Making Peace With The Stains In Your Story // Viral Revival: Bloodline Edition // Brie & Aaron Davis

I wanna welcome you to the next installment of "Viral Revival." I hope you have watched every other session. This is session five, y'all. And I believe there's gonna be a grace on this session for you to make peace with the stains in your story. This conversation is so special to me personally because I've been here for every step of this journey. The people who are about to talk are my friends. Some of my closest friends. And I've watched how they have navigated some very devastating valleys and still come up with a story testimony of triumph. And today, as they share their story, I'm believing that God is going to give you the supernatural ability to make peace with the stains in your story. Get your Bible out because they are about to give revelation on the story of Joseph that. You've probably never heard before. And I believe it's gonna transform the way you think and the way that you live. My friends are bringing this last session of "Viral Revival." Will y'all please give it up for Pastor Brie and Aaron Davis. - Why you're standing on your feet? Let's pray real quick. Oh God. You've been so many things to us just in this week. You've shown yourself as God Almighty.

You've shown yourself as Elohim. Lord, you have shown yourself in so many ways. And today, Lord God, we wanna focus in on Jehovah Rafa. Our healer. Lord, today, help us to see you as our healer. The top of our heads to the bottom of our feet. Today, we shift from anointing. Follow me to anointing all on me. God, you will saturate us in this place today. Will you sweep through the aisles today? Will you go into all the rooms in this building? Will you move through the hallway today, Lord God? Jehovah Rafa, our healer. We receive your healing today. It's in the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. And everybody says, a man, a man, a man. Go ahead and have your seat. We are gonna do this very same thing. - Yes, yes, yes. - My name is Brie. - I'm Aaron, I'm Aaron. - And we are so excited to be able to share with you today. God has already been doing a powerful healing work in this place. And so today, we want you to receive this message as confirmation of what you already experiencing right now in the presence of God. And before we jump in, we want to first say thank you to our friends and our pastors. - Thank you to our dear, beloved friends,

Pastor Mike and Natalie. Now, I mean, I'm serious this. I mean, I can't even say their names too much. When I think about the history and just being in this moment, like I will cry. And so I make jokes instead. So, let me say this, but we are so grateful for our friends and so grateful for this moment. And so-- - Let's give it up again for Pastor Mike and Natalie. - Thank you so much. - Continuing to create spaces for us to experience the presence of God. Well, you may or may not know a little bit about our story, but if you ever have wondered what a miracle looks like. - It's a little rough, it's a little ghetto. - You look at it. - But here it is. Here it is. Here's our story. And I'll tell you what, I'll be a little more honest and we'll get more into the story and even why sometimes, you know, hey, some of my stories, I'll cover up with some jokes, but the truth is God has been so good and God has been so real. And it's true that we should not be up here. - No. - We should have been married. We shouldn't still be here giving God glory and giving God praise and having the peace

that we have now. But yeah, we get into our story. It's a little rough, it's a little ghetto and it's kind of crazy if you really get into the details 'cause somebody cheated. (laughing) - I can not, but now listen, now listen, it took 11 years for our marriage to be safe enough for me to say that, okay. Now, seriously, we'll get more into it, but God has brought us from a mighty long way. Us meaning me. - No. - Brie been with him. She was with him before I met him. - No. - I said, yeah, I need that. - Every time I've been married for 11 years and just like he just said, we started out pretty rough in our marriage. - Rough. - We'll take that shot for my dad, and she said, yeah, for 11 years. - Thank you dad. - Listen, we made it, okay. But God has been so good to us through the ups and down of our stories. And today we wanna dig into our stories to give you the permission to dig into your story also. Because what we believe is,

If we make those parts of our story off limits to God, then he doesn't get to do the healing in that part of our story. And so today, we're gonna talk a little bit about our story. We obviously, like I said, I got married 11 years ago. Our first few years were rough, rough, rough. And honestly, we did not know if we were gonna make it. We just had no idea. God did a healing work in our marriage. And then years later, and you may know a little bit about our son that we had over two years ago. We experienced a tragedy of losing our two-week old son, Ace. And in that, we have seen God, y'all, I wish there were words that I could say to explain how you can go through some of the darkest time in your life and come out feeling better and stronger and wiser than ever before. That is only God that can do that in our lives. And he has done just that. And so much so that we have taken Ace's legacy and his name, and we are actually building a wellness collective now called Ace Wellness Collective. And all of that is to help somebody else that may be going through something that we've been through before. All that to say is today, we wanna talk to you about a very simple topic. Our title today is Making Peace with the Stains in Your Story. Making Peace with the Stains in Your Story.

- As a bloodline blesser, we have got to make peace with our story. We've got to bring the pieces that are fragmented, that are over here. We keep this in this corner. We keep that over there. And we'll have the Tennessee, just humans, not even big sea church or Christians. Either you'll get stuck in your story or you'll stiff-arm your story. For me, I'll stiff-arm the depths of the pain because I'll rather be just be happy. Let's tell some jokes, let's move past it. Let's not bring that up. 'Cause if we bring that up, then I'm a cry. And these old toxic masculinity of tears or weakness and all these other lies that are deep in some of my story. But I'll stiff-arm it. Or we'll have a tendency to get stuck. - Yeah, and my tendency is to get stuck in the story. Meaning, you spiral down into the story so much that it almost becomes your identity. And it becomes a part of who you are so much story that Dr. Anita said yesterday. It becomes the flavor of your life. Like everything is tinted by your story. And so today we wanna talk to you about what it means to make peace shalom with your story because our tendency is to do one or the other.

