Make Room - Week 8: The Secret of Seeds
Tim Ross | November 28, 2021
Listen
Transcription
What's up, everybody? You all doing okay? I'm so excited that you came to church on Thanksgiving weekend. I know a whole bunch of lead pastors that are my friends that are like, "Yes, I don't preach the weekend of Thanksgiving because no one is there." I'm like, "Huh?" This is what happens when you eat in moderation, right? You all found the chico. You all were like, "I'm not going to be in a food coma. I'm going to spread this out. That way, I can go to church on Sunday." I want to greet everybody.
Can we give it up for everybody that's watching online? We are so grateful that you decided to join us, whether you are here or there, we are grateful that you decided to be with us today. Ya'll, we are still in this series. I thought it was going to be like four weeks. Psych. Basically, just mark the rest of this year as make room. I don't think I have anything else to say. I don't think it's going to be any more updates for the rest of the year, except make room. Because I feel like God is positioning all of us individually and corporately for something that he wants to do significant in our lives in this season.
If you've been catching what God has been saying through this series, I believe he's preparing you for something that is exceedingly abundantly above all that you could even ask or think. Now, we quote that scripture, and a lot of people get excited about it, but I don't know if you've ever processed it that God will do exceedingly abundantly above what you can ask or think. Let's process for a moment.
If you can ask it or think it, that's not the way he's going to do it. Had to slow it down because sometimes we get excited about the general principle of a verse. Woo, he was going to do exceedingly abundantly above all you can ask or think, which means if you already asked it or you already thought it, that's not the way he's going to do it so toss it. If he could do what you asked, then he would be limited to what you can come up with.
If he did what you thought about, then he would only be limited to what you can think, but he can exceed abundantly anything you ask or think. I don't need anybody to think out of the box. I just need you to put the whole box away and give God permission to blow your mind in unexpected ways. I don't know who that's for, but some of you all have limited God to what you are comfortable with. "God, I want you to do it like this because that make me feel great. If you just gave me like a little raise, I'd be okay."
He wants to make you the regional manager and that's intimidating because you would have to be responsible for other people. You just want the bonus in your cubicle because you've constantly said, "I don't like fooling with people." God's trying to stretch you past your point of comfort so that you can do something and be something that you never thought you could do or be. That's what we going to get into today. If you have your Bibles, I want you to go to the gospel, according to Saint John, one verse.
I'll give you context to it, but the gospel, according to Saint John 12. The gospel according to Saint John 12. One verse. If you've got a paper Bible, you will find that these words are in red. If you have an app, you should find that these words are in red. This is Jesus speaking. The context of this particular passage is when he is preparing his disciples and giving them context to his death. Imagine that the Chief Apostle mentoring 12 men having to contextualize for them that I won't be here with you as long as you want me to.
I won't be in this role as long as you expected me to be in this role. I have a limited time to put everything I need to put into you, and then I have to make a transition. I know this is going to be disappointing for some of you all, but you'll get over it. I'm equipping you and empowering you. You will find out in the years to come that everything that I've put in you now, you will draw on later, and it will be enough for you to withstand all the persecution that you'll come up against.
That's exciting news that God can anchor you so deeply into His word, that there is literally no situation you can go through in your life that can take you out of your covenant fellowship with Him. That's what discipleship does. Church membership doesn't do that. That's why church members are so fickle because as soon as the vicissitudes of life hit you, a big word, and I can spell it too.
As soon as the vicissitudes of life hit you, the ups and downs of life, the ebbs and flows of life, as soon as you get smacked with one of those, if you have not been calibrated by discipleship, you get disappointed with God and your preacher. You quit on them for three weeks, "I break up with him, I don't like it no more. This ain't going right. I prayed and I tithed, and it's still a bad season, and I'm mad at God, so I'll be back when I feel better."
The disciples got up every day, whether they felt like it or not, and kept following their rabbi because they knew getting up and following him wasn't about the way they felt, it was about the commitment to the faith they had given. This one verse, so much in it, John 12:24, here's what it says, "I tell you the truth. Come on, truth. Be the truth. Unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone, but its death will produce many new kernels, a plentiful harvest of new lives."
