Hey, this is Pastor John Ryan Cantu from PNEUMA Church in Houston, Texas.

Thank you for listening to the message today.

I hope that it blesses you and all those that you share it with.

God bless you.

Welcome to the house of God this morning.

Praise the Lord.

If it feels a little bit more, uh, crowded in here, if you, if you remember, we, we had the soundboard down here.

Um, and, uh, we just anticipated, you know, the, the growth that God has been bringing and of course, uh, resurrection Sunday, um, is we, we expect it to be packed.

So we wanted to make a little bit more room back there, which creates a little less room at the same time for like the mingling and all that stuff.

Um, but, um, we, we kind of made that decision this past Sunday and, and pastor Danny said, Hey, I can, I can probably move everything up, uh, this, uh, by, by this Sunday.

So I'm, I'm grateful for him and everybody who helped him.

Um, Lewis is up there now.

I told him, Hey, if something goes wrong with the sound, nobody can look back at you anymore.

All right.

Everybody's got to look up, but at the same time they're looking up, they're looking at God and God's like, Hey man, mind your business.

Right.

So praise God for that.

But, um, pastor Danny's not here.

They're out of town today, but I just want to, want to thank him, um, for obviously, um, just moving on that quickly and, and, and doing it well.

Um, just a few announcements.

Uh, first of all, I want to, I want to invite you.

If you've been, um, a PNEUMA member for less than six months, uh, we want to invite you to our meet and greet, which is going to be May 6th.

Um, you're going to get an opportunity just to meet all of the leadership, kind of hear about the history of PNEUMA and just connect with some, some good people.

So we want to invite you to that.

Amen.

So if you've been here, uh, for less than six months, you're invited to that, make plans to be there also next for the next two weeks.

What, what time of service?

1130.

Yes.

1130.

If you haven't notated that, make it a note, uh, in your calendar next Sunday, Palm Sunday is going to be 1130 and then resurrection Sunday, 1130 as well.

Amen.

And also before we get into the word, I just want to, I want to highlight and honor, um, a group of men.

So we had 33 men, uh, complete an eight week course, um, called daddy Academy, uh, led by, uh, if, if you were a leader of this group, can you stand up?

Uh, we want to just acknowledge you and honor you brother Alvar.

I see you here.

So stand up pastor Larry, brother, um, brother Darrell back there, guys.

I just want to say thank y'all for pouring in, uh, continuously into these men, um, and, and just continuing to, to cycle through and create more disciples of men.

Uh, now if, if you completed that class at eight week, uh, class, would you stand up as well?

We want to, we want to honor you and acknowledge you.

Come on, give it up.

Praise God.

Praise the Lord.

Come on a little bit louder, a little bit louder.

Praise God.

Amen.

We have heard testimonies of these brothers and their wives, um, and their kids.

And it's, it's, we're, we're breaking generational curses.

Amen.

That's what it's about.

We're creating generational blessings.

Um, and so these, these men are going to continue to go out and make more disciples.

That's, that's the whole concept here.

So I just, I praise, praise God for what he's doing in the lives of these men.

Amen.

Praise God.

Praise God.

We're going to go to the word this morning.

And, um, I want you to turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter eight.

If you would stand, we're just going to read a short portion of, of scripture today, Deuteronomy eight verses one through three.

How are we feeling this morning?

We're all right.

Anybody tired?

Is there a spirit of weariness in this place that we got to rebuke?

Come on.

Somebody asked me this morning, pastor, you look tired.

Are you tired?

And, uh, but, but he was right.

I am tired.

I had a, I had one of those tiring weeks.

Um, but you know, it's, it's the strength of the Lord that we continue to wake up every single day and do the work that we're, that we're called to do and worship God the way that we're called to and created to worship God.

Amen.

So if you're here today and you're tired and you're yawning and you can't wait to get out of here so you can go home and you don't even want to go eat, you just want to go take a nap.

Uh, just, just take a moment here in the presence of God and receive what he has for you.

Amen.

Deuteronomy eight.

Uh, this is Moses speaking to the Israelites after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness.

Uh, they're almost about to go into the promised land.

And this is what Moses tells the people.

He says, the whole commandment that I command you today, you shall be careful to do that.

You may live in multiply and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers.

And you shall remember the whole way.

Somebody say whole way that the Lord, your God has led you these 40 years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.

And he humbled you and he lets you hunger.

And he fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your father's know that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Amen.

