Elevation with Steven Furtick - The Foundation For Favor (Holly Furtick)

Episode Date: December 21, 2020

Real favor is built on a strong foundation. In “The Foundation Of Favor,” the first lady of Elevation Church, Holly Furtick, revisits the story of Mary to reveal more about the favor of God in our lives – and the role we have to play in it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation Church, and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your fate. Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving in your life.

Enjoy the message. And now would you welcome our very own Christmas angel as she shares God's word. We love you. Here comes heaven. Here comes Holly. Let's put our hands together, E-Fam, all over the world. He was going to say, here comes Holly. I could just feel it. You guys can have a seat.

I just want to say, God, I love our church. Pastor, I love our worship team. I love the songs that are coming out of this house. I just can't believe that I get to be a part of this, and it's good in the room, and it's good in your house, and good on your computer, and it's just great. So, Merry Christmas. And I just want to say to everyone watching, thank you for prioritizing the Word of God in your home today. This is possibly the most insane week of the year for many of us during the most insane year ever. And there's only a handful of days left before Christmas, and we're all running around frantic, like we're paying just God knows how much money and exorbitant prices for shipping to hopefully get our gifts on time,

which just let's pause here and say to everyone in my family, I think everybody has at least one gift that's not going to make it in on time, okay? So just heads up. But we're stressing and we're trying to get to the stores and figure out what the COVID hours of the stores are and figuring out our plans. And some of us are stressing about how we're going to pay for Christmas this year and thinking about how it won't be the same without being with our grandparents and wondering if we should risk being around family. I mean, it's a lot.

And my prayer is that in the midst of all of this, that we would stop and that we would realize that the most important thing, in this season is not about what we give, but it's about what we receive from God. Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, God with us. He stands by, ready to give us the grace and the peace and the joy in the middle of our chaos and our anxiety, but we have to pause and we have to accept and we have to allow him to do so. And that is what I feel like this moment is. You're setting aside time. You're putting all of those things out of your mind for just an hour or so you can just let God speak to your soul. You can worship him and you can hear a word for him. So I just want to take

him in and I want to pray so that we can just really center our thoughts and our focus and our attention on Jesus in this moment, Lord, in the midst of all of the worries and all the anxiety and all of the chaos. God, you are Emmanuel. You are. are right here with us. Make us aware of your presence. Open up our eyes to see that you are quietly standing by, ready to speak peace to our souls. God, Christmas is all about how you come to us. And so we want to receive from you right now. You are water for our thirsty souls in this moment, we are longing for you, Lord. Would you speak to us? Just like you always do, Lord, you speak and pray that you would just do what you do. It's in Jesus' name. Amen.

So I got into a little debate the other night on my book club on Instagram Live. Shameless plug. Those of you who enjoy reading fiction, Holly Ferdic Book Club, we would love to have you. You can just Google it, find us. We're there on Instagram Live once a week. Anyway, so we started talking about real trees versus fake trees. We do talk about the book, too, but it's Christmas time. And I'm not trying to start another argument because God knows we do not need another thing to debate about in 2020. But just let me know in the chat, if you are a real tree or a fake tree family. Speaking of real trees, did anybody see the Rockefeller Christmas tree this year? So there was this 74-foot

Christmas tree that was donated by a family in upstate New York. I didn't know the tree was always donated, but they went to this family's front yard, and they wrapped the tree up, and they cut it down, they put it on a truck, and when they set it up in Rockefeller Center, I have a picture for you, because I just want to say it fit right in with 2020. Feller Christmas tree. And if you look at it now, it looks amazing, because I read that they actually took branches from another tree. I don't know what you call it. I read a fiction book about it one time. They like paste a branch onto the trunk of the tree. I'm sure Amy knows what it's called, but it's like hair extensions for the tree. Can I get an amen from the ladies?

