David Hughes - How to Break a Negative Clyce

Y'all have had your coffee this morning. I love that. You're caffeinated. If you're a guest, I'm gonna just jump right into it because you're smart, you'll catch on. We're talking about how to break bad habits and even toxic cycles. If you've wrestled with something that brings discouragement or even shame to your life for a long time and can't figure out how to break that cycle, you're in the right place. And maybe, maybe the first thing you need to understand is our God, the God of heaven is passionate. He's unrelented. He's fixated. He's so determined. He is so committed to your freedom. My God wants to see you set free. My God wants to see you live a life holistically, emancipated, not just to set you free from the powers of sin and the grave and death. He wants to see you set free from any brokenness or any bondage in your life. So we're gonna study how to do that right now. I think you'd be more happy about that idea that God is all about your freedom. There you go. I'm gonna share a couple of stories today. Number one, if you have your Bible, go to Old Testament, 2 Chronicles chapter 34,

2 Chronicles 34. But before that, I'm gonna show you one example. It's from the Bible who finds freedom, who breaks free from cycles and generations of brokenness. But here's an example from history. I love history. This is a historical figure you've probably not heard of before, but he's part of Florida history, especially in the Florida Keys, a man named Sandy Cornish. Sandy was born a long time ago in the late 1700s in Maryland, and he was born into slavery. Now, when someone's born into slavery, it doesn't mean they were free and then trafficked. It means that their mom and their dad were slaves and probably their grandparents were slaves. So cycles of dehumanizing bondage. That was his context. He's born in Maryland, but his master hired him out to a construction company in Florida, building a railroad. And what made that so unique was this company recognized his abilities, his talents. They offered to pay him compensation. Typically a slave didn't get paid, and they paid him $600. You're like, what, a week, a month, a year? A year to do this labor and intensive job in Florida building this railroad. Now, they probably thought he wouldn't survive very long because Florida was a jungle back then. It was swamp, disease, dysentery, malaria.

But he prospered and worked for the company nine long years. He earned enough money, $3,000 he set aside, to purchase his own freedom and that of his wife. He broke that bondage of generational slavery. He moves to Key West in 1840. Doesn't just live as a free man, he becomes wealthy. How did he become wealthy? Farming. Now, if you don't know anything about the Keys, there's not farms in the Keys. Why? There's no topsoil in the Florida Keys. Ever go to the Keys? I love the Keys. All they have is gravel and rock and sand, right? No place to grow crops. But he was an innovator. He developed an agricultural technique where he blended seaweed and horse manure, created compost, and created just enough synthetic topsoil that he could grow crops and especially fresh fruit that he sold to his neighbors at great profit. He became very wealthy and very respected in Key West with both whites and blacks. An amazing story of a man who prospered. In fact, there's a monument to him in Mallory Square in Key West till this day. I love stories like that when somebody works hard, yeah, works hard, works smart, they innovate, then they break generational cycles of bondage

and end up free and prospering and impactful. Those are stories that God wants to see repeated in this church time and time again. God wants to see you living a life that is free. So if you're battling with something, and we all are, amen, we all have something, that nagging habit, I don't mean it's slavery per se, but it's something in your life. You can't handle credit or you battle with the bottle or you just, you know, you gain and lose the same 10 pounds over and over again. How can we be free? So we're gonna be in the Old Testament. The books of 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles are fascinating. The story of the people of God during a unique time is the time of, well, the kings, the kings. First three kings you'll recognize, biblical background, right, I'll set up the study. We have King Saul, first king of Israel, then King David, ever hear of him, King David? Yeah, the giant killer, he's the best king, the biblical benchmark, a man of God's own heart, flawed but loved God greatly ever. So Saul, David, and then David's son was Solomon. You know about Solomon. Now Solomon's life is like watching a series on Netflix that has two seasons, and season one, Solomon is awesome. He's wise, he's discerning, he loves God, but that's season one. Season two in Solomon's life, train wreck, falls apart.

