Michael Todd -Imagine That Expect Effect Part 4

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
This message is from our series the Expected Fact. Pastor
Michael explains what happens when we get the revelation of expectation.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Over Today we're starting Glory to God, our fourth week
of our expect Effects series. And as you can already
see that faith is rising in this place. This is
not a moment and a season of our life. This
is now the new temperature of how we live. Don't

(00:34):
ever come below this level of faith ever. Again, some
of y'all this is your first time coming. Listen. We
believe that God can do anything. And so as we
begin to journey down this next phase of this word,
I got stuck on a scripture and the Holy Spirit

(00:54):
begin to show me and reveal himself. Does anybody know
that God wants to do good for you? Isaiah thirty
eighteen tells us that God is waiting, looking, longing, expecting
to be gracious to you. So many of us don't
believe that, But I'm here to tell you that God
is looking, expecting, longing to be good to you, So
you should look long and expect to receive from him.

(01:17):
I said to Mario, got up here so eloquently and
said that the first thing you have to do. To
be able to do anything is receive. God will never
call for anything from you that he doesn't give you
to give. Well, how am I going to do that?
He said, if you just say yes, if you agree
with me, I'll give it to you. So for this

(01:38):
next season of your life, God is about to supply
you with everything that you need. So go to Ephesians
chapter three, verse twenty. And we've read this scripture before,
but we're about to see it in a whole new
light because God just stopped me. This is why it's
so good to meditate on the Word of God, not
just read. You know, some of us read the Word

(01:59):
for sport, like we just read through Man. I made
it through Proverbs. Man oooh boy. Psalms was good today.
And if anybody asks you what you read, you can't
regurgitate any of it. It was just like wisdom is
something of something and this was so good to me
and I just feel better. But we don't meditate. But
the Word tells us to meditate. Mullet over, think about it,

(02:21):
imagine it. And so I begin to do that this week.
And this scripture says, now unto him who is able,
I'm me read it from the NIV version. Now unto
him that is able to do immeasurably more. I looked
up that word immeasurably more. It means extensive, too large,
or extreme to measure. God is in the business of

(02:43):
doing things that are too large for anybody to measure.
He is. He is able to do immeasurably more than
all we can ask. Somebody say ask or imagine somebody
say imagine, according to the power, His power that works
within us. I got stuck on the word imagine. I

(03:07):
begin to look the word up and synonyms for the
word imagine or think. He can do more than we
ask or we think our thoughts, more than we envision,
more than we visualize, more than we dream up. And
God begin to tell me, he said, Michael, my people
ask for me a whole bunch, he said, But they

(03:29):
imagine way too little. They don't imagine that it's gonna happen.
They don't sit and close their eyes and begin to
see themselves in a different situation. When they close their eyes,
all they see is the past. When they close their eyes,
all they see is the failure. When they close their eyes,

(03:51):
all they see is what could go wrong? He said,
but I am the God that is able. My ability
is ready to do more than they can ask. We're
good as, but more than we can imagine. So today
the title of the sermon is imagine that an expectation imagination.

(04:14):
God is about to release an expectation imagination in every
person that you don't even have to be in the situation,
and you're gonna be able to visualize yourself in the situation.
And see right now, nobody really understands what that'll do
for you. But I'm gonna get scientific this morning. I've
been studying the mind and the brain and how you work.
Some of my nurses from or are you gonna be

(04:35):
excited on this one? Because I have been studying what
happens and how powerful this mind is, how our thoughts
create the world that we live in. Everything you've experienced
has been somebody's thought. It's been somebody's imagination, whether yours

(04:56):
or somebody else, coming to life. And it's one of
the most powerful tools God has given us. But we
use it for the wrong things. So we're about to
get an imagination and expectation imagination. Somebody say expectation imagination.
So everybody in here has an imagination. I want everybody

(05:17):
to close your eyes real quick, and I want you
to focus on what I'm about to say, and I
want you to imagine yourself seeing what I'm saying. This
is a wide field of green, luscious grass, the softest
grass you've ever seen in your whole life. Can you
see it? And now I want you to imagine that

(05:38):
in that beautiful green, hunter green grass, that there is
a pink elephant with blue polka dots. See it. It's
green grass with a huge pink elephant in polka dots,
blue polka dots. And then there's a young boy in
front of the elephant, leading him and he has a
yellow umbrella. See it. Out of the blue it starts

(06:01):
raining candy skittles, starburs. We on a fast, but it
starts raining mic and knights and gummy worms. Now open
your eyes. How many people saw it? How many people
could imagine that? How many people it was a little
difficult to imagine that. Come on, okay, I want everybody

(06:23):
to understand that God gave every person in here the
power of imagination to be able to see a picture
of something that has never existed. Y'all just saw a
pink elephant with blue polka dots with a yellow umbrella
and rain candy, Candy, Rain, I like it better like that. Now.

(06:48):
That power is put on the inside of us, and
usually we use it in a negative form that we
imagine the things that we don't want to happen, and
then they end up happening in our lives. What we
don't want we put our energy and effort thinking about
it not happening, and it actually ends up happening. Why

(07:10):
has anybody had that happen before? Like you thinking I
do not want this happened. I do not want this
to happened. This cannot happen to me, and then it
happens to you. It's because you've been imagining, getting a
picture of it happening or not happening, and your body
does not know how to differentiate the two, and so
you begin to draw to yourself what you don't want

(07:31):
to happen. I'm about to take this thing, and you
are about to get imagination revelation. Can I help you
go even further than that? When I think and study
the mind, we have to realize that everything that you
ever has experienced, everything you use, it came from somebody's imagination.
Your car, your cell phone, your clothes, even you came

(07:56):
from God's imagination. Genesis one twenty seven. It says, so
God created human beings in his own in the image
of God. He created them male and female, and he
created them just look around. God has an imagination. Some
of y'all are interest I mean beautiful, the and no,

(08:17):
I'm just playing. But how come nobody looks exactly the same?
How come everybody has just slightly a different texture of hair,
a different nose structure, a different lip structure, a different
way that they talk. It's because our God has an imagination,
and we were made in his image, his image and

