Backed by Power w/ Sarah Jakes Roberts

Sarah Jakes Roberts

Hello, acclaimed comics writer and notorious Scott Summers hater Rosie Knight. Well, hello, Emmy winning podcaster and totally unbiased Targaryen royal supporter Jason Concepcion. Somehow, the x ray Vision podcast has returned, and like always, we'll be here every week. You'll hear from tv writers, actors, comics creators, pop culture critics. Nothing is off the table.

Listen to X ray vision on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Imagine you're a fly on the wall at a dinner between the mafia, the CIA, and the KGB. That's where my new podcast begins. This is Neal Strauss, host of to live and die in LA, and I wanted to quickly tell you about an intense new series about a dangerous spy taught to seduce men for their secrets and sometimes their lives. From Tenderfoot TV.

This is to die for. To die for is available now. Listen for free on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah Storm, and my new podcast, NBA DNA with Hannah Storm, chronicles my six decades in professional basketball, from growing up in the sport to becoming one of sports tv's first female broadcasters. Join me as I dig deep into the game's history, unearth some wild stories, and talk to my friends from the world of basketball, from doctor J to Charles Barkley, it's been a wild ride, and now I get to take you with me.

Sarah Jakes Roberts

Listen to NBA DNA with Hannah Storm on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Don't be surprised when you turn your light on and some people stay in the dark. I came here to let somebody know that your lifeline is still flowing in your direction. It is on you to get back in position with God. I'm not playing hide and seek no more.

If you gonna be with me, you won't have to stand in the prayer. This was never about you feeling powerful. This was about you letting power move. Here we go. Here we go.

Here we go. I'm back. It's your girl. Sjr, how are you? It is a very special week for me, and if you are listening for the podcast for the first time, maybe.

You stumbled upon this randomly. You don't even know who I am, and you're about to skip it. Just let me tell you something. I love you. I'm glad you're here.

Secondly, if it's not your first time. Then you already know that. This weekend, my book, power moves is available everywhere books are sold. I am recording this on Thursday, April 25. You're hearing it sometime after the first, right?

Yeah, sometime after the first. And so this is going to be just like my brain dump, heart dump. All of my excitement, anxiety, nerves, fears and. Yeah. So this is what I'd like to say.

I know one thing for sure. I placed everything that God put in my spirit into this book. I am nervous because sharing something that God gave you that feels so deeply personal and intimate and hoping that it translates to someone else just creates vulnerability. I'm also leaving this morning. I'm literally, it's 930.

And I'm leaving in a minute to go to Houston in which we will kick off tour for the power moves tour. And we will be in Houston and Chicago. I preach in Dallas on Sunday and then Brooklyn on Tuesday. The DM, Atlanta on Wednesday, DMV on no, I lied. Atlantis Thursday, DMV Friday, D and B Saturday morning because them d and b realys don't play.

And I, last night I was up just working on programming. This is a book tour, different than a woman evolve tour where we've got like the worship team and doctor NeET is there. And it felt like a really good idea when I said it. But now that it's time for me to step into it, I feel nerves. I was combing through the program last night because I just wanted to make sure that it flows nicely and that it doesn't feel as awkward as I feel and stepping into the moment.

One thing that I have settled in, though, in this is that God has placed something in my spirit before that has touched, changed, transformed, brought someone closer to him in the past. And my prayers that this book will be the same. I feel that same feeling as when I'm preaching a message that feels really intentional and pivotal, as I do with releasing this. And so my prayer is that you will receive what God placed in my spirit as you go through this book. And for Tor, I am praying that it will be a surge that restores power for those who have been feeling powerless in an area of their life.

One of the things I argue in the book is that we're hardly ever feeling powerless in every single area, but the area where we do feel powerless stands out to us the most. And so I'm praying that we will be a surge in these cities and that these women will be surges for their communities, their families, for their businesses and everything else. So I am already in it by the time you're listening to it. And hopefully by now I've gotten some reassurance or confirmation and I'm crazy because I be like, God's either going to confirm that I need to sit down and not be the one to do this, or God's going to confirm that it could be no one else but me. But either way, I'm going to win.

Because I'm going to be one step closer to who I'm supposed to be in God. And so I release myself from it needing to be this amazing, over the top experience. Or I failed. Cause, you know, it's gonna be what God wants it to be. And I'm gonna pick up every lesson in the moment.

So y'all pray for me. I have an idea of what I'm preaching on Sunday. Once again, this is Thursday, April 25. I have an idea. I feel like I'm going to talk about the silent transition of power and how we restore it and claim it.

And I've got a text right now. My text is exodus, when Moses is about to part the Red Sea. Because I see a lot of power dynamics. I see God's power, I see the power of fear, I see the power of uncertainty. And I see all of the ways that power moves in that text.

I don't know how it's going to make sense just yet, but I feel like God's giving me something with that text. So what you're about to listen to is whatever this feeling I have turns into. So I'm recording this intro before I actually preach the message. So I want to say it's going to bless you. It's going to touch you.

It's going to change you. God's given me a revelation, and I know exactly what it is. But I'm recording this right now in the unknown. And so let's see together. What does this sensing turn into?

I love you. I'm so grateful to be on this thing called life with you. I hope you enjoy the message. My subject for today is backed by. Power.

And I'm looking forward to giving you what God placed in my spirit. My text is Exodus, chapter 14, verses eleven through. I'm going to add 21. I told them 20, but I was reading through my notes, and I'd like to add through 21. So context is that the hebrew children who have been held in captivity for centuries by the Egyptians have finally received deliverance via Moses.

