The Cost Of Going Off (Robert Madu)

just the highest honor to be here. How many know you are a part of the greatest church on the planet, Like y'all are crazy blessed. And I'm not just saying that as a matter of fact. The reason Pastor Stephen is not here and Passor Holly's not here in the sum of the team is Elevation Nights are happening right now in so many different cities. And if you need empirical evidence for how awesome this church is, you realize people across the nation are paying to pack out arenas

for what you get for free. Earth y'all are crazy blessed, and that's a gift that should not be taken for granted. I pray you never take this church for granted. How pray you never take your pastors for granted, or two of the greatest people, not just leaders, but people on the planet. So right now, in case they're watching, which I have the strain suspicion they might be, can we let pastors Stephen and Holly Ferdick know how much we love them, how much we appreciate them. Come on, y'all

can do better than that across every location. E fam, help me thank God for your pastors, for your leaders. I absolutely positively love them so much. I bring you greetings from the great country of Texas and my wife Taylor, she sends her love. She is holding down the fort at home. A year ago, in fact, we just celebrated our one year anniversary. We planted a church called Social Dallas, and we're seeing God do incredible things. But here's another

thing you need to know about your pastors. A year ago, when we launched out to plant this church, one of the first checks that we ever received, as we were just stepping out on faith, was from your pastor saying, I believe in you and I'm sowing in to you. Come on, you have an incredibly generous leader, and he just did it, didn't put on TikTok and nothing, just just blessed us. And I love them so much and

counted the privilege to be here. And I can't wait to preach the word if you're ready to hear it yet, you come to get a word from God, and he telling me if you feel like hearing it like I feel like preaching it, it's gonna be good in here today. I want you to go with me to Second Kings today, Second King chapter five, and I want to look at verses one through four, and then we'll hop down to verse number nine and go to verse fourteen. The Second

King's chapter five, starting at verse number one. When you're ready to read it, say yeah. If you're not ready, you need some time to find this, say hold on, I heard those hold ups. I'm away for you. I'm away for you. I know that's Old Testament's stressful for somehow. Second King's Chapter five, And I really believe this is a word for somebody who's in this place watching online, but this is a word for our culture, and I

know it's going to speak to you. Starting at verse number one, it says, now Naman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master, and highly regarded because through him the lord had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy. Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served

Nayman's wife. She said to her mistress, if only my master would see the prophet who was in Samaria, he would cure him of his leprosy. Namon went to his master and told him what the young girl from Israel had said. Verse nine it says, so Naman went with his horses and his cheerios, and stopped at the door of Elisha's house. And Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, go wash seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored, and you will be cleansed.

But Namon went away angry and said, whom I thought, those two words right there are the tension in the entire text. I thought, come on, just us talking. Have you ever got in trouble or got frustrated or agitated or angry? Not over what happened in your life, but over what you thought was gonna happen and what actually happened. Come on, I'm the only one like I thought you were coming to help me, you actually coming to hurt me. Yeah,

I thought I was getting a raise. Oh y'all firing me? Okay, okay, I thought that you were about to propose. Wait a minute, you're breaking up with me. Come on, am I the only one has ever gotten frustrated or angry, not because of what was happening, but because of a preconceived notion and idea of what you thought. He said, I thought he would surely come out to me and stand and calling the name of the Lord is God, and wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy?

Are not a bana and far part in the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn't not wash in them and be cleansed? So he turned and went off in a rage. The name and servant went to him and said, my father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you

not have done it? How much more then, when he tells you to wash and be cleansed, so he went down and dipped himself in the Jordans seven times, as the Man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy. Can you say, a man, I love this passage. But what got my attention is that when Nayman gets the prescription for his healing that will stop the leprosy, his immediate reaction was anger, and the Bible says that he

turned and went off. He went off. I want to appreciate to you today at Elevation Church for about five and a half hours, using this as a title, The Cost of going off, The Cost of going off, quick sermonic disclaimer. If you have never gone off or been tempted to go off, I don't have a message for you today. If you have never ever been tempted to

go off on somebody. If you have never responded to an email or a text message with all caps, if you have never had somebody say something so sideways to you that your nose began to flare, and your eyebrows got furled, and your heart began to palpitate. If you have never been driving behind somebody that was driving so crazy that you had to pull up next to them at the stop like just to look at them. You ain't never done that. I ain't gonna work for you today.

