November 7, 2025 • 40 mins
God doesn’t see you through the lens of your mistakes. He sees you through the lens of grace. But it’s not how God sees you that determines where you end up, it’s how you think He sees you.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope
this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving
in your life.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Enjoy the message Joshua Chapter fourteen.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Please remain standing for one moment in respect and honor
for the word of God. The Lord has given me
something today that is so beautiful to me, and I
pray that I can show it to you accurately today
and that you can receive it. I praise God in
advance for the way He's going to show you today
(00:41):
who He really is in your life and who you
really are in his eyes. A man, I'm so glad
you're here. I prayed you wouldn't miss church today. I
was like, Lord, whoever needs to hear it, even if
their kids fight them all the way to church and
they got a flat tire, help them to roll down
the street on a hub. Captain, get this message today.
(01:03):
So if you tuned in, it wasn't by mistake. We
were praying that everyone who would need this message would
get it, even if it's two years later and you
found it on YouTube after watching a cat.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Video or bts. This is gonna be your message, This
is gonna be the one.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
The Lord has heard the questions you've been asking, He's
seen the struggle you've been facing, and he wants to
give you something today to see.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
It in a different light.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Joshua chapter fourteen a very pivotal scripture for the nation
of Israel and for us. As Joshua gives the inheritance
that God promised so many centuries ago to the people
who were walking into the land, and as he's dividing
up the different parcels or the lots, casting lots to
decide which tribe will live on what lot, one person
(01:55):
takes initiative named Caleb, and I want to read you
his speech that he made to Joshua, because he's trying
to convince him that he's supposed to live in a
certain place, and so he's going to tell him some
things from his resume, and he's also going to tell
him some things and reflect on some things that have happened.
And I want you to eavesdrop on it today Joshua fourteen,
(02:15):
verse six.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Then the people of Judah came to.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
Joshua at Gilgal and Caleb the son of Jeffina.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
I'm so sorry I got to put this in here.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I wonder if it's significant that it's Judah because that
represents praise in the Bible, and I wonder if there's
something about praise that helps us to take possession of
the promises of God.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
I just wonder that out loud in your presence today.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I'm not sure, but I wonder if some of the
problems that you've been focusing on, if you could get
in a place of praise, you might see the solution clearly. Today,
We're never going to make it through the next day
versus if we keep interrupting, So.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Start over.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Then the people of Judah came to Joshua, Gilgal and
Caleb the son of Jeffuna. Then I said to him,
you know what the Lord said to Moses, the man
of God in Kate desh Barnea, concerning you and me.
I was forty years old when Moses, the servant of
the Lord, sent me from kay desh Barney. I was
just a young man, just forty years old. That's very youthful,
(03:22):
very youthful age. I was forty years old when Moses
sent us to spy out the land, and I brought
him word again, as it was in my heart. But
my brothers who went up with me, made the heart
of the people melt. Yet I wholly followed the Lord,
my God. I didn't let it get to me. I
didn't let it get in me what they said. And
(03:44):
Moses swore on that day, saying, surely the land on
which your foot has trodden shall be an inheritance for
you and your children forever, because you have wholly followed
the Lord, my God. And now behold, behold, the Lord
has kept me alive, just as he said. These forty
(04:04):
five years since the time.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
That's a long time to wait for a promise to
come to pass.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
That's a long time to suffer for somebody else's disobedience.
Forty five years I survived the wilderness. It's been forty
five years since the time that the Lord spoke this
word to Moses, while Israel walked into wilderness. And now behole,
I am this day, eighty five years old. I am
still as strong today. Eighty five that's still flexing. I'm
(04:37):
still as strong today as I was in the day
that Moses sent me my strength now is as my
strength was then, for war and forgoing and coming. So
now somebody shout, now there's been a long time coming.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
But now give me this.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Hill country of which the Lord spoke on that day.
For you heard on that day how the we're there,
with great fortified cities. It may be that the Lord
will be with me and I shall drive them out,
just as the Lord said. And then Joshua blessed him,
and he gave hebren to Caleb, the son of Jafunah
for an inheritance.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Well, look at.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Your neighbor and give them my title, and then I
want to share a lesson with you. Look at him,
and first of all, say you look amazing. Tell them
you've never looked better. And now tell him say I
appreciate that, but my Maker is my mirror.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
They didn't get it.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Look at the next person and say, I appreciate it,
but my Maker is my mirror. Thank you, Lord for
illumination of your word in Jesus' name.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Amen.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Amen, Well let's give him one more shout as we
take our seat.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Amen. I wasn't really a shout, it was more of
a murmur.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I will teach you how to shout one day like
you do when your kids don't clean up.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Do that.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
But for the Lord, Amen, it's great that we get
to see how God makes a nation. He's forming a nation.
He said, I want a people that can present me.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
To the world.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
And he didn't do it the typical way, because if
you wanted to have a great nation, you would pick.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
A rich one, a wealthy one.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
And yet, instead of making a nation that was already
great greater, God found a man who was too old
to have kids with a wife who was barren in
her womb, and created a great.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Nation out of an impossible situation.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
I am preaching so hard already, and I'm trying to
throttle down.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
But this is a message in itself.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Is that when God found Abram, this was before he
had a consonant in his name. The artist formerly known
as Abram on to be Abraham. He was the father
of many nations, but when God called him, his stuff
wasn't even working anymore. And the reason I'm telling you
that is because sometimes God will speak something over your
life and you will look in the mirror.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And not see it.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
He'll speak something in your soul and you'll look in
the mirror and you won't see it, which is so
important to know that it's not how God sees you
that determines where your life ends up. If it had been,
Moses wouldn't have died in the wilderness. It's not how
God sees me. It's how I think God sees me
that determines where I end up. I'll prove it to
(07:40):
you all the way from Genesis chapter one. Remember, let
us make man in our image. God needed someone to
show the world what he looked like, or else he
would have just been a concept. God would have been
an abstract theory. So he made man, and one man
to reflect who he was. He needed someone to show
(08:02):
his nature through. So he made me in you. And
when you insult the product, you insult the manufacturer, which
is why it's good to know our theology that he
made me from the dust, that God took something that
seemed filthy and something that seemed finite and made something
(08:23):
that would reflect what is eternal. Then after making the man,
he began to create not only the world the man,
but a nation through Abram, through someone who seemed unlikely,
And the nation of Israel spent a whole lot of
(08:44):
time trying to figure out what we spent our whole
lives trying to figure out, or at least our teenage
years and our twenties, is like, what's my identity? So
what you're really seeing in Joshua be fourteen is not
just people getting some realist state, but they're coming into
their identity, their national identity.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
And it's hard because.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
They've been through so much and they started from something
so small. It is easy for them to see themselves
according to what they've been through or where they started.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
And now they're breaking up.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
There's nine and a half tribes that get this land,
and so Joshua and the priests they're shaking this receptacle.
