[SPEAKER_01]: This is Dr. Darrell Hall and I'm going to welcome you to the way community church podcast.
[SPEAKER_01]: Today we are celebrating the turning of a new year as we go into 2026 and we want to spend some time thinking out loud about what it means to be a person who is prepared for whatever God.
[SPEAKER_01]: is preparing for us.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I want to encourage you to follow along in the transcript of this podcast or to the follow-up use notes in the Bible app and turning your Bible to first Peter chapter 3, verse number 15, make sure you have a pen and some paper because you'll want to take notes and also doodle out whatever you feel like the Holy Spirit is speaking as we go through our message.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's study God's Word together.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, let's read our thing together for 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: Excuse me, I've big idea on the count of three.
[SPEAKER_01]: One, two, three.
[SPEAKER_01]: God develops readiness through repeated obedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, as we go into the new year, I want us to build a rhythm of readiness, not a one-time resolution.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, and in those that you have there, I want you to track with me.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are some blanks for you to fill in, and there are some blank spaces for you to draw or do the land.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're going to talk about what life
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybrain, who had leadership maybrain, and what the Lord maybrain in 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: And my goal as we're past about a time we're done is to have you ready for whatever life leadership of the Lord or the Lord requires.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the first thing, number one, if life causes you fear, be ready mentally.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see that?
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the first blank.
[SPEAKER_01]: If life causes you fear,
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that left quadrant, be ready mentally.
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all pick it up when I'm putting down, okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: If life calls as you fear, be ready mentally.
[SPEAKER_01]: First Peter, three, four, 10 says, and do not fear their intimidation and do not be in dread.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I talk about being ready mentally for the fears of life, I'm talking about your mental will be in.
[SPEAKER_01]: the result of the Holy Spirit and dwelling you and the net health, net positive on what's happening in this space.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to hear me, it is Godly work to be well in your mental health because it's demonic work for you to be unwell as much as you can control it, okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want to step in somewhere you're dealing with something that's out of your control.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, something that's within your scope of control.
[SPEAKER_01]: Fear complicates obedience because it causes us to flinch and act trusting God.
[SPEAKER_01]: So in 2026, if life calls as you fear, I want you to be ready mentally.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, that means you've got to get ready before it's time to be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've got to train your mind to tell you the truth.
[SPEAKER_01]: When fear is lying to you, all right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Number two, or be, if life calls as you fear be ready mentally, if life calls as you uncertainty, be ready financially.
[SPEAKER_01]: If life calls as you are uncertainty, be ready financially.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can assure you, in 2020, six, there will be something uncertain that's going to require somebody.
[SPEAKER_01]: Somebody asks me how I know.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I be not a prophet of the living God, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: We gotta be as ready as we can't financially.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at first Peter chapter 1 verse 11, 18.
[SPEAKER_01]: It says, knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your feudal way of life inherited from your forefathers.
[SPEAKER_01]: What Peter is saying is that money is a worldly currency.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's earthbound, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: But just because we know that money can't buy salvation, doesn't mean we should be poor stores of money.
[SPEAKER_01]: Money cannot buy you salvation, but you know what money can buy some food Some clothes some transportation Education Vacation I'm surprised nobody shot right there Right on new house Congrats
[SPEAKER_01]: While we live in the world, y'all, we need provisions for our needs and desires to be met.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the way we manage money helps us to do that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a major key.
[SPEAKER_01]: Money is a necessary tool for navigating the world.
[SPEAKER_01]: So be as ready today as you can financially.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be as ready today as you can because tomorrow is uncertain.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right, it's cold outside.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can crank your car up in two days in the battery.
[SPEAKER_01]: Won't turn over.
[SPEAKER_01]: It won't power the car to turn over.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not speaking negative over your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm telling you to truth, so you can be ready for whatever may happen as ready as you can.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, we just came out of a two month series on money, so I'm not gonna belabor the point.
[SPEAKER_01]: But a simple budgeting to 10% to the lower, 10% to savings, 10% to the future, 70% to live off of.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why should I give 10% to the lower rail because I honor the more of my first fruits?
