WORTH | Hope Carpenter

Amen. So when, when I found out the name of the conference was Worth Conference, I just cried. Because for many years I did ministry. Not knowing my worth. Wow. I was saved. Not knowing my worth. I was trying to help people. Not knowing my worth. Going through life. This is the truth about worth. If you don't know your worth and your value, you will live way beneath your worth. If you don't know the purpose of the thing, abuse is inevitable. It's just going to happen. If you don't know the purpose. If I did not know the purpose of this microphone, I might think it's a hammer. If I've never seen it, I don't know the purpose of it. I could pick this up and I could take it, could use it as a hammer. I could use it, try to use it to comb my hair. But it wouldn't work, right? It wouldn't work. The total value of it wouldn't come out. If I took it and used it as a hammer, what could I do? I could destroy it. I could abuse it. So when you don't know the purpose of a thing, abuse is inevitable. When you don't know your purpose, abuse is inevitable. Have you ever had people look at you and say, you're worth more than that? All of us? I probably have heard my parents say that a hundred times to me growing up. Hope you're worth more than that. Don't settle. Don't date that boy. You're worth more than that. Don't hang out with that group of people. You're worth more than that. So the only story I can tell you is mine. So here's my story. I lived in a very controlled, controlling house. Christian house. Christian house, okay, but very controlling, very manipulating, very abusive. I was beat so severely that I would have blood running down my legs every time I got a spanking. I remember one time in the 11th grade, I was raised in a little bitty small town and all we had to do was ride around. You know, just ride around the one mile of the town. You know, you just ride and you wave at people there they come. Or you stop at the fast fair, the little gas station, and you talk. So there was nothing to do. But I remember one night in the 11th grade, I was supposed to be in a beauty pageant the next day and I was out just riding around with my friends. And it was five minutes till 11 and I had a curfew and my mom. I saw my mom and dad's car go by and we were all sitting out at this gas station. Talking. She pulls up in the car in her housecoat. I was mortified. Number one, she gets out, tells me to get in the car, and I'm like, what on earth? Get in the car. And left my car there at the gas station. We get to the house, and she starts beating me in the face. Then she took her fingernails and she took my skin and she clawed the whole side of my face to where it was pouring blood. And then made the statement, let's see how you look tomorrow on stage. Because she didn't want me to be there. She didn't want me hanging around that group of people. At 15, I was raped. I was on a date. It was my very first date, and I was raped. I'm not going to go into the full details of that, but all of these things I never told. I lived with so much inner pain, just stuffing it down, just stuffing it down. And just felt so bad about myself. When you're beat continually and nothing's ever good enough. And my grades were never good enough. I remember as a little girl, second grade, with a toothbrush in Comet. Y' all remember Comet. So a toothbrush and Comet. And I remember getting with these little bitty tile floors, you know, the old school tile floors in the bathroom. And I had to get down and I would do this and have to clean, and I had to get it perfect or I wouldn't even get to go out and play that day. Performing, performing, performing, performing. And I remember my mom coming in to check and she said, I found one spot. Now I'm 8 years old. I'm an itty bitty. And for one spot, not praised for the job I did on all the other spots, but that one spot, I was punished and I couldn't go out and play or I couldn't get what I had hoped to do that day. So much shame, so much insecurity, so much inner pain that I never told. But I loved God. I got saved when I was 8 years old in a little Baptist church, Southern Baptist Church. And then when I was 12 years old, we got kicked out of the Baptist church because my parents got filled with the Holy Ghost. So they went and told our pastor, guess what happened to us? And so we got the right foot of Christian fellowship and we got kicked out. So we had to go down to the Pentecostal Holiness Church. I loved him. I sang. My very first solo was when I was 2 years old in the little Baptist church. I sang my whole life. I was a music major in college and played the piano and just Loved to worship God. I knew my mom would. Now with all that abuse. My mom and dad still were spiritful Christians. Okay. Still taking me to church, wanting me to do. They did the best they could with the knowledge they had. They were trying to keep me out of trouble, but they did it out of fear. Yeah, okay. Because they didn't want me to make the same mistakes that they had made that I had no idea about. Because we live in a dysfunctional home in a no talk rule. Because when you live in a dysfunctional home, you don't talk, you don't think, and