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In 2023, I'm getting my commitment back. I want to start by sharing something I've noticed watching my own son, Mason. His level of commitment is mindblowing to me. When he sets his mind to do something, I don't feel like there's nothing on the face of this planet that can stop him.
After losing a championship in seventh grade, I would wake up hearing weights being lifted, and before bed I'd find him on the ground doing push-ups. When he broke his thumb during football season, the doctor said he could play with a cast. He didn't miss a single game. Once that thumb healed, he got a pick-six and won the eighth-grade championship. That's the kind of commitment I'm talking about.
But here's what I discovered: during football season, his grades slipped. He was tired. We got D's and C's on his progress report, and I panicked. I literally told him I was willing to give up everything—my singing, my ministry, everything—because my first priority is my boys. Then he got sick, missed some assignments, but had three weeks to make them up. He finished all A's and B's.
I said to him: "Baby, do you see a pattern? The moment you make up your mind, you see results." When you make a commitment, heaven moves. Sometimes the trouble and pain we see in our life isn't tied to a real devil. It might be tied to fake commitments. A lot of y'all are rebuking a devil that ain't bothered you when you should be checking yourself.
The biggest person I'm going to check in 2023 ain't my ex. The biggest person I'm going to check ain't my haters. The biggest person I'm going to check ain't my doubters. The person I'm checking this year is me, myself, and I. Because when I get myself together, I be showing out. I understand I am one commitment away.
Commitment is when we consistently apply the right attitude, actions and attention to achieve a desire, dream, goal or purpose.
But I want to correct something. There's a difference between being persistent and being consistent. Consistent means I do the same thing over and over again. Persistent means regardless of what's going on, I continue to do the same thing over and over again.
I can be consistent because there's no trouble, there's no trial, there's no enemy, there's nothing blocking me. But in order to be persistent, you got to go through something. That might be why you feel like something big is getting ready to happen for you this year. There are two types of people sitting on your row:
I don't need a consistent praiser. I need a persistent praiser. A consistent praiser will shout because God woke them up this morning. But a persistent praiser—like a beautiful brother from Buffalo who almost lost his life—will wake up out of a coma and say, "God, I thank you."
It's the difference between track and football. Running track takes consistency. Running on that field takes persistence. I can be fast in a straight line, but it's hard to be fast when a 6'2" linebacker is looking at you. When you shift to being persistent, that changes everything.
Most people never keep their commitments because they value convenience. When life becomes inconvenient, they choose to no longer show up.
My son goes to Spain Park High School and has to be there at 6:00 in the morning. I don't have to be up at 6:00. But if he wants it, he's got to get uncomfortable. If you want it, you got to get uncomfortable.
And let me say this—I pray God knows my heart—but to me, God is one of the most inconsiderate things I've ever met. Honoring God is one of the most inconsiderate things I have ever done in my life. God wakes me up at 4 in the morning every day. In my head I'm thinking, "God, I got to be somewhere at 8. How about you wake me up at 7:58 so I don't have to get on my knees? Just let me lay here and say, 'Hey, God, thank you for another day.'" But God says, "No, I need you to get out of bed, get on your knees, and talk to me." God is like, "I know you got bills. That's cool. Give me my 10%." And I'm thinking, "God, you know how hard this is?"
But here's the truth: If God made it comfortable, everybody would be a king. But the crown is reserved for people who can stay persistent about their commitment.
Don't let people want to be you when they won't fight through what you fought through. Tell your haters, "Stop wanting to be me when you won't fight through what I fought through." Get uncomfortable. In 2023, if I got to fight for it, if I got to pray about it, if I got to stay committed, nothing will separate me from being what God has called me to be.
Don't want what I got if you don't want my commitment. Don't try to walk in my shoes if you don't know my level of commitment. Ain't it crazy how people be judging you and want all the stuff you got and don't realize how committed you have been. They don't have a clue.
That's for five of y'all working a job now and they talking to you like you're crazy. They don't have a clue. You will walk off that job because the God that kept you before this job is the God who going to keep you after this job. I am here because my babies need me. So I am committed.