[SPEAKER_01]: Why should I give 10% the savings for emergencies?
[SPEAKER_01]: Why should I invest 10% in the future?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you might live longer than you work.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should plan to be alive longer than you employ it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And then 70% do you with their means, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: If life causes you fear, I want you to be ready mentally.
[SPEAKER_01]: If life causes you uncertainty, be ready financially.
[SPEAKER_01]: If life causes you pain, I want you to be ready physically.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to be ready physically.
[SPEAKER_01]: First Peter talks about all the sufferings that we're going to face as believers in the worldly system.
[SPEAKER_01]: And suffering as a Christian is admirable if I'm suffering for righteous reasons.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is not admirable if I'm suffering because I did some illegal or unethical.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what First Peter says.
[SPEAKER_01]: First Peter says, if you're going to suffer, suffer for good reasons, don't break the law and then say, and you suffer it, no?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, that's not right to suffer.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the truth, y'all.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are so much pain in this world that we can't avoid.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's try to avoid the pain we can through preventative health care.
[SPEAKER_01]: And let me say it this way, if you don't take care of your body, the results is not your barrier across for Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not your barrier across.
[SPEAKER_01]: What you mean, Ralph, if you've, and I ain't talking about nobody, I'm just talking about what I'm talking about.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you don't go to the dentist to get to T-check,
[SPEAKER_01]: And then one day, you just get a broken tooth.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you like, oh, I'm suffering with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, you're not.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not for Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, that's what poor stewardship.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a major key.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes your physical wellness can help you cope with other forms of sufferings and burdens that you can't avoid.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's so much suffering in this world that we can't avoid.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want to add to it by not taking care of my tempo as best I can.
[SPEAKER_01]: And maybe the things I do to try to take care of my tempo can help me have enough to carry those burdens too.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's stuff you can't avoid as your past, I don't want you to avoid this stuff you can.
[SPEAKER_01]: You all picking up what I'm putting down?
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, to the right of that first section, there's a little doodle space and there's a prompt there.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to take a few minutes.
[SPEAKER_01]: and I want you to think about that cycle of pressure and obedience and growth and readiness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see that on your notes?
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to take a few minutes to doodle.
[SPEAKER_01]: What is something?
[SPEAKER_01]: What is one area of pressure that's requiring you to be obedient?
[SPEAKER_01]: And how can that obedience help you grow into readiness?
[SPEAKER_01]: What's one area of pressure?
[SPEAKER_01]: You went to the doctor, you got some blood work, they told you, just eat better, all right?
[SPEAKER_01]: So now you got pressure, pressure to the way, eat better.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's one area of pressure?
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us already know it, you can feel it right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: You feel the pressure, maybe some expected of you, maybe something you expected of yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: We got some students in the role.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, you got the pressure of finishing the school year strong, graduating on time, the pressure of what you going to do afterwards.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's real pressure.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's one area of pressure that's requiring you to be obedient, how can that obedience help you grow into readiness?
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all good ago, let's go to number two.
[SPEAKER_01]: Number one, if life happens, but number two, what about if leadership happens?
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, I want you to hear me, everybody in this room is a leader in one way or another.
[SPEAKER_01]: You may not think you're a leader, because you may not have a role or a title in position like the one I have, but I want you to hear me whether you know it or not.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you got influence anywhere,
[SPEAKER_01]: You are somebody's leader and first Peter talks about how we should respond to human leadership.
[SPEAKER_01]: It also talks about how wives should lead their husbands, how husbands should lead their wives, and how pastor should lead their churches.
[SPEAKER_01]: First Peter talks about leadership.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you end this role, you are a leader and if I call out a role in your life, I want you to raise your hand.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't have to keep it up the whole time.
[SPEAKER_01]: Just throw it up, put it down.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you are a wife, you are a leader.
[SPEAKER_01]: husband, mother, father, grandmother, or grandfather, auntie or uncle, friend, you know you will lead us a friend.