you don't rock the boat. So they had issues I didn't know about and nobody talked about, but they didn't want me making the same mistakes they had made. So I loved God. So I live serving God, but feeling so bad about myself. I'm never good enough. It's never enough. I didn't read enough, I didn't pray enough. I didn't study enough. I didn't make good enough grades. So here I am, living this life, go to college. Finally get out of that house. Ran hard as I could go. Went to Emanuel College, a Christian college in Georgia. And I meet this guy, Ooey, I called him. Blonde Ron. Had that white hair, flowing, rosy cheeks, running down the basketball court. I thought, oh, Jesus, now I could do this kind of Christian. He's saved. And cute, right? So we met, fell in love. He didn't know any of this because, see, I thought that just being taken out of the situation would make it okay, that everything was over. I thought if I just got out of that situation, started a new life, everything was going to be fine. But what you sweep under the rug is still under the rug. And hidden pain never dies until it's dealt with. So I meet this guy, he's going into the ministry. I just think, you know, God has delivered me. I have met the most wonderful man of my dreams. We're going to ride off on a white horse and we're going to save everybody from here to yonder, and we're going to storm hell with water pistols. I mean, we. We good. We going. We going to love people. I'm happy. I'm in love. He's cute. Oh, hallelujah. But I lived like this. Then we started having babies. We started our church with nothing, with three people. We lived on welfare for probably 10 years. I mean, I'm talking about that cheese that don't even melt. You can bounce it, it won't melt. We raised our babies like that. We didn't have insurance. Yep. So we live like this. We struggled. I mean, struggled to pay bills, but. But all the time we're just striving and striving. And I got this stuff down on the inside, and. And I'd get little glimpses of it from. From, you know, this year. Maybe one little issue would happen. Then the next year, some little something will pop up on the inside of me. And. And I'd be like, oh, why did I say that? Or why did I feel that? Or why am I acting this way? Not understanding, not knowing. Felt like this pressure cooker was on the inside of me. Y' all ever had a pressure cooker? That's old school cooking. Now, where you put your green beans in a pressure cooker? That's sal. That's Southern. Y' all don't know nothing about that out here in Arizona. Now. Put a ham hock in it. But I felt that on the inside of me. It was like something was boiling on the inside. And I can tell by some of you right now, you know that feeling. You know what I'm talking about. Something was just brewing on the inside of me. And at about 35 years old, literally, I told the girls yesterday, 35 years old, I woke up one morning and I took my birdie fingers. I'm not gonna do it in church, but y' all know what they look like. This isn't a birdie finger, but I'm gonna act like it is. And I said, f U. F U. F U. And you. Oh, yeah, you too. F. Oh, y. I did. Sorry. I did. Yeah. I didn't even know why I was effing people. But I had had it. I had just had it for 35 years of living this life of stress and anxiety and pressure and trying to please man and please my parents and please my husband and please church people and take care of the children and make sure everything's done right and pretty. But I'm dying on the inside. Jesus. But don't know why still don't know why don't know why I feel like I feel. So at 35, I woke up one morning, and this is what I did. I said, f you, you, you. And you. And I went and bought me a bikini because in the Pentecostal Holiness Church, you know, you have to wear one piece and maybe a skirt. I didn't look good in that. And I thought, you know, I woke up one day and I started questioning everything. I thought, well, why am I doing this? I really don't feel like that's Even biblical, wearing a bikini is okay, you know, I'm just gonna go. I want sun everywhere. I had not listened to secular music since I went to Emanuel College. And I woke up that morning, bought me a bikini. I bought me two CDs. Sure did. But it was Jessica Simpson. Honey, I was way on the edge. Wasn't. I was on the edge. I went so far. Jessica Simpson. Let them put my T shirt out. Never felt so beautiful. Jessica Simpson. And I went and bought a six pack of beer. All right, y' all know y' all got wine in your refrigerator right now. Why y' all gasping? Y' all love a margarita better. Anybody telling the truth and shaming the devil in this house. Bought me a six pack, a bikini and some CDs. Honey, I put my bikini on. I went and oiled up, laid out in the sun, drank me some beer, listened to my secular music. But that was just the beginning. Yeah. So I'm going down this path of life 35 years, and I fear just a little bit. Just a little bit. And 10 years later, I find myself so far away from where I was at 35 years old. See, that's the thing. We look back and we say, how did we get here? How did I. How did I end up in this mess? It's just because you turn to either left or right. Just. Just a little bit. But, see, but if you keep walking in that direction for year after year after year, see, this is how it does this. But then you keep walking and the distance gets further and further away. Yeah, I ended up having an affair. I went from Jessica Simpson to 2 Chainz. Y' all don't know about me. Don't let this fool you meet meal. I know it all. I can go hood on you in a quick minute. I knew them songs better than my kids knew them because I was in the club, too. They just didn't know it. Years. 