Nothing wrong with a couple of extra strands to make your hair look fuller or go the whole way. It's all good. So then my friend Ashley, she posted this picture of her real Christmas tree She said, if this isn't the most accurate picture of 2020, I don't know what is. Anyone have their tree fall over yet? You can let me know in the chat. Sorry, we did. This thing, the tree falling over and the tree not looking perfect, these are just one of the many reasons why the Ferdick family is a fake tree family. The Ferdick have only had one real tree in all of the 18 years of Christmases that we have

celebrated together, and that's just because that was all we could afford. And I bought a tree like December 26, the fake tree for the following year, and we've had fake trees ever since. I know some people really love the smell of a real Christmas tree in their home, and some families love the experience of going to a tree farm and cutting down their own tree. And listen, if that's you, I am so happy for you. We're just not really like the outdoorsy-type family and we don't really need to go outside to find the perfect tree. We have the perfect tree in our attic. I bought it at Sam's Club. If you ask me, it's just real trees. There's such a hassle. They're so messy and imperfect, and they have holes that you have to hide the, you know,

turn and hide the branches and need to be trimmed. And then did you know? I mean, I'm sure you know. You have to water them. When we got our first real Christmas tree, I didn't know that. I didn't know that you had to water it, and it died really fast. And sometimes they're lopsite, you get sap on your hands. I hate getting sap on my hands. It's just fake trees. You just plug them in and fluff them up, and then you're ready to go. It's the best thing ever.

Okay, I see. There's a lot of fake tree families out there. So for the past several weeks, we've been learning from our pastor about God's favor. And how many of you would agree that just the sermons of this year that just gotten you through? It just gotten you through. I asked Elijah last night, I was like, do I say that every time that I preach? She was like, yeah, but it's true. It's true.

It's just, I mean, it's just our pastor is so prophetic and his words have just gotten us through. So anyway, we've been reframing the idea of God's favor and gaining this new perspective. because this year, 2020, with all that has come along with it, this year is the year of God's favor. And we've been learning that favor doesn't always come when we expect it to come, and it doesn't always look the way we expected to look. And last week, Pastor Stephen took us to the life of Mary, my absolute favorite Bible character. And we saw in Luke chapter one that the angel told Mary that she had found favor with God. And we learned that oftentimes true favor feels like inconvenience and interruption, and it brings on insecurity, and that favor is almost always accompanied by fear. And as I've been processing these teachings, I'm learning that I have to learn to let go of what

I expected favor to look like in my life so that I can take hold of the amazing things that God is calling me to do. But like my perfect fake Christmas tree that doesn't require, doesn't make a mess, doesn't require a ton of work and water. And I think sometimes it's just easier if I could just have fake favor too. Right? favor that looks good without requiring anything of me. A favor that's beautiful and does it make me uncomfortable in any way?

Fake favor is focused on the outward appearance. It's focused on other people's perceptions of me. And fake favor just stays on the surface because the surface is safe. And so it's safe for me to just tell everyone, yeah, I'm fine. fine. We're doing great. I'm good. Because I don't want anyone to know what maybe is really going on in my life. I want when people look at me and my family to think that we have it all together. Because if I share my fears and my frustrations and my struggles, how will you think that God's favor could possibly be on my life? You don't have to share everything with everyone,

but you've got to share some things with some people. Fake favor also centers around stuff. And until recently, until our pastor started preaching these messages, I think that I have always equated the favor of God with the stuff that I have. Now, don't get me wrong. I love stuff. I love stuff more than the average person. I promise you, especially this time of year. I love stuff.

And Stephen Ferdick is on the front row going, yes, she does. I'm sorry, I'm working on it. I have nothing against stuff. In fact, I believe that every blessing that I have, every good and perfect gift comes from our Father above. But if when you think about all the ways that God has blessed you, the only things that you can think about are stuff-oriented, you have a very limited view of a very big God. Stuff is fun.

It's fun, but it has a very, very short shelf life in the realm of faith. And I know a lot of people who have a lot of stuff and a little faith. Type it in the chat right now. No more fake favor. No more fake favor. How did Mary find true favor with God? There was something special about her that set her. her apart from every other woman in her generation. There had to be. Mary was not a random lottery

pick. God didn't do a lottery and just pick a girl. I believe that Mary had a foundation for favor. That's the title of my message today, the foundation for favor. And I want you to look with me at Jeremiah 17, verse 7. But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes. Its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought, and it never fails to bear fruit.

