June 13, 2025 • 47 mins
Shift your perspective to see your struggles through the lens of faith. Through this sermon, you will begin to recognize that God's word is powerful enough to frame not just the world, but your personal challenges too.
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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 your perspective to see God is moving
in your life.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Enjoy the message.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I want to share today from the same subject that
I began last.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Week, about functional faith.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
About functional faith.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Now, judging from your response to my announcement of part
two of the teaching.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Perhaps you don't remember my sermon let's review.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
We were saying that faith doesn't always guarantee the outcome,
but it establishes the outlook.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
All things are possible to him who believes.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And so we want to take some time today in
a very famous passage of scripture, and I would ask,
if you don't mind, just stand while I read the scripture.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
And then the seat is yours. Somebody tithe good money
so you could have that seat.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
So I want you to use it.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
And we will give you that opportunity today. But just
stand for one more month, and I'm gonna be reading
the scripture from the King James version of the Bible,
because it's the one that I memorized it in Now
I don't still have it memorized, but at one time
I did.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
You can believe that or not is absolutely true.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
But we're just gonna read like a little sandwich real quick,
from Hebrews eleven and Hebrews twelve. And some of you
who are really churchy, you're gonna be tempted that while
I'm reading the scripture to start getting excited. Don't do it, Okay,
just let me read my scripture. These nice people don't
want to hear you shouting while I'm reading my scripture.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
But Hebrew's eleven one says, now, faith is the substance
of things hoped for.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
What did I tell you? I told you to sit still?
Speaker 2 (01:52):
And the evidence of things not seen by it? The
elders obtaining a good report by faith, we understand what?
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Do we understand?
Speaker 2 (02:02):
That the worlds were framed by the word of God,
so that things which are seen were made of things
are not made of things?
Speaker 3 (02:12):
Can I do that whole verse over? Through faith?
Speaker 2 (02:15):
We understand that the worlds were framed by the word
of God, so that things which are seen were not
made of things which do appear. Now look at Hebrews twelve,
verse one and two, Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed
about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight and the sin which does so
(02:38):
easily beset us, and let us run with patience.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Tell somebody we're getting fit. We're getting fit, and look
who our trainer is.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Let us run with patience the race that is set
before us, looking onto Jesus, the author and finisher of
our functional faith, who for the joy set before him,
endured the cross, despising the.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Shame, and is set down. Now.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
He didn't sit down because he was tired. He sat
down because it was done. Touch somebody say it's already done.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
It's already done.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I have to clarify faith, it's already done. Sat down
at the right hand of God. Now here's what we're
gonna do today. As a sermon title, I'm going to
teach you how to do an exercise. This also an experiment.
I want to talk about the Frame game. The Frame game.
Touch somebody on your way to your seat and said,
we're going to have a great time today.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
You may be seated. Thank you, Worship team.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Hey, keep touring, Mac, keep singing, Stay strong, we believe
in you.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
And now to go to this passage that I am.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
So excited to preach, like way more excited to preach
it than you are to hear it. Where I read
you two little passages that are so well known. If
these passages were an exercise, they would be the push
ups of faith, because it's just a really well known
(04:13):
passage where it says, not for in evidence and things
I've seen, and fix our eyes on Jesus, Author and
perfective of faith.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Those are well known.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
In the middle of those verses, there is a picture
that the author of Hebrews provides to encourage perseverance for
anyone who is fatigued in their faith. And to do
it he mentions people who now he calls a cloud
of witnesses, and he's establishing what we might call a
(04:45):
framework of faith. Interesting thing is that that list I
didn't read it to you. It is bookended by these
two descriptions of faith.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Faith is the substance of things.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Hope for, and that Jesus is the author and finisher
of our faith.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
And in between that he gives a picture.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
And these two passages they serve as the frame and
the picture. Here's the thing you got to know, sometimes
the frame is even more important than the picture.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Can I explain that a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Sometimes the way you say something is even more important
than what you say. You can say something to your
kids meant to develop them, that will destroy them all
because of the way that you framed it.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
You can put your.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Kids in a competitive mindset with their siblings, trying to
get them to act right and then kind of create
this dysfunction that they have the rest of their life.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Framework is important any married people, married people, any married.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
People, your phraseology in marriage is really important. I just
want to give you this quick tip because sometimes sometimes
it's not what you're saying to your husband, is how
you're saying it that he can't hear it.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
It's quiet, it's real quiet.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I'm a little nervous to proceed with this illustration, but
I'll do some nonetheless because I believe this has a
very practical application value to your life. You know, if
you really want to get your husband to change, catch
them doing something right and compliment him.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
But you don't have to do that.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
You can keep critiquing him for what he's doing wrong,
and he'll keep doing it because men repeat what you
feed them. So to understand how to effectively communicate with
your mate. Communicate with your mate, you have to learn
the art of framing its framework.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
As a parent, the way you frame.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
A question to your children, especially if they're younger. Now,
my kids are all under the age of eleven, so
I'm not writing my parenting book yet for at least
twenty years to see if any of this crap I.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Tell you actually works in real life.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
But I think you sometimes, as a parent, are tempted
when your kids are small, to give them too many
choices and too many options about dinner, about clothes, just
all kinds of options. And and in my personal parenting philosophy,
I don't ever give my children fill in the blank question.
(07:19):
When I'm asking them to do something for me, I
give I give them multiple choice, you know. So it's
it's not do you want to eat your broccoli?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
I don't ask my kids that.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
My kids, what I might say is.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Uh, would you rather eat your broccoli or never play
video games or see the light of day again? So
now see, you have a choice. I'm not telling you
you have to eat your broccoli. I'm just informing you
of the consequences of not eating the broccoli.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
It's called framing, and I learned it from a counselor.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
This counselor one time was preparing me to go into
a high intensity, high stress situation and he said, you
get all stressed out.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Every time you go around these people.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
I said, I do.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
I said, they're stressful people. He said, but what if
the this time you made a game out of it?
And I said, tell me more about this game, because
I like to play games. I'm the kind of guy
who will turn any conversation into a game.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
As college I like to play, would you rather? I
like to play?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
What if I can turn any conversation into a game.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
And I'm competitive by nature.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
So when he told me I can make it like
a game, that got my attention. He said, yeah, when
you go into this situation, you know they're crazy, So
go in like you're a sociologist, like you are studying
their species of crazy, and you have to bring back
a field report on the craziness of these people.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
So he gave me a technique.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
I didn't know at the time that he was teaching
me cognitive framing.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
How fancy is that he was teaching me that I
could I could take a situation or information facts, I
could take it and frame it a different way.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Now. Advertisers are doing this to you all the time.
Politicians are doing this to you. Occasionally. It is the
invisible frame by which they present the issue or the argument,
and you don't even see that it's there.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Which brings us to Hebrews eleven, where it says that.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
The worlds were framed by the word of God. When
I say framed, if you're in the construction industry, you
picture the raw material that builds a house and the
dimensions of it when you frame the house up.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
When you frame the house up, well that's a.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Good picture because the scripture says that when God was
looking around for something strong enough to build the world with,
there was no substitute for the raw material of his word.
So God framed and built the world which is visible
through the word, which is invisible. Now, we as his children,
get to imitate Him in our life through this thing
(09:41):
called faith. That is, we get to take the same
stuff that God used to frame the world and frame
our lives with it if we choose to that. The
same word of God that framed the ocean can frame
my situation on a Tuesday afternoon if I choose to
(10:01):
use it. So I want to talk about it for
a little while today because I want to build my
life with something that is sturdy and solid. So I
want to know God, can I borrow some of this
raw material? The rama, the word? The rama. You've heard
this before. The word of God is powerful enough to
(10:23):
shape and create my life. Now I get to frame
my life using the same substance that God used to
make my world. And so I got to get a
sense of focus.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Would you write that word down? Focus?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Some of you are playing on your phone, but you
need to focus and write down the word focus and
multitasking self.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
You need to focus.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Touch your neighbors say focus, tell them focus on me.
Focus on me. Now, I told you i'd do it.