He's spiritually compromised. in his own life, in his relationships, in his sex life. It brings chaos to the nation. And by the time he's about to die, the seeds of civil war and division have been sown. His son's name is Rehoboam. When I say three, say the name Rehoboam. One, two, three, Rehoboam. Not a single person in the room named Rehoboam. Why? Terrible king, kind of a dumb guy. And the kingdom falls apart. It splits into the Northern Kingdom, the Southern Kingdom, and all the kings in the North, terrible kings, one bad king after another. The study last week about the four lepers that's in the North in Israel. The Southern Kingdom, have I lost you, smart people? Have I lost you? The Southern Kingdom is called Judah. On the throne of Judah sits descendants of King David, why God always keeps his promises. And those kings are also pretty bad, also pretty bad. Most of those kings are bad. It's bad for the nation, why? Because leadership in a nation matters. And so they have these bad kings, but there are a few shining examples. Like King, like King, I don't know, how about let's go King Josiah.

I love King Josiah. We're gonna talk about King Josiah. He is a remarkable king, an amazing man. He's a person who breaks the chain. Cycles of dysfunction. Another good king, they're hard to find. After David, you have maybe Hezekiah. Hezekiah, probably not many people named Hezekiah, but maybe you should name somebody, it's a great name. Wonderful king, godly king, brought reform to the nation. But in between these two examples of these terrible kings, Josiah's dad was named Ammon. Ammon was such a heinous, horrible king, his own counselors assassinated him after two years. Imagine a president being so bad, his own cabinet, they just bump him off after a while, right? I mean, just a terrible, terrible king. So that is Josiah, we're gonna talk about Josiah. That is his daddy, his daddy, bad dude, gets murdered by his own counselors. He's such a terrible, wicked, pagan king. His dad, his dad, Josiah's granddad, Manasseh. Maybe you heard the story of Manasseh. If you heard the story, it's all bad. He's bad to the bone, he is good at being bad. He literally is the worst king in the history of Judah. He is sensationally sinful, he's profoundly pagan. He does just terrible, evil things. He corrupts the entire, I mean bad, like you can read his story.

He sacrificed his own son in a fire to a pagan god called Moloch, he's terrible. The only thing that makes him worse, he reigned for 55 years. It's the longest reigning king in the history of, 55 years. You know what I kind of feel like for me, that's like me as a perennial sad Dolphins fan, Dolphins fan, Dolphins make me sad. I'm hopeful we just had the draft, right? But in our division, we've had the Patriots. I'm about to say the Patriots are an evil kingdom, but maybe, maybe, and as a Dolphins fan, their quarterback, Tom Brady, right? The best quarterback of all time, and he kept playing. He was with the Patriots 20 years, beating my team, beating my team. Why would he retire, get old, you feel me? So Manasseh, Manasseh, I'm not saying Tom Brady's Manasseh, but anyways, Manasseh, with a terrible king, reigned a long time, so what do you have, stay with me, saying all that, you have almost 60 years of dysfunction. You have sin, brokenness, rebellion for six long decades. And here comes Josiah, and Josiah's gonna change the game. Let's go to 2 Chronicles chapter 34. Look what it says here in verse one. Read the highlighted words. It says, Josiah was, good job, was eight years old. He became, and he reigned in Jerusalem, that's in Judea, 31 years.

Where do I even start? I wanna unpack this, this one remarkable verse. Maybe I start with this. Here's the title today, it's a very simple title. It's called, the sermon is this. How to break a negative cycle. How to break a negative cycle. It's simple, it's clear. I wanna give you three steps, three action steps. If you apply these, whatever the thing that you're dealing with, you can draw a line in the sand today, and find the freedom that God desires you to enjoy, amen? All right, so what do we do? Three steps, first step, I wanna say this. It's about your identity, you gotta know who you are. Gotta know who you are, gotta know who you are. So in this verse, we find out he is eight, he's eight. Now just think about that for a moment, he's eight. That's really young. Eight is what? Eight is the second half of second grade. Probably has no front teeth, probably has freckles. His favorite show is Barney. He thinks girls have cooties. He's eight, he's eight. He's a little boy, probably picks his nose, eats his boogers, he's eight. And he doesn't look like it, but he is king. He is a royal.

