TD Jakes — In Between Places
Greetings in the name of Jesus Christ our king. I am so excited to have this opportunity to share the Word of God with you, and particularly today because the message is powerful. It comes out of Exodus chapter 2, verse 1 through 2. The message is "In Between Places". If you've ever been there, you understand how volatile and disturbing it is to not quite be here and not quite be there. Let's go into the Word of God and see what the Holy Spirit is saying to us today. Are you ready? Let's go.
Moses lives for three months hidden in the house. And when I thought about it, the Lord sent me to ask you, what's hidden in your house? Instincts are babies hidden in your house that don't have names yet, inclinations, drawings, pullings, wooings, half-born concepts hidden in your house that you haven't formalized, that you haven't empowered, that you haven't given a name yet. Isn't it funny how sometimes you have an idea or an instinct for something that is going to take somebody else to name? You have the creativity to birth it, but you may not have the insight to name it, empower it, and nurture it, take it to the next level. Everything you start doesn't mean you finish. But how will it ever be named, or funded, or discovered if it's not exposed?
I'm telling you, you're hiding your own deliverer. Moses's mother was hiding her own deliverer. She was hiding the very one she'd been praying for. She'd been praying, "God, send a deliverer to set me free," and hiding the deliverer God had sent. I'm wondering, what are you sitting on? What are you holding? What's inside of you that you've been praying, "Lord, I need some resources. I need you to open up a door. I'm backed up in a corner, I'm shoved against the wall," and I'm wondering if you're hiding your answer in your house.
Because most of the time the people prayed for things, God didn't send outside things. He just exposed what was already in the house. Oh God, that's so good. He exposed a handful of meal that was already in the house. Samson was getting ready to face the Philistines, he said, "Use that jawbone of an ass that's right by your feet". You understand what I'm talking about? One woman is about to sell her son, she's in so much debt, and he says, "Use the pot of oil that's in your house". And instincts is about rediscovering what's in you.
Listen, you spend all of your life appreciating what was in other people, looking at other people and saying, "Oh, that's so wonderful. And look what he's got, look what she's got," and even helping other people to birth their dreams and accomplish what they got. But you will never enjoy the life that Christ came to give you until you discover what is in your house, what do you have. I'm tired of you being a cheerleader for everybody else's accomplishment while you fail to value and appreciate what God has put in your house. Oh my God, I don't know who I'm talking to, but I feel like I'm talking to somebody. Touch three people and say, "It's in the house".
And sometimes, you have things inside of you, and they are in the house and they are hidden from view. And how do you expect people to empower what you will not expose? If you got the instinct, if you got the inclination, how do you expect somebody to value it enough, to invest in it enough, to get behind it enough if you won't expose what you got? And in order to expose what you got, you got to believe in what he put down inside of you. I'm talking to somebody, it's in your house. Touch your neighbor, ask them, "Do you have the instinct"?
While I'm talking about Moses, I'm going to say a little bit more about Moses's name means drawn out. That's what Moses means. Moses's name means drawn out. It means drawn out. He didn't get his name until Pharaoh's daughter is bathing down at the riverbank, and she looks in and sees the baby Moses floating in a little bamboo ark that was made to float him down the Nile because when his mother got him out of the house, she put him in an ark, floated him down the river. And Pharaoh's daughter was bathing in the river, and she looked out and saw the ark, and said, "Bring the baby to me". And they drew him out of the water and said, "I'll call his name Moses because he's drawn out".
But I think it's such a play on terms because Moses's name means drawn out, but he was drawn out of the womb, and then drawn out of the water, and then drawn out of the palace, and then drawn out of the wilderness. And I began to realize that life is a series of being drawn out. And I don't know if this makes any sense to you or not, but God said life is calling you out. Calling you out of hiding, calling you out of fear, and calling you out of insecurity, and calling you out of small-mindedness, and calling you out of your timidity, calling you out of your comfort zone, calling you out of the safe places you have built for your dysfunction. God said, "I'm calling you out of those places because your destiny is never in your shelter".