10 years trying to find me. Trying to figure out who I am. Looking for love in all the wrong places. You know, if you buy a car and something's wrong with it, you know, you get that indicator light on your dash. It starts blinking, something's wrong. You don't take it to the dentist to get fixed, right? You don't take it to the lake and sit it on the side. You don't take it on a vacation to get fixed. You take it to the manufacturer to fix what is wrong with it. They made it. They know what's wrong with it, and they know how to fix it. See, when we are broken we run looking for love in all the wrong places. We go to doctors, we go to lawyers, we go to men, we go to clubs, we go to alcohol. We go to vacations. We think, if I can just go on one more girls trip, if I can just get that Louis Vuitton, I'm going to be so happy. Jesus made you. He formed you. He knows you. He knows what makes you tick. He knows what makes you think. He knows what your purpose is. He knows what you're created for. He knows what you're designed for. He is intimately acquainted with you. So at 45 y', all, this is five years ago. There's something about five. Pastor Kim, last night. Just start five years ago. She started. Five years ago, I went and told my husband everything, that he knew something was wrong with me. He knew, and he had questioned me over and over. No, no, no, I'm not. No, I'm not doing that. You heard wrong. No, that wasn't me. There's a lot of people that look like me out there. And I told him everything because I was in a situation, kind of like we talked about yesterday, with the domestic violence that I couldn't get out of and I was trying to get out of. I tried probably eight or ten times trying to get out of it, and every time I did, I would be threatened. Or I'm going to show up on the front row of your church, or I'm going to tweet your husband that I'm effing his wife. And, yeah, scared me to death. So it kept dragging me back in and dragging me back in. I didn't want to be there, but I was in a terrible situation. So I told my husband. We separated immediately. He said, you got 30 minutes. Get your stuff and get out by breathing. Wonderful. Pastor Ron, he was hurt. He was devastated. He said, you got 30 minutes. Get your stuff. You know what I got? I got every Louis Vuitton, every Gucci I could find, every gold, every diamond, everything. I said, ain't no woman getting my stuff. I left him my target stuff. I got the good stuff, and I got out. I might have almost lost my mind, but I had a little bit left. You hear me? I didn't know what I'd need or where I'd be or what I'd have to cash out. And he told it all. He got up before the world and told it all at our church, and it went viral. It was the number one story in all the Christian gossip news. Clue why. Nobody even cared to ask why, how I got There I had nobody to call because everybody was friends with us, was allegiant to my husband. I was the one who was wrong. Everybody was employed, and their paycheck was written by my husband. I had nobody to call, nowhere to go. So I got in my car and I drove to this ministry in North Carolina. And I called him on the way there, and I said, something terrible. Something terrible's happened. And I told him a little bit and told them what I told. And I said, now, listen, I don't want no ministry. I just need a bed. Can I come stay? She said, sure. Come on. She lied. Lied to me. So I drove there, and I got there. And to the world, it was the worst thing that had ever happened. But to me, I felt free. To me, you don't understand how I felt. Because all that glass house I was living in was shattered all around me. And finally I was at a place where I felt like I could get free. So I drove there and I stayed there for almost nine months. Nine months total. We separated. He had filed for divorce in three days. And it looked like my life was over. I had no idea what would happen with me. I knew that I could choose to. I mean, honestly, I had a lot of choices. I didn't have to fight for my marriage. I didn't have to fight for my sanity. I mean, I really, truly wanted to go sell margaritas at the beach. I really wanted to put on my bikini and go down to Miami. Y' all know y' all ain't never felt that way. Not up here in Phoenix, Arizona. Y' all so holy. But I said right here, this is a defining moment for me. I've lost it all. I've lost everything. I remember I had, like, six pair of pants, probably six or seven shirts. Had all my good stuff, now had Mixmax tennis shoes and flip flops. And, you know, we get our nails done and we get our hair done. And I went to this place, and I had to turn in my cell phone, I had to turn in my keys to live by the rules of this place. So