The Choice that Moves Us from Believers to Disciples

Hearing vs. Listening: Are You Actually Doing What God Says?

God told me I don't listen to Him. And honestly? He was right. In this episode, I'm getting real about the difference between hearing God and actually listening—and why one leads to fruit and the other leads to frustration.

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Plus, I'm sharing what's been heavy on my heart this holiday season: the enemy's strategy to divide families and why reconciliation starts with prayer.

IN THIS EPISODE:
- Why the enemy targets family unity (and what to do about it)
- The difference between hearing and listening to God
- Breaking down the Parable of the Four Soils (Matthew 13)
- Why hardened hearts can't understand God's word
- Being a doer of the word, not just a hearer (James 1:22)
- Trusting God when His instructions don't make sense
- Why one scripture for a week beats reading the Bible in 365 days

SCRIPTURES:
- Matthew 13:10-23
- James 1:22-25
- Acts 4:13

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CONNECT WITH ME:

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Transcript

Speaker: 0:00

Hello, hello, and welcome to the Big Bold Faith Podcast, a podcast dedicated to getting real bold and honest when it comes to living and fighting for your everyday faith. Hola, mis amigos. My name is Brittany, and I'm so excited for you guys to be here per usual. I am just grateful, grateful, grateful. I feel like, is it Hezekiah Walker? Grateful, grateful, grateful. I would break out into song right now, but I think that I'm off pitch. So we are not. But hello, welcome. If this is your first time, you're like, what is going on? It is the joy of the Lord that is our strength today, according um to Nehemiah. And we will praise him in every season, every situation, every circumstance, always, because he deserves our praise for being such a kind and wonderful God. And if this is your first time here and you're like, what is going on in these streets? Well, you're here at the Big Bowl Faith Podcast, a podcast that's not only dedicated to helping you live out your faith, but also just building in us this everyday faith of what it is to contend for the faith, to believing in the faith. When we look at Acts 4:13, we see that they were ordinary men, um, but they were found to have been sitting with Jesus. And so that is my goal that as we continue to do life together, as you continue to hear the things and the topics that are here, um, that you understand that just being ordinary people in your day-to-day things makes you more than qualified to be bold for Jesus, um, to carry out your light and to do wonderful things, and that we get back into being back bold and big in any place and space that we go. And that's to me not to be cocky, that's not to be arrogant, that's not to be egotistical, but that is to walk in the full confidence and the authority and the identity that God has called us into as every single being, as daughters of the most high. As uh, I was gonna call y'all kings. I'm gonna call y'all kings, kings of the most high, men of valor, men of fervancy. Look, let me speak life into y'all, man, right quick, because um some of y'all aren't getting it at home. Let me tell you how amazing our God thinks about you. He loves you, he adores you. Your heart, his heart is filled with you. He thinks that you are the most incredible man of God with power and strength, that you can do all things that he calls you to do, that you are the covering, that you are the protection, that you are the head of your family, that you are making wise decisions, that you extend wealth, that you are generous, that you have light. Let me just speak to y'all real quick, brothers of Christ, because these are how I speak to my brothers of Christ. Um, if you know, then you know. If you don't, I'm sorry. Um, but my circle, we we keep it a buck around here. And so anytime that I can edify, encourage, um, and just speak life into you guys. Um it's it's a hard role. Adulting is very hard. These holidays are really hard as well. Um, but I know that God is um doing something amazing. And with the holidays, I kind of wanted to speak on something quickly, which has just had my heart this morning while I was in prayer. That um holidays are hard for a lot of people. Let me just be vulnerable for a second. They're hard for me as well, right? I don't have a big extended family the way that I wanted to be. Uh, when we look at holiday or the Hallmark channel, y'all, and y'all see this beautiful couple. They have the family, everyone's around the table, everyone's singing songs. Um, and they're just in this spirit of jollliness. I think that uh, I don't think that. I know that that it was the enemy's plan from the very beginning to divide such a thing. And I'm not just talking about the holidays, I'm talking about all things. When I was in prayer this morning, I started to think about families, um, families specifically mine and other people that I know, and just how diligent the enemy is is calling causing division within families, right? You see from the very beginning where we see Adam and Eve. This is nothing about what we're gonna talk about, but this is what's heavy on my heart. So I'm gonna let the Holy Spirit just meditate um through me and use me as a vessel. But in the very beginning, when we see Adam and Eve, um and you see this division that he splits between them, because um he goes to Eve first, right? He goes to her, and then Adam's like, God, you gave me this woman. Like, she's the one that gave me this fruit. You see division and friction that happens there and it extends in a lifelong journey of generation uh of the blessings that God has called for us to be uh basically sons and daughters, um, or daughters of Eve and you know, sons of Adam as well. And I think from the very beginning, that was very intentional. When I look about the the 12 tribes of Israel, all my Bible nerds, y'all, y'all let me know if I'm I'm right or not, and Holy Spirit convict me if I'm not. But as I remember it, when they went and they took over dominion and authority and territory, they had to do it as one tribe, like one tribe on sound, um, drumline. If you hear me, you if you hear me. But it's it's literally coming together as one to take over the land to accomplish. And I think that the enemy um is so cunning to calls it the most cunning out of all of the animals to take that away from so many people. And so when you see a result of people not wanting to come together around the