Don't let the coloring books and cartoons fool you. He's just a kid, but he is the king of Israel, a son of David, he's a man of destiny. He knows who he is. You have to know who you are. Some of us stay in brokenness and cycles of bondage, why our identity is all wrong. You look in the mirror and you see someone. or not. Based on your past, you look at the mirror and go, well, there's the loser. There's the underachiever. There's the disappointment. There's the failure. There's the one you should be more like your sister. Are you a Christian? Shake that off. Listen, the devil, when he wants to attack your future, goes at your sense of identity. If he wants to have you slip into temptation and failure, he will attack who you think you are. Example, New Testament. The most famous temptation scenario in all of human history, Matthew chapter 4, when Jesus, after 40 days of fasting, the Bible says he's hungry. Didn't need that detail. Could have guessed that, right? Bible says he's hungry. He's tempted by the devil three times. Now, the devil says something two to three times fasting, but for the temptation, he's going to tempt Jesus. Hey, you're hungry? Turn these rocks into bread. But before he says that, he says, if you are the son of God. Jesus, if you are the son of God, turn these stones into bread. I think at that point in the text, Jesus raised his eyebrows and said, did you just say if?

Did you say if I'm the son of God? Did you just say if because that's in Matthew chapter 4? You'll know what chapter immediately precedes Matthew chapter 4, Matthew chapter 3. Matthew chapter 3, Jesus is baptized. Why is Jesus baptized? It's not to wash away his sin. He has no sin. Baptism does not wash away your sin. Baptism announces you're about to start your mission. By the way, Rally Friday night, if you miss Rally, oh my gosh, Rally was amazing. And we baptized over a dozen young adults right on Broward Boulevard. Baptisms on Broward at first baptism are so amazing, right? There are all these cars going down Broward Boulevard. Go, what kind of party is this? It was a baptism party. So Jesus was baptized in Matthew chapter 3, right? Temptation happens in Matthew chapter 4. And the devil says, if you are the son of God. I wonder if Jesus might have said, if? Oh, I guess you missed chapter 3. I guess devil, you weren't listening at my baptism. You weren't watching because when I was baptized, when I came up out of the water, a booming voice from heaven, that would be my father. My father said, this is, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. Oh, I know who I am. If I am the son of God, no, no, no. Go back and read a half dozen verses before this story. I am the son of God.

I know who I am. I will not fall for your trap or your temptation. You must know who you are. Christian, if you have been saved, whether you've been saved for 30 years, 30 days, or get saved in less than 30 minutes, the Bible says so many things about who you are in Christ. This is your biblical definition. Dozens and dozens of amazing things. The Bible pronounces a fact about who you are. The Bible says you're part of a chosen generation, a holy nation. Christian, you're God's own possession. You're a child of God, an heir of God. You are God's sons and daughters. You've been adopted. It says in 2 Corinthians, you are a new creation in Christ. What are old cycles to a new creation? It says in Ephesians 1, you are holy, that you are blameless. You are free. In Romans, there's no condemnation. You're alive in Christ, redeemed, forgiven. You are blessed, it says. You are God's friend. You're God's coworker. I put my hands together. God's field, God's building, his sheep. Member of his flock. It says in Scripture, members of God's household.