This is how they would cast lots. They would take
the thing and shake it and they would have little
wood blocks with different codes on them, and then they
would kind of shake it out and what it fell
on that meant this tribe gets that land, and this
tribe gets that land. When Caleb interrupts the process, he's like,
(09:37):
hold on, you're not going to figure out where I
live by just rolling some dice.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
Okay, I got a promise, Moses said.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Now, remember Moses was the one who was supposed to
lead the people into the land, but he was unable
to do it. And here's how I would put it
if I were a preacher.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
He got them out of each but he.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Never got Egypt out of them, because they were oppressed
for you know, four hundred and thirty years. And when
you've been under something for any length of time, when
you've been under the power of any influence for any
length of time, that influence becomes your identity.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
So now your.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Addiction speaks more to you about your potential than God's
word over you, than the prophetic gift that's.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Inside of you.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
It happens to all of us when when you've been
suffering from something, you can begin to take on the
name of your disease or your issue. It's rating the
name of your creator, whose image you were made of.
But see, it's how you see it. It's how you
see yourself. And I think I can prove to you
if you give me like two and a half minutes,
(10:49):
that the reason the people didn't go into the land
under Moses was because Moses never really saw himself in
the image of his creator.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Abram did.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Abram did, even though he had a hard time getting
with it, even though he was like, you got any
pills for that or anything like that, because I'm old now.
And even though he had to wait for Isaac and
he messed up in the process and ended up producing
something that caused him more trouble by sleeping with Hagar.
Even though all of that happened, God still called him
the Father of faith, the father of many nations, and
to show him who he was, he brought him out
(11:23):
of his tent, out of his limitation, out of his situation,
and he said, Okay, here's your revelation. Here's your situation.
Get out of your situation, and now look up, preach
into somebody.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Look up. And he said, count the stars if you can.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
I don't know how far he got before he was like,
what's the point of God, akin, you know three hundred
and forty three hundred and forty four.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
What are you trying to show me?
Speaker 2 (11:51):
And God said, as many as they are, so shall
your descendants be, So shall your seed be. So he
gives him an image, an image, not just an idea,
but an image.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Now. Colossians one fifteen look.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
It up real quick says that Jesus is the image
of the invisible God. That's very powerful, that Jesus shows
us what God is like that the Word became flesh
and dwelled among us. That's what Jesus is. He is
the image of the God that we can't see. Did
(12:29):
I get it right? Colossians one fifteen, that he is
the image of the invisible God. This is the challenge
for everybody under the sound of my voice. There is
a way that God sees you because he formed you.
There is that you see you. There is a way
that others see you. And where you go from this
(12:52):
point forward in your life is going to depend on.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Which mirror you believe.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I got all these mirrors in my house that are
messed up, and I know they're messed up because they
keep showing me. My beard is supposed to be black.
But I look in those mirrors and they're messed up.
They're defective. I'm gonna take them back to the store
because they keep showing me these gray patches. Like I'm
forty years old and I started rebuking mirrors in my house.
You know, these lines coming up under my eyes, and
(13:23):
I'm like, you are a liar like your father the devil.
I cast you back to the pit of hell or
this it actor how many, ever, looked in a messed
up mirror. How many, ever, have people around you that
made you feel a certain.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Way about yourself.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
When Moses was coming into his identity and assignment, he
had to deal with the fact that he was really
living with two different images of who he was. And remember,
God is using Moses to deliver the Israelites out of
this Egyptian oppression.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
And when Moses first first starts to act on his.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Impulse, he does the right thing, but he does it
the wrong way. He defends his people, but he does
it by murdering an Egyptian. So he's ahead of his
time and he's out of his own but he's doing
the right thing. But he still doesn't know who he
is yet, and it's difficult for him because he doesn't
really fit in with either group that he's living with.
(14:24):
The Hebrews are the people he was born from. The
Egyptians are the people that he was raised by. But
he identifies more with the people that he was born
from than the people he was raised by, so he
doesn't really fit in. And when you don't really fit
into either group, you end up running. That's what happened
to Moses. He confronted an Egyptian who was beating a
(14:47):
Hebrew one day, and he killed him and buried him.
But then the next day he went out and saw
two of his brothers fighting, and he was like, break
it up, guys. You know we're suffering enough from them.
We don't have to kill each other. And this is
in Exodus chapter two. I want to show it to.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
You real quick. You got it Exodus two.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
The man said back to him, who has made you
a prince and a judge over us?
Speaker 1 (15:12):
Do you mean to kill me as you have killed
the Egyptian?
Speaker 2 (15:15):
And then Moses was afraid and thought, surely the.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Thing is known, and he ran. He ran.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We don't really see him in his next stage of
his assignment until forty years later. He ran because he
was to Hebrew to be an Egyptian, and to Egyptian
to be a Hebrew. And when you don't really fit
in with either, you don't know who you are, and
you spend years of your life running from who you
(15:43):
really are, looking in the mirror of your last mistake.
He ran, and he ran, and he ran. And see
the question is the right one, he said, who made you?
Speaker 1 (15:55):
Who made you? But if you don't know that.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
You will hand other people your mirror to show you
who you are. And let me tell you something about people.
People would rather define you by your worst mistake. What's
crazy about Moses is he killed a man and there's
only one verse in.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
The Bible about the murder. Now, if you let church people.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Write the Bible, they would have had a whole book
about it. Would be called the Book of Moses's murder,
the Book of Moses's mistake, the Book of Debi's divorce,
the book of your lowest moment. But maybe God doesn't
see you through the lens of your mistake.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Maybe he sees you through the lens of his grace.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Maybe when he looks at you, he sees the finished
work of Jesus Christ. Have you ever thought about the
fact that if they didn't make you, they can't define you.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
My maker, there is my mirror. I promise. I'm trying
to be as calm as I can be.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
But when God showed me that my maker is my mirror,
he showed me Moses standing in front of the burning bush.
And God's like, I'm gonna use you. You're gonna be
the one to do it.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
You're the one.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Who's had the conflicted identity and so many mistakes, and
you don't even really believe in yourself. And so I
was thinking about you and how you might be standing
in front of something that God is speaking to you
and is burning on the inside, but you can't really
locate yourself because honestly, you don't fit into either group.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
You don't really fit in with really.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Churchy people because they are so perfect and they pray
so much, and they make Bible verses out of their
kids sandwiches before they pack them in the lunch box
numbers thirteen thirty one, cut out with scripture stencils and
pack it in the lunch box like the Fish and
the Loaves and the Little Boy. And you are not
(18:00):
churchy enough, but you're really not worldly enough, because the
spirit of God is on the inside of you when
you try to sin, telling you that you're something greater
than that. And you're kind of righteous, but you're kind
of ratchet, and you're kind of a worshiper, but you're
kind of worldly, and you kind of worry but you
(18:23):
kind of worship, and you're kind of organized, but you're
kind of chaotic, and you're kind of powerful, but you're
kind of petty and you come on, I'm preaching to somebody,
and you're a little bit of both.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And your self concept is in development.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
And this is when it's very important who holds your mirror,
because if the wrong people show you, you get a
distorted image of yourself, and then you start matching in
your life what you see in your mind.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
That's what That's what Moses did.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
God's like, all right, got a job for you to do.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I'm gonna use you. I'm gonna give you everything you need. Cool.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Moses is like, uh but uh but uh but see
the thing about me. Watch what's what He says. This
is Exodus four ten. It's which mirror you're looking at, right,
So if you look at the mirror of what you're
missing and you only see what's not there, that's what
(19:38):
Moses did. He's like, he goes, oh my lord, this
is an Exodus four ten. Oh mg, he says, oh
m L. He's like, I'm not eloquent. I am not eloquent.
