TD Jakes - Internal Arguments: It's Worth The Fight
So it is, in our text today, Moses has sent 12 spies, one representing each one of the 12 tribes of Israel, each one of them as an ambassador of their tribe, to go over and sample the promised land. They are spies sent over to get a taste of tomorrow. Has God ever let you get a taste? I feel like preaching this, y'all in trouble today. Has God ever let you get a taste of tomorrow? to incentivize you, to encourage you, to hang on in there, to let you know it's worth the fight. He lets them go visit where they're going to be. Somebody, I don't know who I'm talking to, but God lets you visit where you're going to be. Yeah-yeah-yeah, just recently God let you visit where you're going to be, God let you visit it, God let you visit. You didn't get to stay, but you got to visit it. He let you get a taste of it, he let you get a sample, he let you get a cluster of grapes in your hand to let you know that where you are is not where you're going to stay, that God has something else for you.
I don't know who I'm talking to, oh, but you got a furlough, you got a pass, you got a visit, you got a touch. They got to taste the fruit of the land. It wasn't theirs yet, they hadn't possessed it yet, but they got to sample it. Good God. And with that sample comes not only the taste of the fruit and the land that flows with milk and honey, but they got to see houses. Now, a house don't mean anything to you until you've been living in a tent. And when you've been living in tents and tabernacles for a long time, the idea of finally being able to unpack is amazing. I want to talk to some folks who just moved and you still got some stuff in boxes; you know unpacking is a big deal and Moving is a big deal. You didn't even know how much stuff you had until you get ready to move, you find stuff in corners and crevices.
These people have been living in boxes the whole trip, and they got to see houses with yards and places for kids to play, and water to splash in and places to go fish and swim. They saw the land that flows with milk and honey. In fact, the first verse, take me back to that first verse. That first verse when they come in and they experience it. The Bible said, "They came unto the brook of Eshcol, and cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes," one cluster of grapes, but watch this, "And they bare it between two". It took two people to carry one cluster of grapes. Now listen, I've grown grapes, I've eaten grapes, I know grapes, that you can get a cluster of grapes in your hand. The grapes were so big they had to put it on a staff and it took two people to carry the grapes back. God said, "It's bigger than you think it is".
It's bigger than you think it is, it's bigger than you think it is, it's bigger than you think it is. It's bigger than your point of reference, it's bigger than what you had in your past, what's in front of you is bigger than what is behind you, that's why the enemy doesn't want you to get there. It's bigger than you think it is, and, number two, you're gonna need some help to carry this. So come out of your shyness and come out of your introversion and come out of your quietness and open up your mouth, because what God is going to give you is so heavy you're gonna have to come into partnership to move it from here to there, from this to that, from where to what. God is getting ready to do something with you, that you can't drag it by yourself, you're gonna mess it up by yourself, you're gonna have to get into partnership to make it all the way.
Give me that Scripture again. They took it on the staff, and they also brought the pomegranates, and the figs. Grapes, pomegranates and figs, grapes, pomegranates and figs, grapes, pomegranates and figs, this is the fruit of the land. God said there is fruit; you've had frustration, but you're gonna have fruit. He said it's gonna be fruit of all types, it's gonna be grapes and pomegranates. Y'all don't hear what I'm talking about. It's gonna be more than figs, it's gonna be more than you imagine, it's gonna be mind-boggling. And the land flows with milk and with honey, and it's hard to imagine that, it's hard to imagine that. Maybe it is a colloquialism, but maybe it is literal, the land flows with milk and honey. Because the Bible talks about there was a time that one of God's servants dipped his stick into honey and the honey was just dripping down off the trees. They had come into a place that flows with milk and honey. Jonathan did, with his armor bearer, and he had honey and he tasted it, "And his eyes were enlightened". This land flows with milk.
Now, when you have been in a desert, and they start talking about pomegranates big enough and grapes big enough and figs big enough that it takes two men to pull it out, you don't come into this kind of blessing without conflict, without controversy, without conflicting reports. We are living in the era of conflicting reports. Conflict, my friends, is stressful, conflict is stressful; even when it's quiet, it's stressful. Have you ever been in a house and y'all was mad and you wasn't saying nothing but it's stressful because you know things are not right? Now, if quiet conflict is stressful, can you imagine what verbal, verbose, outspoken, up-in-your-face conflict is like? Do you know what that does to your blood pressure? Do you know what that does to your body? Do you know what that does to your peace, to be in the house with somebody who won't shut up?
