TD Jakes - Potent Faith (04/14/2024)
God's call often disrupts comfort—choosing idolaters like Abram for new covenants, requiring separation from old mindsets/kin. Like transitional Noah descendants or modern shifts (pre/post-tech eras), we face manna-ceasing moments: easy provision ends, demanding active faith/preparation amid crushing for potent, fruitful wine.
Transitional Generations
Abram is not the Abraham that you are accustomed to hearing about. He is out of Mesopotamia, he is a Chaldean, he is carnal, he is an idolater, his family is all into idolatry because Abram is just a few generations from the sons of Noah, who had lived both in the Antediluvian age, the time period before the flood, and gone through the flood. If I had time, I would really dig into this. They were a transitional group of people who had lived before and after the flood. There is a big difference between before and after. I would really like to dig down into how we are a transitional generation. And in a lot of ways, we are transitioning both before and after. Before and after social media. Before and after AI. Before and after you could bank on your phone. Before and after you could take a picture with the phone.
Before and after, they were both before the flood, antediluvian, and after the flood because God had saved them through the flood. Yeah, I do not know if you heard it. God had saved them through the flood. The tsunami that was sent to destroy others, carried them through. And they were saying, "Just eight people. Save eight souls. Save through the water," which is used metaphorically for baptism. "Wherefore doth not now baptism even save us, even the putting away of the filth of the flesh, even as it saved the eight souls, they were saved through the water."
I am quoting scripture, not opinion. But what I want you to realize is that sometimes God can save you and you can be traumatized by the way in which he saves you. We are learning that the survivors of the Holocaust, not only were traumatized, those who went through it, but even their children and their children's children's children were so traumatized that their DNA, that is not mental, that is biological. Their DNA has been reconstructed as a result of their great, great grandparents' trauma. More recently, books have been written about the descendants of slaves. How your whole DNA has been rearranged as a result of going through, you got saved, you got delivered from it. It is over. But inside, let me break it down.
Trauma from Deliverance
Have you ever gone through anything and God brought you out, but you were left with triggers and trauma and mood swings and uncertainty. Are there any survivors here in the building? You survived it, and you know you ought to be happy, but surviving it cost you so much that instead of dancing when you get out the ark, you are crying. You ought to be shouting that you made it out, but you cannot shout because sometimes deliverance itself creates its own trauma. When a baby is born, it is so traumatic that the baby is exhausted. Though it came through it, from this to that, the baby is exhausted and the mama is sleep because they have been through trauma. So it is okay to say, "I made it, but I am hurting. God delivered, but it cost me something. I am grateful that he delivered me but do not expect me to respond in the way you predicted because it was so amazing."
Noah lived a long time, died at 350 years after the flood at the age of 950. And his father died at 128. Are you following me? And he is a descendant of the sons of Noah. You have characters in the Old Testament... can I take my time with you? You have characters in the Old Testament like Nimrod who built the tower toward heaven. Some scholars say that it was not that he was trying to reach heaven, he was trying to escape the possibility of another flood. That he thought if he built it high enough, should God ever decide to flood again, he would have a place of safety to get to. See, sometimes when you have been through something even after it is over, you are building things you do not need in case it ever happens again.
Building Towers from Trauma
So the second husband gets penalized for what the first husband did because you are a Nimrod. You made it through it, but you are building a tower in case if you think for one moment you are gonna come in here... We are always building things based on past experiences. So God moves on Nimrod and shuts it down and scatters people all over the world. Scatters them by changing their language at what we call the Tower of Babel. Can I take my time with this? Now, if you look at a contemporary map, you will not understand the scatter. You have to look at an ancient map... put my ancient map up. You have to look at an ancient map to see the land mass, that is the traditional one, put the ancient one up. The ancient one will show you that all of the continents had not been divided yet. That we were, at one time, one land mass. That through earthquakes and changes and God knows what, the continents separated.
