Today Matters | Make It Matter | Pastor Jeremy Foster | Hope City

this weekend we're starting a new series entitled make it matter turn to somebody next to you and say it matters turn to somebody on the other side and say it matters there are things that matter y'all there are things that matter how many of y'all are uh you're iphone people where's the android people at way more excited because you paid less for your phone come on iphone people are excited and their phone just died all right um android jokes okay uh iphone people what's funny to me is the iphone people will fight android people i mean there are there are legions of nerds right now on the internet making memes and uh just so you know it don't matter if you have an android raise your hand where are you at there are iphone people that are like why why did i sit next to you if you have an iphone raise your hand where are you it's more of you it's funny to me and i have an iphone and i have an old one and i have a new one but i just haven't updated it yet because it takes me too long but what's funny to me is jimmy kimmel did a piece a few years ago where he rolled out the new iphone did y'all see that and all the iphone users was like ooh and then on and it was an old iphone there are things that matter there are things that don't matter we live in houston texas now there are a lot of people that watch from all over the world and we we love you we're so grateful that you're a part of our family we want you to come to houston because you need to experience the plethora of amazing mexican food that we have here in this city i mean it's just and it's not just mexican food we have we have all central and south america mexico guatemala honduras el salvador and nicaraguan i mean we have all kind of amazing food you should come down and and and taste and see that the h town is good and i will tell you i get in moods at times and we have we have people here how many of y'all know lupe tortilla you know lupe tortilla you know lupe and lupe is good how some of y'all know papacitos you know papacitos and and but i will tell you uh there's also guadalajara and now listen i know i know i'm preaching a a series and this is the beginning and i'm saying things that don't matter but those those matter [Laughter] i love lupe it's good they have uh they have the just huge tortillas this is amazing and i love papacitos because they have that butter sauce if you don't know about the butter sauce you only get it with the shrimp fajitas but you order it with a chicken you just dip it in there it's holy i mean it's holy it's a holy experience but at guadalajara they have red velvet tres leches if you don't know about the red velvet tres leches let me just tell you today is your day you need to go to guadalajara and you need to just eat whatever you want i don't care what you eat crackers it doesn't matter but at the end of your meal ask them for the red velvet tres leches i want you to think about tres leches means three milks i want you to think it's red velvet it's spiritual it's a spiritual experience red it's the blood of jesus come on this is soaked in milk it's baptized come on it's trash leches father son holy come on now [Applause] oh it's gonna be fun but but the truth is uh it really doesn't matter but there are things that matter and i want us to focus this month on the things that matter to god i have never seen the world argue more over things that don't matter than right now you do you know why we argue over things that don't matter because we don't know what else to do i've seen people waste so much time on social media just arguing with people they don't even know arguing over things that don't matter do you know why we do that because we don't know what to do and when you don't know what to do you'll do stupid stuff i i remember one time i was in louisiana and i was i had a political consulting firm and it specialized in media and marketing and i was at a big event and the governor of the state was there a lot of local celebrities were there a lot of business people were there and i brought a friend of mine named donny along with me and donnie if you're watching love bro but um we went to this event and he was nervous i wasn't nervous because i've been in these rooms before and it was my first time to meet the governor and so i walked up and my friend's right behind me he was scared to death he said what do i say to him i just said tell them your name and say hello that's all you do you don't have to come up with any kind of like trick or anything like you have to do something weird just say hello and so we walked up and the governor said hello and i said hey jeremy foster it's good to see you and and and that was it that was it that was all we did and then donny reached out his hand he said jeremy foster good to see you and the governor said to jeremy foster's i was like no this idiot's name is donny he just got nervous you because because when you don't know what to do you'll default to the greatest influence in your life you'll you'll default to the strongest voice in your life this is why the word of god matters in this season of our lives this is why going to church matters this is why growth track matters and getting in a group matters these things matter right now the reason we're doing this series is because we are in uncertain times harvard business review came out with a study this week and said that your brain is not designed to handle the level of uncertainty that we are facing right now it's just not it's overwhelmed you know why because we don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow not that we did two years ago but we we knew a little bit more than what we