Beyond the Storm

Hello, hello. Listen, I know you wanna check out this message, but before you do, I wanna invite you to come check us out in person. Here at Freelife Chapel, we're all about family and would love to connect with you face-to-face. So if you're ever in the Central Florida area, come check us out. Here at FLC, we wanna help you discover and live the free life in Christ. To learn more about who we are, what we do, and how you can be a part, check us out at freelifechapel.org. Until then, check out this message. I wanna talk to you today about something. And a few months back, it was September, you guys remember this, Hurricane Helene. How many of you remember that hurricane that came through? It made landfall here. I think it was a category four when it hit landfall. And then it worked its way up through Georgia on the way up through into the Carolinas. And then it was like it just kinda stopped over Asheville, North Carolina, that area, Boone, North Carolina, and it dumped rain. And I believe that the statistics on it were that it dumped more than 30 inches of rain in these places where they're not used to getting rain like that. You get a little bit of wind in the mountains,

but not that type of rain. And what happened was this storm moves up and it moves into this area around Asheville and it starts to dump rain and wind. And it got crazy. And there's a scripture in the Bible that says, when the enemy comes in like a flood, the spirit of the Lord will raise up a standard against him. And the storm came in here and it was rough, but when it came in up there in a different region, it hit different. You know that new term, that new phrase, oh, that hits different, right? Well, it hit different up there and it did devastation. It literally looked like in some of the mountain regions up there that someone had dropped a bomb. The flooding tore trees down. What it did was unbelievable. And last weekend, I went to that area and I went on a hike with four really close friends of mine. I went with Dr. Jeremy, Dr. Sam, Dr. Tyler, and Dr. Grant, great friends of mine who have worked with their teams, have been friends with them for almost a decade, if not more. We went up there and we hiked on Saturday around that area. I did almost 14 miles in one day, not bad. Got 33,000 steps in, not too bad, right? How many of you have ever had a day before where you're like, I don't even know if I'm gonna be able to step forward at all.

I did 33,000 steps in one day, was not easy, but we did it around that area. And that picture, if you guys put that up here, this is one of the areas near the top of one of the mountains where the path that we were hiking on would normally go. Can you see those trees? Do you see what that looks like? That looks like all hell broke loose up there and tore these trees down like they were toothpicks. You guys have seen that happen before, but up in the top of the mountains like that, to see that, and then if I would have panned this around, if I would have done a video and shot it around to the left, you would see where the flooding started going down the mountains and it was causing these landslides that were just pushing trees like these down, like they were just toothpicks, piling them up, throwing mud into them, rocks into them. It was crazy, but this was part of the path that we were going to hike. How many of you know that sometimes you think you know the path you're gonna be on and you think you know the direction that it's going in, and then a storm comes and it changes everything? How many of you have ever been through some sort of a storm that changed everything? How many of you are married? Then you know. Look at your spouse and say, you are the storm.

No, do not do that. But how many of you know you've got this idea and you've got this plan, and then all of a sudden, boom, something happens, a storm comes, and it starts to mess the path up, and you thought the path would look a certain way, and now it doesn't? If it hasn't happened to you yet, it will. It's going to happen. Storms will happen. Look at your neighbor and say, storms will happen. One of the things that we gotta do, and we're gonna talk about it in a minute, is make sure that we're not the ones causing the storm. Because some people say, oh my gosh, it's so much going on, it's so much drama, it's so bad, it's so whatever. It's like, hey, hey, hey, cool, cool, cool, wait, wait, wait, wait. But are you the one that's causing this storm that you're complaining about? Because in some ways, if you're the one that keeps... complaining, and you're the one that keeps starting it, maybe you like the storm. Maybe the storm that you create with your drama is a diversion away from the thing that you know you need to be working on. So if you can keep some drama stirred up, then we don't have to look at what really needs to be worked on. Can I just say that sometimes we do that? Say yes.

