The Already - Not Yet

I I feel like what what the Lord is saying to us is to stay in this place where we come to A revelation of the significance of what the Lord is doing, and don't downplay that because of false humility. And the analogy I want to use tonight is that 120 people gathered in an upper room. The Spirit was poured out on 120 people. Peter stood up and said, Because of what had happened to a hundred and twenty people, a thousand year old prophecy was being fulfilled. How arrogant to say this is that.

But he was right, therefore it wasn't arrogant. And sometimes when something's happening with 120 people, we miss that it may be fulfilling prophecy that's been waiting to be fulfilled for a thousand years. And and we have such a because our whole value system has been perverted by numbers. Now value should be established by weight.

But instead in our culture, values established numerically. Same piece of paper has one more zero on it, and it's worth ten times what the other piece of paper is worth that has one less zero. Still the same piece of paper. But if you go back to when gold was the standard, value was predicated upon weight, not number.

That thinking has infiltrated the whole of the church culture to where you believe a church with a thousand people is more valuable than a church with a hundred people, although the church with a hundred people may have far more weight. There may be far more glory in the church of a hundred than there is in the church of a thousand, but we have allowed a perverted church. Value system to invade the way that we operate, and now success is based on numbers instead of weight.

And and And we can miss the value of what's happening in one moment of encounter where the weight of the glory of the Lord is falling on someone that if we traveled back not that far. And one kid was having an encounter like many have in each of our services, it would have been unprecedented not that long ago. Think about that. Even in the churches that we grew up in, and certainly in the churches our parents grew up in, n people were not even in spirit-filled uh churches.

m kids were not having encounters like what we're experiencing here. And I think sometimes you've got to step back and recognize by the Spirit we need to begin to put some language around the significance of what the Lord is doing. and not in false humility downplay. And this is something I struggle with. So I'm just kind of venting my own, uh being vulnerable in my own struggle to somehow want to downplay it because that we don't want to be seen as arrogant.

But I'll never forget I heard a man say years ago that humility is agreement with God's perspective. Humility is agreement with God's perspective. And if I'm disagreeing with God's perspective in order to look humble, that's actually pride. Humilitos, the Latin word literally means from the dirt, the idea of humility is knowing where you came from and then assessing where you are.

And religion will let you know where you came from and never let you assess where you are. And you miss that you are indeed the righteousness of God in Christ. and that you are the head and not the tail, the first and not the last, above only and not beneath. You're a lender and not a borrower. As he is, so are we in this world.

We're God's children now. So these are some of the things we're going to go into tonight. And one of the things I want us to do is I want us as a local family, and we're going to be super local in our consciousness tonight. As a local family, I want us to step back. And make sure we're not missing the magnitude of what the Lord's doing because somehow we missed the forest for the trees. You can be in something missing the significance of it, and I'm thankful Peter did not.

There's a hundred and twenty people, and there's fire on their heads, and everybody thinks we're drunk, and this is that spoken by the prophet Joel, In the last days I'll pour out my spirit on all flesh. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, young men will see visions, and old men will dream dreams upon your male and female servants in that day, where will I pour out my spirit, said the Lord? And Peter looked around and did not care that there were a hundred and twenty people.

He would not have been more convinced had there been a thousand and twenty people or ten thousand and twenty people or ten million and twenty people. We've got to recognize the bigness of what the Lord's doing based on the weight of glory, not the number of people joining in. In Canada there were more people on Tuesday night than there were on Sunday morning. There were more people and I don't know that that happens in America.

But somewhere where there's a vacuum, oftentimes there's more thanksgiving. I want to make sure we have the right amount of thanksgiving, not living in a vacuum. Sometimes where there's an infrequent manifestation of the glory of God, there's more thanksgiving. And and we know the opposite should be true. So I I didn't I didn't come home from Canada frustrated with where we are.

I actually came home from Canada more convinced over the significance of what we're doing right here and the impact it can have on nations without us even having to go to Canada just because they're watching live streams. And so one of the things I feel like the Lord is doing, and maybe I'm just ramble a little bit about this tonight, I feel like the Lord is asking us to take our value for what we're experiencing to a level to which is appropriate.

I don't want I never want to overhype, but I have a tendency to underhype. And in doing that I felt the Lord bring some correction to my heart and to be able to say, there there is a way to s to to talk about the significance of what the Lord's doing and not talk about the significance of me.

Talk about the significance of what the Lord's doing and not talk about the significance of someone leading worship. We understand that. It's the significance of what the Lord's doing culturally and for me, sons and daughters. are such a significant mark of how the Lord intends to pour out a coming weight of his glory. So we're in a weight of his glory, but we're also being prepared for the weight of his glory.

And I want to contend with you tonight. I'll show this to you in scripture in just a minute. I want to say this to you. What we do with the glory we are stewarding now has everything to do with how we access the glory we were born for that we've not yet experienced. And many fail to celebrate the weight of glory they're in because they know there's more.

And this is dangerous because it's what you do with your five minas that determines how you get to more. And you gotta faithfully celebrate the measure you've been given. You fa are we going somewhere I has not seen? Yes, but I do not need that to happen in order for me to be thankful. Are the wheelchairs gonna empty? Yes, but I don't need that to happen in order for me to be thankful. If this was all we got.

It's not, but if this was all we got, we already got more than most people, like I mentioned earlier, who faithfully served God for generations and never saw this. We're not going to have to wait on them to sow their wild oak. and taste what the world has to offer and then later on decide we tasted that I think we'll serve God. They are tasting and seeing that the Lord is good and it is ruining any appetite in them for anything other than the glory of God. Isn't it big?