And as a part of their delivery into the promised land, they must travel through the wilderness. And it seems like everything is going to go okay. But then they get to this point where they're at the Red Sea, which would maybe not be problematic, but then they've got Egypt right behind them. Because Egypt didn't just let them go. Egypt changed their mind at a certain point and began chasing them.

And so we have the hebrew children who are sandwiched between the Red Sea that they cannot cross. And their oppressor, which they are trying their hardest to run away from. And they are frustrated because they don't understand why God would bring them to this point. And then allow them to, to experience tragedy. Then they said to Moses, because there were no graves in Egypt.

Have you taken us away to die in the wilderness?

Why have you so dealt with us to bring us up out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians. Than we should die in the wilderness? And verse 13 continues.

It says, and Moses said to the people, do not be afraid. Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again, no more, forever. The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.

That felt good to me. The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace. And the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward, but lift up your rod and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

And I, indeed, will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall follow them. So I will gain honor over pharaoh. And over all his armies, his chariots and his horsemen. Then the Egyptians shall know that I am Lord. When I have gained honor for myself over when I have gained honor for myself over pharaoh, his territory.

And the angel. Lord, my thing got messed up here. Everything's fine. And the angel of God, who went before the camp of Israel moved and went behind them. And the pillar of cloud went from before them and stood in between them, behind them.

So it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. Thus it was a cloud and darkness to the one. And it gave light, light by night to the other, so that one did not come near the other all that night. Spirit of the living God, oh, I thank you. I thank you for your power.

I thank you for your wisdom. I thank you for your grace. I thank you for your strategy. That when we are all out of options, that you were just getting ready to make another power move. God, I pray that this would be a moment of intimate encounter between you and your people.

God, I'm so grateful that you would use me as a vessel to serve what you're doing in their life. And, God, I pray that you would move me out of the way, that you would strengthen me, that you would give me language, that you would translate what you have deposited into my heart out of my mouth, that it would fall into their spirits and take root and produce fruit. God, I call on your name, great God. That's you are. Without you, I am nothing.

I can say nothing that would change a life. But with you, I believe that we could break a generational curse in this room. And so, God, I give you full permission to move, as you have already decided to do. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

Amen.

We are in an election season, and whenever we're in an election season, I am reminded of just how young this country is. America is 246 years old. That's when the government was formed. And at 35 years old, to hear something that's 246 years old, it makes it seem like it's kind of old, but it's really not old in the context of other worlds, world powers, and other world governments. Egypt.

Its government dates back to 3100 BC. India's government dates back to 2000 BC. Greece, 1600 BC. China, 1600 BC. With this context, it makes so much more sense.

While during an election season, we see so many people talking about the experiment that is America, there's a little girl waving at me. Hey, honey, how are you? In addition to it being one of the youngest countries in our world, there is this reality that because of how this country is set up, it is literally an experiment because of the way that this country has been set up. It was unheard of at the time to have a government that's founding principles were rooted in the idea of democracy. It was untested at the time of its inception.

Not only was it unexpected that we would have a government that was handled by the hands of the people who would elect representatives, there was also this reality that they wanted to balance the power of the government. So power in America is balanced between different branches. There's the executive branch, the legislative and the judicial, and between the federal governments and the state. They were intentional about trying to make sure that power didn't land in the hands of just one individual or just one system. And so in an election year like this year, in a few years, in a few months, January 4, we're going to all sit down and we're going to look at the peaceful transition of power that is one of the cornerstones of american democracy.

Is that one leadership peacefully transitions power to another leadership. And part of the cornerstone of this experiment is the peaceful transition of power. Because it says that we respect the will of the people. It says that we're going to make sure that in the transition, that nothing falls. It's why, when at all possible in an organization, when one person moves out of a position, they like to pass it over in a way that there is no ball that drops.

Because the peaceful transition of power is effective in making sure that the objectives of the nation or the organization is able to move forward without distraction. And while everyone is watching the peaceful transition of power, in about a year or so, so after that transition, we're going to realize that what we probably should have been paying just as much attention to were the midterm elections. Because the president can only do what is possible based off of the Congress that is going to enact or veto what he proposes to do, or she. Because we tied. Okay, listen, we don't know if Madam President is going to come up one day, but just in case, throw that in there.

When we recognize that the midterm elections were actually very important for us to recognize whether or not what we were actually hoping for is something that is possible, we realized that in the undercurrent of the peaceful transition of power, there's a silent transition of power. The silent transition of power are those elections that don't get as much attention. Not many people engage with them. But what's crazy about that silent transition of power is that it is actually the election that affects us the most. When we start complaining about the school system, when we start complaining about the criminal justice system, all of these are things that we could handle in these midterm elections, where we get to choose who the DA is, where we get to choose who the police chief is.

But the silent transition of power is not one that we take note of. We're worried about taxes in our neighborhood. We're worried about underdevelopment or over development. We're worried about city planning. And none of these are things that happen in this peaceful transition of power that gets all of the news coverage.

This is what takes place in the silent transition of power. The silent transition of power is not just something that happens within government. It's not uncommon, but it's not something that we often discuss. There's a silent transition of power that happens within culture. There was no announcement when people's jobs were going to be taken over by machines.

We just looked up and we were in Walmart and all of a sudden where there was a cashier, they were telling you to bag your own groceries. There was a silent transition of power. We used to ask people, what type of cable do you have? Now? People don't even have cable.

We've got Hulu and Netflix. And there was no big announcement that everyone's going to leave cable alone. There was this silent transition of power.

There was no notification when our phones would become the place where we have our constant form of communication. It used to be that if you were not home, you missed me, but now you can catch me anytime that you want. Who knows when phone books stopped being relative? No one said, hey, phone books don't matter anymore. There was a silent transition of power.

That silent transition of power is also the strategy that the enemy uses when he has taken his power too.