Here's the part about this thing called focus, Okay. Focus
is a skill that must be sharpened continually, and.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I get a lot of practice with.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
It in preaching because how well I think my sermon
is going totally depends on which person I focus on
while I'm preaching.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Some of you make me suicidal.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
I mean, like I if.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I only had you to look at while I preached,
I would blow.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
My brains out on stage. But I'm really good at this.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Now. I'm a professional, so I don't really look at
the crowd.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
I scan.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
And I'm looking for love. That's what I'm looking for.
But I'm really good at it. I'm a professional because
like we go out on video shoots, okay, and sometimes
we go on video shoots to do for the church.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
There's all kind of crazy, chaotic stuff happening, and.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
I have to I have to focus and ask buck.
I'm a master of it.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
I can lock it in when the cameras. I can
have a million things going on, but I can focus.
We went to Israel a few years ago to shoot
an Easter presentation called seven Mile Miracle, and we were going.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
To different sites like Gaugatha, which is.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Now a bus depot by the way, so if you
ever go, you just need to know that the place
where they hung Our Lord, there's buses there, so anyway.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
But you get yours up.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
And we went on the Amais Road and the Garden Tomb,
which is beautiful.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
But when we went for the last shoot on the
Via Dolorosa, the crew to me, don't even come in today.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You can't do this.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
I said, I could do it. What's the problem. They said,
it's real busy. So we shot this little video. Here's
twenty seconds of it.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
We showed it a few years ago.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
But watch this.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
There's somebody participating in this experience that needs to know
today you've got a new twenty four. His mercies are
new with every rising of the sun, that his faithfulness
is great, That.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
He walked a path where.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
He was forsaken, so that you could walk a path
where you would never be forsaken.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
That God in heaven remembers you.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Now, let us remember his death, let us remember his salvation.
He created like a holy moment via dolerosa, the way
of suffering, the path that he tried.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
But I asked him to go back and pull the
wide shot. That's the tight shot. Here's the wide shot.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I want you to see what's going on the via.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Dolerosa that while I was preaching that show the clip.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
There's somebody participating in this experience that needs to know
today you got a new twenty four. His mercies are
new with every rising of the sun.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
That his faithfulness is.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Great, That he walked a path where he was forsaken,
so that you could walk a path where you would
never be forsaken.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
That God didn't head.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
I see, unless our preacher would have been distracted by
that Middle Eastern girl with a Hello Kitty backpack. Not me,
Why I'm focused? Dot your neighbor say, I'm focused. You'd
be surprised what you could do if you would get focused.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Really you would.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
And it doesn't mean that chaos stops in your life either. Oh,
I have focused if it weren't for these kids. No,
you need to control your frame. You can't control everything
that happens out here.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
You can control who walks by. But but I can
give me camera one. This is what's called a tight shot.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
That means that this shot on camera one is only
designed to show me. We can zoom in, zoom in
a little bit, zoom until they can see the gray
hairs on my beard. Okay, zoom in, zoom in a
little bit more.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
It's focus. Now, that's that's a tight shot.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
That's a that's a terrifying shot. You should zoom out,
zoom out, zoom out. Quick.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Quck quick coock uick quck quick.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I just wanted you to see that you choose your focus. See,
they're they're directing those cameras in the back and they
are making the decision in the moment, what needs the attention.
Speaker 3 (14:59):
So it's it's interesting coming here to JJ.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
JJ can be on the stage, and if we're if
we're working with the wide shot, he's a distraction because
what's he even doing here? What are you even doing here?
But let's say I can't make him go away. You know,
he's a Valentine campus pastor.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Now he wants to stand on the stage. But watch
what I can do camera one.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
I can focus.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
I'm trying to say, he might not leave the stage,
but that doesn't mean I have to keep him in
my frame. I am preaching about anxiety, ap preaching about depression.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
You might stand there.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Well, my faith gives me Li's sten now a focus
touch three people say focus, focus, focus. Faith is powered
by focus, and so they're deciding back there the camera
operators what to put into the frame. That's what is
called the frame. The worlds were framed by the word
(15:59):
of God. The reasons and they're watching me preach on
a screen is because somebody that you can't see is
running a camera and framing it. You know, it is
the invisible aspects of your life that often determine the results.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Faith.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
This the substance of things hoped for and the evidence
of things not seen. It's a matter of focus. And
so you frame up your life. You know, you do
it every day. And Hebrews eleven and twelve give us
a framework of faith, a focal point, telling us to
(16:32):
fix our eyes on Jesus. Now we need Peter to
come and show us how to walk on water.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Whoops, he slipped.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
He slipped because he let the wind and the waves
in his frame. We can't blame him because the wind
and the waves were there. The wind and the waves
were there while he was walking on the water. But
when you allow things in your frame that break your
focus faith this weekend, and you will never build a
(17:03):
solid faith with a weak focus.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Focus. Focus focus.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Maybe it's just because my eight year old is playing
baseball right now, and that's the thing I hear coach
Dave Yelle more than anything to these eight year old boys.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Focus focus.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Focus is not real complicated when they're eight, Like, just.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
Have your glove on your hand when the ball comes.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Okay, focus, somebody show focus. Look at your neighbor, tell
them focus. Some of y'all won't even receive this word
at a deep enough level to build your faith for
your life, because you're not focused on what I'm saying.
You're thinking about who you're meeting after church.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
But if you would focus.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
On this word, the breakthrough that you need is in
this word I'm preaching.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
All you gotta do is.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Focus, focus, focus, because the frame of your faith.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Let's build this out.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Actually, we need focus, and then we need a friend
of reference, a frame of reference. So the writer of
Hebrews said that God started the world with his word.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
And now that same word is the word by.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Which, if you receive it, you will receive a measure
of faith. And then you frame your world according to
the same word that God spoke the universe into existence with.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
He's given a frame of reference all the way.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
To Jesus, who endured the shame of the Cross through faith.
It's a frame of reference for a suffering church. And
he's given them a frame of reference, reminding them of
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. This is the picture that's
inside the frame of Hebrews eleven and twelve. He's given
them a picture, and it's given them a frame of reference.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Like when you and Rachel took Bo to the hospital
last week.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Bo, their little son is prone to injuries more than
most little boys. Even I would say, when you say,
it's just got a bruiser. And so he bangs his
head against a poll on the playground during church, and
they took him to get some stitches, and the emergency
room wait was eleven hours for some stitches. Now, Elaijah,
(19:07):
if that had been you, I would have put a
shoelace in your eye and tied it up.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
We would not have waited eleven hours.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
But it was a deep gash, so they probably needed
to wait. I said, were you mad, buck, I would
have been furious. Eleven hours for some stitches?
Speaker 1 (19:22):
He said.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
I was at first, But the more people that came
into the er that night that I realized I might
have to wait a little while.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
But some of them aren't leaving, he said.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
The longer I sat there, the less frustrated I was,
and the more I started realizing that this might be
how I'm spending my night in the hospital. But some
people have spent their last six months in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Nothing changed, but the frame.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Nothing changed.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
But the frame.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
That's so often what we need is a frame of reference.
Sometimes white people need to have a black friend. Sometimes
black people need to have a white friend. Broke people
need some rich friends. Rich people need some broke friends.
(20:25):
And what we're doing, we're trading perspectives. Hey, take a
look at life through my lens, and we get wiser
and we get smarter. Because it's a frame of reference.
So often your perspective is developed in reverse. Sometimes the
way to get through what you're going through right now
(20:46):
is to go to the wide lens. Wide lens, camera two,
camera two. The wide shot is what gives me a
frame of reference. This is the tight shot. It's an
important shot. But sometimes what I need is a wide
shot so that when I see Goliath on the battle lines,
(21:07):
I have a frame of reference that takes me back
to the lion and the bear in.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
The sheep field.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
Sometimes I need a frame of reference to realize that
I was worried last month, this time when the bills
were due, God made away. It's a frame of reference.
This is why we're instructed in the Bible. As often
as we're instructed.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Anything to remember, to remember.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Sometimes you got to play the tape back, you know,
because the enemy will get you so focused on this
one frame, this one thing, and you will lose your
whole frame of reference.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
What are you doing staying.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Up late worried about this one? No, you gotta zoom
out and change your frame of reference. That's why I
came to church the way I needed to be around
some other believers. I needed to broaden my frame of reference.