One Human Race
So we are one people. Let me bring this home. There is only one race. No matter how we argue and try to divide by black, white, brown, blue, yellow, Ukrainian, German, or whatever you wanna call yourself. Millennials, Gen X, Gen Z, Gen Y, Gen Q, Gen O, whatever you decide to put yourself in... there is only one human race. Our distinctives of characteristics are based on the divisions of where we scattered. If the people scattered into desert places, they develop more melanin in their skin and thicker lips and wider noses to breathe in, in spite of sand dunes, to survive.
If they moved into cooler climates where there was less melanin needed, they came out lighter and brighter, thinner lips. If they moved into places that were scorching with sun, they squinted their eyes until their features change and adapted to their environment. "Where are you going with this?" I am glad you asked. I am trying to explain to you how they became idolaters. Because having had this experience with God, no matter where they were flung to all over the world, they started worshiping other gods. They started worshiping other gods because even though God had delivered the original family, the way in which he delivered them made them be drawn to other gods.
God's Call to Abram
When the Bible says that God appeared unto Abram, we have not seen God appear since Noah. This is a big historical moment. God shows up to Abram and says, "For what I am gonna do in your life, you gonna have to leave your kinfoks alone, you are gonna have to move out of your father's house, you are gonna have to go to a place I will show you. I am going to set you apart, and I am going to start a whole new nation in you that understands blessings." Because the enemy will send idolatry to block up your ability to build in the conduits to receive what God has for you. Hate, envy, jealousy, strife, confusion, turmoil, bitterness all comes in and clogs up your ductwork.
Clear Ductwork for Flow
It clogs your ductwork up so that you cannot receive what is available to you because of how much it costs you to get where you are. And I am not just talking about people who are burning sage in their house, I am talking about you too, but I am not just talking about you. I am talking about all of these strange little things we have going, quarters in our cabbage and all that kind of stuff that we do are descendants of ideologies that suggests that we need a little something extra other than Word for our year to be blessed. Throwing salt over our shoulder and... come on, stay with me, stay with me, stay with me. Not walking in between posts and all of this unbiblical stuff we do. Praying to the universe, all this stuff that we do, this idolatrous stuff that we create because we think God needs some help, but if you can ever get your ductwork clear.
So the ductwork travels through your mind as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. So the enemy cannot stop the chiller from being cold, but if he can jam up your mind with all kinds of foolishness so that you are not getting a good flow in your life, you will say, "Well, I am going to church but it is still not working. I am hearing the Word and it is still not working. I go to The Potter's House and I am still not getting what I need." But it is because your ductwork is jammed up with guilt and pain and envy and anger and confusion and strife, and you need to take a minute and get by yourself somewhere and do a good cleanse and cleanse out your ductwork so that the power of God can flow through you without the obstruction of unbelief and malice and pride and anger because it is stopping you from getting the best of what God wants to flow into your life.
Go to Flow and Grow
There is a flow that God wants to release. There is a flow that God wants to deliver. There is a flow that God has promised you. There is a flow, and in order to get the flow, you gotta leave some folks alone. You gotta move out some places. You gotta change some friends. You are related to them, but you are not connected to them, and you got to pack your bags and go. Somebody holler, "Go!" You gotta go so you can flow. You gotta go so you can grow. You gotta go so you can move into the next dimension, and if you notice, any time you leave them, they hate you. You all right until you left, but the moment you leave, they hate you because they were on assignment from hell to block your flow, but the devil is a liar. The devil is already defeated. You are about to come into a supernatural flow.
Who am I preaching to in this place? Holler at your boy if I am preaching at you! Abraham's father, Terah, dies in Haran, and we criticized Abram a lot for bringing Lot, but Lot was fatherless. And it is not so much that he brought him, it says Lot went with him. What I have learned in 66 years of living, you have to be careful who you let go with you. People, out of their own brokenness and need, will attach themselves to you just because you are going somewhere.