Just gone go home? Love offee fail you've ever gone off, had rage or anger? I want to talk to you today. This is gonna be good. Would you bow your heads? Let's pray along. Prayer God, you are awesome, speak today? Amen. Are there are there any parents in the house today? Any parents? Can I see your hand? Come all the parents? Make some noise? Been trying something different? Are there are there any single people with our kids in the house? Y'all make some noise? Do you notice the difference in

the screens? See the reason y'all gotta all that NLC Because you ain't in the fight of your life. You don't know the pains. You don't know the struggle it is to raise little humans. You don't know what we're going through. Of course you can wow because you don't know. Parents. I had y'all scream first because I need to see what my support group is today. Can't we be honest parents that there is nothing more challenging. There was nothing

more daunting. Yes, this rewarding, but there was nothing more daunting than parenting, trying to raise little humans. I have often said, often said that if you're struggling to have a prayer life, have some kids. Just have some kids, and I promise you will pray real quick. If you want to be an intercessor, then just have a bunch of kids. And I'm telling you will learn how to call on the name of the Father, the Son, and

the Holy Spirit. You will make a trip to Costco and get a big bottle of annoint to oil ats find you a prayer closet, because parenting it is the fight of your life. I'm telling you this because I know. I know. Let me show you my family. We have three little humans, we have three kids. Can you put up that picture of my family. I want you to see. I want you to see my family. There it is right there. That's my bride and those are our kids. Watch the ages here we go, seven, six and four. Yeah,

pray for your boy. Pray for your boy. It's not just their ages. Those are the times that they wake up throughout the night. And I'm in the fight of my life. And I'll be honest with you today, I'm scared. I'm scared a little bit because there's nothing more that I fear. There's nothing more that I fear than then projecting onto these little humans my own idiosyncrasies and my own deficiencies, Like I don't want my crazy to cap their capacity, you know, I want them to be all

that God has created and called them to be. It is. It is challenging to raise children. And shout out to all y'all if you got teenagers too, who hadn't even got to that stage yet, that's a whole another thing right there. You realize in the Bible, in the Bible, we only hear about Jesus from birth to twelve and then boom, he shows up on the sand at age thirty. Even the Bible don't even tell you about Jesus teenage years just like are you on, y'awn. It's a challenge.

It's a challenge to parent. And so uh, I pray, I call on the name of the Lord, and I also look for resources to read. And I was recently reading a book and the title of the book was Parenting from the inside Out, Parenting from the inside out, And what the book postulates is that parenthood can and will trigger the unprocessed emotions of your childhood. Parenthood can

and will trigger the unprocessed emotions of your childhood. So what the book says is that if you can heal the child that's in every parent, then that parent will produce healthier children. So this is the book that I'm reading before I take my youngest to kindergarten. First, this is what I'm reading before I take him to his

kindergarten class. And I'll never get it. I walk into the K five class and his teacher's there, and I'm looking through the room, and all of a sudden, I saw something in the corner that I've never seen in the classroom before. I saw this small whiteboard and all these little markers, and I asked the teacher, I said, what is that. She said, that is the calm down corner. Say excuse me, she said, that is the calm down corner.

She said. These kids are young, their brains are still developing to sometimes their emotions get the best of them, and whenever they're having a moment, they can go to the calm down corner and pick out whatever colors they want and they can process their emotions on the board. She said, that's the calm down corner. And as soon as she said it, I asked her, are these just for the kids or can parents us to calm down corner? A be honest and this climate we live in, I

need a calm down corner. Oh, don't look at me like that. You need a calm down corner. As a matter of fact, I think our world right now needs a calm down corner. So is it just me? Does it seem like everybody is on edge? Everybody is going off? Everybody these patients has worn thin. Fact, I was studying for this message and I saw this article, and I love the title of this article. It says that watch this that adults are throwing tantrums in restaurants, planes, and

at home. Blame the pandemic, they said, now more than ever in our world, at restaurants, at airlines, the customer service industry doesn't know what to do. They're calling in for extra security because everybody is on edge, everybody's going off, everybody's blowing up. All of us went through a trauma collectively called a pandemic. And you are naive if you don't understand how that's affecting your emotions and what's triggering

you and what's making you go off. So today I'm going to ask you a question that maybe a preacher's never ask you in church today. I want to know who how's your anger? How's your anger? What I love about this message today is that nobody can dismiss this message. I don't care what campus you're at, I don't care who you are, where you're watching this from. You cannot dismiss this message because I want to talk about anger, and then what comes to anger. Anger is a universal emotion. Yeah,

this is the message. You can say, Oh, I know three people that need this, I'm gonna send it to them. No, no, no, no no. Anger is a universal emotion. When it comes to the issue of anger, the question is not if you are going to get angry. The question is when you get angry, what are you going to do when those feelings of rage well up inside of you? Oo house your anger? Today, everybody has to face this message today. As a matter of fact, you came in the world angry.