Don't nod, don't nod, don't nod because they might see you, don't nod, don't nod, just look straight ahead, just look straight. We are in the midst of conflict right now, we fight about everything there is to fight about. See, it would have been okay if they'd have just talked about the grapes and the pomegranates and the figs and the land that flows with milk and honey, but then the other guys start talking about the giants and the Jebusites, and the Hittites, and the Canaanites. And it's hard to enjoy the grapes because they're talking about, "The Canaanites are down in the south, and the Jebusites are also in the land. And the Amalekites, we saw them in the mountaintops". And blessings are always encased in trouble. They didn't hear me. Blessings are always encased in trouble.
Moses said, "How can 12 people go to the same place to see the same city and come out with two completely different reports"? If it's the same city and it's the same people seeing the same place and they have two different reports it means that some of them have different kinds of eyes. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder then burdens are too. Which kind of eye do you have? Do you have an eye for the figs, the pomegranates? Do you have an eye for the milk and the honey? Or do you have an eye for the Amalekites, the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Girgashites? Because whatever kind of eye you have determines how you perceive the situation.
Oh, y'all don't hear what I'm saying. Even getting away from the world, away from the Scriptures for a minute, away from the world, away from what's going on in the news, and bring it home to what's going on in between these two ears, we live with conflicting reports. You get ready to do something, someone say, "You too old, you should have done that earlier, it's too late for that. You can't do that now, child, you too old". Somebody down the hall is saying, "I'm too young, I'm too young, I'm not ready for that kind of responsibility, I'm too young". You're always too-something, you're not qualified or you're overqualified, and every time you get ready to go through something you have to have these conflicting reports going off in your head. All of us live with two voices, faith and fear. The presence of faith is not the absence of fear. In fact, faith flourishes in the face of fear, faith stands up on the foundation of fear.
The fact that I have faith doesn't mean I didn't have to fight off fear, my faith wrestled around all night with that fear and finally got a chokehold on it and rose undaunted. But don't you think for one minute that I got automatic faith, that I got that "7-Up" kind of faith that just bubbles up all the time, all you gotta do is pop-pop-fizz, here it comes. No-no-no, I had to fight my way to faith, I had to cry my way to faith, I had to struggle to get to faith, because if you got faith talking in this ear, you got fear talking in this ear; you got trust talking in this ear, you got doubt talking in this ear; you got risk talking in this ear, you got reward talking in this ear. You're torn, you're torn, you're torn between what you want to do and what you gotta do; you're torn between having a life and making a living; you're torn between marriage and ministry; you're torn, you want to be used, but you don't want to be seen.
And with all of these voices talking to you, it becomes difficult to determine truth, which is how it all started in the first place; in the garden, when the enemy came, he came against truth. "Oh, God said, 'The day you eat of that tree, you shall surely die.' Oh, you won't die, the real thing is, you will know even as he knows". Questioning God's integrity, he now makes God sound like he's intimidated and is denying you from being more like him. So she thinks, "If I eat of the tree, I'll be more like him," because she has false truth. False truth will get you killed, false truth will get you driven out of the garden, false truth will destroy your peace, your mind and your marriage. False truth will make you lose your job, false truth will make you lose your mind. False truth, false narratives.
Here they are, and Moses is hearing both things, but here's what's funny about this particular story, and I'm almost where I want to be: Neither group was lying. The Hittites were there, the Jebusites were there, the Girgashites were there, the Canaanites were there. The grapes were there too, and the pomegranates and the figs. What do you do when two opposing ideas are equally true? That's what drove me to the text today, because I could not find a liar, I could not find a liar.
I wanted to tell you that they were lying about the Jebusites and the Girgashites and the Ammonites and the Canaanites and the Amalekites. I wanted to tell you that they are a big lie, that the devil is a lie, but they were there. In the south and down by the Jordan, they were waiting, and in the mountains they were hidden. It was true, it was gonna be a fight. And the grapes were so big that it took two men to carry them, that was true too, and figs and pomegranates, and the land that flows with milk and honey. What do you do when both voices are telling the truth? "They're not gonna hire you, you're dyslexic. They're not gonna hire you, your GPA is not high enough. They're not gonna marry you, you're not cute. They're not gonna do this".
What do you do when Satan turns truth on you and brings an evil report, but it's not a lie? It's evil, but it happened. Oh, you're gonna sit there and look at me, because you're church people, because you act like you ain't never done nothing evil. Yeah-yeah-yeah, some of the things people say about you, and you're trying to rebuke it and call it a lie, let's be real for a minute, it was true, it did happen, I did do it, I was there. It was an evil report, but it was true. You're going in to get the job and the one voice is saying, "This is the moment you've been waiting on," and the other one's saying, "Brace yourself, you know they're not gonna hire you".
You got to go in with both of them talking to you at the same time. You go in the hospital and get ready to put you up under anesthesia, and one voice says, "Look at them good, this is the last time you're gonna see them," and the other voice says, "You'll be fine, you're gonna wake up and you're coming out of this". All of us live, come on, people, come on, people, come on, people, get with me, come on, people, get with me, come on, people, come on, people, come on, come on, come on, people, come on, people, come on, people, come on. Neither report was false, it was true, yet there was the possibility of reclaiming father Abraham's land, few things are as painful as losing your father's legacy.