It's funny because I got the scripture on the back
screen right now, and it's got a typo in it.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
It says I I am eloquent. He said, the opposite.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
That's that's what he said, right there, I am not eloquent,
and you really have both voices. That's that's kind of
how it feels, right like one is saying I am
and one is.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Saying I'm not. And I don't know which one.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I got this thing on the inside of me that
feels like I can do it and I'm supposed to
do it and I'm gonna make it. But I got
this other thing saying and I don't know which way
to look.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So he said, I'm not eloquent.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
And then he says, either in the past or in
the last five minutes, nothing has changed since you started speaking.
It's still the same. I got saved and my nose
is still big. I got saved, and I'm still kind
of cross eyed and I read slow. I got saved
and I still don't feel intelligent enough. I got saved
(20:50):
and I still got memories. I got saved, and I
love God, but I still got trauma. I got saved
and I love God, but I'm still limited.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
By my experience.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
He said, I'm not. I'm not what you think I am.
God's answer is so instructive. Next verse, the Lord said,
who has made who made your mouth? Who made your brain? Yeah,
(21:26):
but I'm just weird. What if the world is weird
and we're the normal ones?
Speaker 1 (21:35):
Yeah, I like it.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
I gotta be careful who I look at when I preach,
by the way, because you're like a mirror. Oh they
put this Chris is Chris Brown around? If he's around
bringing back up, Colin comeson when the worship leaders are leading.
They don't know this, but there was a choir out
here today at Valentine and they were standing on these
risers and if Chris didn't coming, you'll have to do okay,
so LJ. They think that they're just up here saying
(22:01):
I tell about you'll, we could teach a whole thing
on this. Can y'all still see me back here, because
I want to tell this to them. One time, they
discovered that a lot of primates and all humans are
softwired with mirror neurons, so our brains actually experience the
same emotion that somebody were watching if we're tuned into them.
And they got it from a monkey that was watching
(22:21):
a man open a nut, and they had it hooked
up to his brain and they saw the same brain
activity in the monkey's brain that was in the man's
brain who was opening the nut. And they realized that
all humans are wired in such a way with mirror
neurons that I experience your reality by watching you experience it.
So this is why when a parent gets mad, kids
(22:42):
can feel that stuff. They can feel that tension. It's
called a mirror neuron. Here's what was happening while you
were singing. This is how I fight my battles. Somebody
out there was going through a battle, but they've been
feeling like they were losing.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
But God puts you out here as a mirror.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Well, now, all of a sudden, they didn't feel victorious
this week. But when they saw you worshiping God, don't
run from me. I got you by this leather coat.
When they saw you worshiping God, they didn't feel like
they had the victory. But while you were shouting the victory. Now,
I wonder if you would do that for somebody on
your row right now. I know you had a hard
(23:21):
week too, But magnify the Lord with me.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Let us exalt his name together. If you don't have
faith today, borrow mine. You are gonna make it. I said.
So it's called mirror neurons.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
And just as contagious as faith is, so is cynicism.
So if you got cynical people holding up your mirror,
you'll always feel small. You'll always feel smaller than your child,
smaller than your giant, smaller than your addiction, because you're
not looking at your God. But when your maker is
your mirror. Three forty four, three forty five, three forty six,
(24:12):
I'm still counting. God's not done yet. His mercies are
new with every rising up the sun. He who began
a good work in me, will be faithful to complete it.
One thing about a mirror, it always shows you the
image in reverse. God knows how your situation turns out.
God knows how your story ends. God knows what he
(24:34):
put in you. When this message flooded into my heart,
I was like, it's gonna change somebody's life because they've
just been looking in the wrong mirror, been looking at
(24:55):
their mistakes. When your mistakes are your mirror, you stay
on the outside of Canaan, even though you have the
strength to go in, not because you are small, but
because you see small. So the spies came back and
they were like, hey, Moses, Remember Moses has dealt with rejection,
(25:18):
his whole life, and so a lot of times when
people don't accept you, it's because they have rejected themselves.
Not all the time, a lot of times. And this
is a really important point. Everybody's acceptance is not a
(25:38):
blessing because the majority might be the wrong mirror. Ten
out of twelve said we can't go in. Ten out
of twelve said there.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
To be We went in. This is what they said.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
We went to the land Moses, and they became the
mirror for the millions of people who had a promise
from God but hadn't possessed it yet. This is why
so important who you're around, what you take in, what
you look at, you become what you behold. So the
people are giving a report and they're like, it's a
(26:19):
great place. The valleys are fertile, it's a rich land.
We brought you back some grapes. Grapes were so big
they had to carry them on poles. But then they
stopped looking at God, stopped looking at grapes and started
talking about giants. And when they looked too much at
(26:39):
the giants as their mirror, they saw themselves as grasshoppers.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
That's what they said.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Numbers thirteen thirty three They said, there were the Nephelum,
the sons of Anak who come from the Nephilum.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
There were giants in the.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Land, big strong adversary that we would have to dispossess
to take the land. And we seemed to ourselves, wow,
like grasshoppers.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Not to God.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
We seem to ourselves like grasshoppers. Most people see God
really big. Even those who barely believe in God see
him really big. It's not how big you see God,
it's how much you believe that God is in you.
(27:32):
We seemed to ourselves as grasshoppers, and so we seemed
to them.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Our reflection determined our reality. We looked at him. What
got me about it.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Is that they could have seen the exact same situation
in reverse.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Watch this. They were like, the giants are too big.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
God promised us the victory, but I guess we can't
go in because of the size of the giants. Reverse it,
because God always shows you the image and reverse. So
it's like this, God has already promised us the victory
and the.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Giants are so big.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
If the giants are that big and God has promised
us the victory, if what is coming against us is
that great, how much greater must God be within me?
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Greater is he come on and help me?
Speaker 2 (28:31):
That is within me, then he that is in the world.
