Elevation with Steven Furtick - Move In What You’re Made For

Episode Date: February 28, 2022

You were made for this. In “Move In What You’re Made For,” we learn to step out of insecurity and into our unique purpose.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. This word that God gave me to share with you today, I'm still recovering. Oh, man, it spoke to us. I can't wait to share it with you. I can't wait to share it with you. Hey, welcome.

Before we go to the word, I wanted to make sure you knew that the new Elevation Worship album, we've been working on this two years. Lion is out. March 4th. The whole album. What an awesome release date for an album. March 4th. So you can march forth into the things God has planned for you. I might preach that next week. But also, wanted to let you know about elevation nights. Have you heard about elevation nights? It's going to be me preaching. Our whole elevation worship team, all the songs you love, put the favorite

elevation worship song in the chat. Put it in the chat right now. And if you're anywhere near these cities, Let's see. I got them listed. From April 26 to May 5th, Chicago, Grand Rapids, Indianapolis, Columbus, Ohio, Washington, D.C., Redding, Pennsylvania, Newark, New Jersey, Boston. There they are. Don't judge my handwriting. We're coming. We're coming. We want to see you there, elevation nights.com. Now it's time for the Word of God. Let's go. Let's go. Put a hallelujah in the chat and let me know where you're watching from. And let me know what song is your favorite song off of our brand new album, Lion, Roar! Y'all didn't think Katie Perry was the only one who could roar, do you? I know my pop culture references are dated, but we're so excited. Everything that God is doing, God is really busy. And I know the devil is too, but God is busy. And we have to look for him at work.

And I believe that today he has given me the kind of work. I was going to do a lot of announcement. and all that, but they did all of them before I got here. So now all this left for me to do is preach this word to you. Now make sure you get the new Elevation Worship album, make sure that you go to Elevation Nights.com, but right now the presence of the Lord is in this place. And I want to share with you from the very first chapter of the very first book of the Bible. What a week. What a week it was.

What a week it was. I'm talking about Genesis 1. I'm not talking about 2022. I'm talking about when God made the whole world in seven, six days. The seventh day, he chilled. And you should chill too, right? You should chill too. And be still and know that He is God.

Y'all are excited, right? Genesis 1, verse 20, And God said. You know I could preach three weeks on those three words. And means it's a continuation of something that he already started, and he's still speaking. So put that in the chat. Tell your neighbor, he's still speaking. And.

And, somebody say and. And it's a continuation. God, that's the conversation. That's the Creator. It's not the critics that count. It's what the Creator says that counts. And God said it's a command. So it has to happen because he spoke it. And God said, somebody say it. And God said, let the water, hold on, let me find it. Yeah, here it is. Let the water team. with living creatures and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky so god created the great creatures of the sea and every living thing with which the water teams and that moves about

in it according to their kinds and every winged bird according to its kind and god saw ah and god said And God saw. So we live in the space in between where we can't see everything that God has spoken yet. We can't see the promises that He made us yet. They're not in finished product form yet. We are in the process between the beginning of that verse and God said and God saw. And we don't see it yet, but we don't have to see it to believe it. That's what our faith is for. And God saw that it was good. It was good. God blessed them and said, be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas. Let the birds increase on the earth. And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

And God said, because he's not done yet on the fifth day, because you didn't get here yet. God saved the best to last. And that's you. Turn to your neighbor and say, that's you. That's you. God can't stop speaking because you're not here yet. God can't stop speaking because your destiny isn't fulfilled yet. God can't stop speaking yet because he hasn't made the apex crown jewel of his creation, humans in his image. But before he created us, the Bible says, I think this is interesting. Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds, the livestock, the creatures that move along the ground, and the wild animals. each according to its kind. And it was so. God made the wild animals according to their kinds,

the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move, somebody say move, move along the ground according to their kinds, and God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground. Say amen for the word of God. Beautiful, beautiful. Now, what I want to do is take that verse, verse 26, where God said, let us make man in our image, right? That's the most famous one, when God, on the sixth day, made you before he sat down. And I want to back up and see if there's a lesson we can learn from the fifth day about the sixth day. On the fifth day, it's not as

famous as the sixth day because we're self-centered and we're nauseistic and we think we're the ones it's all about. But actually, there is something that the birds know that you don't know. And there's something that the fish have learned that we haven't learned yet. So we're going to go to school with the fish, better in my head. And we are going to learn from the birds this fifth-day principle. Okay, and here it is. I'm going to give it to you at the top of the sermon, and then we'll unpack it together. This is going to be an amazing class.