I love this picture of this tree. This tree is solid. This tree has weathered some storms. This is not a fake tree. This tree shows me that having a relationship with God does not make me exempt from difficulties and struggles. It simply gives us a foundation that we can draw from when those hard times come. And it enables us not just to survive, but to actually bear free.

during the most difficult seasons, during the drought, during the storm. See, fake trees look good, but fake trees can't bear fruit. Everyone is glad to see 2020 come to an end, right? But we all know that 2021 is coming right around the corner, and it's going to hit us with its own set of challenges, because this is life. My goal is to be ready, not perfect. I have a foundation that is going to allow me to bear fruit, fruit in every season. Drought, storm, summer, winter, I can bear fruit because my life is rooted in my relationship

with Jesus. Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. We all know people who seem to weather the most incredible storms and still keep their faith intact. I'm sure you have someone who comes to your mind, like this person who just personifies strength. When you look at their life, you just wonder, how are they making it through that? I could never make it through that.

Have you ever noticed there are some people that don't actually make it through? There are those people who come through a storm. They weather the storm, and they come through it. They're battered, they're bruised, and they're stronger, right? But there are also those people who are battered and bruised and bitter. I can tell you right now that strong people don't happen by accident. Strength is not developed in the dry season. It just reveals itself there.

So if you get to the dry season and you don't have any strength, you're in trouble. The other day, I had a very short window to get my workout in. I have a certain number of workouts. I'm trying to get to the end of the year. I'm not going to make it to my goal, because I was going to, I literally have to work out every day for the rest of the year to make my goal. But that's okay. I'm close to the goal.

Anyway, normally, that's the point, right? I got close. Normally I, that's my definition of a goal. Okay. Okay, so normally I have a Peloton bike and I do the Peloton ride. And to be honest, this particular day, I didn't want to get my hair sweaty. And so I selected a 20-minute intermediate strength training workout. It's like 20 minutes, intermediate.

I'm intermediate, I think. I can do this. And so everything was going along just fine. And there was this one exercise that I never do. And it was called, well, I don't actually know what it was called because I never do it. But it was the one where you hold the weights. It looks really easy. So you hold the weights, and you bend down, and then you come up, and you pull them up.

And the instructor said, that kind of hurt in my legs there. I didn't even have weight. The instructor said, she said, get heavier weights. And I didn't want to get too sore. And so I thought I was being smart, and at the risk of you understanding how little I lift weights, I'm just going to go ahead and tell you, I stuck with my tens, and I still got sore. I got so sore that I could barely walk for two days. I was like shuffling, you know?

And I haven't done that exercise since then. Of course not. I don't want to be sore again. But the soreness is an indication that you are getting stronger. If, if, and only if, you keep doing that exercise. Do you remember what Pastor Stephen so prophetically said to us at the beginning of 2020? He said, time under tension, we had no idea how much tension was coming, time under tension creates strength.

Strength is built over time, little by little, day by day, exercise after exercise. A tree does not grow overnight. A tree takes time to put down roots. And if you want to be a strong person, a person who never fails to bear fruit, a person who has found favor with God, you're going to have to have a foundation that can sustain you through. Jeremiah says that the tree is planted by water and that it sends out its roots. So the most important part of the tree happens below the surface. It's not the blooms.

It's not the beautiful fall leaves. The most important part of the tree happens in the places that we can't see. So I want to go back and look at Luke 1 again this week. And I want to look at Mary. And I want to see how did she find favor with God? How did God know that she would be strong enough to press on when people didn't believe that she was carrying God's child? How did he know that she would not crumble under the weight of disappointment and grief? The immense grief she must have had when she watched her firstborn son die a gruesome martyr's death at age 33?

