You are invited to join us in changing Pinellas County and the world with the gospel, starting with a heart of thankfulness in every circumstance. As you submit your mind to Christ, expect to see His power displayed through unity and healing in your own life.
Before we get started, there are 2 people here that because of their faithful *discipleship* for 37 years in my life, I am who I am today. So I'm gonna ask my mom and my dad to stand up. I'm gonna ask you to stand up and clap to honor them. Thank you. I really finished from my doctorate because of my mom's prayer and support.
I'm very grateful. And, I'm excited because I know, like, my dad does these pastors conferences all over the world. And, I got to do that with him before I came here and planted the church. And, I know that in the future, Lord willing, more and more our church is gonna get to partner with him in the pastors conferences that he does. Last year, the ministry that he has trained between 9 and 10000 pastors.
60 different conferences throughout Africa. I mean, it's amazing. We're just getting started, church. You don't understand. The "best is yet to come".
And, it's fun. And, man, we're we're in it to change Pinellas County and the world with the gospel. And, you're invited to be a part. Amen? Amen.
Praise the Lord. Dad, do you wanna say anything? I can't you can't just let you in the in the room and not give you the opportunity to say anything. You don't have to. If you don't know the story, you know, when I first told him I was gonna I I felt the Lord leading me to move from Winnsboro, Louisiana, he was my pastor as well, I was working at his church to plant a church in Dre's hometown, Clearwater, Florida.
He's like, you know, he was about to go on another trip, he's like, look into it, you know, but didn't really think think much of it. And I told him, I said, dad, I'm not gonna go until you send me, just because that's honor in the kingdom, it's the way it works. God blesses the sent man, not the leaving man. And then, I wasn't gonna tell this story, but I'm gonna tell it anyway. I started praying.
*God*, I know this is you, so you're gonna have to tell him. And, 3 months later, there's this friend of his that I think Did you lead Calvin to Jesus in the prison? Something like that? He He baptized him in the prison. 20 years later, he's a pastor in the area, they're friends.
And, he's in my dad's office, and nobody knew, I don't even think my mom knew about it at this point, that God had put on my heart to plant a church in Clearwater, Florida. And and, so, dad was gonna tell his close friend, Pastor Calvin, that about his son, and and just kinda get his take on it. There's no real big decisions made or anything at this point. And, so he said, Pastor Calvin, let me tell you something about my son. And, as the story would have it, what I've been told, Pastor Calvin said, Oh, no, Pastor.
Let me tell you something about your boy. River of life is like which is my dad's church's name, is like this body coming up out of the ground, and your son's like an arm coming off the body. God said he's going to plant him somewhere else. Is what he said? Amen.
And then, he prophesied many other things. I have no idea what those were. He does, and and but, praise the Lord, I believe it's coming to pass. He said he was a strong-arm. Cool.
So, I'll that. And, so praise the Lord. Lord, I just thank you for my parents. I thank you for what you've done in my life, because of their parenting, and discipleship. Lord God, I pray you continue to bless them.
Grammy, as my kids call her, and and with much joy, and many more grandchildren from my brother and sisters. And me, if Lord willing. And then, Lord God bless my dad and his ministry, and the "River of Life" Church. And, I just pray multiplication, Lord God, for everything that he puts his hand to. In the name of Jesus.
Amen. Alright. Don't worry, I'm gonna keep you I'll I'll I'll be done preaching at 11:25. Why are you laughing? Hold me to it.
11:25. No. Alright. So, do you guys remember the Corinthians series? Yeah?
Did you enjoy the Corinthians series? Most notes he's ever taken. Okay. So, you have to understand a little bit about the way we do church here. Right?
We were in the Corinthians series with full intention of finishing the Corinthians series. But, I I don't I'm not just a solo leader. My wife and I lead as a team, but then also, we have a leadership team, elders and deacons, and we get together from time to time. And, so, in February, we're in the Corinthians series, but we had a leadership meeting where all of our elders and deacons got together, and they helped to steer the church. So, the end of our February meeting, or at during our February meeting, we're praying, and and 1 of the leaders there says, I really feel like we need to teach our church about prayer.
