TD Jakes - How to Prepare for a Shift
I want you to look at the contrast and strength between the younger and older generations. The young man can leap out of bed; he can hear what the Spirit is saying, but he cannot understand how to act on what he hears. The old man can no longer hear what the Spirit is saying, but he can perceive what is being communicated to the young man and can tell him how to respond to it. Samuel doesn’t even know how to respond to what he hears without the wisdom of the elders. In order for us to embrace the shift that God has for us, both generations and all generations must come together in respect for one another to achieve this.
No matter how gifted you are, no matter how talented you are, no matter how many people are coming to hear you speak, no matter how many people are interested in what you are trying to do, there is a blind side, and you need someone to guide you on how to respond to what you’re sensing. Eli says to Samuel, after three times of God calling him, to go back and lay down again, and if He speaks again, to say, «Speak, Lord, for Your servant hears.» That was the missing piece that shifted and changed this whole narrative. You need direction, correction, and instruction. You need direction, correction, and instruction. Until you can accept direction, correction, and instruction, the shift will not occur. Some of you are resistant to direction, resistant to correction, and resistant to instruction.
You say, «I’m grown; I can do it my way.» No, no, no. In order to enter into the shift that God is orchestrating, you will need direction, correction, and instruction. Say this: «Speak, Lord, for Your servant hears.» I want you to type that right now: «Speak, Lord, for Your servant hears.» He instructs you to go back to a quiet place, a calm place, and be still; stop telling God how you feel and what you think. God doesn’t need any information from you. Be quiet, lay down, and listen. This isn’t about talking; it’s about listening. I’m amazed that we have lost the art of listening. We are so busy responding that we don’t listen. Even when I’m teaching, sometimes you are so busy responding that you aren’t listening.
So when I step away from the scene, you haven’t learned anything. You’ve done some cheers, you’ve waved your pom-poms, but you haven’t learned anything because you are not trained to listen. You want everyone to know you’re in the room; you want to be seen and heard. But every now and then, you have to be still. You have to be still and know that God is God. He doesn’t need your endorsement; He doesn’t need your emoji—none of that is required for Him to be God. We have lost the art of listening, and we can’t make the necessary shifts because we can’t listen. We can’t listen; we won’t take direction, we won’t take correction, and we won’t accept instruction, and it is damaging our homes.
We won’t take direction, we won’t take correction, and we won’t accept instructions, and it is harming our marriages. I’m seeing marriages explode like popcorn in hot grease, and almost every time, it’s because of these three things: you won’t take direction, you won’t take correction, and you won’t listen to instruction until the whole thing blows up. Then guess what? When it explodes, you walk out. I told someone last night that I feel like a fire department called to a house after it has burned down—the roof is gone, the gables are gone, the porches have collapsed, everything is gone. The only thing left standing is the chimney, and then you say, «I’m going to call 911.» Why? The fire is over, and everyone has made a decision.
You won’t take direction, you won’t take correction, and you will not listen to instruction until everything has exploded, and then you want a miracle. You need miracles in so many areas of your life. In your finances, you won’t take direction; you won’t correct your credit score; you won’t take instruction. You don’t want to do anything except listen at church. So you have great anointing but no credit. You have great anointing but are about to be evicted, and you’re trying to use your anointing to stop your eviction. You won’t take direction. The hardest thing in the world is to give people direction, especially if it isn’t about spiritual things. We advance in the areas where we listen, and we fail in the areas where we don’t. You need to place the greatest emphasis on the areas where you have the greatest problems, focusing on three things: direction, correction, and instruction.
Financially, what is your credit score? Correction: let’s begin to fix it. Instruction: what do we do with the money we have? I can do a seminar on that, but it will only attract a handful of people. However, if I do something on spiritual warfare or anointing, it will be packed. The areas where we’ve lost the art of listening and we don’t listen to direction, correction, and instruction are the areas where we suffer the most. We warned you when that little boy was young not to raise him that way, but you wouldn’t take direction.
We told you, «If you don’t correct him, you’re going to have problems,» but you wouldn’t take correction. You won’t take direction, you won’t take correction, and you won’t take instruction. There may be something going on with that child that disciplining him will not fix, but you insist on doing it your way, thinking, «I’m going to beat this out of you; I’m going to drive this out of you.» You’re not a slave master; he’s not a slave. Listen to this: direction, correction, and instruction will save your job, will save your marriage, will save your relationships, will save your future, and will save your walk with God. This whole shift is predicated on the ability to hear, not on the ability to speak. It’s not about how many invitations you get to speak, not about who is calling you, not about who you are mentoring, and not about who your spiritual guide is.
We have more spiritual mothers than we have children, and some of you have five spiritual daddies. Stop, stop. Go sit down, lay down, and wait on God to speak to you. When God speaks to you, you don’t need five daddies; you don’t need three spiritual mothers. You have spiritual mothers who are 20 or 25 years old. How are you a spiritual mother? Sit down. Oh, I better stop. We have apostles who don’t have anyone following them; you’re not impacting the nations. Sit down and receive a true word from God. The absence of the art of listening is harming us. You and your husband are having a discussion—debating, arguing.
The reason the argument never resolves the problem is that while one is talking, the other is waiting for them to finish so they can interject, so they can jab, so they can link their thoughts. There’s no direction, no correction, and no instruction, which is making divorce lawyers wealthy. That’s where the tide is heading: to the court. I know that’s hard to hear. I’m sorry I had to be the one to say it, but it needs to be said. Why enroll in a class if you’re going to argue with the teacher? You aren’t there to teach the class; you may not even agree with the teachings. You’re there to get a grade, to be exposed to different ideas and perspectives, and then get out. Direction, correction, instruction.
Now you want to take over the class? Go lay down and listen. The world is shifting; it doesn’t work the way you think it works. That’s why you wasted your thirties trying to make the world work as you think it should, rather than listening to someone who has been there before. Now you’re in your forties doing what you should have been doing in your twenties—15, 18 years stolen out of your life—and now you’re just starting to do what you should have finished. My heart aches because time doesn’t last long. It doesn’t last long, and if you don’t do what you’re supposed to do when you’re supposed to do it, you will miss a critical turn that changes the trajectory of the shift that God is orchestrating in your life.