Heavenly father, we ask my God today that you would just speak to us through this word, my God, that as you have spoken it to me, your servant, Lord, that your spirit would deliver it through through my lips.

My God, I pray that there would be nothing of me today, my God, because I've got nothing good to offer.

Lord, all I have is you, father, God.

And I pray that you would speak to your people through me, Lord, in this word of yours in Jesus name.

Amen.

Amen.

You can take your seat for a moment.

My hope is to offer some encouragement to somebody's life today.

And earlier, Brother Angel in the Spanish service, he brought the word and there was a lot of there was a lot of overlap.

And so I think God is wanting to speak through this this topic.

Really, this this sermon was inspired by a conversation I had with my wife the other day.

So this is really her sermon more than in his mind.

But we were talking about how, you know, you know how God often takes us out of one season just to put us in another season.

And we think the new season is going to look better and bigger and brighter.

And sometimes it does.

But oftentimes it's just another level of testing.

Right.

It's just like a new level of challenges with a hard reset on the trust in God button where you have to trust in God and wait on God all over again in the whole new season.

We're a I was thinking about this.

We're about to pay off a loan that we've been paying off, you know, for for years.

And praise the Lord.

You know, we're coming out of it and we're done with all the debt and we're not taking any more debt.

But we come to find out that just as we're coming out of this expense, we're getting into another one.

And it's not a debt, but it's an expense.

And we're like, dang, God, where's the break?

You know, like where is the end?

Where is the next level that actually feels like a next level?

Have you ever told God, God, it's always something.

It's always something I can't catch a break and I have a moment just to breathe and it's like the next day, God, you send me something else and it's a burden.

And if you read through the scriptures, if you read through them chronologically, you'll see that that every season that God has his people in is only a season to lead them into another season.

And it doesn't matter if you're in a wilderness season or in a promised land season.

Every season has its own challenges every season.

So when when Israel finally came out of the wilderness to go into the promised land, they were met with warfare.

Right.

They they had to go in and take by force what God said belonged to them against the people who didn't want them to have it.

We think that we want the promised land.

We don't even realize that we've got enemies waiting there for us.

The moment we step into the door, we think we're going to pull up and they're going to roll out the red carpet and say, welcome to the promised land.

That's not how it goes.

Those new levels of glory don't always feel or look glorious, because with the very first step that you take into those new places, it's met with new kinds of opposition.

And so when God puts us into these seasons, I don't know, maybe I'm not speaking to anybody today, but I'll tell you what I do.

When God puts us into these new seasons, I'm like, God, why does this season look like the last season?

It's a it's a it's a different picture, it's a different scene, it's different people with maybe a different role, a different ministry, it's a different church, it's a different city, it's a different place.

But I'm still dealing with the same issues I was dealing with back then.

I still have to know how to have faith in you and trust in you the way I had to have faith in you back then.

I still I still have to to fight the way that I fought back there.

I still have to try to survive here the way that I was trying to survive there.

And so this is why Moses tells the Israelites, remember the whole way.

Somebody say whole way, not just part of the way, not just in the wilderness, but also remember in the place you least think you need to remember it.

That man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

See, because when you get so used to depending on God in the wilderness, how many of you might be in a wilderness season?

You don't have to raise your hand.

But if but you if if you've been there, you know what it is to depend completely on God because you've got nothing else.

You're just depending on the grace of God and the provision that he gives.

And so when when you're stuck in the wilderness, we learn how to depend on God, but we get out of the wilderness and we go into the promised land and suddenly we have all this abundance and all these resources, all these opportunities and all this money.

We tend to forget that we still aren't supposed to depend on any of that, but still on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

So you got to remember the whole way somebody say whole way that's going to that's going to stick on you today in Jesus name.

OK, that's the title of my sermon, the whole way.

And I want to I want to look at kind of three seasons that Israel found themselves in from the books of Exodus to Joshua.

We see Israel in a place of captivity, we see them in a place of wandering and we see them in a place of prosperity, which really wasn't that prosperous.

It was supposed to be, but they just mess some things up.

And I think that at any particular time, we, as the children of God, might find ourselves in one of these places.

We're either in captivity or in wandering or we're in prosperity.

And you know, when we read the Bible stories, everything's very neat and organized and it makes for a good structured sermon.

But the reality is you can be in the promised land in one aspect of your life and in the wilderness in another aspect of your life while still being in Egypt and a whole other aspect of your life.