I really feel like we need to do what it takes to do that. And so, out of that, we there was a steer shift. We shifted from the Corinthians series, and started a series called Conversations with God, and did that for 6 weeks, teaching about prayer, and then we had a weekly prayer thing at Moriah and Gabe's house, which was very important, and I think prepped us for what we were doing in Uganda, and what God's about to do over the next year in our church. Because prayer always precedes movement. Prayer precedes movement.
Before God gets something done, He tells His people, and invites them to participate in what He's about to do, at least through prayer. Amen? There's a verse for that. Now, I'd encourage you to go back, if you haven't listened to any of the Corinthians series, or the Conversations with God series, go back and, on the podcast, we have a podcast, you can search Real Church Clearwater, on Apple iTunes, or on Spotify, or any of the podcast stuff, and and listen to the Corinthians series, because I'm gonna give a little review, but not much. And, there's a lot in there.
And if you wanna know more about prayer, listen to the Conversations with God series. But as I'm I'm praying, alright, what's next? I was led back to the Corinthians series, so we're gonna pick up right where we left off. And man, I had plans on preaching *1 Corinthians-4:6* through all the way through the end of chapter 4 verse 21. But, if you know the Corinthians series, we go verse by verse in this, and it's encouraging and wonderful, and you know I'm never gonna get through that many verses today.
Just not gonna happen. So, we're gonna dive in, and I encourage you to buckle up and hold on. This The first verse gives me the license to give you a bit of review. You'll see what I'm talking about. *1 Corinthians-4* and verse 6, says, now, brothers and sisters, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit.
My question is, what things has Paul applied to himself in Apollos for the benefit of who? Now, you have to understand that Paul is writing Corinthians to the people of Corinth. But, if you remember from the Corinthians series, we saw in verse 2, it says, it's to the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, and called to be his holy people, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of the Lord Jesus. Are you part of all those everywhere? And, do you call on the name of the Lord Jesus?
So, you have to understand that this letter is to you. On purpose and for a purpose. So, that's who. Now, verse 6 again, now brothers and sisters, I've applied these things to myself and apostle for your benefit. What things is talking about?
He's talking about everything he's written before. So when I think about that, I think about things like verse 4, where he says, I always thank my God for you because of his grace given to you in Christ Jesus. Well, you have to understand Paul. Paul's always talking about thanksgiving, and he's applied the the rules of thanksgiving to his life, because he don't wanna live in such a way, like, or live this way and preach another thing. So you see in, like, Philippians, he says that you should be thankful always.
Like, there's a command for us to be thankful in every circumstance, every situation. We never have an excuse to not be thankful. Ever. You know why? Because what you're thankful for, you'll be faithful with.
What you're not thankful for, you won't be faithful with. **Thankfulness is a** discipline that Paul practiced and Paul lived and encouraged us to do the same thing. Because thankfulness also leads to contentment. Paul said in Philippians that he'd he's learned what it means to be content in all circumstances, which means contentment is a discipline. If you lack contentment in any area of your life, you probably lack thankfulness in that area, and you need to learn the discipline first of thanksgiving, and then, you will learn how to be disciplined in such a way that you're able to be content in that area.
Amen? I will give you an example of that in my life, how the Holy Spirit is working that out in me, because I, like Paul, want to be able to apply everything that I teach you, I wanna be able to apply it in my life because it's necessary, and we'll see why in a little while. You know, when I moved to Clearwater, I was so grateful that God was sending me to, like, 1 of the number 1 beach spots in the world. Like, it's on Clearwater, you know, Saint Pete Beach. I mean, all of the beaches around here, they're in the top 5, you know, every couple of years.
It's beautiful. It's wonderful. But I was also very surprised that when I talked to natives, especially teenagers, but sometimes even people in their twenties and thirties, forties, fifties, that grew up here, they weren't so thankful for it. As a matter of fact, I talked to a lot of natives, and they I never got to experience any other place. I'm just stuck here, and they couldn't wait, especially the teenagers and 20.