It's only one verse, so I'm going to read it again. "I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone, but its death will produce many new kernels, a plentiful harvest of new lives." If you're taking notes on this message, four words, please write these down. The secret of seeds. I want to talk to you today, continuing in the Make Room series from the subject, the Secret of Seeds. Say it with me, the Secret of Seeds. On my cadence, the Secret of Seeds. Again, the Secret of Seeds.
One more time, real loud, the Secret of Seeds. Good. Got your hands, let's pray over the word, shall we? Holy Spirit, teach us about these seeds now. Amen. It's one of my hood prayers. [chuckles] I just felt it. Imagine being with Jesus. Imagine getting the revelation of who Jesus is, that He is literally the son of God, that He is literally the word of God wrapped in flesh.
Imagine being a Jewish man who's read the entire Old Testament from Genesis to Malachi, understanding that the prophets told about a messiah as savior that was to come, and that you happen to be living in the generation, not just in the generation, the actual time that he's on the Earth, and not just that he's on the Earth, but then he chooses you to walk with him, takes you off of your job. Somebody always say amen to that. Comes to your job and says, "You, I want you to follow me."
The excitement of knowing that all the prophecies are about to be fulfilled in this individual, and then he starts to hint to you, and then goes past hinting to tell you very plainly that in order for all of this to happen, I have to die. No, sir, you just got here. We just sang about you. [singing] You are Alpha and Omega. In this disposition of time, He is trying to calibrate them to what the significance of His death would mean. He does it by using something that they already know about, seeds, agriculture, farming.
I want you to think about this, the God of the universe, wrapped up in flesh, infinite wisdom, omniscient, omniscience, all-knowing. The person that spoke cosmos into the universe, the one that made the earth, the one that made all things, all living creatures, all science was in his words. That person could literally stupefy you with their intelligence. They could be deep. If there was one person, one teacher in all of human history that had permission to be deep, it would have been Jesus. He could have come and broke down complexities of solar systems.
He could have given you the DNA composite of stars. He could have told you the names of each snowflake that has ever fallen on planet Earth because He is all science in one body. Then God said, "This got to be simple for ya'll. I cannot have ya'll confused." I'm so thankful for Jesus because Jesus could have literally intimidated me out of being His disciple. He could have talked to me so deeply that I would have gave up by acknowledging very, very quickly that I did not tested high on my SAT.
Rabbi, as much as I love you, I ain't going to be able to follow you. It's not because I don't want to be your disciple, it's just that being your disciple makes me more confused even before I was one. Now, here's the reason why I bring this up. I'm going somewhere with this, obviously, because I think we need to get back to the simplicity of the word of God. That the simplicity of the word of God will literally unblocked people from feeling like they're too intimidated to follow Jesus.
We don't need deep preaching and deep theology. The deeper it is, the more confusing it can be. Jesus would never call you out into the deep unless He goes with you. When He goes with you, He makes very deep concepts simple. Instead of talking about the death process, and, "Hey, y'all, I'm going to have to die and when I die, I'm going to have to give up the ghost. Technically, when I give up the ghost, this is a powerful thing because no man can take my life, I have to lay it down.
You do know when they put me up on the cross unless I give up the ghost, I can be on that cross for as long as I want to be. The people that put me on there to crucify me would die before I did if I chose to hang up there. They have no idea the complexities of how powerful I am. No man can literally take my life. I will lay it down. If I can call 10,000 angels, I can sure heal the side that they punctured, put through me with a spear. I can be up here for as long as I like.
I could literally outlast the Roman Centurion that put the nails in my hands and in my feet if I wanted to, but I'm just not going to do that because I got bigger fish to fry. I could have stayed dead for three hours, let alone three days. I could have been in there three months. I could have fully went through the decomposition process to where all of the flesh had dehydrated onto my bones and then I could have rehydrated myself because I am." Before we start trying to delineate between where God's power is, it's within Himself. Whatever He speaks has to come to pass, which is why He watched His mouth. Heaven help if God started talking like us. Can you imagine if God talked as reckless as some of us? Can you imagine if God got as frustrated as some of us do? Could you imagine if God said, "I'm sick of you"? Could you? That's exactly what would happen to you if God said, "I'm sick of you." You would get the sickness He spoke. If He ever wished you was dead, you would drop.
