something that he needed a Paul in his life and so he gets upon his life and even then Paul says you will not be able to do what you're doing by my desire for you you have to parent and nurture that thing that's inside of you you have to have a push you have to have a go you have to fan this and if I know one will do this for you and we think spiritual spiritual parenting there's somebody holding our hands and imparting all of their legacy all their resources all their you know their rolodex and then also the opportunity and now where we can that's true parenting that's never been true parenting as a matter of fact most billionaires when they pass on their money it starts to degrade and go away because they had the anointing or they had the authority to build it but they didn't have anyone to who had the authority to give it to you know we see nepotism all the time in the worst cases of nepotism is when somebody who doesn't have the authority comes into position because their father or mother and then they ruined what their father or mother built happens all the time in politics and business and ministry all the time Paul was saying I don't want nepotism I don't want you just to have this because I'm your father he's saying I laid hands on you and something was spiritually imparted and now you have the power of God to do what's inside of you you have the love of God the people you're burning with you have love of God inside of you compelling you but you also have to have a spirit of a sound mind self-disciplined you have to have that go you have to have that place where you know you don't want to wake up out of bed you don't want to get up early you don't want to get healthier you don't want to get cleaner in your environment you don't want to do all those things but you start to set goals you start to have structure you start to have an understanding that I have to be self-motivated or this isn't going to happen for me and there's a deception especially over the younger generation in this generation that thinks that somebody needs to come and give me my hand up Jesus died for you on the cross Jesus literally exalted you and put you in the highest place of authority you could ever be given above any man reasons one talks about this Ephesians 2 says you're seated within there he does not need you to have somebody who spiritually adopts you and then your life starts he is a father as a matter of fact the more you want somebody to make your life happen besides him the more he will resist you in that area because he wants to be the lord of your life he wants to be your God and at the end of the story he doesn't want you to say well this guy this guy this guy did this as I dreamed they made it all happen for me he wants to be the dream maker and he wants to do it with you not just through you so many of us are looking for that spiritual father to awaken our dreams and make her dreams happen and I love Paul's example he says you've been in to find what's inside of you we have to have determination we have to have you know we have our flesh man who's so wired for the opposite our flesh man is like that place inside of us that's cold that's lazy that detaches that's sad that's like that allows ourselves to entertain depression that allows ourselves to entertain you know when we go through hard times that we're suffering and we need somebody we have entitlement or we have a victim mentality and I love what Paul says to the Galatians and he just says he just kills this thing he says put to death these things and he defines to the same people the fruit of the Spirit that will happen if you put to death this place of your flesh and you allow your relationship to God with God to build all these fleshly things will start to go away and then you'll have a spiritual of these things so here's the things that are gonna go away this is so practical Galatians 5:19 through 21 it's obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time repetitive life loneliness cheap sex stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage frenzied and joyless grabs of happiness trinket God's magic show religion paranoid loneliness coat throat competition all-consuming yet never satisfied once a brutal temper an impotence to love or be loved divided homes and divided lives small-minded and lopsided pursuits the vicious habit of D personalizing everyone into a rival uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions ugly parodies of community he says I could go on and we can all relate to those right we can all see those whether we participated or it's been against us either way we can relate to those there's those places that our flesh will naturally land if we don't disciple ourselves in the spirit there's no plan maybe for you it's the addiction partner maybe free to like compulsive behavior or maybe for you it's it's gossip or whatever but that's where you will go if you don't actually live a life in the spirit and a life in the spirit a dream with God is as deliberate the bottom line is that one may come to push you or turn or no one may come to push you or turn your TV off or exercise for you or apply for your jobs you've always dreamed about or to write your business plan or to uh you know to bring you to action again no one's gonna start any of this for you but God inside of you is giving you a yes God inside of you wants to teach you through a life in the spirit and so I want to read what the life of the Spirit looks like especially this specific word Galatians 5 20 22 about 23 24 around there but I'm just gonna read verse 23 you get an exuberance of life not needing to force your way head life able to marshal and direct your energies wisely in other words you get grit in other words when you have a life in a spirit you have something inside of you that knows how to spend your days I think about when I was writing you know my my last big best-selling book and it was when I said it sounds braggy whatever I'm just saying that it was like shocking to me that was a best-seller it was that I'd written a book and it was also shocking but it