This is going to be an amazing moment. And what God wants to teach you from this creation account is a principle from the fifth day. from the birds and the fish. Look at your neighbor and say, move in what you're made for. Look at your other neighbor and tell them, listen to the fish and move in. Come on, tell them, look them in the eyes. Why are you scared of eye contact? You can't catch COVID through the eyeballs. Don't. Look at them and say, move in what you were made for. Now give them a little bump, just a little bump. Say, move in, move in, move in. Let's go to school. Class is in session. Be seated. The Lord told me that. He told me, move in what you're made for. And I needed it. Different sermons come from different places. All sermons are not created equal.

Some of them, you'll say, that was the best you ever preached. No, that's the best. best you ever heard. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. It's not really based on that, is it? It's based on what you need in that moment. And the Lord told me something really interesting that today he wanted to give you a word for your insecurities, a word that would speak directly to your insecurity, but that he doesn't want to deal with it on the surface level. See, the creation of mankind tells us something about the calling of mankind. The process by which God made everything that I see tells me a lot about what he's doing in my life now. So we're not going to study today whether God literally made the world in six 24-hour periods

or whether it's symbolic of a longer period of time. I'm not a scientist. We're not going to study today the different species and the genome of the different... I'll go in there because I sound so stupid. And you'll Google me and you'll know that I'm wrong. Before the internet preachers could say anything, but now y'all fact-checked me in real time,

so I've got to leave that alone. Instead, I want to look at this process by which God made us as a pattern. And the first thing you'll notice is that God doesn't speak to the surface. A real word from God will never speak to the surface of your situation. That's why advice can only help you so much. Because when you ask a human being for advice, you only tell them the information that you deem relevant.

And a lot of times they give you good advice based on bad data. But they don't know deeper down that the reason your relationship is in, what do you call it when it's like shattered on the floor, in pieces, is, and the reason you have no peace in your situation is because you are constantly critiquing and you are constantly correcting. So they give you advice. Well, you should just leave them. But what they don't know is if you leave them, you take you with you. And sometimes the problem is something that you don't think to tell them. God doesn't give advice because he knows what's beneath the surface. So while you're praying about symptoms, God is prescribing a remedy and a cure for what is causing the sickness.

That's what makes him the great physician. Is it just me or could we go home and we already got our gas money? word out of that. Because I want to know what, and God said. And God said. Because when God spoke, remember, he's been busy. We jumped right into the middle of the creation story. We didn't even talk about all that God did in the first four days. I'd feel kind of bad skipping it because it's amazing stuff when he said, let there be light. And light was like, okay. That's crazy. I thought that was amazing until I saw what he did on the second day. And on the second day, when he actually like God just keeps like one up in it.

Because after he created the light, he created the vault, and then he created the sky, and then he created the waters. And that looked pretty good until the third day. Then on the third day, God gets busy calling forth life out of the land that he created and separating the waters so they could sit in their place so he could create a setting for human life to begin. That's on the third day. And on the fourth day, I know you know this already, because you study this stuff all week, and you read your Bible, and you never watch Netflix, and you've been reading Genesis chapter 1 too, and you even read it in Hebrew. But let me tell you

what I learned this week. He gave the sun and the moon and the stars, which he hung in the sky that he created on the second day, and then on the fifth day. That's why I picked up on the fifth day, because the fifth day, God did something different that he didn't do any other day. Lean in for this. He made it and then he blessed it. Study it for yourself. At your leisure. At your leisure. Look and see that he didn't bless the light. He didn't bless the darkness. He didn't bless the moon. He started blessing on the first. fifth day. Because on the fifth day, God started to create the living things. The living things. Raise your hand if you are a living thing. That means you're blessed. Touch somebody say,

I'm blessed to be alive. Oh, I know you've been complaining all week, but it's in the past. Now, look at them again, say, I'm blessed to be alive. I'm blessed to have a breath. I'm blessed to still have the use of my body. I'm blessed to be here. I'm blessed to be a... I've had some good days. I've had some hills to climb. But I'm blessed to be alive.

Come on, let's rejoice in it. I'm blessed to be alive. He didn't bless the beans sprout, but he blessed the bird. I wonder why. To me, I'm thinking that a bird is much less impressed. than a star. But there was something about the bird, and there was something about the bass, fish, the bass and the bird, it's alliteration people, that God blessed. And not only did he bless it,

he directly created it. Now, watch this. Bible nerds wave at me. Bible nerds wave at me. Bible nerds wave at me. You love this little stuff. You don't just need a cliche to rhyme and you don't need to start with all the same letter, but you really love the word of God. This is for you. When God told the land to produce vegetation, the land brought it forth. When God told the waters to bring forth the fish, it said that God himself brought them forth. But now I'm going to blow your mind even more. When he got ready to create you, you messed up you, when he got ready to make you, he did something he didn't do for the birds, the worms, the moon, the stars, the big dipper, the little dipper, the octopus, the crabs, the lobsters, none of them did he do this for.