So in some sense, I want to talk about even even some of the the theotic eschatology stuff we've been on. I and I wanna talk tonight, if I'm gonna give a title to this, I'm gonna call it the already and the not yet. And I wanna stay in this framework. Because whenever we begin to talk about eschatology, which is a word I'm I'm I'm going to help wean us from. Because I think the end is over. So I don't know how much we should be studying the end.

I I have studied the end of what happened in AD seventy. Right. And so I don't know that eschatology is super relevant to people who believe that we've already seen the fulfillment of the Olivet discourse, we've already seen the fulfillment of the prophecies of Daniel, and we've already seen the fulfillment of all but the last three chapters of the book of Revelations. I don't know that we're big into eschatology.

I don't think we're studying the end. I think we're studying the new beginning. I think this is a new creation gospel being led by new creation people who are seeing the whole of the cosmos. as a blank canvas that's waiting for the suns to rise up and declare we have the blueprints because we've been living in the heavenly realm.

We're not waiting to die and go to heaven. We've been in the heavenly realm and we're understanding how things function and operate there and we want to bring that schematic into being. Actualization. So when we talk in terms of the already not yet, I want to talk in terms of three things regarding the already not yet, and then this will probably turn into maybe like a three-part additional series. Three things regarding the already and the not yet.

First of all is that you and I are in the already, not yet. Secondly, that creation is in the already not yet, and creation's state in the already not yet is in direct proportion to how we are operating in the already not yet. And when our already starts to move towards some not yet, so will creations already start to move towards some not yet. But I want to personalize it and talk about where we are in this movement.

The homestead and the houses of the sons that we've got planted out all over the place. So what where we are in this movement is in the already not yet. And I'm beginning to see that how we handle our movement. Of migration from where we are already to where we're called to be that we're not yet is actually going to begin to provoke. Watch this. The houses of the sons.

So that they can begin to move. You would see this in your own lives in ministry, Jimmy and Tina. They would begin to receive permission to move into some of their not yet based on how we as the as the patriarchal house. Of a movement. I don't talk about this a lot, but the Lord's messing with me. This is the patriarchal house of a movement. What is happening here between Apostle Aaron and Robbie and this transition to Tammy and I is unprecedented.

It's it's uh it required unprecedented humility on the part of the eye. of Trey and on the part of Jessica. It required unprecedented humility on the pardon of part of Jordan and Sarah. It required unprecedented humility for for Braden and the next generation that could have easily said, this is rightly our inheritance. But they had a kingdom revelation of family and never saw me and Tammy and Elijah and Judah as outside of the family.

But that takes tremendous humility and when you and I understand that, what happens is you and I are becoming in many cases, maybe without even realizing it, I think as we realize it, we may do a better job of mixing faith with it. Realize we're becoming a pattern. And that can sound arrogant and I I don't I don't just don't make me tonight have to qualify the stuff. I'm just gonna say this is that.

This is much of what's been cried out for regarding the kingdom of God, regarding the establishment of the sons of God, regarding the coming of the next generation. And and that's why I I get excited when I watch people move, sell houses, give up jobs, land. walk away from family generational things in order to come be a part of what the Lord's doing because in that he's strengthening the headwaters of the movement. This is the patriarchal house.

where many sons have been and will be sent into the earth to carry this expression that the glory of God is indeed not only available, but is being poured out on the next generation.

And so we're gonna we're gonna again let me review the three areas I want us to think in terms of the already and the not yet. Personally, we're in the already and the not yet. As far as the cosmos, we're in the already and the not yet. The third one is going to be as a movement, we're in the already, not yet. And as the more of the not yet we experience, the more we're gonna have to be comfortable moving on from the already. And many want the not yet, but refuse to disengage with the already.

If we built this church around our personal appetites, it would not be as appealing to the next generation. I said this in Canada. I was in a leaders' meeting. I said, if they let me pick what I wanted the worship to sound like, it would be Zach Top and Chris Staple. If you don't know who those people are, you may be dismissed.

I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. That's that if you don't well talk about if you're riding around with me on the Ranger, the Polaris Ranger, if you're riding around with me, I am I I'm I'm probably not listening to the same stuff they're listening to, yet I recognize something. This is not about my appetite. In the in the inferior covenant there was a famine in the land and people's response to the famine was to boil their children and eat their kids. How perverted is this?

You're saying your personal appetite is worth more than the life of your child. Real parents cut their arm off, boil it, and feed it to their kids. before they boil their kids and eat their kids. But it's a picture of what we've done in religion where we've built everything around what appeals to our own appetite and we're not really worried about the next generation because they're not tithers yet.

Well, we don't treat tithing anyway, so who cares? We're gonna turn our heart toward the next generation, see them become all that the Father has designed for them to be, and and and to do all that the Father has designed for them to do. And my challenge to us tonight, I promise I'm gonna get in the t I shouldn't promise. I don't know for sure. I feel like I'm gonna use the Bible at some point tonight. I'm pretty confident. But I but I will say this, the m the here's the thing.