You've been called. You're crowned with beauty. You're a holy people, God's treasured possession. You are loved. You're God's ambassador. You're the light of the world, the salt of the earth. You are as his witness. You're a child of God without fault or flaw. You're children of light, partakers in his glory, the first fruits of his creation. You are the temple of God, 1 Corinthians 6, verse 19. You are living stones. You are stewards of his grace. You are a flourishing olive tree. You're the people called by his name, his eternal people, his beautiful bride. You are never forsaken. Jewels in his crown, beautiful without blemish. It says, more than conquerors, beloved. And 1 Peter says, you are members of a royal, a royal priesthood. Just sit down. I'm just reading Bible to you. It's the word of God. This is not a spiritual pep talk. This is not a pop psychology affirmation session. This is your identity. You wrap your brain around this. Next time the devil says, look, you're a loser. You're a failure.

You can't break this cycle. Like, really? Did you catch I'm a royal? Remember a royal priesthood, a royal priesthood. I'm a son or daughter, John chapter one, verse 19. John chapter one, verse 12. Son or daughter of God and God's the great king. That means I am a prince or a princess of God. I mean, man. A royal, see, he's a little boy. Little boy. Right, right, he watches the Wiggles, wears footie pajamas, Josiah, but he's a royal. Doesn't look like a king, but he's a king. You're a royal, you're a royal. Now, let me help you reframe that. When you think of a royal or a king in the Western mindset, you know, Western history, European history, you think of a king and their coronation. Right, when a king or royal is crowned. It's a big deal, it's always public, there's lots of pomp and circumstances. When you're a king in the Western tradition, they give you a crown, you sit on a throne, you get a scepter, and it's all about your privilege and your power. That's not really the idea of a king in the Bible. A king in the Bible is not about their coronation, it's about their anointing. Anointing's a different idea.

By the way, not just kings, but prophets and priests were anointed in the Bible, where a man of God, called by God, would come to you, lay hands on you, then pour oil on your head. Anointing was not about your privilege. It was about your service. It was not about your kingship as much as your calling. It was about your responsibility, not your authority. It meant you were called to serve other people and serve God, not yourself. And they would anoint your head with oil. When I say three, shout the word oil. One, two, three. Oil. Very symbolic. The anointing with oil, what does that mean? I'll tell you at the end of the talk if I have time. All right, I'll tell you in just a moment, because it's really kind of a cool symbolism. But I wanna move on. Second idea, you wanna get free, you wanna end these cycles of dysfunction, you gotta do some building and do some breaking. Gotta build some things, gotta break some things. So one thing Josiah does, you can read his story in the next chapters that follow, chapter 34, is he begins a renovation of the temple. The temple's been in disrepair for almost 60 years, right? Falling apart. When we stepped into downtown First Baptist,

there had been no repairs for 35 years. Oh my gosh, we had to fix everything, right? Imagine an ancient building with no repairs, no renovation for 175 years. So you have to go in and clean house, so you have to go in and clean house because Manasseh, his evil grandfather, had desecrated and profound the temple, so you had to go in, and then he's gonna celebrate the way, he's gonna celebrate, he's gonna celebrate the best Passover since the time of Moses. So there's gonna be a celebration, but before the celebration, a renovation. Before you throw the party, you gotta clean the house. And so he's gonna clean house, and look at how thorough he is, he's a young cat, especially young people, press in here if you're here and you're in high school, middle school, even elementary school, it says, he began, it says verse three, when he had been king for eight years, so it was the eight plus eight, he's 16, 16, just got his license for the royal camel, here we go, he's 16, he was still only a teenager, he began to seek, oh my gosh, that's so good, I wish I had time,

seek the God of David, his ancestor. Four years later, the 12th year of his reign, now he's 20, he set out to cleanse the neighborhood of sex and religion shrines and get rid of sacred asher poles, what is all that? You can just check out chat GPT and it will tell you, but it's weird, perverse worship, these asher poles were a pagan fertility sign. Next line, he, sorry. Oh, it's not gonna, he. He wrecked the bell shrines, he tore down the altars, connected them, he scrubbed the place, see the language, he cleansed, he wrecks, it says the NIV, he smashed, it continues, drew some inside and out, then verse six, verse six, the cleanup campaign ranged outward to the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, and here's verse six, verse six, he doesn't just cleanse Judah of all this idolatry and pagan worship, he goes to Israel in the north and he starts to clean up that area, that's not even his kingdom. It'd be like, you're so meticulous about your yard, you don't just pull all the weeds in your yard, you go to the neighbor's yard to make sure their weeds don't get in your yards.