Can you tell me the moment where you went from being faithful to fearful?

Or was there just this silent transition of power? Can you tell me the moment where you went from believing that you had a purpose and a place in the earth to feeling so lost that you don't even know what matters? Or did it happen in a silent transition of power? Did you know when that person you're sitting next to went from being the love of your life to just your roommate? Or was there a silent transition of power?

Everyone thinks that what happens to us happens in these big moments, these big transitions of power. But what I have learned is that it is the silent transition of power that affects us the most and most of the time we consider, oh, my gosh, this happened to me. I know what happened to me. But do we ever take the time to interrogate? What was the transition of power that happened as a result of what took place?

How did it change the way you view love? How did it change the way you see God? How did it change the way that you interact with other people? Or was there a silent transition of power that has left you even lost to how you got to where you are? I was studying about this silent transition of power, and it dawned on me that as if it were wasn't enough to have a silent transition of power, there is another hard reality, and that is when there is a silent transition of power, that we end up in a position where we are asking God to restore what we lost instead of asking God to restore the power that we lost in the silent transition of power.

Sometimes restoration is not that you get back what you lost. Sometimes restoration is that you get this spirit you had before you had the loss. For God has not given us this spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. But when you go through a silent transition of power, now fear has more power than it once had. And you may be asking God to restore something that you may never actually get back.

But what God can do is restore the spirit you had before you experienced, experience the loss in the first place.

Man. As if it wasn't enough, that power just leaks out of us. The power to speak up, the power to stay committed, the power to keep fighting when we're tired, it just leaks out of us. What happens in this silent transition of power is that we also grow distant from God. Oh.

Because when we're standing in our power, we reflect the image of God, the all powerful. But when we no longer feel like we have power, it's difficult to stay in the tension of serving an all powerful God when you don't feel like you have any power at all.

I'm going somewhere. I promise.

Just because you lose your power, it doesn't mean that God lost tears.

And when you separate yourself from God, because that silent transition of power just affects you so greatly that you no longer can stand in the presence of God. You don't just create this sense of safety for yourself. What you're actually doing is alienating yourself from the very power that can restore what has been lost. And that's why there are people in this room who are here, no matter what the cost is. Because they recognize that I've got to have access to power.

Because the way my life is set up, I don't always feel powerful. I don't always feel like someone who can raise this family. I don't always feel like someone who has the power that they need. But what I realize is I have access to power. And as long as I have access to power, I can be running on low.

Because he is as close as the very mention of his name. There have been moments where I had no power at all. But all I could say was Jesus. Jesus. Jesus.

Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. I didn't know what to pray, but the spirit made utterance on my behalf.

Because when I start calling on the name of Jesus, power shows up in my circumstance.

Oh, I feel my help coming. That's why when Job says, though he slay me, yet shall I trust in him, he's not refuting the fact that he's in problems, that he's in trouble. But what he's saying is, even though I'm in trouble, I'm not going to cut off access to the one that I know can get me out of trouble saying, though he slay me, yet shall I trust in him is an act of defiance when you are in the middle of a transition of power, because what it says is, oh, no, it does hurt. Oh, no, I am depressed. But at the end of the day, I still trust him.

He's all I can hang on to. He's all that I got and, baby, he's all that I need. Because if I got him, I got a way out.

There are some scriptures that only have their power because they exemplify for us what it's like to constantly have access to power, even when we're in the midst of not feeling powerful ourselves. I want to quote some of them for you, because if you don't take anything else away from this service, what I want you to understand is, though power of depression may be strong, though power of anxiety may be strong, if you stay connected to God, that power is going to have to face off with his power. And let me tell you something, he always wins. Let me tell you something, he never gives up. Let me tell you something.

There have been people who have come into this church with suicidal thoughts, thinking to themselves, if I don't get a word from God, I don't know how I'm going to make it. But they messed around and got in the presence of God, and they let the power of God fall on them. And when the power of God fell on them, the power of depression had to break loose off of them. The power of anxiety had to break loose off of them, because I know of a power that is greater than any other power. And sometimes I got to be like the woman with the issue and I gotta press my way into the presence of God, because when I press, he pulls me.

When I press, he pushes me.

I started talking about this incident. Drugs and officials cover up. You couldn't believe it from iheart podcasts. It's like the police knew who he was before they got here. A story about money, power, and corruption.

The medical school dean at USC was leading a secret double life. He's breathing right now. Yes, he's absolutely breathing. I'm a doctor. Actually, there's no way that that guy's a doctor.

I'm Paul Pringle, and I'm an investigative reporter for the LA Times. This is the story of an investigation that starts in a hotel room in Pasadena, California, and reaches all the way to the top of two of the most powerful institutions in the city of Los Angeles. When people fall in line, they fall in line. Looking back, I realized, oh, everyone knew. This is fallen angels, a story of California corruption.

Sarah Jakes Roberts

We're always going to have predators. It's the good people who stand by and do nothing that allow them to flourish. Listen to fallen Angels, a story of California corruption, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

The big take from Bloomberg news brings you what's shaping the world's economies with the smartest and best informed business reporters around the world, western nations like the US and Europe. Mexico will likely have its first female president. And then you have China and help you understand what's happening, what it means, and why it matters. He'll get his yo yos to Europe in time, but the longer this drags on, the more worry he's getting. They knew that they needed to do this as fast as they possibly could to get a drug on the market as fast as they could.

I'm David Guerra. I'm Sarah Holder. I'm Soleia Mohsen. We cover the stories behind what's moving money and markets. Basically, everyone was expecting, if not a calamity, certainly a recession.

