Embracing Audacious Faith: Trusting God for the Impossible

1) "And as I began to pray about this, I became very excited for you guys because I've been watching you step out in audacious faith. Do you know, what the Lord wants us to do is to live in this realm of trust and faith that is absolutely almost, how can I put it, unapologetically rude. So it is. Where we're just calling things into being where the world says you can't do that. So if you've got a Bible, quickly turn with me to Matthew chapter nine. And we're going to go through from verses 18 to 34. Matthew is basically teaching us that if we're going to be a people that actually follow Jesus, he will continually invite you to be a person of audacious faith." [01:06:01] (38 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


2) "But this drives him to Jesus. It doesn't drive him, you know, into depression or anxiety. It drives him towards the Lord. And he comes to Jesus with this conviction, do you know, that if you just put your hand on her, Jesus, she will come alive again. That's a kind of audacious faith when you think about it. That is in the midst of something that is regarded as so final where death is seen as the actual great enemy of all mankind and humanity that this person would believe that Jesus can actually bring resurrection prior to his resurrection. And the first thing that jumps out to me from this script, do you know, is this audacious faith sits in the face of complete loss, but it still hopes. It still hopes, which is extremely difficult to do and could seem ridiculous to actually many." [01:08:50] (47 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


3) "Audacious faith attracts the presence of the Lord. God wants you to be bold. Yes. John's very bold. John's very bold. Very, thank me. I can be bold as well. And do you know what? That's why we see things happening. I think it's just because we go for it. And it's not that we're anything special." [01:12:33] (16 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


4) "Audacious faith makes a withdrawal from heaven that releases healing in earth. Guys, we can do this. This is how to do it, just exercise your audacious faith. It's really dig into that bucket and exercise it, and it draws something, it pulls something from heaven. Notice there's an interesting turn here in the sequence of events. The man's saying my daughter has just died. Jesus starts coming with him, but all of a sudden it turns out Jesus is gone. you know he's like what's just happened here you know why is he off healing someone else in the midst of the moment of crisis Jesus is addressing someone else's moment of crisis because he's completely attentive to what's happening all around him in other words you might be sitting here with an illness and a condition and you've seen someone else getting healed and you go that's it he's done it for them what about me no Jesus is attentive to everything that's going on around about him and you're just as special and important to him as anyone else" [01:15:14] (64 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


5) "Audacity you know of faith is actually having the courage to believe what Jesus actually says and thinks about your situation in the deacon's scenario here it was having the courage to put his trust in how God looks at circumstances where even though he had actually lost you know a loved one he still believed that Jesus would raise her where you feel you've lost hope because your situation has actually been going on for so many years maybe like that woman with the blood issue do you know Jesus says I can still heal you I can still touch you I can still enter into your situation" [01:17:55] (38 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


6) "A disciple is someone who begins to see life and circumstances from the perspective of who Jesus is and again it's that mindset shift again just looking at things differently not how horrible the circumstances are not how dire the needs may actually be or how long the situation has been going on for but it's a mindset shift and it's a perspective shift and it's a perspective shift it's having that audacity to actually believe that in the midst of your crisis moment that Jesus is far far bigger than anything that's facing you or coming against you at this present time he is the king of kings he sustains all things do you know he's resurrected he's ascended he's ruling over the whole complete universe that's the God we follow I get so excited even thinking about that the spirit's alive and you so that you in the midst of crisis can be the hope to Ashford and every single place that you actually go and do you know what it might look ridiculous from the world's perspective on earth but from a heavenly perspective it looks just completely right you're at the right place at the right time just exercise that which God has given you" [01:19:15] (65 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


7) "One of the things that God has convicted me of deeply is there's times in my life where I have to just trust them no matter what the situation looks like it's trusting them but I trust them for what they're doing and I trust them for what they're and placing you know our hope in him that produces audacious faith as we lay everything down before him I come against difficult circumstances at times and it's been a difficult season for my wife Linda and I see me pushing into the kingdom the enemy pushes back you know we've had family problems we've had not between Linda and I but in the family we've had family illness we've had bereavement I lost my mum over the summer she went home to be with the Lord we've had pastoral and logistical issues you know from leaving the vineyard I've had threats of violence against me I've dead threats you know against us we've navigated a lot of stuff and maybe the last six months and they top it all off we were getting kicked out the school building you know because they were re-roofing part of it and so we had nowhere to meet for I think at least eight weeks and we thought we're back to COVID again you know and no one wants to go back to there and then I looked at the scriptures and I read it and you know what this was what I read here on earth you will have many trials I thought oh great Lord thanks and sorrows oh it's just getting better but take heart because I have overcame the world and you know what we took heart and we refused to accept that we were getting kicked out the school and we exercised audacious faith we talked to a couple of people and we were in the school for the whole eight weeks never get kicked out for that I thought this doesn't have to be the end you know why should we just take that no that's a good word no we're not settling for that no so we've had to contend for the future sometimes you and I have to hold on to the promises that God gives you you gotta hold on to them and then do something with it do something with it" [01:21:46] (116 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)