sold like 500,000 copies like 15 years ago and so years later I'm finally willing to write again I had a publisher wound from that one financially some things happen that were crappy and so I hadn't published again for all these years I was just busy doing this church and some other ministry stuff and so years later I'm finally gonna publish again my wife and my new publisher took me surrender healing which was really nice and and gave me the courage to say I have a voice in me to publish and the first book I wanted to write was really about the entertainment industry about how Christians can get out of a dysfunctional relationship with how they participate and actually participate deliberately in the entertainment whether you view it or whether you make it or whatever and I'm so excited about this book and I'm just full of it you know full of full of us full of it and uh and my wife and and my publisher said you know you have an audience right now that love to hear how you hear from God and do you think you need to serve that audience and love them and I'm like yeah but if you write to that audience is such a frenzied niche market like not all Christianity cares about that and it's something that's so small just a few charismatic Pentecostal churches will probably even be interested you know and they said we think you're supposed to do this and I did have a burning message of that in my life and about you know learning how to translate God's voice and learning how to do it out of a love base you know correcting some of the misconceptions of hearing God's voice this is foundation whatever you believe are that kind of stuff and so I was thinking about I was like okay and so I got in my mind the ideal way to birth this dream of this book knowing that this was going to be a small project but it was important and so I thought I need my office space set up a certain way I was transitioning out this church so I didn't have office here so we got an office Heidi Baker donated an office space to us during that season and so I have an office space down the street here in Glendale and we lived up the street in Glendale and I remember just going okay I'm just gonna send it real quiet you know I have to listen like house music while I'm writing it's kind of a weird thing for me it most of time and so I'm gonna play my house which again so I'm gonna kind of darken the Windows I'm just gonna like this whole thing and then our team for four bowls ministries needed all of our spare office space that was just donated to us for what we were working on I'm like oh my gosh I have no office space so I go home and our house we had we're having you know another baby the house was crazy in the first time I sat down to write I was interrupted 20 times the first hour with crisis and fires to put out and I thought this Sox thing went right in a victim like this is never gonna work I can't write it I'm gonna wait 10 more years I you know just all that kind of stuff you know and I just felt like and my wife rebuked me a couple times in love and was just like you were called to do this why are you having such a hard time like you've never written a book I've written to actually three at that point like this is not easy she's like just right so I go back and I'm in my bedroom I'm in our bedrooms packed you know I'm in my bedroom on a on a laptop on our little desk didn't have a pretty view and that was it and I was like oh Jesus I cannot write this I cannot think and I had to discipline myself and say you know it's not ideal but it shouldn't matter where the messages burst from it's in me and so I wrote and I wrote and I wrote and I wrote and so was done I only had like four weeks to write this thing and I was interrupted all the time during some of my greatest writing sessions crap hit the fan you gotta come in here right now cash flow issues I'm like I hate writing but I didn't hate writing I just hated that it was an ideal and I kept attaching myself back to the dream of there's people who need to be released into hearing God's voice God you love these people and I have a theology that you put inside of me and I can reform this thing and I kept dreaming of that just the putting in front of me putting it in front of me and even though nothing was good about the whole process when I delivered the book to my publisher he looked at and said oh this is good so I think I think it's good too and I can't believe it because it's been hard to write and you give me such a timeline when we release the book and we had he originally printed 15,000 copies just for the initial run cuz I've been published in a while and before publishing date he goes we need 15,000 more so we do those we need 20,000 more by the time it's published we need like the first week of public we need 20,000 more like this is getting really good because the that last best-selling prophetic book the only best-selling prophetic book that what beyond the charismatic Pentecostal cares in a buzzword prophetic thing was a book that did 30,000 copies and we're already at 45,000 being distributed I mean if something's happening well within that year 150 170 thousand copies it's sold we went what's happening this is way beyond what we thought this was going to be like this is wild and I was just dreaming just attach the little audience already by Zoe's book I don't know we're gonna go past it and I just nothing was ideal nothing was working for me I wanted somebody give me an office space I was praying that some wealthy person was friends worth would say I'm gonna rent you you know what those sensors where you go and rent by day or whatever a week just I'm gonna written and nothing was happening we couldn't afford to write one at the time and I had to write it in a manger literally many of the things that you're called to birth God purposely allows not because he wants him to be but he allows the resistance so as the enemy comes in all these things because he knows in the end story what he can work for your good to maximize this opportunity he also knows where you're out in life and that it's not ideal