dinner table, when people are like, oh my gosh, I can't stand my in-laws, I can't stand my mother. First off, let's pause. What we're not gonna do is we're not gonna speak word curses around here in these parts of the streets. What comes out of your mouth flows out of your mouth, and then there's an extension of sowing seeds into grounds for future generations to pick back up. So there's that. So that's what we're not gonna do. We're gonna change that language in this season, because power in life um comes out of the tongue and everything that we do, and it overflows from out of our heart of what we're thinking. Not to say that it's not true, and um, that we just need to be able to be mindful of what happens and taking um time to to meditate and figuring out the root of that's in our in our um in our lives. The things that just cause us to be really disturbed and we don't take the time to actually figure out what's wrong with us. We instead we do like the Israelites, we complain. Um, and we we feel or we make it look like we're good on the outside, but inside we're really complaining. So back to this division strategy, snare and trap from the enemy. It's his goal is that if you're not together as a family, then you can't take dominion or authority, nor can you come out of generational curses, nor can you come over and take over the wealth and the dominion. I'm not talking about financials, I'm talking about blessings. I think about also the people that are divided within family, and those people that are in their family will never find my God, um, those people that will never find God because they weren't around good and sound teaching, that they had no accountability. You guys know how how much we've gotten away. I have a I have a dinner table right here at Laura, but um, how much we've gotten away from the dinner table and have moved to the TV, I don't think that that's uh just by coincidence. If you were around the dinner table, y'all remember when we were growing up, like you had to be in the house at a certain time at the dinner table, like with your hands washed, ready to eat, whether you wanted to or not, it wasn't a uh a choice. And so the subtleness that comes through society, that comes through culture, a lot of people I think won't agree with me, and that's okay. I don't need you to agree with me for me to know what's true. I know what I see, and what I see is so many uh families are being divided in this season. So much so that when I um when I serve and when I'm helping those people that are um homeless, that don't have um, that don't have the means or don't have a home, they have families that know that they're homeless, that they know that they're on the streets. And they would rather sit on the streets than be in the home of a place where they could have a proper meal, they could have a proper shower. I think about how how interesting that the enemy would pose it in such a way that you would desire to be in the streets because of, because of the the division, the friction, the uh misagreement, the whatever happened, that something like the prodigal son, that you would never come back to your son or come back to your father's house. You would never come back to your mother's house because you're just like, oh, I can't do it. Oh, my pride wouldn't do it. Oh, I don't agree with her. I hate her. All of this uh just hate and arrogance and this this uh this anger, this anger and rage that comes out of our selfish ambition of not wanting to be in places and spaces with family when in actuality with those people that are within a family. First off, it takes a whole village to raise a child. What are we talking about? We're talking about daycare, we're talking about food, we're talking about meals. And so what happens is we make it harder for ourselves, I believe, when we don't have that uh of that family, we don't have that heartbeat. We don't have people that are actually in our communities helping us raise up these children. It can't be just you. You and I don't always have the experience and the knowledge. You need your grandmama and them, you need your grandpa, your pat pap. You need all of those people that have 40 or 50 years on you to be able to help you raise up a child that they can extend wisdom and counsel, that they can give information. You need to be underneath one household. Like, you know, when you're able to have a five-bedroom house and all of you guys can just pitch in and the mortgage or whatnot is only two or three thousand dollars. It's three thousand dollars for five of y'all versus three thousand dollars times five. That sounds like generational wealth being passed on if you if you knew to be true. But the enemy is so conniving. He got us out in these streets. Like, I want to be autonomous, do the same thing with Eve. I want to be on my own, I want to be independent, I want, I want selfish ambition, is all that I hear. And I'm not far removed from that. Let me be honest, my friends, because y'all gonna y'all gonna think that you're gonna trip me up, and I'm not. I just have the revelation this morning. And what do I do? I have to take ownership for it. I have to go before the father and I have to say, God, I was part of it. I was part of not um allowing for the reconciliation. I said some things, I looked at some people, I didn't reach out. I was like, please don't talk to me, please don't come at me. And I know some of y'all are gonna be like, my families are toxic. Yes, I know. The enemy is after them specifically to keep the division in uh in place. But what we do for those people is we still one, we're still kind to them, right? We still give them love the best way as possible, right? I'm not saying that you invite them into your house and let them just tear it up, tear up your families and cause further division and sow sow seeds of evilness. But what we do need to do is cover them in love the same way that Jesus would. That would be the first thing. Second, we're gonna cover them in prayers and we're going to petition for them so that their eyes can be lifted up, that their hearts can be changed, because you can't do anything. But the God of the universe is out to rescue every one of his children. And you are the responsibility. You are the person that is responsible for your family's healing, their reconciliation. Um, and it and it doesn't mean your physical participation, it means your prayerful uh participation and being in in the place of of God, of just listening to for God might ask you to do something crazy. It might be like, I want you to go make