[SPEAKER_01]: Your partner about to make the dumbest decision of their life.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they call you and they say, I'm about to do something dumb.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I see you all, manager, owner, coach, teacher or educator, God bless y'all, I'm for real.
[SPEAKER_01]: Captain of a team, president of a club or a board, drum major of the band, y'all get the point I'll make it, pastor, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And I may be the pastor in his room now, but I'm not going to be the only pastor that ever calms out of this church.
[SPEAKER_01]: You never know the spiritual leadership guy may give you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the point, even if you don't have a formal leadership role, if you have influence that makes you a leader, according to John Maxwell.
[SPEAKER_01]: This year, I want you to hear me, your leadership is going to be called a part.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you cannot wait until the moment it's time to lead to get ready to lead.
[SPEAKER_01]: And here's the reality of leadership.
[SPEAKER_01]: This year, in your leadership, you're going to fail, and you're going to succeed.
[SPEAKER_01]: The goal is to succeed more than you fail, and fail less than you succeed.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'll pick it up when I'm put down.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if leadership creates for you failure, be ready to learn.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be ready to learn.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know what keeps us from learning after we fail?
[SPEAKER_01]: Pride.
[SPEAKER_01]: Failure don't make you a fool.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pride, dude.
[SPEAKER_01]: Failure just means I failed.
[SPEAKER_01]: It don't even make you a failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: But if you fail and then you'll pride, don't let you learn.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, now you a fool.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm sorry, the Bible say don't call people a fool.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the Bible calls people's fools, never mind.
[SPEAKER_01]: You are what my now 16 year old son would say when he was six, you are a boobu head.
[SPEAKER_01]: If leadership creates for you failure be ready to learn, because there's a lesson in the
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all, we're reading the book of a dude who failed.
[SPEAKER_01]: He walked with Jesus for three years.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus told him, you're going to deny me.
[SPEAKER_01]: He told Jesus, I deny that.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's saying, on deny you, I deny what you're saying to me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm ready to go with you to death.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus said, okay, we don't see it.
[SPEAKER_01]: A few months later,
[SPEAKER_01]: What happens?
[SPEAKER_01]: Hey, you wait him right?
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I don't know him.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can tell by your language, you want it in.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I'm not.
[SPEAKER_01]: He even cursed to do it out, amen.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're from the start.
[SPEAKER_01]: Beep, beep, beep, beep.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know about me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I cut for ears off.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm talking about Peter.
[SPEAKER_01]: Peter failed Jesus at Jesus' worst moment.
[SPEAKER_01]: And what did he do after that?
[SPEAKER_01]: Then he left and went fishing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not only did he fail, he went back to doing what Jesus told him to stop doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: So he out there just a failure in his failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus shows up on the C-shore and restores the failure and now we read in a book of a man who failed Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a major key.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus restores those who fail him if they're love for him is authentic.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now I'm a Paul's right here.
[SPEAKER_01]: I ain't tell him about this, but I just want to be honest because I'm y'all passed on.
[SPEAKER_01]: I studied the word and there's some things I don't understand it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just being honest.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't understand how God knew the difference between Saul and David.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know how Jesus knew the difference between Judas and Peter.
[SPEAKER_01]: How does the Lord know who infel your to restore?
[SPEAKER_01]: And who infel your to leave there?
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not for me to judge, but I do think David and Peter have something in common that Saul and Judas did not.
[SPEAKER_01]: David and Peter loved the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: Saul loved his position.
[SPEAKER_01]: Judas loved money.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what I got from them.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord gave me some deeper or clearer on that,
[SPEAKER_01]: We read in the book of a man who failed.
[SPEAKER_01]: After he failed, Jesus restored him, then he preached on pinnacles, the data church was started, he preached.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was the leader of the church in Jerusalem.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was the source behind the book of Mark, because Mark then see these things with his own eyes, what Peter did.
[SPEAKER_01]: And he wrote the two books that we read in out of now.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what's on the other side of your failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what I know, if you fail, be ready to learn.