that after I decided that I wasn't gonna be a stripper and that I wasn't gonna go sell margaritas at the beach, where I felt like, okay, now I'm gonna go with God. So I had to live under their guidelines. So I had to turn in my keys, I had to turn in my cell phone. I couldn't go anywhere I wanted to go. I couldn't go get a Starbucks. I had a grandbaby that I couldn't see that. I had seen every day, missed all the milestones. Our son was a junior in high school, and I couldn't help him. He had some learning issues, and I always helped him with his homework, and I just missed a lot. But it was important to me that I did whatever I had to do to figure out what was wrong with me and why I had been so miserable. Because other people looked at my life and said, why is she miserable? She's got a great husband. She's got beautiful children. She's got a great, thriving ministry. At this point, point, y', all, we had 20,000 members in our church. She preaches, she drives good, she lives good. What's wrong with her? Well, my husband thought I had lost my mind, so he sent me the psychiatric evaluation. He thought, obviously, if she don't want me, something wrong with her, we ain't going there today. But all my psychiatric evaluations came back, actually, that I was pretty smart and that I was almost on the verge of genius. And I'm like, man, I'd never been told that before. I always got punished because if I didn't make all A's, I got beat. Had no idea that I was that smart. But then she said, you know, on your evaluation, she said, you have the most severe case of PTSD of anybody I've ever seen. Even people coming back from Iraq, back from wars, they said, you are so full of anxiety and depression and fear and trauma that I had pressed down, press pressed down, since I'm a little bitty girl my whole life, and that makes patterns in your life that creates patterns that you don't want to get beat. You don't want to get in trouble. So then what do you do when you're in trouble? You lie because you don't want to get beat. So it creates a hiding aspect. Oh, girl, I could teach y' all all day about all. So I knew that it was going to be a process for me. I knew this wasn't going to be quick and this wasn't going to be easy, that this was going to be a journey for me. But today, I'm whole. I'm happy. I'm at peace. I know who I am. I am content. I don't get up every day and look for something to. I'm not wrestling in my spirit. I am content in my own skin. I have my sane mind. I love my husband. I love the call of God. And God is restoring everything in my life that the enemy set up to steal, to kill and destroy. In my Life. But see, here's the problem with us in the church. We want a quick fix. We want to alter acceptance experience when true healing for messed up brokenness is a process. It takes weeks, it takes months, it takes sometimes years. It is literally lifelong. And I'm going to talk about that. See, we got to crush the idols in our life and deal with one issue at a time. Look at somebody and say, you got to deal with one issue at a time. Let me establish something to you. God is not like man. God's not like your mama. God's not like your daddy. He's not like your husband. He's not like Freaky Freddy. He's not like the man who left you. God's not like any of these people. See, God don't want to date you. God don't want to have breakfast with you. God don't want to see you on Christmas and Thanksgiving and Easter. He is a jealous God. And he wants all of you. He wants you in the good times and the bad times. And when you're single and when you're married and when you're drunk and when you're sober and when you're confused and when you're ashamed, he wants all of you. And we got to recognize first who God is. He's separate. He is other. He is holy. He's in a class all by himself. Ain't nobody like him. Can't nobody come up beside him. But God is jealous. God is jealous. Exodus 34:14 says this. It says, do not worship any other God. For the Lord whose name is jealous is a jealous God. And there are so many things fighting for position in our life, position in our heart every day. Time, money, thoughts, our calendar, our phones, our possessions, our children, our reputation, our laundry. I got laundry. You got laundry. All God children got laundry. We all got things to do. We all got kids to take care of. We all got mouths to feed. We all got bills to pay. But we are all wired the same. We are all wired for worship. And we're all going to worship something. There is a war out for your heart. There's a war for your heart, for your love, for your passions. And the enemy knows that out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. And when the mouth speaks, your words produce life and death for you. There is a war for your heart. Joshua 24:14 says this. Now therefore, fear the Lord. Serve him in sincerity and in truth. And put away the gods which your father served on the other side of the river and in Egypt. Serve the Lord. And if it seems evil for you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve. Whether the gods which your father served that were at the other side of the river, or the gods of the Amorites in the land that