TD Jakes - Provoked To Purpose
Some people live their whole lives complacent, and you might get by with it until God's purpose, watch this, this is until God's purpose is compromised by your complacency. You can live your whole life being complacent, and you might be married to an enabler who makes it legal for you to be complacent 'cause they give you a double portion 'cause they love you, but that love is also enabling you not to be your best self. I have learned sometimes when somebody's crying, let them cry. Don't fix everything for everybody. Don't create a false reality that makes them feel good about something they need to feel bad about. They need to feel bad about it, because when you start getting in the way of what God has a purpose for your life, then God has to send something to provoke you.
Somebody, holler "provoked me". Don't let me spend my whole life living beneath my purpose, living beneath my potential, living beneath what I could be, living beneath where I ought to be going. I know I'm preaching to you because deep down inside there's a voice down inside of you that suspects that there is more that God has for you than what you are experiencing right now, or you wouldn't even be listening at me. It is that haunting, nagging suspicion that there's something else. You don't even know what it is. You don't even know how to get it, but there's a nagging suspicion that you were put here on this planet to do more than what you're doing right now, and I came to irritate you. I came to get on your nerves. I came to stir you up. I came to holler in your year. I came to get you frustrated.
Go ahead and cry. You need to cry. It's gonna take some tears to break the yoke of complacency that's been hanging over your life. I don't know who I'm talking to, but if you hear this word and you know it's for you, give God five seconds of crazy praise. 'Cause I think there's something else inside of you. I think there's more inside of you. I think God created you for a purpose. I don't think you're a mistake. I don't think you're an accident. I don't care what the circumstances of your birth were. I think you have been designed and created by God and that you are to be an asset to the world.
You ought to change the world in some way. You ought to make a difference in the world, even if it's a little difference. You're supposed to make some kind of difference in the world. ForbesWomen, actually forbeswomen.com wrote a very interesting article about complacency for women in careers, and I was reading the article, and it talked about complacency will ruin your career, and it said some things I want to share with you. Though the article was written to career women, it's really genderless truth. It applies to ministry, marriage, any aspirational accomplishment that you might have in your life. All of it is truth. They gave five warning signs of complacency, and I want to share them with you.
Number one, you're complacent when you are no longer striving to do your best in every area. Now, if that stretches you too much, drop some areas. I'd rather have less areas and do more than more areas and do less. In the country, we used to say it like this. You can be a mile wide and an inch deep. So you spread yourself so thin that you're ineffective at everything. If you know you can only handle three things, only take on three things, because if you're not, you're complacent when you're, number one, no longer striving to do your best, to bring your best mind, your best self, to really be present where you are.
Visionaries have a challenge with this because visionaries always have a tendency to live in where they're going at the expense of where you are, so when you get to where you're going, you have lost where you are. Oh, oh, that's good. Visionaries. I'm not talking to evil people. I'm talking to good people. Visionaries, you're so consumed with your goal and your vision and your future, and what's next? That you are negating, starving, under-utilizing, unavailable for your now. You can't neglect now and earn next.
Number two, you're operating off an old playbook. You must remain a lifelong learner. What was best 20 years ago is not best now. When I learned to type, we had a typewriter. Y'all don't know what I'm talking about. We didn't have a laptop. We had a typewriter. It was a manual typewriter. It made noise. You had to depress every key. If you could type 90 words a minute on an old typewriter, you ought to be doing 150 on a laptop because them things, you almost had to crank them and spin it to... come on. You know what I'm talking about. Vrrr...Yeah. Some of you are living in a laptop world, but you've got a manual typewriter effort. I'm gonna drive home that number two. It's important. I'm not finished with it yet. You need to understand giving somebody what they used to need doesn't work. You have a tendency to not really grow. Not doing anything to grow.
It was good 20 years ago. It was enough 20 years ago. Complacency assumes that what was enough is enough. How do I fix that? Ask, seek, knock, read, get magazines, keep enhancing yourself, developing yourself. You cannot be a doctor and not take any more classes once you get your degree. "I'm a doctor. I'm through with it". No, I need them, 'cause they'll still be giving you liniment and stuff like that. Come on, come on, you take some liniment for that, you'll be all right. No, liniment, do they still make liniment? You have to keep enhancing yourself, which means you have to be comfortably uncomfortable. You have to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, to be living on the edge where you got to keep assuming that I need to know more, I need to grow, I need to go further.