Somebody got that revelation quick, immediately. When He speaks, He chooses to be simple because He wants you to understand He is not trying to lock you out based on intellect, which is why He chose fishermen and not scholars. He didn't get one disciple from a university. He didn't call nobody out of theology class to say, "Hey, follow me. I've seen your test scores and they were quite impressive. I think you can answer some of the questions I have." No, he decides to be very, very basic. In that basicness, profound revelation comes.
I'm going to die, guys, and I need you to understand the context of this. Unless the seed falls into the ground and dies, it cannot bring forth much fruit, but if it does go through that process, it will produce many more seeds and it will produce a great harvest. They're like, "Okay," but there's a secret to this seed that he's talking about. There's so much revelation. I feel like you all need to have this because in understanding what it means to make room, that means something has to happen in you.
In these messages, you're grabbing hold of stuff and you're getting confirmation to things and these are seeds that are going down into your heart. You have to understand what happens and what needs to happen with these seeds. These seeds can't just be accumulated. They actually need to go through a process. I just want to give you this. It's so basic. I know basic alert. Everything I'm about to tell you is basic. I know all the theologists in the room going to be like, "That ain't deep," which is why I preface what I said before I said it.
Point number one, please write this down. You have to be planted. Basic, I told you. The secret of the seed is that first, it must be planted. If you have a seed and it is not planted, the only thing you can do with it, well two things, you can toss it or you can eat it. If it's a pumpkin seed, I'm rocking with that. If it's sunflower seed, I'm rocking with that. If it's a peach seed, no, that's not happening. You have to be planted. There's something in the planting process that changes the composition of the seed.
Until the seed is planted, nothing is going to happen, until it is buried. You can put a seed on the top of the ground, nothing is going to happen unless it gets underneath the soil. Here's the thing that's amazing about a seed being planted. The moment you put it under the soil, you don't have to tell it what to do. The moment it's buried, the seed knows. "Oh, I'm finally in a place where I can allow what is in me to start changing. I can allow what is on the outside of me to start changing."
None of this happens when you have it on the table. None of this happens if you put it on your counter. None of this happens if you just toss it somewhere on the street. It has to be underground. The seed is not offended about being planted. It never once says, "I can't believe you're hiding me." The seed never says, "I cannot believe you're not letting me shine. I can't believe you're not giving me more attention." Because the seed knows in order for me to change, I cannot be seen while doing it.
This is a very, very important and critical context for me because I was born into a relationship with God being taught the true meaning of discipleship. I gave my life to Jesus Christ on January 14th, 1996 in my parents' church. God's way of holding this fellowship in West Covina, California. January 14th, 1996 when I gave my life to the Lord. February 25th, 1996 is when I preached my first sermon. Five weeks later, my mom and dad recognized that there was something on my life as it relates to ministry. They put me up to preach.
That first sermon that I preached, I am so glad that there was no video footage of it. I preached 98% of that whole sermon with my eyes closed. I was deadly afraid to look anybody in the face because I just knew I'm probably butchering this text. I don't know why they put me up here with this King James Bible and I am nervous and I was just looking down the whole time. Then I just, I didn't know what to do with God's anointing and feeling his presence strong and hearing the holy spirit speak to me in my ear and so literally, I was just too nervous to look up.
I was like, "And then the Lord says that male in the bible is right there and you can just see it. It's on page 1,171 on your bible." I was reading the page numbers. Listen, I had like four or five verses that I read. I was like-- I just got saved by. We just go, I do not know this whole book, but I'm going to be a master on these five verses. I took my strong concordance because that's all we had. We didn't have logos. We didn't have a PC Study Bible. We didn't have anything else.
You had a King James Thompson Chain-Reference Bible and you had a strong concordance. If you didn't get no revelation out of that, and Matthew, him as commentary, you were done. I got all out that I needed to get. I remember them coming back and they're saying, "Baby, there's something on you. We thought that there's something on you. We want you to preach again next month." I'm like, "I thought that was there forever. I was about to do something else with my life." "Listen, baby. We're going to put you up again next month."