It's either to stiff-arm our story and avoid it, pretend like it didn't happen or certain pieces of our story. Or it's to get stuck in our story. And spiral down into it. Today we wanna specifically talk about how to make peace with your story. Because if you're able to make peace with your story, it not only becomes a part of what God is doing in your life, it becomes a part of your purpose. It becomes a part of why you are here on this earth. We know for effect now because of what God has done in our life, we are here to help people heal. We know that because God has done that in our lives. And it wasn't until the stains in our story that we were actually able to take out of that what God wanted to give us. There is an anointing in your story. Absolutely. There's an anointing, not only in your story, there's an anointing in the stains in your story. And that's the part that we want you to lean into today. It's God, these parts that, honestly, I wanna avoid and act like they didn't happen. These parts that sometimes I get stuck in and I think that this is all I'm gonna be because I went through that. Can you help me pull out the anointing in that? Just like crushed olives,

can you give me fresh oil from this experience, from this pain, from this stain, from this trouble that I have gone through? We have seen that God doesn't skip over the stains in your life to give you an anointing. As a matter of fact, that's exactly where he extracts it from. That's right. And so today, we're gonna ask you to do some deep work. Deep work, deep work. And also, we realize the sensitivity of every individual's story. We have been praying over this particular session as all to workers in the back. And if you need prayer, if you feel like at any moment, at any point, maybe you feel a little dysregulation. There are people available to pray. And we honestly wanna reverence it and respect it because doing this type of work is holy work. You can't do this work without the Holy Spirit. There's no way to go that far deep into the little girl, the little boy that was hurt, that was left, that was unseen out. You cannot do that work without the Holy Spirit. And so we don't wanna push that to the side like it's not a real thing. This is real work and you have to have the Holy Spirit to do it. So we are covering this whole moment with prayer and there's prayer available. - So what we want you to do before we jump in,

deep breath in and out. that you have not allowed them to. The parts of your story that bring up so much pain, they bring up emotion immediately, they bring up triggering, you feel it in your nervous system, your handshake, your heart is populating, 'cause those are the parts that God wants to pull some oil out of. Today we want you to lean into that. We're not gonna just look at our story, which I believe that a part of your story that's so powerful, it authenticates your faith. You know, everybody believes that they have faith until you are tested. And when that faith is tested, you are able to see, do you have authentic faith? Not only are we gonna look at our story, we wanna look at a story in the Bible, in Genesis 45, turn with us there. We're gonna talk about the story of Joseph. Now, we love this story of Joseph because at the end of it all, he says, "What you meant for evil, "God meant for good in our lives." But I wanna take you back through what happened with Joseph and how he got to a place where he made peace with his story. Joseph comes from a lineage of faith. He comes from, the Bible says that God is the God

of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob is Joseph's daddy, okay? So he comes from a lineage of faith. His great grandfather, Abraham, was the father of faith. He has listed, when we talk about all the people that believed God in Hebrews, they talk about Abraham. Like, this is a lineage that Joseph comes from and at the same time. Joseph's family was jacked up. Can I get amen? Not only was he from a place of faith and of lineage of faith, but he was also from a lineage of dysfunction. We could clearly see, when we look at the generations before Joseph, that there were several patterns that his family had over and over from generation to generation. The men in his family and the women were manipulators. They would do things in order to get what they wanted instead of following what God said. A lot of the men and the women in his family were impatient instead of waiting on God. They went and did what they wanted to do in order to make the word of God happen on their own. These people were also a part of Joseph's bloodline, a mixture of faith and fragmentation, a mixture of people who believed that God was real, had real moments with God, like Jacob, wrestling with the angel. He had real moments with God, and at the same time,

Jacob's name meant deceiver. And the birthright that he had was stolen. This was in Joseph's family. And when it got to Joseph, he made a decision for his bloodline that no one else, although they were a part of the lineage of faith made. And that was to obey God no matter what. Joseph, just like Pastor Mike Todas on Night One, was a bloodline blesser. He was born to bless his bloodline. And I know that somebody in here already, you know, you are the one born to bless your bloodline. This was Joseph, and yet that didn't mean a life of ease. Joseph was loved so much by his father that his brothers were jealous of him, and because they were jealous of him, what they did was sued. First they thought to kill him, and then they threw him in a well. And then after that, they sold him into slavery, then he was lied on, put in jail. And then after all of that, he became Pharaoh's number two. Now, half of Joseph's story, we have never even experienced in our lives. Can you imagine? Y'all hold all your siblings mad at you, they can't stand you, your daddy loves you, but they hate you so much so that they're like, you know what, we're not just gonna get rid of him, we're gonna sell him to someone.

What? And then on top of that, powerful wife lie on him and all the things that happened. And yet at the end of this, we are able to see that Joseph was a bloodline blesser, not just because God called him to be that, but because he made peace with his story. This is where we pick up in Genesis 45. Okay, let's read, let's read. Genesis 45, one through seven. Joseph could stand it no longer. There were many people in the room, and he said to his attendants, out, all of you. So he was along with his brothers when he told them who he was. Then he broke down and wept. He wept so loudly the Egyptians could hear him. And the word of it quickly carried to Pharaoh's palace. "I am Joseph," he said to his brothers. "Is my father still alive? "But his brothers were speechless. "There was stun to realize "that Joseph was standing there in front of them. So they came closer and he said again, "I am Joseph, your brother, "whom you sold in the slavery in Egypt, "but don't be upset and don't be angry "with yourselves for selling me into this place. "It was God who sent me here ahead of you "to preserve your lives.