I needed to remember that I'm not the only one
(22:10):
serving God, and I'm not the only one going through
And I need Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. I need
the whole cast of characters in Hebrews eleven. I need
Jesus to remind me that if he endureed the Cross,
I can make it through this crisis.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
So we zoom out and we zoom in in life
and what they.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Really got to do back on the camera to be successful,
to keep me in the frame.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Touch.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Somebody say, keep it in the frame, keep it in
the frame. Yeah, because you've got to keep joy in
the frame. You got to keep hope in the frame.
Faith is the substance of things hope for faith is
that invisible connection point by which I reach out and
grab what I'm hoping for and bring it into this moment.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
So that requires anticipation. I'm building something here. By the
way I'm building something I'm framing something. Here, I'm framing something.
You gotta are you? Are you follow?
Speaker 3 (23:05):
You gotta That's that's their whole job.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
There are camera operators who have been who have been fired,
and they're volunteers because they don't anticipate my movements. Now
you know these guys are professionals. We got the A
team on the cameras today and they are instructed.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Look, Pastor Steven doesn't stand still.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
And just because he preached it one way at nine
to thirty doesn't meet. He's gonna preach it that way
at eleven thirty. So you gotta be ready. You gotta
switch quick.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
And God is like that.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
You know, you can't just you can't just set the camera.
This is how some of you live your lives. And
it's and it's why you it's why you don't have
any faith, by the way, and it's it's why you
haven't seen God do anything in your life. Take your
hands off the camera. Some of y'all just set the
frame and then and they say, well, where is God?
Speaker 4 (24:16):
But if you have faith, the substance of things hoped
for and the evidence of things not seen, Jesus for
the joy that was set before him.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
He didn't get stuck in one spot. But for the joy,
watch this camera. See I'm gonna show you how good
they are. I can come down here. I can come
down here. I turn around, hit this camera. Look how
trained they are. There's nowhere I can go in this
(24:51):
auditorium because they know I am libel and likely to
do just about anything. So if you'll sit at the
front of the church, you better know that too. But
they might have to follow me to the back. It's
your job to anticipate where I might go. Well, I
(25:12):
feel the anoying of winging Bretzky on me. Remember when
he said, I don't skate to where the puck is.
I skate to where the puck's gonna be. I don't
set up camp where God was. I want to know
where God is gonna be next. So God lead me
by faith to somebody, say I'm moving by faith.
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Catch me if you can. So that's their job.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
It is an anticipatory spirit.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
You know.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
The thing that faith and fear both share in common
is they are empowered by anticipation. So you wake up
in the morning and if you frame your day with
the anticipation of depression.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
And discouragement.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Some of you have framed your day to suck before
it ever gets started.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Got a tough week coming up?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
I guess you do, because you've framed it that way.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
I guess you do.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
I wouldn't want to be you this week either, not
the way you're talking, because the worlds were framed by
what was spoken. So when you say it's gonna be
a tough week, you're speaking something that you're gonna see.
But it came out of your mouth. And so the
(26:37):
song hast had the right idea. He said, this is
the day that.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
The Lord has made it.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
What's he doing? He's framing his day.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
I will rejoice and be glad in it.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Well, what are you glad about?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
I don't know yet, but I will be glad.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
You're gonna freak people out when you start acting this way.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
By the way, it's gonna freak people out.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
You are gonna be at the same job you were
at last week this week, and people gonna be looking
at you like what happened?
Speaker 1 (27:11):
What happened to you? Do you get a promotion?
Speaker 2 (27:17):
No?
Speaker 5 (27:18):
I didn't get a new promotion. I got a new perspective.
I got a new frame. Touch somebody saying I got
a new frame. I got a new frame. That's what happened.
Some of you who have been talking to.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Your girlfriends about your husband and complaining about him.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
When you get around those girlfriends.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
This week and you're starting to brag about all the
things he's doing, right, they're gonna look at you like,
did you get a new husband?
Speaker 1 (27:43):
No?
Speaker 2 (27:44):
I didn't get a new husband, but I put him
in a new frame. I started looking for something that
I could be glad. I will rejoice repeat after me.
Touch your neighbors say frame it up?
Speaker 1 (28:01):
What are you talking about?
Speaker 3 (28:02):
All right?
Speaker 2 (28:02):
When I sit down to do a video shoot, the
first thing they have to do, well, I'm getting ready
and putting on a little makeup. Yeah, you gotta put
a little makeup when you do the video shoot. I
know it's terrible. I know you used to respect me.
I'm still a man. But they just a little bit
of powder, Just a little bit of powder, and they say,
hang on a second, pastor, we gotta frame up the shot.
(28:24):
Wonder what your week would be like if you framed
it up before you went into it.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Frame it? Oh. I like the way they say it,
frame it.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
I think that's what worship is.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
By the way, it's framing it. It's framing it. When
I lift my hands. You need to know what I'm doing.
I'm framing it. I'm saying that come win, come wain.
I'm not afraid. I got Jesus in my boat, and
I gotta faith the up.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
Frame it up. I lift my eyes to the hills
from whence come at my health. I'm sorry, y'all. My
help comes.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
From the Lord.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
What am I doing it? I'm framing it up.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Can't look back, can't look down, Gotta look up. I have.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
So it's anticipation. And watch this. This is good. It's motivation.
It's motivation. It's motivation. Hand me the picture in my office.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Now.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I need to tell you something. I am an image
driven person, all right. So faith subs and so forth
the evidence of things. And I've seen I have a
great imagination. So I pictured you being at this church
before you came right and I preached to you were
in that seat. I preached until what was not seen
(30:04):
became the reality that I hope for.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
But sometimes on Wednesday or Thursday, I won't feel it.
You ever, just don't feel it.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
I still love God, I still love you.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
I love this word.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
It's precious to me, Sweeter than the honey from the
honeycomb if you want to know the truth about it.
But you know, I have to have pictures, So I
have pictures all around the office, people getting baptized, people
raising their hands to give their life to Christ, and
then just different staff members, people.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
That have been there along the journey.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
About a year ago, one of our photographers caught something
and whoever this is, I would love to know who
you are. I would send you a check filet coupon.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
In my mind, I just kept like going down until
I felt comfortable with the offer.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
But they caught a moment in worship, and they captured
this moment and this is right on my desk where
I preached my sermons.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
You see how al I just looking at me.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
That might be the only time during one of my
sermons that he's ever been paying attention, but in this moment,
and then you see my wife that one right there.
See that in my mind, that picture is it puts
me in the right frame of mind to remember that
(31:45):
somebody is looking up to me, because look how they're
looking at me.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
They are looking at me like I am their hero.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Don't you agree they sess the interpretation that I have.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
I draw my own. You know what I'm saying. I
can frame it how I want to frame it.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
Amen.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
So he's thinking, Wow, I have big shoes to fill.
That's what he's thinking in my mind. And she's thinking, God,
how what have I done to deserve this specimen of
spiritual out her?
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Tell somebody frame it up.
Speaker 2 (32:26):
So sometimes I look at it and I think, you know,
I got people counting on me this week, and the
way he's looking at me, it motivates me to dig
down deeper. Now, if this motivates me, consider Jesus. The
Bible says, for the joy set before him, what is that?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
That's you?
Speaker 2 (32:50):
It means that while he was on the cross, while
he was dying, the motivation that he had to Is
this what the author of Hebrews is teaching that it
was the glory of his father and the salvation of
his creation that kept him there. So sometimes you need
(33:15):
what we call an establishing shot hit the back of
the room camera, an establishing shot. That's what reminds me
in life that sometimes I can get so focused on
one moment that I can compromise everything that's related to
my destiny in one moment of pressure. So I got
(33:36):
to establish it again and realize that what I'm doing
by faith isn't just for me. This is a generational faith.
I want something to hand to my kids that's worth.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Holding on to.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Sometimes your frame is too small. That shot is designed
to give a context of the whole room for The
perspective is the one that we put on television so
people can go, Oh, people actually show up to hear
this guy preach.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
I should maybe listen to.
Speaker 2 (34:08):
Motivation. And you need all of these shots in your life.
You need all of these frames of reference. You need
all of these perspectives. Sometimes when you have all this
stuff swirling around you, you need camera one. That's the
focus shot, that's the tight shot. I'm going to deal
with what I'm dealing with today, and tomorrow is sufficient enough.