You know I'm saying like maybe your soul has made it to the promised land, but but your mouth is still in Egypt.

Come on, somebody.

Your mind is still in Egypt, your body is in a new place, you're in the presence of God every Sunday, you're here, you're worshiping God, but you still got the mindset, the mindset of a slave, you're still thinking that you are oppressed by your slaver when God rescued you from that old master and made himself the master and Lord of your life.

And so you have to understand that God is in the transformation business.

So, you know.

You didn't just come to church today just to get saved, just to say a prayer of salvation, and that said, no, no, God is in the transformation business where he wants to take your whole life, every aspect of it and transform it.

He wants to take every vessel in your life and make it a vessel for him.

That's what he's doing, taking us from glory to glory to glory in the image of God, and one day we will be totally transformed even down to our bodies when we make it to heaven.

Thank you, Jesus.

No more muffin tops.

But in the meantime, there is still a ways to go and we have to not grow weary in our dependence on God.

So we all know the story of Israel, right?

There were 400 years in Egypt as slaves.

The Bible says that God heard their groanings and he remembered the covenant that he made with Abraham and Isaac.

And so he sends Moses to lead his people out of Egypt.

And after their exodus, the people, they're getting ready to go into the promised land and take it over.

But they send out some spies and they go out and spy the land.

And and some of them, they get afraid of what's there.

There's there's enemies there that are too big for us to go against.

They're going to crush us.

And and so they begin to doubt that they will be able to overpower the inhabitants of Canaan, even though God was able to overpower Pharaoh and Egypt and the Red Sea.

They're still afraid.

And so it's here in this point in time that God sees something in his people that he's called to be holy and blessed.

He sees a problem.

These people don't know what it is to depend on me.

They've always depended on their oppressors, they've always depended on their masters, they don't know how to depend on Yahweh.

And so what should have been an easy journey across the Jordan into the land of Canaan became a 40 year journey and lesson for the people of God.

So before I go any further, I want to make this point.

Sometimes sometimes God will have you in a specific season, not so much because he wants you there, but because he wants you to learn something that you can only learn while you're there.

OK, maybe maybe you're in a in a holding season right now because God is trying to teach you something in this moment.

It's not that he wants you to suffer.

It's not that he wants you to be in pain, but there is a lesson that you can only learn while going through that season of trial.

I am no prosperity preacher, but I don't think that God wants us in the wilderness.

God doesn't take pleasure in our discomfort.

He ultimately wants us to be in the land of promise.

But I do know that my God likes to teach us some lessons that can only come from wilderness wanderings.

The passage goes on to say, just as a man disciplines his son, the Lord God disciplines us.

How many of us have learned the best lessons through the hardest times?

I mean, that ultimately that's that's when we learn the most.

This is something I think we talked a little bit about in our in our life group on Friday.

And if you're not plugged into a life group, man, get plugged in there.

They're awesome.

They're amazing.

Northside is the best one.

But but we talked a little bit about this.

The reason that you might, you know, worship a certain way is because you know what God brought you out of.

You are in a world of hurt before Jesus, you were lost before Jesus, you should have been dead before Jesus, and so you worship like you do, you pray like you do, you have faith like you do, because you have learned some things in those hardest moments, and you're grateful for the God who gave you enough grace to see you through it and see you on the other side.

It's harder to learn lessons in prosperity.

Now, you can learn them, but it's a lot harder, and I think this is this is a problem that or this is a worry that parents have because, you know, you're never my daughters are never going to go through the challenges that I had to go through.

So they just have to learn it by me saying it to them and lecturing them.

And they roll their eyes when we lecture them.

And then Melissa, Melissa says, you know what, God's going to teach you by going through it yourself, you know, we try, we try.

And but that's my hope.

And that's my prayer that we say it enough times that you don't have to learn the same lessons that I had to learn because you're living in a whole other you're living on the other side of the promised land.

You're living in the good land, but you didn't you didn't see the struggles that we had to learn.

You didn't see it.

And I want them to learn it, but I tell you, man, it is hard to learn lessons in seasons of prosperity because because in seasons of prosperity, you never get a chance to build humility.

You don't know what it is to be humbled.

You don't you don't get to exercise that patience muscle when you're waiting on God to send the provision and you're looking in the mailbox for some random check that maybe somebody bless you with and is not there.

When you're living in the land of prosperity, there's not a pressure to have to depend on God for everything, because you can go to all of these abundant resources that you have available.