Sarah Jakes Roberts

But the problem is that that paperwork, as our reporting showed, is fake. As someone who's covering the market, I'm often very worried about an imminent collapse. I'm thinking about it quite often. Listen to the big take on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is an NAACP and Webby Award winning podcast dedicated to all things mental health, personal development, and all of the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves.

Here we have the conversations that help black women decipher how their past inform who they are today and use that information to decide who they want to be. Moving forward, we chat about things like how to establish routines that center self care, what burnout looks and feels like, and defining what aspects of our lives are making us happy and what parts are holding us back. I'm your host, doctor Joy Hardin Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia, and I can't wait for you to join the conversation. Every Wednesday, listen to the therapy for Black Girls podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Take good care and we'll see you there.

Sarah Jakes Roberts

Psalm 20 713 says, I would have fainted unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. It's not that I wasn't tired. I would have fainted. I would have gave up. I would have been in jail, I would have been drunken out of my mind.

But for some, some reason, I didn't let go of what I believed. Yeah, I gotta stay connected to power. Some of you got to stay connected to people, but I got to stay connected to power. I have to stay connected to power, because what God has called me to do in the earth, I cannot do without his power. I cannot do it without his spirit.

You want to break a generational curse? Baby, you ain't that bad. But if you mess around and get connected to power, there ain't a curse in hell. There ain't a devil known to man that won't back up the purposes of God in your life.

Job said, though he slay me, the enemy has this silent transition of power. And the intent of the silent transition of power is to get you to give up on accessing the presence of God. I'm thinking about the woman in the garden. Nobody even knows when she went from being someone who had dominion to someone who was subject to the authority of a serpent. But there was a silent transition of power.

But God shows us in that text that you may have flipped the script on her, but you never flipped the script on me. And he has a conversation with the woman that lets her understand that if you stay connected to me, in spite of this unfortunate circumstance, in spite of this division that we're experiencing, if you stay connected to me, I got a way out of this. I got a way out of this. Somebody needs to know that God's got a way out of this. Somebody needs to understand that you can't give up on God now.

I know things aren't turning out the way that you anticipated, but I hear God saying, don't give up now because I got a way out of this. You just have to wait and see. I'm not finished. You just have to wait and see. I'm not done working.

You just have to wait and see.

Because he never leaves things unfinished. Undone is not what he does.

There's this reality that each of us must face, and that is that in a silent transition of power, the worst thing we can do is try to create our own sense of safety, because that's what we do. When we no longer feel like we have power, we settle for control.

And control is a cheap imitation of power because it makes you God.

And it makes you believe that I can create a sense of safety that is better than the vulnerability required to stay connected with God. In a season where my power is in transition, isn't that what we see? The hebrew children doing. After all, in this text, they are trying to create their own sense of safety. God is so good to me.

They're trying to create their own sense of safety, because what God started in them, it doesn't look like he's going to be able to finish it. And they have been oppressed for so long that all they can imagine is further oppression, not more deliverance, man. The effects of trauma, the effects of constant disappointment, rewires our brain and our expectation to lean more towards what could go wrong than what could go right.

And these hebrew children are in this, this predicament when we find them in the text, when we find them in the text, they are trying to create their own sense of safety instead of dwelling in the presence of the Lord. And I'm not saying it's you, it's probably people watching online who have tried to create their own sense of safety by saying things like, trust no one. Leave them before they leave. You never allow yourself to need someone. Or if I get more money, if I get more wealth, if I get more education, then I'll finally feel safe.

And then you finally get those things and you realize, I actually don't feel any more safe. I just feel isolated and alone. Because that is what happens when we settle for control instead of trusting God's power.

And these hebrew children are trying to create their own sense of safety, because their experience with God's safety has left them feeling like they are going to lose. I marvel at this because the hebrew children felt safe enough to start with God, but the reality of how hard it was going to be made them get stuck in the middle. When it gets hard, that's where the silent transition of power starts taking place.

Most of the time when a couple goes through a divorce, when the papers are actually filed, it's not actually when the divorce occurred. When things started getting hard, they started pulling back their power because they no longer trusted the person who they'd given the power to love them, the power to create a life for them. There's a silent transition of power. The wedding was beautiful, but it's that middle part where things start getting rough. That middle part is where you start trust, taking your trust back.

Because when you don't feel like you're safe anymore, all you can do is try and be in control. And that's what we see the hebrew children doing. That's what we start doing when God calls us to do something that is harder than we anticipated, what we do is we start taking our trust back. God, I'm not actually sure that you said what you said. I know I believed it when I started it, but if it would have been this hard, I don't think you would have signed me up for this much struggle.

So I'm going to start taking my trust back. I came to preach to somebody who has started taking their trust back in the middle. God, if I'd have known it was going to be this hard, I don't think I would have said yes because I don't think I'm cut out for this. And they start taking their trust back, not recognizing that God knew it was going to be hard when he called you. He just trusted that you would have access to his power.

So when you start taking your power back in the middle of it getting hard, you're cutting off your own lifeline. But I came here to let somebody know that your lifeline is still free flowing in your direction. It is on you to get back in position with God.

I got to allow the vulnerability connected with this moment to teach me, to groom me, to show me who you are. When I was studying this text, it got so good to me because it made me realize that the Egyptians were so new, they were so educated and their oppressors ways and methods, they knew how well they could beat them, they knew how well they could kill them, they knew how well they could chain them. And they had been studying their enemy for so long that they didn't even give God's new path a chance. They didn't even take the time to wonder. I know what my enemy can do, but I don't know yet what all God can do in my situation.

And some of us give up because we know the plans of the enemy better than we know the plan plans of God. And we let the enemy move us out of our position. When God says, if you limit me based off of what you think the enemy can do, you will never see the full potential of what your God can do. Don't limit me the enemy. Let me tell you something.