"This famine that has ravaged the land "for two years will last five more years "and there would be neither plowing nor harvesting. "God has sent me ahead of you "to keep you and your families alive "to preserve many survivors." - So Joseph finds himself with his brothers. They've come now asking for help where he is number two in Egypt and he says to them, "I am your brother, "the one that you sold into slavery." They had no idea that it was him at all when they met him. And this is where we pick up in the story. The people that betrayed him and did him wrong are now asking for help. Have you ever been there? Exactly. So this is where we pick up in our story. All right, so when we first got married, - Okay. - I wanted to be a good wife. - My gosh, she did, she was, she was great. And it was beautiful, it was beautiful. (laughs) No, we was talking about this story. We were talking about this story about two, three days ago and it's funny now, at the time, I thought it was the Lord giving me signs that it was time to go. But, glory to God, that's not what he was saying,

that was me and my weaknesses. So, here's the truth. We would do things around the house. And it was so sweet and she would, you know, cook and clean and she wanted to-- - I had two good meals. - Two good meals, guys. - I cooked a Monday, Wednesday, Friday. And then the other days, I switched. - Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. - Tell him about it, baby. - It was glorious, it was glorious. It was glorious, glorious. It was food. And it was-- (laughing) Sometimes you need mana. I just need mana, I don't. (laughing) You don't have to put no salt on that. Just, I need sustenance. So, she would do that. She would also wash all the clothes, which, you know, I'm the type of guy, you know, and I know there's a few men in here that are like this. Like, I like my clothes, fold it a certain way. I won't, I won't still put up a certain way. I'm at Ulta and Sephora looking for the new products. I need moisturizer. My head can't be dry.

I can't be out here with a bald head and his ass. - Y'all, he folds his drawles. Like, that's too far. - I think that's-- - Sorry, TMI, sorry, sorry. - I think that's ridiculous to say that in this moment. (laughing) That's kind of crazy. - Sorry. - But, but no, no. Let me tell you the story, the truth is, Brie would do this, Brie would wash all our clothes at these big loads of laundry. And I started to notice my clothes when I would hang up and I'm like, what's this yellow? Is purple on this? That's a white T-shirt. Is she using bleach? And so I'm trying to be nice and say, "Hey, what products are you using?" And I'm like, I'm just wondering, what are you washing our clothes in? You know, Brie and I first, Brie would, Brie now, Brie don't skip no time with the Lord. She goes and finds him the first thing she do when she wake up. She looks for him. She wonder where he was all night. She can't, she can't get it up. She's like, I don't slept in.

Where is God? And I love that. I do, I do, I do. But also, when she would do this, she'd be having highlighters and pins and stuff like that. She'd go take that everywhere she'd go. But she'd put him in a pocket and then go to the washing machine with all of the clothes. It was an accident. Yeah, yeah, yeah. (audience laughs) And you know, when you, when you, you know, fellas, you like this, you check it, everything. Some clothes I wash inside out. I don't wash this with that. So one thing I'm doing is definitely checking a pocket so I couldn't believe how much highlighter juice was all over my white shirts and my jeans would be messed up and my favorite jeans and my, I come home and my shoes is out there boxes, they in stacks and stuff like that. But it was beautiful, but is this not like? It was beautiful, but. It was beautifully, but I said, where are my Jordan boxes? I don't see my Nike box. I threw them all away. You know, we got some clear things.

Guys, I didn't know. I never had Jordans. (audience laughs) Who throws away? Who throws away the boxes, yes. And she had them case sweats all through clothes. You thought her case box is away. Yeah. And I remember seeing them dirty case sweats and I said immediately, we gotta go get shoes. (audience laughs) I don't know something about that dirty shoe. I said, whoa. But we're getting somewhere. We're getting somewhere. Okay, laundry. Laundry. Yeah. And you messed up all the clothes. But several of the things were ruined. But why this story came to the surface when we was talking about this was, isn't that like our life to feel like I'm washed, I'm clean, I done been under the blood. I done already went to the altar. I went to the altar last week, this week. And then still somewhere, where this thing come from? I'm in traffic and where that come from. And this person approached me and said something to me. where he come from, I didn't put him under the blood,

and this is like life in a way where these stains pop up, and now I'm looking for, okay God, maybe I didn't surrender my heart enough, or maybe I didn't take this moment serious enough, but this is like life, these random stains, and where do they come from? - And this is a thing that we, I think, as believers sometimes, we are so shocked by, is after we come into this relationship with God, and we've been told, Scripture tells us, that we're new creations, we're new things that pass away, and then for some reason, that highlight of stains seemed like, what happened? How you come out the washer and the dryer, worse off than before? Like, what happened? Because the truth is, we all have stains in our story, and when we come into a relationship with God, those stains are still things that we need to deal with, even though we are a new creature in Christ, even though we've been washed in the blood. That thing is not, God doesn't have amnesia on the history of our story, because now we have come into this relationship with Him. He wants to do a washing on the things that seem like they have stained our life. This is a life of a believer. - Yes, yes. And before we get into this next level, I wanna say, we honor everyone's mother, father,