He bent down. And up until this point, everything he made, he made with his mouth because he spoke it. When he made me, he got down in the dirt and made me by hand. Who are you? What is man? The psalmist said that God is mindful of him. or the son of man that you would visit him, that God would stoop down in the dirt, and that divinity would touch dirt. And God didn't leave it up to the land to bring you for it. He got his hands dirty.

God rolled up his sleeves. Now, I need everybody who's got a messy situation in your life right now to know what your maker did when this whole thing got started. He rolled up his sleeves and he said, I'll make the moon with my mouth. I can hang it with a syllable. Moon. And the moon said, yes. And the Lord said, hang. And the moon said, yes.

And the Lord says sign. And the moon said, all right. But when it got down to you. So it seems to me, if we believe Genesis 126, that I was made from a mess in the image of my maker, that there is no mess in my life right now that I cannot bring to my maker and expect him to say, I'll bless it anyway. My God. All right.

All right. Somebody shout, I'm blessed. I'm blessed because God said I'm blessed. And hey, let me throw this in in case some of you guys. any haters. What God bless, no man can curse. What God bless? Even your haters are the PR department. Because God is going to use the people who don't like you to fulfill Genesis 126. Because not everybody liked Jesus. If everybody had liked him, they wouldn't have crucified him. If they didn't crucify him, he couldn't have died for your sin. If he didn't

die for your sin, he couldn't have fulfilled his mission. Is God using in your life the dirt to create and bring forth? Because that's what he did in Genesis 1. And I think that's what he's been doing in me. Some words God gives you as a preacher are not meant to be shared. And that's frustrating. When the Lord speaks to me, I get excited. You can ask my family, this isn't a show I put on. I'll grab the kids in the middle of video games. Come here, you got to hear this.

And I'll start preaching to the kids. All right? All right. And then sometimes the Lord will give me something that I think is just for me. And that's what happened to me with Genesis 1. Okay, let me tell you something about creative work. Because I consider myself creative, a creative person, you know? And, well, I mean, in this area of life, I'm creative.

Other things I can't do arts and crafts. I don't like arts and crafts. Some people go through the supply section of Walmart and stuff, and they just get all excited in the craft section. Ooh, glue sticks. I was taking Abby through Barnes & Noble the other day. She was getting excited about colored pencils. I never in my life got excited about a colored pencil.

And all of my kids are different, you know, all good at different things. And it took me a while to realize that as God reveals your assignment in life, it will surface your insecurities. There's that word again, surface. Because remember, when God started, show them Genesis 1, 2, I pulled this last minute to show you. It said that in the beginning, before God spoke anything, the Spirit of the Lord hovered over the water. You have verse 2? Did y'all get it in there? I definitely gave it to him last minute, so it's not their fault.

But look what it says, that the earth was formless and empty. Now, that just doesn't mean that there was nothing there. The connotation of these words in Hebrew is that it was chaotic. It was not just formless and void. It was chaotic. It was empty. And it was futile. frustrated, like your life sometimes.

Not all the time. I know right now you look amazing, but that's your surface self. That's your Sunday self. I will put a nest camera in your house this week, and then I'll come preach to you, not based on what you showed me on Sunday, but what you dealt with on Wednesday. Don't make me bring a Wednesday word in this church this week that I saw you on Wednesday in the spirit. The Lord was hovering over the surface, and he brought forth something out of that. So I was going to Genesis 1 because I'm trying to understand not only in my professional life,

but as a parent, as a husband, as a man who wants to be like Christ. And some people said it's a midlife crisis, but I don't really look at it that way. I just think it's the process that we all go through of trying to figure out, like, how can I know that God is my father, know that he's my provider? See him do so much miracles, so many things, and still be insecure. How come it even seems like success creates extra insecurity? Because now I've got to sustain it. Now I've got to throw the dart another time and hope I didn't just randomly hit the bull's eye.