Oftentimes you don't get to take the already with you into the not yet. There's some things of the already that once they've been accomplished, they've been accomplished. I don't talk a lot about the fivefold ministry. The reason why I don't talk about the fivefold ministry, neither does the Apostle Aaron, is not because I don't believe that my spiritual grandfather, even though he hated that language,

My spiritual grandfather in the faith, Nolan Ball, had a revelation that he was to help bring the fivefold ministry and the revelation thereof back into the church. That was in that already day. So I don't have to be called apostle now. Hallelujah So we can say already and we can put a period right there and we can say amazing job F. Nolan Ball. You are a man of courage and revelation that was willing to stand. And now what we have is we have the fruit of his sacrifice.

implemented into the way the ch the church operates now and we operate apostolically without having to call me apostle. And then interesting. Now, that in the and let me this is important. In that day the language was really important. Because the language was confronting the religious spirit that had no problem with someone being called a pastor or an evangelist or a teacher. But if you use the word apostle or prophet, you're in trouble.

W and and I'm going, why? There are far more apostles in the New Testament than there are pastors, but we love the term pastor. Think about it. There are far more prophets in the Bible than there are teachers. But we love the term teacher, and we're even somewhat comfortable with the term evangelist. But the moment you use apostle and prophet.

So you know what men like Nolan Ball did? They said, We're gonna use the terminology and if people leave the church, we're gonna use the terminology, and if they call you a cult leader, we're gonna use the terminology. And we now get to live, not reinforcing the terminology. Whoa! I feel like Jimma Jimmy Lovejoyed up in here. My knees don't go as high well they they do they go as high just walking. I honestly

You like that a lot. So so here here's the idea. We don't now have to reinforce the terminology. We get to live in the function.

Because a man dared to reinforce the terminology. But and that's just an example of where we are in the already not yet. I remember growing up in church and We were on the precipice of what you would probably maybe bring call like a Neobaptist. type expression of the church that we were in there, the Liberty, the first church that we went to under Joe Rowland. And I remember them putting hymn books up and putting a projection on the wall and people called it off the wall music. E foi o diabo.

Because we didn't have a red back hymnal in our hand turning to page three hundred eighteen singing the first and third stanza. We don't fight that today, but I'm thankful they did because they're already made room for us to move into the not yet. I remember this I I'm old. So I remember when we first started singing to Jesus. You couldn't sing directly to Jesus. You had to sing about Jesus. And I get frustrated now when we go back there.

Like stop. But we sang today in prayer about the blood. We sang for thirty minutes about the blood and we got the lamb and we keep singing about the blood. How about sing about the lamb? The the blood is only of any value because it came from the lamb. You know what I mean? And and we could sing about the blessing of God and we could sing about the favor of God, but you didn't sing to God. And I remember Buck Gaines.

Buck and Joan Gaines up there dancing like David danced before the Lord, a Baptist worship leader who had gotten filled with the Spirit, who was a mountain of a man, up there dancing like he did not care what anybody thought about him, and he's singing Who

He's singing directly to the Lord, and people can't take it because you're not supposed to do that, because it's irreverent. And who would sing to God like they had that kind of relationship with God? Buck Gaines did. And I thank God, and I'm just showing you some of my. I grew up with a pastor who was willing to become the weirdest man in our city, John Barner.

He's willing to become the weirdest man in our town. And I will never forget, I married Tammy. We moved back to my hometown, and I'm at Chick-fil-A, and John Varner's walking across the parking lot, and I realized Tammy has never met him, and I'm going, this is going to get weird.

Because you didn't have a conversation with him about the weather or the ball game. He was gonna be drunk in the spirit every minute of every hour of every day. And and and and then so I walked up to him and I said, Here's my what and he went In the Chick-fil-A parking lot, like he's been like he'd been on a three-day bender. I'm telling the truth. And and his little wife, Miss Betty, just standing there behind him, interceding for him.

Just hope building him up. Yes, Lord bless him. Give him more. Lord bless him. Give him more. And I'm thinking I'm gonna have to explain this to Tammy. I get in the car, and Tammy got tears streaming up her face. She said, Who was that man? So you had pioneers. And what they did with the already determines that you and I are getting to move toward the not yet. What we're going to have to do is we're going to have to make sure that we don't get so comfortable that we abort an evolution.

That may not be the best language, but it's how I feel. We've got to be make sure that we don't we're used to raising our hands and we're used to jumping up and down and we're used to singing out spontaneously. We've got to make sure we don't get dependent on those drums to tell us when it's time to release our sound. You gotta take that pressure off of them.

That they are not here to announce to you when it's time to lift up your sound. Love announced to you that it's always time to lift up your sound. And we got to make sure we don't get stuck in some of the already and fail to migrate toward the not yet. It is not dishonorable to move on. Maybe it's dishonorable to stay behind. Because you may be announcing to the previous generation you didn't finish this.

If if we got to march around this church with flags and declare the restoration of the five-fold ministry, it's an announcement that the people who did that failed and we got to go through the cycle again. And I don't believe they failed. I believe we are living in an apostolic expression that without even having to use the word apostle, you go to one of the most apostolic places.

on the planet on a weekly basis. And because of that we get apostolic fruit. And because of that we get apostolic teaching. And because of that we have an apostolic relationship with churches all over the place who are being impacted Not by me standing up here and telling people I'm an apostle. I understand my function, but I but I'm I'm not having to deal with the already because they dealt with the already so well.

So what does the not yet look like? If that was the already, what is the not yet? You and I are moving into. And here's the challenge with the not yet. It's not yet. That means there's a tension between what you're familiar with. Help me do this, Lord. There's a tension between what I'm familiar with and what I'm actually being invited into. And we'll take what we're familiar with as a security blanket, and it'll actually keep us from being able to enter into the not yet.

Because you don't get to take a security blanket with you. You get to take the blood of the Lamb with you that gives you access to all security by knowing this is the doing of the Lord. And one of the things we're being invited to do is say, I don't feel confident. qualified for this. I don't have enough understanding of this. I don't have enough experience of this, but I cannot miss out on what the Lord's inviting me into because it's unfamiliar to me.