And yet still, that woman had the faith to be sitting there in the upper room with her. the disciples at Pentecost. How did God know that she'd be strong enough to make it through all of that? If 2020 is the year of the Lord's favor, I want to have fresh eyes to look at it. I want to see that every difficult thing that I faced was actually making me stronger for the journey ahead in 2021. We've been building for this all along, God. How do I do this? I want to look at Luke 1, and I'm going to show you five things about Mary that gave her a foundation to receive the favor of God. And these are the same things that we need in our lives to prepare us for the blessings that God wants to bring us this year, not the stuff, the blessings. Here we go.

Luke 1, starting in verse 26. In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth. a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledge to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel said to her, greetings, you who are highly favored. The Lord is with you. And Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great, and he will be called the Son of the Most High.

The Lord will give him the throne of his father, David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom will never end. How will this be? Mary asks, the angel, since I am a virgin. The angel answered, the Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, so the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth, your relative, is going to have a child in her own age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive in her six months, for no word from God will ever fail. I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May your word to me be fulfilled, and then the angel left her. So Mary has this massive call

on her life. She is going to be the mother of the Messiah. She's going to raise God. We know nothing about her prior to this passage of Scripture. But as the story unfolds, we find out that she's a girl from Nazareth. She's engaged to be married. The angel comes to her and says, greetings. Have you ever thought about all the ways that God spoke to people in the Bible up until this point? It's pretty cool. He spoke through dreams. He spoke to Moses in a burning bush. He spoke through a talking donkey one time, the writing on the wall, and oftentimes God spoke to people in out loud, audible voices. Where was Mary when the angel came to her? What was she doing? The passage doesn't say. It doesn't say that she was in church or that she was kneeling in prayer or even that she was sleeping and that the angel came to her in a dream. It simply says that the angel came to her. And got me wondering if God knew that he could just interrupt any old day in Mary's life, that she had such an awareness of God's presence that she was ready to receive.

see from him during her everyday life. The first foundation for Mary's favor is awareness. Are you aware of God's presence in your everyday life, or is your life so loud and so crowded and so back to back to back that God would have to strike lightning to get your attention because you're so busy? If you think that being aware of God's presence, It doesn't mean that, well, maybe I just get up at 5 a.m. That's wonderful. You should do it. If that's what you think it is, great. I think getting up early is awesome. I just can't do it. And yes, I do think that it's important to set aside time to read and to study God's Word and to pray and to listen to music. It's essential to my growth and to my strength. But I can't get up early. And I live

a very full life. I told the ladies that reflect that one of the things that I do is I look for pockets. Look at the person next to you or put it in the chat. What's in your pockets? You may not have an hour of time to spend each day, but I bet you have pockets. What do you do during your commute to work? What do you do when you're sitting at your kids' sports practice? playing in the background while you're mowing the lawn or doing the laundry or what are you doing your

lunch break at work? What's the last thing that you do before you fall asleep at night? These are pockets. Mary had space in her life for God. And we live in a day and time where this one little device, I actually have my phone in my pocket, this one little device can enable us to fill the space in our life with sermons, and worship music and audiobooks and podcasts, but if you don't have a plan, you'll just start scrolling and you'll scroll feeds during every extra second that you have in your day. And if you spend your day scrolling, you're going to end it starving, starving for encouragement because you were looking in the wrong place? Sarving for purpose because you were comparing your calling to someone else's calling.

Lacking the peace and the joy that are ours for the taking. But we wasted that precious pocket of time that could have been used for God's just whisper a word of encouragement. Fill that little empty space in your life. Some of us are starving right now because we've let children. church just slip between our fingers. When we went into quarantine, you got up, you got your family up, you got the TV on, you were watching the pre-show, you got out of bed and sat up at your kitchen table and gave God your full attention, and now you're like, we'll just catch it later on YouTube. I know it's Christmas time. I know the numbers are going up all over