(08:39):
his light in his likeness. Look at what imagination means
Webster Dictionary. It says, the act or power of forming
a mental image of something not present to the senses
or never before wholly perceived in reality, the creative ability,
the ability to confront and deal with the problem. This

(08:59):
is what he did. God gave you an image maker
that no matter what you're in, you can make a
different image. I want everybody to hear me. God put
inside of you innately an image maker. And when we
begin to tap into using our image maker for the

(09:19):
things that will bring us into a new place. It
can change your entire life. Your expectation will begin to
be built because of what you're seeing that you're not seeing.
And as we begin to look at how God has
formed us, I begin to look at the mind and
the mind, this thing between our two ears, not the

(09:41):
gray matter that's the brain. The mind, though, is the
thing that reasons and has senses and all that other stuff.
I begin to look up some facts about the mind
that blew me away. Do you know that the human
mind is faster than any supercomputer ever created? It has
more storage power, is able to recall things that you

(10:02):
have never even heard or seen. Do you know they
said Albert Einstein, one of the greatest people, that has
the highest IQ, one of the highest IQs in the world.
It said that he only used ten percent of his
brain power ten And I'll begin to look at this
and study it. And it said that your mind can

(10:22):
do sixty quadrillion things per second. That's sixteen zeros. And
at the same time, you don't even know that your
brain is doing it. It's what they call your subconscious mind.
It's the thing that allows you right now to be

(10:43):
pumping blood into your veins and your heart moving at
a rate to keep you alive. But at the same
time you're blinking like clockwork, and at the same time
you're listening intently to me, and at the same time
you can pass gas. Some of y'all did that today.
You were shouting at Oh Jesus, don't even mess with
your neighbor. Okay, come on those sbds, silent but deadly.

(11:06):
I see you, okay. But what I'm saying is you
can do all of that in one moment and not
even think about it. That's how powerful your mind is.
So when I begin to look at that, why God
gave us an image maker, and why he did that,
he said, Michael, I gave my children an image maker

(11:29):
to give them control to paint the picture of their destiny.
He said, I know they were gonna be born into
a fallen world and with jacked up parents in situations
that are not good, and I know they're gonna do that.
So I'm gonna build inside of everybody the ability to
be in a bad situation and get a different picture.

(11:54):
Because if they begin to get a different picture, they'll
begin to attract and go towards everything that that image
is continuing to replay, and that's why you get these
rags to riches stories. You get these people who have
been in broke down situations or disadvantage and they got
a different picture and then they begin to do things,

(12:14):
and we begin to say the equation is faith plux
expectation equals a miracle. Well, the thing that even starts
you have in faith is your imagination, things that you
can begin to dream up and get a picture of.
That's when you start getting faith for it. When have
you ever got faith to buy an outfit that you
haven't seen yet? Think about it. You don't be like,

(12:37):
I'm gonna save up my money for what. It's when
you walk by the store and you look at the
mannequin and you get an image of it, say, whoever
good on me? Then you get faith and say, you
know what I'm gonna start doing, So I'm gonna put
faith in action together. Then you get an expectation next
Saturday when I get paid, I'm going to the mile

(12:59):
and I'm a gonna get that. See, we get an
expectation and a miracle happens. You put it on and
it fits. Glory to God. That was the miracle you
know that was the it's just because of the fast.
But what I'm saying is you cannot get faith for
something until you get an image of something. And God says,
my people are asking, but they don't have enough images

(13:21):
for Me to make come to past. They haven't seen
it in their minds. They're wishing for it, they're hoping
for it, but they haven't gotten an image of it.
And today I'm unlocking you to get an image of
your future. Today I'm unlocking you to get an image,
a mental picture. I want to ignite your image maker
to get in the place where you have an expectation, imagination,

(13:43):
and where when something comes your way that you have
never seen before, you begin to imagine that. Somebody say,
imagine that. So we look at the children of Israel.
Go to Numbers, chapter thirteen, and you're about to see
very clearly through the word of God, that your imagination

(14:04):
can create your destiny, that if you use it in
a positive way, it will give you exactly what you want.
If you use it in a negative way, it'll give
you exactly what you want. And I want you to
see how these children of Israel just got delivered from slavery.
They were bound, broken in bondage. They just got delivered,

(14:26):
and now God wants to take them into their promised land.
That's what he's trying to do with many of you
by building your faith and expectation. He's trying to take
you into a promised land. But most of us come
to this place of our imagination where God is trying
to show us something and we can't believe what he's saying.
So I want you to learn and find yourself in
this story. I'm going to read a large passage of scripture,

(14:47):
but I want you to see the imagery, the image maker,
what pictures go into the people's head, and how they
react to it. Number thirteen, verse one, it says, then
the Lord said to Moses, send out men to explore
the land of Canaan. Watch this the land I am
giving to the israel Lites. He's giving it to you.

(15:10):
Send one leader of each of the twelve and ancestral tribes.
So we sent out twelve people to go spy the
land for forty days. Now watch go down to thirteen
twenty six, Chapter thirteen, verse twenty six. It says, now
they departed and came back to Moses and Aaron. Now
they've gone in, spied out the land. They've come back
and the congregation of the children of Israel in the
wilderness of Paran and Kadeshi. And let me say this,

(15:32):
Moses had the largest church ever. The theologians say it
was about two point five million people. Okay, so it
would be like me coming out to you and there
was two point five million people. And these guys are
about to give a report of the promised land to
all of the people. Now watch this verse twenty seven.
Then they told him and said, we went to the

(15:54):
land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk
and honey, and this is it's fruit. They said. The
fruit was so large that one bushel of grapes took
two men to carry. Now, can you imagine they've been
eating manna from heaven. Manna means what is this? Literally,

(16:17):
they've been eating what is this? Every morning and they
go into a land where grapes is as big as basketballs. Okay,
this is a picture of what God is about to do.
You've been in a season where you're saying, God, what
is this? And He's trying to bring you into abundance