The already and the not yet. So the part of the already, not yet I'm going to focus on here for the next few minutes. Uh the most challenging part of this to teach. So I'll start with that. I don't like that a tattoo artist, Brennan I had this conversation, save the most painful part for the end. When I got my tattoo sleeves, I really wish they'd have started right in here. Well some of y'all are wimps and you can get that part done, but for those of us that are real tough.

And make terrible decisions about how we're gonna decorate our skin. This this this this start don't start here'cause this feels fine. It's up in here where stuff gets gnarly. And and I think one of the th one of the tendencies to do is kind of wade you off into this and save the last part for after you've actually been acclimated. But I believe the key to the already, not yet before it is corporate.

And the key to the already, not yet before it's cosmic is that it's individual. And how do you communicate to people who are living in the fullness of the fruit of the finished work of Christ that we're in the not yet? Because when I say we're in the not yet In essence I'm communicating to you, watch this, there's more. And you and I are being invited not just to do more, we're invited to become more. But in the realm of righteousness, we can't be any more than we are.

So how do we become more If we could not possibly be any more, except we allow the areas in which we could not be any more to begin to impact the areas where we could be more. That was choppy, I know. Thank God for a recording. We can go back and listen to that again and maybe I can go back and clean it up. But I want to minister out of my spirit and saying to you, even in my personal journey, I'm recognizing the more I recognize that I could not be more righteous.

the more that begins to impact the areas in my life that don't scream forth, this guy's righteous. The more I begin to understand holiness is given to me by way of love, the more I begin to see the manifestation of holiness outwork working out in my own life. When I should have been asleep. When you are not trying to earn love, you will radiate love.

The energy you expended under an inferior expression of the gospel can now be converted to giving love away versus trying to earn love. Let me say that again. The energy you expended under an inferior expression of the gospel can That energy can now be converted to giving love away versus trying to earn love. 1 John 4, 7 says, Those who are loved by God, let his love continually pour from you to one another because God is love.

We're in the already in many ways of the revelation of beloved identity. We're moving into the not yet of how that impacts our neighbor. We're moving into the not yet of how it impacts our enemy.

Whoa. We're moving into the not yet of how it impacts people dealing with suicide and the not yet of how it impacts people with drug addiction. This this pat since January 1st through 7th, I've begun to receive multiple reports. of people who were not just saved from suicidal thoughts that night.

But I began to get emails of people who said, this is my journey. One one a man who was a worship leader in Canada came and shared the story of going to jump off the bridge and someone sent him a podcast. And he began to believe he was loved and canceled his plan to end his own life. We got we got we ha we we got an email from a man who is a PTSD survivor and was suicidal and is now teaching beloved identity to soldiers dealing with PTSD to see the power of that pain.

And the lie broken off of their lives. This these are the things the Lord's doing and you're going, Okay, so SHOW! What happens is we take the already that we've been given, and we begin to anticipate that it's going to begin to work itself out into the not yet. If you let religion take its hands on the already, religion will say the already is to get you ready for the afterlife and it's not. The already is to get you ready for the kingdom life.

that you and I were designed for, where we're able to say the works that He did and greater works we will do, because he's going to the Father and anything we ask in his name will be given to us. If any two of you would agree as touching anything on earth, these are the great promises that are in our not yet, but we're migrating from our already into our not yet.

And we we we we can't we cannot fail in that we allow ourselves to get stuck in having great services in this room. What this room is, this room is preparatory. This room is not the playing field. This room is the field house. You liked that, didn't you? You smelled the sweat right now, can't you? Huh. Nick Brown, one of our spiritual sons, a high school football coach, and he said that he teaches his kids that championships are won in the off season and champions are made in the weight room.

But that's not where championships are won, but it is where championships are. This is not where the kingdom comes, but this is where the kingdom comes. And so what's happening is you and I are experiencing the manifest presence of God, the glory of God. It's becoming an invitation into a new way to do life, a new definition of what it means to be human.

Therefore, it's extremely important to over-communicate the idea that as far as righteousness is concerned, you are fully in the not yet. It's the already. The way that works itself out into culture is in the already, not quite in the not yet. Did did you it is finished Yet there's things that need to be finished. It is finished so that things can be finished.

It is already so that you and I can have not yet. And the more faith we have in the already, the more grace we'll partner with to move into the not yet. So we will always reiterate the already because it has to do with the state you're in. Dicausine, that Greek word for righteousness, that means you're in the state you ought to be now. From there, what do you do?

Because I'm watching people get that revelation, not not so much here, but in as I as I travel. I'm watching people get the revelation of righteousness and it make them passive, lazy, and carnal. And if you the revelation of righteousness was a gateway for you to flex your carnality, you missed the point.

It's just not. It's an invitation for you and I to become more like the one who is perfectly righteous because on a cellular level, we've been made perfectly righteous as well, and we cannot afford to stop. Stop short in becoming who it is he's designed us to be. You are in the state you ought to be right now. That's 100% true. And you are becoming the fruit of the individual who knows they're in the state they ought to be right now. Righteousness should be producing change.

Righteousness should be producing maturity. The revelation of beloved identity shouldn't make you self-absorbed, it should make you other centered. That's why I'm so committed to the revelation of the people. people understanding their beloved identity because at once the core of all that constitutes your identity is that you are loved with the same nature and measure of love the Father has for his beloved son, Yeshua, that is going to change the way you look at other human beings.