Oh yes, not a single baby came into the world calm and collected, saying I'm not gonna yell. I would just slic some milk right now, please. No, you came into the world going screaming and raging, and now we're doing it as adults. What are we gonna do about this issue of anger? Look at your neighbors, say, I know this for you today. I know this is for you today. What do you do? What do you do when you get angry? Let's talk about it. We're just talking.

What do you do when you get angry? Do you yell? You kick? You scream? You punch a hole in the wall? Who use profanity? Because don't answer? What? No? What? No? For? What do you do when you get out? You explode? Oh? Do you leave? Do you leave? Your stormtroopers? Just let you? Oh, don't stay at home? Shelters mess up by y'all stormtroopers because you couldn't go outside, you had nowhere to go. What do you do? Do you just go off and yell? I want to talk first to all of you erupts eruptors. Yeah,

because y'all listening to this message. Erupts, erupts, y'all are crazy, because whenever y'all get mad, we know about it, and we know it quickly. Because you explode, eruptors, y'all go off. You will throw a staple across the cubicle. You will throw a chair, you erupt and eruptors, y'all are funny because after you go off, you look back at yourself, once you've calmed down for a minute, and you go, oh, my goodness, did I just do that? Did I just do that? Did I just walk up on stage and slap?

Did I do that? Did I just what did I? Because once you come down, you realize what in the world did I just do? And I laugh at y'all. I laughed at y'all because you are crazy. You are crazy because you understand it is impossible for you to function and wisdom and anger at the same time. The a lot the Book of Proverbs. The Book of Proverbs is replete with scriptures about anger, about anger and how you handle it. I love this verse in Proverbs fourteen.

It says people with understanding control their anger. A hot temper shows great foolishness. Translation, you are craig ray when you get angry. And I laugh at you erupts when you explode. I judge you erupts when you explode. I do you know why, Because I'm not an erupt I am what you call a stuffer and stuffers we are different than those erupters because stuffers whenever we get mad, we don't kick, we don't yell, we don't scream, We just calmly say. Even when you ask us, are you mad,

we will look at you and go, no, I'm not mad. No, No, I'm fine, I am fine, It's okay. It happens. And all while we're saying it, we are ruminating and rehearsing over every single thing that you did. We cannot believe you had the nerve and the audacity to do it. And we are smiling telling you I'm fine. But all the while we are pushing it down into the basement of our soul until it becomes a cantanguerous cesspool of bitterness, and we will isolate and pull away a mom all

while we're smiling and saying I'm fine. Oh, and stuffers might be worse than eruptors because all that stuffing. Your physical body can't even handle the stuffing. Do your research. Scientists and the medical community will tell you that anger does more damage to your physical body than grief or anxiety. Anger will give you a heart attack, Anger will destroy your nervous system, Anger will mess up your blood pressure, anger will aid you. Oh yeah, you can forgive bout

all that exfoliation. Just keep getting mad. You'll mess up your skin and your life. Stuffing down the anger and even erupters, and even stuffers become erupts. So I have the inevitability of anger, and I can't rupt, and I can't stuff, Then what do I do with it? If it's coming? I've learned that anger it's much like having a toddler in the car how me. You know you don't want that toddler behind the steering wheel eruptors. You

also don't want that toddler in the trunk stuffers. What you want is to put that toddler in a car seat, buckled in and periodically check in the rearview mirror to make sure it is in its proper place. God says, I want you to use that emotion that I gave and created, anger to be in its proper place. Anger has a proper place. But if anger is not in its proper place, hear me, you will destroy your destiny. You will mess up the call of God on your life.

You will forfeit your purpose if you don't get your anger in its proper place. You don't believe me. Ask Moses, who missed out on a promised land that he was able to see but not enter into. Why because of the frustration, the agitation that made him go off. I'm wondering today, are you forfeiting your promise because you haven't put anger in its proper place? I love the Apostle Paul. Y'all good. I love the Apostle Paul and Ephesian chapter four.