them a sweet potato pie. And you're gonna be like, God, I don't even like them. But there's something in that obedience, that door opening that God can change. We see that God was able to change Pharaoh's heart for just a bit, right? We were able to see so many people that were able to be changed by God, but he also uses his people. And so he's using you in your family for reconciliation. And so in the season of holidays, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Thanksgiving, the first of the year, all of those things, you guys, we have to be praying. Whether you like your people, and if they come, you guys, cover your houses, get the anointing oil, start praying before Christmas comes, start praying before the new holiday, start praying before you have these dinners because God can do something so um people aren't broken. We'll say that. People can change, people will change if we believe. No one's lost its hope. Uh, there's so many scriptures, so many broken people that God healed and people gave up on them. And God was like, not yet. God didn't give up on you. God didn't give up on you wherever you are in your space. You might think that you're holier than that. You may be like, I wasn't that broken. I didn't have that stank attitude, but you don't know what they did to me. I don't, I don't need to. I don't need to. God needs to. God is the judge, the ultimate judge. He's the soft sovereign one. He has to deal with them. I can't. Even me ignoring that person, me taking out my own vengeance, it doesn't make me feel better at the end of the day. What it ends up doing is it taints my fruit down the road. And then you're looking like trying to pull up things 10 years from now, because you're trying to start a family, because you're trying to uh start a ministry, you're trying to start a business, you're trying to like get married, and you haven't done the very thing that God has called you to do. So uh that's the very top of this episode. Pray for your family members because he wants to sow division. And if he's able to get division, he's able to take a lot of things. He's able to take generational wealth. Again, we're not talking about financials. We're talking about um the ability to be in a family and community, which is what God has called us to do from the very beginning, um, to take care of one another. When I think about the body of Christ, I think a lot of that is also missing in the actual physical um uh ecclesia, the church of God. We leave so much of that behind, little things that are just so that that are just so easy to do. And it ties into what I want to talk about today. But if your family is struggling, if you can't stand them, be be honest, be honest with God, right? We're gonna be honest with God. Be honest with God and say, these are the things that this person has done to me, and it has hurt me so much. They made me feel this way, and I know everyone says this, and you guys are like, I've tried that. Watch God, but that this is the thing which you have to do when you pray to God, you have to open your hands. That's the biggest part about this, right? You you get from this, and sometimes it's slow, sometimes it's like you see how slow these hands are moving, y'all? But you're releasing, right? And then you'd be like, Oh, hold on. Okay, remember when we're little, y'all? Okay, sorry. And you would play that gang in your hands, and you would try to slap the other person's hands real quick. I don't know why that made me think about that, but essentially there is a trust there's a trusting of surrendering your hands. Now, is the is the Lord going to slap you? There might, it might feel like that. It might feel like that because of what he's gonna ask you to do. But I believe that God, I've seen God, I've seen the opportunity of God, of how he's able to make things happen at his time and his place, um, in his space and things and people change. Um, but you've got to open your hands with it too. You can't ask God to do uh a new thing in your life. And when you ask him to do the new thing, you're resilient to not allow him to do all that he wants to do in his timing. Um, so often we have our plans. Many are the plans of us, right? We're like, God, I want you to heal him, and I want them to come and give me an apology. Okay, you go do that, girl. Let me watch you do a give him an apology next year, because that's how God works. It's gonna be the opposite of what you think it is. Faith is hard, faith is hard, but the enemy is after it. Enemies after your faith. He's after. Um, I heard this morning as I was um listening and and just, I don't know, getting my spirit right, that the enemy is after all of the faith that you build up, just to like subtly chip at it. And I think about what it is to be a believer, to believe to actually believe in God, believing in God and what God and Jesus or what Christ asks us to do, to lay down our life, to be uh become loving, to love one another, to love the Lord, to not have any idols, to put down all of the things that the, you know, the lust of the eyes, all of the things of this world, right? You have all of that that God is asking you to do, right? Which is basically like laying down your flesh, which is what you've been operating in in so long, and what the enemy uh just enamors you with day by day, right? So you're just like you're taking it off day by day. Can you just imagine you're just like taking it off and then it comes on, and then you're like taking it off, right? And you have to get so good at like where you're not just picking it up every single day that you can get to a point where you're like, okay, well, I got that off. Like you start just dusting off your shoulder versus like having all of this heavy armor and weight that you're carrying on. So once you lay all of that down, right, then you have the enemy that has a target on your back, right? And he wants to convince you otherwise that you taking off that worldly mentality, that worldly thing, he comes after the very thing that you're trying to build up to be, right? You're trying to be holy, you're trying to be righteous, you're trying to stay pure, you're trying to keep your mind set on the things that are of heaven, spiritual places and not of things below. When we when we start thinking about things and how that actually has to operate, it becomes a very lonely, isolating world of what you have to do. And so when you're walking in your faith, people be out here thinking that you're crazy. You'll be like, you heard God. Somebody did it. So you have to be very cautious