(16:37):
where you need people to help you carry it. Okay,
but watch this. They acknowledge that God's trying to do
something in them. But watch this verse twenty eight. Nevertheless,
the people who dwell in that land are strong. The
cities are fortified and very large. Moreover, we saw the

(17:00):
descendants of Anoch there. That's Goliath's people. Okay. The Amalankites
dwell in the land of the south, the hit Tits,
the Jebusites, the AmAm Rights dwell in the mountains, and
the k Knites dwell by the sea and along the
banks of the Jordan. And then calab quieted the people.
He said, shut up, y'all, you quiet tell him that

(17:23):
he stood before Moses and said, let us go up
at once and take possession, for we are well able
to overcome it. I want you to see the difference
of perspective. Twelve went in, ten got a wrong image,
Two got a right image. I want you to see
what happens verse thirty one. But the men who had

(17:45):
gone up with him said, we're not a ball to
go up against those people, for they're stronger than we.
And they gave the children, they gave it to them.
They gave the entire two point five million people a
bad report. They gave them a bad image. The people

(18:05):
never saw what they saw, but a few people's opinion
painted an image that created these people future. This is
not a point, but watch who you're allowing to put
images into your head, because if you accept them, you

(18:26):
get the consequences of imagining that thing. I'm about to
show you what happens. It says they gave the whole
children of Israel a bad report of the land which
they had spied out, saying, the land through which we
have gone as spies. Watched the imagery, Watch the mental

(18:46):
picture they're putting into people. The land is the land
that devours its inhabitants. Now think about the image I
told you a pink elephant and with blue polka dots,
see that a land opening up to devour were inhabitants.
It's painting an image right now, and all the people
whom we saw in it are men of great stature.

(19:08):
Now that ain't true. There's bound to be at least
three dwarfs in every community. But watch their imagination. Said
that everybody was huge. They exaggerated the truth to the
point to where they painted an image in their mind
that every person in that land was larger than they were.
Watched this verse thirty three. There we saw the giants,

(19:31):
the descendants of Goliath, and they came from the giants
watched this, and we were like grasshoppers in our own site,
and so we were in their site. They didn't talk
to one of them, but they painted an image of
themselves and of those people that made them react and

(19:55):
act out of what God wanted to do for them.
I want you to see how important your image maker is,
because now the consequences of these people receiving this bad
image in their head. Now what I want everybody to
see it. I made up that story about the elephant.
These people could be making up the story about the land,

(20:18):
and the people are receiving it as truth. And now
in their mind, all they're doing is imagining giants walking
around and imagining people getting slayed and devoured. And watch
what happens now because it's in their imagination. Look at
their response. Chapter fourteen, verse one. So all the congregation
two point five million people lifted up their voices and
didn't praise. They cried, and the people wept all the night.

(20:44):
And all the children of Israel then begin to complain
against Moses and Aaron and the whole congregation said to them,
if only we had died in the land of Egypt,
they got a bad image and then wanted to go
back to the mess and die. Or if we had

(21:05):
only died in the wilderness, why has the Lord brought
us out here to this land to fall by the sword,
that our wives and children should become victor? It ain't
nothing happened yet, But they believed a bad image, and
now their imagination has run wild. How many times have
we gotten a bad image? And now we've let that image.

(21:26):
You find out you think somebody don't like you, And
now every time you see them, look at them, they
staring at me. Look at them. I don't want to
go back there no more. Look at them. They plan
an evil for me. They don't even know you. But
your imagination has begun to create something that's going to
draw to you exactly what you want. Watch this, I'm
about to walk with me. This is about to unfold,

(21:49):
it says verse five. The Moses and Aaron fell on
their faces before all of the assembly of the congregation
of the children isers. They were sick of you them.
Verse six. But Joshua, the son of None and Caleb
the son of Jay. I don't even know how to
say that. Who were among those who had spied out

(22:13):
the land tore their clothes, and they spoke to all
the congregation of the children of Israel, saying, the land
we passed through to spy out is extremely good land.
If the Lord delights in us, then he will bring
us into this land and give it to us, a
land which flows with milk and honey. Only do not

(22:36):
rebel against the Lord, nor fear the people of the land.
Watch the image that they paint, for they are bread,
there are food. Their protection has departed from them, and
the Lord is with us. So do not fear. I
want you to see that ten men had a bad imagination,

(23:00):
and two men had a good imagination. And then verse ten,
they literally were trying to warn them. Look what verse
tim says, and all the congregations said, stop them. Can
I give you another pseudo point. When you're the one

(23:21):
that gets a good report and you get an imagination
that nobody in your family has, When you see yourself
graduating with a doctorate degree, and the only thing they
can say is how are you gonna pay for that?
You don't see, you don't have to worry about how
you're gonna pay for it. You don't have to worry
about how it's gonna happen. You have to know and

(23:42):
the God that is with you, and you have to
get a good imagination. Somebody say, imagine that. Now. I
want to give you the first point. Okay, whatever image
you rehearse in your mind is the image you will
ultimately experience in your life. Whatever image you rehearse in
your mind is the image you will ultimately experience in

(24:03):
your life. Verse twenty six of chapter four says, then
the Lord said to Moses in Era, how long must
I put up with this wicked community and its complaints
about me? Yes, I have heard the complaints of the Israelites,
and they're making against me. Now tell them this now.
When God says, now tell them this. This is a
bad situation, he says, As surely as I live, I declare,

(24:25):
I declares the Lord. I will do to you the
very thing I've heard you say. You will all drop
dead in this wilderness because you complained against me. Every
one of you who is twenty years or older or
older and was included in the registration will die. This
is probably the straightest part of this entire story, you

(24:46):
will not enter and occupy the land I swore to
give you. It's got your name on it, and because
you got the wrong image and rehearsed it, he can't
give it to you. The only exception will be Caleb
and Joshua. It's because they had a positive expectation imagination.

