Think you know Jesus? I know I do. Here's how I know I have felt the spirit of the Lord. Let's unpack.

Good morning everyone.

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This is episode 18 of I Can, he Can.

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Thank you guys so much for being

here and for tuning in today.

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Today we are jumping right in

because I know the enemy definitely

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did not want me to record this.

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Ella was not feeling well.

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And you know what?

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It's pretty late, but it's okay because

we are here and we are getting God's word.

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Out there and this message

because that's what matters.

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That's what matters, and

it's what I just have to do.

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So without further ado, let's go

ahead and begin with today's episode.

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And I am starting off with Genesis chapter

22, verse one through 18, and that says,

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sometime later, God tested Abraham.

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he said to him, Abraham.

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Here I am.

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He replied.

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Then God said, take your son, your

only son whom you love, Isaac,

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and go to the region of Mariah.

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Sacrifice him there as a

burnt offering on a mountain.

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I will show you early the next morning,

Abraham got up and loaded his donkey.

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He took with him two of his

servants and his son Isaac.

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When he had cut enough wood for

the burnt offering, he set out for

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the place God had told him about.

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On the third day, Abraham looked up

and saw the place in the distance.

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He said to his servants, stay here with a

donkey while I and the boy go over there.

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We will worship and then

we will come back to you.

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Abraham took the wood for the burnt

offering and placed it on his son, Isaac,

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And he himself carried the fire and the

knife As the two of them went on together,

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Isaac spoke up and said to his father,

Abraham father, yes, my son Abraham

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replied, the fire and wood are here.

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Isaac said, but where is the

lamb for the burnt offering?

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Abraham answered, God himself will

provide the lamb for the burnt offering.

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My son and the two of them went together.

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When they reached the place

God had told him about.

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Abraham built an altar there

and arranged the wood on it.

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He bound his son Isaac and laid him

on the altar on top of the wood.

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Then he reached out his hand and

took the knife to slay his son.

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But the angel of the Lord

called out to him from heaven.

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Abraham, Abraham.

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Here I am.

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He replied.

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Do not lay a hand on that boy.

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He said, do not do anything to him.

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Now I know that you fear God because

you have not withheld from me.

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your only son.

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Abraham looked up and there in a

thicket he saw a ram cut by its horns.

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He went over and took the

Raman, sacrificed it as a burnt

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offering instead of his son.

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So Abraham called that

place, the Lord will provide.

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And to this day, it is said

on the mountain of the Lord.

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It will be provided.

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The angel of the Lord called to Abraham

from heaven a second time and said, I

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swear by myself to declares the Lord

that because you have done this and have

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not withheld your son, your only son,

I will surely bless you and make your

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descendants as numerous as the stars in

the sky and as the sand on the seashore.

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Your descendants will take possession of

the cities of their enemies and through

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your offspring, all nations on earth.

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Will be blessed because you have obeyed me

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and those words, man, because

you have obeyed my voice.

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Have you obeyed God's voice like Abraham?

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Have you been faithful in the waiting?

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Do you truly, truly want the Lord?

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Do you even seek him like

Abraham from the Old Testament?

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No.

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People.

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People nowadays are so wrapped

up in the things that they

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want in the snap of a finger.

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People nowadays just play church.

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People are so predictable.

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People just want the good.

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They don't want what

comes with the waiting.

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The unknown scares people.

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And they only expect the good from

God because God is a good God.

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Right?

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Of course he is.

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But it even says in the Bible that

we will have trials, and that doesn't

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mean that when we seek God, it's just

gonna be all sunshine and rainbows.

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We're only seeking the blessing.

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We're only seeking what he can give us.

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So we need to stop that.

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You're only curious to see

God, but do you want him?

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And I'm guilty of that too.

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And and I know, and I feel guilt

about it because I fell into

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that trap of only wanting what

he can do for me at one point.

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But I know how wrong I was.

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I will mention why I was wrong about that.

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And you know what?

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Society nowadays just wants the fast God.

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And that's not how God works.

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Because not every thing that God puts

in our path, it's because it's for us.

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Sometimes it's a lesson, sometimes it's an

obstacle that we have to overcome because

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he's preparing us for something else.

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They don't want a God that makes us wait.

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They want a God that

answers their empty prayers.

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They don't sit at his feet.

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Heck, people won't even say, thank

you, Lord, when they open their eyes.

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How can we say we truly love God and love

Jesus when we are only seeking the gifts?

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Are you anything like Abraham?

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Abraham trusted, trusted that God

would provide that ram, and he was so

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God-fearing and he just believed Now,

do you have that trust in God and wanna

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please God so much that you're going to

sacrifice your son, you're gonna give

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up that job and you're gonna move away

because that is what God is guiding

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you to do and pointing you to do.

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How much do you truly love him?

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If you knew your life would end soon.