The stakes were high; to not go was to give up on Abraham's promise. And they had thought to themselves, "This land belonged to our great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather, we're not stealing it, we're reclaiming what was stolen from us. The blessings we're getting right now we're not stealing, we're reclaiming". Y'all ain't ready. The blessings, the blessings you're getting right now, you're reclaiming what was stolen. I'm walking in my grandmama's blessing, I'm walking in my great grandfather's blessing, I'm walking in my great-great grandfather's blessing. And every time I start feeling bad about it and start feeling embarrassed, I think about, "No-no-no-no-no-no-no-no, my ancestors went through enough hell and got no pay that I got the right to walk in the blessings of Abraham. I am a child of the King, I am a seed of Abraham, the blessings of God belong to me".
You need to walk in that thing. Somebody just walk a minute, just walk. You need to walk in that thing, you need to walk in it, you need to walk in it; you need to own it, you need to own it. Stop apologizing for what is your inheritance, stop apologizing. You are an heir of salvation, you are purchased by God, stop apologizing, stop feeling bad about it. Somebody give him 30 seconds of praise, I feel a praise break coming, I feel a praise break coming, I feel a praise, I feel a praise, I feel a praise. I just loosed somebody; on the stream somebody just got loosed, somebody just got loosed. Stop feeling bad about it. You can't help it because you're smart, you can't help it because you're intelligent, you can't help it because you're cute, you inherited that, walk in your blessing. Whatever God gave you, walk in it, just own that thing, walk around with your head up high. Yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah.
I'm gonna show you this quick, I'm gonna show you how to deal with these voices. Jesus teaches us in the garden how to overcome internal arguments, he prays till he silences the voices of doubt. He goes in the garden and he prays to have singleness of heart, to shut down the negative voice, even if it's true. "Father, if it be thy will, pass this bitter cup from me; not my will, but thine be does". He had to pray three times, but prayer broke the yoke. God said he's gonna break some yokes in here this morning. Where you've been going back and forth and halt between two opinions, God is gonna break some yokes and bring you into alignment, bring you into agreement. You got a blessing but you don't feel like you deserve it and you don't feel worthy of it, and some of you think there's a curse on your life, but I break every curse, I break every bondage, I break every mindset, I break it now in the name of Jesus.
You're gonna walk in the blessing that God promised you. I know there's a voice that told you it's too late, I know there's a voice that told you you'll never get it, but I come to tell you that God is going to give you singleness of heart, singleness of mind, singleness of vision. Who am I preaching to this morning? Jesus prayed until he came to singleness, until he had shut out the voices that said, "There's another way". Jesus prayed until it was no longer, watch this, until it was no longer important who let him down. Jesus prayed until he was not upset at his disciples. The first time, he said, "You mean you cannot watch with me for one hour? What's wrong with you"? But when he got through praying, he told them, "Sleep on".
There's some people that let you down, you need to say, "Sleep on". You need to realize it was never about them anyway, you need to know that God don't need them to bless you. Oh, whoa-whoa, who am I talking to? You need to know that God don't have to have them to bless you. And if they're going to bed, let them go to bed. Get you some rest, baby. It's gonna be alright, I'm still gonna get mine. I'm coming into mine, I'm coming into mine. If I have to crawl, I'm coming into it; if I have to cry, I'm coming into it; if I have to pray all night, I'm coming into it. Glory to God.
Elbow three people and tell them, "It's worth the fight," it's worth the fight, it's worth the fight, it's worth the fight. Till doubt disappears, it's worth the fight; till fear disappears, it's worth the fight; till you forgive your friends and let go of your enemies, it's worth the fight, it's worth the fight. I feel a praise about to take over this room, I feel an anointing about to take over this room, I feel a victory coming in this room, somebody's about to possess the land. Open your mouth and give God some glory and praise. These are the things that keep us up at night, but we're gonna get some good rest tonight because we're gonna have singleness of heart. These are the things that keep us up at night, these are the birthing place of procrastination.
Some of you, rather than to face the Amalekites, you've stayed in the desert. It's not that you're lazy, it's not that you're slow for, you just didn't want to have to fight this kind of fight. But roll up your sleeves, the Holy Ghost said it's worth the fight. Slap somebody and say, "It's worth the fight". It's worth the fight to get my stuff back, it's worth the fight to find out who I am, it's worth the fight to find out what's possible, it's worth the fight to get better, it's worth the fight to stand up on my own, it's worth it. And, Devil, if you want to fight, baby, you got a fight coming.