[SPEAKER_01]: because you don't know what song is you got to give on the other side of your failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know what speeches you're going to have to give on the other side of your failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know what source you're going to be for somebody after the law restores you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know what books you're going to write after you get up from falling down.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you hear what I'm saying to you?
[SPEAKER_01]: If leadership creates when you fail, you don't be proud for behind failing, just be ready to learn from the failure.
[SPEAKER_01]: but then the leadership creates for you success be ready to store it.
[SPEAKER_01]: A lot of us beg and God do big stuff that we not ready to handle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Where did the Lord answer your prayer for real?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm talking about your real prayer.
[SPEAKER_01]: That prayer that's so big that you be second guessing if God can even do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm talking about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Lord give me the megaball numbers prayer.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm gonna pay my time, I'm gonna pay my time.
[SPEAKER_01]: What if the Lord answers that prayer that he has not answered in a year's past, but naturally he answers it?
[SPEAKER_01]: And if it happens in your life, are you ready to store it?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because if I'm not ready to store it, I don't really believe God can do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us throw a fit with God.
[SPEAKER_01]: We say, I'll get ready after you do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: God said, I'm God, you get ready, and I might do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Success is something that's got to be stored at, you know what?
[SPEAKER_01]: Cause it's traumatic.
[SPEAKER_01]: Success, disorient, show your equilibrium.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you got all the money you want it, you would feel crazy before you felt fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: Am I telling the truth?
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord gave you the opportunities you've been praying for, it would disorient you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You got to reorient yourself to success.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because it's going to require stuff of you that this season and the last season, then require.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you got to get ready to store it before the Lord brings it.
[SPEAKER_01]: What you mean, because even if you're a diligent or hard to work in, like many of us are, some of the most hard working and diligent people I know in the world are in this world.
[SPEAKER_01]: In this room right now, even if I'm diligent in hard work and here's a major key, success is a grace you are given to steward.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a grace you're given.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord let what you weren't working, if he let it work,
[SPEAKER_01]: That's Gracie gave you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know you smart, I know you hard worker, I know you skill, all of that intentional, super dope at what you do, I wanna be the same and what I do, but you know what I know, and some point.
[SPEAKER_01]: All that God has given me is not a result of all I put in.
[SPEAKER_01]: And some point, some of this is just gravy on top of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of this is icing on a cake, I ain't in vain.
[SPEAKER_01]: So the Lord expects us to store it, let the church say, store it.
[SPEAKER_01]: The first Peter time of former as Tan says, that's each one of you has received a special gift.
[SPEAKER_01]: Employee it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Stored it.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, excuse me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Employee it in serving one another as what?
[SPEAKER_01]: Good of the multifaceted grace of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, let's pause for a quick, for some due to time and then I'm going to be done.
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, go to the section to the right.
[SPEAKER_01]: What tools do you need to sharpen this year to be more ready for leadership?
[SPEAKER_01]: What tools do you need to sharpen?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see it there?
[SPEAKER_01]: What tools do you need to sharpen?
[SPEAKER_01]: What's something you know you need to add to your bag?
[SPEAKER_01]: So you can be more ready to leave.
[SPEAKER_01]: Even if you just somebody for him, you want to be a better friend in 2012 or six, what you need to add to your bag?
[SPEAKER_01]: Wisdom.
[SPEAKER_01]: So if they call me saying they gonna do something dumb, I know how to tell them, don't do the dumb.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I need to know how to do that.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's the tool you need to sharpen?
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us is communication.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I talk a lot, but am I communicating?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do I listen?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do I receive?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do I convey thoughts and feelings and meaning that are authentic and true and not just some of my personal opinions?
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us is people's skills.
[SPEAKER_01]: You wanna be a leader, but you don't like people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at me, look at me.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not going to work for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: How do you a leader but don't lie to people?
[SPEAKER_01]: You mean you're working with your people's skills?
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
[SPEAKER_01]: What should two?
[SPEAKER_01]: What should two write it down?
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't have to finish this all now, and you can finish the rest later action.