(34:32):
The grace of God will cover tomorrow. Today is sufficient
for its own trouble. I'm going to focus on what
I've got to do right now now.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Faith is the substance of things hope for so I
need that.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
And then sometimes I need that lion, and I need
that bear.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
I need that camera too. Shot. Give me camera two because.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Sometimes I need to know that the God who was
faithful in my past is no less competent in this
present struggle. I need to remember that the lion went
down and the bear went down. While we're talking about David,
can we establish the fact that David was looking at
the same giant as his big brothers, but he had
a different frame. It wasn't too different, Golias. It was
(35:14):
the same giant, but it was a new frame. I'm
changing my frame today.
Speaker 3 (35:18):
That's it. I made my decision.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
I framed up my life long enough by limitation and lack.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Today I'm making a.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Decision that if the word of God was good enough
to frame the world with, it's good enough to frame
my struggle too. To seven people, tell him, change your frame,
change your frame.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
Come on, you gotta do it.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
You gotta do it this week. Do it, do it,
do it.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Do it real quick, do real quick.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Get your hands and put them like this. And this
is what I want you to do to that stack
of bills that you've been wondering about.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
Reframe it.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
Touch somebody, say, reframe it.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
All right, this is what I want you to do
to the annoying people in your life. This is what
faith will enable you to do You're gonna reframe them. Oh,
you are no longer an annoying person. You are a
part of my spiritual development program designed to bring me patience.
I just reframed you and.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
You didn't even know it.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Joshua and Caleb have faith because they had a different frame.
What is your frame? My frame is this, If God
is for me, who can be against me?
Speaker 3 (36:28):
That's his word? Right, Well, that's my frame.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
I'm going into every situation knowing that He's for me,
and whatever comes against me, he's got it. I got
a new frame, and so there are some things give
me that. There are some things that if you're going
to touch somebody, say change your frame.
Speaker 1 (36:51):
Change a frame, change your frame.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
There are some things that are in your life right
now that need to be eliminated from your friend. See,
that's the fifth thing I wanted you to get. I
wanted you to realize that as you frame your life,
as you reframe your situation, it's going to take focus.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
It's going to take.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Perspective to have a new frame of reference, to realize
that there are other people who have gone through worse
and made it, that there's more to this life that
you're living than the season that you're in.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
It's going to take anticipation to know that.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
I got to be ready for change and I got
to be ready for challenge. But my life is framed
by the word of God.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
So I'm not worried about.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
It because I'm more than a conqueror through Him who
loved me.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
Because He made this day.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
I will rejoice and I've got a spirit of motivation.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
For the joy set before me. I'm going to endure
like Jesus.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
But the writer of Hebrew says that there are some
things called weight and sin that have to be removed.
Speaker 3 (37:48):
From the frame. See, this.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Was an important part of the worship till I got
up to preach. But now that it's preaching time, this
thing is in my way. So it's not a bad thing,
but it doesn't belong in this shot. So got to
learn how that sometimes in your life there are some things.
(38:20):
I mean, how annoying would it be if Mack would
have left his stupid mic stand out like a rock star.
Speaker 3 (38:27):
This ain't Chicago.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Come get your MIC's stand and get it out of
my frame. Tech somebody say, get your down out of
my frame, get your fear out of my frame. Sometimes
you got to look at situations in your life and
say not.
Speaker 3 (38:40):
Right now, I don't have time to carry this weight.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
My faith is a substans of something I'm hoping for.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
I'm headed in an upward direction.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
Get out of my frame. I'm sorry to get aggressive
about it, but would you push five people and tell
them get out of my frame? Out of my frame
and looking looking see this is gonna be so freeing
for you because you didn't know that you were the
(39:12):
director of this shot.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
You didn't even know. But but faith is a frame.
Speaker 3 (39:27):
Faith is a frame.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
I would love for you to go by Target, Dollar General.
Speaker 6 (39:35):
Whatever your taste, and get get a get a frame
to a picture frame, and leave it empty and put
it on your desk this week.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
If you don't have a desk, put it on your
coffee table. If you don't have a coffee table, put
it on.
Speaker 1 (39:55):
Your window sill. If you don't have a windows put
it on the floor. My point is.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
I don't want you to hear this message. I want
you to work this message to see your life through
the frame of faith.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
Every once in a while I will.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Talk to somebody in our church who has received news
that they have a very short time to live. Almost
without fail, talking to that person encourages me more than
it encouraged them. There are very few exceptions. Because they're sad,
they're nervous, they're worried. All of that's there. But it's
(40:45):
like when you talk to them, their frame has changed,
and so they actually it's the strangest thing. I can't
really explain it, but some things you can only understand
by faith. It's like this wasn't a good thing that
came into their life, but it gave them a new
frame to see their life through.
Speaker 1 (41:08):
And they're not irritable.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
About some of the things that they were irritable about anymore.
And they're not worried about some of the things they
were worried about anymore. And they don't even give attention
to some of the things they gave attention to anymore.
And I started the phone call to pray for them,
and I end up asking them to pray for me
because they have a better frame, because here.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
I am worried about, worried about this daily stuff, and
here they have a frame that lets them know that
tomorrow isn't promised.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
I mean, if you've ever seen somebody who was about
to die, and then they really started living. And it
took the possibility that they might die to really start living.
Speaker 1 (41:56):
It took the possibility that they.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Might not get to make it to see to walk
their child down the aisle, to start being a good father.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
Don't, don't.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
Don't let your life get so out of focus that
it takes a tragedy to change your frame. Don't let
it be that it takes a funeral to make you
appreciate your friends. Don't let it be that God has
to take something away to make you appreciate how good
(42:28):
it was while you had it. My advice to you
is to change your frame. And I think the writer
of Hebrews would agree. He would say that when you
fix your eyes on Jesus, even if you haven't fixed
the situation, if you fix the frame, fix a frame,
(42:49):
bring into visibility what really matters, my God. We are
so consumed with the wind and the waves that we
are missing the one who is able to walk on water.
And what I'd like to pray for you today is
that your frame leaving this place for whatever your facing
in your life, would be a faith frame. I want
(43:14):
to pray that you would become a framer in your
everyday life. And this means that you will see potential
in people that other people don't see potential in. This
means that you're going to stop spending all your time
trying to frame everybody else's life and start framing your own.
(43:35):
I just said a lot, and I didn't get a
good response on it, so I'm gonna stay on it.
Some of us are so busy trying to frame somebody
else's future what they should do and what you would do.
God didn't call you to frame anybody else's life. He
called you, And if you'll ever get busy with the
big picture of your life, you won't have time to
(43:56):
adjust my frame. So I want you to stand in
the presence of God, and I want you to do
something that has been symbolic in the church for thousands
of years. But put down your purse. The person next
to you is completely trustworthy.
Speaker 3 (44:18):
Put down your pen.
Speaker 1 (44:19):
There's nothing more to write down.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
Lift your hands, yeah, lift them up. Let go of
all of the things that have been in the frame,
all of the shame past.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
You can't change all of the names.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
Of the people that didn't come on. Let's get in
a faith frame of mind. What things are you hoping for?
What are the things that you can't see right now
that you believe not? Pray that the eyes of your
heart might be open. I pray that the perspective of
(45:00):
your faith might be ENLiGHT and I pray that your
imagination might be awakened to see the good things that
God has prepared for you. Lift your hands high. The
spirit of the Lord is in this place, and I
pray today for liberty and freedom in your life. I
pray today that in the presence of the Lord you
(45:21):
would find the fullness of joy and in.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
His right hand pleasures forevermore.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
I pray that whatever you've been looking at through the
lens of fear would look different today when you leave,
because of what the Word of God has reframed in
your life. I pray today that the eternal Word of
God would reframe your situation and yes, even reframe the way.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
You see yourself.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
God, we thank you today in Jesus' name that you
are reframing and recreating and renewing.