If you're hungry, you don't got to wait for the man to just go down a lot of burger.

You can walk there.

You don't need to wait for the healing.

You can go to urgent care.

There's a difference, there's a difference growing up in the wilderness and growing up in prosperity.

And so when God sees some type of deficiency in his people.

And he says, oh, man, he needs a little bit more humility, he's a little too proud, he needs a little bit more faith, she needs a little bit more joy here.

He will very often allow us to go through some type of wandering where we have to figure out how to stop looking at our money that we've depended on and the people we've depended on and even the pastors in the church that we run to and our moments of affliction and our and our security that we've depended on.

And we have to learn how to depend solely on God.

And so maybe God is taking you out of an Egypt season.

How many of you've been delivered from Egypt?

And you were lost and you were a slave to something and you needed deliverance.

And then one Sunday you you raised your hand, you said that prayer of salvation and you were baptized and all the saints cheered and rejoiced with you.

And and then you went out to celebrate with your friends and your family over a nice, juicy, medium rare steak.

No other way to celebrate.

And you felt so on fire for this new season that God has brought you into only to find yourself outside of Egypt, but in the wilderness.

It's like getting out of prison and you don't know what's next.

You know, I've never been to prison, but I imagine like on the movies, you know, they just get out of prison.

They have one bag.

They got a toothbrush.

I don't even got a ride.

You know, I've got to figure it out.

You don't have a job, you don't know what your first meal is going to be.

Being free doesn't mean it's easy.

The Israelites learned that real quick.

That being free is a struggle.

So much so that they wanted to go back to Egypt.

And so many times we just like the Israelites did, we complain, we reminisce on the past where we were slaves, but at least we ate good.

We were addicted, but at least it felt good.

We had some toxic friends in our lives, but at least we had a place to be on a Friday night.

And maybe I miss church on a Sunday and I never went to church with my family, but at least I was getting paid and I had some money.

Maybe you thought being out of Egypt was going to look a lot different.

You pictured blessings and abundance and endless joy and smiles and always being fired up for Jesus and not dealing with temptation again.

You didn't picture a wilderness.

You didn't picture marital struggles.

You didn't picture financial turmoil.

You didn't picture health problems and temptation.

Maybe you thought that the God who took you out of Egypt was just going to snap his fingers and fix all your life problems.

But that's not the promise.

And maybe the reason that God has kept you, listen, maybe the reason God has kept you for so long in this wandering moment is because he's trying to teach you dependence on him, that before he can bless you with a whole lot more, he needs to test your obedience and your worship and your surrender and your dependence on him in this season that you're in.

I don't know who God is speaking to this morning, but if it's you, God is saying, I want you to learn dependence because whenever you get a new master, you have to relearn dependence on that master.

That makes sense.

Paul says in Philippians, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.

He says, I know how to be brought low.

I know how to abound.

And every circumstance I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger and abundance and need.

He says, this is what I learned.

I can do all things through him who strengthens me, through my master who strengthens me.

It doesn't matter the season I'm in.

He is my master.

I have learned that he is my strength, that I can depend on him.

And so I believe that so many of us, we still have, we haven't given God lordship over every aspect of our life.

And so you have to relearn dependence on him in every aspect of your life when it comes to financial security, maybe for too long, you said, I'm the man, I've built what I've got.

I put food on the table.

And now, now you're, you have Jesus, but you're broke.

You have to relearn, relearn dependence.

Maybe, maybe your master at one point was alcoholism, and any time you would get stressed out, that's what you would run to.

And now you have made Jesus Lord and you're really, really trying to run to him when you're stressed.

But you got it.

You got to learn that dependence because your natural inclination is to go what you would always run to before.

You got to relearn dependence.

I mean, I can keep going, maybe it's gossip, maybe that's your master.

And and to feel better about yourself, you feel the need to tear other people down instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to be your source of worth.

I've said this before, I don't, I don't think that the vast majority of Christians have given God complete Lordship over every aspect of their life.

That means you're not depending on him for everything.

But I truly believe that that's, that's how you grow and that's how you mature.

By giving God access to everything, somebody say everything.

You know what everything means, right?

Everything, not just, not just the godly parts of your life, not just the religious parts of your life, the practical parts of your life, stuff you don't even think about.

Maybe you've tried money your way.

I tried money my way.

Won't do that again.

Lord, here, here you Lord over my money and with every dollar I spend, I need to know that you're watching me spend it.