I just couldn't wait to get out of here. I'm like, man, everybody wants to come here, and you want to leave. Why is that? It's an "ungrateful heart". And so, I made up my mind, because I knew I was coming here to plant a church for the long haul.
I'm like, wait a second, Lord, I never want to lose a grateful heart for where you sent me. So, if you ride in the car with me, as we're going over any bridge, whether it's the Courtney Campbell bridge, the bridge going to Clearwater Beach, the Sand Key Bridge, the Bel Air Bridge, it doesn't matter, 2 75, it doesn't matter. You ride with me over any bridge, I'm going to turn the music down, I'm going to stop, and I'm get everybody to be quiet in the car, as we're riding over the bridge, I'm going say, look around. Man, thank you, Jesus, that we get to live here. It doesn't matter if I'm having a bad day, it doesn't matter what's going on in that moment, it doesn't matter if me and Courtney are in the middle of an argument, which does happen sometimes.
I'm going to stop, and I'm going have a disciplined response of thankfulness in that moment, because I want to maintain a thankful heart for where God put me. Because I want to be faithful with where God put me. And I can't be faithful without being thankful. Amen? Paul said, I always thank God for you, which means I wanna be thankful for every relationship that He's put in my life.
Because if I'm not thankful for every relationship He's put in my life, I'm not gonna be faithful with any of those relationships that He's put in my life. And I I That's why I say I'm so thankful every single Sunday that I get to be your pastor. I'm so thankful that you would choose to be here, because I wanna be radically faithful with the relationships and the influence he's given me as a pastor of real church. And, how can I do that without being thankful? Now, it around.
What are you lacking faithfulness in? You're probably lacking gratefulness in that same area. And, how can God entrust you with more, if you are not gonna be grateful for the thing that He gave you? And then, faithful with the thing that He gave you. Faithful with a little, and He will give you more.
And that's in every area of your life. Amen? So, when I think about Paul saying in 1 Corinthians-4:6, now, brothers and sisters, I've applied these things to myself, I think about that, I probably think about verse 5 as well, in chapter 1. For in Him, you have been enriched in every way, with all kinds of speech and all knowledge. God, confirming our testimony about Christ in you.
Therefore, you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for the Lord Jesus to be revealed. Now, a second. I've been enriched? Like, the Bible says that I've been enriched in every way? But Lord, I don't feel enriched in every way.
Like, Paul says the same thing in in 1 Corinthians-3:21. He says, so then, no more boasting about human leaders. All things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or present, future. All are yours, and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God. I've been enriched in every way, and all things are mine, but God, have you seen my pockets?
I don't feel enriched in every way. I don't feel like all things are mine. This is just a review of the Corinthians series, guys. What Paul is referring to when he's saying in 1 Corinthians-4:6, I've applied all these things to myself. *God* has taught him how to live, and how to think about things, and and how to do things such that his life reflects the goodness and character nature of God, lest he not be able to reflect who Jesus is effectively.
Amen? So, what does he mean? All things are his. Remember, we're heirs of *God* as his dearly beloved children. I'm a son or a daughter of God, so therefore, all that is his is mine.
And, it's all in my bank account. But, just because it's in my bank account, my heavenly bank account, doesn't mean it's in my pocket. Just because it's in my bank account doesn't mean I have access to it to use it yet because my father hasn't given me what I'm not ready for. Do you understand? So I'm going to be faithful with what he has put in my pocket, my time, my talent, my treasure, the relationships, everything that he's given me, in the way that he's asked me to in order to honor him as Lord overall.
I'm gonna be faithful with all of those things and grateful, devoting myself to do it doing it as unto the Lord, trusting him that when I do these things, and I'm faithful, and I'm growing in character, he's gonna give me what I'm ready for, when I'm ready for it. Does that make sense? Because, if he gives me a good gift that I'm not ready for, I'm gonna make a mess of it. Right? You guys follow me?
You guys with me? Then he also says, in that verse 7, therefore, you do not do not lack any spiritual gift. We just talked about the gifts last week. And it says, I don't lack any spiritual gift. None.