the people that raise you, the people that protect you. We wanna put that on a piece of paper, we wanna put a pen in it, and we gonna hang it up, okay? We gonna put this behind us, and this is the truth. We love what our life give us, what they did for us. They provided a home for us. They provided food and shelter. We honored that, and we thank God for it. We want to separate, as we go into our story, intent versus impact. Now, yes, they loved us, and they gave us the best that they had, and we are not coming for that in any type of way, we are not trying to disgrace what they had to give to us. And also, this is the way I felt, this is the things that left stains. And these are the holes that was in my heart that I tried to feel. Dr. Nita touched on a little bit. It's like, as soon as somebody gave me a compliment, it was like, "Oh my God, you love me." It's like, "No, you got a cool shirt on." But if the stain of my story is that nobody ever saw me, like nobody ever pointed that out and said, "Yeah, man, good job, son, like, good job, boy, that's..." If that's not a part of your story, then absolutely, when you're 28 years old and somebody gives you a compliment, it's like, "Oh, now that's what I've been looking for." Because we came here with these needs.

We came here with these things that, from God, they're holy things. So if they're missing, we do struggle with them. - So one of the things you maybe ask yourself is like, "How do I identify those stains in my story?" We want to give you just a little framework. So when you look back at your story, you're able to see, "Oh, maybe this is an area "where the Holy Spirit wants to do some healing." There are some people that you have experienced big tea trauma. You have experienced life-threatening experiences. You've had sexual abuse. There's different things that you know for a fact. Oh, that wounded me. Without a doubt, that wounded me. But sometimes those stains in our life are so subtle. You don't even realize that it has affected you in the way that it has. And that's what we want to talk to you about today. That there are some ways that you can actually see what has stained my story and how do I make peace with those stains in my story? - Now, there are several tools. We're just going to highlight one tool that helps you see yourself, that places you in this room and there are four words, four S's. It's seen, soothed, safe, and secure. Now, a part of your story, when you are first born, there is these phases that are brain and developments and we can nerd out on it and all the different things.

But there are certain things that don't come online unless you get eye contact. Unless you are held in somebody's arms and they see you and they say, oh, I love you. Oh, you're so, if you don't have that, if you don't feel that, then there's things in your brain that just won't come online. Now, this is separate from any medical conditions and anything like that. These are just the ways human seek. But even in that, even with medical conditions, you know when somebody sees you. You know what it's like to be sued. You know if there's a hurt, if you fall on somebody, picks you up and say, oh, did that hurt? Let me pray, let me kiss that. Come here, baby, come here. Those things develop these neural pathways in our bodies that, oh, that's what it's like to be sued. This is what it's like to be seen if there's danger. It's like, no, no, don't cross the street. Look both the way, hold my hand. These all create in our bodies these pathways of that safety. That's these, even if we don't have the words, this security is about this attachment. There are people in my life that I know without a shadow of a doubt if the ground falls upon to me, they got me. If there are holes in your story in these areas as a little kid, And you won't even know what you're looking for, but your body is looking for,

hey, I'm supposed to feel safe here. I think there's some security I'm missing, and you'll look for it. I feel like I should be seen. Do you see me? Okay, well this sees me. And so those things are empty. If there's gaps in anywhere in these building blocks, then they just build on top of each other and there's still holes missing. - And so it could be, I mean, when you look at the scripture, there's people all throughout the Bible that you can tell when you look at their story, especially specifically their childhood, that there were things that they were missing, stains in their story, either not feeling seen, saved, sued, or secure. And you can look at Moses and being adopted into an Egyptian family and see that there is a part of him that probably didn't feel like he belonged there. You can look at Leo, whose father was willing to literally give her to a man who did not want her at all. And you can see, okay, he was not a safe place for her. You can look at David, who became king. And was a man after God's own heart. And yet his father did not call him out when the next king was getting anointed. All his brothers there, and he was not there.

Now, don't tell me that there is no way that that is connected to the fact that later in life, when David does become king, being king is not enough for him. Because those stains in our story show up later in our life. So yes, your mother loved you and she did a great job raising you. And at the same time, you don't think you can even go over her house without your hair done. Right. Yes. Yeah, your dad was present and he was there. But he only asked you about your job, your school, never about your soul. Yes, your siblings let you hang out with them, but they showed you all the bad things to do and told you that they were good. These are the stains in our life that when we really dig down into our story, we're able to see this is where God wants to do a healing. This is where God wants to help us to make peace with the story that we had, just like Joseph. He was born into a story that was already written every single one of us are. We aren't the first one here in our legacy and our bloodline. There was people before us and so much so that we don't even understand or know all the patterns of the people before us, honestly, because most of the time those stories aren't passed down. And because those stories aren't passed down,

we hardly know what we're inheriting and why. But we are all born into a story that's already being written and so it's on us because, just like Pastor Mike said yesterday, it may not have been our fault, but it is now our responsibility. What will you do with the story that you've been given? What will you do with the stains in your story that honestly in your heart of hearts you wish weren't there at all and yet they are? There's parts of our stories that that's just what it is. And so how do we make peace? How do we find shalom in our stories, including the stains? Because that is, when we even say the word shalom, we're not just saying peace, we're saying wholeness. How can we find wholeness in our stories? - Yeah, I mean, you dig into your story and you find, okay God, show me, take me to the places where I might have lacked this. May I might have lacked this? And how do I heal and move on from in our story? When we share our stories, there's things in my life where I feel like I wasn't soothed. Like it was no, a brother can a brother get a hug? I need a hug, I'm struggling, I'm stressed. I don't know what to do about body, but it's like, that wasn't the way we grew up. It's like, boy, you better go, hey, you know, if anything,