know right now we don't everybody talks about new normal there is no new normal because we don't know it's going to change tomorrow all of the authorities argue with one another political business medical everybody's arguing with one another over what we should do and we are uncertain and your brain was not designed to handle this much uncertainty i would add one caveat to that without the help of god and this is why right now you need god in your life more than you have ever needed god judah was in a hard place in the old testament they were having to make some decisions it was challenging times this is why the voice of god matters in your life and jeremiah was giving them instruction they ultimately did not take his instruction but the instruction still stands for us today jeremiah chapter 6 verse 16. this is what the lord says stand at the crossroads and look ask for the ancient paths ask where the good way is and walk in it and you will find rest for your souls think about that the challenge with some of us is we're not standing at the crossword roads we are rolling stop at the crossroads i had a fender bender this week there you go kids it wasn't fun um i was on my way to my small group my small group meets early in the morning um and so i leave my house at 6 15. i was in a little bit of a hurry it was raining like crazy i drive a truck that's a little bit higher than normal trucks it has a seven inch lift on it so it's ridiculous and um so i'm i'm at a stop i'm pulling up to a stop sign i'm in a hurry i've been at the stop sign because there was a lot of people leaving and i there was another jacked up truck to my left and i was looking at that truck and there's a four-way stop and i just never saw the dude that was for whatever reason sitting in the intersection he decided to roll super slow thanks raphael for rolling super saw we met we're boys now um we are boys because i smashed that brother um i i pulled out i didn't even see him i pulled out and and i i never saw him i thought i was like did i hit like what did i hit like did i roll over a little you know little rock or something and um and then i looked and he was stopped and he got out he was like what do i do and i just i leaned out i was like hey bro just pull up you know just pull over i'll pull over behind you and he trusted me thank you bro and um he pulled over and we got to talking and he was scared he was like do i call the police what do i do i was like well bro i mean if you want to do that you can i said all they gonna do is give you boy a ticket and we still gonna have to exchange insurance and all the good stuff so i'm just admitting guilt right now it it was my fault i never saw your super low tee tiny little black vw clar i just didn't see that little tee tiny thing you're driving there and uh he laughed and he was very nice and and we got videos and pictures and everything and i got to thinking about it later on this is me admitting guilt to thousands of people um i just didn't take long enough at the crossroads raphael come to church bro um god's trying to get your attention raphael but when you over spiritualize something the lord caused us to have that accident it wasn't my fault it was him um i need you to cover my premium okay the problem the problem was i just didn't take long enough notice what the prophet says here he says stand at the crossroads look so this that's not just one thing it's two things stand hey then then see look around and then ask for the ancient paths and then ask where the good ways ask twice that means you probably need to get more than one opinion when you're trying to make a decision and then walk in the old ways walk in the ways that god has given you and notice the reward for for stopping for standing for seeing for seeking and for stepping the reward is peace and how many of us need peace right now how many of us would love to just wake up with the peace of god in our lives the reason so many of us don't have the peace of god is because we're making permanent decisions in temporary circumstances i would tell you right now don't don't make a big decision right now take some time stop think pray about it i've never seen more people depressed than right now people dealing with depression the definition of depression is a perceived inability to reconstruct your future what does that mean that means i'm stuck typically in yesterday i'm stuck i can't figure this out and i don't see any way that it's going to be figured out i heard another definition of depressed and if you break it down the word and you just break it down it means you need deep rest you need rest for your spirit you need rest for your soul you need rest in your situation you need rest for your heart some of us some of us need rest from the news just take a break some of us need rest from social media do you realize how much anxiety seriously there's been so many studies done on just the anxiety that your phone brings to you do you you realize how bad it is when your own phone tells you you've been on this phone too much like how bad does it have to be when the people who created something they want you to pay for and use are saying hey y'all using this too much i mean think really think about that how bad does it have to be when the producers of a product are saying hey it's actually becoming more negative for you to use this as much as you're using it if you don't use the screen time option i know they have it on iphone i don't know if they have that on android do they one girl says yes i think sometimes it glitches but i think i think they have it i'm playing i'm placed very pixelated but they have it i'm just guys come on it's a joke it doesn't matter but use that look