Whoo, that's a good one right there. Your destiny is never in your shelter. A shelter is always for a season. Whether it's a shelter from the storm, or whether it's a shelter of a womb, or whether it's a shelter of a cocoon, it is only for a season until you can be drawn out into something bigger than what you were protected in in the first state. Do you hear what I'm saying? Moses was protected in the womb until he was drawn out into something bigger, which was the house. He was protected in the house for three months, and then he was taken from the smaller thing into the bigger thing. He was drawn from the house into the river. Then he was drawn from the river into the palace. Y'all don't hear what I'm saying. He's drawn from the palace into the wilderness.
And I'm telling you, in between every struggle, every torturous, barbaric, hideous thing you have ever been through, God is not trying to kill you. He's trying to draw out what he placed inside of you. Your name is Moses. Your life is Moses. And he keeps trying to draw you out. And I don't know about you, but anytime God draws me out of what I'm comfortable in, I generally don't like it. And I can't even tell you why I don't like it other than the fact that I'm not used to it, and it's out of my comfort zone. And I want you to just leave me alone, let me stay in here where I understand, I understand this life that I got right now. And if you take this away from me, I don't know what in the world I'm going to do.
And he's steadily drawing you out. And you have to trust him that he always takes you from the lesser to the larger. You're getting ready to go from the lesser to the larger. I know you've been hidden in the house for three months, but you're getting ready to go from the lesser to the larger. Let go, stop fighting, stop fooling, stop tugging. Let go, you're getting ready to go from the lesser.
Let's take a moment and talk about the children of Israel. God takes Jacob and Joseph and their kids and cousins down to Egypt, 70 people, and puts them in Egypt to incubate a family into a nation. He uses slavery to hatch a nation. Whenever something goes in and it is being hatched, it will always be bigger when it comes out. They went in 70 people or so, they came out some people say as high as 2 million came marching out after they had been incubated. What comes out is always bigger than what came in. I could point to a lot of illustrations, but I'm gonna keep it right here. Keep it. I got you. I'm gonna let your mind do the rest of the work with instincts.
So, if you know that's true about life, and you know that's true about babies, and you know that's true about the children of Israel, and you know it's true about Moses because what came out in Moses was much bigger than who he was when he started. He was born a slave. He was born a slave, and yet when he comes out of it, he comes out of it a conqueror and a leader. If you know that's true about all of them, then what are you thinking about you? What are you thinking about you? Do you realize that what's coming out is bigger than what went in? My God, that makes my teeth quiver in my jaws when I think about me being on the verge of something awesome if I can just survive the incubation.
I want you to look at what you go through when you're trying to become. You got a cocoon. And the struggle in the cocoon is I got to get into the highest and best expression of myself. If you could hear the worm in the cocoon and say, "You know, I've been crawling around here, but I think there's something else inside of me. And when this process is over, I'm coming out with my wings. I'm coming out with my wings because all the while I was crawling around on the ground, I was singing, 'I believe I can fly. I believe I can touch the sky. Think about it every night and day.'"
Y'all don't hear what I'm saying to you. I was the only one crawling around on the ground, singing, "I believe I can fly". Couldn't understand why I kept thinking about it every night and day, all in my head and in my thoughts. You know what I'm trying--what have you been thinking about every night and day that's so opposite of your situation and circumstance, and looks totally ridiculous? Slap somebody and tell them, "I feel a change". Make some noise if you feel a change. I've been incubated by adversity. I've been incubated by adversity. I've had to grow. I've been growing in my groaning. Can I tell you I've been growing in my groaning? I've grown in my groaning, in my adversity.
