Anybody glad to be here today?

Welcome to church. If you are a guest for us, we want to say welcome to Embassy City Church for those that are joining us online, thank you for tuning in, man, I'm so glad to see y'all. I was thinking about this series and we're in this series called Connected, and we're talking about relationships, and one of the big factors of relationship is that you don't necessarily need to know somebody to be connected to them. And when you think about Embassy City, you think about the many people that are here, but also many people that watch online. We are all connected by a common interest in God doing what he does here at Embassy City, and I'm so thankful that I'm connected to you and I'm so thankful that you're connected to other people. And this series is not just something that we just dreamed up and thought, okay, let's just do a series. But this is, I believe the heartbeat of God is for us to be connected to one another, to draw from one another, to see each other's gifts and purpose. And as Sarah was talking about us having a well within us, other people can drink from the well that you have. Yes,

They can drink from the wisdom that you have. They can drink from the experience that you have. So I'm so grateful that you're here today. All right, so this is the third week of this series we're calling Connected. The first week we talked about the necessity of us being connected to God because God gives us our identity, he gives us our boundaries, he gives us our purpose, and he gives us rest. Then last week we talked about friendships, and we talked about how Jesus exemplified to us the need for friendships, but that not every friend that you have is on the same level. That's right. We got confidants, constituents, and comrades, right? But this is the question that I had after I walked off last week. How many went and recategorized some friends last week? How many people let some folks off the hook,

Right?

Some expectations you may have had on somebody, then you realize, ah, man, I thought you were, were a constituent, you were a comrade. Well, this week I feel inclined, I have prepared a different topic for today, but after last week, I really felt inclined by the spirit to do kind of a part two of friendships. But today I want to focus in on the topic of betrayal. Has anybody ever been betrayed by a friend? Has anybody? You don't have to lift your hand for this one. Has anyone been the betrayer?

Here's the reality of what we're talking about when we talk about connection and relationships. If you have not overcome betrayal, and it could be a spouse, it could be a friend, it could be a pastor, it could be a church. If you have not learned how to overcome betrayal, you will have a hard time connecting. And many of us live in isolation, or we live with gaps or we live with walls up because we never truly dealt with the betrayal or the hurt. And so if we're not careful, we can miss out on what God has for us because we're still attached to a hurt that somebody else caused us. And so today that's what we're going to talk about, and I really feel a burden for this today. I've been praying all week, I've felt a burden on me. So this is a burden type of message, and my encouragement to you is be completely open to what the Spirit would say.

Amen. So grab your bibles. Let's go to second Timothy, the book of second Timothy, the fourth chapter, second Timothy chapter four. This is Paul's last letter that he wrote. He happens to write it to Timothy, and most scholars agree that this is literally, Paul knows that he's about to die. And so he's writing this last letter, he's sending it to Timothy, and this is where we find ourselves. So these are literally the last recorded words of Paul. Let's read what it says, ma, second Timothy chapter four, verse number nine. Speaking of Timothy, do your best to come to me soon for Demis in love with this present world has deserted me and gone to Thess, Nikah. Cress has gone to Galatia, Titus to Alecia. Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you for he is very useful to me for ministry. Tuus, I have sent to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Corpus at Tru as also the books sent above all the parchments. Alexander the Coppersmith did me great harm. The Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Let me just stop and say this. This is the best way to deal with somebody is let the Lord deal with them, right? Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposes your message, which is another message all in itself.

Paul said, God is going to deal with Alexander. However, guard yourself from Alexander. That's a word for somebody. At my first defense, no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them. But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me so that through me, the message might be fully proclaimed and all the gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion's mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom, to him be the glory forever and ever. A amen. So I want to really take my title and my topic from verse number 10, where Paul says, for demus in love with this present world has deserted me and gone to the nikah. So my topic for today is I thought we were friends. I thought we were friends.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, oh Lord, we just come to you today. We say thank you for letting us be in your house. I pray that in the next few moments as we get into your word, as we open up our hearts, as we are hot before you, honest, open and transparent, that you would do a healing work today, that you would help us to deal with the betrayal and the hurt that we may have experienced, so that we can fully be engaged in the relationships that you have intended for our lives. Give us ears to hear, a heart to receive and a mind to understand what you would say to us. Do what only you can do. We give your name, the praise, the glory, and the honor in Jesus name. And everybody say, amen. Amen. I thought we were friends. Has anybody ever been there where someone does you so wrong that you are shocked and surprised by that you think to yourself, I thought we were friends.