It is going to change the way you honor your spouse. It's going to change the way you talk to your children. It's going to change the way that you worship when we come together. When you get this revelation inside of you, you're going to begin to be prepared for some things that listen. Without that revelation it would be unsafe for you to and handle for you to handle much of your inheritance. A twelve year old can have a baby, but it's not a good idea.

Why? Because just because things are in you does not mean that you disengage with the process of maturity. Uh well I've got it. I'm righteous. Then show it. Then grow into it. Then become the manifestation of that. I've been given Jesus shared his holiness with me. Absolutely. Then live like Jesus, because that's a pretty high standard.

And I see people who know they they know all of this and they still feel entitled and then you don't know any of it. You know all of this and you still think you're the most important person in the room, then you don't know any of it yet because you're still letting things center around you and self- Self-absorption is an announcement that you've not yet come into beloved identity because by definition that kind of love is agape, which means other centered self-giving love.

centered above yourself that you don't yet have the revelation of beloved identity. And it's it's not because something's wrong with your spouse. It's because you're still the center. And if you'll put the other in the center, it's amazing what benefit that brings to you simply by allowing yourself to not be the center of attention all the time. Man, the church is filled with entitled people.

It's fascinating how entitled people feel. And the moment that entitlement gets messed with, all of a sudden you'll see people and they'll start to withdraw because they didn't receive attention. And I want to help you right off the bat. Nothing happening in this room is about you and I receiving attention. What's happening in this room is about the Lamb of God who took away the sin of the world receiving attention. And if that makes you feel less special, good. Because we're not worshiping you.

I shared the story of my buddy. I'll share it quickly again. Of my buddy who traveled with me in my single days, in the early days uh be before I was married, I always took him with me everywhere that I went. And and and one night we were in a weird worship service in North Carolina. We weird. I mean weird the weird people would have called this weird.

And my buddy just he's just s he just he's prophetic, he's powerful, he's amazing, but he's flaky just wasn't really his thing. So he just kinda sat there through the service and the service did not go real well. So I was already um

Prickly, that's a word I've been trying to use more often. And um I was already a little prickly, so we went to dinner that night. I always mentioned I'm sure it was Applebee's appetizers at one o'clock in the morning. I don't know why revival makes you fat. If you're filled with the spirit full by your spirit, then you're gonna be fat if you're gonna be in revival.

I'm giving myself an excuse right now. And so we're sitting there at the Applebee's having high price appetizers. And and I said, Um, something wrong, man? You seemed off tonight. And he said, Well, he said, that m that worship just didn't really minister to me. And because I was feeling prickly. I said, oh my bad. I didn't know the worship was to minister to you.

And then he he could put my head in his bicep and crush it into one thousand pieces. Not to mention that he had stab wounds from having been in gangs. No, I really shouldn't have been as prickly with the guy, now that I'm thank God he loved me or he could've killed me. But he So the next morning we're in the gym and I'm going to apologize to him and he said, Don't you apologize to me.

He said, I stayed up all night with that thought. I have let myself become the center of attention. I have let my appetite control what I think needs to happen on a particular night. And I want to disengage and I'm telling you, man. And and I and I'll never forget the story. Not too long after that, I am teaching in a Syrian Orthodox Seminary.

Get you one of those sometime if you get a chance. I'm teaching in a Syrian Orthodox seminary. They are swinging incense, and they are giving the liturgy in Latin, and that big boy was on his knees with tears streaming down his face. I knew in that moment he got it. And don't listen, I did this the other day. I'm going to keep doing it again. If they're up here trying to decide what song to do next, I don't have Jack to do with you.

Go after God, man. We're we're you're we're waiting on them to tell us what's gonna happen next. Do you remember the Ray Hughes dream? The dream I had when I first moved here about Ray Hughes was this stage was floating. And the Lord said, don't worry about what's happening on the stage. The water in the room will lift the stage.

You me and you are the water in the room. I'm not looking for them to tell me how to minister to the Lord. I want to make their job so easy because I'm coming out here pouring my guts out in thanksgiving that I have been made the righteousness of God in Christ.

And I am not going to have to have my favorite song in order for me to engage. This is not about ministering to me. I don't have to have the drums. I don't have to make him almost to the point of physical death by the time he walks out of the room after three hours because you and I needed some of this. Let's grow in this revelation and we can't wait to pour oil on his feet and we don't care if it's a slow song or a fast song or a track playing over the sound system because this is about Jesus.

And I believe that revelation helps us get into some of the not yet. Not yet. Not yet. This this worship is not supposed to look like upper room. God didn't call you to upper room. It's not supposed to look like Bethel. God didn't call you to Bethel. I didn't go to Canada and try to make their worship look like our worship. That's not who God called there. They've been called there. What you and I have been called to do is

So come ready to pour thanksgiving on the feet of Jesus that this is not about our preferences anymore. It's about his glory. And as we engage with that, I'm telling you why this is important. One of the areas I've most seen people get stuck, and I won't say this in an addendum to that, and even eliminated, is the inability to worship. I'm not talking about singing songs. I'm talking about adoration to Jesus. I'm talking about the hours you can spend just in his presence.

and you don't have to have your mind distracted by what you're reading or what you're looking at on your phone or who you're having a conversation. It's you're just able to just go vertical and stay in that place of the presence of the Lord. And you're going to have to go through some days where that's not easy. But champions are made in the weight room. All right. And so that's that's the I I heard Bill Johnson say years ago, he said he God spoke to him watching Rocky.