on the people and the places and the spaces. When I think of God having that inner three of uh of his disciples, his roll dogs, I don't think that that was by coincidence. I think there's something that we can emulate when we see him, when we see that emulation and we we see Jesus. I think that that was very intentional to say some people are gonna think that you're crazy. Like, but that's you carrying out your faith and being very mindful and having people that are accountable and people that understand the walk that you're trying to get to so that you can work out your salvation and fear and trembling, right? That we're having such a reverence for God, that we're hearing him, that we're listening to him, because when we start quelling the spirit of the Lord, we start being spiritually hard and spiritually deaf. And that leads us into the perfect segue and to our conversation for today. Um, it was a week ago that I heard, and I I can't remember what I was doing specifically. I I love the Lord because one, God is so patient with us and so kind. Um, I think every morning, Jesus, I don't want to cry today, y'all. We cried last week. We might not have to do cameras anymore. Because every time now I'm crying, and I'm like, I don't know why I'm crying. You know what? Before I think I would just cry and keep putting keep pushing forward. But now that like there's a camera, I'm like, okay, God, and I didn't even grab any tissue. So we gonna we're gonna take it from the top. I love that God is so patient with us and he's so kind um that he gives us the opportunity to wake up every single morning to choose. When I think about choice, I think about how um in the Garden of Eden, where Eve and Adam they had a choice to choose between one tree or the next. God gives us that choice every single day, right? He gives us the choice to choose evil or good, to take him at his word, to take him at what he says. And when I when I think about it, I think about that I'm grateful, God, that you didn't decide yet to allow me to pass on to the next, that you gave me the opportunity to learn the same lesson that you were teaching me last year and this season in a different way, that you were so kind that it's like, you know, it's like psych 101, psych 102, psych 103, and it goes from levels to level, but very incremental. And it's not like 102 to 201, and you're like, God, how did we get into how did we get into this level? Why am I in the AP class of things? I didn't understand. I needed to be back from medio. He meets you where you are. And when I think about what God had showed me, I don't even remember specifically what I was praying for, but I'm grateful that God is able to trust me. And he literally comes in a still small voice that I'm just like, what? And what had happened was, right? That's how the story goes. And what had happened was, is that I was sitting and I heard, I heard a voice, I heard something more innate to um innate to my spirit. It wasn't an audible voice. I have heard God in audible ways um before, and it's a trip. It's a trip. When you hear it, you be feeling like Moses and you you get going. But when it's innate to your spirit and it's not you, and you're like, okay, I would never say this. I'm not really sure. I think, I think that I'm good. I think that I'm like walking in the ways of of Christ. God basically telling me that like I don't, like I don't listen to him is what is what it came down to. It's like, my child, you don't listen to me. And I'm like, what do you what do you mean, God? I don't listen to you. And I I started to kind of sit on it and I started to, it was just like a heavy weight that I was carrying basically for like a day or two. And I was like, God, what do you, what do you mean? I don't listen to you or I don't obey you. I'm trying my best when I when I hear something to go after it, but I'm trying to be wise about it and not, you know, just be very like a lack of better words, to be very flippant about it and just do what I want to do and think that like to really pray and to meditate and fast. And when when I heard it, it's this listening and trusting for God, right? When we think about listening to God and hearing God, you might think like they're the same thing. But when you hear something, hearing is very passive. I've talked about this before in a previous episode, and I'm gonna bring it back up because God is still dealing with me. So he's probably still dealing with you on the issue. But when you hear something from God, it could be very audible, very passive. We hear things all the time. For believers, we hear a good word all the time. We shout, we praise, we rejoice, we uh get really excited, we hear something great from a pastor, from a motivational spirit. And what do we do often with it? We do nothing with it. We don't take the word back to see if one, the word was true. We don't take it back to see if it applied to us. And then three, we don't take it back to do anything with it actually, practically or physically. So if I were to tell you to say what I said earlier, pray about your family members, right? You guys hear that, you're still driving on the road, you're probably watching lists, you were like, oh yeah, girl, let me pray about it. And just as quickly as I said the word, um, the word has vanished out of your head. The time I finish out of this episode, you're not gonna do anything with that. You're not gonna pray about your family. I bet you, I bet you, out of the people that listen to this episode, probably five of y'all will actually do it, or y'all will write it down, or y'all will write it in your notes and you will never look at it again. And maybe one out of that five will actually do it. Why? Because we're human, right? We have a lot of things going on in life, and that doesn't negate us from the responsibility of what God has called us to do. One, the the enemy is very clever and crafty, right? Um, I'm gonna pull up scripture here in a minute because I think that that is important to come back to scripture. But I think that the enemy is crafty about that because he's not really, he's not really afraid about you getting a good word. He's not really good, he's not really afraid of you getting a prophecy. He's not really afraid of you getting um were a word of God, a word of knowledge, a word of information, a word of insight, because you're not gonna do anything about it, right? You're not gonna actually walk into the promise. Like if God's like, hey, Abraham, I'm gonna make you the father of many nations, he's not scared about