I Got Insight

Hey, what's up? This is Tim Pratt Jr. I want to thank you for taking the time to listen to this content today. I hope you hear something that adds value to your life, shaping your perspective, faith, and hope, as well as the application to see it through on this thing that we call life. Enjoy. What's up everybody? So this is episode 10 of season 2, and we're gonna call this one I Got Insight. So this is the last episode of season 2, and I want to basically focus more on this sabbatical that I've been on. I've been fasting from social media, don't plan on getting back until mid-spring. And I really been wanting to just spend some time focusing on leadership, but more so through the lens of following. Follow to lead, lead to serve. And so wherever the direct God— wherever he takes me, you know, for season 3, um, I'm just gonna be obedient. But in this episode, I've been working on this one, like I said, called I Got Insight, and it's a message that I've been working on delivering when it's God's time. But this is in my heart to share this one and see what you— I hope that whatever— like, we're not going to get the same thing out of it, but I pray to God that like the, the context of it and the principle that you're able to draw from what you need, right, could be applicable to your life. It's what I'm trying to say. So it's two books out there that I have heard people rave about. One of them, my friend has talked about, Josh, The Power of Positive Thinking and As a Man Thinketh. And I haven't read neither one of those, like I say, but I've heard a lot of good things and had like listened to a lot of good discussions about them that I do plan on reading sometime in the future. But with that being said, I want to draw you to Proverbs 23:7. It's the King James Version. And it goes, for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he. Eat and drink, saith he to thee, but his heart is not with thee. It's all gonna make sense. It's probably sound like I'm reading poetry of Shakespeare. So let's move over to John 8:32. Then you should know the truth, and the truth will set you free. Now some people say make you free. I don't really get into debating. I mean, it's different type of translations and versions out there. At the end of the day, it's all about getting you free. But from my perspective, when it says— talks about, as a man thinking in his heart, so is he, and then it goes into, then you should know the truth and the truth will set you free. In other words, what I believe is going on here is that the wrong perspective will keep you from freedom or seeing as God wants you to see. God has already done it within us. It's just us not seeing it. This is why a lot of people say perfect vision, you know, 20/20. Hindsight is 20/20. Perfect vision. And, you know, I know that's a theme throughout this year and stuff like that, but I believe people say this because all it is is that hindsight has caught up with foresight. And a lot of times when we in the day-to-day, the grind, the mundane, you know, we're toggling by believing foresight and living by faith, what God sees and what he said versus our natural sight in this day-to-day world. Because I'm just being straight up with you, my faith gets weary. And I know the goal or the intent of God to say, I want your default to be what I have spoken, what I see, as I let this manifest when Jesus was here on the earth. Everything was from a finished work. I understand the cross and all of that in the process and things like that, but it was already finished. He was just manifesting it out in, in a flesh perspective, but spiritually it was already done because if nothing was never going to stop what God had already spoken, if that makes sense. And so God wants us to live in that way. Jesus, you can say, was purpose-driven. He was living according to the will of Father, although he had to learn obedience and was tempted and all these type of things. But he didn't let nothing supersede the will of God. That's how we have to be in our lives. And that's what I mean by I got insight, because what am I doing? Like right now, even with me doing this podcast, I don't have a major following or a big platform. I'm late to Instagram. I was late to Facebook because I was just never really into the social media things like that. Was late, didn't even— when I met my wife, was late to Snapchat. So it's like, and I never really worked aggressive to grow those because I always felt like God didn't call me to grow a platform. Although I'm not saying that's a bad thing because it's all about being influential and living according to his will. So I have to have something downloaded. I have to have insight. And that's where I believe that it comes from, the Holy Spirit. He's plugging in and consistently renewing my spirit. So when the Lord said that you should know the truth, to me, why didn't he just simply say in John 8:32, Why didn't he take out no? Why didn't he just say the truth will make you free? You have to come into the knowing. You have to do the work to come into the knowing. Now I'm not talking about— this has nothing to do with salvation. We can never earn our way. That's not what I'm talking about. I want to rightly divide this thing. That's not where I'm coming from. But we do have to put forth the effort in order to say like, okay, Lord, I'm seeking you, I'm seeking the kingdom, I'm seeking you, and now those things will be added into us. So as I'm basically— what all I mean, all I believe what he means by that is, you seek me, you'll find. Like, it's not like this hide-and-seek game. I'm not talking about like that. It's just like coming into the knowing, coming to the knowledge, and then living it, becoming one with the text, becoming one with his word. Because he simply could have said the truth. And I was talking to one of my friends, you know, and the Holy Spirit was just teaching me as I was talking to him. And the Lord was like, I am truth. But people don't know me. That's why they haven't been set free, because they're trying to get to know me through all this other stuff— religion and, you know, man-made tradition and just logic and things like that. So they don't know me, so they don't know how to walk in truth. So