at it because there are so many of us so when god's trying to talk to us we're looking at what somebody else is saying you ought to take a step back i want you to listen to this definition matthew chapter 28 verse 11 jesus says come to me all you who are weary and burdened how many of you would be honest right now and say that's me i'm weary raise your hand if you're if you feel weary if you feel burdened if you're carrying something heavy that's almost everybody in the room we're weary and we're burdened so you are a prime candidate to come to jesus and he said if you'll come to me you're weary and you're burdened i will give you rest many of us think we're trapped we're depressed because we feel like there's no way out and i i declare to you today that yesterday ended last night today is a new day and god can set you free today today isaiah 43 says forget the former things do not dwell on the past see i'm doing a new thing now it springs up everybody say now now everybody say now type it in the chat now today matters it matters do you not perceive it i'm making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland i believe with everything within me that god wants to help you succeed that god wants to bless your life now that doesn't mean that your life is going to be without suffering and your life is going to be without hardship and it's all going to be roses and butterflies and frolicking through fields of flowers no you're going to have hard times it's going to be tough i love jeremiah 29 and 11. many of us it's our favorite verse for i know the plans that i have for you declares the lord plans to prosper you and not to harm you plans to give you a hope and a future now if you understand the context of this verse of scripture it will give you pause some people have that verse of scripture on their mirror i know the plans that i have for you says the lord plans to give you hope and the future not to bless you not to curse you oh come on jesus we get excited about that but if you realize where the people of god were in that moment they were they were going into captivity and they were feeling kind of down but there were false prophets arising amongst the people in that moment and they were saying hey listen don't don't get down don't get freaked out don't don't sink deep roots here you're only going to be in captivity for a couple of years and then god's going to miraculously deliver you and jeremiah steps onto the scene and says hey they don't know what they're talking about you're going to be in this for 70 years you're going to be in this captivity for 70 years it's going to be a lifetime for some of you but if you'll sink roots here if you'll pray for blessings on the city that you're in when god prospers the city he will prosper you if you'll sink roots you'll grow great crops if you'll start businesses god will help them succeed if you'll build relationships god will give you sons and daughters even in a captive time but there's a role that you have to play sometimes we just use that as a oh god's going to bless me yeah god's going to bless you it's conditional though his love is unconditional his blessings are absolutely conditional on things that you have to do yeah god has plans to prosper you and to bless you but you actually have to have a plan as well you you have to do some things it's not going to be just like wow look at that look at what god did out of nowhere now you're going to be able to point back to a time in your life when you prayed and when you sacrificed and when you said god i give it to you and then the lord blesses you it's almost if you will then god will so what do we do in uncertain times when we don't know what to do and we are in absolute uncertainty many of us thought it would end december 31st 2020 and then january 1st got here and we still didn't know whether to wear a mask or not and we still were sucking the mask in anybody do that you've been wearing a mask and you're going to call to somebody you're like then you realize before i call somebody's name i take a sharp intake of breath i have cotton stuck in the back of my throat from sucking so many masks in on accident we don't we don't know we're uncertain it's very uncertain season so what do you do throughout the course of this series and i would urge you to come for the next five weeks we're going to get very very very practical deeply spiritual but very practical my mentor john maxwell teaches an important rule of success how many of you want to be successful raise your hand if you want to be successful in your life and your marriage and your career i want to be successful he calls it the rule of five and here's the principle if you take an axe and you go out every day and you swing it five times at a tree every day not all day just five times then here's what will happen over time that tree is gonna fall so the principle is find five important activities that you do or that you need to do and do them every day not all day just every day well how do i find those important activities we'll look at your life evaluate your life evaluate your day you're good at looking at you you have no problem with the mirror y'all have no you look at me like well i'm not that conceited until until you take a picture with several people and then who are you looking at in that picture you ain't looking at them you don't zoom in on them you zoom in on you and they can all look like idiots but if you look good you post it right you're all and everybody else's eyes closed and stuff they're like why don't you post that like oh bro i'm sorry i didn't see you cause i don't look at you i had to learn i have a bunch of daughters y'all i have four daughters it doesn't matter