The Apostle Paul, in brevity, actually gives us the biblical worldview of anger. In Ephesian chapter four, verse twenty six. What Paul says, he says, be angry and do not sin. He says, do not let the sun go down on your wrath. In other words, when it comes to anger from a Biblical perspective, the goal is not to get rid of the anger. God does not call for you to just stop getting angry. No, because he just said, be angry still a holy ghost. Two step on that

right there. You can get angry, he said, But don't let that anger lead you to sin. In other words, anger has its proper place because if you never get angry about anything, then you don't love anything. You don't love anything. As a matter of fact, if you want to check what you really love, watch what you get angry about. Whatever you get angry about is the sign of the thing that you really love. If you care about your image, anytime somebody attexts your image, you're gonna

explode because that's what you love. Whatever you love is the thing that will get a reaction out of you and get angry. So Christians aren't called to not have anger. As a matter of fact, gusts, I want you to have anger, but use anger in its proper place. As a matter of fact, there are things we should see in the world that actually make us angry. We should be angry about poverty. We should be angry about injustice, we should be angry about people who are abused and marginalized.

But we shouldn't get angry just to get angry. We should get angry and say, God, I'm gonna be a light in the midst of darkness. I'm gonna do something about it. I'm gonna make a change in the earth. God, you didn't call me to just come to church and listen to sermons and same songs off a screen like it's Christian karaoke. No, you called me to bring the Kingdom on Heaven into the earth and affect every sphere of society and that step into let that anger push

you to do something. Oh, don't you forget your God? That one day cleared a whole temple because they were making it difficult for people to worship God. And he said, don't you know my house will be a house of prayer. Don't you ever stop people from coming in the house of God and lifting up my name. I will turn over tables and kick people out. I get angry sometime, so this is not a call to passivity. Doll says, you can get angry, but make sure that anger is

in its proper place. Woo. Anger is interesting because what makes you angry doesn't make me angry. What makes her angry doesn't make her angry. This is what triguing about anger is that it is ubiquitous, but it is unique. And that's why you have to understand it. Because a lot of people will think, well, if they hadn't said it, I wouldn't have done it. Now they don't want to cut me off. Now you saw I could have died, and then the fundy whenever you get angry about someonever

you go off. We always try to blame the external factors, but if it's really the external factor. How come what made you go off didn't make somebody else go off. See, this is what we don't understand that anger is a secondary emotion. Whenever somebody goes off, it's really about what they're going off about. It's always something deeper. As a matter of fact, when it comes to anger, you can't look at anger. You have to look under it because

there's always something deeper. Which brings me to my text today. Who all of that was intro? I'm confused. I'm confused about naming because this is a man who has a leprosy, the incurable skin disease of leprosy, the disease that there is no cure, the disease that starts off in your skin and spreads all over your entire body. A disease that had social ramifications because as soon as you had it, you had to isolate yourself from people. You had to

tell people, I'm unclean. You were stripped away from your family, you were stripped away from everybody you loved, and there was no cure for it. This is what Naman has and the prophet Elisha says. For you to be cured and healed, all you gotta go do is take seven dips in the Jordan River. That's the cure. And his reaction to the cure. What is to go off in

a range? Come on, contextualize it. Can you imagine going to the doctor's office and you got a call and doctor says that it's not a big deal, he's just gonna have to take this medicine. Go to nurses station. She'll give you a prescription two times a day. And you walk out the doctor's office grabs two times a day. Are you serious, Namen? Shouldn't you be more concerned about the hill? What are you going off about? Don't look

at anger? Look under him? And I think the blues clue to Naman's anger and his rage is in the very first verse. It says that Naman was highly regarded. He was a commander in the army. Naman had the thing that everybody in our world seems to be fighting for, name and had status. Who naming was the man? This was not a regular dude. Please understand, Naming was the man that everybody when they walked in a room, they said, there is, there is, there is, Oh my godness, do

you think I'll take a picture this? What's the name? And he was on the cover of every wheaties box. He is the one that every kid wanted to be like, every man desired to be like every woman wanted name it, naming what's the man? He had status. He had a blue check next to his name, naming was the man and the Bible lets you know right up front about his status and who he was. And I think his status is connected to his rage. Isn't it funny today

that everybody seems to be obsessed with status. Oh, everybody wants to either be the somebody, beat the somebody, or be connected to the somebody. Everybody wants status. Everybody wants to be known. Everybody wants to be the person that everybody looks at and goes, oh, there they are. We are obsessed with status. If you don't believe it, talk to a kid today. There used to be a time in the history of a world. You talk to a kid, you said, what do you want to be when you

grow up? They'll tak you firemen, school teacher. Ask the kid today. They don't care famous, just name. Do you see my TikTok video? We're just famous. They don't care. Whatever will get views, they will climb on crates, they will go crazy in the class, do a prank. As long as I can get some status, as long as

I can get acknowledged. Not just kids, adults too, thinking if I just got that house, if I just got that job, I would be somebody, because we buy into the live that if I just reached that place, whatever that place is, then maybe I won't have any issues. Maybe I won't have any problems. But Naming is a beautiful picture that status and success does not stop suffering.