to birth the dream usually when we're birthing dreams it's not like where were you know and the strongest place we've ever been as a matter of fact most of people I know who've birth the greatest things have been reduced to the point that they couldn't believe it themselves that happened they're like really this is the season you chose remember when I was really strong and had a lot of ambition I was super excited remember that me and he says yeah stir it up again like Caleb stir it up that you again because I need that version of you to come into season which is part of how we learn to access that there's no age there's no time and God's heart he literally can make us timeless he could make the best things happen at 80 he can make the best things happen at 20 so how do we start operating in our dream again number one you got to pray and then you got to work you got to work and no one's gonna tell you and give you their work ethic unless you were a kid and your parents you know my parents trained me and work ethic I knew how to clean my house and a lot of kids in this generation don't clean their house I knew that my daughter's are learning how to clean the house like we know how to clean her house and but I mean like learning how to you know get up out of bed and and and just finding out what he's dreaming for you just to even a little glimmer just the basic desires what do you find the most beautiful what is the thing that you can't help spending time on what are the things that you you just dream of and think if I could just do that that would make me the happiest sometimes it's so spiritual you don't even know it's really spiritual then schedule your time you know if you don't know what to do clean your house schedule your time and start to make your world work because those of you who are creative especially if you think you can work in the chaos that you've allowed around you you can't no my chaos I was talking about was that writing the book wasn't an unclean house or not good schedule because I keep my schedule really well my house is really clean because I work but those of you who are saying you know like well my life's chaos so like all my bills aren't paid I just keep shopping I went to Starbucks 50 times this month and I should have had coffee once cuz I can't really afford a but my credit cards maxed that will stop you you're dreamer from coming alive because you're not working you're resting and someone else is gonna rescue out of this and you have to work that's the first thing and so schedule your time you know stop saying self lies watch your inner self talk listen to your inner monologue and take captive every thought or every excuse that tells you why you're not doing it I've met people who told me I'm gonna be a screenwriter and that is God's dream probably but then their dream was like they're like okay I'm gonna move to LA that's awesome that's a step now I'm gonna go work a normal job at a restaurant and wait until it hits me and a great creative idea hit me it went from dreaming to imagination because those who are dreaming with God there's always action steps towards that dream they're not saying you don't have a year to offer you don't have time when you can't focus on that or sometimes other dreams take place I know people who've got married and had kids and it put other dreams on the back burner I'm not talking about that I talk about the people who live as though they're doing something or are going to do something that have no action to their words it drives me crazy and I know God is nicer than me you know I love Gary Vee I don't if you guys ever listen to him but he says the only thing that matters is the the actions you take towards life I think that's so important just listen to the Bible Joyce Myers and Gary Vee all at the same time and the quicker you take those actions the faster you feel worthy because there's a lie that's on every single one of us especially when you're first pursuing a dream that I'm not worthy somebody else could do this better somebody else is more positioned for somebody else as a family that's more connected somebody else has resources or finances to do this there's always a lie but the moment you start taking the classes for the moment you start you know making an action plan meeting with your friends to develop a project it's creating the business plan whatever it is even if it's only the starter plan because there's usually 25 plans before you get to the end plan the moment you start doing this is the moment that unworthiness lifts off your life because you're coming into agreement with the dream and God can deliver the self pity self-absorbed miss and also the unworthiness that comes especially a lot of Christians who are coming to the altar and saying I just thought worthy you've been a Christian for eight years ten years three years and you still feel unworthy then you don't understand what he did on the cross he became unworthy so you could be made worthy you no longer need a wrestle with I'm not worthy for what God's called me to or you need him to go back to the cross again Jesus came in the most unusual package as the most unusual person and he suffered and his dream for us and died on the cross that was his dream for you so you can actually do don't have to die on a cross and you could do what was in the father's heart for you you know number number two and all this is that you know it takes faith it's another word for risk you have to risk you have to do things you've never done before or doom again if you did them and they failed I'm gonna think of you know when I was reading backyard millionaire in a next-door mill you know there's a great book so when you study people who have had a lot of wealth you start to realize how many major failures they've had and I love the iconic Denzel Washington speech to the college that he did where he says you're gonna fall but you can fall backwards or you can fall forwards if you fall backwards you're done if you fall forwards you're following the next opportunity and he talks about Edison and how Edison had a