Say thank you. You're welcome. So I want to give you a couple of things today that I know can help you, help to remind you. You may know these things, but to help you to continue to navigate through the storms as you go. And here's what I'll tell you. Sometimes the storms are not just external storms. Sometimes they're just internal. Any of you guys up there ever had an internal storm that you've gone through? Like you felt it. Emotional storms. You ever had that? You ever just had an emotional storm like, I don't know, I'm about to tear it up in here. It's about to become a cyclone. We're about to blow, you don't know any, you're going to blow through the office. You go to work with all your co-workers, you're just going to create a storm. Let everybody know. Be careful. You may have a relational storm, co-worker, friend. Can I tell you something? The people you work with, your friends, your family, people in your community, if you care about people, you can love people. And do you know what? Sometimes you're still going to get frustrated with them. You might get frustrated with your parents, you might get frustrated with your kids, you might get frustrated with your spouse, you could even get frustrated with your pastor, you might get frustrated with me today. I might offend you in the best way I can, in the most loving way that I can. But do you know that you're going to get frustrated? Storms will frustrate you.

Will they not? Yes? Let me tell you a couple things about storms. Number one, come, storms do not come to stress you. God allows them to strengthen you. And the storm that we deal with today oftentimes is to equip us for a storm that we know nothing about that may come in the future. Yesterday at Surge, I was talking to them, I said, you know, sometimes we think success is a win, that I have to get the win. And do you know sometimes you can gain something so much more than a win when you get wisdom? The win may not be the win, the loss may be the win if you get wisdom. So I'm going to tell you something, wisdom is better than a win. And a lot of times what people say is, oh, OK, you get wisdom from experience. Can I tell you where experience comes from? I could probably ask my daughter Kennedy if she knows this because she can recite a lot of my stuff. She's smart like me. She's beautiful like her mom, intelligent like her mom, wonderful like her mom. But I'm the one wearing the blue suit. Check this out. I thought when Pastor Caleb was talking about not being able to change that tire, I was like, well, of course you're not going to be able to change the tire, you wear a blue suit. I mean, like, you know, and I went, uh-oh, you ever been convicted wanting to say something to somebody else and you got to look in the mirror and be like, uh-oh, I'm wearing a blue suit. You ever do that sometimes? But please hear me, that sometimes what I believe is that we get frustrated when we create this stuff. And what I tell people all the time is this, is you got to know that if God allowed it,

there's a purpose in it. Right. It's good. If, if you're frustrated, if something hurts, if there's a circumstance you didn't plan, God allowed it. You can look all through the Scriptures of all the people in the Scriptures, the great leaders in the Scriptures, they were tormented, they were afflicted, they went through stuff. How about my servant Job? I don't know if you guys know this, if you've read the Bible story, Job, it's like he had everything and then he lost it. Yeah. Didn't mean he didn't love God, didn't mean God didn't love him. He went through it. We're going to go through challenges. The storms don't come to stress us. They come so that God can strengthen us. That's pretty good. Storms don't come to exhaust us. Storms don't come to exhaust us. Storms come to equip us. I don't want to get bitter because of the storm. I want to pull the wisdom, take the lesson. I want to get better because of the storm. So in some ways, when I become a leader, I start looking around going, is there a storm somewhere that I could help to be a solution to? I'm not gonna add to it, I'm not gonna bring my drama to it, I'm not gonna bring my negativity to it. I'm gonna bring some peace to this storm because of the peace I have in me and it's a peace that surpasses all understanding. I might not be able to intellectually get it but I can carry it because there's something

in me that's different. So storms aren't here to exhaust us. They're here to equip us. And storms aren't here just to challenge us. They're here to change us. They're here to change us. How many of you know that there are some changes that you could make in your life right now? Just not everything. But something that could help you to be just a little bit better. Come on raise your hand really really really high Yeah, that's all of us. Let me tell you if you didn't raise your hand, that's okay You don't have to I get it, but everyone seemed to raise their hand But you know Sometimes we can get to a place where we feel like we've been through so many storms that we know Everything about everybody else's storm and that ain't true Can I tell you something just from this point of that that storm hit landfall here in Florida The reason I wanted to talk to you about us because we live in North Carolina now. We're closer to my family We moved back almost a year ago. It's been the toughest year of my life The storms hit different we don't always know what the storm looks like to someone else For some person it just feels like wind to someone else It could be rain to someone else. It could be a fire Things Elijah in the scripture they said the Spirit of the Lord told him to go out by the cave and he said there was an earthquake and there was Wind and there was fire and God wasn't in all that but it was this still Small voice of whisper to Elijah that said hey. Hey, here's what you need to do next Do you understand that storms are different to all of us? But how we respond to them is going to determine where it is. We wind up This Last year has been difficult. We moved back closer to North Carolina. I'll be closer to my family We get back closer and then it's like all hell broke loose for me personally