As a matter of fact, when you get successful, you have to be careful because success has a way of sedating you to the point that whenever you go through suffering, it's generally not the suffering that destroys you. It's the fact that you don't think you should be going through what you're going through. Oh, Naming had the status. Naming was the man until one day he came home, perhaps after fighting the battle, and he's in the bathroom and

he takes off his armor. You know how you do when it's just you and the house in the bathroom, he's looking in the mirror. Who's the man? Name Man, who's the man? Namen? You know how you do when it's just you by yourself, and as he's looking and flexing, perhaps he turns his back to go to his steam shower and he sees us a spot on this again, and the moment he sees the spot, he knows what it is. Perhaps he falls to his knees in his bathroom trying to figure out, how can I be such

a valiant soldier? And now I've gotten let proceed? How did this happen to me? How do I have a spot? Can I tell you? One of the first things I saw in this text that you have to get today is that everybody's got a spot. Everybody's got a spot. I don't care how much money you have. I don't care how saved you are. You could have floated into

a campus and had manner for breakfast. Every single person has a spot, some area in your life that makes you get on your knees and say God, I need you, some area in your life that makes you say, God, what is wrong with me? How can I be so oh good over here? But I got this issue over here. Everybody's got a spot, and don't let anybody's success for you. Isn't it crazy? How you can be so good in the boardroom horrible at home, so good with balancing the budget,

but can't stop over eating. You can communicate to thousands, but then not communicate to the one person that you love. Every single person has gotten a spot. That's why biblically, leprosy is a metaphor for sin, because it is an issue that starts in your flesh. It starts eating itself. And all of us had issues with our flesh, things that we say, God, you are not through with me yet. Everybody's God a spot. And now this warrior is weeping

because he's got a spot. And perhaps his wife comes in and sees her husband for the first time in the fetal position, crying, Gord, what is wrong. But before she touches him, she sees it and she says, it's okay, baby, it hasn't spread it yet. It's okay, it's okay. We'll do something. Just just put on your armor, just cover it up so nobody will see. Because isn't that what we do? Oh, we love to cover up our issues

so nobody will see what we're fay saying. We love to post better than we actually live in because we don't want anybody to see our spot. He said, Okay, I'll cover it up. But I think the walls in Nayman's house were thin. They had to be thin because this servant girl from Israel. Bible says, she's just a servant girl. We don't even know her name. This servant

girl one day, perhaps says she's mopping the floors. She goes to Namon's wife, and maybe she sees her crying, and this servant girl goes, I know it's not my place to speak, and I know you just brought me here to mop the floors. But I'm telling you, if naming, we'll go see the prophet in Samaria. I know he'll be healed when I get to Heaven. I want to meet this girl right here. I want to meet the

servant girl from Israel. You know why I want to meet her because she might not have a name, she's nameless, but she is not faithless. Did you hear what this girl said. She said, I'm telling you, if you will, just go see the prophet in Israel. She did not say he might be healed. She didn't say it's possible, purchase. She said, no, no, no, I know he'll be healed if he goes and sees the prophet This girl was a slave girl from Israel, but she knew the God

of Israel. She had a history with God to know that if there's a situation that looks impossible or incurable, there is a God that you need to call on. A God that opens up blind eyes, a God that opens up deaf ears, a God that can split a red said, my God that can do the miraculous and the impossible. I don't know who this is for today, but I need somebody to give God some praise. If you know that he can steal through miracles, he can steal do the things that everybody said was impossible. We

serve a wonder working, miracle working dad. Oh see, y'all give me that golf clap, like you don't believe it. But I wish somebody that would really testify that's ever been in a situation in your lives where it was impossible what the doctors told you, There's no way, But somehow, some way God stepped in and showed you that. I'm praying to the impossible. I'm so thankful the miracles are not relegated to the past. Then he still does miracles today. Wow,

look at this serving girl. This girl started the whole miracle. If she didn't speak up, Nayman doesn't get his miracle she started. Oh that's what I want to tell you too. Not only do you have to understand that everybody's got a spot, you gotta know that servants always start miracles. Servants always start miracles. The reason people miss out on miracles often is because they don't ever want to get low and serve. But I'm telling you, servants always start miracles. Oh,

I'm so glad Love Week is happening. You ought to be racing to sign up for Love Week. You know why, because servants always start the miracles. The miracles are not in high, lofty places. The miracles are always in lowly places. You gotta look low. We missed out on miracles because we're looking in the wrong place. You gotta get low. Come here. Don't you understand that God could not redeem us from heaven. That's why Jesus had to get low and put on human skin and sit where we sat

and feel what we feel. You know why, because servants always start the miracles. The King of Glory started not robbery, to empty himself of divinity and come down from heaven to earth and your Savior, my God, and your God. He washed disciples feet. You know Peter had nasty feet. Look at our God. He got low. Why because servants always start the miracles. Maybe you're missing out on the miracle because you become so narcissistic and so consumed with you.

