What Do You See? Week 1

Tim Rivers | January 8, 2023

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Transcription

Tim:

Isn't God good? Yeah, man, I'm so glad that you are here. If you have first time guests with us, thank you so much for being here. This is what I believe when we come into the house of God, we're not here on accident. No. I know you may have gone through the list of 10,000 churches in DFW and said, you know what? I think I'm going to go here. Well, I believe that was divinely inspired cuz God's got a word for you and God's going to do something special in your life if you join us online. Our Vitamin E family, we literally have people all over the globe that are watching every week. Thank you for your faithfulness wherever you are, standing on your couch, laying in your bed, driving in your car, wherever you are. We're so thankful that you're with us and those that are in the overflow.

Thank you so much for being here. I am so excited about this new series that we're about to kick off. We are starting a new series today that we are calling. What do you see? Several months ago I preached a message and I titled it. Can You See It? And in that message, really what we talked about is that God generally will send a preceding sound about what he's going to do. He's going to talk to you about what he's going to do prior to him doing it. And that sermon was really kind of an appetizer for this sermon series. And so for the next several weeks, what we're going to do is we're going to talk about what I believe God has called us as a church to do. I believe that God has given us vision. I believe that God has given us a mission and we're doing our best as a staff, as a leadership here at this church to kind of get some things geared up that I'm really excited about that you get to participate in this year. But I really wanna spend the next few weeks just unpacking with you what I believe God specifically is calling us to do. But in order for us to really understand vision, what I'm going to do today is I want to spend some time talking to you about the importance of having vision. Some people are opposed to New Year's resolutions,

<laugh>, how many been to the gym this week? For some of us, we gotta wait a couple of weeks, right?

Planet Fitness know what they're doing, you know what I'm saying? They get memberships signed up and they'll have it for two years. But I want you to get started this year on understanding why it's important for you to have vision and why it's important for our church to have vision. God has ordained for us to have vision in our lives. And that's what we're going to talk about. So if you have your Bibles, turn with me to Revelation chapter one. If you have a physical Bible, grab it, put it up in the sky, wave it, show us that you have a, oh, nice Bible nerds. Look at all over the house. Hey, I'll actually love having a physical Bible. It's just something about her. It just feels nice. But if you don't, that's okay. You'll see it on the screen. But before I read the scripture, we're kicking off 21 days of prayer and fasting tomorrow. Come on, somebody make some noise over that.

Oh yeah. So I told you last week that I'm expecting God to do amazing things in the next 21 days. So I wanna tell you that God's already on the move. So I'm wanna share testimony with you. But let me just add this as a caveat to what I'm about to say. Fasting prayer is not a way for us to manipulate God. We don't fast and pray to try to twist God's arm and go, will I fast for God? That's not what prayer, prayer and fasting is about us setting aside things in our lives. Food, social media, whatever means something to you so that we can concentrate on intimacy with God. However, consequently, when you get close to God, yes sir, you start hearing him more clearly and you start seeing him work a little more in your life. So last week my mom called me on Friday, not this past Friday or Friday before that, she called me and she said, Hey Timmy when she calls me Timmy, Hey Timmy I got bad news. And our kids were standing over there at her house and I thought the first thought I had was like, oh man, what did they break?

And I said, okay, what's up? She said, my car got stolen.

I said, your actual car, not a toy car. Your car got stolen. Yes, my Honda got stolen from in front of your house. Yes. Now, I don't know if you know anything about stolen vehicles, but the recovery of stolen vehicles is slim to none in terms of recovery. So of course my mom's a woman of faith and prayers and she prayed and nothing was happening. So we pretty much gave up hope, right? So this past Wednesday, my mom said, you know what? I'm about to enter into this 21 day fast a little early. I'm going to start tomorrow on Thursday. And let me just tell you, I grew up with my mom fasting every week and she would dedicate one day to the Lord fast every week. And so she said, she told Lord, I'm going to, I'm going to start fasting on Thursday and this is my prayer for the 21 days. God, I'm asking you to help me find my car. Now, couples, couple doors down from her is like the chief of the SWAT unit who has been doing his best to try to find this vehicle and we can't find it. We got video, but it's blurry, so I'll hope is lost. So on Thursday she starts her fast. On Friday she gets a letter in the mail and she opens it up and in the letter it says, ma'am, we found your car and is ready to be picked up.