that. Now, what he will be afraid of is when you actually take up your shield, when you actually go out and you leave your family and you walk into the uh walk into the land um that is opposite of your family, and it's like, oh, okay, God. Like, oh, you wanted those. You wanted those about your business. You're one of those that handles and you take action. And I think that for the the current believer, one, we've gotten a lot of, we've gotten very much sidetrack with our responsibilities of what we should be doing. It does not matter if you read this entire word and or sermon and you do nothing about it, right? It doesn't produce any fruit at all. What happens when you is when you actually uh get to a place where you're actually carefully going through the word and you're letting it be part of you, right? A faith comes by hearing um and hearing the word of the Lord. But I will read this scripture because I thought it was very important as we converse about this listening and trusting from God and what God is kind of saying in this season, because it's like we can read this all day long, right? There's a scripture that says they they perish for lack of knowledge, right? Lack of knowledge, but that's not the scripture that we're in. We're in Matthew 13. Um, and we're gonna talk about the parable of the four soils, and I'll tell you how they kind of correlate here, but I'm gonna read the whole scripture starting in 10. Um, so 13, 10, what version am I in today? I'm in the NLT, this version today. It goes, His disciples came and asked him, Why do you use parables when you talk to people? He replied, You were permitted to understand the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but others are not. To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given, and they will have an abundance of knowledge. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them. That is why I use these parables. For they look, but they do not really see. They hear, but they do not really listen or understand. This fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah that says, When you hear what I say, you will not understand. When you see what I do, you will not comprehend, for the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes, so their eyes cannot see, and their ears cannot hear, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears because they hear. I tell you the truth, many prophets and righteous people long to see what you see, but they didn't see, and they long to hear what you hear, but they didn't hear. Um listen to the explanation of the parable about the farmer planting seeds. The seed that fell on the footpath represents those who hear the message about the kingdom and don't understand it. Then the evil ones come and snatches away the seed that is planted in their hearts. The seed on the rocky swell represents those who hear the message and immediately receive it with joy. But since they don't have deep roots, they don't last long. They fall away as soon as they uh have problems or are persecuted for believing God's word. The seed that fell among the thorns represents those who hear uh God's word, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of life and the lore of wealth, so no fruit is produced. The seed that fell on good soil represents those who truly hear and understand God's word and produce a harvest of 30, 60, or even a hundred times as much as he has planted. Oh my gosh, you guys. So as you guys can just imagine, when you see all of these, when you see all of the the different moments of of the parable, what I noticed when I was reading it is every single one of them heard. They heard the word of God, and then uh then something happened. So each one of them hears, and then the very end, they hear and they understood the word of God. And so I started to ask God, I said, God, why why are we hearing, but we're not understanding? What does that even mean? And so what I was hearing mostly was that we don't we don't understand because we because our hearts um are in a space where we're not able to understand the word of God. I actually actually went back to the original scripture to answer it. It goes, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them. For their hearts of these people are hardened and their ears cannot hear. So the whole thing is the hearts of these people are hardened. Well, the enemy, right? We don't keep going back to the adversary, right? We don't wrestle between uh flesh and blood. We wrestle against the spirits of that are like in heavenly places that aren't of this world, of the of those that are part of the demonic. And I just started to think about every part of our walk of life when you're growing up, when you're put into certain positions, when you're growing up as a child, when you have certain triggers, when you have certain experiences, every part of the enemy is to confuse you, one by your faith. He wants to confuse your faith, he wants you to change your identity, he wants to change who you are so you don't understand the power and authority that you have. But outside of getting that, he's after your heart. If he's able to go after your heart and make you more offensive, if he um the bait of Satan talks about this with um John Bavel uh Bavere. Um, but after at talking about offense being the biggest thing, there's even scripture that says if you have a sacrifice, if you're coming in front of the Lord and you haven't forgiven your brother, to basically put that sacrifice down, put that offering down and go back and return and ask for forgiveness for that person. I don't think that that's by happenstance. I don't think that the scripture was there and planted just as like, oh, okay, cool. I think that specifically what happened is that the person's heart is hardened. If you were to go, thank you, God, if you were to able to go and go into the presence of the Lord, and you, and and most of us struggle with this. I don't hear from God. I, I, I don't know the word of God. Well, first off, the very first thing that we need to do is get back to reading the scripture, right? Get back into our prayer closets, get back into the disciplines. I'm not saying you got to be there for 15, 16, 24 hours. Like, that's not what I'm saying at all. I do think that when you when you get into a place of intimacy with God, he becomes like your friend, right? Just think about your girl, your best girlfriend, your best guy friend. When you guys kick it, time is not of an essence, right? Time, you just you just kick it. You like, girl, let's hang out, let's