The enemy only has one or two tricks. He is not the creator. He's going to keep hitting you in the same soft spot. Yes, I'm inadequate. No, I don't have one.

What it takes, no, I don't have everything that I need. But God still called me anyway. And because God still called me anyway, I'm going to get curious about why God called me and I'm going to be suspicious about why you keep trying to knock me off my square every time I get enough courage to step up and do what God has called me to do. Here comes the enemy with the same old tricks. He ain't got nothing new to say.

I don't know who needs to to hear this, but I want you to understand that everything the devil could possibly say to you, he has already said it is time for you to turn the volume down on the enemy and start turning the volume up on the God who called you. On the God who sees you, on the God who knows you. You can't say nothing else to me. You can't put my past in front of my face, lived through it, and I came out on the other side. You can't say nothing new to me.

I didn't have the right background, but I'm standing here anyway because he that began a work in me shall complete it until the days of Jesus Christ.

I'm going to need you to turn me up in the monitors.

I need a little bit more heat in the monitors because I don't want to lose my voice in the midst of declaring this word because I feel like somebody's about to get a breakthrough in an area where they've been feeling powerless. I feel like somebody's about to get another charge. I feel like there's a surge of glory that's going to sweep through this place and somebody's going to start moving in power again. Somebody's going to start decreeing and declaring, man, as long as the enemy's got your ear, he's got your mind. And as long as the enemy has your mind, he's got your hands.

But I hear God saying, if you really want your power back, you ought to hear what I think about you. I think you're fearfully and wonderfully made. I think no weapon formed against you will prosper. I think that I'll go ahead of you and make your crooked path straight. I think you better start meditating on my word day and night because I got something to say.

I hear God saying, I got something to say about your family. I got something to say about your finances. I got something to say. Speak, Lord. Your servant is listening.

Speak, Lord.

I know you heard what the enemy said. But did you hear what God said? God said it ain't over. God said, I didn't leave you here to just leave you here. God said, I still got work to do in you.

God said it ain't time for you to retire. It's time for you to turn it up another notch.

No limits, no boundaries. Breakthrough all around you. I know you feel like your back is against the wall. You may feel like you are surrounded. But God says, I got another way out of this thing for you.

I got another way of escape. I'm still surrounding you.

Okay, I'll be honest with you. I know why the hebrew children don't think that God can show up in this situation. Because God came through so hard when they were in Egypt that they don't trust that the same God who showed up that hard back then, some kind of way they think he ran out of grace. Some kind of way, they think he ran out of power. Have you ever had God do something so powerful in your past that you doubt he could do it again?

Have you ever been afraid to even ask him to show up in your situation? Because you already been better to me than I deserve, and because someone else gave up on you, and someone ran out of love, and someone ran out of energy, you think that God could run out too. And you got more faith in the enemy's consistency than God's faithfulness.

I get it.

Steadying the enemy, rehearsing his thoughts, letting it torment you, letting it keep you up at night, over and over again, telling you how you gonna fail, telling you how you ain't gonna make it. You studied that devil.

And at a certain point we have to make a decision to turn our face towards God. Because the more I hear from the enemy, the more I believe what he says. But when I press my way into the presence of the Lord, he gives me a new song, he gives me a new word. He gives me a new revelation. God, I prophesy in this room right now that you would behold fresh vision.

I prophesy in this room right now that there would be a new sound in their ears, that there would be a new worship released in their ear. God, I prophesy right now that the enemy would go on mute and that your voice would arise. I decree and declare that the enemy would be scattered so that you could hear the voice of the Lord again, so that you could hear him calling your name.

Somebody's going to hear again. Somebody's going to be hungry again. God, I want to hear from you. I heard anxiety, I heard depression, I heard the trauma. But God, what do you say about this?

I say that all things work together for the good of those who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose.

God, I got something to say.

And the hebrew children are about to see what you're going to see. That God is never out of moves you out of options, but God's never out of options. I'll create a stream in the desert because I am the creator of options you can't even see on the level I see. Your ways are not my ways. Your thoughts are not my thoughts.

When I decide it's time for you to get out of this, I will push hell out of the way to make sure you can get through.

I call him creator God because he's created a way out of no way. I call him creator God because he defied what the doctor said and healed my body anyway. I call him creator God because there's no way I should be who I am. But he created a new thing on the inside of me. I call him creator God because he transformed my mind.

Can we take 10 seconds and thank God for being creator God?

Yeah.

Creator God is trying to teach the hebrew children about what they got when they got him. You didn't take a chance. You just felt like you took one.

This was a calculated risk. I knew the end before you said yes.

I knew the enemy would be on your heels. I knew you would be standing at this Red Sea. I knew that you would feel like you had no other options. I knew it before I said move.

I love this takes so much because I feel like it expresses so succinctly what God gave me when he told me the message power moves. Most people think that power moves is about doing something, but God told me, no. Power is a fluidity. It's a flow. And that's why you have to stay connected to the Holy Spirit, because what God calls powerful in one season may change in another season.

And you'll be using power from an old season in a new season, where it's not power in this season, it's destruction.

And too many of us are used to forcing our way through something, because forcing our way through worked. In one season, the hebrew children had to move when they were in Egypt. But when they're in this text, Moses tells them, stand still.

They're thinking to themselves, how can I move again? Maybe I'll move back to Egypt. Maybe I can move. They're used to moving. But this time, power isn't moving.

This time, power is standing still and seeing the salvation of the Lord.

Because power is always moving. Man, that was so good to me because it shows me how so many of us become religious.