what i look like in a picture they don't care we have to run it through all of them and if they look good they don't care about post it dad post that one i'm like okay you're good at looking at you so look at you look at your day the truth is right daily decisions compound into a lifetime of success the secret to your success in any area spiritual physical mental emotional relational can be found in your daily agenda what do you do every day the challenge is oftentimes we think more events than we do process i don't know about y'all but i like to have something to look forward to right like you you book a vacation you're like just can't wait for my vacation hmm i can't wait for my vacation gotta get my vacation it's gonna be all we gotta have fun and then you get home from the vacation and you're like oh oh i gotta have something when are we going again and the problem is we're event driven and not process driven and so in your life you need to not just look at the event that's fine i want you to have events to look at but more importantly look at the process that's going to get you to the event because we all know that we've gotten to vacations before and been so exhausted we couldn't even enjoy the vacation some of us are so focused on other people and other people's lives and what other people are doing that we'll be on the greatest vacation of our life just looking at what other people are doing and not even paying attention to the people that are around us focus on you problem is we give too much power to yesterday too much power to tomorrow and we don't realize that all the power in your life look at me rests in today in the decisions that you make today do you realize you can overcome your past today and you can construct your future today you don't construct a future in the future think about that tomorrow we'll do it tomorrow i'm going to do it this is i'm going to do this tomorrow it's going to happen tomorrow i'm going to work this situation out tomorrow i'm going to make that phone call tomorrow i'm going to fix this relationship tomorrow we're going to start the business tomorrow and you never do anything to get there so guess what tomorrow never comes and the future is always in the future but you are creating your future today today matters turn to your neighbor say today matters it matters you'll never change your life until you change what you do every day and so in this series we're going to teach you biblical principles on how to live intentionally how to live focus we're going to develop some spiritual disciplines that i believe will bring you success we're going to eliminate some of the things that have been holding you back this is why i think you need to come or you need to watch you need to listen for the next five weeks i think it's going to radically i believe it will radically shift your life it'll punch you in the face a little bit it'll encourage you it'll ruffle your feathers a little bit but i think it'll push you forward so i'm gonna give you five secrets to help you with your rule of five the five important activities that you need to do every day number one you gotta find your five you gotta find your five what are the five things that you do or that you need to do reduce your life down to five activities that you do every day now some of you you real simple god bless you love you you all right i'll get up i'll put my clothes on okay that's not party that's not part of the thing but others of y'all that's part of your problem is you don't get up or put clothes on you need to do both of those things okay that's a given but the beauty of this principle is in its simplicity proverbs 17 24 says this an intelligent person aims at wise action but a fool starts off in many directions i'm going to give you my list i actually created two lists one for personal and then one for leadership leadership or business or my job my personal list is this i i wake up every morning i pray i'm gonna pray and then i'm gonna get in god's word i'm gonna read the word of god and then i want to spend time with my family i want to spend some concerted time with my fam i have a lot of kids my goal every day now this may not sound big to you and some of you this may sound overwhelming but my goal i have three small children at home nine five and four my goal every day is to spend 15 minutes with each kid looking in their eyes in a conversation now can't tell you how hard that is with a four-year-old because we don't talk about much okay yesterday my whole conversation with gunner was he just he was putting his hands down the back of his pants and for whatever reason and he thought it was hilarious he was laughing and just running around the house like that so our conversation yesterday consisted of big boys don't do that and y'all know a couple weeks ago i told y'all he wants to be a big boy last night he told me that i'm not a big boy and i was like okay all right i said do you see dad doing that he said no and then he did it and ran around the house he's i'm not saying this is easy and some of y'all might say 15 minutes that's not long but but i can tell you this if you take 15 minutes looking in the eyes of each kid that's more than most dads and moms look in the eyes of each kid in this city every day it's a simple goal i want to spend time with my kids on things that matter to them not to me little parenting advice can i give you some parenting advice i've raised some really good kids and then i've got some coming up that i hope will be really good kids okay my goal is not to solve every problem for them so when they tell me about a problem that they're having oftentimes i start with empathy and then i ask a question now this works