Let me hit number three. You aren't seeking to take advantage of new opportunities. You're not seeking to take advantage of new opportunities. I like to call this remaining in a state of growth and challenge. Just as much as you need rest and no one has to tell you to lay down, you need new challenges to keep you engaged. I shouldn't have to tell you you're tired. You need to go to bed. Nobody has to tell you to go to bed. I shouldn't have to tell you to get up in the morning. I shouldn't have to tell you that you need to keep reading, keep growing, keep learning, keep studying, keep praying, keep worshiping, keep talking to God. You can't wait till Sunday morning to have a worship...
You know why it's so hard on y'all to lead people in to worship? They wait for Sunday morning to worship God. There are people in this room that haven't worshiped God all week, and there you are supposed to in 15 or 20 minutes compensate for a life that hasn't worshiped God all week long, and you up there giving them a grade on the worship service. We came to worship. We didn't come to raise the dead. Just like you have sensitivities inside of you that let you know when you're tired or let you know when you're hungry, you need to sharpen your sensitivity to let you know when you need to learn, grow, enhance, accessorize, develop, come to the next level. Are you with me?
Number four, you aren't maintaining or building your contacts and relationships that are the currency of growth. You have no more growth than you have relationships, and you know, I just, I don't, I like to keep this like it is. Then don't grow, and be complacent, and take the risk of missing your destiny. You need to keep it fresh. You need to be on the cutting edge. You need to walk up on stages to challenge you. They make you nervous. Walk into rooms where you don't know exactly what to say. You need to walk into spaces where you have to pray, and say, "O God, I'm going in here now, okay. I'm getting ready to make this presentation. If you don't go with me, Lord, I'm not gonna be able to get this done. I need your help, Lord. I need your help. Lord, I'm getting ready to do this. I'm out of my element. I'm out of my conference zone, Lord. O God, scare me again, Jesus. Here we go. We're walking into this door".
Come on. Who am I talking to? I'm talking to somebody. If all your contacts are old contacts, you don't have no contacts. Relationships are indicators. They are indicators of the currency of growth. All you have is the same old friends you had when you was drinking at the strip club and those are the only people who you can befriend. It means you haven't changed. You haven't grown. You haven't developed. Your new friends ought to make your old friends uncomfortable. If ain't nobody said to you recently, "You think you so much," you ain't growing. See, that's a real compliment. When people walk up to you out of your old life and say, "You think you so much," they're really complimenting you. They're saying that you're growing. They're saying that you're entering into another level of life. Stop getting mad at that. That's a compliment. It's a sign that you're growing.
Oh my god, I feel the Holy Ghost talking to somebody in this room right now. You know you're not complacent when you walk in the rooms and they're talking about what you used to think was funny, and now you think it's silly. You used to think they were fun and now they're boring. You can laugh for a few minutes and then you want to go. When you get through talking about old times, you don't have nothing to talk about, because everything that's on your head is not on their mind. That is a sign you are growing to the next level. Come on, talk to me, somebody. You're not supposed to get along with everybody. Everybody is not supposed to like you. Stop dumbing down who you are so you can fit in with where you left. I'm gonna break it down until you get it.
Give me number five. I'm gonna come on through this. Number five, you don't risk sharing your opinion or ideas. These people drive me crazy. Whatever you say, they agree with it. They never add nothing to the conversation. They won't risk being wrong, so they just parakeet your ideas. They don't risk sharing your opinion or your ideas as a sign that you are complacent. Fear has got you locked in. Have an opinion. Even if they don't do it, have an opinion. Open your mouth and speak it. You wait on others to be assertive while you just go along to get along.
Without taking the risk of offering your contribution, whether it is used or not, you will never be able to evaluate whether you are growing or not because you're playing it safe. You're hiding, Adam. Get out from behind them fig leaves, and let me see what's really going on here. You're hiding. Your silence is a cover up because you are afraid to take risks. You cannot be a leader and not take risks. You cannot be a leader and not get on people's nerves. Everybody's not supposed to like you if you're gonna be a frontliner. Stop crying about people hating on you. They're supposed to hate on you. If you are a leader, they are going to hate on you. That's part of the job requirement.
Hannah is trying to settle in to something that is beneath her. She has everything a woman could want. She has a well-to-do husband who loves her. She has an environment that allows her to do pretty much whatever she pleases. She's sitting good. She's doing really good. He cares about her. Everything would be fine if it wasn't for Peninnah. Peninnah comes into her life as a ministry. Write this down: the ministry of Peninnah. I want you to identify Peninnahs in your life. There are people that God sends in your life solely to get on your nerves. They are there to save you from mediocrity. They are there to provoke you to jealousy. They are there to show off that God has something more, and if you're not careful, you will acquiesce into becoming their hater rather than to allow them to become your stimulator.