Except for five of y'all who woke up this morning and it was raining outside and you told yourself, "I'mma just watch online." But then something in you said, "Let me get my butt up today because I need to go to church because I'm committed." I got to pause because I'm about to make this sermon about you. Forget your commitment for a second. I just want to thank God for being committed to me because He didn't have to wake me up this morning. Didn't have to clothe me in my right mind. Didn't have to keep my baby safe.
Ghosting is when you build an expectation, then abandon it with no explanation. That's what we call in the culture going ghost. Ghosting is a popular term that describes abruptly cutting off contact with someone without warning.
Why is that important? Because sadly we live in a culture that has exchanged convenience for consistency. So we ghost people without an explanation. We ghost relationships. When I say relationships, don't automatically think romantic—some of the worst, most painful relationships are with friends. We get in our feelings either through pride, anger, arrogance, or—and here's a fourth one that I'm realizing a lot of us have once we get saved—righteous indignation.
We say, "I didn't do nothing to them. I know I'm not doing it this time. I'm not calling them. I didn't do nothing to them." And then we start dissecting them, thinking about all their faults. And instead of having a conversation, we ghost.
We ghost gym memberships. Planet Fitness has got me for a strong $3,000 over the last seven years. It's just $10 a month, so it don't seem like much. I ain't been back since 2011, but we ghost them.
We ghost family members. And sadly, we ghost God.
How do we ghost God? When we build the expectation and then don't do it with no explanation.
Let me paint a picture. Your life is a TV series—a reality show. Every year you come to church on the first Sunday of the year. Heaven is watching. It's like the beginning of a new season. You come in saying, "It's been a crazy year. I lost some friends, lost some stuff, but I'm still standing and I'm excited about 2023. I'm going to go to church on the first Sunday."
Now we watching your show in heaven. It's the first Sunday and you're in church. Hallelujah! This is going to be a good season. You got your tithe. Expectation. You've been praying. Expectation. But by that third episode, you just go off and we didn't get a warning. And God is like, "So you going to ghost me like that? When you was in need, you was present. When you got blessed, you was absent."
Here's what I want to free you with real quickly: You don't find out if you're committed when you're struggling. Everybody's saved when they're struggling. You pray real good when you're in need. You come to church a whole lot when you're in need. When you needed that job, you remember? You got here early. You was all in church. You came to the altar and you prayed hard. But now that you got promoted, because blessings have a tendency to make sick people sicker, you ghost.
We ghost God when we only sit but don't serve. God put all that gift in you and you ain't going to do nothing with it.
We ghost God when we get but don't give. We ghost God when we are forgiven but don't forgive. We ghost God when we praise but don't pray.
Ghosting God occurs when we give God our words but not our actions. We make major decisions but make minor devotion. So we give our words: "God, if you get me out of this, I commit to..." And He gets you out of it. But then we don't follow through.
These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. (Matthew 15:8)
They're giving God a lot of lip service, but their actions don't match. Is that not one of the most frustrating things in this world? For somebody to say all the right stuff, but just never follow through.
This is why relationships hurt so bad. The world calls it ghosting. I call it promised commitments. Somebody tells you everything they're going to do. They build expectation and then ghost. So you're not even really hurt about them—at the core, you're hurt because you're trying to figure out why these expectations weren't met.
It's insane to expect God to bless anything you are not willing to fully commit to.
We often hear and learn about the 12 disciples. We know the 12 disciples because they were committed to following Jesus. But did you know that there should have been 15 disciples? Three ghosted Jesus. We only know about the 12 because they were committed. Let me introduce you to three potential disciples that ghosted Jesus.
This first potential disciple ghosted Jesus in Luke 9:57-58. As they were going along the road, someone said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go."
And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head."
Jesus immediately challenged this man at something all of us struggle with—the level of his comfort and his possessions. This guy says, "Jesus, wherever you go, I'mma go." And Jesus looked back and says, "Foxes have holes. Birds have nests. I don't even know where I'm sleeping tonight."
You know what this brother said? "God bless you." Why? Because like so many of you in this room and online, he was more concerned with being comfortable than committed.