with my 20 year old my 19 year old my 24 year old my nine year old i'll start with oh that must feel terrible i'm sorry that you're dealing with that i'm sorry that you're going through that what do you think you should do i'll ask my four-year-old that and he'll scream you know because he wants an answer but i'm trying to help them understand that i can't solve all of your problems you have to figure this out so get you a little strategy spend time with my family i exercise and then i try to rest those are my five things that i try to do personally now my leadership strategy is just a little bit different i spend time some of the things overlap i spend time every day i pray every day so notice those two overlap then i study that doesn't mean that i just read the word i'm going to study some other things i'm going to read some things that i think will help me you notice i reference the harvard business review that's because i follow the harvard business review on instagram you don't just need to follow the kardashians okay i'm just saying i'm not against that but i'm just saying i mean let's god bless y'all love all of the kardashians i've never met y'all but god bless y'all what i'm trying to say is follow something that encourages you that enhances your brain that helps you learn something so i study every day and then i take time to think you know the little emoji take time to think thinking is a lost art do we spend so much time talking to somebody else listening to something else turning on some music distracting ourselves from the greatest weapon that we have and that's our brain that's how you connect with god that's how you connect with other people so stop especially young people listen stop and think turn everything off dan kathy started chick-fil-a and he said this he said most people cannot take one full day and do nothing but think he went on thinking retreats bill gates does seven-day thinking retreats do you realize microsoft was headed in the wrong direction he did not believe he believed that the internet would be a blip on the radar he went on a seven-day thinking retreat came back shifted everything in microsoft and said the internet is going to be the dawn of everything but it happened when he disconnected from everything disconnect from everything jesus did this the bible says he often went away to desolate places to pray he didn't bring his iphone or his android it don't matter he spent time so take time to think this is important and then the last two things that i do is i lead and i communicate those are the things that i do now i want you to notice today already before 10 o'clock i've done all of them i've prayed i've studied i've spent time thinking i'm leading and i'm communicating right now so i'm going to take a nap after this i'm done but i will tell you this you talk about a sense and a feeling of accomplishment when you find your five that's really important the second thing that you have to do is you have to prioritize your five prioritize them get them in early not all day but every day start with your five in the morning this is real practical but it's also deeply spiritual the principle of firsts is all throughout the scripture do you realize the principle of first preceded the law by 400 years the principle of first fruits or tithing why do you think we talk about tithing giving god the first do you think that god needs your money no he doesn't need your money and if you get nervous when the church talks about money that's more about you and maybe your experience with the church that that wasn't great talking about it than it is about god god doesn't need your money he wants your heart and the bible says where your treasure is there your heart will be also i don't want to give god leftovers i want to give god the first that's why when we pay our tithes we pay our tithes or we give our tithes back to god first i give god the first tenth of our increase and then he blesses the rest so i want to give god the first of my day why so that he can bless the rest i want to pray first thing in the morning i want to read the word first thing in the morning why so that i can have a blessed day so that i can have the strength and i'm not struggling through the end of the day going god please help me i want to pray before the meeting not during the middle of the meeting oh god help us now i want to pray you got to prioritize it you got to get it in first psalm 90 and 12 says teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom get them in early every day there was a professor and he had a jar and he took some big rocks and he placed them in the jar and he filled the jar with the big rocks and then he asked the students he said is this jar full and they said yes and then he took out a bunch of pebbles and he poured it into all the empty spaces and he said is this jar full and some of the students said yes and others are like i don't know and he took out some sand and he poured it in and then he said is this jar full and someone were like yes and others were like no and then he took out some water and he poured it in he filled it until overflowing he said is this jar full and they finally said yes and he said what's the principle and one of the eager students raised his hand and said you can always fit more in and he said no the principle is put the big rocks in first because if you don't put the big rocks in first you'll never get them in prioritize your five number three this is crucially important enjoy your five enjoy your five because if you don't if you don't if you don't enjoy what you're doing guess what you won't do it you notice one of my one of my five is exercise i really found it last year because i got fat