Either you're gonna be a hater or you're gonna be stimulated, but God says Peninnah and all of her kids and all of their jelly- and peanut-butter-stained jaws as a sign to you that what they said about you isn't true. There is more possible for you in your life. God, thank you for Peninnah. Thank you for Peninnah. In the face of all the obstacles and the challenges, God, you sent Peninnah. Are you hearing what I'm saying to you? Hannah didn't realize, watch this, that her purpose was hidden behind her problem. Her problem was that she was barren. Her purpose was hidden behind her problem. Whenever God, this is, please get this if you don't get anything else. Whenever God has a great purpose in your life, he will put a great problem in front of it.
Why are you writing that down? Write this down. Find your giant. When you find your giant, you will find your kingdom. There wouldn't have been a Goliath in David's life. Goliath was the greatest thing that could have ever happened to David. David would still be taking care of sheep if it wasn't for Goliath. Goliath is the gateway to the next dimension. Whenever God is getting ready to take you into a the new zone, there will always be a big problem standing in its way. The big problem is a sign that as soon as you get over this, you're gonna step it... did you see that? You're gonna step into... you're about to step into a brand-new dimension? Stop shrinking back from Goliath. Stop shrinking back from Peninnah. It's a sign that God has something else for you.
So, cry if you want to. Fuss if you want to, but when you get through crying and fussing, now it's time to fight. Now it's time to fight. Personal testimony. Quick personal testimony. The first time I got ready to speak in front of what I call a big crowd, which was about 120 people. That was big. Don't laugh till you try it. Don't laugh till you've tried. A hundred and twenty people with three rows of church mothers on the front row, all dressed in white. I came up in a church where being spiritual meant looking evil, and the more anointed you are, you squinted your eyes and looked hateful, and the more hateful you look, the more holy they thought you were, and I had to go past all them church mothers and go stand up in front of them and preach, and here was my problem.
In order to preach, I needed a mic. I don't really need one. I probably could have hollered and covered the room, and my hands would shake so bad, and then when I knew my hands were shaking and they could see it, they would shake worse. And I thought, "I cannot speak in front of people because my hands shake". Now, my purpose is on the other side. The thing that annoys you, the thing that irritates you, the thing that scares you, the thing that frustrates you, it's the very sign that God has something on the other side of it for you.
Somebody, holler "leap over it". Questions jumped up in my head. I'm gonna give them to you real quick. Questions jumped up in my... why did God choose a barren woman to birth a prophet? Why did God choose a barren woman to birth a prophet? Why didn't he just give Samuel to Peninnah? It was easy for her to have babies. God never does what's easy. He does what's divine. God never does what's easy. He does what's divine. It's always gonna be complicated. Why did God choose a barren woman to birth a prophet? Why did God use a boy to kill Goliath? Why did God send a backslider to preach to Nineveh? Why did God use a century-old man to have Isaac? Why did God use a virgin to birth Jesus? Why did Jesus tell a man whose hand was withered, "Stretch forth your hand"? Who tells a blind man to go wash in the pool he couldn't see how to get to?
Y'all don't hear what I'm saying to... who stands in front of a tomb and tells a dead man to come forth? That's how you know it's God. Whenever it's hard, it's God. Whenever it's difficult, it's God. Whenever it goes against the grain, it's God. Whenever it frustrates you, it's God. Peninnah was in her life to get on her nerves. Peninnah was there to provoke Hannah. For the first time in all of those years, Hannah got, the Bible says Hannah stood up. Somebody, shout "Hannah stood up". I came to tell everybody in this room, this is the hour. This is the time. This is the moment for you to stand up and say, "I'm through crying. I'm through being depressed. I'm through being frustrated. Whatever it takes to break this yolk in my life, I'm going to break this yolk in my life".
This is your hour. This is your moment. That's why God has you here. That's why God gave me this Word on Mother's Day when he knew you would show up so that you could get this Word. Your barren days are behind you. Your birthing days are before you. Your barren days are behind you. Your birthing days are before you. God is about to do a new thing in your life because you're provoked. Slap somebody and tell them "I'm provoked". Elbow somebody and tell them "I'm provoked". I'm provoked. I'm running out of time. I'm running out of energy. I'm running out of strength. If it's ever gonna happen in my life, it's gonna have to happen right now. I want all the provoked people in this room to open your mouth and make some...