They may not hit you the way it hits me, but I'm just saying somebody better get ready for God to do some spectacular things in the next 21 days. Your expectation sets the foundation for God to move. Whatever you need God to do, you better go ahead and ask them to do it in the next 21 days. Wow. Because God's going to do something special, right? All right, revelation chapter one, verse number nine. I know some of y'all are nervous. Are we talking about the end times

Verse number nine, I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation in the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus was on the aisle called PMUs on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. Here, let me just stop and say this. Let me give you context. John is on an island by himself, the aisle of Patas, and he is there. Why? Because he's doing the work of God. <laugh> never get confused about trials and tribulations and suffering. It doesn't mean if you go through hard times that you're out of the will of God. In fact, oftentimes you end up having to go through suffering because you're doing the will of God. The will of God is not always easy, and it's okay to admit that. Alright? He says, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Tyra and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and tole desia.

So I really want to concentrate in on verse number 10. It says, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches. So today I want to talk about the importance of having vision. And my title for today is you got to see it to believe it. You got to see it, to believe it. I'm not talking about physically see it, but in the spirit with spiritual eyesight, you have to see what God wants to do in your life in order to believe it. Let's pray Heaven. Father, we thank you so much for your goodness and your mercy. I pray that in the next few moments as we dig into your word, you would give us revelation that you would give us ears to hear and heart, to receive a mind, to understand what the spirit says to us. Help us to walk outta here different than the way we walked in. We give your name all the praise and glory in Jesus' name we pray and everybody say amen. Amen. So there are five basic human senses. One is we have this sense of touch and a sense of touch is great because it gives us the ability to feel things you can feel if something is rough or smooth, hot or cold, round or flat. Then you also have the sense to taste how many, thank God for the sense to taste Mama, mama my mind.

Your ability to taste of something is good. To taste what your favorite meal is. To taste of something is sweet or sour, bitter or salty. Then you have your sense of smell. Thank God for a sense of smell, right? Because your sense of smell will alert you to something that smells good like your favorite meal. It can make you salivate. In fact, many of the animals in the animal kingdom, they depend on their sense of smell for survival. But a sense of smell could also alert you to funkiness. Anybody been around teenagers lately? Why is it that dudes at the age of 1314 start smelling funky when they start getting ax for Christmas? I had to do that to my brother-in-law. You know what I'm saying? I had a young brother-in-law when he turned 14. I was like, I got you ax and I asked you to use this, please. So the other day we were at Target and Zion, our three year old was riding in the cart along with Zane and we were going down the aisle and I turned in this aisle and man, I'm telling you, it smelled funky in that aisle. And Zion, he's very vocal and very passionate. He goes, Ooh, who tuned it?

Well, it just so happened that there was a gentleman at the end of the aisle and as soon as Zion said it, he went around the corner and I'm like, this dude is crop Dustin right now and Target. And we right in the middle of Funky Cloud. So let me get up outta here. So I just left that island, went to the next aisle. Well, in the next aisle I smelt it again. And I'm like, is this dude going through Target? Just funking up this whole store? And Zion does is the same thing. He goes, Ooh daddy, this stinks. Who tooted it real loud? And I'm embarrassed for this guy, but I'm also like fam

Go outside. You know what I'm saying? <laugh>, go to the bathroom. So a few minutes later and we're at another aisle and I smell it again and I'm like, this guy is literally going all over the store with this funkiness. So Zion says again, and I said, Zion, who is it? And Zion smiles at me, he goes, it's me <laugh> the whole time this Jober has been doing it.

But thank God for a sense of smell and I had to go home with that. And then we have another sense and it's a sense to hear. And his hearing's very important because it alerts us to danger that's coming. It allows us to hear when people are calling us. It allows us to kind of navigate through some things then, but not least you have your sense of sight. And the sense of sight is very important because according to research, up to 80% of impressions and information is entered into our brain through sight. So you may wonder out of the five senses, if you are going to lose one, which would it be? Well, I don't wanna lose my sense of sight. Why? Because being able to see allows you to kind of take in the environment being able to see tells you who you are.