You're not serving somebody else. But if you would serve, you would see the miracle. This girl started the whole miracle. Be careful who you look down on, because you don't know where God will send the miracle to you from. Here's how I know name is he was bad. He say all know who he listened. He listened. That's how I know his leprosy was bad because he listened to the girl that he would have dismissed. He listened to her.

And I love that. Life will do that. Life has a way of humbling you to a place where you will have to listen to some people that you would have dismissed and looked past. Life will hit you with some stuff. You was so cool coming in places with sunglasses on inside till life hits you in the gut. And now Naming is listening to the servant, And I love it because he doesn't do it at first, he

doesn't go straight to a Licia's house. I wish you would have, but it takes a while, especially when you've been in pride and you've been pretentious for so long. He actually goes to the King of Israel first, with all kinds of gold and silver, and he comes to the king visery with an official letter. Hello, King of Israel, got my official letter. You see my gold, you see my bitny chariot six horsepower, And he's trying to buy

his healing. And I love it because when he gives the letter to the King of Israel, the King of Israel, I didn't read it because I gave you just the abbreviated version. The King of Israel goes off, he said, what am i God? I can't do a miracle. I love it. I love that. The King of Israel he had the title, but Elisha, who was the prophet in Israel, he had the authority. The King of Israel had the position,

but Elisha had the power. Can I just parandemically pause right there and tell somebody who's seeking after a title, don't seek after the title. Ask God to give you some authority. Don't seek after a position after God. They give you some holy ghost power. Because if you've got the power, God and give you the position. If you're not the authority, God will give you a title. The King of Israel had the position, but he had no power, so he thought it was a catastrophe. And Elisha said, no,

this is an opportunity to me. He'll know there's a prophet in Israel. So now watch this. Naming has to go to a licious house, now where he should have gone in the first place. Can you see him, who bentley, chariot, nice armor, going to a licious house? You know Elisha lived in the hood. Oh yeah, And I can see people walking watching name and coming town. They said, what is naming doing in this part of town? Gets all the way to a licious house. And I love it.

Because Elisia's servant sees naming pull up. He's like, wow, it's name is up there. Do you know how many followers he has? Oh my goodness, Elisha, he looks better in person that he does on the ground. Elisha's like, calm down, calm down, don't be impressed with all that. You don't even know. He is falling apart underneath all that art. Don't let the thin veneer of success, fool you. His life is falling apart. He says, well, what we gotta do something? He's here. What do you want to do?

He says, uh, go tell him to watch seven Times in the Jordan. He'll be cleansed. At your service. The you're not gonna say anything to him, No, you go tell him then, if you watch the seven Times in the Jordan, he'll be cleansed. Did you know who that is? I do, but I'm also watching Law and Order, So go tell him what I said. Servant starts going out, and she's like, and put your phone away? How they have it? Out? Goes up to naming. Can you see naming?

He still in his high horse. I just sert like, hey, beautiful chariot. Hey uh Namon uh. Elisha said, if you just gonna wash seven times, you'll be cleansed. Namon says, excuse me, look, don't kill the messenger. Bro. He just he told me to tell you, if you go wash seven times, you'll be cleansed. And naming goes? Is he not gonna come see me? Just? He noful who I am? He does, but you know you know he's a prophety praying Namon looks at his side. He's watching Law and Order.

That's what he does before he prays. Okay, just the Bible says the naming turned off. You had a rage. He was so upset name and why are you upset? He's upset for the same reason you're upset because life is not turning out the way he thought. He's upset because of the chasm between his experience and what he was expecting. And any time there's a gap between your experience and your expectations, sometimes rage and anger it's the reaction.

I know you can't say anything right now, but I know there's some of you that since twenty twenty, there has been such an anger and such a rage, and you're lashing out on other people and you are added God, not just because of what's happening, because of what you thought. And you're about to do what Naman did and turn off and go off and say forget it. God. I'm tired, and I still lost the business. I came to church and I still went through the divorce. I was there.