They buried me. They didn't say, "Whoo. Oh, tere's an anointing on you. Get some business cards and some flyers. Let everybody know that there's an anointing on your life. You need to ring people's phones and call them up and tell them, you got a word and you're running revival." They buried me. In their ministry, they buried me. They said the only place you can preach is here. For 11 months, once a month, I preached at the church.
After 11 months, they said, "You know what? God has confirmed. You have gotten stronger every month. There's an anointing on you. If anybody calls you to preach, take the engagement." I said, "Who's going to call me to preach?" Why would anybody ever call me to preach if for the last 25 years, that's what it's been, but it was because I was buried that I was given the opportunity to develop and grow. We live in a generation now that doesn't have enough soil to cover them. "This is just the way the sermon is going to go."
They don't have enough soil to cover them. They're exposed before they've had enough time to actually be covered. Because they have not been properly covered, they grow distorted. My father was a photographer and that was his passion. He works for the post office for 33 years but his passion was photography and he had the old-school film cameras. I'm talking about click [imitating camera shutters]. He would take the film exposures, and he would take them to a dark room. When he put them in the darkroom, he would take all the film.
He would put out these little containers and fill them with a solution. The darkroom only had a red light in it. They would put the film into the solution and the solution would have to sit in the dark until the image appeared. Now, I know nobody knows about this right now, Instagram generation, just hold on. You can Google old cameras. This is there. That's not Polaroid either. I know those who are making a comeback where you do this, it ain't that. Some of you all think you all vibing with me like, "Yes, I got one of those."
No, you don't. That's the Polaroid. It would have to sit in the solution until the image literally was raised in the dark. If you were to come in and cut the lights on, it would literally wash out the image and you would never see the picture or the image that needed to be raised in that moment. Here's what's happened with most people who are not covered and planted.
They have more light on them when there should be darkness and the image of Christ never raises in their life, and so people are more drawn to the person than they are the character of Christ because they were never in the dark long enough for his image to be raised. Ask yourself the question, "Am I planted? Am I covered and buried in something, where I can literally grow and change or am I sitting on top of something, where I'm just noticed and exposed?"
Exposed seeds get eaten and thrown away. Buried seeds are the only seeds that have an opportunity to change and to grow. Jesus says this in a two-part process, and I'm about to go to point number two with this. He says, "Unless a seed is planted and dies." [chuckles] Point number two, please write this down. You choose to live or die. You choose to live or die. A seed doesn't have the option. You put it in the ground, it's going to automatically die.
When it comes to us, the children of God, and how we are supposed to navigate in our relationship with God, he gives us the choice of whether we want to live or die. Under point number two, I have A and B. I want you to understand based on the choice that you make. I've seen these choices, I've been in church all my life, 46 years, but I've been walking with the Lord and been in church and in ministry for 25 so I've seen both sides. I want to give you A and then B. You choose to live or die.
If you choose to live-- Without me giving a prophetic word, this is not a word of knowledge, this is just empirical data. If you choose to live while planted, you will live alone. If you choose to live while planted, you will live alone. That's not me throwing shade, that's not coming against your ministry giftings, I'm just telling you what I've seen people that choose to be planted but don't choose to die live alone. That's the choice of a seed that doesn't want to die once it's planted.
The reason why I have to say this is because I know people that are literally planted in ministries, in a church, under covering with discipleship, with mentorship, but because they refuse to die to their will, to their way, to their agenda, they live alone. A seed that won't die lives alone. It doesn't and do anything more than be exactly what it is when it's planted, a seed. You were never meant to stay the same person that you were when you met Jesus.
You show me somebody that's been walking with Jesus more than six weeks and they talking about, "I'm still the same. I can go back to where I came from." Because what happens was, when a change happens in your life, the first people that notice it are your family and friends and those are the ones that we try to convince that we haven't changed because people don't accept change. You cannot change and you cannot evolve because you don't stay where the other person puts you.