you about to get something your forehead if you keep asking questions. You keep asking questions. But that's a real thing. - How many of y'all got something y'all's here before? Okay. - Yeah, off the blue, too. It was just kind of feel like a pre-thump. Like, first of all, I mean, anyway, if I get into too many details, I was definitely that kid, I was a little too curious, but I'm asking a lot of questions, I'm in a lot of stuff. So I got thump, pre-thump before I actually did things. And the truth is, I need somebody to tell me they love me and hug me, please. But that's a real thing, I can joke about it, but it's a real thing that I need a God to heal. And I'll search for it. If I get too deep into my story, I'll tell you certain names of people that show me different stuff. I was like, oh no, you don't need that, you can soothe yourself, let me show you. And so that's some of my real story that I had to give to God's like, that filled a hole. I didn't even realize it was being filled because of this soothing hole that was in my story. But God redeemed that. And let's go into these points 'cause I'll keep talking about that.

- Okay. (audience laughs) Three different things that we wanna give you today of how to make peace with your story. This is gonna be important. Looking at the story of Joseph. These are the things that we see in Joseph's story for him to get to in a couple of chapters later. This is when he says what you meant for evil "For him to get to that place of peace with his story, "there are three things that we're gonna pull out "of what Joseph did." So first in Genesis 45, one through two. It says, "Joseph could stand it no longer." He's standing in front of his brothers. He says, "There were people, many people in the room, "and he called them all out. "Then he broke down and wept so loudly "the Egyptians could hear him, "and the word isn't quickly carried to Pharaoh's place." Point number one, how to make sense, I mean, how to make peace with your story is to connect to it. You can't avoid it. And when we say connect, we mean not just logically, not just intellectually, we mean emotionally. Have you connected emotionally to the stains in your story? Now, the problem is a lot of times when we think about those stains in our stories, are those parts of our stories,

we think if we emotionally connect with them, we will never be able to come out of that emotion. That if I sink into it, maybe I'm going to sink too far and I'll never be able to come out of it, that is not, God has given us the capacity to actually connect emotionally to our stories and still feel redemption on the other side. Joseph wept over his story and just a few verses later, he says, "God did this so I could save y'all." But before he ever said that, he wept over his story, he connected to it. Emotionally, we had to pull a emotion wheel team, can you put the emotion wheel up there? And the reason we did this, you guys may or may not have seen an emotion wheel before, but a lot of times as believers, we are so flat line when it comes to our emotions. We think God only wants us joyful and maybe sometimes we can be angry 'cause Jesus flipped tables in the temple. So maybe sometimes for the glory of God, we can be angry, but there are dozens, look at how many emotions actually live on the inside of us. - And if you're a human, you have all these emotions. Men, we have all of these emotions. - If you are human. - If you are human, you have all these emotions, but peace is not emotional numbness. It's like we think in most guys and some of the guys I grew up around,

it's kind of like if you just didn't talk, then the house was peaceful. It is all kind of stuff boiling up under this house that we're not addressing. Why is it so tense in here? But as men, we will avoid these feelings thinking that this is gonna bring about a peace and this is going to actually make it 10 times worse for the ones in the home who really need to speak on some things, but you don't feel safe enough to do so. This is not something that actually we do in our churches or we practice often, but it's like if I bring this pain to you, it's almost like, hey, can I find some safety in it because I don't find it at home. I don't know how to really put words to the emptiness or the tension that I feel in my home, but it's almost like peace, it's just emotional numbness. Let's not bring it up, let's not address it. The secrets that we have, the Pastor Mike talked about that yesterday where it's kind of like, hey, don't say nothing, don't tear up this family name, the lineage, the history, and it's kind of like, it's tearing itself up 'cause we ain't addressing nothing. - That's true, that's the truth. I think a huge thing is knowing that God welcomes all of our emotions, he wants us to feel those emotions

and Joseph shows us in this story that he was connected to his story emotionally even though he had already made peace with it. So yes, we have made peace with the fact that our son passed away two years ago and yet I will still cry over it today. Because I'm connected to my story. Charles talked about this last night, are you alive to your story? Are you connected to your story? Because if so, it'll show up in your emotions. Being an emotionalist Christian does not make you a mature Christian. - Yeah. (congregation laughing) - When I tell you, I am sick to death of Christians that think that they are so high and mighty and so emotional 'cause they don't cry and they don't go low in their emotions. And I don't ever get sad, what? When all that's going in the world, you ain't never got sad before. That we only do that 'cause we don't think God is big enough to actually deal with those parts of us. That is actually a sign of maturity and childishness in Christianity when you do not allow yourself to connect to your emotions. Jesus, the most mature believer on earth, sinless, spotless lamb, wept. [BLANK_AUDIO]