And the Rocky uh movie that so impacted his life was the one after Rocky had now been the multi te multi-time heavyweight champion of the world. Right? I'm sure Fulcher can give us the details. on that. And so he's a he's a boxing encyclopedia. He's a walking boxing encyclopedia. It's fascinating. And he he he he so he's he's got this posh gym now. He lives in this mega mansion house.

and he's training, but he's not getting the breakthrough that he wants to get the breakthrough. And he realized the way you get the breakthrough is you're gonna have to go back to the old gym. You've gotten too comfortable.

And you're gonna have to go back to the old gym where it's cold. And you're gonna go back to the old gym where it's hot. And you go back to the old gym where everything's not taken care of for you. And I feel the Lord inviting some of us to come back to the place where we make sure what we're giving is costly and not casual.

Make sure that we're not waiting on the drums. We did it three times tonight. We waited on the drums to tell us it was time to get excited. You don't need the drums to tell you when it's time to get excited. The cross tells you when it's time to get it. to get excited. The icon up here is not an instrument, it's a man.

Oh gee. Who is the Christ who when he's at the center, something in you wants to give your best a hundred percent of the time. And and the more irrelevant what's going on on that stage becomes to me, the more engaged I am. This is not We're not trying to create a new expression of worship. We're trying to worship. Let me go back and say that again. We're not trying to create a new expression of worship. We're trying to worship.

We're learning to worship. We're not looking for the next fad. We're not looking to be on the cutting edge of what the fresh new worship movement is because some of that has just got entirely too much concert DNA for it to even be considered worship. If it's making celebrities who show up on the red carpet Then we might be missing the point of what worship is,'cause it's not about you getting a trophy for how well you worshiped.

The trophy doesn't go to the worshiper. The trophy goes to the one that's being worshipped. And when the glory is being given to Jesus, it shifts things.

I want us to understand the significance of what the Lord is doing in us as individuals and understand worship as a central part of our process of maturation. For about a generation and a half, the Western church missed that and they expected maturation to come through disciples. And they miss the maturation that only comes through worship. It doesn't mean I'm anti-discipleship. It means if you were worshiping well, it would take less practical infrastructure for you to grow.

They created the blueprints for the New Testament church without the New Testament. Did you hear what I just said? They didn't read a verse about elders and put elders in place. They heard a word about elders and put elders in place. They didn't read a verse about deacons. That's what we're always doing. We always want to go to the playbook. They had the spirit.

I said to somebody I said to somebody recently on a phone call, I said, I'm convinced some people if you ask them if they were on a desert island, would they rather have the Bible or the Holy Spirit, they picked the Bible. Because that doesn't require relationship. If you wanted to engage with the Holy Spirit on the island, you might have to be holy.

So you can read a book all day long and not have anything of holiness anywhere within your zip code. Doesn't mean there's something wrong with the book. It just means they didn't have the Bible. That's right. But they got the New Testament. They got the new covenant. They got an understanding of the significance of what had taken place. Therefore, they moved away from the already of the old covenant.

Into the not yet. And you'll watch them in the New Testament. This is interesting. You watch them wrestle with trying to bring some already with them. Yeah. Some people have said the book of James should be a part of the Old Testament.

What is he trying to do? I'm trying to take some of the I did not say that by the way, so don't send me an email. But but but but that we just tried to take some of the new and this is what I say, we're gonna go back and now we're gonna make these Gentiles be circumcised.

And they're going, no, no, no, we need to have a medium. Meeting. And the first ecumenical council is held, and they're saying, uh, should we require the Gentiles to be circumcised? And this is what they came up with in the first ecumenical council. Abstain from sexual immorality. Don't eat food that's been

Mingled with blood, sacrificed to idols. This is this is this is what they're you look around and you're going, What what about the whole circumcision thing? They didn't even uh mention circumcision. They said there's somebody trying to bring their already into mind not yet. They're trying to bring their already into my not yet. This happened when we when we did away with the tithe.

And people go, Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, if we don't tell people how much they're supposed to give. And I'm going, I don't want anybody in my life that sits down and calculates the minimum every week. How can you look at what Jesus has done for us and sit down and calculate the minimum? Some of you have dreams of living off 10% and giving 90% away.

Some of you have those kind of dreams of I want to I'd you know what I'd like to do? I'll I'd live off 1% and give 99% away. First of all, you have no idea how rich you would be if you did that. You'd have the most happening one percent of anybody who's ever lived in the history of mankind, right? Because that's the way that the kingdom works. But what we're what we're wanting to do is we're wanting to wean people. off of bringing some of the already into the not yet.

And bringing some of the already into the not yet is is it has the potential to stunt our growth because we're moving into, I don't know how this wasn't supposed to primarily be about worship, but it's turning that way.

What we're doing in worship. is we are stripping people of the accoutrements of entertainment. by them just being up there playing. You know, it's I never thought I'd see this today, but when we left Canada, they said we have one request. Pl please bring back Rudy. That's what they said. Please, would you see if Rudy would come with you? I said, first of all, I know he has a passport. They don't understand that we don't all have passports.

So they were like, You think some people are gonna come from your church? I said, It probably ninety percent of my church probably doesn't have a passport. And they said, Why didn't they have a pet like something's wrong with it? Why don't they have a passport? I said,'cause we ain't in such a hurry to leave our country. We we got we got we got it we got beaches, mountain, west coast, east coast, whatever you want.

So they so if it was if I lived in that weather, you'd doggone right I'd have a passport. I'd get a new one every three weeks. But they said, bring Rudy, and I'm going, think of, think of, think of, would you think of how far we've come. Would you ever have said I mean Aaron Bra you have Aaron Brackens goes to our church. That's my spirit animal. Aaron Brackens is my spirit animal.