If you don't stay where the other person puts you and live up to their expectation of where they had you, then they're disappointed and they want you to go back to where they found you because that's where I liked you, but there's no way you can give your life to Jesus and still go back to the hood and convince everybody. "I'm the same. It is incongruent," because the change that happens on the inside is bound to catch up with all of your actions on the outside. If they don't, you're living alone.
There is no change because the seat never has the opportunity to go through the process it was destined to go through. I've seen people in ministry, who's been in ministry a long time, but they're alone and I don't mean like, they don't have friends and all that kind of stuff. I'm saying there's nothing that's ever changed in them. As a result, they've allowed themselves to stay the same because they're afraid of what the change might mean for them and those around them. It is risky business to follow Jesus.
Whoever told you following Jesus would be convenient, lie to you. Whoever told you living for Jesus was going to be sunshine and roses, lied to you. Whoever told you living for Jesus and actually following His scriptures and His commandments, His decrees, His laws because he is a king and not a president, He was not voted in, He can not be impeached. There is no four-year, eight-year cycle by which we can reevaluate if we still like his leadership. He's not coming up for a re-election in another millennia.
He is Alpha and Omega. He is the beginning and the end. He was here before it all started, He'll be here after it all folds up. As a result of that, we have to make a decision or if we want a king or not. Hear me. Not a savior, a Lord. Not a redeemer, a rabbi. Not a comforter, a king. Most people want the Savior, but they don't want the Lord. "Save me, Jesus." "I saved you. Follow me."
"I don't really like where you be going. You'd be on the street that got inclines and just the way my thighs are set up, sir, and you be going to altitude. My breathing gets weak, I'm just not the way my blood count is. I just don't-- I can't be following you. I get blisters, sir. You don't stop when I want you to. You just say keep coming. Oh my gosh, it's just inconvenience me following you." Well, you wanted a savior. You keep Him as a rescuer. You use Him to break glass in case of emergency because you don't want a king.
Instead of following Him, you do you into do you get you in trouble and then you say, "Oh Lord, please save me. Here I am, Lord, standing in the need of prayer. It's not my mother. It's not my father, not my sister, nor my brother. It's me, Oh Lord, standing in the need of prayer," and you wouldn't be in that situation if you had followed Him because He would have walked you right past that street. He wouldn't turn on that corner. He would have never made that person a disciple who you made a friend.
Ooh, y'all like, "Did you have turkey?"
How was your Thanksgiving? Bring cob backup. A is you live alone, B the option is you die to gain. Let's the seed falls into the ground. It does what? Does what? Louder, does what? Unless it goes into the ground and actually dies. It will not bring forth much fruit. The secret to the seed is death. When that seed dies, something that is on the inside of it comes out that it was never going to be if it stayed alive. The strategy to success in a relationship with God is death. This is what we don't preach. When we talk about making room we say all the happy stuff. God about to bless you, and you're about to increase, and He's about to do something. Everybody gets happy, "Oh, yes. Give it to me, Jesus. I want it." Then He's like, "Die." You're like, "No. The devil's a liar. I rebuke Satan."
Satan, "No. Okay. Sir, that's great." The wages of sin is death. How does the enemy make you work for your death? By telling you to live your life. I never said that in my life. I'm just telling you. The wages of sin to death. The way he gets you to that death is by telling you to live your life. Eternal life, the way to eternal life is to die now, live later. The way to eternal death is to live now, die later.
"I don't know who that was for." You have to stop living your life. You have to stop doing you, because doing you will ruin you. Bars.
I felt that thing. Doing you will ruin you. Doing you will ruin you. Say it. Doing you will ruin you. Again. Doing you will ruin you.
There's no glamorous way to package it. As a communicator, I wish I could talk about dying and sacrifice to self in a way that make everybody go, "Yes, I'm about to go die right now." There's no glamorous way to say it, which is why most people, communicators, preachers, and teachers will not say it because they don't want to hurt the feelings of the people. Have you read your Bible? I'm talking about outside Proverbs and Psalms. Have you read? Have you read what He said in red? Bars. Have you read what He said in red?