this is why our minds stay so— like, the limitations on it. Like, that's why we have all these limiting beliefs and stuff like that. And that's why I believe that when we often go through difficult and confusing times, we start once again moving to our default. We start moving by sight rather than insight, and we miss basically how God is teaching, or we miss how God is guiding and teaching us. Because if I'm moving by my natural sight, and this is when I'm supposed to be totally complete and aligned by faith, I cannot completely say that I'm trusting in God's teaching and his guidance. When I look throughout the scriptures, Throughout the text, it was all about guiding and teaching. Like, let's, let's think about Peter for a second. You remember when Peter made the statement to Jesus that he would never leave him? And Jesus, you know, he made this declaration, and Jesus stated that, you know, you'll deny me 3 times for the rooster crow and things like that. Okay, Peter made that declaration in the safety, in the, in the parameters of safety. But as soon as it got hot and Jesus started to go through the process and it seemed that those parameters were no longer there anymore, all of a sudden that fire that Peter had, it went away. You know, he, of course, he denied that fire and that passion. It wasn't the same. But if you really examine it, what Peter didn't know is that God was actually taking him through the process. That his faith would be tested in such a way that— I want to say this the way I studied it— that his faith will be tested in a way and developed in order for him to do what he was called to do, the works that he was called to do. Think about— let's jump over to Acts when, you know, the Day of Pentecost and things like that. When Jesus told him about, you know, this rock— but this rock I build my church— Peter was basically— I'm not gonna say he was the cornerstone, but he was a key element in it. He was a key person that basically said, I'm gonna do the will of God. He— Peter was vital. But he was empowered to do it, and he was tested and tried. His faith was, and his spirit was— he was tested and tried to basically carry that out. You know what, so what does those examples look like in the more modern day to time? Same thing. When you got money in the bank, man, investments going good, got a good career— Lord, I'mma tithe, I'mma give, I'mma do all of this stuff. I'm out here, I got you, I'm giving to the ministry, I'm blessing people, I'm buying, I'm picking up meals. But what happens when that money flow not the same no more? Parameters change, or the appearance of parameters change. So in the parameters of safety, it's like, man, I'm gonna keep sewing this, I ain't gonna never stop doing this for the Lord. Lose your job, investment start to slip. Well, Lord, well, Lord, well, Lord, because process. You see what I'm saying? But can you say no matter what? Now, you might not be able to give the same amount— that's between you and God— but are you going to still keep giving? And are you still going to give sacrificially? Let me just be straight up with you. I done failed at this many times. Money get tight, I give offering because tithes hit too hard. Tithes hit different when money get tight. This is transparency, man. Or pay my tithes, I'm like, can't get nothing extra. Show ain't giving no sacrificial giving parameters, you see what I'm saying? But it's a faith thing. See, now I'm back to my default. My default is sight, but I should be living by God's foresight, that insight that I have. You know, somebody get like, I can make a move like, thank you, when working as a technical project manager, senior technical project manager, oftentimes I move different and do certain things because it's kind of like I'm a hub. Like I have to kind of be well in tune with the entire company. But when I go talk to like a departmental manager or a lead or something like that, they might be doing something like, hold on, wait a minute now. 'You got to consider this, you got to consider that.' They say, 'Well, I didn't know that.' All they doing is moving in the parameters of what they know, but I give them insight on what's really going on. And so then they change, we change the way we move. So it's basically— stand what I'm— in other words, what I'm saying is we gotta stay plugged in. We gotta go to Bible study, we gotta listen to the podcasts, we gotta get around like-minded people that's gonna challenge us, uplift us, edify us, correct us. All by the Spirit of God. That's how you keep and maintain that right insight. We have to understand that plugging in to the necessary community of sound doctrine and people that's not just talking, but I'm talking about living it— we have to stay plugged in. That's the only way that we're going to keep this level of insight that we need in order to move accordingly. You know, kind of moving along. This is why I believe the Bible says, James 1:2, count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds. In other words, what he's saying is that when we encounter— we have these type of tough encounters, we have to hold on to our insight because it's extremely valuable to our spiritual lives. That's the way it is in my notes. And like, when I wrote that down, I was just meditating and studying this. I was like, man, Wow, like God insight, insight. So how do you maintain it? We kind of just talked about it. You gotta study, you gotta study, and not just study, but you have to apply God's word. This shows us how God works and how we should respond. I look for principles and things. I don't try to make it culturally relevant or things like that anymore. It's like, okay, Lord, what is the principle that you're teaching in this? What are you— what are you showing me? What did you do for them? Because if you did it then, I know you can do it now. So truthfully, I can ask myself, when has God not ever came through? That's what's stupid, to believe that he's not going to come through according to his will. Like I said, we got to rightly divide this thing. And then as I look at them, sometimes in the Bible when you see things go like, like, wait a minute, Lord, okay, this didn't go right with these set of people. I think it's always