thousand failed events and inventions before he had the real ones he talked about different people in history and I just think of how many of us weren't told no one ever told you you're gonna fail so you're trying to keep the appearance especially in church because fail to us equals looking like a sinner but to me you know Jesus look like a sinner all the time because he hung out with them so it's not it's not he's not concerned about that he's concerned with you actually living his dream or being mediocre like lukewarmness is the scariest thing for Christian I know enough to want to be saved and be here but I don't know enough to really want to go after his dream for my life that's called lukewarmness that's what he says in Revelation he spits out and so faith is so important I love faith you know when we came out here in Kona and I came out here like 20 years ago and I may be a teenager I don't know I was a long time ago like eight ninety nine or a long time ago and we came out one time oh no this is 2001 so today we have a lot of stories out here because we came after I heard from God we were supposed to come out to LA at some point oh and I came with me and a lot of the scouting missions like the Caleb missions to just see what God was doing and in 2001 we came out here and we went to this one Church and I remember just thinking looking around going this isn't what I'm called to and we went to like a Hollywood party in the Hollywood party was pretty scary it was like people who I don't think were that important but they were acting like they were the a-listers of you know whatever but they were all Christians and I don't even know if it even exists anymore as far as the entertainment strip but it was really a scary part and remember looking at going god this isn't these people aren't my dream the ones that you brought me the Christian party and it was very Christian II you know Christianized that wasn't my dream and the Lord spoke to me and said it's not mine either I just have Kevin be a reformer and come join the Reformers that are out here come be a reinforcement to what's already out here and I thought how can I come out here I don't have any entertainment background at the time I didn't know the difference between a producer and a director I mean I came from a theater background we had producers and directors but out here was a lot of different and so I was like God what in the world am I gonna do out in LA like what am I gonna actually do I don't want to be an actor I don't want to I don't do all these other things what am I gonna do out there and when hone and Jennifer figured out they were supposed to come in 2006 they were like why is God bringing us to LA we're not creative people at all like we're not like gonna go be actors like what in the heck they only had Malaika at the time who's - we're not even - and she was a baby and they had no idea what was on the Leica just hi Andrew we've now been in commercials and have been acting they had no idea that they had a spiritual family who was gonna impact industry and they're gonna lead a church that's family based on community based that loves justice in the midst of the city they had no idea but they said yes out of radical faith where they could have gone into other opportunities that were more secure they looked and they saw you somehow in their spirit they were like we don't know why we're there we have all the things that could disqualify us but something in our spirit says yes to the faith and it was completely stupid it's a matter of fact most of the things that are the greatest things overdue are gonna feel really stupid to everybody around you all the key people you're gonna want to be celebrating you your family and your friends you may get one how many of you shared things too prematurely and you got some criticism anybody ever that's what my parents have lots of those stories when we shared we were coming out to LA in 2006 I mean I literally had all these spiritual kind of fathers and mothers who are like it's gonna go in the ocean like the really bad theology so you've heard those stories and that like they were afraid for our lives not just for our morality but for our like we were gonna die if we moved here and I'm just like and behind the Twilight its own like God's telling me this and all the people I love are standing against me telling me I'll die if I go there that's pretty that that's hi hi faith the fact that I said yes and when we the people we were connecting to out here their churches were all following there's five broken churches when we got here and I'm like oh my gosh we're going out to like the war zone brokenness it was crazy but I just knew and then these guys know several people came with us we just knew that it was time number three the last thing that you need to do is surrender he's taking somewhere that you won't go you wouldn't go without him he's taking you on a journey that you wouldn't have picked for yourself and there's times when you're in the middle of the journey that you have to just say not my will but your will cause God you have to remind yourself that you you sing really powerful worship songs on Sunday morning you're like you gonna have everything God you'd be doing your way you're amazing and then you like are doing it his way and you don't like it how do you know that when little kids are little they challenge their parents with a better way so I have a six and a four-year-old and Harper will tell me if we do a project together why shouldn't be doing it the way I'm doing it she's six so she's already smarter than me at six she's already like no dad you got to do this way like you will cut off your fingers with those scissors if you do that she's like dad do it my way it's the right way kids constantly think that their ways better I'm thinking of the entire project she's thinking of the one thing she wants to cut we do that with God all the time we're like don't you understand god I'm giving you everything I've said yes everything if why are you afflicting me and he's like I'm not afflicting you and everything