Transcript
Week 2 of the series Yes². Transcribed from the service recording and lightly edited for readability.
Welcome: When I Call on God, He Answers
Good morning! How y'all doing? I was sitting there listening to that song, and I realized something. Are we calling on God? I'm just saying, because every time I call on Him, He answers. So maybe you're just complaining, and you're complaining to the wrong person. When I call on God, He answers. So if you haven't got a fix to your situation yet, call on Him, because He will answer. There's not a time I've called on Him that He didn't answer. It might not have been the answer I wanted, but it was the answer I needed.
This Year: Yes²
All right, let me jump into it. This year we're talking about Yes Squared. I promise you, Yes Squared is the answer to whatever situation you're in right now. When God's yes and my yes meet up, we're going to see unimaginable blessings. Not just the blessings you've been hoping for and wishing for, but blessings beyond your human imagination. Last week we talked about God's yes. This week we're going to talk about how my yes unlocks God's promise.
Declaration Statement
Let's start with our declaration. Then we'll get to the scripture and jump into this word. Let's read it together:
I am a Christ chaser. I am here to be transformed. I am here to hear the voice of God. God, clear my mind and open my heart to receive Your word. Jesus, do not let me leave the same way I came. I am ready to be changed. Amen.
Scripture Reading: Luke 1:26–38
This morning we're in Luke chapter 1, verses 26 through 38. This scripture is familiar to some, and hopefully to all. It's the story of the angel coming to Mary. Starting at verse 26:
In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you."
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever; his kingdom will never end."
"How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?" The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail."
"I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May your word to me be fulfilled." Then the angel left her.
— Luke 1:26–38 (NIV)
Who Was Luke?
A little thing about Luke: Luke was a Gentile. Jesus said He came first for the Jews, and yet one of the main people who wrote down His story was a Gentile. This Gentile actually wrote two books of the New Testament, Luke and Acts. And Luke, being a Gentile living in a Jewish world, had quite a task on his hands. He had to write so that Jews would believe his account of Jesus, and so that Gentiles would believe he had truly been converted to this new thing called the Way.
Luke is also known to be a physician: a doctor, smart, intelligent. So he wrote in a way that people knew without a shadow of a doubt that what he said was the truth. One of the ways he did that was by always including what happened to women. Why would he do that? Women were treated as second-class citizens. People didn't take a woman's word for it. Typically, a woman couldn't even testify in court. So why would you use a woman to prove your point? If I really wanted to convince you of something, I would have used a man. The fact that Luke uses the women means it has to be true, because it wouldn't have been the convincing way to tell it. Luke is saying, "I'm giving you the 100% gospel of Jesus Christ."
Your Yes Requires Surrender
And when we see Mary, Mary surrenders 100% to God. Your yes requires you to surrender. Surrender begins when I trust God's plan even though I don't understand the details. Mary said, "How can I have a child when I haven't even been with a man? None of what you're saying makes sense."
God often speaks assignments that feel bigger than our ability. That's the thing: when we can do it in our own strength, on our own accord, with our own ability, we don't need God. But if we want to get to that unimaginable blessing, it's going to be nothing but God. God is going to do it in such a way that you have no choice but to give Him all the honor, all the glory, and all the praise. Why? Because that's what we're here for. We were created to glorify God. We weren't created to have a fancy job and drive a Bentley. That might be a byproduct, but that's not what we were created for.
Releasing Control
So saying yes means I'm releasing my control and embracing God's direction. We talked about this a long time ago: "I don't want nobody telling me what to do. I got this. I drove myself here; I can drive myself home. I don't need You to take the wheel." The only time some of us want Jesus to take the wheel is when we've been drinking: "God, help me get home safe. Take the wheel."
But time and time again, the people who did awesome things in the Bible and in this world relinquished control to God. Look at Moses. Moses thought he had it figured out. He thought he was going to deliver the Israelites, so he took it into his own hands, ended up killing a man, and had to flee for his life. Then God met him at the burning bush: "Now are you willing to listen? Now are you willing to let Me control this thing?"
Most of you have a GPS on your phone. Some of you have it built into your car. Reggie's even got a song about it. But the GPS doesn't really give you directions until you start moving. Say I want to go to Willowbrook Mall. I turn the GPS on in the parking lot, and as I start driving, it tells me to make a right. But my dumb behind makes a left, because I know a better way. What does the GPS do when I make a left? It reroutes me. Why? Because I wasn't listening the first time.