The size of my giant is a proof of the
size of my God.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Thank you Lord.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
If God is letting me experience a challenge this big See,
God is trying to use your enemies to show you
how valuable you are in his gigdom. And why would
you let your enemies hold your mirror? Anyway? Who cares
(29:10):
what the sons of anac think you look like? That's
what Caleb said. He was like, shut up, we can
do it. Hit somebody, say, shut up, I can do it.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
It's in the Bible too. It's in the Bible. Caleb
said that he says shut up.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
He silenced the people and said, if God is with.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Us, my maker is my mirror.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And I always thought it was funny because he's like, hey, Joshua,
I know you're rolling these little lots around on the
ground to figure out who lives there. But remember God
gave me a promise that I would live in the
high place I want hebron, hebron three thousand feet above
sea level, above.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Sea level.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
I'm gonna have to take a month off after I
appreciate this message. I'm giving you everything I got. You've
been living a c level. You've been looking in the
wrong mirror. You've been consulting the mirror for your flesh.
You put twenty minutes into your makeup today, but you
didn't you didn't get in this mirror right here.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
This is a mirror too. This is a mirror too.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
You've been struggling over external issues, but what about what's
in you?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
James said something curious.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
He said, if you listen to the word and don't
do it, you're like a man who looks at himself
in a mirror. In the beginning was a word, and
the word was with God, and the word.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Was God, My maker is my mirror. So I can't look.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
I can't run around the people who are struggling with
their own sin of self to determine mine.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
And I can't use the situation either.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
That's why I love Caleb because it's almost like he's lying.
Come moment, he's eighty five and he's walking. I'm talking
about I still got it. Now, what mirror are you
looking at? Look at somebody says I still got it?
It'll feel good to say it. Too, I still got
(31:31):
it because I'm not talking about the flesh. I'm talking
about faith. And the wilderness can do one of two
things to you. It can kill you or it can
make you stronger. Caleb said, all that I went through,
I didn't get bitter. I didn't get the wilderness in me,
(31:54):
even though I went through the wilderness. In fact, everything
I went through over the last four and a half
decades only serve to convince me.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
That much more that I still got it.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
I mean, if God promised it to be back then
and saw me through all this, I don't want to
live at the level of feelings. You settle too low.
You settle for what you see, You settle for what
people say. You settle for old templates, you settle for
old scripts, you settle for emotions. When you're stated in
(32:31):
heavenly places with Jesus, you got to settle up.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
You gotta get up above what.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
You see, above what you feel, and above what you've
been through.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
He said, I want to live.
Speaker 4 (32:48):
I want to live where the blessings are. I want
to live where the battles are. You can't have a
victory without a battle. God is raising you up right now.
He's doing it through a process. The level you will
(33:12):
settle on is the level that you see yourself. And
it makes me so sad to think of how many
times that you and I have gone to the wrong mirrors,
and so we see a grasshopper when we're really a giant,
(33:38):
When we see a failure.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
When really it was a lesson, when we see what's
missing because we can only see through the filter of
our fear. God said, let us make man in our image,
in our likeness. You are not my maker. You will
(34:03):
not be my mirror. When God said I Am to Moses,
you know my name is I Am, he was trying
to get in to see you are as I am.
That's what a mirror does. God says, I want to
(34:26):
see myself in you. When God sees you, he sees himself.
He sees his son. Christ is the image of the
invisible God, and if he is in you, he is
more than the world against you.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
I want to pray for a few hundred people today.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
You will know who you are if the message resonated
with you in a personal way.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
And it's this. You've been going to the wrong mirror.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
You've been consulting physical, natural, relational, elements incomplete fragmented elements,
and you don't know who you are right now, and
you're stuck between two realities.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
The message God gave me was your Maker is your mirror.
And you know what's beautiful. You're his.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
He wants to use you to reflect himself to the world,
and so he's gonna give you some stuff.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Some of it's gonna.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
Be giants in front of you, some of it's gonna
be giants inside of you.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
David was good at killing.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Giants as long as they were standing in front of him.
It was the ones within him that took him out.
Some of them are gonna be short term, some of
them are gonna be long term. If you go to
the wrong mirror, you'll always feel small.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
But if you will learn how to worship and get
in the word of God and believe the promise that
He spoke for your life and get in this mirror, you.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Are not going to win over insecurity. Looking in the
mirror of Instagram, it is only going to show you
what you're not, what you can, and what you want.
But if you get in this mirror, I'm telling you
the word of God can do something for your spirit.
It can make you stronger in your spirit than your
enemies are in your situation.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
Now stand up on your feet. I want to pray
with you. I want to pray with you. I want
to prophesy over you. I don't want anyone moving or leaving.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
The Lord said that this word would hit deep for
the ones who needed it. Have been seeing themselves, according
to past experiences, have been looking in a rear view
mirror at something that happened, and are about to wreck
in the face of their future. And he said that
today he wanted to give you a different mirror, different mirror.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Caleb said, I'm not just settling for my lot in life.
I'm not just settling for depression.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
I was hesitant to preach the message because I thought
people would hear it like it was some you know,
God give me my BMW, you know, God make me famous.
That's not what Caleb said. He said, I want the challenge.
I want the altitude. I want the opportunity to prove
God again. I want to live at the high place.
(37:27):
I want to be my higher self. I'm still strong.
Speaker 1 (37:31):
I still got it. I still got it.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My faith went through testing forty five years and I survived.
I still got it. I'm not ashamed of what I
went through. It proves that God was with me. I
still got it.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
Thank you for your word, Lord, It shows us who
we are.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
Thank you for worship where we can reflect you, where
we can behold your glory.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Close your eyes, visualize.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
The king told Elisha that he would strike the ground
three times. Elisha said you, you've got to see the victory.
Before you see the victory, open the east window and shoot.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
It's the first creation is You got to.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Be able to see yourself made of dust but touched
with divinity.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
You got to see.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
Yourself free, even though you don't feel free, even though
you still keep running back to lesser stuff. You gotta
know you got a higher purpose and a greater name.
I wish you would lift your hands in His presence,
wherever you are. I wish you would lift them high
and surrender. I wish you would lift them like the
burden has been rolled away, and begin to sing. I'm
(38:55):
gonna see a victory. I'm gonna see a victory. I
shall see it, gonna see it in my spirit. I'm
gonna see it in my heart. I'm gonna see it.
I'm gonna see deliverance. I'm gonna see the red Sea part.
I'm gonna see the mountains mooth. I'm gonna see.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
It come to pass in my blood line. I'm gonna
see it. I'm gonna see it. I'm gonna have the
joy of the Lord. I'm gonna see it. I'm gonna
fulfill it. I'm gonna walk in it. I'm gonna receive it.
I'm gonna prove it. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna
make it. I'm gonna sound it, I'm gonna declare it.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
You can click the link in the description to give
now or visit Elevation Church dot org slash podcast for
more information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
You can share it with your friends. You can click
the share button, take a screenshot and share it on
(39:58):
your social stories and tag at Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you.