(25:11):
My question to you this morning is what images are
you continuing to rehearse in your mind? No, come on,
for real? What are the thoughts that dominate? What images
do you see every day when you close your eyes?
Do you see your family hold and healed? Or do
you see your family divided? I didn't say what do
you want? I said what do you see? Because a

(25:34):
lot of us wish for things, but we don't intentionally
call our thoughts into subjection and tell ourselves you know what,
I'm gonna see myself different when it comes to your finances,
what do you see when you close your eyes and
think about money? Do you get anxiety? And because hood
I forget to pay? Oh god, they're gonna shut something

(25:55):
off every week? Oh god, what are you seeing? Because
because whatever you're rehearsing in your thoughts, those images you're
rehearsing you're ultimately going to experience those things in your life.
Look at this, Joshua and Caleb rehearsed their victory. When
it says that they went into the land, they begin

(26:16):
to say, we are well able. They were getting an
image of them in the land eating grapes. They had
a picture of themselves in the land making some of
those giants carry them around. They had an image of
themselves in a place that they were not yet in.
But that image kept them in a place to where

(26:38):
even though it looked like it was gonna be an obstacle,
they could say, to that obstacle, God's already given me
an image of you defeated. So all I'm gonna do
is keep rehearsing by victory. My encouragement to somebody today
is to stop looking at your situation and start rehearsing
your victory. Start seeing yourself walking across that stage, rich

(26:59):
your diploma. I know you didn't get into school this
semester because of the money, but I dare you to
keep rehearsing the image of you getting that diploma and
them stamping that thing paid in full. See. Our problem
is we begin to rehearse what the situation is and
not what we want to see. Rehearse your victory. Get

(27:23):
an image of yourn in your mind, of you and
your most victorious state. Everybody, close your eyes. See yourself
in your best shape ever. Come on, no, literally, picture
your head looks. Some of y'all like, see the abs,
see the booty lifted, see the pecs. No, I'm not

(27:46):
talking about anybody. See yourself. See you back down at
your high school way. Look at you girl, you bad.
See yourself being able to have stamina. Now open your eyes.
Verse that victory you see. So many of us look
in the mirror, and we rehearse where we at right now,

(28:09):
we get that image. Jim, I can't wear stuff like
that because you know that's the thing, and yes, that
is the truth. But you need to rehearse your victory.
Some of y'all need to go home and find a
magazine and cut your head off and paste it on
somebody else's fat body. And you need to start getting
an image of yourself differently. Why pess, I'm like that
ain't gonna do nothing. It's gonna begin to build faith

(28:30):
because whatever image you begin to rehearse is the reality
that you're gonna experience. I remember my dad and mom.
My dad, he's a dreamer. He's one that has a
humongous imagination. And I remember growing up as far back
as I can remember, is he had a picture of
him and my mom standing in front of He cut
it out of a picture standing in front of this

(28:52):
huge mansion. You still got it somewhere today. It's huge.
He would hang it in his office and every day
we would walk in and we begin to look at that.
And what it did is it was building my imagination
to see beyond where we were at. I remember our
first house that I was born into. We lived in Glenpool, Oklahoma,

(29:16):
and it was a little house. And when I tell
you that God took my parents from glory to glory,
to glory to glory in their house, and they're not
done yet. And one day I planned to buy them
the house that is on that magazine. Why are you
saying that My dad was teaching me and showing me
how to not look at what we were in to
begin to get an image of what I wanted to

(29:38):
see in my life. If you need healing in your life,
begin to see yourself running, see yourself well, begin to
see yourself delivered healed and set free. Why are you
saying that, pastor Mike, because the image that you're rehearsing
is coming to you. Do you know our mind can
do so many amazing things, but it has one thing
that it's limited to do. It cannot do this one thing.

(30:00):
It cannot differentiate or it can't tell the difference between
what is reality and what is a thought or an image.
It can't. Your subconscious mind cannot tell the difference between
what is a thought and what is an image. Let
me prove it to you. How many peoples have a
nightmare before? How many people have had a nightmare? That

(30:21):
nightmare happens in your mind and you wake up with
an elevated heart rate, You're sweating, you're fighting some of
y'all fighting off people. Things are happening. Your body physically
reacts to something that was a thought in your mind.
You were never in any real danger, but you couldn't
tell yourself that you walking around the house with a bat,
you praying and calling people, You're doing stuff. Why was that?

(30:44):
Because the image that was in your mind begin to
produce in your reality. What I'm telling you is you
need to begin to rehearse your victories every day. Some
of you are going to get pictures. I'm literally saying
physical pictures out and put them all over your house
and your refrigerator. You're gonna get something that says paid

(31:06):
in full and you're gonna put it in. Just put
your name on the end of it. You're gonna begin
to see your children. Your children ain't been together ever.
You're gonna cut individual pictures off of their Facebook and
make a family collage of your family in one picture
and say Christmas twenty seventeen. Why are you saying that?
Because if you get that image in your mind and
begin to build your faith and get an expectation, you

(31:27):
will see a miracle. See how quiet it is. And
here's because all you're expecting and all you're imagining is
what has happened and what you're afraid will happen. And
God says, I want to unlock the greatest power that
I have on the inside of you. I put in
you an image maker. So it's time for you to

(31:48):
begin to get faith and believe the word of God
and make a new image. I'm not broke, i am wealthy,
and I'm giving it a weight of people. Why Because
I made that image in my head passed my what
do you mean? I have seen myself literally closed my
eyes and seen myself walking up to doors that I
don't know, knocking on the door and saying, God told

(32:09):
me to pay all your bills this month. Give me
a roundabout number. You're not scared of what they say,
twenty thousand dollars. I was just waiting for you to
say it. Why. I have imagined myself walking up to
Bishop Gary McIntosh and asking him what else do you
need to pay off? Cause I'm about to take care

(32:30):
of it today. I have imagined myself standing up every
single mother in our auditorium, hundreds of women, and saying,
all of you are getting a new car today. You're
getting a new car. You're getting a new car. You're
getting a new car. You're getting a new car. See.
I'm scaring some of y'all right now because your imagination
is too small, and God says, all I can do

(32:53):
is more than you ask. Or you better unlock your
image maker. You better walk into that building instead of
saying I'm just gonna work here the rest of my life.
You say, I'm my own something like this, I see myself.
I see myself walking into this place and people saying yes, sir,

(33:14):
mister Todd. But unfortunately many of us, many of us
stopped getting images when we graduated from being a child. See,
because when you were a child, you could have a
cardboard box and be in space. Come on, you could

(33:40):
have a barbie doll and one second it was a
barbie doll, the next second it was a soldier. The
next session it was a bear, the next second it
was something else. Why because we could see something that
wasn't there. And then when you get saved, somehow you
begin to think that when you got saved, everything became new.