Can you allow yourself to feel what you need to feel the fact that you come around parts of your family that are these are the one people that are supposed to love you regardless and you are automatically triggered being around them? Trying to say things right and not say things right or you got to walk in the house with your dukes up already because you already know somebody going to start something. The fact that your your mama you've been taking care of your mama since you was a kid that you have never been able to go to your mom and share your emotions with her because she's always dumping on you her emotional baggage and now she's old enough now that you've got to take care of her. You never had the opportunity to be nurtured. Connect, connect. This is not okay. The fact that you have been hit by your parents at certain points and had welps on your body. Not okay but you got to connect to that part of your story because if you are flatlined on that God cannot touch that. He cannot heal that. He cannot redeem that. That's so good. No, no, you're good. Please don't say sorry because I will sit up here and watch you preach. It is my favorite TV show. I love that. For sure, for sure, for sure. Point two, point two, communicate. Now I'm speaking to every man in the room and anyone who's willing to actually accept this as a real struggle. Communicate. Have you told the truth about what happened? I've had so many conversations with men who have never told what actually happened. What are the details? Can you actually tell me who was in the room? What did it smell like? What did you wear it? How did you feel before? These details we find throughout the description but we'll go back to Genesis 45 where Joseph in verse 4 says, "I am your brother the one you sold into Egypt. I'm not quiet about the details of why I have pain. I'm not quiet about the things that I'm struggling. I'm not going to minimize it and I'm not going to try to over-spiritualize it. I'm not going to try to rewrite it. You sold me into real slavery and here I am, I am your brother." All the things and all the details of that sentence is like, "Hello, I am your blood brother that you sold into slavery." It's these details that I feel like we get the benefit of because we bring the Holy Spirit through all of this stuff. It's like we're not doing this work without the power of the Holy Spirit in itself. Why don't we communicate? Why don't we talk about it? And the number one answer is weakness or I don't want to be weak or I don't want to show that or I don't want to talk about 10 people. Let me tell you, I've got family members that actually taught me how to be a whore. I know it's crazy to say, but what I'm telling you is that- He literally says that to me all the time. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, and the fellas will

understand what I'm saying. We've got uncles and cousins that trained us on how to lie, how to cheat, how to manipulate, what the woman going to do. So this is what you got to say to the girl. This is what you got. Ain't nobody supposed to be training me at eight on how to manipulate a woman's heart. And I had not addressed it. And so I had to go and tell somebody one year into marriage, "Hey man, I don't even know another way of thinking. Like it's in my mind. She's supposed to be doing this. She's not doing it. So I got to figure out a way to kind of manipulate her to like, bring me my plate. You bring my plate, but I won't tell you how I feel. What? You can't say, "Yeah, this is me as a man. You need to be doing this. You need to be doing this." But she asked you how you feel. Like, "I'm good." What? But you're going to have to make your plate. You don't know if you're happy, angry. I feel lonely. I feel left. I feel a little dish. I'm hurt. You said something to hurt my feelings. You can't say that? But she wants your chicken on time. I can't beat that man. I don't know how to beat that man. No, no, no, no. That hurt my feelings. And also like, "I'll get my own chicken, but can we talk about my feelings?" But we must communicate. We must communicate. Peace is not silenced. We have to communicate these things. Joseph's healing didn't require signs about his story. You cannot fully heal. It'll be too hard, too much work to try to keep yourself and not invite the Holy Spirit into your healing. Why are you silent about what happened? us tell you what we're not saying yeah hosting it on Facebook no okay and just for what for who what we're saying first of all is communicating it to God have you ever said it out of your own mouth what happened to you in your story have you ever said it to God have you ever even if you just whispered it have you ever written it down have you ever cried it out before have you ever said it to God and have you ever said it to save community yeah Joseph was so safe within himself he was able to say it to his brothers that may not be your story yet it may not be time for you to go to the person who offended you and communicate that they offended you or hurt you yet starts first with God absolutely and your quiet time tell them God I know you know this part about my story already but I need to tell say it out loud it's more for me than it is for you but I need to know that you are the safest place for me to tell you about the stains in my story God this is how I feel when I'm around my auntie I don't

know how I don't know why I feel that way God I keep going to Thanksgiving with this man that I know did something to me when I was a child I don't even know if I got all the memory of it but he did something and we're acting like something didn't happen God this is what we're talking about communicating it out it is alive on the inside of you right now you can decide to verbalize it or not but it's going to be alive until you have able been able to verbalize what has happened this is why we talk about theology and therapy therapy is not just us because we feel like some we believe in some woo woo thing like this is because you need a safe place to talk about your story you need an unbiased party to just listen and guide you from hearing your story your story is that important absolutely it's that significant that someone else needs to hear it because there is healing that happens in being witnessed absolutely if I don't take my story to God in my say community or my therapist or counselor if I don't take my story there's no way I can sit up here and talk about the affairs and that's right I could not say it to you if God had not already redeemed and healed and showed me why I even was in there in the first place while my heart was even drawn to that in the first place I had to take that to God had to heal it had to redeem it so that I can share it so that somebody else can see like you ain't the only one and you're not alone and this this part of our communication and and Shannon and helps us build our boundaries we know okay now I can communicate to my my uncle my mother my father I can communicate okay this is the boundary and this is where I'm gonna hold it because I understand where God has brought me from and I realize the joy that I have I can't let you touch that I have to put a line up here but that only comes through the redeeming power of the Holy Spirit and my state community and my therapist and how we can all be healed now I see my trigger now I know okay yeah if I stay here I'm gonna end up in this same spot yeah communication looks different for everybody for somebody is prayer from somebody else it might be setting boundaries with your family members or people in your life that you need to for someone else it looks like confession yeah that is a huge part of