How could you do that to me? How could you betray me like that? How could you betray my trust? How could you talk about me like that? How could you walk away? I thought we were friends. So there is, in the area of arguments and speech, there's a thing called the antithetical argument. And the antithetical argument is really kind of a style of argument that says, if there is a true statement, then the opposite of that statement must be true as well. And so over the last couple weeks, we've been talking about the intention of God is for us to be connected, for us to be connected, first of all with him, we see that exemplified in Genesis chapters one and two, where God creates Adam and then he notices Adam is alone. He says, it is not good for man to be alone. I will create a help me fit for him.

However, God doesn't create the help me. Yet he first of all establishes a relationship with Adam. He gives him his identity, his boundaries, his purpose, and then gives him rest. Then he creates Eve, and then he brings Eve and Adam together and they are to fulfill the work of God. But first of all, in friendship, and remember we talked about that again. We looked at the friendships that Jesus had. So we know through scripture biblically that God wants us to be connected. It is still true that it is not good for man to be alone. God does not want us in isolation. He doesn't want us to live life alone. He doesn't want us to live life disconnected. So if the statement is true that God wants us to be connected, then the antithetical statement is also true that the enemy, Satan wants us to be disconnected, right?

Because Satan is the complete enemy of God. So whatever God builds, Satan wants to destroy, right? Whatever God connects, Satan wants to disconnect. Whatever God sets out to do, Satan wants to undo. In fact, if we look through scripture, Satan has been referred to a couple of predatory animals, the lion and the wolf, and first Peter, Peter describes this. He says, be sober minded. Be watchful because your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Now, the scripture doesn't say that he is a lion. It says that he's walking around like a lion, right? The only thing that Satan has is the power of a lie. It's all illusional. He prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. That word devourer means to pull apart or to swallow up. So Satan is going around prowling around seeking whom he made devour. Now, I don't know about you. If you've ever seen any of these videos of lions in the wild, or maybe you've been out to the safari and you've seen these lions out in the wild, they're a different type of lion than the ones we see at the zoo.

Can we talk about these zoo lions? These zoo lions give lions just a bad rap in general. Every time I pass by one of those lions, I'm like, they have no motivation, no instinct, no, no killer. And they literally just lay there with their paws crossed on a makeshift rock. They won't even pick up their head unless the steak is coming. They won't even roar very loud. I mean, I pass by the lines and I'm like, this is say I could take a lion. These zoo lions are like ra, but the lions out in the wild or a different type of lion, right? And what you have to understand about lions is a lion uses its roar to petrify the prey. In fact, when you do the research on a lion's roar, a lion's roar can hit up to 114 decibels. To give you some perspective, the average, that's the average sound of a rock concert is about 114 decibels. You can hear ion's roar up to five miles away. And what a lion does, a lion will roar. And when it roars, it tries to petrify its potential prey and paralyze it momentarily to disengage it from the group.

A lion will roar to try to make you think that you can't do something that you're able to do. It'll stop a gazelle when a gazelle should be running. It'll get, it'll disorient a buffalo from knowing which direction to go, because a lion's row will petrify you, and when it petrifies you, it paralyzes you. And when it paralyzes you, although a lion is incredibly strong, a lion does not attack herds. Even a lion knows that if I can isolate you, if I can separate you, if I can distract you, if I can get you by yourself, you will be my meal. As strong as a lion is, a lion even knows instinctively the power he has over someone who is disconnected. Because even the lion knows that if you're disconnected, then you cannot draw from the strength of the herd, of the tribe of the pride. If a lion can get you disconnected. And this is exactly what Satan does. Satan works to disconnect us from God and from other people. Oh, y'all want word? Okay, I got you. Let's go back to the garden of Eden. Genesis chapter three. Genesis chapter three. Adam and Eve are in the garden. They're doing the will of God. They are, they're, they're working the garden. And in the midst of the garden, Satan appears and he begins to speak to Eve. Now, it's very important to notice that Satan is not speaking to Adam and Eve. He first of all, isolates Eve and has a conversation with her directly. We don't know where Adam is at this point. He could be somewhere else in the garden. He could have been close by. We don't really know where Adam was, but we do know that there's a conversation that begins between Adam and the serpent. And the serpent begins to question Eve. First of all, he questions her identity. He says, Hey, hey, listen, if you eat at this fruit, you'll be as God's yourself. And here's the thing, they couldn't be any more like God than they already were because God was the one that formed them in his image and likeness. What else could Adam and Eve have done to become more like God? The first thing that Satan will do in your life to try to get you isolated and disconnected as he'll, make you question your identity. Then he says, listen, if you eat of this fruit, you will be as God's yourself knowing good and evil. Now, God says, do not eat of this fruit. When Satan comes to her, he begins to question her boundaries. Hey, if you eat of this fruit, when Satan becomes comes to try to disconnect you, he will try to entice you with violating your boundaries. What would happen if you went there? I know you said you wouldn't, but what would happen if you did?