And she goes to our church and Matt and Paige Putman go to our church and CJ goes to our church and you I mean you think th think about the vocalists that we have. Tina Lovejoy goes to our church.

I I love to remind my spiritual. I'll pull them to the side sometimes as struggling with praise and worship and got somebody can halfway singing, playing a upright piano with a microphone shoved in the top of it, somebody hitting on the snare drum, and I'll put my arm around him in one of our services. I say, pray the Lord send me some worship. I did that to my brother one time. He said, I hate you.

Because the Lord so blessed us with so many gifts, but they said, bring Rudy back. Why? Rudy is the representative of the not yet. Where it's not just vocalists now, it's the sound of a horn. It's what would have been complimentary in other seasons becomes predominant when you've got a group of people who don't have to have words on the wall for their heart to engage.

And so what I feel this is so beautiful because what I feel the Lord inviting us into in worship is I feel the Lord inviting us into this place where we're saying, I need less and less and less. entertainment in order to fully engage in the place of my heart. And I think that's some of our not yet.

That's some of our not yet. You'll you have people that get and I understand it, I get it, but I we'll have people that that that will be frustrated if they come in from out of town and I don't teach. I understand that because if I went to Bethel And Bill Johnson didn't teach how to be I'm not saying I'm Bill Johnson, by the way. We we got a ways to go. But I d but I but but I would I would I would want to hear him teach, yet at the same time, how do you stop what's happening

all the time in order to just teach and sometimes you go, I'm I'm I'm letting I'm wanting to preach before the Lord and worship myself. One of the reasons I moved from worshiping here to worshiping here is because there were less distractions for me. And if I you're gonna worship in this church I'd rather be surrounded by kids than adults anyway because they're leading the whole thing to start with.

So I just jump up in there in the middle of it with him and just start going after the Lord and I'm able to he see his face clearly, lead from that space where I feel like the Lord's doing. Let me let me let me let me just I'm just I wanna I wanna bless our worship team for I wanna I wanna I wanna bless you guys to lead us into the not yet. And I want to say to you, we're going to give you the gift of going there, even if it doesn't look like the already.

Well, I bless you. Lead us, and we'll if you'll lead us, we'll follow, and we won't be codependent in our following. But we'll bring our oil with us. We'll help that platform float and we're gonna get into some expressions of the glory of God. We're gonna get into some sounds. We're gonna get in some places where you can't tell if it's heaven's musician or ours. You can't tell which dimension the sound is coming from, which realm it's coming from. That work

well when you're living that lifestyle at home, when you're living that lifestyle in the vehicle. I was in prayer in my office today leading up to this and I said, Lord, what do you want me to tell the people? He said, tell the people that I'm ordaining their vehicles as rolling sanctuary. I'm gonna ordain your vehicle as a rolling sanctuary. So if you normally listen to the news, turn the news off. If you normally

Listen to the sports broadcast or the stock market report or whatever it is, turn that off. If even if it's normally where you make your phone calls, rearrange things and make your phone calls somewhere else. Because the Lord said, I'm gonna ordain people's vehicles.

as rolling sanctuaries where they can't wait to get in their car because they're going to have encounters with me as they sit down in that vehicle. I I this I was reminded of this. The Lord blessed us to be able to give a vehicle away. And in the w the vehicle that I gave away was not most em important to us because of the type of vehicle it was, but because it's the vehicle that I had used to transport myself back and forth in revival in the panhandle and also in Chattanooga.

And we were uh Judah was having issues with his truck, so we were getting it worked on. So so they some they said, You can you wanna use your old vehicle and when I got back in there, as soon as I sat down I began to cry. And I could remember the smell of that V I remember the encounters I had with the Lord driving for hours, drive finishing the Panhandle meetings and driving through the night so I could get back to Chattanooga.

finishing Chattanooga and driving through the night and going driving back home to Salute, pick the family up. And it was almost as if the Lord was reminding me of that today to say, I want to make, I want you to make your vehicles rolling sanctuaries where you encounter the Spirit of the Lord. That is crucial to how to what we encounter corporately. If you're growing in your one-on-one encounters into the from the already into the not yet.

If your personal worship is going from the already to the not yet. If let me say, if in personal intimacy you're going from already to not yet, when we gather corporately, we will go from already to not yet. But remember it's what you you have a different role here in that you don't come as the audience to experience praise and worship. You cause the stage to float.

You're responsible for the water in the room. Therefore, if all they do I look sometimes at Tina, Tina's always got her back to us. I look sometimes at Tina and she's doing this thing with her hand and I realize that's as important as if she was lifting her voice. Because her hand is witnessing to me. She's having a personal engagement with the Father in that moment that is independent from whatever responsibilities she has.

And I want to say they don't have more responsibility in worship than you and I have in worship. And if we'll personally travel from the already into the not yet, we will corporately naturally travel from the already into the not yet. But the corporate meeting is not to take you somewhere that you're unwilling to go when you're alone.

It's to reinforce grace for you to be able to experience what you're designed to experience when you're outside of this room. What's happening in this room is unlike anything I know of. And that's a sign to me there's something happening when you're alone that's unlike anything I know of. So I want to say to you, keep fueling the flames there, keep fanning the flames there, and we'll keep experiencing corporate breakthrough together. Already? Not yet.