our country, but as we look toward 2021, are we going to prioritize? Church in our homes. This virus has taken a lot from us. But I just want you to know, me and my house, we're going to take away. We're going to take the time to worship God. Enemy take away church from us. I'm not. Actually go to church. If it's safe for me to actually be in these seats, you better bet my kids' butts are going to be in these seats as much as possible. If you're not careful, if we're not diligent, we will let the important things just slip. And then we find ourselves in a difficult storm, and we don't have the roots to get us through, because we haven't made the presence of God a priority in our lives. It's time to wake

up and position yourself to hear God speak. Wherever God speaks to you, you get yourself there. Because the strength that you need for the next season is in the things that God wants to speak to you right now. Are you aware? Are you listening? Mary was aware. And the angel comes to her and he tells her, you have found favor with God. You're going to give birth to the son of the most high God and the power of the Holy Spirit is going to come upon you. And I got to read to you Mary's response from the Passion Translation. I love the passage translation. Sometimes I just go. to it to see a little bit different way that it says this. This is my favorite verse in the whole Bible. And I love to read it in a different translation because sometimes when you switch up your translations, God will show you something new.

So this is Luke 138. Then Mary responded, saying, this is amazing. I will be the mother for our Lord. That's a message for some of the moms out there, I think. I'll be the mother for our, I'm going to be the mother. I'm going to be the mother. Lord, I'm going to be the mother for these people. This is amazing. I will be the mother for the Lord as his servant. I accept whatever he has for me. May everything you have told me come to pass, and the angel left her. The second foundation that Mary had was acceptance.

See, if this were in me, I don't think I would have said, This is amazing. I would have been like, okay, God, this sounds, I'm getting there. I have a few questions. Before I accept this assignment, God, you do know that I'm just a girl and I don't know nothing about babies. Right? Just checking. And God, have you thought about how nobody's going to believe me?

God, like, are you sure I'm the right person? Are you sure I'm good enough to raise your son? Are you sure I'm smart enough? What about my past? What about the mistakes that are of me? What about the things that I've done? God, you know, are you sure? I was thinking I could have more of like an upfront calling than a behind-the-scenes one.

Like maybe I could be a prophetess instead of a diaper changer. Mary simply accepted the calling that God had placed on her life. And if you don't have the foundation of acceptance in your life, you're going to abandon your calling at the first sign of trouble. And then you're going to miss out on living a life full of purpose. The thing about a calling is it's like a gift that is exclusively for you, like a gift that has your initials in it. You can't trade it with someone else.

You can't return it for a different one. You can either reject it or accept it. And let me just say, you don't have to accept God's calling on your life. He has someone else that he can use. He does. But he picked you. I'm going to say, I've been guilty of just rejecting the calling that God has placed on my life at times. Not outright, of course.

I mean, I would never be like Jonah and go in the opposite direction of what God told me to do. It's just a little more subtle, you know? Maybe I get a little stuck, and some days I'm just unwilling to put in the work required to accomplish the things that God wants me to do. I'm just going to say, I'm lazy, and I'd rather watch YouTube videos of someone else's day in the life than actually live mine with the purpose that God has given me. Since I'm up here being honest with thousands of my closest friends, I'll just tell you that There were years, years, where I was simply unwilling to put in the work required to do the things

that God was calling me to do. Because living in the favor of God requires work on my part. So, like, it takes a lot of work to write a good sermon. You know what else it takes to write a good sermon? like knowing your Bible, reading it, you've got to hear from God for yourself before you can just pass it on to other people. And there were years where I hid behind the idea that I wasn't good enough, that I didn't have the intelligent or the talent or the charisma that it takes to minister to people from a stage. And the reality is I wasn't willing to put in the work, to live up to the calling that God had placed right in my lap. You are enough, and you have everything you need. If God called you, you're enough, and it's time for you to accept that. But that doesn't mean it won't be hard.