And so Eve begins to have this dialogue with the enemy, and Satan convinces her to eat of the fruit she eats in the fruit, then she gives to Adam and hes of the fruit. Now, I want you to notice something. The first attack that Satan brought against humanity, he didn't attack their health. He didn't attack their possessions. He didn't come after their physical body. He didn't buffer them anyway. He worked to try to disconnect them from each other and from God. It is the work of Satan for us to feel like we have to live life separated since the very beginning of time. This was the strategy of Satan. And we know that the Bible is clear that Satan has no new strategies.

He literally has no new. He uses the same strategies over and over and over and over again because he knows that if you're disconnected, you lose power. What good is a hand? If a hand is not connected to an arm? What good is a foot? If a foot's not connected to a leg, what good is a head? If a head has no body, you have to be connected. And Satan's job is to get us disconnected. And this takes us back to this story that we read earlier about Paul and Demus. We can talk about all types of stories about betrayal throughout the Bible. We can talk about Adam and Eve. We can talk about Kain and Abel. We can talk about Joseph and his brothers. We can talk about David and Saul. We can go through the line and talk about all these people, Sampson and Delilah that have gone through betrayal. And Adam stands here and he feels betrayed by Eve. Why? Because he feels like Eve was given to him by God. It's one thing to be betrayed by somebody that you had questions about. Has there ever been someone that's done something to you? You're like, I knew they weren't trustworthy. They had that look on their face. It's just the way they combed their hair. Man, I could tell.

But imagine being Adam, you didn't ask for Eve. The Lord was the one that said, it is not good for man to be alone. Eve was brought to him by God. Eve, Adam ate of the fruit because he trusted Eve.

He knew it was wrong, but he still trusted Eve. And how do we know that Adam felt betrayed? Because when God comes and he says, yo, Adam, where are you? Adam is hiding because he's ashamed. And God says to Adam, what have you done? And Adam says, the woman that you gave me the, there's what wasn't even my idea. Yes, I was lonely, but you didn't even give me options. I'm here in the garden because you placed me here. I'm in relationship with this person because I thought you brought them to me. And now the place that I'm at and the person that I have makes no sense to me. And that Adam was probably upset at God because the betrayal of Eve caused Adam to lose out on the place that he thought God put him. Have you ever been there? Have you ever been betrayed by someone that makes you question God completely like, God, I thought you put me in this church. God, I thought you brought this pastor into my life and now he has betrayed me, and now I have to leave the garden that I thought you, that you plant me in.

I thought this was my spouse for life. We said to death do us part. I thought I prayed about it.

I thought it was affirmed and confirmed by my friends and family. And now we're going through a divorce. How is this possible? God? And in that moment, Adam probably thought it would've been better for me, just a bet alone. It would've been better for me never to have come to this church.

Because the hurt that I feel now was worse is worse than the loneliness that I felt before.

Let's go back to second Timothy. Let's talk about Paul because Paul has been doing ministry for quite some time and he's been doing ministry with a lot of partnerships. But in second Timothy chapter four, Paul finds himself in prison in Rome, and he has gone through trials before legal trials and trials and tribulations. But he is literally in a legal proceeding. He has gone to court, they have imprisoned him, and now they are awaiting his trial. He's awaiting his trial. So he's imprisoned. He's been in partnership with a man by the name of Demus and other apostles as well. But somewhere along the journey, you can read about Paul speak. He speaks very highly of Demus. He says, Demus is a co-labor. You can read about this in Colossians. And Ephesus is like, he literally talks about Demus being kind of his partner in ministry.

But now Paul finds himself in prison and he's done this before, but this time when he's in prison, when he needs help the most, when he needs to support the most, Demus somehow decides I'm leaving. Not when they're out doing a great work for God, not while they're out there casting out demons, not while they're out there healing, literally while Paul is in prison, when he needs demons, the most Demis desert him. And we know this had to have hurt Paul because Paul specifically wrote to Timothy, I'm writing you and I'm asking you to come to me because four Demus has left me. He's deserted me. He's left me all alone in a vulnerable space, in a place where I don't have any friends. I don't have anyone to take care of me. I don't have anyone that I can lean upon, and now I'm imprisoned and I have no friends.