lessons learned. Like I said, the principle, okay, I don't— I shouldn't respond that way, so I know it's a better way to respond. Or if it goes according to plan, okay, that's how I need to respond. I might not be going through the same exact thing, but in some shape form of my life I'm going through something like the principle, if that makes sense. So it might be different, you know, different examples, but the context for the most part is the same. Like, so I might not necessarily be walking through a literal fire, but I can be going through things in my life where it seemed like all hell is breaking loose. So you gotta study, and we have to study so we can learn how God works and how we should respond. You got to go to Bible study and Sunday service, the local fellowship. We got to stay connected in the church, as I just said. Get you a local church, visit it, get connected. This is the area my wife and I— because my dad is a pastor, my father-in-law is a pastor, and then we stay an hour and a half away from— that's not an serious. So my wife and I, we're trying to figure this thing out because we know we've been called to the ministry and we've been praying and guidance because it's the light. Because it's like we always just visiting when that's not cool. Like I said, this podcast right here is, it's full of transparency. And so then moving to number 2 is that we have to have a prayer life. This is how we commune with God, converse, talk, and we gain understanding and wisdom. He teaches us. But first you have to know his word in order to be able to pray, and so he can communicate to you. So that prayer life is vital. How often do you commune with God? Like I tell you, right, like I think I told you in one of my podcasts a while back, I can say all day I know my wife and I acknowledge her, but do I spend time with her truly knowing her intimately, like deeply asking her questions, and she's asking me questions, and it's just drawing so much out of us. You got it, like, you gotta know, you gotta commune, man. And third is simply trusting God. Just as I said, can you show me anywhere in the word of God where he didn't come through according to his will? Not your will, but his will. You can't, you can't show me nowhere in the scriptures. And I'm telling you, if we just continue to live by insight and stand on our— basically stand on, yeah, stand on that Holy Spirit. If we continue to live by insight and just stand within the counsel of God, is what I'm trying to say, things will move a lot different. We'll start to see things like Like, once again, like I said, they say hindsight is 20/20, but we can truly have that same 20/20 vision as we're going through life because we connected to a different sight, and that's insight. Insight helps us live by God's foresight versus just sight. So I just want you to really think about that. And the last thing I want to leave you with is that you got to understand that some of our habits will have to change in order to live by this proper insight, living by the Holy Spirit, the ways of the Holy Ghost. You got to drop some TV shows. My wife and I, man, we'd be sitting there, say, I don't want to watch that, I don't think you should watch that either. And I'll be like, man, no. Um, and it'd be like, dang, bro, okay. Certain songs, just gotta drop them, man. Stop justifying them. And most importantly, conversations. There's a lot more out there, but if somebody gossiping, man, they always talking about somebody and they not uplifting that person, and they always talking about that person's past, you know, things like that, man. I used to listen to this stuff and I used to do it. Just chill. Drop it. Drop it. We getting— like, I've been really studying relationships lately, um, from Dr. Henry, uh, Cloud to John Townsend, and more notably, uh, Darius Daniels. Of course, I'm gonna, you know, study this. I'm excited about this Michael Todd book coming out from the series Relationship Goals. But I've been really studying because, like, yeah, I'm gonna say that that might be a season 3 thing because I'm spending a lot of time with that. But ask yourself, do you have insight? And if you have it, what are you doing to maintain it? Because I always talk about this, we have to make a distinction between the dwelling of the Holy Spirit and the filling of the Holy Spirit. So the Holy Spirit comes and dwells in you, and that's cool, that's good, that's great, because you have his Spirit. But now what are you doing to feel that? That's the ongoing process. Are you applying? Are you living? Are you studying? Are you applying? Are you becoming one with his word? Because if you're not living in the feeling of it, you're quenching the Spirit. And so that's why you can't operate effectively and live by faith. That's why you consistently move by sight. So it's a continuation process. You have to make that distinction. So I hope this word has blessed you, man. I'll say this is the end of season 2, and I really want to close with this one. So man, y'all be blessed, you know. I'm praying for you. Share this content with people, uh, go out, you know. And if, if it's doing anything for you, you know, and if you need to talk, like, hit me up through the appropriate channels. I'm not like I won't be on social media until like basically, you know, early spring or mid-spring. But this way, I'll— if you get— it's ways to get in contact with me is what I'm saying. Or go to my website and fill out the contact thing. I'll get that and I'll see that a lot more quicker if you hit me up on social media right now. So be blessed, man. I ask the Lord to touch and guide you and just protect you and give you everything that you need on this side of the earth and to be successful and help advance the kingdom of God. Be blessed. Hey, thank you so much for listening to this content today. I want to encourage you, if you haven't already, to subscribe to it and share it with family and friends on your social media feeds. And you can also go over to www.timothyprattjr.org in order to find out more about the blog as well as other things that I offer on how to connect with me. So with that being said, I hope you have a blessed day and continue to see this thing through that we call life.