And you gotta keep not just your vision, but your peripheral vision so you can see who went with you. Lot went with him. Whenever God appears to you, other people wanna go. Some of y'all are in trouble right now, not because of you, but who went with you. Yeah, and you felt sorry for them and you had empathy for them, and Lot's father was Abram's brother, and he felt an obligation, and I am learning that sometimes feeling an obligation is the arrogance of empathy to think that you could be something that you were not designed to be to somebody else.
Do It By Myself
Let me break this down. Some folks you cannot fix because you did not break. Let me say it to the people over here. Some folks you cannot fix because you did not break, but your heart is so big and you wanna make a difference in their life and you ignore the instruction of the Lord when he said, "Leave them, you trying to take them with you." And some of them when you are trying to take them, they die because they were not designed to go to the next level. So Terah died in Haran, and Lot hung on and still went with him. Look at somebody and say, "I gotta do this by myself. I love you, but I gotta do this by myself."
Peter, James, and John, you have gone as far as you can go, but I am going a little further than what you are able to go. I gotta do this by myself. I gotta go by myself. I come to the garden alone while the dew is still on the roses. I gotta do this by myself. I gotta let you go. I gotta let you go. But your heart is your strength and your weakness. The same thing that makes you strong and drew God's attention to you is the same thing that makes you vulnerable that causes people to become ticks attached to you, sucking the blood out of you.
Blessed Despite Famine
I got a word for you. You have to understand that you have been blessed. Abram receives this blessing, some people call it fivefold, I counted about seven or eight blessings; he receives them from God. The blessing is not based on the circumstances, because right after the blessing, the Bible says a famine broke out in the land, but the famine could not destroy the blessings. Stop defining your blessings by your conditions. You are blessed. Somebody holler, "I am blessed!" Somebody who said, "I am blessed," has got a million dollars, and somebody who said, "I am blessed," has got $100, and somebody who said, "I am blessed," do not have no dollars, but it can still be true in all three cases because the thousand does not make me blessed, the million does not make me blessed, the dollar does not make me blessed.
The appearance of God is what makes me blessed. Somebody holler, "I am blessed!" You gotta understand what a blessing is because we have commercialized the blessing of the Lord and turned it into vain, corruptible things. You gotta stop being a carnal Christian and understand that your blessing has nothing to do with the season you are in and the conditions around you. You are blessed, that is why hell cannot curse you. You are blessed, that is why you keep getting up again. You are blessed, that is why you can make it through the desert. Somebody holler, "I am blessed!" My God, my God, my God.
I Am Blessed
See, you are a little afraid, you are a little intimidated. You said it, but you did not say it with the conviction of somebody who has the real ductwork all cleared out, but we are gonna say it to you, ductwork clears out. I want you to shake hands with seven people and say, "I am blessed." I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. Type it on the line, "I am blessed." Shout it in your house, "I am blessed!" Speak to the cancer and say, "I am blessed." Speak to the diabetes and say, "I am blessed." Speak to your kidney failure and say, "I am blessed."
Break every generational curse over your family and say, "I am blessed." I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the council of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. His delight is in the law of the Lord." If the Word of God do not make you happy, you are not blessed. But if the Word of God makes something leap up in your belly, you are blessed. I want every blessed person in this room to make a noise before God. I am blessed. I am blessed. I am blessed. I came out of the hospital blessed. I was blessed in the ambulance. I was blessed when I was bleeding. I was blessed when I was lonely. I was blessed when I was turmoil, because through it all I kept getting up again because I am blessed.
God is with me. In the valley he is with me. In the mountain he is with me. With friends he is with me. In isolation he is with me. I do not care where I move, I am still blessed. I am blessed in the city. I am blessed in the field. I am blessed in my uprising. I am blessed in my down-setting. My body is blessed. My children are blessed. My mind is blessed. My heart is blessed. I do not blame you for hating on me, I would be hateful too. I am blessed. I do not deserve it, but I am blessed. He chose me. He picked me up. He turned me around. I am blessed. I need about 50 blessed people to go into a blessed praise so that somebody could see what it means to be blessed.