I dedicated my child to you. Garda strung out on drudge, You're about to turn off in the rage, and God told me to tell you, please, don't go off, Please don't go off. If you go off, you're gonna miss out on the greatest miracle. If you go off, you're gonna miss out on the thing that God wants to do in you and through you. Don't go off. Naman was willing to sacrifice his miracle because of the rage, because life didn't turn out the way he thought. Thank

God for the servant. Servants always start the miracles. Now the servant stops naming in his rage and says, naming, if he would have asked you to do something great, wouldn't you have done it? Naming? Why can't you do something so simple? Do you see the brilliance of what the servant is trying to get naming to see? Don't forget naming is a great man. If Elisha would have told him to go kill a thousand men to get

his healing, he would have done it. If he would have told him to go fight a lion and rip his jaw in have, he would have done it. He was a great man. He would have done anything that he could have gotten the credit for. If he could have paid for the healing, he would have done it. He already had the gold, He already had the silver. But he was trying to get him to understand this powerful principle called grace, called salvation. How many No, you

cannot purchase grace. You cannot buyas how va should. It is a free gift that you have to receive. It is a gift that was paid for about the precious blood of Jesus Christ. You can't buy this, you can't earn this, you can't work for this. You just gotta receive it and be all be here. Wow, hear me.

Today some of you are trying to earn a gift that has already been given to you, and naming the great warrior, naming who could scale a mountain and kill armies, couldn't do something so simple as split splash, I was taken a bath. You laugh, But I see it all the time. You know how many people reject Christianity not because it's too difficult, but because it seems too easy. Oh that's it. Just confess with my mouth, believe in my heart that He's the Lord, and just like ah,

everything's washed away. That's it. Yeah, Nah, nah man, I got at least fast for a week, I got a least memberize the book of Limitticus say they came here that easy. Isn't it funny how we make some of the most simple things complex? And Naming was about to find out the last thing. I want to tell you that simple obedience is strength. Your strength is not in your ability and your degrees and your money. Your strength is directly connected to your ability to obey what God,

don't you? Simple obedience is strength? Thank God. Naming turned around, he did with somebody who's watching this message has to do? Humbled himself said, I gotta forget about what I thought. I gotta obey, even if it doesn't makes sense. And here's Naming going down to the Jordan River, the dirty Jordan River. He was fighting all the way, he said, getting there, clear of water, No obey, Your strength is

in your obedience. Namon had to get off his high horse, take off all that armor, covering up his skin that was already falling off. Can't you see the crowd looking Is that, nameMan, I didn't know you had leprosy? Wow, I didn't know? Is that? He can hear them talking as he gets in the water. I can see him fighting. His pride was fighting him all the way. And maybe that's you today, and maybe that's why you haven't surrendered

your life to Jesus because of pride. But you got to get to a place in your life where you care more about what God thinks about you than you care about the opinions and the applause and the accolates of other people. Humble yourself, naming. I know it hurts. Simple obedience is strength. It takes off all that armor. He gets in the dirty Chortan river who he has to dip seven times, which means he can't even stay in the shallow. He's gotta go deep as he gets

sin he dips the first time. Come on, put yourself there. You know what you would have done? He starts chicking. Oh, nothing's changed, Come on in there. What we do? And then how we sometimes bargain with God? All right, God, I came to church. Where's the race? All right? God? I did it. What you produce that is religion, That's not relationship religion, says God. I produce. Now you produce that is religion, not relationship. Relationship, says I trust you you are God and I am. I gotta obey, even

when it doesn't make sense. I gotta obey. Even when I don't see evidence of it. I gotta do what you told me to do because my strength is not in my cognitive aptitude. My strength is in my obedience. And you said, dimp seventh time. He dipped the second time, nothing happened. He dipped the third time, nothing happened. He dipped the fourth time, nothing happened. He dipped the fifth time, nothing happened. You know, he wanted to quit on the

fifth time. But just like some of you, you gotta understand that God is not Amazon Prime, and just because it didn't happen on your time schedule, it doesn't mean that his word is not true. You gotta do what he told you to do. He dipped the sixth times. I'm sure he was ready to walk away. Oh but I thank God he didn't quit on that sixth time, because the Bible says when he dipped the seventh time, he got up and his skin was completely healed. It was restored, and it proved that God still can't do

the impossible. God still can't heal. Then terrible, and he'll know it. Nobody take ten seconds and give on God some praise, and there's hi right, I'm done. Everybody stand, everybody stand watch this. Don't miss the miracle. Don't miss the miracles. Watch when he got up the seven time. It says his skin was restored and became like a little child. Don't miss that. It's two miracles. It's one thing for my skin to be restored to the way