It's one thing to be betrayed by somebody that you don't really know. And it's one thing to be betrayed when you're doing well, but it's another thing to be betrayed while you're going through a trial. It's hard to kind of fathom that you are literally in prison and the one that you thought was supposed to be close to you has deserted you, has left you. And so Paul is writing to Timothy and he says, Timothy, I'm literally at the end of the road. I don't know what else is going to happen. Paul knows that he's about to die, right? Paul is very well aware that this is his last letter. And he says in his last letter, Hey, listen, there are so many people that have deserted me, but somehow Paul is able to work his way through. He says, I will not lay this against them. I pray for them that God would forgive them. He basically echoes what Jesus did on the cross when Jesus said, forgive them for they know not what they do.

I want to tell you my story because I think it's relevant to this message and to many that are here in this building that are watching online. I have gone through church drama trauma twice. The first time was I was born in Germany till I was nine, and then we left Germany. We came here to US and we moved to Dallas and we went to a church. And the church was fun, all that stuff. It was great. About two and a half years in, there was a transition between the pastor was there and his son was coming into becoming the lead pastor. So the senior pastor was becoming more senior, and his son was stepping into lead pastor role. In that process though, there were some accusations that started to come against the son, immorality, adultery, things of that nature. And so my parents, of course, they were very prayerful and they were trying to decide, all right, what do we do?

Cause we didn't know, are the accusations real? Are they not real? We were kids. We were young, we didn't really know anything, but my parents felt led to go ahead and leave. And so we were in the process of leaving. My parents had left us kids went there for one more service, basically to say goodbye to all of our friends, and that's kind of when everything started exploding in the church. So we left. A few months later, it comes out that the pastor was a serial adulterer and along with a lot of other devious behavior, he was, and he ended up being sent to prison for eight years. And I remember I was 13 at the time, and I was in shock. I've heard this man preach and I've felt the presence of God, and I was learning about Jesus all the while. This man was on some shady stuff, and it bruised my thoughts a little bit about church because what is real and what is not

Right?

But my parents were faithful enough to the Lord, and my relationship with the Lord was strong enough that I didn't elevate him as a person above Jesus. So I kept on doing what I do in church. Let me just stop and say this. I'm a pastor, but I'm not infallible.

That's right.

That's right. The word of God is infallible. This is why I encourage you that anytime I preach a message, you go home, you read your Bible, you check it out. I'm doing my best to be faithful to the word of God, to study the word of God, to be prayerful. When I come up here on Sundays, it's serious business for me, but I'm also not infallible. There are times where I may say something that offends somebody. There may be some, and I would never do it on purpose, but there may be times where I'm going to do something that rubs you the wrong way. It's because I'm human, and yet God has decided and chosen through this vessel to speak his word. But I'm encouraging you. Don't elevate me above Jesus.

Don't just take my word for it. That's why we all get the chance to have a Bible. So you can look at the scripture and say, is that really what the word of God says? And I'm not afraid of that. In fact, I want to tell you this. I stay accountable. I have somebody that prays for me every week, but they also check my sermons every week. So on Monday, I get a text from this person. They tell me about my message, but they also are looking for theological misses, and they're a theologian, so I stay accountable to God.

So we ended up going to this other church, and then this church, this is where I cut my teeth. This is where I fought my call to preach. This is where I started doing ministry, started preaching at the age of 13, became a youth pastor at 18, and then went full-time into ministry at 21. And I was doing the thing, and my pastor at the time was to me, a mentor, a spiritual father, all the things that you can imagine and everything was going great. I go off to California, I preach a little bit. The Lord said, go back home. And so I came back home and our church was kind of in turmoil because we were doing some changes and some people were moving out and some people were moving in. Anyways, it was one of those times where the Lord asked me to come back home so I could help at the church.

So I did. I came back home, I left the field. I went on, I came on staff. Our church was kind of small, so they couldn't afford to have me on staff full time. So I'd be about bi vocational for a while. Anyways, about 15 years that I, I've been at this church, well, I felt transitioning happening within the relationship between me and the pastor, and I did not know why. And so I did the biblical thing. Whenever you feel something strange, you go talk to the person. Don't talk about the person. Go talk to the person. That's the biblical principle. If someone has offended you, the Bible says go to them.

So I went to them and we had a dialogue and it didn't go necessarily great. So I said, all right, step two, maybe it's me. So I fasted, I prayed, I talked to counselors, blah, blah, blah. And so I thought, okay, maybe I should go again. But now, by this time, I'm still working partly at the church. And I end up asking a couple guys to go with me, and I wanted to have this meeting with the pastor, and I wanted to squash whatever the weird and funkiness was, and let's move on and go ahead and build the church. So I get to this meeting and it's at a coffee shop. It's me, two other witnesses. The pastor walks in and I could tell by his count as he was not happy about the meeting, but I knew the meeting had to be done. So I was sitting across from the two men, said, Hey, you want to start?