Maybe you've tried marriage your own way, but if you're honest, you haven't always given God your marriage and if you, you've reacted more in the flesh than you had in the spirit, you haven't get you.

I mean, you, you gave God your marriage at your wedding ceremony, Pastor Ryan married you and it was a great ceremony, but you go home and you fight in the flesh.

Maybe you've tried relationships your own way because you understand people and you understand emotions and all that stuff, but you haven't been doing relationships like the Lord would have you do it.

Even ministry, man, even ministry.

There was a time where I tried ministry my way with my gifts, with my talents, but I know that I need to depend on the leadership of God because I've stood up here plenty of times by my own strength and the sermons have flopped.

Lord, I need your anointing, I need your leadership whenever you are in some type of dry season, whenever the health is gone, the wealth is gone, the anointing is gone, the relationship is distant, the marriage is struggling.

Ask yourself, who have I been depending on?

And I'm not saying that you got to sit back and do nothing, but when you've exhausted all your efforts and you've come to the point where you've got nothing else to do, you have to still get up in the morning with the expectation that God is going to continue to be your greatest resource because he is your provision.

The people of Israel had to learn in the wilderness when there was nothing.

Somebody say nothing.

I'm having you repeat a lot of stuff today.

They had to learn in the wilderness where there was nothing, how to depend on God for his provision.

And you know what?

It took an entire generation, an entire generation to relearn dependence on the father because the last generation was stuck in their mindset, serving their old master.

So God said, no, no, no, we're going to we're going to get Egypt out of you.

I took you out of Egypt.

You still got a little bit of Egypt inside of you.

So I got to teach you the way of the new master.

And in order to do that, I'm going to have to let you wander for a while.

You're going to have to feel this for a little while.

I'm going to have you pray and I'm going to have you wonder if I'm doing anything while you're praying.

Because if you are, if you just go from nothing to having everything, you will not have learned how to depend on God.

And listen, man, God doesn't just want to be your deliverer.

He doesn't want to just be the one who bails you out every time you make a mistake.

He doesn't want to just be your last result.

What father wants his kids to call him only when they need him?

You call him only when you need something and then when everything else is good, you put him to the side.

No, Jesus said, I am the living water.

I am the bread of life.

He doesn't just give it.

He is it.

He is the source of life.

And so whether you've got plenty or you've got nothing, if you have Jesus, it doesn't matter what season you're in, you've got all that you need.

This is easy to preach, easy to say amen to, but come Monday morning, there's there's no spiritual atmosphere that you're surrounded by.

There's no sisters.

There's no brothers.

There's no worship song.

There's no there's no preacher.

You have to you have to learn when you open up that mail and it's saying, hey, eviction notice or foreclosure notice that God is still your source of provision.

You have to know these things.

You have to learn how to depend on him when the enemy wants to attack you and distract you and tell you that you have to figure it out because God's abandoned you.

No, God has never abandoned you.

He is the source of life.

Yeah, the Israelites had to learn what it meant to be led by God, not just out of Egypt, but in the wilderness.

In the wilderness.

The verse says, and you shall remember the whole way that the Lord, your God has led you these 40 years in the wilderness.

If you're in the wilderness of some sort, first of all, you got to know that you're not alone, right?

Like the spirit is leading you in this season.

The spirit led Jesus to the wilderness to be tested for 40 days.

Jesus did in 40 days what took Israel 40 years to figure out.

And I think that God is trying to tell somebody today that it doesn't need to take 40 years in the wilderness.

You don't you don't need to be in this endless cycle of struggle when the promise is just on the other side.

If you would just learn to depend on the voice of God in the season, maybe you'll learn how to do it in the next season that God wants to take you into.

But if you can't even do it when you've got nothing.

I don't know, I don't know who God is talking to today.

If you can't depend on God when you have nothing, how will you depend on him when you've got everything?

If you can't wait on God before you construct an idol of your own, like the nation of Israel did when Moses was taken so long from the mountain, God takes him out of Egypt.

Their leader, Moses, goes up to the mountain that was taking him so long.

You know what?

Let's just go ahead and construct our own idols.

That's what we used to do in Egypt.

If you can't wait on God and in this season of dryness and a season of silence and you feel like you've got to make your own your own idols happen.

I don't know how you're going to do it in the abundance.

If you've got to strike that that rock when God says, just speak to it.

But in your anger and in your frustration, you hit that rock to get the water.