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope
this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving
in your life.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Enjoy the message Joshua Chapter fourteen.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Please remain standing for one moment in respect and honor
for the word of God. The Lord has given me
something today that is so beautiful to me, and I
pray that I can show it to you accurately today
and that you can receive it. I praise God in
advance for the way He's going to show you today
(00:41):
who He really is in your life and who you
really are in his eyes. A man, I'm so glad
you're here. I prayed you wouldn't miss church today. I
was like, Lord, whoever needs to hear it, even if
their kids fight them all the way to church and
they got a flat tire, help them to roll down
the street on a hub. Captain, get this message today.
(01:03):
So if you tuned in, it wasn't by mistake. We
were praying that everyone who would need this message would
get it, even if it's two years later and you
found it on YouTube after watching a cat.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Video or bts. This is gonna be your message, This
is gonna be the one.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
The Lord has heard the questions you've been asking, He's
seen the struggle you've been facing, and he wants to
give you something today to see.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
It in a different light.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Joshua chapter fourteen a very pivotal scripture for the nation
of Israel and for us. As Joshua gives the inheritance
that God promised so many centuries ago to the people
who were walking into the land, and as he's dividing
up the different parcels or the lots, casting lots to
decide which tribe will live on what lot, one person
(01:55):
takes initiative named Caleb, and I want to read you
his speech that he made to Joshua, because he's trying
to convince him that he's supposed to live in a
certain place, and so he's going to tell him some
things from his resume, and he's also going to tell
him some things and reflect on some things that have happened.
And I want you to eavesdrop on it today Joshua fourteen,
(02:15):
verse six.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Then the people of Judah came to.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
Joshua at Gilgal and Caleb the son of Jeffina.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
I'm so sorry I got to put this in here.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I wonder if it's significant that it's Judah because that
represents praise in the Bible, and I wonder if there's
something about praise that helps us to take possession of
the promises of God.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
I just wonder that out loud in your presence today.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I'm not sure, but I wonder if some of the
problems that you've been focusing on, if you could get
in a place of praise, you might see the solution clearly. Today,
We're never going to make it through the next day
versus if we keep interrupting, So.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Start over.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Then the people of Judah came to Joshua, Gilgal and
Caleb the son of Jeffuna. Then I said to him,
you know what the Lord said to Moses, the man
of God in Kate desh Barnea, concerning you and me.
I was forty years old when Moses, the servant of
the Lord, sent me from kay desh Barney. I was
just a young man, just forty years old. That's very youthful,
(03:22):
very youthful age. I was forty years old when Moses
sent us to spy out the land, and I brought
him word again, as it was in my heart. But
my brothers who went up with me, made the heart
of the people melt. Yet I wholly followed the Lord,
my God. I didn't let it get to me. I
didn't let it get in me what they said. And
(03:44):
Moses swore on that day, saying, surely the land on
which your foot has trodden shall be an inheritance for
you and your children forever, because you have wholly followed
the Lord, my God. And now behold, behold, the Lord
has kept me alive, just as he said. These forty
(04:04):
five years since the time.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
That's a long time to wait for a promise to
come to pass.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
That's a long time to suffer for somebody else's disobedience.
Forty five years I survived the wilderness. It's been forty
five years since the time that the Lord spoke this
word to Moses, while Israel walked into wilderness. And now behole,
I am this day, eighty five years old. I am
still as strong today. Eighty five that's still flexing. I'm
(04:37):
still as strong today as I was in the day
that Moses sent me my strength now is as my
strength was then, for war and forgoing and coming. So
now somebody shout, now there's been a long time coming.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
But now give me this.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Hill country of which the Lord spoke on that day.
For you heard on that day how the we're there,
with great fortified cities. It may be that the Lord
will be with me and I shall drive them out,
just as the Lord said. And then Joshua blessed him,
and he gave hebren to Caleb, the son of Jafunah
for an inheritance.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Well, look at.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Your neighbor and give them my title, and then I
want to share a lesson with you. Look at him,
and first of all, say you look amazing. Tell them
you've never looked better. And now tell him say I
appreciate that, but my Maker is my mirror.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
They didn't get it.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Look at the next person and say, I appreciate it,
but my Maker is my mirror. Thank you, Lord for
illumination of your word in Jesus' name.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Amen.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Amen, Well let's give him one more shout as we
take our seat.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Amen. I wasn't really a shout, it was more of
a murmur.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I will teach you how to shout one day like
you do when your kids don't clean up.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Do that.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
But for the Lord, Amen, it's great that we get
to see how God makes a nation. He's forming a nation.
He said, I want a people that can present me.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
To the world.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
And he didn't do it the typical way, because if
you wanted to have a great nation, you would pick.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
A rich one, a wealthy one.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
And yet, instead of making a nation that was already
great greater, God found a man who was too old
to have kids with a wife who was barren in
her womb, and created a great.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Nation out of an impossible situation.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
I am preaching so hard already, and I'm trying to
throttle down.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
But this is a message in itself.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Is that when God found Abram, this was before he
had a consonant in his name. The artist formerly known
as Abram on to be Abraham. He was the father
of many nations, but when God called him, his stuff
wasn't even working anymore. And the reason I'm telling you
that is because sometimes God will speak something over your
life and you will look in the mirror.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And not see it.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
He'll speak something in your soul and you'll look in
the mirror and you won't see it, which is so
important to know that it's not how God sees you
that determines where your life ends up. If it had been,
Moses wouldn't have died in the wilderness. It's not how
God sees me. It's how I think God sees me
that determines where I end up. I'll prove it to
(07:40):
you all the way from Genesis chapter one. Remember, let
us make man in our image. God needed someone to
show the world what he looked like, or else he
would have just been a concept. God would have been
an abstract theory. So he made man, and one man
to reflect who he was. He needed someone to show
(08:02):
his nature through. So he made me in you. And
when you insult the product, you insult the manufacturer, which
is why it's good to know our theology that he
made me from the dust, that God took something that
seemed filthy and something that seemed finite and made something
(08:23):
that would reflect what is eternal. Then after making the man,
he began to create not only the world the man,
but a nation through Abram, through someone who seemed unlikely,
And the nation of Israel spent a whole lot of
(08:44):
time trying to figure out what we spent our whole
lives trying to figure out, or at least our teenage
years and our twenties, is like, what's my identity? So
what you're really seeing in Joshua be fourteen is not
just people getting some realist state, but they're coming into
their identity, their national identity.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
And it's hard because.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
They've been through so much and they started from something
so small. It is easy for them to see themselves
according to what they've been through or where they started.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
And now they're breaking up.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
There's nine and a half tribes that get this land,
and so Joshua and the priests they're shaking this receptacle.