[SPEAKER_01]: Number three, and we'll be done.
[SPEAKER_01]: If life causes,
[SPEAKER_01]: For you, fear uncertainty or pain, you need to be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: If leadership creates for you, fail your or succession, you need to be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: Number three, if the Lord calls you out, be ready to repent.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you out, be ready to repent.
[SPEAKER_01]: going to other direction.
[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus told Peter, you're going to fail me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Peter told Jesus, I know you the Son of God, but you are liar.
[SPEAKER_01]: Am I telling the truth?
[SPEAKER_01]: He said, no, I'm going with you to death.
[SPEAKER_01]: Peter sinned against Jesus by the 9, 3 times.
[SPEAKER_01]: By the time Jesus gets with him to the sea shore, Jesus angst him, 3 times, do you love me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Why did he ask him three times because three times he denied him?
[SPEAKER_01]: Some let you repent for each time you deny me, even though I told you you was going to do it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you love me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes Lord, I love you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you love me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes Lord, I love you.
[SPEAKER_01]: One more time.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you love me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, you know I love you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be ready to repent.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you out, consider that a good thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: The Lord don't call out people he intends to not use.
[SPEAKER_01]: Being called out is a blessing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Getting away from where it does the scary part.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why do I need to be ready to repent?
[SPEAKER_01]: The Lord calls me out.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a major key because you can better talk to others about repentance when you have first repenting yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's hard to receive a good word from somebody who ain't live that word.
[SPEAKER_01]: It just come out a little less loving.
[SPEAKER_01]: But if the Lord has called me out, you could tell him by the way, I call you out.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to be a little bit more extra gentle, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not trying to warn you as I draw your attention to some things, because I know how I feel to be called out.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to try to hear this from my heart.
[SPEAKER_01]: Being called out is not being judged.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's been given the chance to avoid judgment.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the Lord wanted to judge me.
[SPEAKER_01]: He would have just left me in what I was in.
[SPEAKER_01]: When the Lord come tap me on my shoulders and say, okay, all right, all right, you're done.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're done.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've had you had a time.
[SPEAKER_01]: A time was hand, you're done.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, Lord, why are you calling me?
[SPEAKER_01]: How you judge me?
[SPEAKER_01]: If I want the judge, I want the judge.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want the judge.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be, if the Lord calls you up, be ready to represent.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord elevates you in 2026, be ready to represent.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have a saying somebody's step into a spotlight and they were not ready to represent.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, oh man, you should have just stayed at home.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you're ever saying the artist went in the ward and they stepped up to win this award and they not ready, you mean to tell me you won't expect in the win?
[SPEAKER_01]: You didn't have in mind how you was gonna manage the win?
[SPEAKER_01]: You stepped into a leadership role and you was not ready to represent.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should have just failed a bad.
[SPEAKER_01]: with a lower elevation in 2026.
[SPEAKER_01]: Put you on a platform, no man can take you down from.
[SPEAKER_01]: Shons a light on your life for the world of sea.
[SPEAKER_01]: Opens a door, no man can close.
[SPEAKER_01]: Goes before you and lifts up your valleys and humbles your mountains to make your past street.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I'll river for you in the desert because he's doing a new thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Are you ready to represent?
[SPEAKER_01]: Peter got called up, y'all, the preach on pinnacles.
[SPEAKER_01]: He had to deliver the first sermon on the day of the church was born.
[SPEAKER_01]: And Peter and Acts chapter two verse 14, he represented.
[SPEAKER_01]: He stepped right into that moment.
[SPEAKER_01]: as if he was born and born again for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you could see that God had chosen him for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: If God elevates you, will you be ready to represent?
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to pause for a quick write to the side of there.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's one area you hope to load to elevate you in?
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't be bashful, either.
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't be bashful.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is between you and the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is not pride.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you desire elevation in an area,
[SPEAKER_01]: What's something you designed to do?
[SPEAKER_01]: Are you the assistant person, and you want to be the person who?
[SPEAKER_01]: Write it down.