If you've got to do that, how are you going to do it when there's an abundance?

God is trying to teach you something in this wandering moment in your life.

And you know, in our wandering moments, they're they're they're wandering moments.

You're wondering if God is with you.

You're wondering if God has left you.

You're wondering what it is God is doing.

And he's trying to teach you a lesson there.

Moses said he humbled you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.

See, God already knew who would make it to the promised land.

That's the scary thing.

God knows right now some of you who are going to make it out of this wandering moment that you're in into the next season that he really wants you to be in.

He doesn't he doesn't want you here, doesn't want you in the wilderness.

And I just I know that he's waiting and looking at some of us hoping that we get that lesson, but he also knows who's going to make it, who's not.

God knew who was going to complain in Israel.

He knew who was going to give up.

He knew who was going to get impatient.

He knew the names of those who were going to go in to spy out the land of Canaan and say, oh, no, we can't we can't do it.

They're too big.

They're going to destroy us.

And he also knew the Joshuas and the Caleb's, the one with a different spirit, a spirit of faith, a spirit of courage, a spirit of dependence who said, I don't know how God's going to do it, but I know he will do it.

Those get to go into the promised land because they get it.

And verse three is key, verse three says, and he humbled you and he let you hunger and he fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

I still have your attention.

Yeah, Moses tells this generation, this generation who's about to enter the promised land, your daddies didn't know this stuff.

You didn't know this stuff.

So God had to make, you know, it, you, you had to learn this through seasons of hardship.

You had to learn this through seasons of hunger and seasons of confusion and weariness.

You had to learn that the people that God has called out of Egypt were not called to live by bread, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

And so whenever you found manna on the ground, whenever you found manna on the ground in one place, and then God said, okay, now it's time for you to pack up and go to another place.

You don't make your home.

Listen, you don't make your home based off of the manna.

I want you to hear this today.

I want you to hear this.

You don't make your home based off of what secures you.

That's what the world says to do.

That's what we do.

Naturally.

We set up a place, we call it home based off of what secures us.

Well, I've got friends here.

I've got family here.

I've got a job here.

I've got, I've got a good church here.

Those are good things, but sometimes those things become the bread that we choose to live by.

We choose to live by the things that secure us.

We choose to live by the things that make us feel safe and, and, and, and comfortable.

And God had already taught his lesson to Abraham when he called Abraham to leave his home, his place of comfort, to go into a place of, of, of foreignness.

Abraham was known as what the man of what faith.

God had already taught this lesson to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob and to Joseph faith.

And this is something that this new generation of people had not yet learned.

And so Moses reflecting back on the wilderness years realizes that this was what God was doing all the time.

He was teaching his people that man does not live by what secures him, but by every word of the Lord.

And so if the word of the Lord is weights, but you think, man, if I wait too long, I'm going to miss the blessing.

No, you don't live by what you see.

You live by faith.

You live by the word of the Lord.

If the word that God has given you is go, but you think if I go, I got to leave my blessings behind.

I got to leave my home behind.

You don't live by what you have.

You live by the word of the Lord.

And so whenever you think that you're not going to have enough in this next season that God is calling you into, well, I don't know what God is calling you into, but I know for a fact that he's calling you to something and you've been holding, you've been clinging on to something else.

You've been clinging on to the bread, to the manna.

That's that's kind of the.

That's the danger.

Sometimes we depend on the blessings of God more than we depend on God.

God, you gave me this job.

I got to hold on to it for the rest of my life.

No, no.

God gave it to you in a season.

God fed you with manna for a season.

The man is not supposed to be with you the whole way.

The thing that's supposed to be with you the whole way is the word of the Lord.

And so when when God shuts up the sky and the bread's not falling anymore, it only means that he's got something else for you coming.

Yeah, stop looking for the bread.

Stop looking for the thing that secures you.

Stop.

Stop looking for the blessing and go after the word of the Lord.

If God is calling you here, don't be afraid to go there because man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

So Moses says, I love Deuteronomy.

I love the book of Deuteronomy because it's Moses' farewell address.

It's very pastoral.

Moses, Moses learned those hard lessons.

Moses, Moses struck the rock when God said, Hey, just speak to it.

And his frustration, Moses wanted to throw in the towel so many times he gave God so many excuses.

And so he's telling this generation, this young generation of people who are going to cross the Jordan.

I need you to remember the whole way.

I need you to remember when, when you're in a struggle or when you're in a, uh, in an abundance, when you feel like you're captive, I need you to remember.