This is how they would cast lots. They would take
the thing and shake it and they would have little
wood blocks with different codes on them, and then they
would kind of shake it out and what it fell
on that meant this tribe gets that land, and this
tribe gets that land. When Caleb interrupts the process, he's like,
(09:37):
hold on, you're not going to figure out where I
live by just rolling some dice.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
Okay, I got a promise, Moses said.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Now, remember Moses was the one who was supposed to
lead the people into the land, but he was unable
to do it. And here's how I would put it
if I were a preacher.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
He got them out of each but he.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Never got Egypt out of them, because they were oppressed
for you know, four hundred and thirty years. And when
you've been under something for any length of time, when
you've been under the power of any influence for any
length of time, that influence becomes your identity.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
So now your.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Addiction speaks more to you about your potential than God's
word over you, than the prophetic gift that's.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Inside of you.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
It happens to all of us when when you've been
suffering from something, you can begin to take on the
name of your disease or your issue. It's rating the
name of your creator, whose image you were made of.
But see, it's how you see it. It's how you
see yourself. And I think I can prove to you
if you give me like two and a half minutes,
(10:49):
that the reason the people didn't go into the land
under Moses was because Moses never really saw himself in
the image of his creator.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Abram did.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Abram did, even though he had a hard time getting
with it, even though he was like, you got any
pills for that or anything like that, because I'm old now.
And even though he had to wait for Isaac and
he messed up in the process and ended up producing
something that caused him more trouble by sleeping with Hagar.
Even though all of that happened, God still called him
the Father of faith, the father of many nations, and
to show him who he was, he brought him out
(11:23):
of his tent, out of his limitation, out of his situation,
and he said, Okay, here's your revelation. Here's your situation.
Get out of your situation, and now look up, preach
into somebody.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Look up. And he said, count the stars if you can.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
I don't know how far he got before he was like,
what's the point of God, akin, you know three hundred
and forty three hundred and forty four.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
What are you trying to show me?
Speaker 2 (11:51):
And God said, as many as they are, so shall
your descendants be, So shall your seed be. So he
gives him an image, an image, not just an idea,
but an image.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Now. Colossians one fifteen look.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
It up real quick says that Jesus is the image
of the invisible God. That's very powerful, that Jesus shows
us what God is like that the Word became flesh
and dwelled among us. That's what Jesus is. He is
the image of the God that we can't see. Did
(12:29):
I get it right? Colossians one fifteen, that he is
the image of the invisible God. This is the challenge
for everybody under the sound of my voice. There is
a way that God sees you because he formed you.
There is that you see you. There is a way
that others see you. And where you go from this
(12:52):
point forward in your life is going to depend on.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Which mirror you believe.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I got all these mirrors in my house that are
messed up, and I know they're messed up because they
keep showing me. My beard is supposed to be black.
But I look in those mirrors and they're messed up.
They're defective. I'm gonna take them back to the store
because they keep showing me these gray patches. Like I'm
forty years old and I started rebuking mirrors in my house.
You know, these lines coming up under my eyes, and
(13:23):
I'm like, you are a liar like your father the devil.
I cast you back to the pit of hell or
this it actor how many, ever, looked in a messed
up mirror. How many, ever, have people around you that
made you feel a certain.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Way about yourself.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
When Moses was coming into his identity and assignment, he
had to deal with the fact that he was really
living with two different images of who he was. And remember,
God is using Moses to deliver the Israelites out of
this Egyptian oppression.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
And when Moses first first starts to act on his.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Impulse, he does the right thing, but he does it
the wrong way. He defends his people, but he does
it by murdering an Egyptian. So he's ahead of his
time and he's out of his own but he's doing
the right thing. But he still doesn't know who he
is yet, and it's difficult for him because he doesn't
really fit in with either group that he's living with.
(14:24):
The Hebrews are the people he was born from. The
Egyptians are the people that he was raised by. But
he identifies more with the people that he was born
from than the people he was raised by, so he
doesn't really fit in. And when you don't really fit
into either group, you end up running. That's what happened
to Moses. He confronted an Egyptian who was beating a
(14:47):
Hebrew one day, and he killed him and buried him.
But then the next day he went out and saw
two of his brothers fighting, and he was like, break
it up, guys. You know we're suffering enough from them.
We don't have to kill each other. And this is
in Exodus chapter two. I want to show it to.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
You real quick. You got it Exodus two.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
The man said back to him, who has made you
a prince and a judge over us?
Speaker 1 (15:12):
Do you mean to kill me as you have killed
the Egyptian?
Speaker 2 (15:15):
And then Moses was afraid and thought, surely the.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Thing is known, and he ran. He ran.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We don't really see him in his next stage of
his assignment until forty years later. He ran because he
was to Hebrew to be an Egyptian, and to Egyptian
to be a Hebrew. And when you don't really fit
in with either, you don't know who you are, and
you spend years of your life running from who you
(15:43):
really are, looking in the mirror of your last mistake.
He ran, and he ran, and he ran. And see
the question is the right one, he said, who made you?
Speaker 1 (15:55):
Who made you? But if you don't know that.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
You will hand other people your mirror to show you
who you are. And let me tell you something about people.
People would rather define you by your worst mistake. What's
crazy about Moses is he killed a man and there's
only one verse in.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
The Bible about the murder. Now, if you let church people.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Write the Bible, they would have had a whole book
about it. Would be called the Book of Moses's murder,
the Book of Moses's mistake, the Book of Debi's divorce,
the book of your lowest moment. But maybe God doesn't
see you through the lens of your mistake.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Maybe he sees you through the lens of his grace.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Maybe when he looks at you, he sees the finished
work of Jesus Christ. Have you ever thought about the
fact that if they didn't make you, they can't define you.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
My maker, there is my mirror. I promise. I'm trying
to be as calm as I can be.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
But when God showed me that my maker is my mirror,
he showed me Moses standing in front of the burning bush.
And God's like, I'm gonna use you. You're gonna be
the one to do it.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
You're the one.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Who's had the conflicted identity and so many mistakes, and
you don't even really believe in yourself. And so I
was thinking about you and how you might be standing
in front of something that God is speaking to you
and is burning on the inside, but you can't really
locate yourself because honestly, you don't fit into either group.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
You don't really fit in with really.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Churchy people because they are so perfect and they pray
so much, and they make Bible verses out of their
kids sandwiches before they pack them in the lunch box
numbers thirteen thirty one, cut out with scripture stencils and
pack it in the lunch box like the Fish and
the Loaves and the Little Boy. And you are not
(18:00):
churchy enough, but you're really not worldly enough, because the
spirit of God is on the inside of you when
you try to sin, telling you that you're something greater
than that. And you're kind of righteous, but you're kind
of ratchet, and you're kind of a worshiper, but you're
kind of worldly, and you kind of worry but you
(18:23):
kind of worship, and you're kind of organized, but you're
kind of chaotic, and you're kind of powerful, but you're
kind of petty and you come on, I'm preaching to somebody,
and you're a little bit of both.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And your self concept is in development.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
And this is when it's very important who holds your mirror,
because if the wrong people show you, you get a
distorted image of yourself, and then you start matching in
your life what you see in your mind.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
That's what That's what Moses did.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
God's like, all right, got a job for you to do.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I'm gonna use you. I'm gonna give you everything you need. Cool.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Moses is like, uh but uh but uh but see
the thing about me. Watch what's what He says. This
is Exodus four ten. It's which mirror you're looking at, right,
So if you look at the mirror of what you're
missing and you only see what's not there, that's what
(19:38):
Moses did. He's like, he goes, oh my lord, this
is an Exodus four ten. Oh mg, he says, oh
m L. He's like, I'm not eloquent. I am not eloquent.