that's the truth a man in our church and i love him god bless you jeff i love you man he came up to me and he goes hey pastor can i be honest with you and i was like yeah he goes you're getting a little fat [Laughter] hey if you don't have somebody who can speak directly into your life you need to open yourself up a little more and i was like well thanks man i appreciate that he was no i don't mean that bad he's like look i'm in my 50s if you don't lose weight and get fit now it's going to be really harder because you you lose muscle mass past 40 and you can't gain that back you got it you got to start now and so i started and that became one i added that because exercise was not one of my five and you looked at the podcast a few years ago you could see it wasn't one of my fights i was up here breathing hard i got i got two little boys i got to keep up with those guys so i started exercising i got pretty excited about it i like i like exercise but i've learned there's things i don't like this year i was able to go uh earlier part of the year um to visit my daughter she was at highlands college jayden she graduated from there and now she's at stanford and very proud of my daughters and so i went up then i was visiting with her and one of the classes that she had was an exercise class at highlands college we had a partnership with lifetime fitness and she said dad do you want to go to my fitness class and i said yes i do and i got kind of excited about i was cause that's the first time this is the first year that i've been excited about that i was like yeah and she so we got there and i was like what kind of class is it and she said it's a spin class and immediately my heart sunk a little bit because i was like this is a bike i finished that when i was a kid you know i don't need to do that no more but she didn't what she didn't tell me is it wasn't just a spin class i rolled up in there with 45 other students that i was by the way 20 years older than everybody in the class even the god bless instructor i was older than everybody in there i rolled in there and it wasn't just a spin class it was soul cycle okay that's a whole different thing you all know what soul cycle is it's all hip-hop music it's not just riding a bike it's dancing while on bike i'm talking wave your hands in the air or wave them like you just don't care and you're doing this at the same time i'm like hey i finished all of that in 1989. okay and this in the middle of shoes and now body roll and i was like i looked at jaden i was like i'm not doing that the music was not censored at all but i could tell you your boy i went hard in the paint i mean i i went for it i looked at some of those little highlands college boys all wheezing i was like what's wrong what's wrong who's your daddy me i mean i said that to jayden because i am actually her dad and um and afterwards she was like dad you dominated i was like that's what i do she said you want to do it again tomorrow night never we'll never do that again ever don't ever invite me to soul cycle no unicycle nothing i don't want to do any of it because i didn't enjoy it find something that you enjoy okay prayer is one of your five which i believe prayer should be one of your five make sure that you know how to pray i don't know about y'all but i remember whenever i really wanted to get into prayer i was like i'm gonna start praying this is when i was younger i'm gonna really start praying i was in my teens i'm gonna start praying and i was i got in my room i turned on my prayer music i prayed for everybody that i knew i prayed for everything i could pray for i felt the presence of god i looked at my clock a minute and a half it passed i was like this is hard that's why at hope city.com 21 days there's a downloadable prayer guide that will actually help you especially if you're adhd like your boy it'll help you have a way to pray and stay focused with your prayer please don't think that if you're going to pray that means you have to pray for an hour or two or three every day smith wigglesworth was one of the greatest evangelists to ever walk the face of the planet and he said i never pray more than 20 minutes and i never go more than 20 minutes without praying so it's important to add prayer to your life reading the word of god is fun you can make it enjoyable download the youversion bible app it's got all kind of bible plans in there just make it a part of your day and it takes work to find this it takes it takes time to find things that you enjoy jesus is our example hebrews 12 says therefore since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us let us fix our eyes on jesus watch this the author and perfecter of our faith who for the joy set before him endured the cross what does this mean he enjoyed his life and he remembered his why he was doing what he was doing and it helped him get through the hardest season of his life take time to enjoy number four fight for your five fight for your five it's going to take discipline every great life is marked by decisions and discipline a lot of us make really good decisions but we don't have the discipline to follow through on it it takes discipline discipline's not fun hebrews 12 11 says no discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful later on however it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who've been trained by it i was trained by discipline i thank god for my parents they disciplined me they taught me there are consequences in life there are consequences in our family there are consequences when you do something wrong i saw a shirt the other day that i loved it says i was spanked as a child and now i suffer from a disease called respect i play it