You can look in the mirror and see who you are. It allows you to understand where you are. And it also allows you to understand where you are going. So when you lose your sense of sight, it can inhibit you from doing a lot of things in life. And to further prove the fact that sight is very important to us, we have to do what is called in the theological realm the law of first mention. If you're an A Bible nerd and you want to look this up, it's called the law of first mention. And the law of first mention is this, that anytime we see a word or a principle or a thought or a phrase in the Bible, in order to properly understand it, we have to go back in scripture to see where it was first mentioned, to understand context for that word, principle or phrase.

So when we apply the law of first mention to the idea of eyesight or vision, it takes us all the way back to the very beginning in Genesis chapter one. Because when you read Genesis chapter one, it tells a story of God creating the heavens and the earth. And then on the seventh day the Bible says that God saw he used his eyes, he saw what he had made and he saw that it was very good and God arrested from all that he had done. So when God looks, he looks and he sees and he uses vision to behold what he has created. But then we have to go to Genesis chapter three and in Genesis chapter three, we read the account of Adam and Eve being in the garden. And there in the garden God told Adam and Eve be fruitful, multiplier supplant the earth and have dominion in the earth and basically feel the earth and do my work.

So as they're doing this, God also says, there's one thing that I don't want you to do. I don't want you to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But in the story in just chapter three, we find Eve now standing in front of the forbidden tree and she's beholding the fruit. And while she is looking at the fruit, Satan slithers his way into the garden through the form of a serpent. And there he begins a conversation with eve and the serpent is like this. Hey girl, Hey <laugh>, you just gotta go with me. All right? This is how I imagine these Bible stories. And Eve is like, Hey serpent <laugh> and serpent is like, Hey, question did God actually say you shall not eat of this tree.

When Satan against the target, he always is going to come with a question, did God actually say and Eve's reply to the serpent is <laugh>. God didn't just say don't eat it, he said don't touch it. I just feel like this is how Eve she had a little attitude to it. You know what I'm saying? And here's what happens though. Her reply to the serpent isn't correct because it's not what God said, but what Eve felt like she could do is modify what God said. Anytime Satan begins to try to get you to sin, he's first of all going to try to get you to modify what God said. This is why you have to be very careful when people begin to give their own interpretation of scripture. No, I wanna know what did God actually say? Because whenever you start modifying what God actually says, you'll start getting confused about what he actually said.

So she says, well, he said don't eat of it and also don't touch it. And then Satan goes, well I don't really think that's what is supposed to happen. And so let's read about it in Genesis chapter three, verse four. This is Satan's replied through the serpent to eve. He says, but the serpent said to the woman, you'll not surely die for God knows that when you eat of it, check this out, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God knowing good and evil. So when the woman check this out, saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the what eyes and that and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. And she also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate.

Then the check this out, eyes of both were open and they knew that they were naked and they sold fig leaves together and made themselves loin cloth. Can I tell you the significance of vision is displayed in this passage scripture? Because when Satan got ready to attack the creation of God, when Satan got ready to come after Adam and Eve, he didn't come after their ability to work. He didn't come after their ability to use their hands. He didn't come after their ability to walk. He came after their ability to see why. Because Satan knew if I could capture their vision, I can get them focused on something else other than doing what God has called them to do. Satan knew that if I can affect their vision, I can affect their direction. If I can affect their vision, I can affect their concentration. If I can affect their vision, then I can get them so distracted that they will stop doing what God has called them to do. Satan is after your vision.