that's happening to you because the enemy's trying to destroy you in the midst of that I'm gonna use it for you're gonna get like 10 times I'm out because you surrendered to me but your process will not bring you to my journey and the surrender is one of the hardest things we do I remember when Sheree and I bought our house and it was a big surrender where we just couldn't afford to renovate it we couldn't afford really to keep it and we had a trust guard on every front it was such a stupid thing like when we were buying her house one of our board members even said to us he said I don't believe this is God but I love you guys enough to be in the journey for you so if you need me on the other end I'm on your board stone I love you and I'm gonna in faith be praying for you and I trust your hearts but I don't think this is God I think it's gonna destroy you it's bad when a board member says that but they said I give you permission to do it I mean we all need to take risks and fail which is huge maturity of them to say that and we're in the house at one point and it's about to fail we need we needed a miracle for a miracle for like the tenth time and have you ever been there like you need a miracle free miracle so we're needing a miracle for a miracle it was like two and a three years ago and that was like oh it's over and I remember it Sheree looks at me and said there's nothing we could do I said the others we can surrender we can actually say to Jesus this is yours not ours this is your process and ours we've never thought of bringing ourselves into this you gave us vision for this and so we tell you not only is it yours not like when parents go there your kid when they're doing something bad not like that but like when you actually say god this is yours and I rescind it to you and my my fear my anxiety my lack of trust all those things I surrender it again and I say you are gone we can't go further unless you bring us there anyway so there's there's no there alternative did if you don't surrender is entering to panic attacks any depression and energy to discouragement where you actually short-circuit the work of God in your life and we entered into surrender and I said what's the worst that can happen she said we have to sell it I'm like who cares we didn't really buy it in the first place in a real way it was like just god thing so we both surrendered and I remember when we surrendered the next day after we started we literally let go of our contractor we gave him the last of the money we had we gave it to him it just it was more than we owned him but we felt like God said to do it and so we had zero dollars to renovate our house where we need to go and we surrendered the whole process to God and said this is either gonna be a really expensive flip that doesn't get finished it or it's yours and we're gonna live here and the next day we had a financial miracle radical breakthrough miracle your breakthroughs come when you're in a place of surrender sometimes we look back at our surrender and we think we see the brilliant strategy of God in it and those actually are things you have to do because you have to reverse-engineer how God works in your life he's very personal in some of things he's done before it's not that he doesn't in the same way again it's that he wants to teach you how he works in your life so any great win in your life go back and look at maybe it's how you met with your spouse maybe it's you know like something that happened in your family maybe it's something happen in your career look at it and then look at it with God's eyes like okay where were you in this so you can go back and reverse engineer it because when I if I told you the story of our house completely I would tell you seeing now the strategy of God I would tell you now that we're in a secure place where we have a traditional mortgage at a really low interest rate and it's super doable I would tell you you know like how God did that but if I told you in the midst of it I would be like it's scary ah you know I have no story for you it's like just we're in this house so we don't know if we're gonna make it that's where I would have been back then but now that I see it it's given us space to take on a huge project so we didn't necessarily we weren't ready for so to speak you know where could create cash flow shoes or something else or we needed employees or whatever else that was and we took on huge project because we could reverse engineer where God showed up before and so when we felt a dream to go forward into something else we can attach our faith to it in a unique way because we already had killed a lion and a bear we're like ok this is a Goliath let's go after it the last thing I want to talk about it and those are my three steps with last thing I just want to encourage you about in the last five minutes as the battle we know the scripts are second Corinthians 10:3 through four-four although we live in a natural realm we don't wage a military campaign employing human weapons using manipulation to achieve our aims and set our spiritual weapons are energized with divine power to effectively dismantle the defenses behind which people hide we can demolish every deceptive fantasy that opposes God and break through every arrogant attitude that has raised up and defiance to the nature of God we capture like prisoners of war every thought and insisted about an obedience to God now I think the enemy targets people who have dreams the most if you wonder what it is some people you know it's the marketplace people know it's entertainers and the artists oh no it's the moms and dads we all have our things that we think the enemy targets the most if you sum it all up it's people who would dream now when you understand that realize that in all past moves of revival like when it actually hit culture I was on a transformation team we quantified this it started with a small minority of people who weren't even majorly liked by their churches so all past revivals the Welsh revivals the Argentinean revivals the Cuban revivals all the American revivals and I mean the