(34:00):
Let me help you, only your spirit became new at salvation.
Corinthians tells us that any man that be in Christ,
he is a new creature. The old things have passed away. Behold,
all things have become new. But the thing it's talking
about is your spirit. Why are you saying that, pastor Mike,
is because you're made up of three parts. You're a
spirit first. Then you have a soul, which is your mind,
will and emotions. Your mind is where all those images

(34:22):
are coming in. And then you have a body. Before
you get saved, you're led by the body when you
get saved, you're supposed to be led by the spirit
and that gets made new. But your soul and your
body still have to be renewed. So that's why Romans
twelve two tells us, don't be conformed to the patterns

(34:44):
of this world, the thoughts of this world, the images
of this world, what the world is thinking of. Don't
be conformed to that, he said, but be transformed by
the renewing of your mind, your thoughts, and your images. See,
this is why this word is so hard for some
of us to digest, is because all of our life
we've seen images that have been of this world that

(35:08):
love doesn't exist. It's all about sex, live your life once,
feel good. Those are the images that are coming to us.
The images are we don't respect authority. We do what
we want to do when we want to do it.
The images are saying, get your money, don't worry about them.
Generosity given you, better stack your coins. So when you

(35:28):
get those images in your mind, God is saying no, no, no, no, no,
no no no, don't conform to that. Be transformed by
the renewing. Because I've given you the most powerful gift.
I've given you an image maker. And if you get
the right thoughts in your image and in your mind,
if you start seeing what I see for you, Philippian says,
let this mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.

(35:49):
The mind that can look at a dead situation and
say he ain't not dead, he's sleeping. That's the mind
that God wants you to have. That you can get
an image of something that is not living, nonexistent, and
you can begin to say, yeah, no, no, no, no, no,
that business is not dead. It just needs a revamping.
Let me get in there, give it one more year.

(36:10):
This thing is gonna live. No, this marriage is not dead.
This marriage is about to move. You know what. My
future is not dead. Yeah, I missed a few opportunities,
but I got a different image. Once you tap into
your image maker, then you get faith, and then you
build expectation, and then you're able to see a miracle.

(36:30):
Let me go back to this story so I can
finish this thing up, It says. As we rehearse our victory,
we get to get a different expectation. Point two is
that you need to align your imagination with what God says. See.
I'm not just telling you as believers to just start
thinking of anything, because if you just start thinking of anything,

(36:53):
you gonna get what you're thinking about. I remember there
was a time where I was dealing heavy in lusting pornography,
and boy, I could get an image in my head
and literally I wouldn't do anything except try to make
that image come to pass. And my fellas is real
quiet right now. Just look at me, look straight, looks straight,
look at me. I'm hot with mine, I'm humble, overn transplanting.

(37:15):
My wife knows all my stuff. Okay, so we're keeping
it a hundred. I literally would get images images in
my head. I'd see an image from years ago, and
that image would come back until I had to do
something to make that come to pass. What I'm trying
to tell you is your images, unbridled and unsubmitted to
the Holy Spirit and the Word of God will cause

(37:37):
destruction in your life. How many people have gotten an
image of something and it's come to pass and it
was not good for you. Okay, So my point number
two is always align your images with what God said.
Look what God said in the very beginning of this
thing to them? It said, Then the Lord said, did
it say? Moses said? It said? The Lord said to Moses,

(38:00):
send out men to explore the land of Canaan, the
land I am giving you. Joshua and Caleb were the
only ones that heard what the Lord said, so even
though there was giants in the land, they aligned their
imagination with what God said. So my question to you
is what is God said about you? Cause if you

(38:21):
get what God says about you, that I'm the head
and not the tale, there's no way that I should
align my thoughts with anything else then what God has
already said about me. But you know what the problem
with the Church is, we don't know the Word of God.
We don't know what the Word said about us, and
so we want to hear cliches. Half the cliches you

(38:42):
hear about church ain't even in the Bible. No, I'm
trying to tell you, I literally can go through things
that we say and we act like you know where
it says, No, it's nowhere in there. Fred Hammond made
that up. Somebody else made that up. And you think
it's a scripture, it's because you don't read your Bible.
But what happens is the Word tells us that there

(39:02):
are great, impressious promises, and if we get the great
impressious promises in the Word of God, then our faith
can align and our imagination can align with what God
already said. I want to talk to my generation for
one second. You just being in church is not enough
for God to get his purpose done through your life.
Hear me say this. You gotta get in your Bible.

(39:24):
You have more time. There was no Facebook fifteen years ago,
and now you have spent more of your life on
Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and every other wider that
you can think of. That now you have nothing in
you that can create an image to bring it to
reality in your life. So now instead of bringing images

(39:46):
to life that God is showing us and the promises,
we're trying to become what somebody else is on their page.
We're basing our images off of others images. Half of
your outfits in here were inspired by somebody else on
your Instagram or Facebook, And God says, I've called you
to stand out and be a trendsetter. I called you
to be against the grain when all ten are doing this.

