Sheryl Brady - Change Is An Inside Job

Romans chapter 12 is where we will go today. If you’ll put it up on the screen, that would be great. Romans chapter 12, and the second verse, the Bible says to us, «Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God; you will be changed.» Somebody shout «change!» You’ll be changed from the inside out. That’s it. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God, set your affection on Him, and you will be changed from the inside out. Look to your neighbor on the right and say, «Neighbor, change is an inside job.» Turn to your other neighbor and say, «Neighbor, change is an inside job.» Father, today we honor You and thank You for Your Word. We thank You for the opportunity to be in this place to hear it. Now, anoint me, God, to declare what You want this house to hear. When it’s all said and done, I’ll give You the glory and the honor, and all of the praise belongs to You. In Jesus' name, somebody shout «Amen!» On your way down to your seat, hit somebody again and tell them, «Change is an inside job.» I am the kind of person that loves clarity. Is there anybody like me? Do you like clarity? I can fulfill an assignment as long as I clearly understand what it is that You want me to do. I don’t like to assume. I would rather ask questions. Some people would rather not ask questions, and they assume and get it wrong. But I’m the type of person that even if I get on your nerves, I’m going to ask questions. I ask questions because I don’t want to second-guess, and I don’t want to assume. I don’t want to come short, and I don’t want to build something that You do not want built. So I’m going to ask a lot of questions because I like to succeed. I like success, I like accuracy, I like certainty, I like precise exactness, and I like understanding. The Bible says, «In all your getting, get understanding.» Once I get to the place where I clearly understand a thing, it is at that place I lock in, and I lock in hard. When I clearly understand, I lock in hard. Sometimes I lock in so hard to a thing that I end up locking myself out of what it could potentially become or what it could potentially evolve into. All of that being said, as I began to come out of 2018 and step into 2019, I found myself asking a series of questions—questions that went something like this: What if I am the person that I don’t think I am? What if I really am the person that I never thought I was? For example, what if I really am a person that has confidence, and the doubtful person that has tried to tell me I am doubtful all my life has been lying to me? Okay, are you following me? What if I am sure but have lived my entire life feeling as if I am unsure? Think about all I might have missed. I am asking myself all of these questions. What if I am brave, and I have lived my entire life fearful, just because I thought I was fearful? But in reality, I believed— I told myself for years that I was fearful. So, because I told myself I was fearful, I didn’t walk in the bravery that God had given me to walk into. What if I have lived as an indecisive person all my life, frustrating everybody around me because I didn’t think I had the power to make a good decision? What if the script really flipped in your head? What if the narrative that you have been speaking to yourself about was, by some chance, wrong? What if you’ve been telling yourself your whole life, «I don’t know how to hear God; I can’t hear God,» but the truth of the matter is you actually do hear God, and you hear Him better than most people? You have a preconceived idea of what God is going to sound like, and because His voice may not sound exactly like your preconceived idea, you don’t think that you’re hearing God. Hello? Or you think you can hear God in A, B, C, D, and E, but you cannot hear God in F, G, A. I’m sorry, I had to get you to straighten that out. What if—what if you have lived 60 years thinking you were one way, but in reality, God has been all along the way trying to tell you that it’s not who you are, and you wasted your whole life? Think about that. I was thinking about that—I am thinking about that. I’ve asked myself so many questions. I was thinking, «God, I know I can hear You in this, and I know I can hear You in that, but something in me holds back in this area because I’m waiting for somebody else to say what You’re saying, and then I’ll confirm it; it’ll leap inside of me.» But the truth of the matter is I already heard it because You told me. You know what I mean? I have discovered that the day I stopped believing I could not hear Him was the day I began believing that I could. That was the day. God is not as difficult to hear as we want to make it out for Him to be. My question to you today is, what narratives are going on? What narratives?