When we relinquish control to God, all we have to do is start moving. When we start moving, He'll give us direction. He can't give you the whole thing, because your dumb behind ain't going to listen to all the steps. "I can tell you what's going to happen, but when you don't follow the plan, I've got to recalculate." And you say, "God, why am I going through this now?" "Because you didn't listen. I'm recalculating." The Israelites didn't listen, so they spent forty years in the wilderness. He had to recalculate. He had to get their minds back on track. "I'm going to have to take you through some things, because when I asked you to surrender the first time, you didn't. So now I've got to take you through some things so you truly understand that My plan is My plan." Your surrender is not about what you can do. It's about whether you trust God to do what He's going to do through you.
Your Yes Requires Faith
Our yes requires faith. Faith is believing God can do what seems impossible. We all want to do the impossible, but we have to trust God to do it through us. Faith is trusting God even when the timing feels uncertain. Faith grows when I focus more on God's promise than on my limitations.
Abraham and Sarah
Abraham, the father of faith. This man was old. Not just old; old, old. He was about to step into death. He was ninety-something years old, and God's talking about, "I'm still going to give you a child." "I don't want no kids at this point, God." I've seen some sixty-year-olds with toddlers, but a hundred-year-old man with a toddler? It doesn't make sense. His wife had been barren and had gone through the change. Yet God said, "I can." "God, this doesn't make sense. A ninety-year-old and a hundred-year-old running around with a kid? Who's going to raise this boy? This boy's going to be bad." Y'all know about old people with children.
But they, too, tried to take a detour. Sarah said, "If this can't happen for me, if it's taking too long, go sleep with my servant, and we'll have it this way." And God said, "Nice try. But this ain't it." It takes faith, because God is showing you some things, and right now you're like, "God, You're crazy. That ain't going to happen through me. You're not going to use me like that. Matter of fact, God, I don't want You to use me like that."
Let me tell the truth and shame the devil. Standing right here was not my dream. This was not how I thought it was going to happen. I felt a call on my life. I knew I was going to preach and proclaim the gospel. I didn't mind being a pastor. But my vision of being a pastor was being a full-time pastor. "This bivocational stuff, God? The work is too hard to be bivocational. This is supposed to be a full-time gig. I've been to churches where the youth pastor was full-time." Y'all feel what I'm saying? I had a picture in my mind of how this should happen. I watched my father minister here for twenty-something years, and I'm like, "God, ain't nothing moving. Ain't nothing shaking."
I'm going to tell you how bad it was. Y'all know my daddy. I was questioning my dad's ability to hear from God. Why? Because he told me this is what I was going to do. He always told me he started this church because God told him it was for me. I'm like, "God, I don't know who You're talking to. He must not be listening, because You ain't told me nothing." Brother Cortez pulled me to the side before I took this position and said, "D, this is what your dad's going to do." What did I tell you, Cortez? I told him that, point blank, period.
But God has a way. When you relinquish and surrender and say, "God, not my will but Yours," things change. As my father got sick and I began to stand up here, God was massaging my heart, turning things, showing me things I never thought I would see, giving me desires to do things I never thought I'd want to do. Why? Because I surrendered, and I had faith. Now I've got faith for stuff I didn't even need faith for. I'm seeing things beyond my imagination, and I don't know how it's going to happen, but I have faith that it's going to happen.
Faith says that even when the situation doesn't add up, God will bring it together. Think about the times in your life when the situation didn't add up. The math wasn't mathing. You knew good and well your money wasn't supposed to make it to the end of the month. Just like the widow in the Bible, the oil never ran out. You were in the desert, but you found water. Some of you tried to take your own life, but it didn't work. Why? Because God says you can't override His will. And He says, "If you want to see something you can't even imagine, try putting your yes with My yes."
Your Yes Releases Power
Yes releases power. Power is released when I agree with God's word, not when God's word agrees with my word. I wasn't even going to go here, but let me go here.
When God says you are His child, do you agree? When God says He owns the cattle on a thousand hills, do you agree? When God says you're going to be a lender and not a borrower, do you agree? When God says you're going to be free of that addiction, do you agree? I guess y'all don't agree. When I said everybody in this building is going to be debt-free, do you agree? Whatever healing is necessary is going to happen for you. Do you agree? Because that's the will of God for you.
Miracles begin when my yes aligns with God's will. It's a miracle for us, but it ain't a miracle for God. For Him, it's just a normal day. He's got this. It reminds me of Katt Williams talking to his son: "I got this. All day, every day." God can handle it, all day, every day. My yes becomes the channel for God's power in my life.