He's cleaning house. Yeah, with David, okay, great, great, I see this young man, 16, 20, very zealous for God, very enthusiastic, he's smashing all these idols, I get it, cleaning the temple, repairing, destroying pagan worship, but I don't think I have an Asherah pole in my neighborhood. There's no statues to bail, how do I even apply this? Okay, maybe here's one way. You wanna break the bonds of paganism or sin or temptation, maybe the words for you are mute, block, delete, just one way to think of it. Unfollow anything or anyone who fights against your faith. Now, if you missed last week, you think, oh, he hates iPhones, no, I don't, I love my iPhone. My iPhone's amazing, but there's a lot of negativity and hate on my iPhone, there's temptation on my iPhone, I gotta protect me from my iPhone. There are influences on my life I gotta be careful about. So listen, boundaries are blessed and beautiful. Some of us, we sabotage our own spiritual success, we actually fight against our freedom because what we keep within. Example in the Bible, when Elisha was called by God to be a prophet, he became a great prophet. At the moment of his calling, he was busy. God tends to call busy people. He's plowing. He's a farmer. He's a well-to-do farmer.

The Bible says he's plowing with 12 yoke of oxen. That's 24 oxen, 24 cows. He wouldn't do it by himself. He had a staff, right, two per person. But the moment he's called by God, he said he stopped right then, he butchered all the cows, he broke up all the plows, he created a big bonfire with the wood, and he created a big barbecue for the neighborhood of all the cows. Imagine the brisket, right? I mean, this barbecue fed thousands of people, but he's making a statement. My old life is done. I've eradicated my exit strategy. Some of you want freedom, but you want to keep the old life as an option just in case you change your mind. I mean, why is his number still in your phone? Why is that substance still in your house? Cortez burned his ships. No going back. That's kind of radical. That's kind of radical. That's a little extreme. Do you want to be free? You think people who benefit from your bondage will grant you your emancipation without a fight? Oh, freedom calls for radical steps. So, when I first learned the story of Sandy Cornish, this man born into slavery, you know, goes to Key West, becomes wealthy, influential, city leader, has a monument, I found out there's a part two to the story.

Well, he purchased his own freedom, but this happened before the Civil War. There's still slavery in America. Well, he had a house fire, burned everything in his house, including the documents declaring his freedom. So, when some scoundrels heard about this, some shady characters heard about this, they came to kidnap him and his wife, take them to faraway New Orleans, and sell them as a slave, though they were free. When they came to take Sandy Cornish as a slave again, he pulled out his knife, the scholars say, but he didn't attack. He took his knife and he cut the tendon behind his knee and hamstringed himself, said, do you still want me? When they continued to come, this is a little grotesque, but he put his left hand down, he cut off his pinky, put it in his mouth like a cigar, and said, do you still want me? At that point, they recognized, no, he was crazy about his freedom. He would harm his well-being. He would sacrifice his health. He would cut parts of his body off to be free. And you won't cut off that relationship. You won't cut off that experience. You won't cut off that environment. Do you want to be free? So, I put the ideas together. I want to build. I want to break. I want to break anything in my life that holds me back from

God. I want to eradicate my extra strategies, and I want to build room in my heart and my life for God to move in a powerful way. I want God to be dominant, and then I'm a royal. I'm a royal. I'm a son or daughter of the king. I'm a royal priest. Now, the Bible doesn't mean a coronation. It means an anointing. So, here's what I found out about anointing. I promised if I had time I would share with you. Anointing in the Bible is symbolic of your calling, your responsibility, your purpose before God serving other people. But the main thing in the Old Testament, the scholars say every time you see anointing with oil, it's symbolic of the Holy Spirit. Now, the Old Testament has a different understanding of the Holy Spirit. God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit. It's more developed in the New Testament. But in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit comes from the outside in with certain individuals. It's not everybody. Again, it's priests and prophets and kings. But when the Holy Spirit comes on a king, they change. The Holy Spirit always brings about transformation. Stay with me. I'll give you an example.