good Lord I wish as believers we understood we should be the most confessional community on earth do you know why because our God loves us no matter what yes we should always be telling on ourselves we should always be saying you know what I came home the other day until here and I was like this happened at work and honestly my motives was wrong when I did that and he's like okay I was like yeah I just need to say it out loud because I don't want to do it again but if it sits inside of me and I don't act like my motive was great and pure and I know it wasn't because I'm a human being yeah you got a communicate you got to confess what's going on in your life and we also recognize that sometimes you can confess and people have betrayed people yes absolutely in church I went and told somebody who's on a prayer team and they went and told my parents and I got another weapon and it's kind of like I was telling you about the weapons I'm trying to tell you hey I think something needs to be talked about here can we address now I shouldn't have got hit like that like okay I know I did something that you wasn't supposed to I wasn't supposed to be doing but I mean like that with hey now so but then people have betrayed trust and that's just one way but there is so much so that as Christians we we struggle with the real confession because now you don't judge me now you're gonna I've been betrayed that you're gonna tell somebody else and all these things so it has to be trusted community has to be safe community but first it has to be God so if there is a struggle with confession because as we should be the most confessional communities but also we confess to humans that's Yeah, just sue us. You can't tell. If they tell, just sue them. Yeah, so I learned my lesson. I would no longer tell an usher, my real opinion. Trusted usher or not, I won't tell them about it. We don't mean usher, sorry.

No, no, no. Not at this church at all. But what I will say is, yes, we do struggle with that, because humans don't know how to sometimes carry our pain, and sometimes don't know how to carry our stories. So it is a struggle, but also the beauty of confession is for the healing, and it's for us to receive love, and to receive, get back to joy, and I can keep going. But we're going to go to the next point. So what you want to do when you are making peace with your story is first to connect, second, communicate. And the last thing is, count it. Now let me explain this a little bit to you. Count it. And Genesis 45, 5 through 7, Joseph is talking here, and he says to his brothers, essentially, you guys, now that you know who I am, and they are filling all types of ways. They are totally shocked that this is a brother that they sold into slavery, and probably they had already deemed as dead. Like, Jacob thought his son was gone forever. And when he saw them, he said, this is OK. Don't feel bad, because God actually sent me here so I can save our entire family. When you make peace with the stains in your story, you're able to count it as something that God can give you something out of that part of your story. Now, listen, what we're not going to do is spiritually bypass anything.

So this is not us saying God did this painful thing happen in your story, because God wanted to use it so that you-- no. There are sometimes that terrible things happen in our life, and that was actually not the will of God, because it was somebody being disobedient to God when they did it. So that wasn't supposed to be a part of our story. And yet we serve a God that can redeem everything. Everything that happens in our life, he can redeem it. So when we say count it, we're saying what the scripture says in James, which when you experience trials in your life, could you do me a favor? Could you count it as an opportunity for joy? Could you count it as an opportunity for joy? Because all that to say, no matter how terrible that stain is, there is something out of that stain that God can give you, because Romans 828 is the truth. All things work together. Not part of your story, not the good parts of your story, including the stains in your story. All things work together for our good. So if you have not experienced the good and the stains in your story yet, today is your opportunity to say, God, what's the good that's what's to come from there? Because I know in Joel, it tells us I will repay you for the years that the Cancun worm and the locus have eaten up. I will give you back something for what you have endured. So what we're telling you today is count it.

Count the cost, count it all joy. Who I am today, because of the pains of my story, I will never forget. We're in the hospital and with Ace. And it's the last day he's alive. And so they bring us in, they put them in, breathe arms. And his heart rate is going down and there's doctors and there's all this stuff going around. And some minutes pass and they're counting that chicken's heart rate, he passes away and they take us to this room. They take us to this room and they say, would you like to hold him? Now the first time, we held him while he was passing away. And we sat there with the doctors. But they took us to this room after he had passed and they say, would you like to hold him? And yeah, I didn't know really how to feel. My body was kind of, I feel like I was dysregulated. I didn't know. So they put him in my arms and I had this sinking feeling of, you know, God, this is my only son. And what I heard my spirit say is mine too. And I'm saying that because what I felt was not sadness. It shocked me because what I felt was happiness. I had never held my son in my arms. But when they put him in my arms, the feeling that I felt was happiness. I felt playful. I'm like, he's not even here.

He's with God. He's with my father and my witnesses. But it's like now he's a part of my great cloud of witnesses. But he's in my arms and I feel playful. And I can't help, but when I feel that feeling, when I think about that moment, how much more is God saying to me like, "Count it." Counter calls, "Yeah, it hurts." I'm not going nowhere, I'm with you, and also me too. We don't serve a high priest that doesn't understand what I struggle with. He felt it. He understands, I can't help but think the imagery of him on his row with the cross and the beatings that count it. Every hit, every mark, the person on the side, the holes in his hands, when he, I love his scripture, he comes back to his disciples after the cross and he shows him that holes in his hands is marred, and I can't help but imagine it. There's probably some scratches and some scars from the crown of thorns. The scripture talks about the piercing on his sides of holes in his feet. And this might be the most unrecognizable Jesus that they knew, but somehow is shalom. My peace I get, this holiness, this unfragmented story of the holiness of God that now I'm here, I'm standing before you and I know it's gonna be hard and I know it's gonna be fire, but I'm telling you through the fire,