We just do what God said did over and over again without ever consulting God to see if what he did back then is what he's going to do now and where I need to be positioned in the midst of how he's going to move him telling them to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord is unreasonable.

They're right behind us. If we don't move, we're going to be attacked. What they want to do is reasonable. I want to talk to those of you who disguise your fear with reason.

I want to show you what I learned about God. That sometimes God is going to use you to do something unreasonable.

And it's going to sound scary for you to do something so unreasonable. But if you reason yourself out of what God called you to do, you're going to be in more danger than had you just stood where God told you to stand and allowed yourself to do something that seemed unreasonable.

I don't know who you are, but all you can do in this season is stand still.

I know. I know. You don't want to shout about that. I know. Because you got options, you think, but your options lead to more oppression.

So you have to stand still while a thousand fall on one side and then 10,000 fall on the other side. But what happens when you stand still is that you don't get in the way of how God's going to move. You don't get in the way of the target, because God's going to. And make sure the enemies are scattered. And I need you to stand still so you don't get caught up in the line of fire.

I need you to stay planted right where you are, because some of you are going to catch your enemies stray. Because you were so busy trying to be God that you couldn't let God be God. And now you just gotta trust God.

But to the point of this revelation, God gave me, the hebrew children have to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. If Moses stands still, he's not going to be able to part the Red Sea. So power for them is standing still. Maybe this part of the message is for the other half of the room, where power for you is using what's in your hand.

I found this text to be so interesting because after Moses tells them to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, it says that the Lord came to him and said, why are you crying out to me? In verse 15, it says, and the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me? But Moses never cried.

In verse 14, he sounds courageous. He tells them, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. And what he told them was right. That was their only option. But God must have been able to tell that underneath his courage for them, he had fear himself.

You got a word for everybody else.

But God hears the cry, you never released.

You can encourage everybody else. And you're right about what you say to them. They do need to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. But is that what God wants you to do?

The Lord says, why do you cry to me? In verse 15, he says, tell the children of Israel to go forward. But that means continue with what you told them to do. Go forward in that direction you told them, right? But you.

You lift up your rod and stretch out your hand. It ain't no standing still season for you. I don't know who you are, but God says, this is the season where you lift up your rod and stretch out your hand over the sea. Oh, can I break it down for you the way God gave it to me?

I know this rod. This is the same rod when the bush was burning that the Lord told him to throw down on the ground and it turned into a serpent. And then he picked it back up, and it turned into a rod. He knows that this rod has power, because in his secret place with the Lord, he saw the power of the rod. But when they go to Egypt and it's time for the Nile river to turn the blood, the Lord says, tell Aaron to take his rod.

But God, my Rod. Uh uh. Tell Aaron to use his rod and the now river. Now, that's. That's confusing for me, because, God, you showed me something in my secret place about what I have in my hand.

But when it's time for you to use something that looks like what I got, something that you've already showed me, was blessed and anointed, you pick somebody else.

I read it twice because that was confusing to me. It was Aaron's rod. When they were in front of Pharaoh, that Moses. God told Moses and Aaron and then take Aaron's rod and throw it down in front of Pharaoh. But my rod does the same thing that his rod does.

Has God ever given you confirmation about what you carry but no outlet to release it?

Have you ever had to sit back and watch God use somebody to do the very thing it seemed like he anointed you to do?

This part of the text was good for me because it speaks to the fluidity of power, but it also speaks to Moses making a power move. It speaks to the reality that God has not forgotten what he gave Moses. It speaks to the reality that sometimes God shows you something in secret. And even though he makes you watch somebody else use the very thing that he gave you, that it doesn't mean he forgot about what he put in your hand. And most of us would have thrown our rod away and said, I guess you have no use for my rod.

I guess my rod has no power. But I hear God saying that somebody in this room needs to go back and grab the thing that God said was anointed for this journey. Because just because God hasn't used it yet, it doesn't mean that you're not going to come up on the moment where God says, now I need you to pull from what I gave you. Now it's your turn to use that rod to do the impossible. God uses Moses rod at the Red Sea at a time when it seemed like they were trapped.

To remind Moses that while power is moving, I want you to understand that there's still power in your hand. I wish I could say this the way I feel it in my spirit, but I feel like God has been putting somebody's power on reserve. I didn't want you to waste your power until we were in a situation where your power was the only power that would get the job done. I didn't want you to waste your power showcasing to your enemies. I didn't want you to waste your power trying to prove your doubters wrong, trying to prove your insecurity wrong.

I wanted you to wait to use your power so that nobody could get the glory but me. So that no one could understand what happened in your life but me. And I hear God saying, don't throw your power away, don't throw your power away. Don't throw your power away.

What I put in your hand still has power. What I put in your hand still has breakthrough connected to it. Don't sleep on what I put on your hand. Just because I haven't used it yet doesn't mean I don't have a strategy for it. It shows us that God's strategy, it's for the long game.

And I'm going to use everything I gave you for where you're headed, even if it's not for where you are. Oh, that's good.

I have a function for everything I gave you. And just because you can't use it all now, it doesn't mean that I don't have a strategy for it. Later man.

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Sarah Jakes Roberts

So God makes the first move, and now it's time for them to respond. And Moses does what God tells him to do. We talked a little bit about power moving in you. That's what happened with the hebrew children in which power had to move from that space of fear, that space of worry and doubt and strategizing, and start listening to God. That's what happens when power moves in you.

That's when you reclaim your power from the enemy. We talked about power moving through you. That's Moses having to actually make a move. He had the faith, but now it's was time for him to actually make a move. But before we go, I want to talk about power moving for you.

Because in this text, when God is orchestrating what will be their deliverance, we see the clouds that were going ahead of them move behind them. So it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. Thus it was a cloud and darkness to the one, and it gave light by night to the other. There is so much that I've studied here, but one of the things that God showed me in this text is that he takes. I'm always searching when I'm reading and studying.