you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. See, this is what he's saying, people. It's time for you to choose. It's time for you to choose. Who will you serve? It's time to make a decision. It's time for you to stop wavering back and forth and stop saying one thing and doing another. And stop dancing at the altar after you've been dancing at the club all night. It's time for us to choose. And change is hard. It's difficult, isn't it? We've been eating fried chicken all our life and the doctor tells you you gotta eat grilled chicken because your cholesterol's high and your blood pressure's high. To be healthy, you gotta put it down. That's hard, isn't it? We're like, no, not the low lows. Ephesians 4:22 says, Put off your old self, which is being corrupted by what? Deceitful desires. Stop eating the French fries. It's killing you. Stop chasing the approval of man. It's corrupt, it's deceitful. It's killing you. Stop chasing your career. More than the call of God. It's corrupt, it's deceitful. It's killing you. Stop hoarding and loving your money more than you love to be a giver. It's corrupt, it's deceiving, deceitful. It's killing you. We all want to be changed, don't we? We all want to be holy. We all want to be sold out to Jesus or you wouldn't be in here, right? But how? How hope? How is this achieved? We've been preached at our whole life. Listen now, okay? Let's just get truthful in the church. We've been preached, you've shouted, you lose your voice, you dance, you shout, you get up, you sling something, you throw a shoe. But we leave, dumb as rocks. Our life doesn't change. We have no shift in our character. We've been coming to church 15 years and we still got the same problem. Something's wrong. It is not in the preaching, it's not in the shouting. It's in real life. Application to where you can hear something and take it and write it down and learn it and put it to work tomorrow at 8 o' clock in the morning. Something you can wash dishes with, something you can raise your children with. It's something you can pull on when things are tough. It's not in the shouting and good services and altar calls. I've been in altar calls my whole life and still did not know who I was. How is this achieved? It's a simple word. It's all holiness word. Nobody wants to talk about. No more. Here we go. It's called sanctification. But here's the truth about sanctification. It's two things. Write it down. Sanctification is both positional and it's progressive. It's positional. It's who you are. It's instant. The day you got saved, saved. The day you were covered by the blood of Christ, you were declared holy and blameless. It's positional, but it is also progressive. Sanctification. It is a slow process of change where God transforms your heart into his image, into his likeness. Listen, the day I got saved, I was in right, standing in position. But I could have got up from that altar and mixed the best margarita and rolled a joint back behind my back same day. This is God's method. It's the way holiness is played out in your life. It is not if you sing enough. It is if you give enough, if you shout enough, if you come to church enough. None of that makes you like Jesus. We've all lived in church all these years and we still got the same problems and the same issues because we waitin on somebody to lay hands on us right here in Shamalamangdong and gloried us come out of the air vents and we're still mean as hell. We still hate our husband. Preach, Pastor. It's a slow process where God transforms. We're in cooperation with Him. It's God's method to make us look like inwardly what we already are positionally. It's a lifelong process of taking off the old and putting on the new. God uses your successes, your failures, your growth, your fails, your, your falls, your kids, your husband, your jobs, your families, your sickness, your health, your pain. All for his purpose, all for his glory. To mold you and shape you and bend you to be more like Jesus. Nothing is wasted. It's not about what we stop and start doing. Don't get it twisted. It's not about the things that you stop and then you start doing this. It's not that at all. That's the trick of the enemy. We got to stop going here and doing this, okay? You can't go to club no more. But I want to go to club. Gotta quit twerking. Oh, but I like it. But the sanctification process is this. See, when you first get saved, first you want a honeymoon, you don't do nothing right. You so say so sane. Give it a little bit. Let something set in. Let somebody hurt you in church, let somebody lose their job, Let your husband step out on you. Get diagnosed with a sickness. Where's God? See, all the sanctification process happens along your life inevitably as you fall in love with Jesus. Ephesians 4:22 says that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man, which grows corrupt according to what? Deceitful lust. Yeah, that's in you. Yeah. Look at somebody say that. Deceitfulness, that's all up in you. You full of it. Deceitful lust. And be renewed in the spirit of your mind. See, it's not about stopping and starting actions. This is how sanctification comes. It's when you are renewed in your mind that you put