I've started feeling bad. I had bad allergies before I went to the doctor changed all that up Thought I had myself dialed in changed all my diet up in a way. I thought I was good Have you ever been before like oh, we're good. I got this and then all of a sudden something else comes from over here And so I go and I'm not feeling good and I go get some blood work done Get the blood work done. Then I get on a plane. This is December and I fly to Colorado Training a team that I've worked with for over a decade that is has done so many amazing things around the world I go out it's December the 19th And when I come back, I've got kovat I Don't know if you guys ever heard of its kovat. This is word I don't know if anybody any of you have ever heard it before but it's a little virus No, people don't know what it is. But kovat any of you ever heard of the word kovat? I got kovat for the fourth time. I've had it four times and it's rocked me every single time And some people like oh I got kovat. I just couldn't taste anything. I'm like, well, let me tell you something. I Have tasted and seen that kovat is not good So I come back about two weeks rocks me through the holidays missed the family Christmas party missed the gathering. I'm rocked Miss it Then the beginning of the year finally meet with my doctor. I'm getting to a point where I'm foggy in my mind Like I'm fatigued. There's a point like I'm like, this is not good So when I have my appointment, I have my wife Jen sit with me Because I knew I was in a place where I wouldn't be able to retain what the doctor told me You guys with me? It's kind of like church. Sometimes this is why we say hey take notes Right. Don't just come out. Okay. I had this appointment. Here's what what did you learn from it? I don't know How was the doctor's appointment? It's good. What'd they tell you? Oh, no, that wouldn't be very good, right? We don't want to do that. And so I have Jen sit with me. Here's what my doctor says to me He says right off. He's gonna tell you something. He said if on a scale of 1 to 15 He said 1 being your hearts really good 15 is you're about to stroke out have a heart attack and be dead he said you're pushing 14 5 and He said you're too fit man we got to do something and

So Jen's listening and it's at that point. It's like okay, there's work to be done I got a family to take care of I got a life to live. I got a pursuing I got a calling I got to pursue. What is this? And so we start changing things up I immediately go into a detox and Can I just tell you? That the detox stuff that they gave me these supplements if I could describe Satan in pill form I got this one green neuro detox thing that I take that I will tell you is the devil himself in a little capsule But please hear me Sometimes things have to get worse before they get better And if you only get one thing from today, I'm telling you when you decide to make some changes Sometimes things get worse before they get better. We start this detox. We go through it I'm pushing now. I'm almost three months in it's like the what went on in those months. Thank God for friends Thank God for pastor Scott my friend pastor Leroy like people that were checking in going you okay? Because I was not it was tough and Let me tell you we come out of it and about a month ago I say out of it I'm on the way out I'm starting to think oh this is gonna be good I'm starting to get the old thinker back all right I'm starting to get clear-minded again I'm good then guess what happens the flu I thought that if you got kovat that your immune system then for a while at least could fight off anything else that might look like Kovat like the flu because we were like Kovat and the flu is the same thing they are not the same and guess what the flu floored me so here I am excited I'm coming out right I'm ready I'm like let's do it and then uh-huh no you're not boom flu hits me knocks me out a couple of weeks on the back end of it come down here I'm doing an event here in Lakeland come down here my wife's got it Addison my daughter's got it Kennedy got it it got all of us on the back end of it thinking like wow maybe getting through the flu did the event here was great was gonna come over here to the church I got to tell this story was gonna come to the church and then Jen and I were feeling so bad I text Heather