cool. And you're like, dang, it's already seven o'clock. We had such a good time. That's how it is with Jesus and me. When when I'm kicking it with God, when I'm kicking it with the Holy Spirit, there have been so many times like I literally have to kind of set my alarm outside of my prayer closet to alert me of the time because I I kind of have to still go to work, but I still wake up early enough to give to God his time that I'm not rushing, but I still have to set myself an alarm to be able to get out of my closet. That is what it is to like spend time with God. But I think also what's tripping us up is when we don't have understanding or we don't hear God, it's because a part of our hearts are hardened. Our hearts are hardened because we have that offense against someone, we have that ego against someone, we have that comparison, we have that jealousy against someone that we're not able to have the fullness of God's heart to be the full image. When I think about looking, um, James 1, 6, uh, I think it's James 1, 16. Hold on, let's go to that. All right. So in James, um, James 1 22, it goes, but do not just listen to God's word. You must do what it says, otherwise, you were only fooling yourselves. For if you listen to the word and don't obey it, it's like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself, walk away and forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free and do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it, right? Again, we hear here that you have to be a doer of the word. You have to be actually doing what God has asked you to do to be able to have that understanding. When I looked into another translation, um, a translation said to uh look at your natural face. Well, when I think about going into a mirror and looking at myself, right? Usually I'm in the mirror and I'm like, oh, okay, like I'm either one, making sure that my outward appearance is uh pleasant for other people, like I might want to look attracted for other people. I might want to make sure that my lip liner is on, that my hair is like looking, looking a little right. So I'm on an outward part. I'm naturally uh I'm making sure that my image looks well, but then I started to think it says natural face. When I think about a natural image, I think that you look deeper than on your uh what's on the outside, right? What's not gilded, but things that are happening on your inside. So if you're if you're looking into this mirror, right, of your natural self, which my natural self should reflect the image of God because I'm an image bearer of the most high God, and I'm looking at myself, is my actual self what I see when I read this word of God, or when I sit with God, is it an image? Is it bearing image of what God is? Or am I so concerned on what the outer appearance is that I miss the very, very nature of God that when I walk away from the mirror, when I walk away from it and I no longer see it, that I'm like, oh, I no longer am able to recognize myself because I'm I'm no longer no longer carrying his image, if that makes sense, right? Like, not that I can't undo carrying an image of God. God is made, like that is that is my divine, uh, that is that is the divine nature of who I am. I carry his image. You carry his image. We all carry his image, but in a way when we're actually looking at ourselves, I want us to look at ourselves in a way where you're looking not just on the outside, but the inside. What is the inside representing when you're looking at the word of God? When you look into the perfect law that sets you free and you do what it says, then God will bless you for doing it, right? We can't just be hearers of the word. The enemy's not afraid of sound, right? He's like, okay, go ahead. Like go ahead, listen to that favorite pastor. You're not gonna do anything. But when you actually take root and you start discipline yourself, you start making your flesh, um, making your flesh submitted underneath what God is, then you start becoming a disciple. I think of I heard something, something recently by someone. Someone had mentioned a disciple really requires you to be under the submission of someone else's counsel. Many of us have mentors, many of us have counselors, many of us have therapists, some of y'all on better help, some of y'all got therapists, I have a therapist. Let's make the assumption right now, right? We're under the assumption of our pastors, we're or under the submission of our pastors, we're under the submission of our therapists, we're under the submission of wise counsel, right? These are people that God has brought to you, the divine, you've you've vetted them out, you've made sure that they, whatever, and they give you instruction and you say, Oh, that was cute. Let me write it down. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then next week in the week, in the week, in the week, and you have notes, you have assignments, you have things that you have not done, you don't do anything. And then you wonder why. Like five years, not even five years. Uh uh, you at the end of 2024, and you still got problems that you had in January 2024, right? You at the December 2024, you like going into January 2025 and they're like, What do you want to work on? You like, oh, the same problems I worked on last year. They're like, Did you do your homework? You're like, no, I didn't do my homework. Why was I supposed to do my homework? I couldn't just come to session and just it like vent it out. And I think that that's so much, so many times that we're coming to God and we're saying, God, I have this problem, I have the situation, and God gives you the word uh that sets you free. Um He gives you the perfect law to look into as a reflection, as a mirror, to show you your natural self, to show you the inner parts of your heart, the things that are always um apparent on the outside. So we don't one get our validation and our applause of what man thinks about us on the outside, right? People think that I'm very pleasant, people think that I'm very outgoing, charismatic, that they think that I'm a great speaker. They think that I'm kind. Yes, all of those things are true. And when I get before God, God doesn't always see all of those things. He sees a part and fraction of me and he celebrates me for the things I am and he helps me correct the parts that the that me and don't always see. He's like, oh, okay, you got a little jealousy in your heart. Oh, you were looking at homegirls thing, or like you were at the gym trying to compare your body with somebody else's body that I didn't make. I