(40:08):
I've called you to be one of the two that
will get a different image and begin to create something
that has never been seen. But if you don't get
in the word of God and find out his promises
about you, you won't align your images what you think
about what God has already said. I want you to
see this very clearly, as I come to a close,

(40:28):
that we're supposed to imagine what God said about as
numbers fourteen eight said, if the Lord delights in us,
then he will bring us into this land and give
it to us. And the land flows with milk and honey.
Now I have an imagination, and so I believe that
Joshua and Caleb did see the facts when they went

(40:52):
into the land like dang, these fools is big man, shoot,
I hate no, stay down, bro, and they big be
quiet right there. But I think they remembered what God said,
I'll give you this land. And so this is my

(41:15):
encouragement to you. I heard it said like this. You
can't stop a bird from flying over your head, but
you can stop it from making a nest on your head.
Caleb and Joshua probably had the thought of doubt and insecurity,
but they didn't allow it to be the thing that
they meditated on. It didn't become the thing that dominated

(41:39):
their thoughts and made up their image. Can I help
you sometime, because some of y'all are in so much
gilt in condemination where you just have a bad thought.
If you had listen, you're gonna have some bad thoughts.
We're still in this flesh shoot. What you have to
do is do what the Word tells us to do,
and to cast those things down and take them captive.
I want to show you the scripture that set me free. Okay.
I want everybody to go to second care Corinthians ten,

(42:01):
verse four and five, because this is what some of
y'all need this morning, the images, the things that have come.
You'll never be nothing more than your daddy. You'll always
be broke, you always have that addiction, you'll always be
struggling in that. This is what you need to do
with that thought. Everybody needs to say that is a lie.
Look what it says for us to do. It says
we're responsible to guard our mind and our images, for

(42:23):
the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty
through God, to the pulling down of streum. Do you
know where strongholds are. They're in between your ears. It's
the stronghold of lack, the stronghold of perversion, the stronghold
of low self esteem, the strong. It's all up in here.

(42:43):
Ain't nobody even said nothing about you? But you said
I'm ugly, I'm fact. It's all here. How many of you?
Does the battle come to you? In your mind? Where
comes to everybody? So he says, I'm giving you a
weapon to pull down the strongholds. Looks is verse five
casting down what imagination? Put it in the King James version.

(43:03):
I need you to look at that for me, please,
because I want them to see the word. Okay, King
James version, if you have it, If you don't, it says,
casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself
against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity. Stop. Ah,
I can't think that no more. Yeah, that's what my

(43:25):
bank account says. But I'm the head and not to
tell I have more than enough. God provide. Get down. No, no, no, no, no.
My marriage. Yeah, we had a bad argument and they
looked like they was doing but God said, what God
is joined together, Let no man bullet get out. We
have to begin to take those thoughts into captivity because
if we don't, it begins to pain an image and

(43:46):
you see yourself divorced before divorce ever happens, and then
the image that you repeatedly rehearse becomes the image that
you ultimately experience. I'm trying to give y'all keys to
your future. Use your image maker and imagine what God
has for you. But you only can do that if

(44:07):
you imagine it through the lens of God. Can I
tell you something that God gave this church in October
a prophetic word that this church would double in size
in the year twenty sixteen. So most of us would
get a word like that and say, glory to God.
We're just gonna wait on him to do it. He's faithful.

(44:28):
Do you know what I did last night? I came
into this sanctuary and I sat down right here for
thirty minutes, and I closed my eyes, and there was
not a person in this sanctuary except me, and I
begin to get an image of me having to come
into this place at six in the morning because the

(44:50):
first service starts at eight thirty, and then the second
service starts at ten thirty, and because it overflows, we
got to do another one at twelve thirty, and then
we sign on casting in three or four different places.
I begin to get an image of looking at my
cell phone and getting a report that the overflow is
full and we gotta figure out something else to do

(45:10):
pastor see it. I got a prophetic word, but I
can stop it by my image not being aligning with
the word of God. If God told you you're gonna
be wealthy, you need to close your eyes five minutes
every day and begin to see yourself driving up in
something that don't make any noise when it's on. You
don't even know if it's on or see. Y'all ain't
even playing with me. You need to get in a

(45:31):
car that you don't even know if it's on or not.
You need to be able to visualize yourself. Never gone
to the bank again, You just working wire transfers. They
didn't come for it today. See, your imagination only wants

(45:52):
to see what it's already seen. But God says, I've
put my DNA on the inside of you, and I
called you out of nothing. I looked at dirt and said,
that looks like my child. Pick it up. There you are.
He breathed and got an image, and he made it.
And he said, and the same power, and the same

(46:17):
power is working in you. I challenge every person in
here to spend ten minutes a day visualizing yourself in
a better position. It's gonna be awkward at first because
you're like, what is this? This is the thing that
I realized. I told you all a couple of weeks

(46:38):
ago that I went and I went to a car
lot and began to visualize myself in a land rover,
and I begin to get that image. Before I ever
had a land rover. I knew how everything in it
worked because I had put myself in the place to
be able to get an image without even seeing it,

(47:01):
and so it was easy for God to allow me
to be attracted to what I continued to rehearse. I'm
telling you, whatever you can get an image of God
is waiting to agree with you. I'm gonna say it

(47:22):
one more time. Whatever you say, and the thing is
some of y'all's face like that does not work. It'll
never work for you. But I'm a living testimony that
I have gotten images. If you go into my office
right now, everything you see in this sanctuary I got
an image for before it ever came. The past. Bishop,
am my telling the truth. I drew this entire sanctuary

(47:45):
when there was still green everywhere, when there was still
flags on the stage, when there was nothing that looked
like what it looks like right now, I got an image,
and before it ever was realizing, you could enjoy it
and all this other stuff, this whole thing, before it happened,
I could correct things that were wrong because it didn't
align up with the image I had already seen. See,

(48:08):
you can begin to call stuff, oh, that's not how
it's supposed to be, because that's not the image that
I saw. This marriage where it's not the communication is
not working. That ain't it Because that's not what I've
been seeing. That's not what God showed me. That's not
what I've agreed with. And some of us are sitting
in this place waiting for God to do something. God

(48:28):
saying I need you to get an image. I need
you to get in my word enough to where you
believe that it can happen. See, even with Moses, I
think about God doing miracles for them. He parted the
Red Sea, and then he called it so sad because
He did that enormous miracle for Moses, and that then

(48:50):
in another season, when his imagination was not aligned with God,
he didn't obey God to strike the rock, so that
water come out of the rock. Now, let me just
put this in context for you. You saw an entire body
of water dry up, so you and two point five

(49:12):
million people could have walked across. Then you couldn't get
the image of you in your mind to believe him
to just bring some water out of a rock. What
happens is we get discouraged in the things that we see.
Moses was discouraged by the people. There was one thing.