It's funny because I got the scripture on the back
screen right now, and it's got a typo in it.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
It says I I am eloquent. He said, the opposite.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
That's that's what he said, right there, I am not eloquent,
and you really have both voices. That's that's kind of
how it feels, right like one is saying I am
and one is.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Saying I'm not. And I don't know which one.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
I got this thing on the inside of me that
feels like I can do it and I'm supposed to
do it and I'm gonna make it. But I got
this other thing saying and I don't know which way
to look.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So he said, I'm not eloquent.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
And then he says, either in the past or in
the last five minutes, nothing has changed since you started speaking.
It's still the same. I got saved and my nose
is still big. I got saved, and I'm still kind
of cross eyed and I read slow. I got saved
and I still don't feel intelligent enough. I got saved
(20:50):
and I still got memories. I got saved, and I
love God, but I still got trauma. I got saved
and I love God, but I'm still limited.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
By my experience.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
He said, I'm not. I'm not what you think I am.
God's answer is so instructive. Next verse, the Lord said,
who has made who made your mouth? Who made your brain? Yeah,
(21:26):
but I'm just weird. What if the world is weird
and we're the normal ones?
Speaker 1 (21:35):
Yeah, I like it.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
I gotta be careful who I look at when I preach,
by the way, because you're like a mirror. Oh they
put this Chris is Chris Brown around? If he's around
bringing back up, Colin comeson when the worship leaders are leading.
They don't know this, but there was a choir out
here today at Valentine and they were standing on these
risers and if Chris didn't coming, you'll have to do okay,
so LJ. They think that they're just up here saying
(22:01):
I tell about you'll, we could teach a whole thing
on this. Can y'all still see me back here, because
I want to tell this to them. One time, they
discovered that a lot of primates and all humans are
softwired with mirror neurons, so our brains actually experience the
same emotion that somebody were watching if we're tuned into them.
And they got it from a monkey that was watching
(22:21):
a man open a nut, and they had it hooked
up to his brain and they saw the same brain
activity in the monkey's brain that was in the man's
brain who was opening the nut. And they realized that
all humans are wired in such a way with mirror
neurons that I experience your reality by watching you experience it.
So this is why when a parent gets mad, kids
(22:42):
can feel that stuff. They can feel that tension. It's
called a mirror neuron. Here's what was happening while you
were singing. This is how I fight my battles. Somebody
out there was going through a battle, but they've been
feeling like they were losing.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
But God puts you out here as a mirror.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Well, now, all of a sudden, they didn't feel victorious
this week. But when they saw you worshiping God, don't
run from me. I got you by this leather coat.
When they saw you worshiping God, they didn't feel like
they had the victory. But while you were shouting the victory. Now,
I wonder if you would do that for somebody on
your row right now. I know you had a hard
(23:21):
week too, But magnify the Lord with me.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Let us exalt his name together. If you don't have
faith today, borrow mine. You are gonna make it. I said.
So it's called mirror neurons.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
And just as contagious as faith is, so is cynicism.
So if you got cynical people holding up your mirror,
you'll always feel small. You'll always feel smaller than your child,
smaller than your giant, smaller than your addiction, because you're
not looking at your God. But when your maker is
your mirror. Three forty four, three forty five, three forty six,
(24:12):
I'm still counting. God's not done yet. His mercies are
new with every rising up the sun. He who began
a good work in me, will be faithful to complete it.
One thing about a mirror, it always shows you the
image in reverse. God knows how your situation turns out.
God knows how your story ends. God knows what he
(24:34):
put in you. When this message flooded into my heart,
I was like, it's gonna change somebody's life because they've
just been looking in the wrong mirror, been looking at
(24:55):
their mistakes. When your mistakes are your mirror, you stay
on the outside of Canaan, even though you have the
strength to go in, not because you are small, but
because you see small. So the spies came back and
they were like, hey, Moses, Remember Moses has dealt with rejection,
(25:18):
his whole life, and so a lot of times when
people don't accept you, it's because they have rejected themselves.
Not all the time, a lot of times. And this
is a really important point. Everybody's acceptance is not a
(25:38):
blessing because the majority might be the wrong mirror. Ten
out of twelve said we can't go in. Ten out
of twelve said there.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
To be We went in. This is what they said.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
We went to the land Moses, and they became the
mirror for the millions of people who had a promise
from God but hadn't possessed it yet. This is why
so important who you're around, what you take in, what
you look at, you become what you behold. So the
people are giving a report and they're like, it's a
(26:19):
great place. The valleys are fertile, it's a rich land.
We brought you back some grapes. Grapes were so big
they had to carry them on poles. But then they
stopped looking at God, stopped looking at grapes and started
talking about giants. And when they looked too much at
(26:39):
the giants as their mirror, they saw themselves as grasshoppers.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
That's what they said.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Numbers thirteen thirty three They said, there were the Nephelum,
the sons of Anak who come from the Nephilum.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
There were giants in the.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Land, big strong adversary that we would have to dispossess
to take the land. And we seemed to ourselves, wow,
like grasshoppers.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Not to God.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
We seem to ourselves like grasshoppers. Most people see God
really big. Even those who barely believe in God see
him really big. It's not how big you see God,
it's how much you believe that God is in you.
(27:32):
We seemed to ourselves as grasshoppers, and so we seemed
to them.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Our reflection determined our reality. We looked at him. What
got me about it.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Is that they could have seen the exact same situation
in reverse.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Watch this. They were like, the giants are too big.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
God promised us the victory, but I guess we can't
go in because of the size of the giants. Reverse it,
because God always shows you the image and reverse. So
it's like this, God has already promised us the victory
and the.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Giants are so big.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
If the giants are that big and God has promised
us the victory, if what is coming against us is
that great, how much greater must God be within me?
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Greater is he come on and help me?
Speaker 2 (28:31):
That is within me, then he that is in the world.