He said, no, let him talk. So I began to talk, Hey, I know there's some weirdness between us. I want us to squash that. I love you, I respect you. You're my spiritual father. I'm here for life, blah, blah, blah. So I said, my peace. Then they said, okay. One of the guys said, okay, it seems like there was just regular relationship stuff, some funkiness. The question is, can y'all just move forward from this? Just shake hands and then move forward? And I said, for sure. I'm here for life. My family is here, my wife, we just had a child like I'm ready to go. And in that moment I said, yes. He was sitting right across from me, pointed his finger at me and said, no, I will never work with you again. And he said, I don't trust you. You don't trust me. I don't feel so. You can come to church, but you'll never be on staff. You can preach every now and then, but as far as I'm concerned, we will never work together again. I was crushed because I thought I, I've been here for 15 years, you're supposed to be my spiritual father.

Where do I go from here? All my friends are at this church. My family's at this church, my parents, my brother, my sister, everyone is there. What does this mean for me? Of course, I started bawling. Yeah, I mean crying. But I was able to say, okay, thank you for 15 years. Thank you for being my spiritual father. Thank you for giving me opportunities. Janice and I are going to start looking for a church tomorrow, but I'll still pay my tithes here until we find a place. And when we find a place, I'll let you know. And so I left that Sunday and I disappeared, and Janice and I started looking for churches. We found High Ridge. And at first I was like, nah, I'm not going here. But then I talked to a pastor and he said, the most vulnerable place for sheep is when they're between shepherds. He said, just pick a place, submit to God and heal. So I went to the church High Ridge, which is where I came from, and I would come in late and we would leave early, and I didn't tell anybody I was in ministry. I didn't tell anybody what my history was. I was trying to figure out

How to deal with this betrayal. And it wasn't until six months later that the Lord said, all right, now I need you to tell. And he showed me a particular guy, tell him everything. So I went out to eat with him and I said, yeah, I started on the story and then I broke down and started crying, and I cried uncontrollably, and that's when I realized I was hurt.

So there are many of you in this place that have a similar story where a pastor has betrayed you or a spouse has betrayed you, or a friend has betrayed you, and if you're not careful, you can miss out on what God has for you because you haven't dealt with how to overcome the betrayal. So I want to help you. I want to give you five things that you need to overcome, betrayal. And the reason why I'm telling you my story is because when I'm up here, I'm not just telling you some story that I heard on a podcast somewhere. I've lived through this, and I can tell you, it is Satan's job to isolate you and keep you isolated. He does not care if you come to church, but he wants you to come to church disconnected. So I want to give you five things of how to overcome betrayal. Number one is acknowledge the hurt. Too many of us when we go through things will not admit that we are hurting. Ego, pride, save face, whatever. Oh, I'm good. They ain't going to break me. I'm good. I didn't want to be married to her anyways.

I didn't like his preaching. Anyways, I'm good. I walked around for six months going, I'm good. My wife would ask me, Hey, you okay? Yeah, I'm fine. Y'all making more money than I ever have. I get to roll in and out of church, don't even have to do anything like I'm good until I talked about it to somebody and was real. And when I was real, I real God said, no, you're not.

Let's talk about Joseph for a minute. Joseph is betrayed. He's a young teenage boy, right? Because he shares his dream. His brothers don't like it, so they sell him into slavery. Then for years, we're looking, literally talking almost third, almost 20 years, maybe 20 years, he's going through a series of all kinds of junk, right? He's betrayed again by Pat's wife. He's betrayed by the dudes in the prison. And then finally, God elevates him to the second most powerful position next to Pharaoh. And you would think that because Joseph is in this position, that he's good, that God is blessing him, right? The ones who are losing out are the ones that betrayed him, except for the ones that betrayed him are now hungry, which are his brothers. And then they come to Egypt to get some grain. Joseph recognizes them and he says, Hey, bring those jokers in here. And so Joseph has the power now to cut all their heads off and to be like, huh, prove to you that God meant what he said, and the dreams are coming true, and now y'all get to live in my reality. You would think that's the response, but now let's look at it. Genesis chapter 45, verse number one. Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him, he cried, make everyone go out for me. So no one stayed with him. When Joseph made himself known to his brothers and he wept aloud so that the Egyptians heard it and the household of feral heard it, and Joseph said to his brothers, I am Joseph. Is my father still alive? But his brothers could not answer him for they were dismayed at his presence.