Have you R-E-A-Ded what He said in R-E-D? He is not concerned with your convenience. He did not set up discipleship to be your buddy click system. He meant it as a means for you to get around like-minded individuals that were committed to the same death process you are. He said if you get in on this, if you get planted in My word, if you get planted in My Church, big C Church, He said, and you die, you're going to gain so much. I know you are in love with your seed self.
I know that's all you've known up until this point is your seed self. All the selfish you got is of your seed self. I'm telling you, there's another person on the inside of you. There is something else on the inside of you. I've put such a rich deposit on the inside of you. How am I going to get it out, Lord? You going to have to die. It's the only way to get it out. Well, can I take a class?
I found out my ministry gifts are. I find I have discernment and the gift of knowledge. Can I just exercise those gifts? No, no, no, you're going to have to die, because that attitude won't get you where you want to go. That lust won't get you where you want to go. That anger is not going to get you where you want to go. That low self-esteem is not going to get you where you want to go. How do I get that out? Altar calls? No, just die. How am I going to die? Every time that thing comes up, you have to bring Me up.
The wheat grows with the tare. Both of them come up at the same time. Then He gives you discernment to know which one to pick up and burn, and the one to put in the storehouse to learn. I'm rhyming this weekend.
I'm not even trying. Was raising to point number three. Please, write this down. You get what's in you out. This is the secret of the seas. You got to be planted. You choose to live or die but if you choose to die-- If you choose to live, you're going to live alone. If you choose to die, we get to point number three, you get what's in you out. When we talked about making room, I want to die knowing that I got out what God put in me.
The late great Dr Myles Munroe, I call him the brilliance of the Bahamas, Dr Myles Munroe always talked about purpose and dying empty, and all that kind of stuff. Do you know that man died in a plane accident on his way to preach? He had preached purpose and destiny, and kingdom for years and years and years. He always talked about, "Whenever it's over for me, I'm going to die. I'm going to die empty." He wrote all these books. He did all these seminars. He talked to government officials, heads of state, got the keys to kingdoms and governments all over the world, and then die in a plane accident. Do you know what his family said?
After the shock of losing their father and mother, and seven more people on that plane, here's what they said, "He must have been done. He said he was going to die empty. He thought he had more." The Lord was like, "You did good, man. Let's get home." It's a tragedy to us, but he's in heaven, he ain't thinking about us. Him and his wife was on that plane initially, knew they were in the presence of God. They were like "Well, well, well. Have no idea how I got here. I thought we landed on the other side of the island. Well, bless God. Are my people going to be okay?" "Don't worry about them. I got them." "Okay. Where's my room?" You get what send you out.
Here's what Paul had to say about it, 1 Corinthians 15, starting at the 35th verse, "But someone may ask," and this was talking about the resurrection of the dead, but the principle still applies. "But someone may ask, how will the dead be raised? What kind of bodies will they have? What a foolish question." Calm down, Paul. So aggressive.
"When you put a seed into the ground, it doesn't grow into a plant unless it dies first, and what you put in the ground is not the plant that will grow, but only a bare seed of weeds or whatever you are planting. Then God gives it the new body He wants it to have. A different plant grows from each kind of seed." Paul, you preaching good. Here's what Paul said, if you want to know the secret of the seed, is that you get what's on the inside of the seed out, if you choose to die.
If you die, you will get what's on the inside of you out. If you live, we'll just know the seed form of you. For some people in this room, you're still the seed form of yourself because you refuse to let go of things that will keep you from being who God wants you to be. Paul said it, what you put in the ground is not what is actually going to grow out of the ground.
What you put in there goes in looking one way, it comes out looking another way. I think everybody in here has done through third, fourth, fifth grade science were you had to put the little lima bean in the little glass, and put some dirt over it. You watching that lima bean, and you watering it. That lima bean starts going down before it starts going up. The roots come out of there and it starts going down.
It looks like it's going the wrong way, "No, sir. Go up." It cannot go up until it goes down, because without a healthy root system, the whole plant will literally kill itself. It goes down before it goes up. What comes out doesn't look like that bean. After a while, when you look back at the base of it, the whole seed is gone. It doesn't even exist anymore.