He starts attacking it. Now, I also want you to look at this. The first result of sin wasn't that Adam and Eve were separated from God, the first result. Now you, you've probably heard many preachers preach, said that because they sin and then they were separate from the garden. That wasn't the first result. The first result of Adam and Eve having participated in sin, the first result in their life is that they stopped seeing God for who he is and who they are in relation to God and what he's called them to do. The first result of sin is that they started looking inward on themselves. They started seeing their own frailty, their own insufficiency, their own nakedness, their own vulnerability. They started looking in upon themselves instead of looking at what God had in front of them. This is why it's important to guard your vision because if you don't guard your vision, you will have no direction in life. This is why the scripture tells us in Proverbs 29 18 that where there is no prophetic vision, the people cast off restraint cannot tell you what you listen to is what you see. Because check this out,

Satan wasn't able to affect their eyes directly, but what he was able to do is speak into their ears and then what they heard is what they saw. This is why you have to be very careful who you listen to. Two, because who you listen to will affect what you see and what you see will become the direction in which you walk. This is, let me just stop and say this. This is why you gotta be careful not to be slipping in people's dms. Stop flirting and stop talking with that person at your job. Because eventually what you will start doing is when you talk to this person, you will start imagining what it's like to be with that person. And next thing you know, you will stop seeing the plan of God for your life to remain a faithful person and you will start heading in the direction of sinful behavior. That's not even in my notes, but that was just for free. So we have to understand that vision is important, but to understand the importance of vision, we have to talk about the effects of having no vision, right? And to do so, I'm going to demonstrate it.

I brought this now, this is my wife's

Congregation:

<laugh>.

Tim:

Don't trip.

When you have no vision, the first thing that happens is that you start forgetting who you are. Cuz now I no longer can see myself in a mirror. Also, when you have no vision, you lose your sense of direction, you no longer understand where you are. So now not only do I not see myself, but now I don't know where I am and when I don't know where I am, I start looking for things to hold onto. And when I have no vision, I'm looking for stability in my life. But I don't know how to find stability in my life. So I hold onto to the very things that I can hold onto. Even though it's not secure, it makes me feel secure because I have no sense of direction and I don't know where I am. So I hold onto things that are shaky and they're not really stable, but they're the most stable thing to me. So I'm going to hold onto it. So I hang on to relationships that are unstable, but they're stable to me because I have no vision. When you have no vision, what ends up happening is you also don't know where you're going. And when you don't know where you're going, what you'll start doing is asking somebody else to come and help you use their vision. Wow,

Where you at? Okay, thank you <laugh>.

Bro, I can't see <laugh>. All right, this is what I want you to do. I want to use your vision cuz I have no vision. Come on. Because I have no vision. I gotta use your vision. So I'm going to tell you where I wanna go, but you gotta lead me by your eyesight. So I want you to take me to toward the drums please. Okay, we're going towards the drums. Oh, this is going to be excellent. I love it, I love it. I love that we're going toward the drums. Are we we by the drums? Well, I have no vision, so I don't know. So I gotta wait on somebody else to gimme a word about where I'm at.

I have no vision, so I gotta concentrate on somebody else's vision and they are going to take me wherever they want to go. Why? Because I have no vision for myself. So I want you to take me somewhere else, wherever you want to go. I'm just connected to you. Just take me wherever I don't know and watch my step because I don't know how to watch out for pitfalls myself or stumbling blocks myself. I just need you to tell me where those things are. This is what happens when you have no vision. Another thing that happens when you have no vision is that that it don't matter how strong you are when you have no vision, it doesn't matter. Can we ask Samson about it? It doesn't matter what your gift is, right? It doesn't matter how great the anointing of God is on your life. If you have no vision, you don't know how to use what God's given you. So no matter how strong Sampson was, when Sampson had got deceived by Delilah and they cut off his hair and he lost his anointing, guess what he did? He didn't know what to do. So they took his eyesight because they said, we don't care how strong you are, Sampson, we don't care that you can lift gates up and take it to wherever you want to go. If you have no vision, you have no direction. So your strength don't matter. Your gifts are null and void if you have no vision.

So what God wants to do is God wants to remove the blinders and give you vision. Thank you bro. I didn't even know we were over there. I thought I was right. What God wants to do is he wants to give you vision because when you have vision you have direction. And when you have direction you know where you're going. This is why I wanna talk to you about the vision for our church because where there is no vision, the people parish.