I don't know if you guys know Heather Nance Heather Nance works here the church one of the greatest stewards she's amazing unbelievable human being I text her and I said Heather hey Jen and I still aren't feeling well so we're gonna go ahead and head home the response was oh no we'll be praying for her you know I mean you guys get what I just said I said we still aren't feeling good we us inclusive all under the umbrella my wife and I still aren't feeling good and when I got back we'll be praying for her I'm like you know it ain't that hard to throw Ronnie into a prayer you know I mean my name is not that hard to say Ronnie if you got don't like how much time with prayer just call me Ron just throw it in there or maybe if you're really busy Heather please just throw in Roo Lord bless Jennifer and Addison and Kennedy and Roo you know who he is trust level with Heather went from here to here but here's what I want you to know after that it's been now three to four weeks I'm going back in a couple weeks gonna have blood work done again I just want I'm telling you this because some of you need to hear this I'm going back I'm getting my blood work done and I'm gonna tell you that I'm not completely out of this this change is gonna be a lifestyle deal I know that it's a change but I'm believing that I'm completely healed completely whole and then listen to me here's the phrase I got let me tell you the phrase and some of you need to say this because you've gone through some storms how many of you have gone through some storms raise your hand let's let me tell you here's the saying I've heard people say before and I'll say it now with authority devil you should have killed me when you could have because when I come out I'm ripping the doors off these hinges it ain't gonna be like anything you've ever seen before you thought you didn't like me back then when I was operating at about 70% you surely aren't gonna like me at a hundred there's storms they're not meant to stop us I think they're meant to stir us and here's a few things that I want you to know about this I'll give you a couple of specifics on this regardless of how tough the storm may be there is still a path to be walked regardless of how tough the storm may

be there is still a path to be walked if you decided you're going to school even if it gets tough there's still a path for you to walk you start a new job God opens a new door for you you open up a new business you do something you know you're called to do it when it gets difficult it gets challenging there is still a path to walk you get married new relationship there is still a path in the beginning come on am I right tell me I'm right say yes Ronnie you're right the beginning of a relationship it's always like ain't this great love this whoo and it's awesome and then you get a little bit more in the relationship and you're like ain't it well you know and then you feel like ain't this great and then you feel like the person in relation pulling you back and you're like oh I thought this was gonna be great now it's your fault all that stuff you ever been through this right yes there's still a path to be walked Don't abort your destiny just because the storm came and made it challenging. If you promised to do it, if you committed to do it, do it. Listen, that picture we saw up there today, those trees were laying across that path. I know, this is what I've found, that on the path sometimes there's highs and there's lows. Those trees, we had to climb over and under some of them, up and down. And do you know that's how the path is? It's up and it's down. But when we develop emotional maturity, can I tell you what I've learned? I have learned that when we develop emotional maturity, we don't let the highs take us too high and we don't let the lows take us too low. We find that middle ground, we stay anchored to Christ, we stay anchored in what we know, we stay anchored in the Word of God because it keeps us and holds us. And here's what I'll tell you, maybe the storm that you're in, it might not be that difficult. But let me tell you, even though it's not challenging, that doesn't mean you still can't stand for what it is you decided you would stand for way before any of the inconveniences started. Even if it's not that challenging, you can still stand for what you said you were going to stand for.

It doesn't have to be all drama, all everything's lost before you go, no, no, I'm still standing. There's a little bit of gossip going on in the office. It's not a big deal. No, no, no, I'm still standing. It doesn't have to all implode. We don't have to wait till it all hits the bottom before we can go, no, no, no, I'm still standing. There's gonna be ups. There's gonna be downs. There's a Scripture, Psalms 23, I just spoke at a celebration of life in Scottsdale, Arizona for a friend of mine. His mother passed away. Great honor for me, for my friend to say, hey, would you come speak at this celebration of life? And the Scripture was Psalm 23. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for thou art with me. Do you know when you're going through the lows, you walk through the valley, the shadow of death? I know that if there's a shadow, there's gotta be a little bit of light, so you know what I'm doing? No matter what the challenge is, whether it's a little challenge or a big challenge, I'm still looking for the light in that situation. And you can too. So here's a great question I'll ask you. This is a good one. If you're in a big storm, middle storm, light storm, whatever it is, here's a great question. What are you looking for? Because what you look for, you will find. If you need to find that it's all lost, this is awful, there's nothing we can do, oh no.