zuzo revival is responsible for the Pentecostal charismatic faith these things did not start with like 3,000 people going yes Lord no revivals coming the ones that impacted culture and we're beyond just her local church they started like the one in Argentina was like 13 people praying in a college campus that didn't believe in the gifts of Holy Spirit and it turned into a full-blown revival where several million were saved and even they had Christians and you know political offices and stuff that we're working together for the rebuilding of God's dream of their nation this happened with like 13 people with the same things true review when do you have a dream the enemy looks at you and goes oh my gosh one person can change everything because Jesus did and you have him inside of you the disciples were 12 and then 72 and then however many hundred in the upper room it was a group it was a company of people it wasn't the majority was that minority we see that with minority issues today there's certain minority issues that if someone has allowed enough voice they could actually change something and this I'm not talking what the negative was I'm sorry what the positive ones where we see certain women's issues and certain like an african-american women and where if they're single that they have their in the highest poverty rate in America right now and we're seeing a group of people cluster of people who are attacking that issue and saying no these women who are hard workers these women are amazing women they have leadership on their lives let's so in an investor this minority issue and see a change and a small group of people is going after a 70% to turn it into a 30% like everywhere else and saying what if God does it through us in our generation and so these these little these little things these little seeds inside of you you look at them and go no one sees me no one knows my dream no one knows who I am even the people I work with now only see what I'm capable of now they don't know the greater that's inside of me you know who season Satan because he sees light he cannot not see light he lives in the darkness and you and the spirit shine more brilliantly than the Sun and you walk into a room and you're living with the dream of God here thinking I'm gonna change the entertainment history I'm gonna change a poverty issue and we have tons of you know nonprofits over here on the wall that are like we're gonna change you know poverty we're gonna build 40 schools in five years justice rising we're gonna reach up reach out we're gonna the cover not just two or three thousand or seven thousand orphans we're gonna go for all the orphans we can and they walk into a room and people go oh that's neat you have a small cause that's cool you have this little thing that's that's cute it's cute we have a cause but the enemy is looking at going they might just change Africa why do you get targeted how many of you feel targeted sometimes because there's a dream and some of us feel so targeted that we start to realize that we you know we've had broken relationships or you know you might have you might have had an addiction season or a divorce so you might have had you know some some financial failure or even some sickness or some loss of a person maybe a death and you hit and that hits you and then the enemy tries to drive it in like the stakes in Jesus's hands on the cross and make you feel like everything will die without the hope of Resurrection and Jesus is looking at you and saying though you have the weakness I'm advocating before my father's throne that you're exactly what we dreamed of in the beginning and I don't love you for who you can make yourself in your own strength anyways so don't worry about it just love me and there's this place inside of many of us where when we when we hit this and demonic you know swirl when we feel targeted by the enemy that our first place we go into a spear cuz you can feel it you could feel there's a battle and you feel there's a bad out so much so and I think it Daniel where Daniel is battling in the spirit he's praying in the spirit going God you have to come here that's my whole people group all the Israelites are gonna be killed I'm gonna be killed if you don't show up and he's waiting and he's waiting he's waiting passed you know like we always hear like you know the midnight hour it's like 12:30 1:00 it's not like to even 12 anymore he's like okay it's past midnight there's no way you can show up now there's no way God you could be here now and then at 12:30 1:00 I'm making that number up all of a sudden angel shows up in its full glory goes dear you know dear you know I was sitting here from the first time you prayed but I mean there's been a war in the heavens for over 40 days but we won some of us don't like midnight I hate midnight but it's even worse when it you know like you need money by a certain day and gods like I'm still gonna work it out I'm gonna give you two weeks later you need that money for that house right now two weeks later you're gonna get it and I'm gonna hold that house open the people who put the offer on it it's gonna fall through you're gonna get it two weeks from now they're gonna be so desperate to sell it they're gonna produce something on their price God knows how to do things that we just can't do if we give Him control and the enemy is looking at as soon as that you know you didn't get the money or the house offer fell through the enemy's trying to show you he's trying to shame you and to not believing for the big purpose of God see you're foolish for trying to believe for something like that you're stupid you're unworthy why would God ever do it something like that that's good for you you should be mediocre mediocre is your your talent and you like yeah I am mediocre but when you're reading the word when you're when you're in this presence in the spirit you start to make those declarations but Christ and me you know he can do all things or like in my weakness he is strong and you start to answer that the accuser with the Spirit of God and it can change everything let