Jentezen Franklin - So What if They Don't Believe?
I wanna go quickly, but I wanna go to Romans 3:3. "For what if some do not believe? Will their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? Certainly not! Indeed, let God be true and let every man a liar. As it is written". I love this question Paul asked. He said, "If God's promised you something, if God's put a dream in your heart, if God's given you a word about your family, if God's given you a promise in the scriptures, confirmed by His Spirit - I'm not talking about just something you wish and you want. I'm talking about when God has birthed a something in your heart and you know He's spoken to you about it". He asked the question, "What if some don't believe"? And so I'm gonna preach today on "So What If They Don't Believe"?
He said, "If they don't believe what God has told you that you could do and would do by His help and by His power and His anointing. If they don't believe in the dream that He has given you, if they say it will not happen; you're not talented enough, you're not gifted enough, you're not good looking enough, you're not important enough. If everybody is not going to believe in you can you still hold on to it"? So many people just absolutely allow the affirmation of people to hold their dream hostage, and the call and the purpose and the plan of God for their life. "When there is clearance from all the right people then I can believe it". But there comes times in life where God will give you stand alone faith.
And it's not that you don't need people and it's not that you are arrogant and proud as though, you know, you feel like you can do everything, "Oh, I don't need nobody". That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about when you know that you know that you know God said it. Then you have to reach a point that you being to ask the question that Paul asked when he said, "So what if they don't believe? Does that make the word of God to no effect? Does that make the faithfulness of God canceled out"? No. He told me He was going to do something. Does their unbelief make the word of God to no effect? Can they cancel out what you know God has promised you in His word, confirmed out of the mouth of two or three witnesses? You fasted about it, you prayed about it, you found it in the word, you've got people praying with you and you know that you know there will always be opposition to your dream.
So what if they don't believe? So what if they don't see what you see? It's your dream. The dream doesn't walk away when they walk away, He put it in your belly, He put in your Spirit of possibility, He put it in you heart and He gave you the giftings to make it come to pass. And I came to preach to dreamers, so what if they don't believe? Tell somebody beside you, "It's still going to come to pass". Do it. Do it. Say it. Say it out loud. There's still some things in me that are going to happen that haven't happened yet. You don't have to believe in my dream. I hope you do, I really want you to, but I don't base the dream God gives me on who stays and who goes. If He gave it to me He's got the people lined up. I want to give you three things you need if you're gonna hold on to the dream God gives you, and the promise and the word that God gives you. Three things.
Number one: You've got to determine the origin or the place that that dream came from. What's the origin of the dream? Is it God's dream or is it your dream? Because God's not obligated to back up dreams He didn't give you. Did it originate from God? Secondly, you have to determine the resources that you have. Because they will fit the dream that God gives you. You gotta do inventory of the gifts and the talents and the skills and the abilities that God has given you. God has given you resources and talents. And the gifts that He's given you is enough in seed form - they may have to be developed, they may have to be coached, they may have to be mentored, somebody may have to show you who you really are and help you bring out some of the gifts. But if God gave you the dream, the talent, the gifting is not in somebody else, it's in you. It should be an indication, your gifts, your talents, your desires should be an indication of the dreams that God has for you. I believe when God gives you a dream He gives you what you need to fulfill that dream.
The talent, the skill, the ability. If you can't sing, I doubt God's called you to the praise team. Everybody else knows that, why don't you accept that? He puts it on the inside of you. You've got what you need to get the dream going. It's not in somebody else, it's in you. "Well if they had noticed me. If they had given me a break. If that person would give me that. If that person would open up that door. If that person would do this for me then I could do it". You know that was the mistake that Sarah, Abraham's wife made in the Bible. She had a dream to have a baby, but she got so old and her husband got so old and they were not able, they were infertile, and they couldn't have a baby. And do you know what? She thought that her dream had to come through somebody else. But anytime God puts the dream in you, He puts the ability to make it happen. But she thought, "Well what I'll do is, I'm tired of waiting on God so what I'll do is, she went and told Abraham to go into Hagar and have a night there and a little situation and get her pregnant".