How did I keep this going? How can you do that? As my assignment is revealed, my insecurity surface. By the time you get good at changing your child's diapers, you will need to teach them to drive. The skills needed to teach your kid to drive are not the same skills needed to change the diaper. When you change the diaper, the worst they can do is pee on you in the process, and you can clean that up. When you teach them to drive, they can send you to meet Jesus early. I need everybody who did it to clap those hands.

and give God praise that I'm blessed to be alive. I'm blessed to be alive, like Genesis 1 said. So it's like that in every area of life. I was talking to a man who's 62 the other day. He said, I never felt so insecure. I said, really? You're a man. Net worth is crazy, too.

I mean crazy. Crazy net worth. He said, yeah, man, it's this and it's that, and it's the other, and it's the third, and it's that. And I said, you're still insecure. after all the success that you have. Now, on the surface, he looks very confident. But beneath the surface is an insecurity. What insecurity is beneath the surface in your life right now? That God wants to speak a word to. Because you don't experience insecurity as insecurity.

Nobody runs around. Just pray for me for my insecurity. We ask people to pray. We say, like, I'm worrying a lot lately. But why are you worrying? Because you're insecure. No, no, no, no, no now, Pastor Stephen, that's quite a jump. I'm worried because life is crazy and I'm worried because I've got these things. But if you believed that you are so blessed, if you believe, like deep down, if I believe that, then I would look at the birds who neither store nor reap, yet my father feeds me. My father them. There is something in me that does not believe I have what I need for where I am. I do not, fundamentally now, I do not believe that I have what I need for where I am. Or maybe in one area of my life, I know I have what I need for where I am. But then I get

in another area of my life, and then I get in another area of my life. This is the kids that are really good at school. But watch them on the, watch them on the, watch them on the, the soccer field. Or they suck at school, but they can kill you on the soccer field. But everybody, this is one thing I know. This isn't a Bible verse, but I want to say it. Everybody in here sucks at something. It's not in the Bible. How many think I'm right? Everybody in here has an area of your life. Don't make me come through that camera. But God told the birds, Let me show you this. This is not. I don't know if this is getting through. Hang on a second. I'm going to be like God for a minute. I'm going to go back in the dark and I'm going to bring something out in the light and show you what I'm talking about. I'll be right back. This is like the beginning, the without form and void. The earth is without form and void. And then God said, let there be light. Let there be light. Let there be sky. Let there be ocean. Let there be moon. Let there be stars. Let there be plants. Let there be ground, dry ground appear. And then on the fifth day, because we're talking about the principle of fifth day, God said, let there be birds. Let there be fish.

I know this is not the natural habitat. This is a reproduction. Just for a mental image, because you'll forget what I say if I don't show you something. Because you're a visual learner. That's how God made you. And they told you you were slow and they told you were stupid, but they just didn't teach you right yet. So I'm going to do it enough where every bird gets to eat today, all right?

I got the deep stuff in this sermon for the deep Christians, the ones who just want to be confused so they don't have to apply it. And then I got the... I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. And the Lord said both are blessed. He blessed both. That confused me at first because it said, he told the fish fill the waters, and he told the birds fill the sky.

And it was good. Both. It leads me to believe that I'm blessed when I'm doing what God called me to do, where God called me to do it. The quote that I read was attributed to Albert Einstein, but I don't think he really said it upon further review, that if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend the rest of its life believing that it is stupid. Some of you tell yourself you're stupid because you are trying to swim in somebody else's sky. And some of you are telling yourself

that you are incompetent or nothing or insignificant or ridiculous. Because you, on the other hand, are trying to flap. Look, here's one trying to say. We got a lot of Little Mermaid Christians. Did you see the movie? I used to have such a crush on Ariel. I'm confessing it in front of Holly just so I could get healed from it and delivered from it. She was my first crush. But Ariel had a problem, remember?

What did she say? I want to be part of that world. And we got a lot of Christians that haven't read Romans 12-1. Do not conform to the pattern of this world. Did you see the Little Murray? And God is not King Triton. And God is not going to give you legs if he made you for water. God is not going to help you flap if he gave you fins.

We've got to move in, operate according to, and function by white. you were made for. I didn't want to bring any animals out here because we live in a contentious time, and I figured I would offend somebody, and Peter might shut my church down. But just imagine. Now, this would be really bad, right? I would never do this. I'm not an animal person, but I would still never do this if we put a bird in the bowl. And I knew Hollywood liked this sermon. Hey, did you know there's six birds for every human? I thought about you this week. I was studying the birds. She's a bird person in theory. Let one fly up close to her.