This is why Jesus said one of the five things that he said he came to do. He said, I came to give sight to the mind. And it wasn't just in a natural sense, but it was in a spiritual sense. Who was he talking to? The household of Israel. Who had what? Lost sight of what God had for them. Yes. So here's what happened to happen. When you don't have vision in your life, you start manufacturing things, you start having to use your imagination. When I say the word elephant, is there one picture an elephant? Yes. Is there an elephant in the room? Well, there may be for somebody <laugh>, but there isn't a physical elephant here. But you imagined an elephant in your mind. Why not? Because you saw it but because you heard it. So the question is then how do we get vision? And what is vision? What is contained in vision? There are three things that are contained in vision. If you're taking notes, write this down. Number one vision will tell you who you are. Number two, vision will tell you where you are. And number three, vision will tell you where you are going. And you may be like, well prove it by the Bible. I got you fam.

Adam is the first person that had vision in his life. God-given vision. How do we know this? Well, God told Adam who he was. You are man. He told Eve who she was. You are woman, you are Adam and Eve. You are my creation. This is who you are. Where are you? You are in the garden. Where are you supposed to be doing? I want you to be fruitful and multiply. Were they already? No. But vision tells you where you're going. How do we do? It? Doesn't matter. You start figuring out how you do it. When you have the vision to know where you're going. Abraham, Abraham, who are you? You are a friend of God. Where are you? You're in the ear of Cald. Where are you going? You're going to the land of Canaan. David, who are you? You're a shepherd. Where are you?

You're in the house of Jesse. Where are you're going? You're going to go sit on the throne. Jesus. Who are you The Bible love sudden whom I am? Well pleased. Where are you in the wilderness? Where you going? You're going to go sit on the throne in heaven. So vision is always going to include these three things. Now the question then becomes how do I get vision? Somebody say, how do I get vision? Vision? This is why we read Revelation chapter one, because I felt implored by the Holy Spirit to teach you how to get vision for your life. And there are three things that we have to observe in Revelation chapter one that John did. First thing that John said he did is that he said, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day. If you want God-given vision for your life, the number one thing that you have to do is get in the spirit. You can come up with your own vision. I wanna lose 6% body fat. I want to have an eight pack. I want to run a 5k this year. I want to do a marathon. Hey, God bless you if you are running a marathon. I am not the one <laugh>. I'm the kind of person that I've had many people. I say, Hey, you wanna run a half marathon with me? I'm like, no, I will be the dude with a cup of water. <laugh>,

Keep going. You only have 10 more miles. You can have your earthly goals, but if you want God-given vision, you gotta get in the spirit. And now you may say, how do I get in the spirit? Does this mean some kind of ecsta? See, does this mean some kind of experience where I have out body experience and I'm sitting there with my legs crossed and going, do I have to speak in tongues for 35 hours? No. To get in the Spirit, we have to look at what John said. John said, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day. Now the significance, if you do study on the Lord's Day, the Lord's Day is a church service as the Lords Day is what we do when we come to gather together in the presence of the Lord. There are three things that we do anytime we gather on the Lord's day.

Number one, we worship. If you wanna get in the spirit, you got to learn how to worship. You have to maybe turn off some music and turn on some worship music. Maybe you have to, whatever you gotta do to get in the spirit, you have to worship. Worship is an act of placing God where he is in your mind, he is on the throne. And when you worship you acknowledge that he is on the throne. If you don't know what to say, just say hallelujah. If you don't know where to go or how to respond, just when you worship, just place God in his rightful place. Yes. Number one is we worship. Number two is we pray. You may say what is prayer or have a hard time praying. Prayer is simply defined as exchanging wishes. Prayer literally means I've talked to God about what I would like and I do it with an open hand to receive whatever he gives me.

Yes. Because God will give you whatever is best for your life. That's why we have to pray in humility knowing that whatever I'm asking God for, I'm okay with his answer. If I ask God for healing, he may not gimme direct healing right now, but maybe he gives me ultimate healing. If I ask God for a Mercedes S 500 <laugh>, I may be okay with a Kia Spectra <laugh> if I ask God for, because you have to be okay with whatever God gives you. That's prayer. And then the third thing is you gotta get in God's word. The word of God is God's gift to us. It's his words to us. It is his authorized words that are in the cannon of scripture given to us. If you want to get in the spirit, first of all, you have to worship, pray and get in God's Word because it makes you sensitive to hear from God. The second part of getting vision that's getting in the spirit, the second part of getting in vision is that you have to listen because God speaks to us through our ears.