I'm like, God, what does this reveal to me about your character? What should I know about you as a result of how you showed up for them? Because you are so consistent, you are so faithful. If I can take something from then I can apply it to now when he puts the cloud behind them. And it's dark for the Egyptians, but light for the Hebrews.

It helped me to see that God will create a covering. So you aren't practicing in front of your enemies.

That's really good for me. I don't know about you. I'm gonna cover you so you. I know everybody wants. He'll prepare a table for you in the presence of your enemy.

That's what we wanna hear. But sometimes we don't make a move because we're afraid to have to practice in front of our enemies. But if they will trust that God is actually covering them, God says, I'm gonna put your enemies in the dark. While you practice your strategy, there are some people who should be talking about you. We talk about the ones who got something to say.

There are some people that if they really knew how you messed up along the way, they would have so much more to say. But because God covered you from the perspective of your enemies you were able to build without division. Sometimes God covering you in the presence of your enemies is God making some people betray you. Sometimes it's letting some people walk away from you because I didn't want you to have to step into your destiny with an audience that would be cursing you. I am trying to bless you.

Sometimes I got to clear the air so that you can breathe clearly. What I'm doing in your life, God will create a darkness over your enemies. You got to trust God when God places a darkness over your enemies. Because some of your enemies used to be your friends, but just because you moved into another season, some of those enemies can no longer be your friend. And God says, if I don't put them in the dark, you'll be paying more attention to them than you need to be paying attention to what I've told you to do.

I wish we could take about 15 seconds. I know you're ready to go to brunch, but if we could take just 15 seconds to thank God for pulling the enemies back, for helping me put my enemies in the dark, for helping me to see them for who they really are so that I could close my eyes to them, some of us started focusing on the Lord because we had no one else to focus on. Baby, you walking away from me was the best thing you could have ever done for me. Because when you got in the dark, I got in the light. When you got in the dark, I started seeing my breakthrough when I thought you were the only option.

God showed me there was another way. When you talked about me, God started whispering to me. When you left me, I started walking, and I thought I needed you. But because God put you in the dark, now I see that he's ordering my steps. Now I see that he'll never leave me nor forsake me.

And there are some things I could have never known about God, unless he put my enemies in the dark. There are some things I could have never known about God unless they talked about me, unless they betrayed me. There are some things I could have never known about God unless he casted a shadow over the people I thought I needed. Oh, I don't know. Pay attention to the shadows.

Somebody's been trying to pull a shadow into a light. And I hear God saying, if you don't leave them in the dark, they gonna take you back with you. But if you leave them in the dark, you may be lonely for a season. You may be isolated for a moment, but when I get finished with you, you will see that I gave you oil. You will see that I gave you power.

I can't drag you into the light. You're either in the light or you're in the dark. I can't drag you. I'm in a season of my life where you either send standing in the light or you are a part of the darkness. But I got something to do for God and I can't keep wrestling with somebody who wants to play in the dark.

It's light season, baby.

Yeah.

I renounce every dark relationship. I renounce every dark religion. I renounce every toxic situation that is trying to poison the voice of God in your life. I renounce it in the name of Jesus. I don't know who you are, but you've been playing in the dark.

But I hear God saying, light zone, baby. Lights on. It's time for you to move differently. It's time for you to walk differently.

Turn the, turn the lights on.

Don't be surprised when you turn your light on. And some people stay in the dark, leave them there.

If you're gonna be with me, you gonna have to move inside the light. I'm not playing hide and seek no more. If you're going to be with me, you're going to have to do it in the light. If you're going to be with me, you're going to have to stand in the presence of God. If you're going to support me, if you're going to encourage me, I don't want to be a secret thing.

I don't want to be your funny thing. If you gonna be with me, I got asked, can you stand the light?

I'm almost done.

While their enemy is in the dark, they're standing in the light.

They never know darkness.

God told me I had to keep them in the light because they were already so afraid that I couldn't let them think that they were running out of time too.

Sometimes when you feel the pressure to do something for God, you also convince yourself that you're running out of time to do it.

You tell yourself, the sun is setting and I may have missed my window, but God says I'm going to keep the light in front of them so they know that I'm giving them time to figure out how to be who I called them to be.

I feel like God just gave me a prophetic utterance for somebody who has been chasing against the clock their whole life.

Their whole life they felt like they were out of time.

Their whole life they felt like at any given moment, this rug could be ripped from underneath me. I hear God specifically saying, you should live and not die, and you will declare the work of the Lord. How are you going to declare it? Because you go know it so intimately. Because I'm going to let you live to see it.

God says, I need you to start living like you got time to get it right.

I don't know who that's for. That's not for everybody. But God told me specifically that some of the reckless decisions that someone has made, they've made it because they felt like they don't have any more time. And so they might as well not care. They might as well.

They might as well. They might as well. You might as well stop, because God sees your end before your beginning. And God gave you that vision. And with that vision, he also gave an opportunity for acceleration.

Just because you don't see how God is going to feel, finish it. It doesn't mean that you shouldn't get started. It's okay for you to start moving without knowing what the end is going to be. Family. I'm finished, but can I just say this?

I'm finished for. That was such a preacher thing to do. I'm finished. But one more thing. Y'all done got me.

Dallas didn't turn me into a real, real preacher.

Can I say, I feel like God gave me so much in this message. But when God says to them that the Egyptians that were following them, that what he was going to do was going to be a sign, he says, and I indeed will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall follow them. So I will gain honor over Pharaoh and over all his army, his chariots, and his horsemen. God says, then the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord. It revealed to me that sometimes we take things so personally that we don't realize that our obedience is a part of a much bigger plan, that in this moment, in the text, we are witnessing a silent transition of power.