Joseph acknowledged in that moment that he was hurt. He cried so loud that people in the other room hurt him. When you've gone through a trial or betrayal, it can so easily, we can so easily try to mask it because everything seems to be going good in our lives. Well, I'm the second most powerful person in all of Egypt, but you're still hurt. Yes, I'm I'm the CEO now, but you're still hurt. I got the job promotion now, but you're still hurt. I I'm back in ministry now, but you're still hurt. You have to acknowledge the hurt first. Getting wounded by betrayal is like a burn, and a burn is treated different than like a laceration. A laceration. You sew it up and you just heal a burn. You have to leave open and you scrape away layer by layer. Why? Because the only way for a burn to heal is from the inside out. You cannot receive healing unless you expose the burn. Here's the second thing. After you acknowledge the hurt, and this one's hard for all of us, it's forgive them. I ain't forgiving nobody. I wait. I'll forgive, but I won't forget.

Forgiveness is not about forgetting. Forgiveness is not about letting somebody off the hook. Forgiveness is about releasing yourself. Forgiveness, the very act of forgiveness, a is not executing judgment for what they did wrong. When you harbor unforgiveness, it's like holding an ax over someone's head. Oh, I'm not going to strike him, but I'm going to hold it right here. You don't even intend to strike him. Then why are you holding the ax? Forgiveness releases you from that person. Let's look at this passage, justice chapter 45, verse four and five. Now, this is the continuation of Joseph's story. So Joseph said to his brothers, come near to me please. And they came near and he said, I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. He acknowledged the hurt. And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here for God sent me before you to preserve life. He didn't ask them. He wasn't waiting around for them to ask for forgiveness. Joseph took the first step and said, even if you never say it, you're forgiven. Forgiveness releases you from the person. If you don't deal with, if you have unforgiveness, unforgiveness will eventually turn into bitterness and bitterness. The scripture says, eats away like a cancer.

Literally what the Bible says that unforgiveness eats away at you like a cancer. How many people are infected with unforgiveness? It's not fair. I agree with you. It wasn't right. I agree with you. But if Jesus could stand, be stretched out on the cross and say, father, forgive them for they know not what they do. How much more should we forgive others? Joseph did it. Paul even did it in our passage. He said, I will not lay this against him. If you don't forgive, you won't fully be released into your purpose because Satan will always have a spot to push on. This is why people can be very successful and still be irked that the person that hurt them has a little bit of success

Or

They're still alive right now. I know we laugh about this, but the truth be told, I've seen people I just recently where a woman was abused all throughout her childhood, and now her mother, the one who allowed for the abuse to happen is ill and sick, and the only one that could take care of her is her, and she's trying to work through that. That's a reality for many of us. Why are they still pastoring after all the abuse, spiritual abuse that they were able to execute on people? Have you ever had that thought?

Forgiveness releases you from that. Forgiveness says God's going to deal with them. Here's the third thing, pray for them. Oh, Lord boy, this is the hard one right here. Jesus said it here in Matthew chapter five, verse 44, but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who bring you Pies every Christmas compliment you all the time. Pray for those who persecute you. Jesus says, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. If you can't pray for them, you haven't forgiven them.

How do you know if you're harboring unforgiveness? You can't pray for them or the prayers that you pray. God, I pray they get covid three times after the vaccine. Let the vaccine not even work. I'm not saying I pray that a rock would fall in their head, but if an asteroid came, let it be in their direction. But the way you've forgiven somebody is if you can pray for them, and prayer does not mean that you let them off the hook. Prayer is posturing yourself in a place where you are not allowing any strings of attachment. Pray for them. Genesis chapter 50, verse number 19. This is again the story of Joseph, but Joseph said to them, do not fear for I am in the place of God for oh no, do not, do not fear for am I in the place of God's? The question as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. Yes, to bring it about that. Check this out. Many people should be kept alive as they are today. So do not fear I will provide for you and your little ones. Thus he comforted them

And spoke kindly to them. The reason why many of us have survived abusive scenarios and betrayal is because God wants us to help somebody else survive.

I've questioned the Lord many times. Why did I go through the church trauma and drama that I did? And when I say it was deep, it was deep. And I ask God why?