How does God speak? He speaks by impressions. When you have the Holy Spirit, if you have accepted Jesus and the Holy Spirit comes into your life, God begins to give you impressions. He begins to navigate your life. The Bible says the Holy Spirit would teach you all things. Yeah, yeah, right. He will tell you which way to turn. He will give you impression. That's not where you're supposed. He will convict you when you try to sit. He will set you straight. When you start to go wrong, the Holy Spirit will start commuting with you. And when you are in the spirit, you become sensitive to what he's saying to you. So the Lord will start giving you impressions, but he'll also speak through other people. I have found this out that when I'm praying about vision, I'm listening not just to the Holy Spirit, but I'm also listening to those that love me, that pray for me, that walk in the spirit. I'm listening to what they're saying to me. And thirdly, the Lord speaks to us through his word.

And then here's the third thing. You gotta write it down,

Whenever the Lord starts giving you vision, you gotta write it down. Write down what He's impressing on you. Write down what he's saying to you. Write down what he's putting on your life. Now I'm giving you this because this is exactly how I pray about vision for our church. First of all, several months ago started to pray and get in God's word and I get into the spirit and then I'm listening to what God is wanting to say to us. And then I write it down. And over the next few weeks I'm going to teach you. I'm going to show you what I wrote down about the vision that I believe that God has given our church. But I'm here to preach and tell somebody that if you have no vision, you have no direction in your life. This is why God wants to give you vision. So then you may say, how do I know that God is the one that gave me that vision? Somebody say, how do I know? Number one, it's big. Yeah.

The vision that God gives you is big. It's so big that you can't accomplish it in your own spirit. Somebody say like, how do I know God's talking? You can't do it. How do I know that God's leading me to do this? You can't do it in your own power. Well, how do I know that God is the one giving me the vision? God's vision for you is so big and so grand and so phenomenal that you can't do it in your own human ability. You have to rely on faith in God to accomplish the vision that God gives you. This is why I make no apologies about telling people that I don't know how to accomplish the will of God. I just know what he wants me to do. Because the vision for your life that God has for you, it's bigger than what you think.

It's not not so small that you can do it. God requires faith to accomplish the vision that he gives you. People aren't going to always agree with the vision that God gives you. People ain't going to understand. Could you imagine how crazy people put the thoughts that Abraham was when he say, listen, listen, I don't have any kids right now, but this division that God gave me, the vision that God gave me is that he's going to make of me a great nation and that God's going to bless all the ends of the earth and anyone that curses me is going to be cursed. And anyone that blesses me is going to be blessed. God said, wherever I put my foot, that's what he's going to give to me. He said He's going to raise up a nation outta me. When you begin to talk to other people about the vision that God has given you, it's going to sound crazy. I'm telling you next couple of weeks when I begin to talk to you about what I believe God is calling us to do, it's going to sound crazy, but it's only crazy until it happens. Yeah. Thank you Mike. Todd.

The vision that God has for your life is huge. It's big. And here's the second way that it's God, it points to God. We don't get the glory for the vision that God gives us. We don't get to say, ha, I did that. No. God says, the only way you did it is that I did it through you. So when people see it, they go, there ain't no way. That was Tim Rivers. Ain't no way. That was Sheila. Ain't no way that was Earl. That had to have been God. Because if I know Earl, like I or know Earl, Earl ain't able to do this, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And here's the third way that it's God that it lines up with truth. It lines up with the word of God. God will not violate himself with the vision that he gives you. It is not the will of God for you to go have three wives. Come on, say that. I just felt in the spirit that I'm supposed to have three and five conquer by. That ain't no that don't line up with his work. God doesn't give you vision that doesn't align with his character now. Now why does God give his vision back Chapter two, verse number two, or ick.

I know some of your theologians were like, this is what God says. Write the vision and make it plain. Okay, why? So that he may run who reads it? Why does God want vision for you individually and for our church so that we could put 'em down and pick 'em up and head right to where God wants us to go? Here's the secret sauce about vision. It ain't your vision. It's God's vision. Yeah. All I got to do is run when God says, here it is. This is what I want you to do. All I gotta do is say, all right God, what you want me to do? Got it. And you gotta take off running. Here's what I believe God's going to do with us in our church and you individually as a person is God is about to unleash in you a recognition that his vision for your life that you will be able to take off running toward.