[SPEAKER_01]: Somebody said no.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's, that's Glenn Richard, who knows the A, I might just be good, why I'm Dr. Glenn Richard, as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all, he about to graduate.
[SPEAKER_01]: We give out praise for Glenn.
[SPEAKER_01]: Woo, woo!
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, Dr. Richard said, no.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because look, every elevation is not for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's some elevations I don't want.
[SPEAKER_01]: What some people think is a promotion, I might feel like it's a demotion.
[SPEAKER_01]: What you talking about there are, it's some single people in this room right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: People pestering you about getting married.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're like, no, I'm good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Actually, I'm a goner stay well, man.
[SPEAKER_01]: I do not want to be demoted.
[SPEAKER_01]: So don't be bashful, and also don't try to do, don't write what you think you should write.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's one area deep in your heart?
[SPEAKER_01]: You hope the Lord elevates you in.
[SPEAKER_01]: That if the Lord shine a light on this area of my life, I want to be ready to represent him.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a last one.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I don't want this to be morbid, but I am your pastor.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm your brother and Christ.
[SPEAKER_01]: I need your honor just hold with me through this last point.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you out, be ready to repent.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you up, be ready to represent.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you home, be ready to go.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm saying this to you as a 39-year-old man, who's not guaranteed to see his 40-year birthday.
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope the Lord let me live to be 100.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I know guaranteed.
[SPEAKER_01]: I normally say this to you as a 39-year-old man, who's not guaranteed to see his 40-year birthday, I also say this to you as a pastor, who carries the grief.
[SPEAKER_01]: of the people I love and serve.
[SPEAKER_01]: Phone calls you do not expect to get.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just being honest.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not looking for sympathy or trying to pull it around down.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because that's all you can control.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can't control when you go.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can control your readiness.
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pass the hall.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why would you bring this out of first Peter?
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at first Peter chapter 1 verse 24.
[SPEAKER_01]: It says, for all flesh is like grass.
[SPEAKER_01]: All this glory is like the flower of grass, the grass withers, and the flower falls off.
[SPEAKER_01]: First, speed of 47, the end of all things is near.
[SPEAKER_01]: Therefore, be a sound judge with an insoluble spirit.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at second, Peter Chapman, 11, 14.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the kind of relationship I think I want with the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: But you've got to be careful with what you ask the Lord for.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because the Lord, give it to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're like, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look at what this is.
[SPEAKER_01]: Peter says, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as all so our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me, Peter was so close to the Lord that the Lord told Peter, you die and so.
[SPEAKER_01]: because that's all you can control in the equation.
[SPEAKER_01]: Which I mean, ready, ready, am I spiritually ready?
[SPEAKER_01]: Am I spiritually ready?
[SPEAKER_01]: But here's some practical things we can do while before we get that out.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's a major key.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want you all to think I'm talking about death because I'm speaking deaf over you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's actually the, the, the, the Antonyom, the opposite.
[SPEAKER_01]: The, the, it's paradoxical what I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here what I'm saying?
[SPEAKER_01]: You are not free to live until you are ready to die.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of us are so afraid to die that what we don't know is the fear of the live that we speak out as the fear to die.
[SPEAKER_01]: Once I'm ready to die, now I'm free to live.
[SPEAKER_01]: Me telling you to be ready if the Lord calls you to go home is not
[SPEAKER_01]: Let go of your worst fear.
[SPEAKER_01]: Be ready for it if it happened.
[SPEAKER_01]: So now since it ain't happened yet, come to live your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: With freedom and joy and liberty, win someness, authenticity, warmth, light.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those things that a fearful person does not have because they cannot have.
[SPEAKER_01]: We talk about in a blended life, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You can't have in a blended life if you still not ready to die.
[SPEAKER_01]: Only to I'm ready there, and I'm really ready here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all pick it up when I'm putting that on?
[SPEAKER_01]: So here's some practical things.
[SPEAKER_01]: How can I be more ready, Ralph?