on the new man, which is created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. So number one, you put off the old. Number two, you renew the mind. And then three, you put on the new. Listen, this is not done in sequence. This is not done. One, two, and three. It's done simultaneously. People need to teach this in church. People would be free. It's done simultaneously, at the same time. Say same time, same time, that you start to take off one thing, an old habit. The spirit will renew and refresh your attitude and strengthen you by the word and enable you to start new habits and mirror God's righteousness in the earth. God starts working you. God does the work. God does the work, y'. All. It's not you doing the work. It's God doing the work in you. Somebody better get up and praise him because he is your helper in this process. He is your helper. It's a process. It isn't enough just to put off the false worship of a false God or an idol in your life or something that you love so much, you have to put on the worship of the true God in the place of the thing that you're putting off. If you know that you're consumed with the world and the spirit of the world and secular music, and you love it. You listen to it. You got all the albums downloaded. You know every word. You know more of Jay Z and Beyonce than you know Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. You know it all. You know you're consumed with it. You love that feeling. You know that the crazy you like to go down the road and you know all the words. Well, when you lay that down, if you know that as an idol and you know that is something that's occupying the space in your heart that God wants. So when you lay it down at the same time, you have to replace it with. And it ain't gonna feel normal at first. You ain't gonna like Hill songs at first. It don't feel like Jay Z. It don't bump like Meek Mill, two Chain. It don't do like that. But I think that's why God put on in the Word where he says put on Christ. Because when you first start doing it, you feel like a put on. See, it was so second nature to you to know all those other songs. Listen, I can still today sing you every line of Prince Purple Rain. Every line, whole album. Really. Don't give me no lakeside. I know every word, every word, every word. Come along, come along, take a ride. I ain't doing it. I ain't doing it. Devil, get behind me. See, it's so quick. It's so easy. Fantastic forage. See, y' all like it, too. Y' all in trouble. I know you. I see you. You got to know who you're fighting. And you got to know how he works. Satan tempts you through pleasures by portraying joys that disobedience will bring. He says, this is fun. It's awesome. It feels good. And it does. It really does. He frightens us. This is the truth. He frightens us that serving God will not bring these joys and pleasures. So we need to make ourselves happy, right? What's wrong with that? After all, aren't we supposed to be happy? That question is an immediate indicator that Satan's talking to you. The first time you say, what about me? What about me when the Bible says we die daily? See, it's not that God. That God knows that. It's not that he thinks that you don't have these desires. No, we have them. We have these urges. We have these desires. But we have to bring them to the cross daily so that we are sanctified daily through the washing of the Word and renewing of our minds. So that the next day we're more of Jesus than we were the day before. Then the next week, we look more like Jesus than the week behind. See, it's a process. It is a process of sanctification. James said, we are dragged away by our own evil lust and desires. That is why we have to continually and progressively sanctify our heart and Our mind. You got to evaluate your heart and your desires. Don't be deceived by your own heart. You got to know your weakness and the things that you're drawn to. This is just me. I cannot. I personally cannot listen to secular music at all. Cause I know me, honey. I'll be twerking. I'll be up on this pole somewhere in a restaurant at Applebee's. I know me. And do not be deceived by your own heart. You gotta know you and you gotta know the bullseye that Satan has right on you and your proclivities and your propensities. And you gotta put them to death on the cross daily. I can't listen to secular music. It's just something I will not do anymore because I know what a hold it had on me. I know in high school that's what I loved. Music was, has always been my life, always. So secular music was my thing. Then when I went into ministry, I only did the Christian music because that was the thing to do. That's what you did. So when I went back, where did I go back to first? Always look where you go back to. Where do you always retreat? Just like Peter. God found him fishing. When Peter gave up on God, he said, I'm going back. What do you always go back to? It's what you got to kill in your life. It's the kryptonite in your life. Got to take a hard inventory where you're weak, who brings out the worst in you, what takes you back to those old familiar feelings and put a bullseye on them and ask, what do I want so badly? What drives me? What do