Speaker 3 (45:57):
All things to look like your word. We declare it,
confess your word over our situation.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
We declare it, confess your word over our insecurity. We
asked that the same word that frame the world, what
frame our lives this week, and we declare we will
say the goodness of the Lord in the land of
the Living. If you believe that, put a praise on
it and clap your hands in the presence of God.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (46:30):
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.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
You can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
share it on your social stories and tag us at
Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
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 your perspective to see God is moving
in your life.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Enjoy the message.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I want to share today from the same subject that
I began last.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Week, about functional faith.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
About functional faith.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Now, judging from your response to my announcement of part
two of the teaching.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Perhaps you don't remember my sermon let's review.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
We were saying that faith doesn't always guarantee the outcome,
but it establishes the outlook.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
All things are possible to him who believes.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And so we want to take some time today in
a very famous passage of scripture, and I would ask,
if you don't mind, just stand while I read the scripture.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
And then the seat is yours. Somebody tithe good money
so you could have that seat.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
So I want you to use it.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
And we will give you that opportunity today. But just
stand for one more month, and I'm gonna be reading
the scripture from the King James version of the Bible,
because it's the one that I memorized it in Now
I don't still have it memorized, but at one time
I did.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
You can believe that or not is absolutely true.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
But we're just gonna read like a little sandwich real quick,
from Hebrews eleven and Hebrews twelve. And some of you
who are really churchy, you're gonna be tempted that while
I'm reading the scripture to start getting excited. Don't do it, Okay,
just let me read my scripture. These nice people don't
want to hear you shouting while I'm reading my scripture.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
But Hebrew's eleven one says, now, faith is the substance
of things hoped for.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
What did I tell you? I told you to sit still?
Speaker 2 (01:52):
And the evidence of things not seen by it? The
elders obtaining a good report by faith, we understand what?
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Do we understand?
Speaker 2 (02:02):
That the worlds were framed by the word of God,
so that things which are seen were made of things
are not made of things?
Speaker 3 (02:12):
Can I do that whole verse over? Through faith?
Speaker 2 (02:15):
We understand that the worlds were framed by the word
of God, so that things which are seen were not
made of things which do appear. Now look at Hebrews twelve,
verse one and two, Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed
about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight and the sin which does so
(02:38):
easily beset us, and let us run with patience.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Tell somebody we're getting fit. We're getting fit, and look
who our trainer is.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Let us run with patience the race that is set
before us, looking onto Jesus, the author and finisher of
our functional faith, who for the joy set before him,
endured the cross, despising the.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Shame, and is set down. Now.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
He didn't sit down because he was tired. He sat
down because it was done. Touch somebody say it's already done.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
It's already done.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I have to clarify faith, it's already done. Sat down
at the right hand of God. Now here's what we're
gonna do today. As a sermon title, I'm going to
teach you how to do an exercise. This also an experiment.
I want to talk about the Frame game. The Frame game.
Touch somebody on your way to your seat and said,
we're going to have a great time today.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
You may be seated. Thank you, Worship team.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Hey, keep touring, Mac, keep singing, Stay strong, we believe
in you.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
And now to go to this passage that I am.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
So excited to preach, like way more excited to preach
it than you are to hear it. Where I read
you two little passages that are so well known. If
these passages were an exercise, they would be the push
ups of faith, because it's just a really well known
(04:13):
passage where it says, not for in evidence and things
I've seen, and fix our eyes on Jesus, Author and
perfective of faith.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Those are well known.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
In the middle of those verses, there is a picture
that the author of Hebrews provides to encourage perseverance for
anyone who is fatigued in their faith. And to do
it he mentions people who now he calls a cloud
of witnesses, and he's establishing what we might call a
(04:45):
framework of faith. Interesting thing is that that list I
didn't read it to you. It is bookended by these
two descriptions of faith.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Faith is the substance of things.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Hope for, and that Jesus is the author and finisher
of our faith.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
And in between that he gives a picture.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
And these two passages they serve as the frame and
the picture. Here's the thing you got to know, sometimes
the frame is even more important than the picture.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Can I explain that a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Sometimes the way you say something is even more important
than what you say. You can say something to your
kids meant to develop them, that will destroy them all
because of the way that you framed it.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
You can put your.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Kids in a competitive mindset with their siblings, trying to
get them to act right and then kind of create
this dysfunction that they have the rest of their life.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Framework is important any married people, married people, any married.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
People, your phraseology in marriage is really important. I just
want to give you this quick tip because sometimes sometimes
it's not what you're saying to your husband, is how
you're saying it that he can't hear it.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
It's quiet, it's real quiet.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
I'm a little nervous to proceed with this illustration, but
I'll do some nonetheless because I believe this has a
very practical application value to your life. You know, if
you really want to get your husband to change, catch
them doing something right and compliment him.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
But you don't have to do that.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
You can keep critiquing him for what he's doing wrong,
and he'll keep doing it because men repeat what you
feed them. So to understand how to effectively communicate with
your mate. Communicate with your mate, you have to learn
the art of framing its framework.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
As a parent, the way you frame.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
A question to your children, especially if they're younger. Now,
my kids are all under the age of eleven, so
I'm not writing my parenting book yet for at least
twenty years to see if any of this crap I.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Tell you actually works in real life.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
But I think you sometimes, as a parent, are tempted
when your kids are small, to give them too many
choices and too many options about dinner, about clothes, just
all kinds of options. And and in my personal parenting philosophy,
I don't ever give my children fill in the blank question.
(07:19):
When I'm asking them to do something for me, I
give I give them multiple choice, you know. So it's
it's not do you want to eat your broccoli?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
I don't ask my kids that.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
My kids, what I might say is.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Uh, would you rather eat your broccoli or never play
video games or see the light of day again? So
now see, you have a choice. I'm not telling you
you have to eat your broccoli. I'm just informing you
of the consequences of not eating the broccoli.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
It's called framing, and I learned it from a counselor.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
This counselor one time was preparing me to go into
a high intensity, high stress situation and he said, you
get all stressed out.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Every time you go around these people.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
I said, I do.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
I said, they're stressful people. He said, but what if
the this time you made a game out of it?
And I said, tell me more about this game, because
I like to play games. I'm the kind of guy
who will turn any conversation into a game.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
As college I like to play, would you rather? I
like to play?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
What if I can turn any conversation into a game.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
And I'm competitive by nature.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
So when he told me I can make it like
a game, that got my attention. He said, yeah, when
you go into this situation, you know they're crazy, So
go in like you're a sociologist, like you are studying
their species of crazy, and you have to bring back
a field report on the craziness of these people.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
So he gave me a technique.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
I didn't know at the time that he was teaching
me cognitive framing.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
How fancy is that he was teaching me that I
could I could take a situation or information facts, I
could take it and frame it a different way.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Now. Advertisers are doing this to you all the time.
Politicians are doing this to you. Occasionally. It is the
invisible frame by which they present the issue or the argument,
and you don't even see that it's there.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Which brings us to Hebrews eleven, where it says that.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
The worlds were framed by the word of God. When
I say framed, if you're in the construction industry, you
picture the raw material that builds a house and the
dimensions of it when you frame the house up.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
When you frame the house up, well that's a.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Good picture because the scripture says that when God was
looking around for something strong enough to build the world with,
there was no substitute for the raw material of his word.
So God framed and built the world which is visible
through the word, which is invisible. Now, we as his children,
get to imitate Him in our life through this thing
(09:41):
called faith. That is, we get to take the same
stuff that God used to frame the world and frame
our lives with it if we choose to that. The
same word of God that framed the ocean can frame
my situation on a Tuesday afternoon if I choose to
(10:01):
use it. So I want to talk about it for
a little while today because I want to build my
life with something that is sturdy and solid. So I
want to know God, can I borrow some of this
raw material? The rama, the word? The rama. You've heard
this before. The word of God is powerful enough to
(10:23):
shape and create my life. Now I get to frame
my life using the same substance that God used to
make my world. And so I got to get a
sense of focus.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Would you write that word down? Focus?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Some of you are playing on your phone, but you
need to focus and write down the word focus and
multitasking self.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
You need to focus.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Touch your neighbors say focus, tell them focus on me.
Focus on me. Now, I told you i'd do it.
Here's the part about this thing called focus, Okay. Focus
is a skill that must be sharpened continually, and.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I get a lot of practice with.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
It in preaching because how well I think my sermon
is going totally depends on which person I focus on
while I'm preaching.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Some of you make me suicidal.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
I mean, like I if.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I only had you to look at while I preached,
I would blow.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
My brains out on stage. But I'm really good at this.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Now. I'm a professional, so I don't really look at
the crowd.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
I scan.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
And I'm looking for love. That's what I'm looking for.