Water Into Wine: "Do Whatever He Tells You"
Y'all remember Jesus' first miracle? Turning water into wine. Let's walk through how it played out. His mother came to Him and said, "They have no more wine." He said, "Woman, My time has not yet come." She didn't listen to that. She told the servants, "Do whatever He tells you." And He told the servants to go fill the water jars.
Now, I had to do some research. The amount of water they gathered was about 120 gallons. They didn't have a faucet; they were going to the well and carrying the water back. A big five-gallon bucket from Home Depot is heavy when it's full, so they were probably carrying two or three gallons at most. So the servants go to the well, fill the bucket, fill the jars. Go back, get another bucket, fill the jars. Over and over and over. "Man, what has this man got us filling these jars for? This makes absolutely no sense." Because every time they poured, they knew there was nothing in there but water.
And whoever had to take the cup to the master of the banquet, I know he was scared. "Now dip some out and take it to him." "You want me to take him water?" But he did what he was told, because Jesus' mother said, "Do whatever He tells you." They did whatever Jesus told them to do. And when it reached the master of the banquet, it was some of the best wine.
I told y'all I dabbled in alcohol a little bit back in the day. Making good wine takes years. You press the grapes, you let it ferment, you let it sit in vats. It takes years to make the best wine. Y'all ain't with me. The best wine. After a period of obedience. After days of seeing nothing but buckets of water. The best wine.
"But God, I've been following You for thirty, forty years. I ain't seen no best wine yet." Are you still going to move in a posture of obedience? Because some of the times we've tasted good wine, we just didn't realize what we were tasting. We had a bitter taste because our coworker was talking about us, so we couldn't taste the times Jesus saved us from everything He just saved us from, because we were focused on that stuff over there. We're so mad our friend isn't our friend anymore that we can't taste the times Jesus is taking us from one place to another.
My Yes Matches God's Yes
Church, our obedience, our yes: that's my new way of saying obedience, because we get kind of funny when we hear the word "obedience." When my yes matches God's yes, it will release a power you've never experienced. Are you waiting on God's power? A lot of us are waiting on God, but God is waiting on us. He's waiting on us to surrender. He's waiting on us to show true faith. He's waiting on us to align our will with His will. God is not withholding anything from us.
The Prodigal Son
In the story of the prodigal son, one son goes off and does all these outlandish things because he said, "Daddy, I want my money now." Daddy gave it to him, and he went off and did all these outlandish things. But what we sometimes forget is the brother who stayed. When his brother came back, he said, "Daddy, why didn't you ever give me the fatted calf? Why didn't you ever throw me a party?" And what did the father tell him? "Everything I have is yours." When his brother left, he took his half. Who owned the other half? The brother who stayed. So everything he thought his daddy should have given him, his daddy said, "It's already yours." Everything you want is already yours. What did the song we just sang say? "When I called on God, He answered."
Her Yes Unlocked God's Promise
Mary made room, and when she made room, God filled it with the miraculous. God had already said yes. The power is already flowing. The promise is already spoken. The only question is: will you agree? When Mary said yes, she didn't know everything God would do. But her yes unlocked God's promise.
Some of you need direction. Some of you need provision. Some of you need peace. But God's promise has already been spoken. He said He will give you the peace that surpasses all understanding. He said He will supply all your needs.
The Name Above All Names
He is Jehovah Rapha, Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Tsidkenu. In those days, they knew all the names of God. Why? So they could call on the name of God for the specific area of their life they needed Him in. But right now, we don't need to remember all the names. All I need to do is call on Jesus, because Jesus is the name above all names. Are you ready to say yes to God and unlock His promises? Because all He's waiting on is you.
Weekly Challenge
All right, let me go to my seat. I think I've labored this enough. Let's wrap it up.
- Reflect: Where is God calling me to trust Him beyond what I can see?
- Act: Take one bold step of obedience this week.
- Pray: "Lord, increase my faith so that my yes aligns with Your word, Your will, and Your power."
Closing Prayer
Most gracious and heavenly Father, I come before You today saying thank You. Father God, thank You for this opportunity to declare Your word. I pray that You will continue to transform our minds, our hearts, and our souls. One thing we know and believe is that Your word never returns void. So, Lord, do what only You can do. Give us a glimpse into Your presence. Show us where You would have us go. Let us see a glimpse of the vision, purpose, and plan You have for our lives, to rejuvenate us and remind us that You've placed us here for a purpose, a purpose more powerful than we can ever imagine. Give us the strength to let our yes be obedient to Your yes, so that we can watch You do a mighty work. Father God, we love You and praise You. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.