me just wrap this up I want to tell you God hasn't changed his mind over your dreams the problems that would permit can have a sudden turn around you hear that the problems that look permanent can I have a sudden turn around what should have taken years what feels like it's been lost can happen now in a way that doesn't even feel like it needs those years he can do something in your dreams that when you walk into him with him because he's a God you're not just walking into oh great that accomplished a purpose but you're walking into a relational aspect of God revealing himself to you by accomplishing your dream through you it will make the pain of everything that felt lost go away or change or evolve inside of you so you have lessons from it what does God put in your heart and your dreams today what is he putting in your heart and it's time to get our passion back I think of it this way is that every time you remember your your dream you're being faithful to God every time you watch somebody else do something that is involved with your dream and you look at it and you go I want that too not like envious not where you're I wish I had that they didn't but when you're saying oh that's so awesome I want that too it's it's you being in faith thing I'm the dreamer every time someone else is singing in your musician you're like oh that's you dreaming with God every time somebody has a family and you're not married yet you don't have kids yet and you look at that family and you celebrate them and you think I want a husband like that or I want the wife like that I want the kids like that and you just allow that to just that place of passion to be inside of you and you articulated or you allow yourself to feel it that's dreaming with God dreaming with God is not just having a focused plan dreaming with God is feeling his passions for the things you're supposed to call be called a passion for so I want you to stand I'm gonna pray for you I think one of my favorite things that happen when the disciples you know finally they have the resurrection they saw Jesus but then it says I'm gonna fill you the same way I'm filled you're gonna walk with the Holy Spirit the same way I am go to the upper room until I do this for you and they go up there and the Holy Spirit comes on them and they now can relate to the Father the way Jesus did it was so powerful and he breathes into him and in there and he's so in them that when they share with anybody around them they could even speak in their language and they could tell him everything Jesus did I think it's so profound they give this group of people who were breathed in by God and when you got saved God breathed into you and for that early church their mandate was immediate salvation to build and just to replicate everything God was doing with them and then I got more sophisticated over the last couple thousand years where now it's it's also to go into places of society places of extreme poverty in those days they weren't thinking of extreme poverty although it existed everywhere I'm sure they thought of poverty the poor boys among them and our generation we're thinking how do we obliterate the poor being among us and we actually are the tools to do it you know that wasn't a prophecy when Jesus said that the poor will always be with you who's just making a statement there's always poverty in this side of the world but that doesn't mean we shouldn't fight to eradicate it and so in our generation we're dreaming with God different dreams and even the early church the early church was just trying to populate the world with the belief of Jesus yes we're still trying to do that yes that's still part of our foundation but we're also doing it from different platforms and God is breathing on you today his dream and I want you to just put your hand on your heart and Holy Spirit I pray that you would awaken our dream in a deeper way God if we don't have dreams yet awaken your dream for us gun hint and point bring us signs god that this is your dream for our life God if our dream is already fully active and alive multiply it make it so ridiculous that again we can't do the next stage without you Lord some of us may be in the middle of the dream and cashflow hit or two team we need hitter we need management we need friends we need what or whatever we need God you allow these these gaps so we cry out to you and we do it with you you want to meet every need but you want to do it relationally well those whose dreams have totally died we pray Lord that you'd resurrect him today and show that some of them are just hibernating like Caleb for the proper time all of a sudden it's time to go and I pray Lord if we felt dead in those places that you would bring a spark of life back and then we feel passion when we see someone else doing what our dream is and that passion comes up in us and sometimes we just cry or we just feel deeply Lord I pray that we would celebrate that feeling is not as grief or as unworthiness but we celebrate it as oh that's me too Lord I pray that you would take labels off of us for what we can't be where where authorities we're supposed to tell us who we are what we're supposed to be and some of them said don't go there don't do that you can't do that Lord I pray you take all those labels off well there was a parent a teacher a friend a coach a pastor take any label off of us gone thank you Jesus that through your spirit you're so good to lead us in a conviction so if we get delusional which is right next to faith sometimes that you'll bring us back into real faith you'll bring us back into reality through our community through our friends God I pray there would be even even here Lord in our church that we would just be the right kind of reality buffer not the wrong kind I pray that those who feel an acceleration in the season into 2020 that it would only multiply God has more for you and Ephesians 3:20 to Good Hope or imagine in your wildest dreams that's what it says literally says that he has more for you than you could hope or imagine and your wildest dreams I want you to just offer them