But I'm really good at it. I'm a professional because
like we go out on video shoots, okay, and sometimes
we go on video shoots to do for the church.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
There's all kind of crazy, chaotic stuff happening, and.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
I have to I have to focus and ask buck.
I'm a master of it.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
I can lock it in when the cameras. I can
have a million things going on, but I can focus.
We went to Israel a few years ago to shoot
an Easter presentation called seven Mile Miracle, and we were going.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
To different sites like Gaugatha, which is.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Now a bus depot by the way, so if you
ever go, you just need to know that the place
where they hung Our Lord, there's buses there, so anyway.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
But you get yours up.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
And we went on the Amais Road and the Garden Tomb,
which is beautiful.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
But when we went for the last shoot on the
Via Dolorosa, the crew to me, don't even come in today.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You can't do this.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
I said, I could do it. What's the problem. They said,
it's real busy. So we shot this little video. Here's
twenty seconds of it.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
We showed it a few years ago.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
But watch this.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
There's somebody participating in this experience that needs to know
today you've got a new twenty four. His mercies are
new with every rising of the sun, that his faithfulness
is great, That.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
He walked a path where.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
He was forsaken, so that you could walk a path
where you would never be forsaken.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
That God in heaven remembers you.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Now, let us remember his death, let us remember his salvation.
He created like a holy moment via dolerosa, the way
of suffering, the path that he tried.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
But I asked him to go back and pull the
wide shot. That's the tight shot. Here's the wide shot.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I want you to see what's going on the via.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Dolerosa that while I was preaching that show the clip.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
There's somebody participating in this experience that needs to know
today you got a new twenty four. His mercies are
new with every rising of the sun.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
That his faithfulness is.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Great, That he walked a path where he was forsaken,
so that you could walk a path where you would
never be forsaken.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
That God didn't head.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
I see, unless our preacher would have been distracted by
that Middle Eastern girl with a Hello Kitty backpack. Not me,
Why I'm focused? Dot your neighbor say, I'm focused. You'd
be surprised what you could do if you would get focused.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Really you would.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
And it doesn't mean that chaos stops in your life either. Oh,
I have focused if it weren't for these kids. No,
you need to control your frame. You can't control everything
that happens out here.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
You can control who walks by. But but I can
give me camera one. This is what's called a tight shot.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
That means that this shot on camera one is only
designed to show me. We can zoom in, zoom in
a little bit, zoom until they can see the gray
hairs on my beard. Okay, zoom in, zoom in a
little bit more.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
It's focus. Now, that's that's a tight shot.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
That's a that's a terrifying shot. You should zoom out,
zoom out, zoom out. Quick.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Quck quick coock uick quck quick.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I just wanted you to see that you choose your focus. See,
they're they're directing those cameras in the back and they
are making the decision in the moment, what needs the attention.
Speaker 3 (14:59):
So it's it's interesting coming here to JJ.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
JJ can be on the stage, and if we're if
we're working with the wide shot, he's a distraction because
what's he even doing here? What are you even doing here?
But let's say I can't make him go away. You know,
he's a Valentine campus pastor.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Now he wants to stand on the stage. But watch
what I can do camera one.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
I can focus.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
I'm trying to say, he might not leave the stage,
but that doesn't mean I have to keep him in
my frame. I am preaching about anxiety, ap preaching about depression.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
You might stand there.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Well, my faith gives me Li's sten now a focus
touch three people say focus, focus, focus. Faith is powered
by focus, and so they're deciding back there the camera
operators what to put into the frame. That's what is
called the frame. The worlds were framed by the word
(15:59):
of God. The reasons and they're watching me preach on
a screen is because somebody that you can't see is
running a camera and framing it. You know, it is
the invisible aspects of your life that often determine the results.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Faith.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
This the substance of things hoped for and the evidence
of things not seen. It's a matter of focus. And
so you frame up your life. You know, you do
it every day. And Hebrews eleven and twelve give us
a framework of faith, a focal point, telling us to
(16:32):
fix our eyes on Jesus. Now we need Peter to
come and show us how to walk on water.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Whoops, he slipped.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
He slipped because he let the wind and the waves
in his frame. We can't blame him because the wind
and the waves were there. The wind and the waves
were there while he was walking on the water. But
when you allow things in your frame that break your
focus faith this weekend, and you will never build a
(17:03):
solid faith with a weak focus.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Focus. Focus focus.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Maybe it's just because my eight year old is playing
baseball right now, and that's the thing I hear coach
Dave Yelle more than anything to these eight year old boys.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Focus focus.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Focus is not real complicated when they're eight, Like, just.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
Have your glove on your hand when the ball comes.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Okay, focus, somebody show focus. Look at your neighbor, tell
them focus. Some of y'all won't even receive this word
at a deep enough level to build your faith for
your life, because you're not focused on what I'm saying.
You're thinking about who you're meeting after church.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
But if you would focus.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
On this word, the breakthrough that you need is in
this word I'm preaching.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
All you gotta do is.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Focus, focus, focus, because the frame of your faith.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Let's build this out.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Actually, we need focus, and then we need a friend
of reference, a frame of reference. So the writer of
Hebrews said that God started the world with his word.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
And now that same word is the word by.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Which, if you receive it, you will receive a measure
of faith. And then you frame your world according to
the same word that God spoke the universe into existence with.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
He's given a frame of reference all the way.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
To Jesus, who endured the shame of the Cross through faith.
It's a frame of reference for a suffering church. And
he's given them a frame of reference, reminding them of
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. This is the picture that's
inside the frame of Hebrews eleven and twelve. He's given
them a picture, and it's given them a frame of reference.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Like when you and Rachel took Bo to the hospital
last week.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Bo, their little son is prone to injuries more than
most little boys. Even I would say, when you say,
it's just got a bruiser. And so he bangs his
head against a poll on the playground during church, and
they took him to get some stitches, and the emergency
room wait was eleven hours for some stitches. Now, Elaijah,
(19:07):
if that had been you, I would have put a
shoelace in your eye and tied it up.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
We would not have waited eleven hours.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
But it was a deep gash, so they probably needed
to wait. I said, were you mad, buck, I would
have been furious. Eleven hours for some stitches?
Speaker 1 (19:22):
He said.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
I was at first, But the more people that came
into the er that night that I realized I might
have to wait a little while.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
But some of them aren't leaving, he said.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
The longer I sat there, the less frustrated I was,
and the more I started realizing that this might be
how I'm spending my night in the hospital. But some
people have spent their last six months in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Nothing changed, but the frame.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Nothing changed.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
But the frame.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
That's so often what we need is a frame of reference.
Sometimes white people need to have a black friend. Sometimes
black people need to have a white friend. Broke people
need some rich friends. Rich people need some broke friends.
(20:25):
And what we're doing, we're trading perspectives. Hey, take a
look at life through my lens, and we get wiser
and we get smarter. Because it's a frame of reference.
So often your perspective is developed in reverse. Sometimes the
way to get through what you're going through right now
(20:46):
is to go to the wide lens. Wide lens, camera two,
camera two. The wide shot is what gives me a
frame of reference. This is the tight shot. It's an
important shot. But sometimes what I need is a wide
shot so that when I see Goliath on the battle lines,
(21:07):
I have a frame of reference that takes me back
to the lion and the bear in.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
The sheep field.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
Sometimes I need a frame of reference to realize that
I was worried last month, this time when the bills
were due, God made away. It's a frame of reference.
This is why we're instructed in the Bible. As often
as we're instructed.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Anything to remember, to remember.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Sometimes you got to play the tape back, you know,
because the enemy will get you so focused on this
one frame, this one thing, and you will lose your
whole frame of reference.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
What are you doing staying.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Up late worried about this one? No, you gotta zoom
out and change your frame of reference. That's why I
came to church the way I needed to be around
some other believers. I needed to broaden my frame of reference.