God says number one. So you won't repeat that. And number two, that you can help other people survive. Amen. The reason why I'm preaching this today is because there's somebody out here right now. You have dealt with the abuse of power from a pastor. Yep. You've dealt with spiritual abuse. You know what it's like to get fired unjustly. You know what it's like to even in a family situation. You know what it's like to go through abuse in your family, and I'm here to preach and tell you the reason why God lets you survive. That is so you can help somebody else survive it. Joseph says He is in such a place of forgiveness that he can say You meant it for evil. God obviously meant it for good. I forgive you. But not only do I forgive you, but I'm going to tell you why I survived. I survived so that other people can survive so that other people can go through the same thing. When the whole thing happened with me and the church, I thought, okay, that's it for ministry. Because literally I didn't know anyone outside of my context. So I thought, okay, well, I'm going to be a marketing guy and I'm going to make the big bucks

And I'm going to be okay. And the reality is like God was blessing me at my job. I got three different promotions within a year. I started making more money than I've ever made. But inside of me, there was still this like, yeah, I'm not doing what God's called me to do. But God said, I'm not even going to let you get back in until you seek out forgiveness, till you seek out the ability to pray and you acknowledge the heart. Here's the fourth one. Ooh, this one's going to be hard. Be open to reconcile. I don't want, I don't want to. That's okay. Reconciliation does not mean fellowship. To reconcile means to make things right. God has over and over reconciled relationships. In fact, I believe that this is the will of God. I believe it is the will of God for relationships to be reconciled. Now, reconciliation cannot happen unless both party agree

In terms, right. Be open to reconcile. Just because you went through a circumstance doesn't mean that God cannot heal it. Just because you signed a divorce paper doesn't mean that God can't reconcile the marriage. Just because you have gone through a traumatic situation with a pastor doesn't mean that God can't reconcile the relationship. So here, I'll tell you, so that happened with me. I didn't contact the pastor at all. I didn't feel like I had any kind of angst against him. I had no, I didn't feel like I had an unforgiveness. I could pray for him, and somebody gave me some great advice. He said, you know that you're healed when you can talk about it without reliving the emotion.

That's a word for somebody. When you can retell the story without reliving the emotion. I'm not saying that you can't recall the hurt. I'm saying you have emotionally dealt with it enough to where you can retell the story without putting yourself emotionally back in the same position. So I felt like I was there. I felt like I was good. You know what I'm saying? Ministry was going great. I mean, everything was firing away. So in December of 2020, I'm sitting there at the table chit-chatting with my wife late at night. I think that my mom had the kids. And so Janice and I were just sit sitting there talking, and out of nowhere, Janice says to me, I think you need to call your old pastor. And I said to her, what does this have to do with anything? We literally weren't even talking about it. And I said, why? She said, I don't know. I just feel like you need to. And I said, I hadn't talked to him in four years. I have no angst against him. I have no unforgiveness. We good. You know what I'm saying? Y'all got a new pastor. You know what I'm saying? I'm fine. And then I was like, you know what? I don't even know why you would bring that up.

I said, I'm going to bed. So I get to my bed, I get in, and now I ain't got to say nothing. I just got to do like this. Y'all know exactly. Oh yeah, I've been there. So will's turning. Why would Janice say that? I wonder. And I start crying uncontrollably. And while I'm crying, I'm like, why am I crying? I'm over it. Why am I this emotional about this? So I knew because of the emotions that I felt there was something greater at work. So I go back out. Janice is still at the table, and I say to her, it's like she knew you'll be back. Which by the way, the Lord has used Janice so many times to just whisper something to me so many times. So I knew, okay, this could be the Lord. So I go back, right? I'm good. But why did you say that?

She said, I don't know. He was your spiritual father for 15 years, and I just feel like you need to reach out. So I do what I normally do if I get what? If I get a word that I feel like is from the Lord? I always test it with my confidants. This is why you need confidants. So I called my confidants and I said, Hey, here's where I'm at. I don't, I'm not harboring unforgiveness. I feel we good, but I do feel a prompting that I need to reach out to him. And so every one of 'em without Ferrell said, you need to do it. I said, well, let me ask somebody else. Let me drop it down to my constituents. See what I'm saying? I don't think y'all are for what I'm for. You know what I'm saying?

So I reached out to him and I said, and it was a text, and I said, Hey, I have no agenda, but I feel like we need to meet. And he fired away meet. So I got there and I said, I got three things on the agenda. Number one is I don't have an agenda. I'm here because the Lord asked me to be here. Secondarily, I want to thank you once again for 15 years of leadership, for allowing me to preach when I was a kid for investing in me, and I am where the Lord wants me to be. But you had spiritual oversight for me, of me for 15 years, and I never got blessed going out. And I would like that and that that's just me. I think it's scriptural too. But thirdly, if there's anything that I did in leaving, I want to know so I can make it right. And so he said, oh, no, no, you're good. So we talked for a little bit and then he said, Hey, can I pray a blessing over you? And I said, sure. So he praised his prayer of blessing on me and he says, God, release him from me