your dreams right now but your wild imaginings that you've dreamed at some point at some point you let yourself go a little bit wild maybe you live there maybe it's hard for you to get there but you dreamed of what your life might become or what it might look at like and I want you to look at that what you're offering him and realize that he's gonna give it back to you in an exaggerated form in a way that feels uncomfortable to look look at because he wants to do what he has in you in a way that will have Kingdom for the last generations and as part of what other Christians have already started and it won't end with you other generations are gonna pick up after you just as we end this I had a prophetic word a couple weeks ago in our turrets and I wanted to wait until today when to release it but I just wrote about someone reading I have loved the NMC of our services in our growing family the microcosm that God is building but we're about to grow what God is doing in the micro will he's gonna bring the multiplication both in our lives but also the people we're gonna start to come here we're called to invite our friends and our co-workers and people we meet I saw a season invite the way I literally saw it was a someone asked how he literally saw it it was a vision or an envelope that was golden and we were giving it out to our friends but also God was inviting us as a people to what he was doing in a unique way in LA and I felt like it's time to start taking this invitation very seriously and that he's gonna he's gonna allow us to begin to see a new release of his presence that we couldn't imagine not just in our church but in this city now in this I feel like God set a table and it's time to invite people to come and eat our future friends and spouses family business partners other kinds of people are gonna be born out of this great invite I thought many of you have you've ever had this experience where God invited somebody in your life because you've said yes I mean I invited hona to come live in America because of a word from God and he became my best friend like I that would have never happened 20 whatever years ago if it wasn't for geez just showing me to invite him no no that's not an unbeliever it doesn't have to be all in believers but I feel like there's a season of inviting people into your life into your heart and and even into this church I feel like you know the majority of Christians who get saved in America it's because someone invited them to church and I think it's like eight out of ten times they won't say no after you've asked me a few times like it when I said it's not harassing them we're not multi-level marketing we don't want people to join it's in that sense you know but it's like where you just say hey we have really good music okay that's interesting hey you know there's something that's happening in my life you've been asking about it it's happening because of my Christiana you might want to come to church to me it'd be really fun let's go out to lunch afterwards whatever and people want that people people a lot of people have never come to church in LA because they've never been and it's uncomfortable to go somewhere where you don't know anybody you're just I mean some of your new here today going this feels awkward I don't know who to talk to or what to do or how the structure works so when you're invited by a friend you're brought into family and I feel like 2020 is a great year of invitation and that what's been happening on the micro is gonna start happening in the macro I don't believe we're gonna have the space anymore to have these intimate services I think we're gonna have more people I think we're you know we have 800 adults between us or three services that are coming monthly and and then all the kids and I think God's gonna either give us a new building or a place to meet or whatever and we won't have the 250 to the 300 of the time we're gonna have more and I think it's special but when you have when it's family family always feels good when it multiplies when it's just services it doesn't feel good you're just like that's just a big church tower it's a lot of people but when it feels like family the more the merrier and it just feel like we need to open our hearts to the seats that were empty next to you today if there was one or or when you've come on a Sunday night and there's an encounter night and there's stuff happening and just starts a dream of who's supposed to go there because I know that all of my friends would have let God pick our lifers and there's so much there's a covenant in them and there's beauty in them and I think of some of my friends who are saved now because I was willing to say please come to church with me and how I'm linked to their lives and they become part of the structure of my life and all the way from youth like I have a high school guy that we asked he was 27 years old and we were like 15 and 16 we asked him to come to church and he became a youth pastor with me that crazy like a year and a half later like it's just great like he wasn't even saved you know and so God wants to do a radical thing so I want to encourage you I know this is long I'm lame I'm Way over but I want to encourage you to invite some of the church especially maybe the Christmas service or whatever just try that if you haven't invited people to church before you're gonna be pleasantly surprised they're gonna be like cool I've never thought of that sure I'll come and just and then host them while they're here like really host them focus on them so with that bless you guys have a great Sunday when I encourage you if you need prayer the prayer ministry team won't be up there we love you guys [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you you

Channel: Expression 58

Views: 42,398

Rating: 4.8824811 out of 5

Keywords: shawn bolz, bolz, cherie bolz, expression 58, expression58, e58, church, los angeles church, revival, jen toledo, jennifer toledo, jona toledo, bolz ministries

Id: LhZNxJ16wj8

Length: 60min 21sec (3621 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 02 2020