Now you have this plant. Now, if you were to come back to-- If you were to bring a friend in after the lima bean has fully sprouted, and said, "I want you to come look at my seed," they will say, "That's a nice plant you got there." You will go, "No, this is my seed." He's like, "No, you were a seed." This was maybe a seed, but now something's changed and you're totally different.
This is a totally different thing. This is not what you put in there. This is what happened. This is what is happening with some of you as you are making room right now. People don't recognize you. They're not they're not engaging with you the same way, and you think there's something wrong with you. There's nothing wrong with you. Here's another thing, there's nothing wrong with them. It's just change. If you don't have proper contextualization to change, you will think something's wrong. They are not hating on you, and you are not hating on them. It's simply a change. The change is happening because you have chosen to die.
I was telling my niece last night that God did something incredible in me, in my heart because I come from-- I was raised in an environment that had a lot of danger in it. I put it that way. There's gang members all over the place, and violent people. When you grow up in an environment like that, if you choose not to be in gang, you're actually in a gang. Does that make sense? The gang you're in is the non gang you chose to not be in.
When somebody comes up to you, and they're like, "What set you from? What set you claim in your life?" Man, I'm not banging. They is mad at you as if you said you was in a game, then they want to recruit you, and if you don't want to be recruited, then you got to run for your life as if you did-- It's just confusion. Then I don't know what color to wear today, I don't know what y'all into. You all didn't make none of these colors, you all don't have a t-shirt factory. You don't own none of these bandanas, you bought them all. I'm confused.
That environment produces in you a certain way that you see the world, and retaliation and revenge. You do something to me, it's like I have to-- You might get gut, then I gave my life to Jesus. I'm interacting with other believers who have not quite died. There's some attitudes and there are some anger, and there are some lies, and there are some deception, and there are some other stuff going on. The hood in me is like, "I need to get them, Jesus. Let me get them." He's like, "No, you have to die to that." "No, sir. They need to die."
"I have several ways that I can accommodate this death." One day I'm reading through Proverbs, and in Proverbs 25, I'm just telling you practically how you die. You won't do it without the word of God. Just not going to happen. You won't do it without reading through the entire Bible. It's not going to happen, because there's going to be certain stuff that the Holy Spirit punches you in the face with as you're just reading through like, "La, la, la. Oh my goodness. Ecclesiastes."
He's just going to get you. That's how He gets you. It's not like this deep revelation. It's just you go on your journey walking with Him, and you read through the scriptures. You're reading Corinthians one day and you're like, "Oh man. I'm dead. You got me, I'm dead."
I'm reading through Proverbs. I'm going to be wise. Like, "La, la, la. Amen. Amen. Amen." Proverbs 25. "If your enemy is hungry, give them something to eat. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing so, you will heap hot coals upon their head, and the Lord will reward you." I said, "I'm sorry sir, what did You just say?"
If my enemy is hungry, feed him? My enemy? If they're thirsty, give 'em something to drink? For in doing so, you will heap hot coals on their head, and the Lord will reward you. Now you all know everything I hear and everything I read I see it, so I slow this down. At first, I thought you was trying to-- You are killing me, but I like this death, because I still get to do something.
"If the enemy is hungry, feed him. If they're thirsty, hydrate them. In doing so, you will heap hot coals on their head, and the Lord will reward you."
Let me get this straight, if I'm nice to my enemies, you will burn they scalp and I get a reward? I'm going shopping for these jokers right now.
Do you know how many scalps I have sizzled since I got this revelation? I have marked so many scalps. People got third-degree burns on top of their head, don't even know it. I'd be hugging people that I know talk behind my back. When I hug them all I hear is, "[sizzle]" Why? Because this is the kingdom's way. I died to my perspective on this. Guess what grew out of me? A person who's non-petty. Because I chose to die, what grew out of me is kindness, long-suffering, patience with difficult people. I don't write people off after one, two, thee, four, five, six things.