[SPEAKER_01]: Insurance.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, I don't already talk about the spiritual part.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're paying that salvation.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm gonna give an invitation for that in a minute, but now we get in practical.
[SPEAKER_01]: What steps can I take to be ready to go?
[SPEAKER_01]: And show rents.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm the people behind you.
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll thank God for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: And show rents.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not gonna tell you what type of policy to get because I'm not a broker.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm your pastor.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to tell you, ensure it's going to be a blesser, so you're your family.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hear me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am this insured as I can possibly be at this point in my life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Especially when you don't have the wealth to cover the last, the insurance, counter-acts, the wealth you don't have.
[SPEAKER_01]: So should the inevitable take place, the insurance, can cover your final deals and set your family up for wealth you would have produced, had you live that long to produce it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Get as much as you can for as little as you can.
[SPEAKER_01]: And Sharks, number two, last wheel and testament.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some of the stuff I still got to do.
[SPEAKER_01]: This ain't just for you, this for us.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't want nobody fighting over your favorite T-shirt.
[SPEAKER_00]: Did my T-shirt?
[SPEAKER_00]: She was my auntie.
[SPEAKER_00]: She was my great auntie.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's state planning for giving and apologizing to people.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not ready to die if you engage and you certainly not live it if you engage.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not free to live if you're not humbling up the apologizing when you're all.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you know you was wrong and you're not big enough to apologize, come on now.
[SPEAKER_01]: up, giving your best gifts to serve others in the world.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've ready to die when you're ready to give without receiving.
[SPEAKER_01]: True free living is not a tick for tat.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not a queer pro quote, I scratch your back, you scratch my back, that's worldliness.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're on free to live, I'm here to give.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm here to give my best gifts to the world because God didn't give me these gifts to just say I'm so gifted.
[SPEAKER_01]: God gave me these gifts to give away.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when I'm open-handed with my gifts and I am being sustained by his spirit to source that gift, oh, now I'm really living for real.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm free to live, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I can give and I respect nothing in return because I've received everything that only God can give me anyway.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what sustains me.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, I would listen to some of these things because as 26 roles, all of them we're gonna be doing practical things here at the Wake Community Church, like a health fair, like in-the-life planning.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is not morbid.
[SPEAKER_01]: As your pastor, I want you to be ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: As ready as you can be.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's why, because when there's uncertainty above you, you gotta have certainty within you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can't depend on institutions above you to do right by you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Y'all picking up what I'm putting down?
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't care who you voted for, which your political interests are.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is not a political conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: But we know where uncertainty lies.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you got to take hold of what you can.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can work your finger to the bone for a company.
[SPEAKER_01]: Give them years of your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: You cannot get back.
[SPEAKER_01]: You will be two weeks away from qualified for a pension.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they'll pink slip you out the dump.
[SPEAKER_01]: Am I telling the truth?
[SPEAKER_01]: But I want you to be ready for that.
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you to laugh in the face of danger.
[SPEAKER_01]: You guys daughter, you guys son.
[SPEAKER_01]: This job on my provider anyway.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, there's already this checklist there on the right of that last point.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's at the top on the back.
[SPEAKER_01]: You see that readiness checklist?
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me see what I was doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just wanna, no, no, I don't wanna read yours.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just wanna, yeah, yeah, that between you and the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not checking your homework.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, oh, my man, my man, I like the way you do business.
[SPEAKER_01]: Can I say yours?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not gonna read it, I promise you.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls you, there's notes there, but then there's already this checklist.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the Lord calls me to be a blank, what steps do you need to take?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see that?
[SPEAKER_01]: So if the Lord is going to call me to be this, what steps I need to take now?
[SPEAKER_01]: In order to be ready for that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Take a few minutes, complete that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, the rest of it at the bottom, you can complete before Sunday.
[SPEAKER_01]: If the lawyer says the same Sunday I'm gonna start or continue our series already.
[SPEAKER_01]: But my goal as your pastor is to supply, support, and resource you in every area of your life to be okay, to be away from him.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I believe being ready is a part of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen church.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then get them all the handcuff and praise if you work.