The size of my giant is a proof of the
size of my God.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Thank you Lord.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
If God is letting me experience a challenge this big See,
God is trying to use your enemies to show you
how valuable you are in his gigdom. And why would
you let your enemies hold your mirror? Anyway? Who cares
(29:10):
what the sons of anac think you look like? That's
what Caleb said. He was like, shut up, we can
do it. Hit somebody, say, shut up, I can do it.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
It's in the Bible too. It's in the Bible. Caleb
said that he says shut up.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
He silenced the people and said, if God is with.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Us, my maker is my mirror.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And I always thought it was funny because he's like, hey, Joshua,
I know you're rolling these little lots around on the
ground to figure out who lives there. But remember God
gave me a promise that I would live in the
high place I want hebron, hebron three thousand feet above
sea level, above.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Sea level.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
I'm gonna have to take a month off after I
appreciate this message. I'm giving you everything I got. You've
been living a c level. You've been looking in the
wrong mirror. You've been consulting the mirror for your flesh.
You put twenty minutes into your makeup today, but you
didn't you didn't get in this mirror right here.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
This is a mirror too. This is a mirror too.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
You've been struggling over external issues, but what about what's
in you?
Speaker 1 (30:38):
James said something curious.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
He said, if you listen to the word and don't
do it, you're like a man who looks at himself
in a mirror. In the beginning was a word, and
the word was with God, and the word.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Was God, My maker is my mirror. So I can't look.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
I can't run around the people who are struggling with
their own sin of self to determine mine.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
And I can't use the situation either.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
That's why I love Caleb because it's almost like he's lying.
Come moment, he's eighty five and he's walking. I'm talking
about I still got it. Now, what mirror are you
looking at? Look at somebody says I still got it?
It'll feel good to say it. Too, I still got
(31:31):
it because I'm not talking about the flesh. I'm talking
about faith. And the wilderness can do one of two
things to you. It can kill you or it can
make you stronger. Caleb said, all that I went through,
I didn't get bitter. I didn't get the wilderness in me,
(31:54):
even though I went through the wilderness. In fact, everything
I went through over the last four and a half
decades only serve to convince me.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
That much more that I still got it.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
I mean, if God promised it to be back then
and saw me through all this, I don't want to
live at the level of feelings. You settle too low.
You settle for what you see, You settle for what
people say. You settle for old templates, you settle for
old scripts, you settle for emotions. When you're stated in
(32:31):
heavenly places with Jesus, you got to settle up.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
You gotta get up above what.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
You see, above what you feel, and above what you've
been through.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
He said, I want to live.
Speaker 4 (32:48):
I want to live where the blessings are. I want
to live where the battles are. You can't have a
victory without a battle. God is raising you up right now.
He's doing it through a process. The level you will
(33:12):
settle on is the level that you see yourself. And
it makes me so sad to think of how many
times that you and I have gone to the wrong mirrors,
and so we see a grasshopper when we're really a giant,
(33:38):
When we see a failure.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
When really it was a lesson, when we see what's
missing because we can only see through the filter of
our fear. God said, let us make man in our image,
in our likeness. You are not my maker. You will
(34:03):
not be my mirror. When God said I Am to Moses,
you know my name is I Am, he was trying
to get in to see you are as I am.
That's what a mirror does. God says, I want to
(34:26):
see myself in you. When God sees you, he sees himself.
He sees his son. Christ is the image of the
invisible God, and if he is in you, he is
more than the world against you.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
I want to pray for a few hundred people today.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
You will know who you are if the message resonated
with you in a personal way.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
And it's this. You've been going to the wrong mirror.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
You've been consulting physical, natural, relational, elements incomplete fragmented elements,
and you don't know who you are right now, and
you're stuck between two realities.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
The message God gave me was your Maker is your mirror.
And you know what's beautiful. You're his.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
He wants to use you to reflect himself to the world,
and so he's gonna give you some stuff.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Some of it's gonna.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
Be giants in front of you, some of it's gonna
be giants inside of you.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
David was good at killing.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Giants as long as they were standing in front of him.
It was the ones within him that took him out.
Some of them are gonna be short term, some of
them are gonna be long term. If you go to
the wrong mirror, you'll always feel small.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
But if you will learn how to worship and get
in the word of God and believe the promise that
He spoke for your life and get in this mirror, you.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Are not going to win over insecurity. Looking in the
mirror of Instagram, it is only going to show you
what you're not, what you can, and what you want.
But if you get in this mirror, I'm telling you
the word of God can do something for your spirit.
It can make you stronger in your spirit than your
enemies are in your situation.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
Now stand up on your feet. I want to pray
with you. I want to pray with you. I want
to prophesy over you. I don't want anyone moving or leaving.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
The Lord said that this word would hit deep for
the ones who needed it. Have been seeing themselves, according
to past experiences, have been looking in a rear view
mirror at something that happened, and are about to wreck
in the face of their future. And he said that
today he wanted to give you a different mirror, different mirror.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Caleb said, I'm not just settling for my lot in life.
I'm not just settling for depression.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
I was hesitant to preach the message because I thought
people would hear it like it was some you know,
God give me my BMW, you know, God make me famous.
That's not what Caleb said. He said, I want the challenge.
I want the altitude. I want the opportunity to prove
God again. I want to live at the high place.
(37:27):
I want to be my higher self. I'm still strong.
Speaker 1 (37:31):
I still got it. I still got it.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My faith went through testing forty five years and I survived.
I still got it. I'm not ashamed of what I
went through. It proves that God was with me. I
still got it.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
Thank you for your word, Lord, It shows us who
we are.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
Thank you for worship where we can reflect you, where
we can behold your glory.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Close your eyes, visualize.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
The king told Elisha that he would strike the ground
three times. Elisha said you, you've got to see the victory.
Before you see the victory, open the east window and shoot.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
It's the first creation is You got to.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Be able to see yourself made of dust but touched
with divinity.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
You got to see.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
Yourself free, even though you don't feel free, even though
you still keep running back to lesser stuff. You gotta
know you got a higher purpose and a greater name.
I wish you would lift your hands in His presence,
wherever you are. I wish you would lift them high
and surrender. I wish you would lift them like the
burden has been rolled away, and begin to sing. I'm
(38:55):
gonna see a victory. I'm gonna see a victory. I
shall see it, gonna see it in my spirit. I'm
gonna see it in my heart. I'm gonna see it.
I'm gonna see deliverance. I'm gonna see the red Sea part.
I'm gonna see the mountains mooth. I'm gonna see.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
It come to pass in my blood line. I'm gonna
see it. I'm gonna see it. I'm gonna have the
joy of the Lord. I'm gonna see it. I'm gonna
fulfill it. I'm gonna walk in it. I'm gonna receive it.
I'm gonna prove it. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna
make it. I'm gonna sound it, I'm gonna declare it.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
You can click the link in the description to give
now or visit Elevation Church dot org slash podcast for
more information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
You can share it with your friends. You can click
the share button, take a screenshot and share it on
(39:58):
your social stories and tag at Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you.
Host
Steven Furtick
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