But yet, in 1 Corinthians-14, it says, eagerly desire the spiritual gifts. Once again, the same concept and the same principle. I wanna be *faithful* with what he's entrusted to me now, knowing that he's going to entrust more of the gifts as I'm ready and as the people around me need them. And I'm gonna be thankful for what my father's put in my hand. The example is my son.
My son my car is probably my son's car when he gets 16 years old, which is great. So it's his, but he ain't ready for it. I'm not going to entrust the keys to him right now. He doesn't have the character or the skill necessary to handle what is his. So, he's got a lot of training left to do.
But, if he passes all that training, it's not because I don't love him, it's because I do love him that I'm withholding it from him until he's ready. Amen? So, Paul's applied all these things to himself. Probably also, verse 9, *God is faithful who has called you into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ*. Oh, I can't leave out verse 8.
He will also keep you firm to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. *God is faithful*. Everybody say, blameless. God, Jesus, will keep you firm to the end, that you will be blameless. Wait a second.
Don't don't you know what I've done? Don't you know the screw ups that I've that I've had? Don't you know the habits I'm trying to break? Yeah. What I'm saying here is not just mental assent.
It's not just some analogy, or allegory, or or or whatever metaphor. No. This is truth. Like, you have to believe this as truth. And, I can give you the example of this.
*Abraham* was a pretty screwed up dude. Like, God called Abraham to go to the promised land, and if we read the story of Genesis, Abraham went to, like, because of fear, let Pharaoh have his wife. Abraham cheated on his wife with his servant Hagar at his wife's encouragement. Like, Abraham was a pretty messed up dude. And so, we read history, we see 1 thing.
But, when we read Romans-4, where Abraham it says, Abraham believed God and it was "credited to him" as righteousness, we read what God has written down as the history of Abraham, and we see that "he's blameless". Now, wait a second. We look at his literal history, and there's problems, but we look at what God says about Abraham, and it says blameless. Blameless. Why?
Because Abraham believed God, so God rewrote his history. And when you're a Christian, when you've given your life to Jesus, you've become born again, like, God has rewritten your history to make you "blameless in the books" of heaven, which is truth. That was better than a half clap. And, when you believe that, you begin to live in a way that's blameless. To the extent that your eyes on what he's on what he's done.
That's what Paul was applying to his life, and saying that's the way that he lives. I think about don't worry, I'm about to skip forward quite a bit. But, I think about, in 1 Corinthians-4, when when Paul's saying, now brothers and sisters, I've applied these things to myself, and apostle for your benefit. I also think about chapter 1 verse 10, where it says, I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with 1 another in what you say, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be "perfectly united in mind" and thought. Before I say this, I have to say this.
Verse 9, it says, God is faithful. He who has called you into fellowship with His Lord Son, Jesus Christ, is Lord. Faithful means full of faith, and God is full of faith. But, He's not full of faith in you. He has no faith in your flesh.
He's full of faith in Jesus, who He put inside of you. So, where should our faith be? Not in our self. In Christ. And then, I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus, that all of you agree with 1 another in what you say, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.
How is that possible? We're supposed to be perfectly united in mind and thought. I'll tell you how. *1 Corinthians-2*, if you remember the series, we have the mind of Christ. He's put the Holy Spirit inside of us, who shows us the mind of the Father.
And so, to the extent that I'm in my own mind, that's the extent I'm going to be divided with you. But, to the extent that I'm in Christ, and my mind is I'm submitted to the Holy Spirit, and the extent that you're in Christ, and submitted to the will, and the thinking of the Holy Spirit, that's the extent that we're gonna be unified. Man, God's looking for a church, not just a local church, but a body of Christ in a region, in a county, around the world, that's perfectly unified, because we're so out of our mind that we're into his. United. Amen?
Amen. Any frustration, any arguments that we have, at least 1 person in the argument or at least 1 person in there is is being selfish. Just so you know, when you're ever in an argument, don't look at the other person, look at you and how you're being selfish. Get out of your mind and into Christ, and then you can love them despite, no matter how they're responding, because Christ laid His life down for the person in front of them. Amen?