How do I get there? That don't matter. You just know where you're going. How is it all going to work out? That don't matter. We just work our way toward it. How we going to get there? I'm anxiety ridden. Why? No, no, no. God said I don't. I'm going to give you strategy on how to do it. All I need you to do is believe that this is what I have designed for your life. Now take off. Abraham said, I don't know where I'm going. God said, don't worry about that. I will tell you as you are going, but I need you to go cause I already told you where you're going.

So the question is for us, us individually is this, do you have vision for your life? Because I can tell you, if you don't have vision, you have no direction. And when you have no direction, you will feel lost. And God's vision for your life doesn't mean that everything is going to be perfect. You will have to go through some valleys, you will have to go through some hard times. Maybe sickness does hit your family. Maybe you have to go through incredible loss. And then sometimes during the journey that we getting the question of whether God really gave us this vision or not. I've been there, I've been there when I've heard God say, I've called you to preach the gospel. I've called you to be in ministry and then had to go through times where I go, if this is what ministry is, I ain't trying to do that fam. And I remember going to work a corporate job and I would go in the office and just sometimes stare at the wall. And I didn't blame God, but I for sure questioned him. But really I questioned myself because I would go, God, did I hear you right?

This doesn't seem right to me. So maybe you're in this place. I thought I had vision, but my life currently doesn't seem to line up with what I saw. It's not your vision, it's God's vision. Your job is to take one step at time toward the vision that God has for your life. I don't know who I'm preaching to today, but I'm preaching to somebody cuz there's somebody that you started this year and you said, I ain't writing down no goals

The way my last year went, I ain't trying to set myself up like that again. I'm here to give you some hope. I'm here to preach some faith into you. God's vision doesn't have timestamps. We try to put timestamps on God. God, if it don't happen this year, I'm out.

God's like, nah, you ain't ready. You ain't ready this year. It's going to take some molding, make breaking. I gotta get some stuff outta you. I gotta put some stuff in you so that you can accomplish my vision. But really what I want to tell you today, it's important to have vision. How do I get it? Get into the spirit in the next 21 days is we begin to pray and fast corporately. This is the perfect time to do it. Whatever you gotta do, whatever you gotta push aside, whatever you gotta sacrifice, whatever you gotta give up, get in the spirit. Right? And when you're getting in the spirit, listen. Listen to those props, those impressions that God begins to give you. It doesn't make any sense. It ain't supposed to make sense to you. If it's a God thing, it's what big. And here's the third thing. Write it down. And the next 21 days as we begin to praying and fast and as I begin to unpack, but I believe the vision for our church is write down what God is speaking to you about the role that you play in it. I'll heads bowed, all eyes closed. I want to pray for somebody today

Because I believe that there is somebody in here that you have been so faithful man. I want to just say how much I love you, how much God loves you. And he's so proud of you for coming to this place, for listening online. Even though you feel like your vision is shaky. I believe that this is going to be a year of a recognition of vision.

Because when you can see and when you have vision in your life, you know where you're going. So if there's anybody in this place or online that you say, man, I've been a little shaky. I don't, don't really know if I have vision I I've been a little shaky on that. I want you to raise your hand a little, cross this room online. Throw it up in the chat. Cause I wanna pray a specific prayer for you. Let's keep that hand up as high as you can. Heaven follow You see these hands that are raised right now and maybe some that feel it, but don't feel inclined to raise their hand. I pray right now that you would inundate us with a renewed faith, for vision, for direction. Give us understanding through your word. That vision helps us to know who we are in you, where we are currently, and where we are going. So as we begin to dig in your word, and we get in the spirit, and we listen and we write down, reveal to us God, where you're taking us, and help us to walk and the beauty and the splendor and the glory that you have bestowed for us. We give your name all the praise, all the glory, all the honor in Jesus' name and everybody shout. Amen. Come on, give Jesus some praise in the building.