They said about Israel, "It was good for us that we've been afflicted". It says the more they afflicted them, the more they grew. I've been growing in my groaning. That's what's going to break me out of the cocoon 'cause I'm too big to live in this little sac you have me in. My thoughts are too big to be locked up in the same little sac that you have me in. I know there's something else in me. I know I'm crawling on the ground, but I can't help even though my body's on the ground, my mind's in the air. I believe I can fly. I've got the instincts before I get the wings.
I'm going to say it till somebody gets it, I've got the instincts before I get the wings. I've got the instincts before I get the husband. I've got the instincts before I get the career. I've got the instincts before I open up the business. I've always had these instincts, even when I was crawling on the ground. Put that video up there again. even when I was crawling on the ground, I've always, I've always had the instincts. And I finally got in a position so that the thing that's inside of me can finally burst out, and expose itself, and become real. That's what's happening in the person sitting next to you. Their wings are coming out of their sac.
Tell your neighbor, "I got the instincts". I don't have the house, but I got the instincts. I don't have the job, but I got the instincts. I don't have the money, but I got the instincts. I haven't met the woman, but I got the instincts. I haven't married the man, but I got the instincts. I may not be pregnant, but I got the instincts. I got the instincts to be what you cannot see. It's in me before it falls out of me. It's in me before it falls out of me. It's in me before it falls out of me, out of your belly.
So, I got some brothers here. Bring my brothers here. I got a brother need, brother need and brother opportunity. Brother opportunity, you go over there. Brother need, you stay right there. Brother need and brother opportunity. Brother need and brother opportunity, face them so they can see your sides. Face where I can see. Brother need over there, and that's brother opportunity over there. And brother need is trying to figure out how to get brother opportunity. Brother need's been begging for brother opportunity. Brother need has been praying for brother opportunity. But brother opportunity is payin' brother need no attention at all.
The difference between need and opportunity, the gulf can only be bridged when you follow your instincts. These are my instincts. My instinct is to be more than where I am. My instinct says I believe I can fly. But I haven't been placed in an opportunity that would allow me to get my life up off the ground. But my instincts have been with me all the time. Need does not draw opportunity. But when you allow your instincts to operate, the more you follow what you are instinctively, instincts will always find... Instincts...
To all you college graduates who graduated from school and still can't find a job, intellect won't find opportunity. But if you stop relying on your intellects and reach down and get your instincts, your instincts will always be drawn to your next opportunity. To that person who's stepping into the second half of your life, and you've been saying, "Lord, what's next"? your answer is already inside of you. Your answer is already in your dreams, in your thoughts, in your gifts, in your skills. And if you would just turn your instincts loose, you would reach over and be able to snatch your next opportunity.
This is your season. This is your moment. This is your time. This is your hour. This is your cocoon. This is your birthing place. This is your second half of your life. It is time for you to reel your opportunity in. It may take awhile, it may be a struggle. You may have to tug on it. It may be step by step. It may be piece by piece, but I prophesy unto you today if you turn your instincts loose, you are going to reel it in. Somebody praise him if you understand it. It's coming. Everybody who understands what I'm talking about, touch your neighbor and tell them, "It's coming".
My opportunities. My entrepreneurship. My company, my ministry, my opportunity is coming my way. Tell my haters my opportunity is coming my way. I'm coming out of this cocoon. I'm coming out of it. Touch three people, tell them, "I'm coming out of it". Put it back, I'm coming out of it. Bit by bit, pull by pull, tug by tug, I'm coming out. For the next 30 seconds, if God is talking to you, find some kind of way to give him any kind of praise that you might possess in your body.
Well, thank you so much, I'm out of time. I want to thank you for joining us today, and I want to speak to those of you who are in the in between places, where you have a dream you know that God has placed on your heart, but have no idea how to make that dream become a reality. First, take an inventory of all the talents and resources God's already given you. And then next, find people with similar instincts to help you birth the dream. And third, be willing to be stretched and learn new skill sets. Don't quit, keep seeking the Lord. He will draw out the dream that he placed inside of you.