through the ashes, what comes beauty is beauty is beautiful. It's beautiful, but you can't avoid the fire, I'm sorry. I wish I could tell you that you have to avoid fire. I wish I could tell you that you have to avoid the pain, but if you don't go into your story, then what are you looking for? The grace that wakes you up in the morning is for the pain that we will experience. If you're avoided here in the life that God came to give us, this abundant life and we avoid the fire, we avoid the pain trying to get to the beauty and God is saying the beauty comes with the pain. We don't have a beautiful Jesus on the cross without the pain. - Jesus. - How much more, how much more, yes, yes, it hurts. And there's stains that's gonna come up, but now I find myself glory to God looking for stains. Show me where it hurts, show me where there's something that I miss, show me where somebody doesn't say something to me that doesn't brought something up. Show me where I'm triggered because I know if I find it, then I find you, if I find that, I find the beauty. I can't get to the beautiful life, I can't get to the abundance of your love, of your joy if I don't go find it, so I'm looking for the stains. Show me where you are, show me where I need a mark. This is where God, this is where God did it for me. This is where the cross, this is where the cross stands up for me. And so in this moment, guys, I wish that it didn't cost that,

but it cost something, but we counted. It might've hurt, yeah, they did it and it was a foul, but I don't know if any Hooper's X, Hooper's in here in the room, but like when you get fouled, but you still make the shot, and it's flagrant, and it hurt, but I got another shot. Hold on, wait, wait, wait, wait, counting, and one. I don't know if you remember, and one, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. I ain't hooped in a while, I ain't hooped in a while, but I do know, when I get to that and one, counting. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, counting, counting, counting, counting, counting. And if you get a flagrant, counting, and one, and I'm gonna tell you what I'm gonna do. I'ma go to this line and God will give me another shot. Yeah, yeah, that's the mercy and the grace every morning. That's the mercy and the grace every morning, and I'ma hurt, but I'ma face it, and it is a foul. It was foul how they did you, it was foul what they said. It was foul how they treated you, and one. Give me another shot, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That mercy and that grace gonna wake me up every morning, and I got another shot. I got another shot to find his joy, I got another shot to find his love, 'cause it's gonna wake me up, it's gonna wake me up. It's gonna wake me up, and I'ma stop for, I will break into tears up here, and I'ma stop, but I'm telling you, it hurt, but yeah, yeah,

God too faithful, and the cross was for you. The cross was for this moment, the cross was for the pain. Take it to him, our stories are real, our stories are real, our stories are not to be denied. Come on man, it's foul and it's flagrant, but my God, he is faithful to restore his children. That's what the whole thing is for, it's for us, for the grace, for the mercy, don't avoid it, don't avoid the pain, and I wish there was things we could avoid. There are some things I did in my life, in my story, that was my fault, but if I make my bed in hell. (crowd cheering) - I made up several beds in hell, but I got woke up with grace today's morning because I brought it to him, he's with us, with us, with us, Emmanuel, oh God, be with us. We give God, come on, come back over here, come back over here, I felt like I need to go. 'cause I'm gonna fall out. - This is all that we're trying to say to you. You can count it because when it comes to the stains in your life, there are some stains that cover it. - Come on. - It was a blood-stained cross for the parts of your story that still hurt, that still bring you pain. And when you look at the stains in your life, know that you're not just looking at the stains in your life. You're looking at the stains of Christ,

covering all of the stains in your life. Today, all we are asking you to do is don't avoid, don't stiff arm, and also don't spiral down into, but make peace with your story. 'Cause then we will all stand up just like Joseph and Sam, what you meant for evil. I'm not gonna downlive that, you downlive that, you meant that for evil. But what you meant for evil, God intention is greater. God meant it for good. His good is always gonna outweigh the evil. And today, no matter what has happened in our life and in your life, God has made you stronger. He's made you wiser. He has given you a good sense because of it. You know how to treat people better because of how you were treated. We all got some treasure for the darkness that we've been through. We all got some gold for the darkness that we've been through. Baby, I've met the person I was before, I lost my son. After we lost our son, we became stronger. We became better. We loved God even more. We believe in miracles even more. And because of our story, not inside of our story. (audience cheering) We ain't the same people from two years ago. We're not the same people because we made peace with our story, it's ours.

We own it. And it's not just for us. It's for somebody else. Stop hiding the fact that you went through that. Somebody needs to hear it. Somebody needs to crush oil from your story. (audience cheering) So today, we're just asking you to surrender it. (audience cheering) Give it to God and let him do what he wants to do. Connect to it. Communicate it and count it 'cause it's all gonna work for your good. Everybody standing in this place. (audience cheering) Oh God, we thank you for your peace. Oh God, we thank you for your faithfulness. Oh God, we thank you that even in the midst of our story, there may be pain. Oh God, but you are not and will never leave us. That you help us to find the stain so that you can help us find the joy and the love that you have for us. And when the enemy tries to suggest something else, oh God, we thank you that you remind us that your grace is sufficient, your grace is sufficient. We thank you for it and we surrender our hearts. We surrender our hearts to you Lord. Have your way in our lives,

have your way in our stories. And as we move forward in this place, oh God be mercy, oh God be grace, oh God be love, oh God be peace. In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. (audience applauding) (bell ringing) (audience applauding) (bell ringing) (dramatic music)