it was before. It's a whole another thing. It took go all the way back too, when I was a little child. Wow, look at the greatness of our car. He doesn't just restore, he says, I cannot only restore, but I can reverse and take it back better than it was before. Oh. I don't just want to restore the marriage. I can take it back to how it was when you were a dayton talking about girl you. I will take it back looking, naming, looking like a

little gerber baby. Skin healed, And the power of the text is not just that his skin was restored to being a little child. Hear me, His heart was, Oh if we could just have that childlike obedience. It says, whatever you say, I'll do it. Stop trying to flex and show who you are. Simple obedience his strength. Naman says,

Now I know the God of Israel. He's the living and true God, I'm so glad that he did not allow his rage and his anger and going off to stop him from missing the greatest miracle of his life. Hear me today talking to somebody who's anger is stopping you from receiving the greatest miracle. Maybe you didn't even realize that's what it was. And you've been wondering why you've been lashing out on other people, why you've been so on edge and going off. Maybe this message gave

words to an internal feeling. Hear me today. I'll say it again. We collectively went through trauma together. Many of us are on the edge, filled with rage. But don't let that anger make you miss out on your miracle. Oh, there's a cost to going on. You will miss out on the greatest miracle of your life. Oh, I feel the Holy Spirit in here. Maybe you're saying I have a right to be angry. You don't know what happened. I'm not denying the hurt, I'm not denying the betrayal.

I'm just asking is it worth missing out on your miracle? Wait a minute, who started this miracle? The servant girl from where Israel? Don't forget who name it is. This is a pagan name. It does not worship the God of Israel. He is the enemy. He's got a slave girl from Israel in his house. Scholars and theologists will tell you that it is most likely that this girl's family was probably killed and she was taken captive at

the command of naming. Do you realize this girl had every right, soon as naming got leprosy to say, that's what you get to God, be the glory that you now have leprosy. She had every right to say, Dad's paying you back for what you did to me. You took me from my family, you took me from my home. That's what you get. But she did this perfect girl said, if you would just go to the prophet, she'll be healed. Who offers the remedy of healing to their enemy? I

don't know of anybody that does that. And for a savior who hung on a cross, said, Father, forgiveting, They don't know what. And if he forgave you, what right do you have to hold onto that anger? What right do you have to not forgive? As every head be bound? I was close Father, Thank you today for your word. God, thank you that you did not respond in anger and rage when it was our sin that put you on

the cross. But yet it was your forgiveness, your blood that was shed, that gave us the gift of salvation. So Father, we can't do this on our own. Lord, we need the Holy Spirit to help us to live the values of the Kingdom and not this earth. Let us respond with love. Let us not take the easy route to love those that love us. Let us not take the evil route to do evil to those who love us. But Father, let us reflect your character, which

is to love our enemies. God, I pray today that you would heal hearts of anger, hearts of rage and bitterness. Let healing take place now, even the anger that's affecting physical bodies. Let your healing take place now. Heads are still bound, ours are still close. If you're here today and you've never surrendered your life to Jesus, whether you're watching Epham or any location, I'd love to give you

that opportunity. Heads are still bound, houses still close. Hear me, You don't have to earn this free gift of salvation. Naman was trying to buy it. You cannot buy this gift. You just have to receive it. So stop trying to get yourself together before you give your life to him. You can't get yourself together. That's why you need a savior. So it heads about ho's closed. I don't care. If just one person you'd be worth my flight from Dallas,

Texas today. If you're saying Pastor Roberty, include me in this closing prayer. I need to give my life to Jesus. If that's you what you lift up your hand across every location, even at home, right there in your living room, say today's my day. I'm giving it my life. Just lift it up high enough and long enough to where I can see it. Thank you God, Thank you God. I see hands all over this place today. Thank you Jesus. Thank you Jesus. Come on, let's pray this closing prayer.

We're all gonna say it as one big family. Come on, let's say it. Say Jesus, I need you. I cannot do life without you. Jesus. I know I'm a great sinner, but I also know you're a great savior. So today I surrender. I confess with my mouth and believe in my heart that you, Jesus, are the son of the Living God. You died for me, you got up from the grave for me, and you're coming back for me. But until that day, I am walking with you. All

that I am is yours in Jesus's name. Come on, somebody, say hey man and give God the best hang type of praise that you've got. Oh, come on, you could do better than that. I mean, really praise Him today. God bless your elevation. Well, if you enjoyed today's podcast, there are a couple things I'd love for you to do.

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