(49:33):
He said, all right, God, you can kill him, take
him malck. Then he said, no, I gotta do it.
But then God said I'm sick of them. Now that's
a horrible thing. When God says I'm done. Done. You
know your daddy comes in and say I'm done. He said,
I'm done. He said. Every person that has and believes

(49:53):
the imagination of what these ten people came back and said,
And that's the image they're going to. And then it
starts to affect their speech, and it starts to make
them complain, and it starts to make them spread it
to other people. He said, they're gonna get exactly what
they say. They're gonna die in this wildern land, wilderness land,
and it's a sad narration that what God meant to

(50:14):
only take eleven days took them forty years and they
still died in it. God, how long I'm gonna get it?
Be in this season? As long as it takes you
to get a different image? Oh, I get that was
worth the omission today. How long I'm gonna be single?
As long as it takes you to get an image

(50:35):
of yourself submitted to a man of God. I'm gonna
independent one a I in thee. Okay, cool, cool, but God,
I'm lonely. Well, you need to figure out what image
you want to be. Do you want to be a
help mate or do you want to be a eye andy? Okay?
See it comes down to practical things like that, you

(50:58):
want to be broke and rich. You want to be
broke and rich. You still want to lie on your taxes,
but you want to go to another tax bracket. You
better make up your mind what image you're gonna have.
I'm sorry you still claiming dependence that got their own kids,

(51:21):
but I'm wealthy. God says you better change your image.
It don't mean nothing to give away that money when
God is supplying all your needs and giving seed to
the sower, But you better get a different image. God,
how long am I gonna be in this wilderness? As
long as it takes you to imagine that, to imagine

(51:44):
that that I already spoke to you, To imagine that
I called you before you were in your mother's room.
I called you, I knew you. I had plans for you,
plans to prosper you. Why are you not imagining me
prospering you. Why are you not imagining yourself forgiving those
people who hurt you? Some of y'all are still stuck

(52:06):
in the soul tithes of those old relationships because you
have never seen yourself free from them. You see yourself
on your wedding day at the altar, wondering if they
in the audience. So how long you're gonna be in

(52:26):
that place? As long as it takes you to imagine
that which God has called you to. I want everybody
to hear me say this that the greatest thing that
God ever gave you which choice, And now today you
have to choose to activate your imagination. See yourself free,

(52:51):
see yourself consistent. Come on, you imagine yourself being late
every day? Now you do you see yourself running into
the dang, I got to get a better stand. Imagine
that I'm gonna have one by next week. I bet

(53:12):
I will. Amen. But what I'm saying to you is
you see yourself in what you're experiencing right now. You
see yourself church hopping. No church has ever been good
enough for you. You've been a nine churches in nine months.

(53:34):
You need to get somewhere and sid out why you
saying that, passing Mike, because all that's in your mind
is that somebody's gonna hurt you again, that that church
hurt you experience back there. Every church is looking. You
need to imagine yourself connected, hole healthy, being a heeled, healer,
walking in abundance. You need to just listen, and you

(53:57):
don't have to be there to imagine it. That's why
you put an image maker in us. And as we
begin to imagine the thing, then we get faith in it.
You know, God could probably actually do this, like I
could see, I can see myself. Then I put my
faith in it. And then you know what, a matter
of fact, I'm not just gonna believe it. I'm gonna
have faith and expectation God you're gonna do that this year.

(54:19):
And then miracles so it's time for every single one
of you to imagine that. I want to pray for
you this morning. I want to pray that God would
literally put you in times of meditation where you would
just begin to see yourself in your victory. I want

(54:44):
you to literally be able to I don't want to
be deep right now. I want to be very practical.
I want you to close your eyes in your workplace
or on your lunch breaker as you're not while you're driving. Okay,
get to your destination, park the car. Okay, then begin
to imagine yourself in a different place. Because as soon

(55:04):
as you can begin to imagine that which God has
called you to, everything in your life begins to change.
I want to pray for every person in here that
your imagination will be unlocked. Passion like that's not a
deep message, Passion like that's not some Oh it's way
deeper than you think. Because the word says, as a
man thinketh as he imagined. Oh see that's what you have.

(55:29):
I'll end it like this. Your imagination can build it
before it is reality. Your imagination can build it whatever
it is. The relationship, the finances, the healing. The ministry
gives some of y'all, ministries, the reason you're not moving

(55:50):
in the power of God is because you've never imagined
yourself on a platform speaking the word of God with
knowledge and wisdom and power. Just imagine it. You've only
made no two bibles aures right now, But imagine yourself
being able to stand and pray for people and see them.
Imagine it. See some of you already started. But I'm
reminded of a story in Genesis eleven, and you can

(56:13):
look it up later, that there was a group of
people who made a decision, a story called the Tower
of Babel. And these people say, you know what, sick
of being here in this place, Let's build the city,
and let's build a tower in that city to reach heaven.

(56:36):
What y'all think about that? And see a lot of
y'all would have been haters in that and be like,
we gotta do that, we gotta work it said. These
people said, Okay, they got an agreement. Can I say this,
whenever the church gets in agreement, there is nothing that
we won't be able to do. These people got in agreement,
and look what it says. Genesis is eleven four and five.