I am And some not yet in twenty twenty six that I wasn't in in twenty twenty five. What I'm learning is I have a t propensity, person, this is personality. I have a propensity to take the already as a life raft. Yeah. I do. And and one of the reasons why is because because the way my mind works, I understand the already. And I don't understand the not yet. But I'm not supposed to understand the not yet yet. Let me say it.

I'm supposed to trust what I do not yet understand, so that I can understand what I do not yet understand, so that eventually the not yet will become the already, which gives me grace to move into the not yet. And that's Isaiah sixty five. We're we're not going to jump from where we are to immortality.

We're gonna take a step from the already to the not yet, the already to the not yet. Now, now some will get untethered from corruption more quickly because in their personal life they're moving from the already to the not yet. But the enemy to the not yet can become the already. And I watch people, even when the presence of the Lord is moving, and they don't know what to do, what do you immediately reach for? Familiar. Every time.

And I'm not not I don't mean that as a criticism, but I do mean it as a critique. Maybe we just go on in. Maybe we just instead of thinking it sure is neat how the Lord's loving on these kids, maybe we get jealous. In a righteous way. To say, no, no, this is supposed to be about one generation commending your kingdom to another generation. And if they're having those kind of encounters, I want to have those kind of encounters. And that becomes provocational. Let me let me close out with this.

Beloved, first John, we are God's children right now. Already. However, it is not yet apparent what we will become not yet. Yet when he is revealed as he truly is, we will be like him. The already is his child. The not yet is his grown child. The and don't stop with being a child of the king. Stop with being a king. Who gave up childhood, who said when I was a child, I fought as a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

Galatians 4 said, The heir differeth not at all from a servant, even though he's Lord of all, but he's under guardians and stewards until the time appointed of the Father. So this is what happens. The the the child of the slave and the child of the king can grow up together in the same house until one comes to the state of maturity of recognizing I don't my parents don't work here. They own this place.

And I have a di I can't continue to live as an offspring of slavery. I have a different measure of grace I need to partner with. so that I can grow into the fullness of the stature, which is what Ephesians four says the fivefold ministry is supposed to be doing anyway, is helping you and I reach a state of maturity.

So that we can leave the immature already behind and engage more fully with the not yet. That is you and I being able to look face to face with him, I think we'll eventually migrate away from pouring oil on his feet. John got to his breast. John laying his head on his breast was not an inferior expression to the woman pouring oil on his feet. He's looking for face to face. Ruth starts at Boaz's feet.

But we don't ever get the offspring of David unless Ruth moves beyond David's feet. I mean, unless Ruth moves beyond Boaz's feet. Who have a child named Obed, who has a ha a child named Jesse, who has a child named David. And so what's happening is the Lord is even in this expression of worship. I know this is a lot of teaching tonight, but the Lord is even in this expression of worship. Here's where I can get caught. That's super comfortable now. That's the thousand dollar check.

Or for some it may be the hundred dollar check or the five I don't mean it in a like a a money flex. That's not what I'm doing when I say that. That's the thousand dollar check. The drums build and we all go nuts. It doesn't I'm I'm not saying stop doing that. I'm saying we're gonna get to the place where that won't have to be the signal. Vessoil. And before the sound even starts and before they even pick a song and before

There's still a little there's a little lapse when we stop the track and they begin to play. Why? Because we're waiting to see what's going to happen. And the real worshiper doesn't wait to see what's going to happen. The real worshiper is helping determine what's going to happen because I've come to pour oil on his feet. Fill it?

Beloved, we are God's children right now. Awesome. We're children of God. We've been making that declaration. That's a great starting point and a terrible stopping point. You're not meant to be a child the rest of your life. I don't identify myself as Ike and Anita Thompson's child. I'm their son. I was a child, but when I became a man I put away childishness and began to grow into the fullness of the expression now where I am not dependent on them to provide for me, I provide for them.

That's how it's supposed to be. I'm not that's not I'm not something special because of that. There's an entire thing there's an entire th deal in the Bible where there's a group of people who are not financially taking care of their parents and they are being rebuked because they're saying the reason with the Pharisees don't take care of their parents financially Salah. So what happens is the father's beginning to say, come on up.

Don't become experts on the already and get so comfortable that you don't move toward the not yet. And I think one of the first places that's gonna show up is worship and you would think that normally this this th you know, what what are we gonna do from here? We're gonna worship. I know it's eight twenty eight, that's okay. It's also Friday night. Mama got on her leather pants. It's Friday night. With the worship team you guys will come back up おだまし This is helpful tonight?

Sometimes there are nights where he's going to help grow us up. And he kind of gives us a uh some some necessary revelation to help us grow into the not yet that we were designed for. I want to tell you something. I knew when I moved here. I knew when I moved here. That there would come a day. where we will begin to see a great convergence with mine and Apostle Aaron's revelation.

I knew for a season it would almost seem like some of the revelation he carries would be shelved, but it wasn't being shelved. It was it was growing in him. And you and I are growing to the place where we can begin to hear something. Begin to receive some things and begin to understand some things that that many many heard it and were not mature enough to understand it and they went a thousand different directions.

but to have a new wineskin that's ready to receive some mysteries and ready to sit receive of the not yet. This man is a carrier of the not yet. He's carrying in more ways than you could even unknow or understand. He's carrying the not yet. And what the Spirit of the Lord is doing is the Spirit of the Lord is preparing a group of people to have enough infrastructure to be able to hold the weight of the fruit of the not yet without it bringing destruction. This is holy, man.

When you feel that right now, just engage. Just engage with your heart. Don't wait. Again, we're not waiting. We're not waiting. The platform does. With worship right now that we're gonna do it. Giving him praise.