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Now this is, this is a tough question,

but if you knew your life would end

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soon, would you be glad for knowing?

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That you'll be with him, with

the Lord, or will you curse him

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for not giving you more time?

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That happens time and time again, but

instead of having faith, instead of

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being in prayer, instead of fasting,

instead of just giving it all to

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God, people just turn away from

him and they say, why God, why me?

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No, make it God.

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Why are you doing this?

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What are you trying to show me?

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What more can I do for you?

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God, that's the hardest

part about loving God.

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And that's how you know

you really do love God.

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But also ask yourself, how many times, how

many times do you say your will be done?

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Lord, I know.

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I don't always say it.

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I mean, guys, it's, that's

a hard thing to say.

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We always wanna have control, but

ask yourself, do you think there

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is a difference in the life and

the salvation of a person who says,

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your will be done, Lord, versus the

life of someone who is always trying

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to control their life and destiny?

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What is the difference?

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Is there a difference?

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Of course.

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Of course.

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There's a difference.

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There's a huge difference.

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We are all going to have trials in life.

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Jesus had them.

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we were made to endure and to

grow through those struggles.

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We can either fight against them or we

can fight them hand in hand with God.

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You choose.

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You choose.

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But funny enough, I want to ask, are you

like Saray, Abraham's wife, Saray, who

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then became Sarah by the grace of God.

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He showed her grace.

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Despite her struggle to trust and

wait and be patient, God still gifted

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her the most amazing gift of all.

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She was barren.

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and then God still gifted her a son.

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A barren woman then became mother, and

yes, just like that, Sariah in the Bible.

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I am also impatient.

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It's funny enough because I'm, I

like to think I'm a lot like her,

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perhaps even more impatient and

impulsive, especially if you know me

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personally, you know those things.

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But I too am becoming Sarah.

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I am seeing, and I am living life now

where I can feel and see the difference

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of what Christ has done in me.

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I have a long way to go still.

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I have a very long way to go,

but Christ does live in me.

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And how do I know this?

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How do I know that he lives in me,

that I have the spirit of God in me?

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Just how I mentioned a few minutes

ago about falling into the trap

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of how the world loves God today.

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Yeah, that was me.

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My life has been a rollercoaster

these past few months, and yes, my

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life has changed from the moment

that I gave my heart to Christ.

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However, as I grew in my relationship

with him, I got to know him in

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a way that I can never explain.

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I've encountered the Holy Spirit

many times as I drove to work so many

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times as I showered and shed tears.

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I encounter the spirit here in

this very corner that I am sitting

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in and speaking to you right now.

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this little old desk of mine has felt the

weight of my life on it many, many times.

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And just as I felt the spirit

many times, I also felt how the

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Lord was not listening to me.

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Recently, I felt his head turn away.

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And I'm not talking about him

being silent and making me wait

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for something I prayed for.

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No, no, no, no, no.

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Absolutely not.

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My friends, my life was in shambles

from one day to the next and God

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turned his head because of my sin.

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I know this in my core.

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I know this in my soul.

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How?

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How do I know this when, if you know me?

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You know that I cry, you know

that I cry for everything,

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especially when I am praying,

especially when I am in the moment.

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I cry.

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I shed tears for God and for what he

did in my life and how he changed me.

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But guys, I could not shed a single tear.

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I felt so far from God.

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I felt how apart the Lord was from me,

and I'm pretty sure that God threw this

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wrench in my life as a test of obedience.

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Would I stay in sin or

would I stop the sin?

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And of course we sin every single

day as much as we try to avoid it.

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We are imperfect humans.

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We were born imperfect humans.

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From the moment that we start

thinking for ourselves, we started

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sinning because sinning feels good.

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The enemy wants us to be in sin, and he

is a liar, and he wants to keep us in sin.

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So how much are we going to love God

to try and stay away from that sin?

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We need to do our best.

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We need to do our best to

stay on the right track.

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But I could not willingly

stay in a marriage and in sin.

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I couldn't do that to God.

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I could not continue to be

in this marriage, and there

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will be more to come on that.

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I will talk more on that eventually.

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But my unhappy marriage and my unhappy

heart was driving me away from the Lord

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every single day a little bit more.

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And so it had to end.

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I had to get right with God.

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I had to feel God again.

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I can't live without God.

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When you know God, when you

have that relationship, when you

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have felt his presence in some

sort of capacity, I promise you

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you'll never be the same again.

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And I refuse to do life without God.

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Do you wanna do life with God this

much that you will turn away from

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your marriage or turn away from a job?

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Or, like I said, move away.

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Move away because the Lord

is asking you to move away.

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Do you love him that much?

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Turning away from something that is of the

world to please God, would you do that?

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A lot of people won't.

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But I will because I know the difference.

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I know the difference in me with God, and

I know the difference in me without God.

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And it is.