I might have to put a healthy boundary around you because if you toxic, I can't have your pollution in my direct vicinity. I can still love you. It was going to be the street me or the God in me. I choose which one that's going to be. There is no, "That's just me. Run up on me. I'm saved but I'll still throw these hands." Nice song. Completely unbiblical. After your bop, are you going to drop? Bars.
Y'all were waiting on it. Seven people whispering, "Bars. Bars. Bars."
"Bars. Bars. Bars. Bars. Okay, thank you so much. I appreciate you." Listen, this is one of them tight but write messages. There's no way for me to take this and be like, "Everybody ready to die. Let's go." This not that weekend. This weekend is one of those sober reminders that you have to make room for death, the death of you. "Make room? Yes, I'm ready Lord, let's go." Okay. Did you make room for your own funeral while you are still living? Have you written the obituary to the old you? Are you ready to lose the seed you so you can be the you that He has called you to be? This is your choice. No one else can do this for you.
The secret of the seed. The revelation that Jesus wanted to give is that I'm choosing to die so that all of y'all may live. For some of you all in this room, your choice to die is going to establish a generational blessing for 1,000 generations in your family. Your choice to die is going to end the curse of anger and grudge that's been perpetuated in your family. Your choice to die is going to end marriage out of wedlock, and fornication, and promiscuity, sleeping around, and drugs. Your choice to die is going to change not only you, but everybody around you. Are you ready to make room for that?
This is the seed that I've been assigned to sell today. If you would choose to allow this seed to grow, I can promise you other people are going to benefit from it. Last thing I'll say and then I'll be done. I moved from Cali to Texas in 1997. I had never left California. I can't count Nevada, we just drove over there and drove back. I moved to Texas.
When I got here, I couldn't stand Texas. No disrespect to the natives, but being from West Coast, I got over here and I was like, "What is happening? Everybody is so slow." I don't mean that disrespectfully, it was just a different pace. The Southern pace is just a different pace. I was used to [snaps fingers]. I got down here and everybody was like, "Man, it's whatever. We chilling."
I was like, "What? What do you mean we chilling? We got stuff to do." They was like, "Relax, kinfolk." I was like, "Kinfolk? I don't even know you like that. We haven't done our genealogies. I don't even know if we're related. I don't think we have any Robinsons in our family, sir. I don't know who kinfolk is." It took me four years to appreciate the death God was trying to bring to me.
Let me say it another way, it took me four years to die, because every year I was like, "Can I go now? Can I go now?" Then I met Juliette, got married to Juliette. I was like, "Can I go now? Can I go now?" He was killing something in me so He could grow something in me. What was going to grow out of me wasn't going to be found in California.
I don't hit on something right there. What happens when God transplants you so that something that can grow out of you. My destiny, my purpose, everything God had for me was in Texas, not in California. I had to die to what I was thinking my life was going to look like. That's it. I don't have a clean way to even end this message. I'm going to just end it.
Why try? Amos, just play something soft.
I don't even know what vibe, I don't know. Play some funeral music, I don't know.
What do we play in funerals? I have no idea. Let's just set the mood, shall we? Dearly beloved, we have gathered today to eulogize the life of the old you. He and she was a good person, did many good things, but then they realized that there was more on the inside of them. Without asking permission from anyone, he and she chose to die. It wasn't a tragic death, because once a mind is made up to be who God has called them to be, there is no tragedy in that death, but beauty. They died peacefully and quietly because they refused for the old them to get in the way of the new them.
We do not mourn like those who do not have a savior, because we know that what they gave up is not as significant and beautiful for what they are about to attain. We say goodbye to the old you, and we welcome the new you, knowing that all of God's purposes, plans, and destiny is inside the seed that you have chosen to break out of. We say thank you. We applaud you for being buried and growing up anew. Let us pray.
Dear God, we thank You so much for the many deaths that are taking place around this room. We thank You so much for the confirmation You're giving many people about the death process that they are already going through. God, we say thank You for being patient with us. As we go through some of our death throes, as we go through some of our death rattles, You have given us an exponential grace to live through and see what the other side looks like. We make room today in our hearts and in our minds for what You want to do and how you want to do it. Give us the grace for this season and this stage of our life. God, may we be changed forever into the image of Christ.