I fear of losing so bad that I think nothing of sinning in order to hold to? Romans 8:13 says, for if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if you live by the spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live, period, Selah. If you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if you live by the spirit, you put put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. You have to kill it. You have to burn it with fire and crush it into powder, just like Moses did when he came down off the mountain and Aaron had constructed idols out of gold. What you do in the flesh is an idol. We don't have little Buddha sitting around our house. But you do have things that you rely on, things that you depend on. Habits, lifestyles that scream, God, I don't trust you. I can't give my whole heart to you. God, because I'm afraid I won't find joy like I find in these things. So how do you crush them? First you got to recognize what they are. You got to do a hard inventory. You got to know what your issues are. And then you got to repent and ask God's help daily. Daily. That's why it's so important. It's not religious rituals say, when we say you got to read the word, you got to be in prayer. It is important because your flesh runs wild if you don't. I tell my kids this. I say, kids, think of your life as a measure, like a measuring. What do you call those things? Like a scale. And here's your flesh, here's your spirit. Whatever you sow to the most is what's going to have the most weight. You spend more time in secular things, secular music, secular tv, social media. All of this more than you spend in the word. Guess what's going to have the money. And you don't understand. I don't know why I just keep falling. You sewed for it. You sowed for your fall. You sowed for your downfall. And ask his conviction for righteousness. Write God's word on your heart. And as you grow in your love for Jesus daily, his grace, his mercy, his faithfulness, the old man's ways of trusting other idols just seem to fall away, just fade. And it's a gradual process that I talked about. It's not instant, but you will look back one day and say, my God, look how far I have come. Look what God has done in my life. It's faithfulness on the daily basis. Doing something so little for a long time. It's not these big events and it's not conference that changes your life. Conference never changes your life. It might jump start a change in your life, but this one event is not enough to change your life. It is what you do on a daily basis that changes the old man into the new man. Becoming more like Jesus. Not looking like your old janky self, your old shyster self, your old mean self, y'. All. Sometime I try to type ugly things on Instagram. Sometime I want to reply to people. I'm just like, I want to say, holy Ghost will not let me. People have said something of the ugliest things to me on Facebook and Instagram and I got a reply. I mean, I got some. I could rip them a new one with the word, Holy Ghost won't let me. Ten years ago, I'd have met you in the street. I'd have ripped Them earrings out and it was on like Donkey Kong. Don't mess with my children and don't mess with my husband. Don't make me come up to the schoolhouse. Serious. I showed my tail so much at school back in them days. So embarrassed today. So glad I left South Carolina. He loves me. That's how Paul could say that everything else paled in comparison with the treasure of knowing Jesus. Philippians 3:8. Yet indeed I also count all things. Loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish that I may gain Christ. See, without Jesus you'll worship anything. We love everything. We love Louis Vuitton. We love Louboutin. We might even settle for Phoe Vuitton. We love ice cream. We love the beach. We love glitter. We love eyelashes. See? We love everything. But all of these things, are they bad in themselves? No, but they occupy space. So much space. You got to put him to work in your life and allow His Holy Spirit to do his work in you in conjunction with you. May the Lord our God be with us as he was with our fathers. May he not leave us nor forsake us, that he may incline our hearts to Himself, to walk in his ways and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments which he commanded our fathers first. Kings 8. Solomon knew that our hearts needed to be inclined to worship God. Because by our sinful nature, left on our own, without disciplines set in our life, we were born to worship anything else other than our Creator. And that what we would feel and we would indulge and we would be gluttonous and we would occupy all this space in our heart that is dedicated only to Jesus. I'll never go back. Once you taste it, once you've tasted what real freedom is, once you've tasted what being sold out feels like. We are in so much fear. We're in so much fear that what we give up won't be as joyous and pleasurable. Meek Mill can't do nothing for you. Jay Z can't get you through a divorce. Jay Z don't even care about you. Truth be known, he just wants your money. All these things that the Gentiles do seek. Revelation 3. But you're still wretched, poor, pitiful and blind and in need of eyesalve.