And see there, that's being born of the flesh. And she gave birth to Ishmael and she said, "I'll keep the baby". But the dream is dependent upon somebody else. Do you understand? God never wants the dream dependent on somebody else doing what they do for you. He allows all of that and puts Kingdom connections in your life, but you can't let, because if you make that person an idol or that situation or whatever it is that you think God has to use to make it happen once you start praying to those people, "Help me, help me, help me". Then you start preying on people because you begin to try to motivate and see them as your source. Thank God for people. But here's what I've learned, people are resources. God is the source, people are resources. And sometimes resources change, but the source is Jehovah Jireh and He'll always provide. Clap your hands and say, Amen Somebody.
God gave the dream but she thought that the only way that dream would be produced was through somebody else's gifting and talent and body. She started looking to other people. She looked to someone else. God's gonna birth your dream not by somebody else's gifts and talents, but - even when you feel like you don't have it. You don't know what you have if God put it in you. And when you compare yourself to other people you insult your creator. When you compare and say, "I wish I was that person. I wish I had that. I wish I could do that. I wish I had that talent". I'm telling you today that God said, when He gave you the dream He gave you the talent and the ability. And that's why you need Him. Without Him you can do nothing. God says, "I'm not going to use somebody else's gifts". Look at somebody and say, "You gon' push this one out. She thought Hagar would push it out and give birth to it, but you're gonna push this one out". He'll give you a dream and you can provide that dream. Say Amen somebody.
The gifts are there, the talent is there. I'm gonna use you. "If they, Pastor. If they. If they". That's not God's will. If God's called you He said, "So what if they don't believe? You believe". I even thought about how we get to a place where the gifts that we have we don't even recognize how powerful they are. Sometimes you have to say to yourself, "I've got it. I've got it. I can do this. I've got it. By His grace I've got it". "I can," Paul said. "I can do all things," there it is, "through Christ who strengthens," somebody else. "Me". God came Moses a dream. He didn't have the support of Pharaoh, he didn't have the support of the people he was even trying to help, but he kept believing it and God brought the dream to pass.
I was in California a couple weeks ago, Cherise and I. And we had a sleep over with the grandkids, and little Luca and Leo, five and four year old. And I was telling them a story in bed, a Bible story - I do that and I use my imagination with those little children to hold their, and so I told then about Moses, and I told them about how he had a stutter. And I acted that out and he went to the Pharaoh and first God caught a bush on fire and their eyes got big and I just really did that up big. And it ended up with him standing before Pharaoh and he said, "Let my pe-pe-pe-people go.' An-and-and all of sudden Pharaoh said, 'I will not do it. I will not let them go". And I said, "You know what happened Luca and Leo"? They said, "What"? I said, "God sent frogs. And the frogs started hopping up the stairs, they came through the windows, they jumped into the fruit loops, there were frogs hopping. They were everywhere. 'And then I put my hand up under the sheet. And I said,' I think there's one in the bed now, they're all over the place. Frogs, frogs".
And they were giggling and laughing. And we went on playing and then Cherise said, "Get them to sleep. Get them to sleep". And right before they were going to sleep Luca spoke up and he said, "I wanna tell that story G-daddy. I wanna tell that story about Mo-Mo-Mo-Mo". I said, "Moses". He said, "I wanna tell about Mo". And he said - and he started telling, he did amazing job. Said, "The bush exploded and caught on fire and God talked 'and said,' and Moses went before Pharaoh and he said, 'Le-le-le-le-le-let my-my-my-my people-ple-ple-ple go". And he said - and little Leo, his sister sat up and just looking at him. And she got drawn in again, all over. And then he said, "And you know what God did, Leo"? And she said, "What"? He said, "God - 'You know, he's have Australian.' God sent Kangaroos and they started jumping in the cereal and jumping in the bed".
Well I happen to believe if God said it, He can use mice, He can use lice, He can use grasshoppers, He can use kangaroos if He has to, but He's got the stuff if you would believe Him. Clap your hands and say, "Amen" somebody. He said, she said, they said. So what if they don't believe? What did God say? The last thing that I wanna say to you, is never let the dream that God gives you intimidate you. And by that I mean in two ways; sometimes when you hear a sermon like this you feel like you're supposed to come up with some big worldwide, international dream. And it almost makes you feel like that - what the dream God puts in your heart is unimportant. It's not so big and grand, seemingly. But some of the most powerful people in the Bible did seemingly insignificant things. And I thought about how that Moses mother didn't get intimidated by the smallness of her dream. "Well what was the smallness"? She had one dream in life. "I want to raise Godly children, in a culture that is anti-God".