I needed to remember that I'm not the only one
(22:10):
serving God, and I'm not the only one going through
And I need Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. I need
the whole cast of characters in Hebrews eleven. I need
Jesus to remind me that if he endureed the Cross,
I can make it through this crisis.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
So we zoom out and we zoom in in life
and what they.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Really got to do back on the camera to be successful,
to keep me in the frame.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Touch.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Somebody say, keep it in the frame, keep it in
the frame. Yeah, because you've got to keep joy in
the frame. You got to keep hope in the frame.
Faith is the substance of things hope for faith is
that invisible connection point by which I reach out and
grab what I'm hoping for and bring it into this moment.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
So that requires anticipation. I'm building something here. By the
way I'm building something I'm framing something. Here, I'm framing something.
You gotta are you? Are you follow?
Speaker 3 (23:05):
You gotta That's that's their whole job.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
There are camera operators who have been who have been fired,
and they're volunteers because they don't anticipate my movements. Now
you know these guys are professionals. We got the A
team on the cameras today and they are instructed.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Look, Pastor Steven doesn't stand still.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
And just because he preached it one way at nine
to thirty doesn't meet. He's gonna preach it that way
at eleven thirty. So you gotta be ready. You gotta
switch quick.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
And God is like that.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
You know, you can't just you can't just set the camera.
This is how some of you live your lives. And
it's and it's why you it's why you don't have
any faith, by the way, and it's it's why you
haven't seen God do anything in your life. Take your
hands off the camera. Some of y'all just set the
frame and then and they say, well, where is God?
Speaker 4 (24:16):
But if you have faith, the substance of things hoped
for and the evidence of things not seen, Jesus for
the joy that was set before him.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
He didn't get stuck in one spot. But for the joy,
watch this camera. See I'm gonna show you how good
they are. I can come down here. I can come
down here. I turn around, hit this camera. Look how
trained they are. There's nowhere I can go in this
(24:51):
auditorium because they know I am libel and likely to
do just about anything. So if you'll sit at the
front of the church, you better know that too. But
they might have to follow me to the back. It's
your job to anticipate where I might go. Well, I
(25:12):
feel the anoying of winging Bretzky on me. Remember when
he said, I don't skate to where the puck is.
I skate to where the puck's gonna be. I don't
set up camp where God was. I want to know
where God is gonna be next. So God lead me
by faith to somebody, say I'm moving by faith.
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Catch me if you can. So that's their job.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
It is an anticipatory spirit.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
You know.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
The thing that faith and fear both share in common
is they are empowered by anticipation. So you wake up
in the morning and if you frame your day with
the anticipation of depression.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
And discouragement.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Some of you have framed your day to suck before
it ever gets started.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Got a tough week coming up?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
I guess you do, because you've framed it that way.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
I guess you do.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
I wouldn't want to be you this week either, not
the way you're talking, because the worlds were framed by
what was spoken. So when you say it's gonna be
a tough week, you're speaking something that you're gonna see.
But it came out of your mouth. And so the
(26:37):
song hast had the right idea. He said, this is
the day that.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
The Lord has made it.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
What's he doing? He's framing his day.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
I will rejoice and be glad in it.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Well, what are you glad about?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
I don't know yet, but I will be glad.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
You're gonna freak people out when you start acting this way.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
By the way, it's gonna freak people out.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
You are gonna be at the same job you were
at last week this week, and people gonna be looking
at you like what happened?
Speaker 1 (27:11):
What happened to you? Do you get a promotion?
Speaker 2 (27:17):
No?
Speaker 5 (27:18):
I didn't get a new promotion. I got a new perspective.
I got a new frame. Touch somebody saying I got
a new frame. I got a new frame. That's what happened.
Some of you who have been talking to.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Your girlfriends about your husband and complaining about him.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
When you get around those girlfriends.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
This week and you're starting to brag about all the
things he's doing, right, they're gonna look at you like,
did you get a new husband?
Speaker 1 (27:43):
No?
Speaker 2 (27:44):
I didn't get a new husband, but I put him
in a new frame. I started looking for something that
I could be glad. I will rejoice repeat after me.
Touch your neighbors say frame it up?
Speaker 1 (28:01):
What are you talking about?
Speaker 3 (28:02):
All right?
Speaker 2 (28:02):
When I sit down to do a video shoot, the
first thing they have to do, well, I'm getting ready
and putting on a little makeup. Yeah, you gotta put
a little makeup when you do the video shoot. I
know it's terrible. I know you used to respect me.
I'm still a man. But they just a little bit
of powder, Just a little bit of powder, and they say,
hang on a second, pastor, we gotta frame up the shot.
(28:24):
Wonder what your week would be like if you framed
it up before you went into it.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Frame it? Oh. I like the way they say it,
frame it.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
I think that's what worship is.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
By the way, it's framing it. It's framing it. When
I lift my hands. You need to know what I'm doing.
I'm framing it. I'm saying that come win, come wain.
I'm not afraid. I got Jesus in my boat, and
I gotta faith the up.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
Frame it up. I lift my eyes to the hills
from whence come at my health. I'm sorry, y'all. My
help comes.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
From the Lord.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
What am I doing it? I'm framing it up.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Can't look back, can't look down, Gotta look up. I have.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
So it's anticipation. And watch this. This is good. It's motivation.
It's motivation. It's motivation. Hand me the picture in my office.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Now.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I need to tell you something. I am an image
driven person, all right. So faith subs and so forth
the evidence of things. And I've seen I have a
great imagination. So I pictured you being at this church
before you came right and I preached to you were
in that seat. I preached until what was not seen
(30:04):
became the reality that I hope for.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
But sometimes on Wednesday or Thursday, I won't feel it.
You ever, just don't feel it.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
I still love God, I still love you.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
I love this word.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
It's precious to me, Sweeter than the honey from the
honeycomb if you want to know the truth about it.
But you know, I have to have pictures, So I
have pictures all around the office, people getting baptized, people
raising their hands to give their life to Christ, and
then just different staff members, people.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
That have been there along the journey.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
About a year ago, one of our photographers caught something
and whoever this is, I would love to know who
you are. I would send you a check filet coupon.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
In my mind, I just kept like going down until
I felt comfortable with the offer.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
But they caught a moment in worship, and they captured
this moment and this is right on my desk where
I preached my sermons.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
You see how al I just looking at me.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
That might be the only time during one of my
sermons that he's ever been paying attention, but in this moment,
and then you see my wife that one right there.
See that in my mind, that picture is it puts
me in the right frame of mind to remember that
(31:45):
somebody is looking up to me, because look how they're
looking at me.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
They are looking at me like I am their hero.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Don't you agree they sess the interpretation that I have.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
I draw my own. You know what I'm saying. I
can frame it how I want to frame it.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
Amen.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
So he's thinking, Wow, I have big shoes to fill.
That's what he's thinking in my mind. And she's thinking, God,
how what have I done to deserve this specimen of
spiritual out her?
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Tell somebody frame it up.
Speaker 2 (32:26):
So sometimes I look at it and I think, you know,
I got people counting on me this week, and the
way he's looking at me, it motivates me to dig
down deeper. Now, if this motivates me, consider Jesus. The
Bible says, for the joy set before him, what is that?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
That's you?
Speaker 2 (32:50):
It means that while he was on the cross, while
he was dying, the motivation that he had to Is
this what the author of Hebrews is teaching that it
was the glory of his father and the salvation of
his creation that kept him there. So sometimes you need
(33:15):
what we call an establishing shot hit the back of
the room camera, an establishing shot. That's what reminds me
in life that sometimes I can get so focused on
one moment that I can compromise everything that's related to
my destiny in one moment of pressure. So I got
(33:36):
to establish it again and realize that what I'm doing
by faith isn't just for me. This is a generational faith.
I want something to hand to my kids that's worth.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Holding on to.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Sometimes your frame is too small. That shot is designed
to give a context of the whole room for The
perspective is the one that we put on television so
people can go, Oh, people actually show up to hear
this guy preach.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
I should maybe listen to.
Speaker 2 (34:08):
Motivation. And you need all of these shots in your life.
You need all of these frames of reference. You need
all of these perspectives. Sometimes when you have all this
stuff swirling around you, you need camera one. That's the
focus shot, that's the tight shot. I'm going to deal
with what I'm dealing with today, and tomorrow is sufficient enough.