She likes the information about the birds, right? And a lot of Christians are confident in Christ, in theory. I'm a child of God. Yes, I am. That's your surface of. But before God can bring forth what he really wants to bring forth in this season, he's got to move waters. He's got to start clearing out stuff that is covering up,

stuff to ask you what is beneath the surface in your life. And are you moving in it? Are you moving in what you're made for? Take a picture if you want to, so you could put this on your screensaver this week. You know what I'm saying? I'm not saying you want to look at me, but maybe you just want a little reminder. Like, when you're comparing yourself, when you're sitting there looking at other people's life, comparing yourself. Because what we do, go back to Genesis 1.26 a minute. Let us make man in our image, God said. But we don't go off of God's image. We go off of an image of what we think a good mom is supposed to look like, or a good dad or a good man or a successful person. That's what

we think, right? You have to be like that. But it's an image. You imagined it. It's not the real image. It's a surface image. So now you try to make memories with your kids, right? And they backfire. And it doesn't go down like it was supposed to go down. That's because you are making memories compared to somebody else's pretend memory that they posted. They captured it.

You're a bird in a bowl. We have these amazing things God made called brains. Amazing. Your brain is amazing. Your mind is amazing, absolutely amazing. I mean, even the ones of us in here who had to take algebra a few times, your brain is amazing. What it just enables you to do is just amazing. I mean, come on, the moon is jealous of you.

The stars are jealous of you. God made you by hand. He made all of that stuff, boom, with his mouth. He made you by his hand. Your brain is amazing. Your brain was not made to look at everybody else's life all day. Your brain was not made. I'm going to make CNN and Fox News, man, like they're watching.

It was not made for you to process all the information of the world all the time. You're a bird in a bowl right now, and you are drowning in stuff that God did not intend for you to live in. I read all a quote. Listen how good this quote is. The lady said this book is called Gift from the Sea. She said, we are asked today to feel compassionately for everyone in the world. Listen again, this is the demand that's being placed on us today in the day we live in, going back to the beginning what God made you for versus what is being marketed to you today as normal.

We are asked today to feel compassionately for everyone in the world, to digest intellectually, all. all the information spread out in public print. All of it. You've got to know everything all the time. What's happening on the other side of the world? What's happening? You are watching people eat lunch on a screen and they sit three cubicles down from you. That's how weird it is right now. And you are asked to digest on the same screen, world events, and also somebody's vacation that lifts three doors down from you. And it's all right there. Now listen to what she says. We are asked to implement in action every ethical impulse aroused by our hearts and minds. The interrelatedness of the world links us constantly with more people than our hearts can hold. She wrote that in 1955. What would she say today? What would she say about? You're weak. Where you've been this week? You've been a bird in a bowl?

Here's what I mean by a bird in a bowl. God told the fish, you are good in what I made for you. And I think the Lord wants to say that to somebody. You are good in what he made for you. And you're going, don't you mean that he made me for? No, no, no. What he made for you, Ephesians 210.

for we are created in Christ Jesus. This is like the New Testament explanation of the illustration in Genesis 1. We are God's handiwork. Remember, he spoke the son with a word. He made you with his hand. So the author here is simply saying, Paul is reminding you, God made you by hand. And that's good enough to know that he stitched me together.

He made me by hand. I'm not mass-produced. I didn't come off an assembly line. That means I don't have to fit in with something else because I was formed by someone who knew me before my frame was. So then, if that's good news, how much better is it to know what comes next? We are God's handiwork, verse please, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. To understand the fifth day, you have to understand the second day. To understand your life, you have to

understand the heart, the mind, and the order of God. See, because God wouldn't have made a bird before he made a sky. God wouldn't have made a fish before he made an ocean. You think God just dropped you down in your life and didn't put in you everything that you need to do everything he's called you to do? Break it down, Ferdick. All right. If God put me in it, he put it in me. But see, I have surface words that have been spoken over me that create insecurities to keep me from believing what God said and moving in what he made me for. Can I tell you how much I suck at most stuff. I mean really, really bad.

I'll be right back. I got some other stuff back here. Y'all good? Y'all good? I've been excited to preach this word. I really want to give it to you. Okay, I'll be right back. I'll be right back.

Some stuff. Now, when I say I'm bad at basketball, I mean my kids started beating me at horse when they were four years. I am so bad. I'm not saying like, oh, I'm not really good behind the line. No, I'm saying I'm not good against the backboard on a ladder. I can't shoot a basketball. And here's how bad it was. When God called me to preach, now we're talking about what you were made for. Don't get distracted. Like I'm giving you a history lesson on my life. I know you'll come to church for a memoir, but there's something like this for you. Okay? And I remember when I first went

around preaching. Me and Holly, we'd go to these little churches, and we would end up After I preached, the kids would all want to go in the gym and play basketball. And then it would undo the good impression that I made on the pulpit when they saw me play basketball. They're like, that guy can't know God. Look at him out there. Look how he moves. And so I went to my friend. Now, I'm going to tell you this is the detail that you may not need. But I went to my friend.