(56:57):
It says and they came and they said, come, let
us build ourselves a city in a tower whose top
is in the heavens. Let us make a name for
ourselves lest we be scattered abroad over the face of
the earth. Look at verse five, and this would trip
me out, it says. But the Lord came down to

(57:18):
see the city in the tower which the sons of men,
look at the tents, had built. They said, let us
do it. But they were unified and had already gotten
the image of it. And it made God get off
the throne and said, because they've already imagined it, they've

(57:38):
already built it. Your imagination can build it before its reality.
This is what the word says. But the Lord came
down to see the city in the tower which the
sons of men had built. And the Lord said, indeed,
the people are one day, the people are one, and

(58:00):
they all have one language. This is what they begin
to do. Now, nothing that they propose, that they even
suggest to do, will be withheld from them. That's the
word of God. He's saying, your image is so powerful,

(58:22):
but that if you see it and you believe it,
before one brick is laid, God considers it a done deal.
If you can get an image of yourself. I want
you to see how powerful this is. Go to your
home today and tell your home bye bye. It's too

(58:44):
small for you. That's not where a child of God
is supposed to live. You know, that's lower than what
you want to be able to entertain people and bring
people in for the street. You want to be able
to use your house not just to flot but use
it for kingdom territory. So you need to go home,
and just when you walk in and say, we only
got a few more weeks left with you, and you

(59:05):
need to go to the neighbor that you want to
live in, and you need to begin to get an image.
Take a picture of yourself in front of it. Knock
on the door and tell the neighbor, could you please
take a picture of me and my husband in front
of your house. See what you don't understand is And
you put it on your refrigerator, and every day you
begin to imagine you're saying, well, I can't wait to

(59:25):
pull my car up into that place. I can't wait.
Some days you're gonna get off the highway and go
there before you go to your actual home, so you
can get an image of how long it takes you
to get to your new house. That's a waste of time.
I ain't got time for that. You ain't got time
for a miracle. What God's saying is, if you can

(59:46):
imagine it, it'll already be built. So that's why are
prayer and our suggestion has to be proverb sixteen to three.
Commit your works to the Lord, and your thoughts or

(01:00:08):
imagination will be a stab. Imagine that. As we close today,
I want to pray for you. I know it took
me a minute to get through it, but I know
somebody needed that revelation. You will never see yourself the
same again. You will never see yourself again because somebody

(01:00:31):
but I'm going back to the same situation. You will
look at what it is, but you will know what
it is. Okay. So I'm encouraging you. And as much
as I've poured out my heart and my spirit today,
some of you will go back and see the same thing.
And then God looks at you and says, I only

(01:00:52):
can give you what you see. I can only do
a little bit more you see for yourself. So that's
why it keeps bringing you to a place that builds faith. Listen,
at this church, we ain't gonna bash you. We're always
going to encourage your faith. We want you to see more.
We're a church of faith. We believe in God, we
believe in people, and we believe for miracles. Why is

(01:01:13):
that Because if you can just get a glimpse of
yourself in a better state, and you can believe that thing,
then God will begin to produce that picture in your life.
I know people in this church that came in here broke,
busted and disgusted, and now God has moved them into
a different place. Why because they got a different image
of themselves. Command you to begin to imagine yourself in

(01:01:38):
your victory. If you've never accepted Jesus Christ as your
personal Lord and savior, you've never imagined yourself walking free
from the sin that you've been in the cycles that
keep happening in your life. I'm in inviting you to
see yourself different. The greatest thing happened to us, the

(01:01:58):
greatest image that any believer could ever see, or any
human being could ever see, was the image of Jesus
Christ being crucified on a cross for our sins, our mistakes,
and our mess ups. And through that he was able
to reconcile us. That means bring us back together with
our creator, the one who imagined us. And when you

(01:02:20):
get the imagination creation back with the person who created it,
something beautiful happens. Then God begins to tell you things
that are to come. He begins to show you who
you are. You can get the pictures that are going
to produce your destiny. I'm telling you today that the
greatest one decision I ever made was to make Jesus

(01:02:40):
Christ my personal Lord and savior. And today some of
you never imagine it. There may be somebody in here
or watching that's an atheist, but today you're going to
imagine yourself free, home delivered and if you want to come.
According to Romans ten nine, it says that if we
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord and that he raised

(01:03:02):
Christ from the dead, then we are saved. So today,
if that I want everybody to just close your eyes
and imagine yourself free. If you want to accept Jesus
Christ as your personal Lord and SAVI, you're the best
decision you'd ever make. I want you to pray this
prayer in your heart. I just want you to say,
Lord Jesus, I believe that you sent your son to

(01:03:23):
die from me, from my sins and my mess ups,
my shortcomings, my mistakes, And today I ask you to
be lord of my life. I renounce sin, and I
accept you, change me, renew me, transform me. I'm yours.

(01:03:46):
I am saved. If you pray that prayer in this place,
Heaven is rejoicing. If you prayed that prayer before and
you weren't really living it out, and you prayed that
prayer again and you got in alignment with God today,
Heaven is rejoicing. And this is what I want you
to do. You're almost there. All you have to do
is confess it to one person. And as the altar
workers come right now, they're coming from all over this building.

(01:04:07):
Why are they coming? Because I want you to know.
Service is not over. We only got five more minutes.
But this is the most important part of service. This
is the point where if you just pray that prayer,
you get to come up and tell somebody, you know what,
I believe that Jesus Christ died for me. I pray
that prayer and I want you to agree with me,
and at that moment, you are saved and everything in
your life changes. And they're going to agree with you

(01:04:27):
in prayer. And then if you need prayer for any
other reason, if you need prayer for God to change
your imagination. You got images that are almost you feel
like are burned into your mind. God can erase those
and they'll agree with you. If you have relationship problems,
if it's financial, if it's healing in your body. We

(01:04:47):
want to pray what you Listen. You don't have to
be a member of Transformation Church to come and get prayer.
This is what I need prayer. I get prayer. So
don't let pride hurt offense. Don't let that keep you
at your sick. Come get agreement, and then we're gonna
worship God. We're gonna thank God, the God that gives
us a fresh imagination. We're gonna ask him to come

(01:05:08):
in Holy Spirit. We're saying that you're welcome in this place.
Come change us, Come change our minds, Come change our thoughts.
Come give us a new image, and Father will be
careful to give you the glory, honor, and praise. Holy Spirit.
I'm praying that you would draw every person in this
place by your spirit and Jesus' name. We agree, Hey, man, come.

Speaker 1 (01:05:26):
On, we pray you were blessed by today's message. If
you'd like more info about our church, please visit us
online at Transform Church.

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):
Got us