And the Bible said that Pharaoh... and she... "I don't wanna be Hannah, I don't wanna be a prophetess, I don't wanna be the queen like Ester, I don't wanna be, you know, some - I don't wanna write a best-selling book, I don't wanna do conferences like Joyce, I don't want that. What I wanna be is a great mother". And she was a bad momma. Because - I'ma prove it to you. When Pharaoh and all of his army were killing all the male children two years of age and under, they killed every child except hers, because she hid him. She hid him for three months and when she couldn't hide him anymore that fabulous mother made a basket out of bulrush and put him in it and sent him down the Nile river. Alligators, crocodiles, snakes, deep water; an infant, a small toddler, two years - under two years of age in a basket floating down a massive river.
But I need to tell some parent that God knows how to keep our kids in dangerous places. God says, "They may be out of your reach but they're not out of My reach". And when you raise them right and you create a basket of faith that you put them in, they may be going down the river and crocodiles may be all around them, but no weapon formed against them. I'm not saying they're not gon' go through some stuff, but I am saying what we have, so what if they don't believe?
So what if right now they spit on that Bible and mock God and say, "I don't believe any of that stuff. Virgin birth and resurrection. I've gone to university and I've been enlightened. I'm woke. I know what", you are not woke. What you are is you gon' find out sooner or later through the trials of life, a little bit of time you gon' come running right back to the very... C'mon. So what if they don't believe? If you believe God will be faithful. See I still believe. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved in thy house". Still believe Joshua when he said, "As for me and my house we will, 'not me.' We will, 'not me and Cherise', we will serve the Lord". So what if they're on drugs right now? I'm not making light of it, I'm simply saying, "So what if they're backslid? So what if they've gone into another faith and another religion"? Don't you give up. If God promised it. He said, "I'm not a man that I can lie".
I need somebody to clap your hands like you believe the promise today. Don't let the smallness of the dream - Can you see that? Can you see that baby going down there? Watch the plan of God. And while the baby is going down the river Pharaoh's daughter just happens to be - If she's 5 minutes earlier or 5 minutes later the basket would have floated on by in the current. But she walks down and she's bathing and she hears a baby crying. And she reaches out and grabs that basket, and she picks up that little baby. And I must have been a little biddy fella because she said, "I love this baby, but you know, what? It needs something to eat and I can't feed this baby I'm not able to breast feed this child, but I know that there's a lot of mother's whose children have been slaughter by my father Pharaoh".
And about that time there's one up in the bushes. And she said, "I've lost my child but I'll be glad to volunteer and take care of that child". And it happened to be Moses mother. And he said, "Well if you'll do it my daddy Pharaoh, he'll pay for the diapers and he'll pay for the clothes and he'll pay you to do what you would have done for free". What he didn't know - you know when you begin to do what God's called you to do, right after that comes the provision, comes the resources, I'm telling you, wouldn't you like to give Pharaoh the whole bill and say, "Lord I'm just gonna do what you've called me to do". She got paid to do what she would have done for free!
That's when you know you're walking in a dream. When you're doing what you're doing and you would have done it for free! Don't let anybody intimidate you! It seem like a small thing, just taking and changing diapers - And she doesn't have a worldwide, international vision, she just has a vision of... But Moses brought the Ten Commandments. She had a second son named Aaron, he became the first high priest that would stand before God and stop plagues and offer blood in the Holy place. She had one daughter and the daughter's name was Miriam. And the first time we every see praise and worship in the Bible it's when they went across the Red Sea, she pulled out her tambourine and started singing and writing songs and dancing. In one household, one mother who had seemingly a small vision produce the Ten Commandments, produced the High Priest and produced the first worship service in all of creation.
Don't be intimidated by the smallness of your dream. And lastly, don't be intimidated if the dream that God is giving you is bigger than you think you're capable of. You're gonna find out sooner or later that God says, "If there's a giant between you and the dream I can handle the giant. I can handle the need. I can handle and I can give you all that you need". The magnitude of the dream sometimes will intimidate you. I wrote this down last night, God said to tell men and women under the sound of my voice that He's about to finance your dream. He's about to help raise your Spiritual babies that you're giving birth to. He's about to open doors no man can shut. He's about to wrap you in a coat of many colors. And the favor is gon' make you stand out that you walk in. Somebody give God a mighty praise if you believe it!