She was the captain of the Lady Stags, the Berkeley Stags, the high school team. And I said, I need help. I said, I'm out here preaching. She said, I don't know anything about preaching. I said, I don't need preach. I need you teaching my basketball. And I said, can I come over? And we went out in her driveway.

And after an hour, she said, maybe you should just ref. Okay, I'll be right back. I'll be right back. Y'all hang out right there. Because I'm bad at that. I'm bad at that. I'm bad at that. Another thing I want to show you, this one's a little bit more close to home.

When I told them what to get me, y'all look at me. I said, get a pink hammer. Just to symbolize that Holly is a better handyman than I am. Now, see, I don't like to tell you stuff like this when I preach because I look kind of manly. I got a beard. I need to show you this because it's going to help you with something. It's going to set you free from something. When we first got married, I felt so insecure, inept, incompetent, and capable.

It's sufficient. Because I thought a good husband was a good handyman. That was the image I had. My dad could fix stuff. Her dad can fix stuff. What kind of husband can I be? If I can't fix anything. Bird in a bowl.

Put that on the camera. Put that on the camera. Bird in a bowl. That's you. Oh, God. Well, I'm not good at that. I'm not quick on my feet. Well, be slow on your feet.

Be deliberate. Be accurate. Chop them right in the throat when you hit. Boom, right there. Because I was a fish in a tree in second grade, the teacher said, nobody wants to just hear you talk all the time. What you're made for? Let them say what they want.

You were made for this, baby. So, let's make a trade. Let's make a trade. Bring me a mic. Bring me a mic. She didn't need a handyman. She needed a holy man Give me my mic

I just had the wrong thing In my hand And if you will focus with enough gratitude On what God gave you And how God made you You little quirky bird You little funky fish You little weird

You get focused enough on what he gave you beneath the surface of what you see. That's not what you thought it was supposed to be. And you can knock down giants and God can break down walls and you can see great and mighty things. So I can't be her handy man. I'm her holy man. I like that. Make me a t-shirt. I'm your holy man.

It's good. Because God prepared us in advance. Don't get me started. I'll start spelling words wrong. Pre-paired. Pre-paired. Take it, take it, take it, take it. I'm done with it. Pre-paired.

Somebody say, pre-paired. All right, let's ask Van der Waite, can we buy a vow? I want to buy an I. Pre-P-A-I-R-E-D. Come here, Holly. Come here, come here, come here. Pre-paired. Pre-paired.

She was pre-paired. This is how I know God is God, because on the second day, he made the water. On the fifth day, he made the fish to go in it. On the second day, he made the sky. On the fifth day, he made the bird to fly in it. And the birds are smarter than we were, because we spent the first 30 years, 40 years, 50 years. How long is it going to take for us to go to fish school and learn what the fish and the birds knew from the moment God spoke them? You didn't see a fish flapping around in the sky, but you see people all the time trying to dress like something they're not.

Talk like something they're not. Walk like something they're not. Quacking and waddling all around, you ugly duckling. I'm putting all the fairy tales and Disney characters in this. Because I want you to get it. I want you to get it. I want you to get that you're handmade. That you're handmade.

I'm not talking about marriage. This is an illustration. We were pre-paired. And when you preached yesterday, I was so proud. My barber was cut my hair. He said, be still. I'm going to gap you up and you're going to make me look bad on camera. I said, I'm sorry. She's just doing so good. She was out there in Austin, Texas preaching. And he said, yeah. You from Austin? You are? She was bringing the gospel to your homeland in fine style. And when it was done, Flytai said, you must be proud. I said, you have no idea how proud? Because I know the process.

I know all the insecurity that she pushed through to preach like that. Let me tell you a few. You mind if I tell them? I don't know. It's better to ask for forgiveness and permission. She got to forgive me for this, because this is what God told me to tell you. She is saying, all right, let the fish fill the water, let the birds fill the sky. You will fill what you are formed for when you stop complaining about where you don't fit.