Alright. Now, brothers and sisters, I've applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn, well, what things? Once again, I think about 1 Corinthians-2:4, where it says, my message and my preaching were not with wise or persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the spirit's power, so that your faith may not rest on human wisdom, but on God's power. The gospel is the "power unto salvation". And, the gospel throughout scripture is always paired with power.
It's paired with preaching, and it's paired with healing and miracles. Y'all are quiet. It is. You look through Acts, it's paired with preaching, and it's paired with healing and miracles. You look through Jesus' ministry, it's paired with preaching, and it's paired with healing and miracles.
You look through you look through, like, what we talked about last week, the 1 thing that Jesus was like rejoiced about in scripture. He rejoiced when the disciples were living out preaching the gospel, healing the sick, and casting out demons, and it called it caused the son of God to rejoice. And, man, I wanna be a Christian that lives a life that causes my Jesus to rejoice. Amen? Over the last little over a month and a half, There's many people in here for for many years have lived a supernatural life where they're leading people to Jesus and praying for people, and they're being healed, and it's awesome, and more and more so as we disciple people.
But, over the last month and a half, there has been the power of the gospel on display in this church on a Sunday morning. The last part of that Conversations with God series, go back and listen to on the podcast. There were, like, 4 or 5 words of knowledge given in the middle of service. 14 people were healed. 1 person was healed that we didn't realize was healed in the middle of the message.
And then, people came forward at the end of service, and multiple people were physically healed. And, that's been happening almost every Sunday ever since. And, I say almost just because we weren't here, we were in Uganda for 2 Sundays, so I'm not real sure what happened those Sundays. But, praise the Lord, God's been doing amazing and wonderful things. You know why?
Because he meets people in their area of unbelief, in order to show them, hey, I love you enough to show you this. Now, believe. You mind if I share a story with you? A testimony? Like, this happened this past week.
Last Sunday, Fred came up for prayer. And, we've prayed for him multiple times over the past few weeks because he's been struggling with seizures. And, Fred came up for prayer, and Mike Gabbert, and Gabe Rogers prayed for him. Laid hands on him. After they got done praying, he felt, you know, like a brain freeze type thing?
Like, if you eat too much cold ice cream, you get a brain freeze? That's how he described it. He felt a brain freeze. And, he thought he was gonna have another seizure. He didn't know what was going on.
So, he said, I gotta go, and he left. And, on his way home, he walked on the grass, because he's been told that he doesn't need to, you know, be careful where he walks. He doesn't need to swim or anything like that. His license has been taken from him. Because when he went to get everything checked out, the scans showed that he's had between 15 and 20 seizures.
And, he had a seizure as they were scanning him. And, so, really, they told him it's likely that he'll lose his memory, and, as he keeps having seizures, become a vegetable. And so, we laid hands on him and prayed for him this past Sunday. Felt a brain freeze type thing, which a lot of times, when we pray for people to be healed, about 50% of the time, people feel heat or cold, or some kind of a tingling, or something like that. The other 50% of the time, they don't feel anything.
Right? But, God just heals them. It's amazing. And, if nothing happens, we just trust the Lord and praise Him anyway, because He's good, and we're supposed to be thankful in all circumstances. Right?
So, Monday, Fred went to the doctor, and the doctor tested him. Same tests. And, the test showed that he had never had a seizure in his life. Doctors said, Well, man, this is great. You've been taking your medicine, it's had an amazing effect.
Fred said, I haven't taken any medicine. He said, I never went to CVS to pick it up, you can ask my wife. Doctor didn't believe him. Had his receptionist call CVS. CVS said, Fred's never picked up his medicine.
Doctor couldn't believe it. He said, well, you've changed your diet. And, Fred, trying to relieve the pressure, said, yeah, I've been eating a seafood diet. Doctor said, well, that's probably it. No, doc, I have seafood and I eat it.
Doctor did another test on him. Second test said, never had a seizure in his life. **Jesus is a healer**. And, that's happening in our church. Not because we're super spiritual.
No. It's because Jesus is the healer. And, we're just crazy enough to believe him. And, he does that to show his kids how much he loves them, and also to show those far from him that he loves them too. And, he wants them to have a relationship with him.