And that doesn't mean you won't have to put in a lot of work. And that doesn't mean that sometimes you won't like it. Repetition, overtime, creates strict. strength. And you might be thinking, well, that's easy for you to say, you're Stephen Ferdig's wife. How do I know what I'm called to do? I have an answer for you. You're called to do whatever God has placed in your life right now, this moment. Not one day when you get married, or one day when you have more money, or one day when you own your own home, then I'll have people in my home, then I'll be hospitable. And I said to the ladies last month, and I'm going to say it again to everybody under the sound

of my voice, the best person to raise your kids is you. Mom, Dad, it's you. The best person to do your job, the job that you have today, thank God that you have a job. The best person to do that job is you. The best person to speak up for that cause is just burning in your heart. That's the Holy Spirit, calling you, calling you out to speak out for that organization or for those overlooked people. You are called to the place where you are right now.

Your high school, your neighborhood, your coworkers. All of these people need to see you confidently walking in the calling. that God has given you. And when you do go through something hard, because you will, they're going to see your strength and your resilience and your dependence on God and your relationship with Him as you go through whatever your challenges are. We like to think of Mary when the angel visited her, but what about Mary when no one believed her that she was a pregnant virgin?

That would be hard. What about Mary when she had to ride on a donkey when she was nine months pregnant? That would be hard. What about Mary when she stood at the foot of the cross? The most unimaginable pain and rejection. That was as much a part of her calling as anything else. Those are the things that we celebrate today about her. I think it was in those moments, those difficult moments, that Mary had to come back to that

encounter with the angel and remember that she was chosen for this. She was chosen for this task, no matter how hard it is. You're chosen for this. And I want to tell you today, you can do hard things. You can. In the minute that she accepted her calling, she went into action. That's the third one. Look what Mary said. So we're back at Luke 138. I am the Lord's servant. Mary answered, may your word to me be fulfilled.

Then the angel left her. At that time, Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, where she entered Zechariah's home and greeted Elizabeth. Let me ask you this. What do when the angel leaves? Think about this. An angel comes to her and tells her all these amazing things. Don't be afraid. God has chosen you. You're going to bear the son and you're going to call him Jesus. And when Mary asked her one clarifying question, she said, how? My husband pointed this out last week. Mary said how. The answer she got was who. The power. of the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and also your cousin Elizabeth is pregnant, and then the angel left. You see, God doesn't always spell everything out for us. Now, he's with us every step

of the way, but he's not going to move your feet for you. Favor requires action on your part. When God gives you a direction, what is your response? time. Because Mary, she went quick. God uses people who hear and move. Now, he may give you a big calling, but usually every calling starts with a small step. Because if you can't hear and act in the small things, you won't do it in the big things. I know you think you will, but you won't. And sometimes I think it's so funny that the small Small things are what hold up our progress. But why would God give you more direction when you have not done the simplest things that

he's asked you to do? I mean, little things. Maybe he asked you to apologize to someone, to admit that you were wrong and say you were sorry. Did you do it? Maybe he asked you to begin the process of forgiving. I know that's a big thing. That's a big deal.

But did you start? Maybe he asked you to do something seemingly easy, like join an e-group or start an e-group. Did you do it? God is good. And God is very patient. Thank you, Lord. But he is not going to give you step two before you do step one. Now the good news is, one is still right there waiting for you right now.

Because better isn't something out there. It's here. It's now. in the very next step. Becoming a person of action takes practice. But the absolute best gift that you can give to the people in your life this Christmas is for you to make space for Christ in your life. For you to receive the words that He's speaking to you and for you to act on them, even

if that is the smallest thing. I love to imagine this scenario. Again, an angel comes to Mary. And he tells her that she's blessed and she's highly favored. And he gives her the details, like, what she's going to name the baby and how the power of the Holy Spirit will come upon her, and then he leaves. Can you just imagine Mary in just the moments right after he left, like what she was thinking? Did that really just happen?

Did I dream that? Did I make that up in my head? No, I think I really did. So then she decides, okay, that did happen. And I bet all of a sudden she's alone with her thoughts. I don't really like to be alone with my thoughts. Can you imagine how her thoughts just started going insane, you know, like thoughts of doubt and fear and discouragement?