created your body to be more athletic, to be more dance-like. Like I didn't con I didn't make you a size zero girl. So I'm looking at the zeros. You were a nice curvy, I'm not gonna say a number, but I'm a nice curvy, petite size insert. Y'all better guess the right number too. Don't be putting numbers in there. I'm a nice petite size, but God's like, don't compare yourself. And so he has to deal with me similarly. Why won't you take me at my word? And the biggest thing I struggle with is like obviously trusting God for the word that he's giving me. And even if it doesn't make sense to other people listening to what God is uh God has asked in this season, and it's like, when are you gonna start trusting me? And I'm gonna ask you a similar question. When are you gonna start trusting God? I think that as believers, for me, something that I deal with and I struggle with is wanting to get it perfect before I step out in faith. And that's not that's not how faith works. Faith requires you to step onto the water even before you even know if you're going to, if you're going to sink or if you're going to float, to know if you're going to be able to swim or not. And knowing that God is on the other side of that place to basically um make sure that your feet are ordained, that they're, that they're ordered, that they're in alignment to what he is. And what I've had to start believing is the times that I spend with God are not void. It's the difference between having like head knowledge and street knowledge. And it's cool to have like the whole book of the Bible memorized. Yes, great. Sorry, I I had a lyric that came in my head because I I'm I'm a uh Linnel, Lynnel fan. Oh, now I'm gonna butcher the whole thing. Sorry, no. Um, and I try to do the uh what it says to do in that Bible, basically. So I'm like, if you have a word, if you're like actually taking the maturation of looking at it, studying it, understanding how can you actually biblically apply this to your day-to-day life, right? So instead of it just being a scripture a day, of you getting like having a scripture, take time to meditate on that thing and say, okay, God, how can I? And maybe it's for the whole week, can we be okay with not getting through the Bible in 365 days? Ooh, I just made someone super salty. I know I did. I made y'all super salty. I felt it. But can we be okay with not getting through all uh all the books of the Bible in 365 days and be okay that maybe it was one book of the Bible, but guess what? You did everything that was in that Bible, right? You did everything that was uh that God had asked, and now you have an understanding. So then what you do is you end up going into next year. And I'm exactly like this because I've had it to start, like I've wanted to expand my vocabulary. And so often I'm like, oh, I want to do a word a day. And it's like, okay, cool, you know a new word of day, but are you actually implementing that in your natural way of how you speak your prose in your day-to-day communications so that it can actually be integrated into um your like being the word of life so that you can not that I want to sound well well educated, I just think that God has designed so many words, right? He's given us the uh the power of prose. Uh, we might be doing another power prose challenge, but essentially he gives us prose. And I think that when you're able to fully communicate yourself using words, and it doesn't have to be basic. When I think about Paul and Paul going into the, I think it's the Church of Corinth, that he gives them milk because that's all they're able to handle. They're not able to handle meat at that point. I think of the same thing when it comes to vocabularies and words. I think of the same thing when I think about scripture. I think about sometimes we want more, we want meat, but we're not able to handle because we've never taken the time to just digest the one scripture and implement it into our day-to-day lives. And so many of you guys are going to hear this word, right? And then we think about the parable, right? You're gonna hear it with joy, and then the enemy's gonna take it out, right? Or you're gonna hear this and then the word, and then someone's gonna call you, someone's gonna text you. There's gonna be distraction that's going to be able to take this good word that you heard, and you're gonna start thinking about your bills, you're gonna start thinking about the worries of life, you're gonna start thinking about something else when, and then you're gonna be like, God, I didn't hear you today. God, I didn't hear you today. God said, Um, you heard me. I used certain people in certain things, but we don't take the moment to, to, to say la, to breathe, to sit, to be still, to say, okay, God, what and even if you don't get anything from this scripture and passage today, that you take that and you go into it the next day. You go into it the next day, you go into the next day. Right now, I'm trying to make uh I'm trying to make a really yummy cod uh putonesca. And the first time I made it, it was okay. Second time I made it, it's getting better. But I'm going to have to continue making it. What that does is one, it computed to memory on how to make it. I know what flavors I'm looking for, I know the depth and the taste. I don't have to look at the cookbook to see, and I don't really like measure according to the recipe, but that's not the point. Let's let's listen. When when you get the scripture and you continue to maturate on it and you continue to sit on it, and you continue, it gets to be part of your DNA. You get a chance to use it as your prose and your vocabulary. And so it becomes easy to recite because you've already been sitting with it. And so when people are like, How do you know that scripture? Like, I was sitting with it for seven days. I was sitting for it with 14 days. God showed me different things, God gave me different understanding that I didn't understand in one season when I was trying to just get through all of the books of the Bible in 365 days. And that is nothing against anyone that's able to do that. But I think in this season, what God is calling us to do, especially with so much um, so many false words, so many false teachers, so many um lack of knowledge and insight and biblical biblical literacy, is that we really have to sit with it. And I've been having to do something similar. I've been trying to really read less um, I'll say spiritual guidance books and more about just the word, right? There's nothing against the authors. I'm not calling anyone a false, uh, a