When you find your water, when you find your sky, when you stop asking, can I be a part of that world? And Holly says, I wish I could preach and be more spirit-filled. You know what she meant? spontaneous. Because where we grew up, scripted and structure, men, it wasn't spirit-filled. So she was a bird in a bowl. You love birds? Hold that bowl. She was in that bowl. The bowl of her belief about what God needed her to be for her to be effective. And now, y'all make me mad, because y'all see me in the store, and y'all say, we love when Holly preachers. I'm like, What am I supposed to do with that?

I love it when she preaches, too. She's not as available for romantic interludes when she's preaching on reeks. I'm not going to let her preach too much. Spontaneous. That's my gifts. This is my water. This is my sky. This is me being me.

Blame it on the birds. Blame it on the birds. I got excited. Because even that, they'll put on YouTube, they'll say, this isn't preaching. This is a motivational seminar with a failed B-rate comedy hour on it like that. Okay, you swim in your sea. I'll swim in mine.

We can both be blessed. We can both be blessed. I'll preach it how I preach it. You preach it. You preach it. They told Finney, I don't like your style of evangelism. He said, what's yours? He said, I don't have one yet.

He said, I like mine better. I like mine better. I like mine better. I like my wife better. You know, because I watched you. He said, you must be proud. I said, I am because I know the process, not the product. People will see the product.

But God knows all the mess that you're in right now. By hand, he's crafting and designing you for it because he prepared it with you. So I watched her. I watched her go from I'm not spirit-filled. to realizing that the Spirit of God can fill a script, that you don't have to wing it. Bird reference. And yet the craziest thing is, now when she speaks and I see the Spirit of God, it reminds me of Genesis 1 too, that the Spirit was hovering over the surface trying to bring forth what was already there.

You know how many birds are in bowls today? because of the insecurity that imprisons you, and you can't move in it because you weren't made for it. Quit trying to fit in with those friends that aren't good for you. Let me be dad for a minute. Let me be dad for a minute. Let me move in what I'm made for for a minute, okay? All right. God has given me a parental anointing just as well.

And there are times in my kid's life where I'm like, you don't fit there because it's not for you. I'm not saying you're better than anybody, but you don't fit there because they're for you. So everybody who doesn't want to be your friend, the real you, is doing you a favor. Uh-huh. Oh, I'm going to preach somebody free today. You've been in this bowl going like, well, I can't. Some of you are trying to be sinners and you suck at it. Because you're not supposed to be a sinner.

You're a saint. You're the righteousness of God. You're a child of the light. a child of the light, and that's why darkness doesn't feel right to you. Make the confession. Say I'm a child of the light. Now let there be light over your life. Let there be light over your life.

Let there be light over your life. Because I'm a child of the light. And if it doesn't fit, it's not for you. Give me that blazer. Now I'm going to show you how silly you look. Trying to fit in to the customs of this world. Some of y'all are encouragers, and you are trying your best to be negative because negative is so normal now. And you're not even good at it.

Some of y'all need to stop cussing because y'all don't even know how to cuss correctly. You sound silly. Give me that. Now, I could put this on. I told her I was going to do this. I said, what if I rip it? She said, then rip it if you got to rip it. Because I want you to notice something.

wasn't made for me so I can't move in it. That's the mindset you've been in. This insecure, y'all can't take me seriously. You got to get it off you. Oh, she said turn around so we can see how you look from the back. This is you. I can't be free. I can't fly.

Uh-huh. All you do it. Nobody. Get it off you and get back. Take this jacket, girl. And no. that he is good. A blessed favor to.

Eat the praise. Do what you were made to do. You were made to glorify. I believe I can fly. I can make it. I was made for this. He is the potter. I am the clay.

I'm staying on the wheel. I got wings like a dove. I can make it over this situation. Now, scrunch up your eyebrows like you mean business and tell somebody, I was made for this. I was made for this. I was made for this. I was made for this. Like a fish in water, like a burn in the sky, like something sprouting forth out of the ground.

I was made in the image of God. So why in the world would I move in the condemnation of my enemy? I'm coming out of insecurity today because I wasn't made for insecurity. I was made in the image of God. And how do I know what I'm made for? I spend time with my maker. I got to get with him now. And God said, and God said,

y'all better stand up and put pressure on me to close because I feel a part two coming on early. I feel a part two coming on early. Stand up. Stand up. You're never going to find out what his hand can do because you are so distracted by what your hands are holding that wasn't made for you. Now, God did not make the sky for the birds to hover in and hang out. And God did not make the sea for the lobsters to get some sun. You got to move in it.

You've got to move in what you were made for. That's how life happens. Did you ever have a baby? I didn't. But when it moved and it got uncomfortable, that's when we knew she was closer than ever to bringing forth life. The same is true in the spirit. And God said, don't you want to know what he spoke?