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It is 2, 2, 2, 2.

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Too much for me to be without.

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I am an empty vessel of a person.

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We are all empty inside until we fill

ourselves with the spirit of God.

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And I'm a person who refuses to slow

down, a person who battled lust, A

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person who has lied from time to time.

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A person who's just tried to get

by, get by with life, just doing

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my own thing, like if I already

didn't have a destiny written out

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for me, as if he didn't know me.

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From the moment that my heart started

beating the first time, he already

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knew what was in store for me.

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He already knew all of those things, and

here I was just trying to do what I wanted

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to do, being the rah that Abraham had,

not trusting, not waiting more than those

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10 years for God's promise that was me.

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The same Ry.

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And yes, even though while now

I am still my bubbly self and

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I'm friendly, I wouldn't like to

say that I'm a horrible person.

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But there's some good in me.

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I didn't hurt anyone here on earth.

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Maybe emotionally, of course, you know,

because we say things, we say things that

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hurt people, but overall, you'd like to

think that you're not a horrible person.

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But what I did hurt someone.

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I hurt the Lord.

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I hurt the Lord.

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The Lord who already hurt for us, the Lord

who gave his life for us to be new and to

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be redeemed and to be washed of all sin.

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Here.

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Here I was hurting the one

man who gave it up all for me.

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So yes, that's saray Without God, that

same wife of Abraham, without trusting,

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without giving her life to him, to God.

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That Sariah is impatient.

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She was not well.

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She was not a good person.

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And of course, I am also speaking

about myself here, not just

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Sariah in the Old Testament,

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but that person could never be

in the presence of the Lord.

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I could not even get near him

if I wanted to, but the Lord

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knew what he needed to do.

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He kept seeking me so that the difference

was apparent in me to everyone around me.

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and so much so that still some people

that are close to me reject the new me.

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Everyone.

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Everyone that is around me needs to

know that I am new But you know what?

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I have a lot of work to do still.

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I'm conscious of that, and all I

wanna do is continue to please the

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Lord, continue to please the Lord

and love him more and more and

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more, and ask less and less for me.

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How can I serve the Lord instead

of him always serving me?

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He already served

everything he had for me.

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He already gave up his life for me.

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His blood spilled out for me and just

like John chapter three, verse 30 says,

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he must increase, but I must decrease.

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How simple but true are

those words my friend.

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He's greater than us.

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He will always be bigger

than anything in our lives.

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And just like that, for that

very same reason, we should

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not just pray an empty prayer.

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We should not just ask him for salvation.

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No, no, no, no.

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Stop that right now.

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Yes, it's great to be saved, of

course, but we need to love him.

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Want.

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Him respect and worship the holy

one that gave it all for us.

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He redeems us.

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He restores us.

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Let's get back to the heart of worship,

like the name of the song, let's Redeem

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and Restore What True Love for God is.

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Let's do that for him.

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Bow your heads when you pray.

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Raise your arms longer than

you would ever do because his

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arms were apart for so long.

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Carrying the weight of his body, you

can raise your arms for him longer

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than you could even think to do.

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Shed the tears and just ask

him to reveal himself to you.

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Shed tears for his heart to

meet yours where you are.

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Plead that he will grace you

with his presence one day, even

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if it's just for one second.

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I want him the way he wants your heart.

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If there is one thing that I pray you will

do today, as soon as this episode ends.

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It's to pray to the Lord and

let him have all the praise and

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all the glory that he deserves.

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Don't ask for a single thing.

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Don't even ask him to

wake you up tomorrow.

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Just say, thank you for waking me

up now, and thank you for giving

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me this time to praise you, God,

to glorify your name, Lord, do that

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today and every day moving forward.

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He deserves every single second of the

time and thoughts that we have when we

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are not consumed with things of the world.

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And I hope that you are consumed with

things of the world less and less,

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because what matters is the time that

we spend with him, not just here on

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earth, but the time that we will one

day get to spend with him in heaven.

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And we can only do that.

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We can only do that if we love the

Lord more and we hurt him less.

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He's already hurt enough.

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He's already hurt enough, and

we need to love him like he

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loves us and how he wants us.

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The same way he pulled you out of

that pit, let's make sure that we are

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right there beside him, calling on

him every single day of our lives.

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Every day a little bit more.

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My friends, I thank you so much

for spending this time with me.

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You could be doing anything else right

now, but you are here and you are

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listening, and that means the world to me.

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That means the world to me, but it'll

mean the world even more to God if

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you open up your Bibles and you get

a little bit closer to him today.

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So I pray that you guys will do

that, whether it's right now or

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before you close your eyes tonight.

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Get a little bit closer to God.

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Read his word, stay in his word,

stay in prayer, and stay in love

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with God because he has always

loved you, and he always will.

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Thank you for listening, and until

next time, my friends take care.