When Saul was anointed in private by Samuel in 1 Samuel 10, verse 6, it says this on the screen right now. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord will come upon you, the prophet said, empower, and you will be into a different person. And sure enough, it happened. When he was anointed, all of a sudden, Saul, who was big and impressive but very, very timid, became powerful and intrepid and had gifts and skills he didn't have. Then the Holy Spirit came on him and changed him. Now, Christian, New Testament, the moment you and I are saved, whether it can happen years ago or happen a few weeks ago or can happen in 7 1⁄2 minutes, you come to a prayer partner, the moment you pray that salvation prayer, God qualifies you for heaven. You become his child. He forgives all your sins. He eradicates your shame. And the Holy Spirit of God comes to live inside every single believer at the moment of your salvation. You can reference Ephesians chapter 1. He is the seal of your salvation. Now, how does that work out for different people? I've seen some people in the Holy Spirit who brings change, comes into their life. Man, the change happens in a moment. It's night and day. Mainly messy people, people, a lot of stuff, but I'll see them also go from really messy to all of a sudden these holy, godly, transformed people we had.

Gosh. Like 10 years ago, I interviewed a pastor from Chicago, Pastor Jolinda Wade. Jolinda Wade, brilliant, awesome lady, has this great inner city church. I interviewed her for many reasons. One was her son worked down here. Her son's name was Dwayne. Dwayne Wade. For the heat, it's Dwayne's mama. But she's awesome. But she didn't raise Dwayne. Dwayne was taking her while she was an addict. She had an addiction to heroin for over a decade. But Jolinda said when she was saved, God eradicated that addiction in the moment. No withdrawal even. That's rare, that's amazing, that's the Holy Spirit. Most of us are not that lucky. For most of us, the Holy Spirit comes to live in your life when you're first saved, and right away in the next days and weeks, he takes care of some of your sin, some of your temptations. But other stuff you keep working on, right? Other stuff is two steps forward and a step back, and why'd I do that again? But guess what? He's gonna do his work. Let him continue to work in your life. He set up shop in your life.

He is gonna bring transformation. If you'll partner with him, if you're not discouraged, if you don't quit, you gotta do a little house cleaning, eradicate those exit strategies, right? Burn those bridges, right, back to sin. But he's gonna make a change in your life. After all, what's his name? The Holy Spirit. What's his first name? Holy, right? The sanctification work of God, the process of holiness will happen. Just don't you quit. You keep showing up. You blow it, you have a terrible week, you make that same terrible decision, you feel shameful, you make sure you come back to church. Church is not just when you had a great week and feel joyful, man, come when you're hurting. Come when you're mad. Come when you're broken. Come when you're discouraged. Come when you're mad at that person. You need to be here. So I'm out of time, but those are two big ideas. Know who you are. Your identity matters. You're a child of God. You have been forgiven. You've been redeemed.

You're purchased at great price. I hope you took out your phone and took a picture of that slide. If not, you have permission to stay for the next service and do it then, but don't leave that part of the sermon. That'd be awkward for both of us. But I mean, know who you are. And then you gotta do some building, gotta do some breaking. Before the party, you gotta clean the house, right? Then the last thing I'm gonna say is this. Josiah's story is magnificent. This young man takes so much turf. He is so God-hearted. He's remarkable. I'm gonna come back and show you when he first reads the Bible and how it wrecks him. But he dies at age 39 in battle. That's young in my opinion. I'm well past 39, right? In the ancient world, they didn't take you seriously until you were 40. He died at 39. So we learn this from his life. Don't wait. Don't you wait. Do it now. Again, if you're here and you're young and like in middle school, high school, you're thinking, hey, David, I'm a pastor.