If that's what you need to see in it, you'll find that. If you're looking for, hey yeah, this is challenging, this doesn't feel good, but we can still do this, there's a way, there's gotta be a way, with God all things are possible, if that's what you're looking for, that is what you will find. You gotta decide what you're looking for. Not just out there, also in here. The Scripture of David said, search my heart, Lord. Look inside here. If we can do that and we can get peace in here, do you know that we can weather the storms? I'll give you a quote that I didn't share earlier today, but if you can conquer the enemy within, the one on the outside can do you no harm. If you can conquer the storm within, the one on the outside can do you no harm. I said it yesterday and I'll say it again because it's worth repeating. If you can hold your tongue, you can hold your peace. Sometimes, I don't know, have any of you ever done this? I don't know, maybe you've done it, I've done it once. Maybe twice, I don't know. My wife and I have been together for almost 21 years. I said yesterday, we don't argue, we just have a vigorous exchange of dissenting ideas. But have you ever done this before where you're a little bit frustrated, you thought I'm not gonna say anything, but then you start talking about it a little bit and the more you talk about it, the more you hear it, the more frustrated you get? Have you ever had that happen before? You're like, oh, this ain't that big of a deal, but I'm just gonna say a little something and then once you start talking, it's like gas on the fire. Am I right or am I right? How many of you have done that before? As soon as you said it, you're like, shouldn't have said that. Put this back in.

Does that happen? If we can hold our tongue, we can hold our peace. Let me tell you something, I'll give you this and I'm gonna be done with you. Be done today. Hopefully I get to come back. Hope y'all have me back. It'd be year, what, number seven, wouldn't it? Wow. Here's what I want you to know, that if you're feeling a certain way during what you'd call a storm, if you're feeling a certain way during something you might call a challenge or an unexpected... Circumstance. I want you to know that what you are feeling requires, say requires, emotion requires belief. Emotion requires belief. I'll give you the old story, we've all heard it before. Someone's walking along a path, they look down, there's a stick, they believe it's a snake. How do you feel when you look down and you see a stick that you believe is a snake? Come on, is there an emotion with that? Yes or yes? Yes. You believe it's a snake and there's emotion, but then in a moment you have a realization, you believe something different and now you believe it's a stick, it's not a snake. What happens to the emotion? It goes away. Many of us are running through the same, same storm again and again and again because we're not getting control of what it is that we believe. We're letting the news tell us, news, N-E-W-S, north, east, west, south, cast. I ain't gonna say what that would mean. Witchcraft, newscast, casting spells. Be careful what you watch, you might be getting programmed. There's a reason they call it television programming. I'm sorry. Faith comes by hearing and hearing. What you hear starts to change what you believe. Many of us are facing the same storms because we keep putting the same information in. And if you don't conquer the mountain that you were called to because you let your emotions run you again and again and again, hear me, please hear me, if you don't conquer that mountain, you'll wind up circling that mountain and you'll be the same face in

the same place and the only thing that gets better are your excuses. That's not who we are. That's not who we are. Say, that's not who I am. I'm gonna tell you this last thing. I want to give you this scripture. Maybe you guys have seen it. Romans 8 and 18. It says, I reckon that the suffering of this present time is not worthy to be compared to the glory that's going to be revealed in us. What that means to me is maybe I'm going through a storm, maybe I feel like I'm suffering, maybe I feel like there's pain, but I reckon that this suffering of this present time is not worthy to be compared to the glory that will be revealed in us. I'm gonna challenge you today, church, that when you leave here today, you look at whatever the storm is that you may feel like you are facing. Maybe you'd say it's a big storm, maybe you'd say it's even a small storm, but I would ask you to look at what it is that you believe right now and if it's not serving you to feel more bold, more courageous, more proud, more authority, more forgiveness, more worth. If it's not causing you to feel that, I'm gonna challenge you to shift that belief because the work has already been done so that glory can be revealed through us. He did the work. It is finished. Let's get to work and let's finish the job. God bless you guys. I love you. Thank you. I hope you enjoyed that. We hope you enjoyed this message. To hear more impactful messages just like this one, check us out at FreelifeChapel.org. We hope you have an amazing week.