And that the Egyptians who are used to having power, God, is stripping power away from them. And it is all relying on the obedience of Moses. In the Hebrew, everyone has got to play their part so that the Egyptians can get a revelation that he is lord. Why does this matter? Because right now, in this moment, the kingdom is witnessing a silent transition of power.

And there are too few of us who are not willing to occupy our power because we think it's personal. And God could do without me. He could use someone else. My little family, my little business, my little ministry, my little idea, my little healing. It doesn't matter.

It won't shape the world. But had the hebrew children said this, and had Moses said this, then someone would have stayed in authority who God was trying to do dethroned. We are a part of a royal priesthood.

We are children of the most high God. He is all powerful, all knowing. And when he places something in your spirit, you have to remember that even when it gets hard and even when you feel trapped, that you are backed by power.

And when you recognize that you were backed by power, it gives you courage, it gives you strategy, it makes you sensitive, for sure, but also it dethrones the rule and reign of the enemy.

I need you to stand in your power.

Culture would have you to believe that power is about who's going to be the most arrogant, who's going to be the most popular, who's going to be the most famous. That is not power. Power is who's going to be the most obedient, who's going to do it with humility and accountability, who's going to do it.

And God told me that power is available to everyone, but not everyone is willing to do the work. Some people don't even know the work. I wrote this book because y'all started saying stuff like, she's a powerhouse. She preached the power. I didn't feel powerful.

I just felt obedient. And I had to backtrack to figure out how did God take the girl, who wouldn't say a word, who wouldn't pray out loud, who felt like God was for the good girls, for the ones who did everything? How did you take me and rise me up in this generation? And now they're calling me powerful, and I don't feel powerful. And God says, stay focused on me.

This was never about you feeling powerful. This was about you letting power move.

You want a feeling, but God wants a movement. You want a feeling, but God wants to flow. You want to feel confident, but God wants you to be more than a conqueror. And if you're going to be more than a conqueror, you're going to have to tap into courage that you never knew existed. And I want to pray with somebody who's been experiencing this silent transition of power.

You didn't even know what was going on with you until I started giving language. You didn't even realize how you got off. And at this point, it doesn't even matter. All that matters is that you are willing to admit that some kind of way, there's been a silent transition of power.

Before I formed you in your mother's womb, I knew you. I sanctified you. I ordained you, I set you apart. I put power in you before you took your first breath. If power has been stripped from you before you even realized you had it, it doesn't change the fact that you once had it.

And we have an opportunity through our humility to say to God, that power you gave me, I lost it. That power that I once felt in this relationship, that power that I once felt to walk in righteousness, I lost it. I felt strong at first, but now I've lost it. Somewhere along the way, there was something that happened in the middle. Let me tell you, you, this is a moment of true humility.

Our Jesus, our king, Jesus, the most powerful to ever do it, humbled himself. You cannot convince me that you can be powerful and arrogant. God says that if you're really going to be powerful, you're going to have to be willing to be humble. So this altar call is a moment for humility. If you think you're going to be embarrassed, foolish on you, because this is the space where you really pick up your power.

Maybe you're watching online and you're not in this room, and even now you feel like God orchestrated for you to have a personal encounter right where you are. I want you to know that power moves and the same power that's in this room is flowing in your direction. And I want you to know that the same grace, the same anointing that God allowed the hebrew children to experience, that God allowed me to experience, it's flowing in your direction. Don't miss the moment. Well, how was it?

I have no idea. Cause I haven't. I haven't preached it yet. How was it? Did it make sense?

Did the math and math. Did it touch you? Did it. Bless you. Can you shoot me a DM and let me know how it went?

Cause I'm curious. I love you. I'm grateful that God uses me to be in your life. I don't take it for granted and I take it seriously, even when I don't know how God's going to do it. I've seen God show up so many times that I just surrender.

And so, yeah, that was me surrendering. And that's what happens when you surrender to I pray above all things that you prosper even as your soul prospers. But also that this intimate way in which we are connecting helps you to feel like you can do impossible things. With a God who only specializes in the impossible. If you bring your possible and God brings his impossible, there is no doubt that power will move in you through you, for you.

I love you, and I'll see you next week.

Hello, acclaimed comics writer and notorious Scott Summers hater Rosie Knight. Well, hello, Emmy winning podcaster and totally unbiased Targaryen royal supporter Jason Concepcion. Somehow, the X ray Vision podcast has returned. As always, we'll be here every week. You'll hear from tv writers, actors, comics creators, pop culture critics.

Nothing is off the table. Listen to x ray vision on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Imagine you're a fly on the wall at a dinner between the mafia, the CIA, and the KGB. That's where my new podcast begins. This is Neal Strauss, host of to live and die in LA, and I wanted to quickly tell you about an intense new series about a dangerous spy taught to seduce men for their secrets and sometimes their lives, from Tenderfoot tv.

This is to die for. To die for is available now. Listen for free on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tameka D. Mallory, and it's your boy, my son in general.

Sarah Jakes Roberts

And we are your hosts of TMI, and catch us every Wednesday on the Black Effect network, breaking down social and civil rights issues, pop culture, and politics in hopes of pushing our culture forward to make the world a better place for generations to come. Listen to TMI on the Black effect podcast network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. That's right.

Backed by Power w/ Sarah Jakes Roberts

Primary Topic

Episode Summary

Main Takeaways

Episode Chapters

1: Introduction

2: Power Moves

3: Spiritual Insights

4: Application to Personal Life

Actionable Advice

About This Episode

People

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Transcript