As a man, going to do his own thing. Then he says, God, forgive me for the hurt that I caused him when he left. I wasn't even there for that. But as soon as I heard those words, I knew why God sent me there, because there was still a spider web threat that was attached. And God said, I need to reconcile that. And we reconciled our relationship. Now we're still doing. He's over there. I'm doing here. There's no unforgiveness. We're good. There's peace. Right? My Bible said, seek peace. So there's peace. The relationship's great. We talk. If we see each other out and about, we'll talk. There's, there's nothing. It's good. But God reconciled a broken relationship. What's crazy that happened December of 2020, January of 2021, the Lord said, get ready because you're not going to be here in next Jennifer Long. At the end of 2021, God says, okay, I'm releasing you to step into your next. And April is when I get the phone call to come here. Y'all see what's happening. There's greater things at work. This is why I'm preaching about this. Here's the fifth and last point. Reconnect, reconnect to God and to other people. The reason why I'm preaching this, maybe teaching this is because it is the job of the enemy to keep you hurt or at least bruised. The greatest advice that my pastor gave me in the situation I was dealing with is he said, God wants to heal any bruises that you have so that when you walk into what God has for you, Satan can't push on the bruise

Because Satan will try to find that little thing that's within you. That little bit of connection, that little bit of unforgiveness, that little bit of bitterness, he's going to try to push on it. The reason why we're even preaching this series is because it is the will of God for you to be connected. It is not good for man to be alone, and you will be alone as long as you have betrayal still in your heart. You won't be able to connect to your wife, sir, if you don't acknowledge that you've been hurt, if you don't forgive, if you don't at least be open to reconcile, you cannot be what God wants you to be fully if you don't forgive and commit them to the Lord. Satan will always have a cloud over your head. If the pastor did you wrong, first of all, I'm sorry that happened to you. I truly am. But if you don't let go, if you don't forgive the word, can't penetrate your heart like it needs to because unforgiveness and betrayal puts layers over your heart. And what does the Bible say about ground that is hardened? The seed of the word would just

Fall by the wayside. But when you acknowledge the hurt and you forgive, you open to reconcile. God begins to soften your heart so that the seeds of God's word can germinate and you can be a fruitful tree. Too many people are not burying fruit because they're still dealing with betrayal that they've never dealt with. I went to counseling. I wasn't opposed to counseling, but I was like, I don't need counseling until I went. The first question the counselor asked me was, who are you? I said, I didn't pay you for this. I'm asking the questions. I said, I don't even know what you're, I'm Tim Rivers. He said, no. If you were left on an island all by yourself and you didn't have the job that you had and you didn't have the family, do you know who you are? And I realized I didn't. So if you need to go to counseling, go to counseling, professional counseling, your friends, don't count. If you need to have a meeting to forgive, do it. If you need to make some phone calls, make some phone calls. But don't allow yourself to be isolated from relationships because you're, you're trying to protect yourself.

The prophetic word that I got before I went on staff at High Ridge, cause again, I went through all this and I thought, man, I'm not getting back into ministry. Oh, this was painful. But they came and they said, Hey, would you like to join us on staff? And I was like, not unless I get a word from the Lord and he better be specific. Then I got a word from the Lord, from a guy. He looked at me, he said, it looks the same, but it's different. You can trust this place. He didn't even know how to job offer. How many in this place know what it's like to be betrayed? And I wonder how many of us are still dealing with that feeling. And every time you hear their name, you're like, every time you see their face, just you're angry, you're upset. You relive that emotion. God doesn't want you to live that way. He does not. So I want to pray for you. Actually, I'd like for our alter team to come up here if you don't mind. And the reason why is because when you hear a word like that, you could easily be like, ah, I'm good. I'll be, yeah, let's bring up so many emotions, but I'm good. I'm going to toughen it out.

Don't leave this place until you pray with somebody. If you have dealt with betrayal, if you're currently going through a situation where it's, whether it be could be a spouse, it could be your kids, it could be a church scenario, it could be a parent. If you've gone through betrayal, do not leave this place until you pray with somebody all across this house. Would you stand right now to your feet? Dear Jesus, right now, God, I come to you and I say, Lord, I thank you for the sacrifice that you paid for us, God, to be forgiven. I thank you, Lord, that you paved the way for us to live in victory. And Lord, we know that the job of the enemy to try to keep us bound in unforgiveness and in betrayal. But right now, God, we make the decision that we will not move forward without dealing with hurt or pain. God, we bring it to you, God, and we're asking you to release us from it. Let it be done right now in your name. Dear Jesus.