The word of the Lord is what sustains you.

There will be a day where today's struggles is tomorrow's breeze in Jesus name.

There's going to be, there's going to be things.

There's going to be a time where the things that intimidated you today, no longer have any power over you.

I speak from, from experience the giants that I wouldn't dare face before.

I walk in there with confidence.

I'll walk in there knowing who goes before me.

There will be a day where we walk and we dwell in the promises that God has made to us and to our family.

But you got to remember even then that it's not the blessings of God that we depend on.

It's not the material things that he's allowed us to have.

It's still the very word that the Lord has spoken over our lives.

So don't get stuck in Egypt.

Don't get weary in the wilderness and don't get proud in the promised land.

Okay.

I want to end it with, with this.

If, if you're in an Egypt season today and you feel like you've got chains on you and you feel like you could barely walk and you feel like something's wrong with your mind and you feel like you keep going back to the things that you know, God is trying to take you out of.

I want you to know that those chains can be broken today.

Those chains should rattle every time you come into the presence of God, because even the chains know that they have no power over the mighty name of Jesus.

Those chains can be broken today.

If you're in an Egypt season, you've got to know that God will rescue you from the captivity that you've been in.

Now, if you're in a wilderness season, I want to encourage you don't get tired.

Because it gets tiring in the wilderness season.

We get tired of looking.

We're looking constantly for the provision.

Where is it?

We're constantly waiting.

We're constantly discouraged.

We get bored in the season of wandering.

It's like, God, should I even pursue the promise anymore?

Because it feels like I'm just stuck.

Don't get tired.

Don't get tired.

Don't stop trusting.

And to those of you that are living in the total blessings of God right now, you're in the promised land.

You got nothing to complain about, even if you tried.

I want to tell you, don't cling to the blessings.

Don't cling to the land.

Don't be so afraid to leave the promised land when God calls you into some uncomfortable territory.

Don't cling to the resources because they are not your source of life.

Cling to the very word of the Lord who can call you at any moment to give everything that you've got away to the poor.

Come on.

Don't stop trusting.

Don't stop praying.

Don't stop worshiping.

You've learned too much to get proud.

Now you've been, you've been too much.

You've been through too much to, to, to abandon the faith.

Now depend on God the whole way, the whole way, everywhere, everywhere you go.

God lead me.

I want you to stand with me.

Oh, Jesus.

We trust in you.

My God.

I want to, I want to make three altar calls today, three altar calls, and this, this shouldn't exclude anybody.

And I'm going to do what those preachers do.

Um, I'm going to count to three and when I say three, they'll come up.

Okay.

So don't, don't come up right now.

Let me, let me make these altar calls and the Lord puts it on your heart.

I want you to come up and you either take a moment or you get some prayer.

The first one, the first one, I want you to close your eyes with me.

Just, I don't want any distractions because I really want the Holy Spirit to speak in this moment to those hearts.

If you are in an Egypt moment and you've still got chains binding you and you walked in and you know that you need freedom and you need deliverance and you are ready to repent of that sin and, and, and, and have Jesus rescue you from that Egypt moment.

If that's you, this altar call is for you.

And it could be a mindset that you need to break.

It could be an addiction that you need to break.

You just need rescue from an Egypt moment.

For the second group of people is those that are in the wilderness.

You're in the wandering and you're getting tired and you're getting discouraged and you're about to throw in the towel.

You don't even know if you want to come to church anymore because you keep hearing the promises repeated in your life, but you're not even sure if, if you got to believe them anymore, because you have seen the same thing and the same struggles day after day after day.

And God is wanting to renew your strength this morning and remind you that he has fed you this long.

He has given you enough for this long.

And if you would just learn the lesson to depend on him, there is a new season coming.

And then the third altar call is for those that are in the abundance, you are in the blessing, you're in the promised land, but you still wake up every day worried about losing the things that God has allowed you to have.

You have created an idol out of the land of promise that was supposed to be a blessing, but was never supposed to be everything.

And God is calling you again to trust in him and his word, and not to be afraid to leave the abundance because you're going to enter a season of lack.

If you have resonated with any one of those altar calls, I want you to come forward and get prayer or just seek God.

I'm going to count to three and I want these altar calls filled.

If that's you, one, two, three.

Thanks for listening.

If you'd like some more information on PNEUMA church, visit us on our website at my PNEUMA church.org.

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Thanks again, and God bless.