(34:32):
The grace of God will cover tomorrow. Today is sufficient
for its own trouble. I'm going to focus on what
I've got to do right now now.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Faith is the substance of things hope for so I
need that.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
And then sometimes I need that lion, and I need
that bear.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
I need that camera too. Shot. Give me camera two because.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Sometimes I need to know that the God who was
faithful in my past is no less competent in this
present struggle. I need to remember that the lion went
down and the bear went down. While we're talking about David,
can we establish the fact that David was looking at
the same giant as his big brothers, but he had
a different frame. It wasn't too different, Golias. It was
(35:14):
the same giant, but it was a new frame. I'm
changing my frame today.
Speaker 3 (35:18):
That's it. I made my decision.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
I framed up my life long enough by limitation and lack.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Today I'm making a.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Decision that if the word of God was good enough
to frame the world with, it's good enough to frame
my struggle too. To seven people, tell him, change your frame,
change your frame.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
Come on, you gotta do it.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
You gotta do it this week. Do it, do it,
do it.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Do it real quick, do real quick.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
Get your hands and put them like this. And this
is what I want you to do to that stack
of bills that you've been wondering about.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
Reframe it.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
Touch somebody, say, reframe it.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
All right, this is what I want you to do
to the annoying people in your life. This is what
faith will enable you to do You're gonna reframe them. Oh,
you are no longer an annoying person. You are a
part of my spiritual development program designed to bring me patience.
I just reframed you and.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
You didn't even know it.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Joshua and Caleb have faith because they had a different frame.
What is your frame? My frame is this, If God
is for me, who can be against me?
Speaker 3 (36:28):
That's his word? Right, Well, that's my frame.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
I'm going into every situation knowing that He's for me,
and whatever comes against me, he's got it. I got
a new frame, and so there are some things give
me that. There are some things that if you're going
to touch somebody, say change your frame.
Speaker 1 (36:51):
Change a frame, change your frame.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
There are some things that are in your life right
now that need to be eliminated from your friend. See,
that's the fifth thing I wanted you to get. I
wanted you to realize that as you frame your life,
as you reframe your situation, it's going to take focus.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
It's going to take.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Perspective to have a new frame of reference, to realize
that there are other people who have gone through worse
and made it, that there's more to this life that
you're living than the season that you're in.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
It's going to take anticipation to know that.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
I got to be ready for change and I got
to be ready for challenge. But my life is framed
by the word of God.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
So I'm not worried about.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
It because I'm more than a conqueror through Him who
loved me.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
Because He made this day.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
I will rejoice and I've got a spirit of motivation.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
For the joy set before me. I'm going to endure
like Jesus.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
But the writer of Hebrew says that there are some
things called weight and sin that have to be removed.
Speaker 3 (37:48):
From the frame. See, this.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
Was an important part of the worship till I got
up to preach. But now that it's preaching time, this
thing is in my way. So it's not a bad thing,
but it doesn't belong in this shot. So got to
learn how that sometimes in your life there are some things.
(38:20):
I mean, how annoying would it be if Mack would
have left his stupid mic stand out like a rock star.
Speaker 3 (38:27):
This ain't Chicago.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Come get your MIC's stand and get it out of
my frame. Tech somebody say, get your down out of
my frame, get your fear out of my frame. Sometimes
you got to look at situations in your life and
say not.
Speaker 3 (38:40):
Right now, I don't have time to carry this weight.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
My faith is a substans of something I'm hoping for.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
I'm headed in an upward direction.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
Get out of my frame. I'm sorry to get aggressive
about it, but would you push five people and tell
them get out of my frame? Out of my frame
and looking looking see this is gonna be so freeing
for you because you didn't know that you were the
(39:12):
director of this shot.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
You didn't even know. But but faith is a frame.
Speaker 3 (39:27):
Faith is a frame.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
I would love for you to go by Target, Dollar General.
Speaker 6 (39:35):
Whatever your taste, and get get a get a frame
to a picture frame, and leave it empty and put
it on your desk this week.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
If you don't have a desk, put it on your
coffee table. If you don't have a coffee table, put
it on.
Speaker 1 (39:55):
Your window sill. If you don't have a windows put
it on the floor. My point is.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
I don't want you to hear this message. I want
you to work this message to see your life through
the frame of faith.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
Every once in a while I will.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Talk to somebody in our church who has received news
that they have a very short time to live. Almost
without fail, talking to that person encourages me more than
it encouraged them. There are very few exceptions. Because they're sad,
they're nervous, they're worried. All of that's there. But it's
(40:45):
like when you talk to them, their frame has changed,
and so they actually it's the strangest thing. I can't
really explain it, but some things you can only understand
by faith. It's like this wasn't a good thing that
came into their life, but it gave them a new
frame to see their life through.
Speaker 1 (41:08):
And they're not irritable.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
About some of the things that they were irritable about anymore.
And they're not worried about some of the things they
were worried about anymore. And they don't even give attention
to some of the things they gave attention to anymore.
And I started the phone call to pray for them,
and I end up asking them to pray for me
because they have a better frame, because here.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
I am worried about, worried about this daily stuff, and
here they have a frame that lets them know that
tomorrow isn't promised.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
I mean, if you've ever seen somebody who was about
to die, and then they really started living. And it
took the possibility that they might die to really start living.
Speaker 1 (41:56):
It took the possibility that they.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Might not get to make it to see to walk
their child down the aisle, to start being a good father.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
Don't, don't.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
Don't let your life get so out of focus that
it takes a tragedy to change your frame. Don't let
it be that it takes a funeral to make you
appreciate your friends. Don't let it be that God has
to take something away to make you appreciate how good
(42:28):
it was while you had it. My advice to you
is to change your frame. And I think the writer
of Hebrews would agree. He would say that when you
fix your eyes on Jesus, even if you haven't fixed
the situation, if you fix the frame, fix a frame,
(42:49):
bring into visibility what really matters, my God. We are
so consumed with the wind and the waves that we
are missing the one who is able to walk on water.
And what I'd like to pray for you today is
that your frame leaving this place for whatever your facing
in your life, would be a faith frame. I want
(43:14):
to pray that you would become a framer in your
everyday life. And this means that you will see potential
in people that other people don't see potential in. This
means that you're going to stop spending all your time
trying to frame everybody else's life and start framing your own.
(43:35):
I just said a lot, and I didn't get a
good response on it, so I'm gonna stay on it.
Some of us are so busy trying to frame somebody
else's future what they should do and what you would do.
God didn't call you to frame anybody else's life. He
called you, And if you'll ever get busy with the
big picture of your life, you won't have time to
(43:56):
adjust my frame. So I want you to stand in
the presence of God, and I want you to do
something that has been symbolic in the church for thousands
of years. But put down your purse. The person next
to you is completely trustworthy.
Speaker 3 (44:18):
Put down your pen.
Speaker 1 (44:19):
There's nothing more to write down.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
Lift your hands, yeah, lift them up. Let go of
all of the things that have been in the frame,
all of the shame past.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
You can't change all of the names.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
Of the people that didn't come on. Let's get in
a faith frame of mind. What things are you hoping for?
What are the things that you can't see right now
that you believe not? Pray that the eyes of your
heart might be open. I pray that the perspective of
(45:00):
your faith might be ENLiGHT and I pray that your
imagination might be awakened to see the good things that
God has prepared for you. Lift your hands high. The
spirit of the Lord is in this place, and I
pray today for liberty and freedom in your life. I
pray today that in the presence of the Lord you
(45:21):
would find the fullness of joy and in.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
His right hand pleasures forevermore.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
I pray that whatever you've been looking at through the
lens of fear would look different today when you leave,
because of what the Word of God has reframed in
your life. I pray today that the eternal Word of
God would reframe your situation and yes, even reframe the way.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
You see yourself.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
God, we thank you today in Jesus' name that you
are reframing and recreating and renewing.
Speaker 3 (45:57):
All things to look like your word. We declare it,
confess your word over our situation.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
We declare it, confess your word over our insecurity. We
asked that the same word that frame the world, what
frame our lives this week, and we declare we will
say the goodness of the Lord in the land of
the Living. If you believe that, put a praise on
it and clap your hands in the presence of God.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (46:30):
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.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
You can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
share it on your social stories and tag us at
Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you.
Host
Steven Furtick
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