You could get stoned for being pregnant out of marriage, right? So she's thinking about all of that. And she's on the verge of just her mind just going off. And then I like to think, like, maybe she just remembered this one little detail that the angel said to her, your cousin Elizabeth in her old age is going to bear a son. And that was all she needed to figure out what her next. step was, the angel didn't just give her one who. He gave her two. He said the Holy Spirit will bring forth the baby, but also your cousin Elizabeth is going to show you how. The angel

didn't stay with her and coach her through the process. He pointed her to a person. And the Bible says she got ready and she hurried down to the town of Judea where Elizabeth was. Is there a person God is pointing you to who can help you through the hard things. You know, when we talk about stuff, God, you know, the favor of God and how it's not just about stuff, sometimes the favor of God is about the people that he has placed in your life. And Mary understood that part of her strength would come from the people that she surrounded herself with. This is the fourth foundation. It's attachment. When I am confident in my calling, I don't want.

need to compete with other people or compare myself to other people, but I do need to align myself with those who will confirm what is already placed inside of me. You were never intended to live out your calling alone. You do have to get the order right. It is not people first. Mary was aware. She was ready to hear God when God spoke to her, not another person. She accepted the calling that God placed on her life, not her mama. Then she acted quickly because she realized if she was going to have a baby, she needed to get herself around someone who was a little bit farther down the road from her. We need each other. This is the body of Christ, and it is beautiful.

And that's another thing that I feel like the enemy has tried to steal from us in 2020. I need you, and you need me, and I'm not talking about marriage. I'm talking about friendship. Because when the favor of God is on your life, you are going to need the support of others. And yes, yes, yes, I know. There are dramatic people out there. There are crazy, see people out there. And I told the youth girls, mean girls don't go away when you graduate high school. But perhaps you are using the wrong criteria for your support system. What you want to do is get yourself around someone who's a little bit farther down the road from you like Mary

is, maybe not in age, maybe in maturity or experience. Someone that you look up, to not for what they wear, but for who they are. Someone that you admire, I want you to just think about it, someone that you admire for the way that they treat their wife, not the kind of car that they drive. Someone who has walked where you are about to walk and can help you prepare for some of the twists and turns that could knock you off course. When Mary got to Elizabeth, Elizabeth immediately confirmed what was already happening inside of Mary.

She said, look at this. It's in the ESV. It says, blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit. Here's that word again. The fruit of your womb. We all need people in our lives that will confirm what God has placed on us, people who will call out the fruit that isn't even there yet. And I think about the people that have come alongside me and have come alongside my husband and have called fruit out in us. And we wouldn't be where we are today without those

people in our lives. And God has those people in your life, too. Elizabeth celebrated Mary, and then she brought her into her life. And the Bible tells us that Elizabeth was six months pregnant and that Mary stayed with Elizabeth for three months. I don't know if you can do the math on that, but I can do that math. Mary stayed with Elizabeth until Elizabeth gave birth. It came time for Mary to give birth to her own child in a barn alone. Well, she had her husband, but, you know, whose voice I think was in her head? Favor of God is ultimately built on the foundation of our relationships and our relationship with God, relationship with others and our relationship with God. That's the foundation.

And you can't leave out the people part. And men, if you think that this isn't for you, there's more in the Bible about men friendships than there are about women. Trust me, I've looked. David had Jonathan, Paul had Silas. Jesus even had the disciples, although sometimes he probably wished that he didn't. It's okay. Friends make you feel that way sometimes.

It's okay. Who is around you? Who is cheering you? on. Who has fought with you and grieved with you? Those are the people that God has placed on your life, on your journey. And if you don't build it now, you won't have it when you need it. And you know what? Because I know some people think, like, oh, I'm good. I'm good. I don't really need a lot of people. But you know what else? It's an amazing thing to feel the support of people in your life during a difficult time. It's a beautiful thing to experience.

But it is also a privilege to do it for someone that you love. And if you've ever walked with someone, walked alongside a friend through a divorce or a loss or a sickness, you experience a level of friendship that's only found in this struggle. Beautiful gift that God has for us. So Elizabeth confirms, she says, blessed, is the one who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her. And then Mary begins her prayer. This beautiful prayer that she prays.