false prophet or a false author. Sometimes it just needs to be me and Jesus and God and me sitting with God, me having revelation with God, me knowing and hearing God, I'm able to then be able to identify the still small voice. I'm able to listen to him so that I'm able to trust him, so that I'm able to know him for his word. I think when we, when we when we're not hearing from God or assuming that we're not hearing from God, I think that that too could be a facade from the enemy that you're battling inside of your head and you're like, oh my gosh, I don't know if that's God. I'm not sure if that's God, I'm not sure if this is God. That can't be God. Why would God ask me to do this? And it's like sometimes that still small voice is very scary. And God's not really asking you to do anything small, He's asking you to do something big. I think also, and I believe that when God calls you to do something great like Abraham does and to leave his whole family, that sounds crazy to a lot of people. I think that in that walking by faith, that big bold faith of yours uh plug is when you start growing in your discernment and your hearing from God because you're out here on the waters walking and saying, God, I prayed about it, I sit in your word, and now I'ma just I'ma go, I'ma go, I'ma do the like you think about Noah. Noah hey, never saw rain. What is rain, God? Like, is rain hail? Is I mean, I don't even think they had hail back then. Did he know rain was a form of water? Or did he think, like, okay, let's let's keep it like a real, real, real, real, real buck. Back in 2019, if God told you get ready for a uh uh a pandemic, right? Get ready for a health pandemic that's going to kill a lot of people, and it's gonna compromise a lot of immune systems. And I want you to to to basically design a bubble or something of that magnitude. You're like, oh what I got, a pandemic? Is this like the measles or like like I don't know, I'm just I'm pulling out of things. What would you do? You have no history, you know, have no experience. People are like, that's not going to happen. Like, how can you? And you guys remember how quickly like the whole world shut down. It was like within weeks, it was like it could have been in days, but it just happened so quickly. It wasn't like it took that much time. And so listening for the word of God doesn't always seem practical. Um, but it takes faith. And that faith comes by listening, even in the day-to-day things that God is calling you to do. God is gonna call you to pray for that family member, he's gonna call you to pray for that neighbor, he's gonna ask you to do micro things that he's been asking us the whole time, but he's gonna ask you for some pretty big things too that aren't gonna make sense. Last year, God asked me to go to Tulum. I went to Tulum, Mexico, thinking that God was going to come out of the heavens. Um y'all think I'm joking. When God be asking me to go places, I'd be like, okay, God, let's go. What are we doing? What we learning? Like, what revelation? You what secret you guys helped me? And it's just me and God on the beach, just taking it, just hanging. I didn't get a revelation, I didn't get three points to the scripture, I didn't get a sermon, I didn't get a podcast episode. I have that memory, I have that obedience, I have that receipt for my faith to do something crazy. I didn't get a refund, I paid for my own, my my own hotel, I paid for my own airfare. Um God woke me up the second night at like 12 a.m. and I did not go to sleep, and I was just like, oh okay, God, here we are in a whole foreign country. Here we are. Um, and sometimes it's that, it's exactly that. There's nothing more that God has asked you to do but to obey. So um my question to you in this season is are you hearing God or are you listening to God? And the difference is hearing is passive, listening is very active. The activeness requires you to do what God has called you to do, even when it's scary, even when it doesn't make sense, trusting that God will continue to guide you. And if you think that you're getting it wrong, that God will guide you along the ways. I'm not saying to be reckless, I'm not saying to go out in these streets and be doing stuff that God hasn't told you to do. Take the word back, go to God and say, God, okay, I'm gonna take this and I'm gonna walk in faith and allow God to build up your faith, allow the Holy Spirit to lead you and guide you into all truth and understanding. All right, let's pray for today. Dear Heavenly Father, God, I thank you for today for truth and understanding. I pray, Lord, that our hearts be more open, Lord, and soften, God, that you would replace with us a thorny heart, a hard heart, God, but a heart made of flesh, God, that we're able to not just hear you, God, but do what you call us to do, that we're not forgetful of the things and the places and the spaces that you called us to do, that we don't allow the threats and the worries of the world, that we don't let the enemy take our joy nor the um instruction that you've given us in this season, God. Lord, I pray that you make for disciples, Lord, of people that are getting good at listening to your word and your voice, which is in the stillness, God, of us doing less and spending more time with you and intimacy, Lord, in the secret place, God, with uh reverence, Lord, with honor, Lord, with um our eyes set upon you, Lord. Lord, in the season, God, as a holiday season, God. I just pray for every single person that feels alone, Lord, in the season, that feels isolated, that feels uh separated, God, Lord, and that you would just call back, Lord, the ideal of family, God, that Lord, every trap and snare from the enemy, Lord, that's caused division and factions, Lord, that's caused separation and agitation, God, Lord, that you're doing a new thing in the season, God, that you're reconciling people's uh families and identities back, Lord, that you're bringing back the joy of what it is to be one in community, that we're able to provide for each other's needs, God. Lord, in the name of Jesus, God, I just pray, Lord, that we know that this season is more uh about giving than getting, that we give our time, that we give our energy, that we give our love, that we give to one another as you gave to us, Lord. Thank you, Lord, for making a way. Thank you for new mercies and grace. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and to rejoice and to praise your name. We give you all the glory and all the honor. Amen. The Big Bull Kit Podcast is a production of Sozo Digital Media.