don't just make your kids spank your kids um send them to therapy number five and i think this is the most important one and that is simply this evaluate your five evaluate your five look at it see if it's working for you see if it's the right five try it for two or three weeks and then evaluate it i've heard that experience is the best teacher i don't think that's true because i've met some people who have a lot of experience and they're not very smart i mean people who 70 years old and they've just lived the same year year after year after year after year i believe evaluated experience is the best teacher go through an experience and then stop think about it think what can i do better how can i do it differently when you get finished with an argument with your spouse don't just press the reset button think about what got you there think about ways to not do that think about how can i be better when i make a mistake i fall into sin i fall into a bad way of thinking i say something have you ever had a moment where you snapped at somebody you're at a fast food restaurant and they're not fast they gave you a medium and you said you clearly asked for a large and then they say something like well you didn't pay for a large and you're like well i'll pay the 85 cents okay and then you think about it later like man i really shouldn't have said that you ever had that moment evaluate it don't just live life without evaluating evaluate your experiences stop create some sabbath experiences in your life there's a word in the scripture and it's all throughout the psalms and it's called sila or selah and it literally means rest stop evaluate think because sometimes we're moving so fast we don't have any salah moments social media has taken away the salah why because something happens and then we just get on our phone and we're talking to somebody and we're on our phone we're talking to somebody we don't have any moments or sabbath moments where we just stop and evaluate how can i be better how can i do more of god's will and god's plan for my life paul did this philippians 3 i love this brothers i do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it what did he do he evaluated okay i'm not where i want to be but one thing i do forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead i press on toward the goal to win the prize for which god has called me heavenward in christ jesus listen this is not self-help there's a bit of self-help in this you actually have to help yourself but you have power on the inside of you to help you walk out the plan of god god has a plan for you what plan do you have to get you in god's plan can i tell you the authority that you have ephesians chapter 1 verse 19 says i pray that you'll begin to understand how incredibly great his power is to help those who believe in him it's the same mighty power that raised christ from the dead do you realize you have the same power on the inside of you the raised christ from the dead and he can help you accomplish what he has called you to accomplish but you just got to wake up every day and put him first and say okay god today let me walk in your will would you bow your heads and close your eyes across all of our campuses right now i want to pray for you but before we do that i want you to evaluate your life [Music] i want you to evaluate where you are right now i want you to evaluate what's missing i want you to ask yourself that question what is missing ask yourself and answer it what's missing is it peace rest is patience kindness goodness is one of the fruit of the spirit what's missing and why more importantly why is it missing have i not made space for god to work in me i need to find my five make sure that every day i'm giving god time to operate move in my life nobody looking around right now if you know that that god has a missing part in your life that you know somewhere you haven't prioritized him where he needs to be but you would like to today would you just lift your hand bible says when you acknowledge him he will acknowledge you there's hands all over the room thank you thank you thank you thank you you can do it online too just put a hand emoji in there so that's me i want us to pray this prayer we're going to pray at all of our campuses and then i want you to stay where you are because our campus leaders will come they'll tell you your next steps next steps are crucially important for us here at hope city the next step that you take after you ask jesus to be the lord of your life the very next step that you take is obedience that's what actually shows you and the world that you actually were serious about your decision and we want to help you with those next steps after we pray this prayer would you pray with me every voice lift your voice and say jesus you're the only one who can save me i've made so many mistakes in my life i have failed i have sinned i have fallen short i'm asking you right now to forgive me of my sins create in me a clean heart renew a right spirit in me i believe you're the son of god i believe you died on a cross and you rose again so that i can live free so in this moment right now i repent of my sins i receive your love and i'm asking you jesus to be the lord of my life in jesus name amen

Channel: Hope City

Views: 5,231

Rating: 4.8709679 out of 5

Keywords: Jeremy Foster, Hope City, pastor jeremy, jermy foster, jeramy foster, hope city church, jeremy foster hope, hope city houston, jeremy foster hope city, inspirational, sermon, make it matter, the rule of 5, principle of 5, leadership, make it count, legacy, today matters, carpe diem

Id: 8K1v9NmDE3s

Length: 42min 34sec (2554 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 03 2021