And she says, My soul glorifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on, Mary says, all generations will call me blessed, for the mighty one has done great things for me. Holy is His name. The last foundation is affirmation.

Because you see, it was good for Mary to have Elizabeth to confirm what God had called Mary to do, but there also comes a time when the affirmation that you need has to come from within yourself. With your own mouth, you begin to worship. And before Mary saw any fruit that the angel told her that she would see, she centered her focus on who God was to her, her Savior, the mighty one who's done great things. Worship like this only flows from someone who has a living, breathing relationship with her Heavenly Father. She goes on to quote Scripture, the Scripture that she had planted in her heart as

child just started to pour out of her mouth, because long before she was visited by an angel, she was building the foundation that she would draw from. Mary focused her faith on the one who had called her, the one who had chosen her. She didn't list out all the things that could go wrong. She didn't think about all the hardships that would lay ahead for her. She stayed focused on who God was and who she was in Christ. This makes sense when you read about Mary, the mother of Jesus. But these are things that we have to put into action in our own lives.

Affirmation, this is the root that you draw from on the days when you feel weak, and when you feel like you don't have what it takes. And on those days where maybe nobody knows exactly what you're going through, because you just can't, sometimes you just can't tell people yet. That kind of affirmation can only come from within. And I told the ladies that reflect this, it's kind of like a little embarrassing story, but several weeks ago, I woke up to the start of a really long day. I had truly, it felt like a million and one things to do. Some of them were big, and some of them were small, and I already told you I'm not a morning person. And so when my My alarm went off at 6 a.m. I was overwhelmed and just feeling like there's no way I could do all of this. And I drug myself out of bed and I kind of trudged toward the bathroom. And I thought to myself, I can do this. And my husband sat up and he said, what can you do?

Honestly, I was shocked and I was a little bit embarrassed. Like, did the angel come to me? And I didn't realize that I'd actually spoken that out loud. And so he says, what can you do? And I said, all of it. Everything I have to do today, I can do it. And I promise you, 99 mornings out of 100, I do not get this right. I don't do this.

But on that particular day I did. It was like in the darkness my soul tapped those roots that I have and reminded me, Philippians 413, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. And if you hear me say nothing else today, I want you to know you can do this, all of it. All that you were called to do and not one thing extra. You don't have to let fear and anxiety occupy the space in your soul that was meant for Christ. You are a chosen child of the most high God, and you're not operating in your own power, not by my power, but by my spirit, says the Lord, you don't have to force it, you don't have to manipulate it. You have a foundation for the favor

that God has placed on your life. And that foundation, is the Holy Spirit within you. Jesus Christ, Emmanuel. You are never alone. And as I close today, I just want to pray for us. Just want to take a minute and pray over you. So wherever you are, just close your eyes and focus your attention on Christ. This Emmanuel, we come to you in this moment. I pray for the person that is overwhelmed with everything they have to get done. God, would you just stop and whisper your peace. Pray for the person who's lonely. God, would you just whisper to them? Here I am. Right here with you. You're not alone. Thank you for being with us. For showing us the way. Thank you for the people that you've placed in our lives. Lord, we are so grateful.

We are so grateful that we never have to walk alone. Help us to fight. God, make us strong. Make us aware of your presence so that we can see that you are there with us. Thank you for this word. Thank you for these words that you've spoken over our lives. In this time, we're ready. We're ready for whatever you have for us. We accept your calling on our lives in this moment. Thank you for picking me.

Thank you for picking us. It's in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Were you blessed by that? I want to thank all of you who pray for me and Holly and for our church and for the great and awesome outreach that's happening. This time of year, so many people rely on us to be the light of Jesus Christ. And I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful that you're a part of this move of God.

Make sure you subscribe and like and all of that stuff. But don't forget, this is the year. of the Lord's favor, and there are great things ahead for you. I just wanted to tell you that we're praying for you, believe in God for great things in your life. We love you. God bless. This is an IHeart podcast, guaranteed human.