I'm gonna serve God when I'm older, when I'm grown and married. I'll be back in church. I'll be, you know, I need to. But right now, I'm having my fun. Do it now. Do it now. This year, don't waste a single day. Do it now. You never know. Listen, I hope you live to be 103. But all you have for sure is today. So what's the God decision today? The Holy Spirit is laying on your heart to get you free. Again, I hope you live a long time, but you never know. We have the very sad but beautiful honor of hosting the funeral a week ago for the vice mayor of Coral Springs, Nancy Mateo. Some of y'all, if you live in this community, you know about her. She was on the city council. She died due to violence at age 38. The room was completely full. All kinds of city officials and the police department, but lots of family. I mean, she made a huge impact. And by the way, the funeral, in my opinion, was a beautiful funeral. She was a remarkable woman.

And all the speakers, her sister especially, gave great tributes and politicians spoke. And then Pastor Oral from across town, I mean, he came up with a robe looking awesome. I mean, he preached Jesus. He preached Jesus to our community in such a clear way. It was a great, great message. But I, along with Stan, Pastor Stan, kind of kicked the thing off. And I just wanted to address the elephant in the room. I said, a lot of us are hurting because Nancy was taken so soon. And it was tragic. It was horrible. But don't use the word, what a waste. I recommend, don't frame it the language, what a waste, because as far as I could tell, Nancy didn't waste a moment of her life. She squeezed goodness out of every second. She accomplished more in 38 years than most of us would do in 98 years. So Nancy actually was part of our church family. It's not about politics right now, Republican, Democrat. It's just a compassionate city leader. And Lisa and I met Nancy at, when she was sworn in to office, it was back in 2020, we were wearing masks. And we were so proud of her. She did a lot in very little time. I know we all want to live a long time.

My mom's made it to 94. I hope I get her genetics, you know, but you never know you got today you got today. There's words in a famous speech You might recognize where someone very famous said like anybody I would like to live a long life Lunge longevity has its place Dr. King said that The night before he was assassinated That's part of that. I've been to the mountaintop speech. No one talks about that part. He said I want to live a long time I'd like to see my kids grow up. I'd like to meet my grandkids Longevity has its place, but it's not the first place Your life can be brief and beautiful Brief and brilliant, but you got to maximize today listen JFK never saw his 50s and dr. King never saw his 40s American patriot Nathan Hill never saw his 30s Joan of Arc one of the greatest leaders in the history young people at age 14 began her fight for freedom for her country of France never saw her 20s you count for God today So what's that God decision you need to make today? Is it salvation? Do you know for certain sure? You've been set free by Jesus. Is it baptism? What are you waiting for? We can baptize you today We got clothes get a place to baptize you the waters warm. Why not today? What's my next step? I don't know go to best next steps today Make that move today Every once while it'll float by you a great statement in Scripture 2nd Corinthians chapter 6 verse 2 on the screen right now It says I tell you Now is the time of God's favor loudly Now it's almost like the Bible anticipates when the devil's best strategies to keep you in bondage is not to say there's no heaven He would not tell you there's no hell. He'll just say there's no hurry No, you're not ready Wait a little longer Louie a better time that says no your time is right now Your time is right now make that move step into your destiny your freedom right now You got to cut some things off got to block a few things

Mute a few things do what it takes get yourself free. I want to fight for freedom I want to protect my freedom I want to protect my family and my future my king says when the Sun has set you free you are free indeed Father God, thank you for the truth of the gospel. It emancipates people right now prayer partners are taking their place across the stage Someone's going to choose Jesus. Someone's going to choose salvation Someone a prodigal far from God needs to come home and draw a line in the sand days that God I'm back I need a second chance I want you to receive me forgive me Whoever it is father lead them right now to make decisions and movements that you can play a blessing Jesus name