Don't you? Don't you play gyra. Don't you want to know what he spoke? Don't you want to know what he who chose you before the foundations of the earth, before all this surface stuff got on you? Don't you want to know what you were created in Christ Jesus for that was prepared in advance for you to do? This is your season to begin to move in your water, to begin to fly in your sky, to begin to control the the atmosphere that you allow in your heart. Your mind was not made to worry about the future. Sufficient is the day. If you move in what God gave you, this day, our daily breath, I feel

anointed to help somebody because he said this was a word for your insecurity. And when you bring that to your maker, you remember what you were made for. Oh, I'm a reflection of God. I told my buddy a while back he was getting criticized, and I said, that's happened to me before. Let me tell you what I learned. I read a quote where the man said, never wrestle with a pig. And then he said, because you both get muddy and the pig likes it.

And then God gave me something to say, you're a prince, not a pig. I wasn't made for the mud. I was made from the mud. When I'm in the hands of my maker, come on, release it to God right now. If you just start like getting ready to leave right now and you don't seal this word,

the enemy's going to snatch it. You're going to get back in the same situation, the same people, the same stuff you've been staring at all week. But this is the principle of the fifth day, that we could learn from the birds what we don't know with our human life. That when I fly in what I'm formed for, God always has a worm for me. That when I swim in where God set me, now don't go quit your job. Tell your boss you're a bird. You're going to be a broke bird looking for a worm. That is not my message.

Do not put an asterisk by my message. I didn't say that. I want to talk about your heart. I want to talk about what you believe. I want to talk about the bowl you put yourself in. And if the Lord helps me, I'm going to continue this same line of teaching next week. I am. Prodigal son said, I'm out here with the pigs.

My father has hired servants. I'm a prince, but I'm down here with the pigs. I wasn't made for this. I wasn't made for this addiction. My heart was made for God. I wasn't made for this bitterness. I'm not going to be down here with the pigs and forget that I'm a prince. I was made in the image of God, created in Christ Jesus to do good works.

And God made the work for me to do before he made me to do it. So whatever you're in right now, I don't care if it's for a job or for a challenge that can't be named in the room, because you know how we are. We can only talk about like three things in church. But beneath the surface, that's what the spirit of God brought for it. I believe he's bringing it forth right now in your life. Just to get you to realize that when you move in what you were made for, I don't know what that is yet.

That's all right. Your maker does. Yeah, but my life is a mess. Do you not remember? That's how the whole thing got started to begin with. And he remembers our frame, Psalm 10314 says. And he knows that we are dust. So when it's messy, just remember your maker knew all of that.

Now, we don't. We only see the pieces. Remember? He sees the picture. He knew what to make on the second day. so what was made on the fifth day would have somewhere to live. He knew who to allow to leave you so that who came into your life later would have a place to be. He knew what disappointments to allow you so that he could teach you the lessons you would need

for the level that he wants to use you and the glory that shall be revealed. This is the principle of the fifth day. And I wonder, can we who were made on the sixth day learn from the birds and the fish who were made on the fifth day? just to move in what you were made for. You can have this when your knee gets better. You can have this. God is calling me from glory to glory, from strength to strength. It's the insecurity keeping you from seeing the strength.

The spirit of the living God is hovering over your heart at this moment. He's drawing some things forth. Some of us going to look ugly. Some of us can look unfamiliar, but you just trust that the one who is speaking knows what is beneath the surface. Heavenly Father, lift your hands, everybody. We receive the Holy Spirit, the equipping, the divine enablement and the grace of God, not to think more highly of ourselves than we ought, but to function in the gifts that we've been given. Shall the thing made say to the thing that made it?

Why have you formed me this way? No, God. You're the potter. We're the clay. As you shape and form and move our lives and conformity to your perfect will and purpose and your divine counsel, we offer ourselves to you. Jehovah Jira, the God who provides the sea before he ever speaks forth the fish. The God who provides the sky before he ever creates the bird.

God who gave us the grace before we ever encountered Goliath. Hallelujah. We receive your grace, Lord. We worship you, Lord. Come on, worship, worship, worship, worship, worship, worship, worship. With your mouth, with your mouth. No, don't just cheer. Worship him.

Worship him. Worship him. You were made for worship. You were made for worship. Well, if you enjoyed today's podcast, there are a couple things I'd love for you to do. sure to subscribe, rate, and review this podcast. You can also help us reach others by investing today at Elevationchurch.org slash give. And thanks again for joining us on the Elevation podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.