Staying in your comfort zone may feel good, but it leads to mediocrity. And God has called me to be more than mediocre. I'm allergic to average. I break out when people try to keep me in a box. I can't deal with mediocrity.
You don't have to have nothing to be around me. But you at least got to want something. We can all be broke, but as long as we're broke and our conversation ain't broke and our faith ain't broke and our mindset ain't broke, I don't mind stepping outside of my comfort zone.
The comfort zone is a beautiful place to live, but nothing grows there. What would happen if God chose to make your yard comfortable? While I'm in my house saying, "It's raining. I don't like the rain," the grass outside is saying, "It's raining. I need this." The rain makes me uncomfortable, but it grows the grass.
This is why you got to change your circles. Y'all ain't the same. This is why you get irritated at that job because y'all ain't the same.
What would happen if God chose to make your yard comfortable? While I'm in my house saying, "It's raining. I don't like the rain," the grass outside is saying, "It's raining. I need this." The rain makes me uncomfortable, but it grows the grass.
This is why you have to change your circles—y'all aren't the same. This is why you get irritated at that job because y'all aren't the same. They're at work saying, "I can't stand this job," while you're saying, "I have a job." They're saying, "I don't know what I'm going to eat," while you remember when you didn't have anything to eat.
If your circle is negative, you can keep that. But my mindset says, "Can't nobody do me like Jesus. And if I got to be uncomfortable, so be it."
If being uncomfortable in January, February, March, April, May, and June means November is going to be crazy, give me some discomfort. If me having to be uncomfortable—getting braids in my hair because I can't get my hair done for the next six weeks because I'm trying to save for a down payment—means you're going to see tracks, new growth, and all of it, then what if I have to be uncomfortable to get to my destiny? I am willing because I am committed.
Your neighbor might not shout because they're like, "Forget all that." But if you're committed and you know sometimes you got to step outside your comfort zone, you ought to shout about commitment.
Who grew up in the hood? Back in the day, everything was body language. I had a friend named D'Angelo who didn't talk. D'Angelo would just act. I used to hate being around D'Angelo because he didn't communicate—he just did. He would pull his pants up, and it was go time. I didn't know who was going to get it. All I knew is if he pulled his pants up, it was going down.
This is how I can tell some of y'all aren't committed: you talk too much. When you see someone committed to their word, you know because they don't announce it—they just do it.
This year, no more announcements, just actions. I'm not telling you what I'm going to do. I'm not prepping you about what I'm going to do. You're going to see the fruit of my commitment.
Just because something is unpleasant doesn't make it unprofitable. You're going to have to be unpleasant. You're going to have to work in season when nobody else wants to work.
My boys have summer workouts. The whole summer we're fussing about when we can take family trips, but they have summer workouts. So my whole life is wrapped around their commitments. This is why I get frustrated when they act like they don't want to do it.
This is why you're tired of your circle. This is why you're tired of everybody in your family. It's because you've heard them talk about what they were going to do for so long. And if you love someone, their commitments kind of become your commitments. Don't have me cheering for something you're inconsistent about.
Let me free you: five of y'all have people in your life making you feel bad because you're not excited about what they're telling you. You've heard it so much that you're not going to shout over what you're telling me you're going to do. But best believe I'm going to tear the church up when I see you walking in it.
Can I free you real quickly? We know the names of the committed. The committed get a name. The uncommitted go nameless. When Jesus calls disciples, they get named. When someone doesn't commit, we don't even remember who they were.
I had a conversation at a TED Talk in Los Angeles with someone extremely wealthy. He asked me, "What do you want most?" I said, "I want to be impactful, not impressive. I don't want to be popular."
Popularity is what I can get from you. Impactful is what I can get to you. I don't want to be popular. You've got to know me from the depths of my heart. I'm not on money trying to be famous. I want influence. I want my commitment to my assignment to matter in such a way that if your daughter or son ever gets into something and you call me, and I walk into that courtroom, the judge says, "Pastor McClure, what are you doing here?" I say, "This is a good young person here, Your Honor. I'm going to have them." That's influence.
I got done speaking at a theater in Los Angeles. We leave, go back to the hotel, put on sweatpants, go to the airport. At 12 midnight Pacific time, the plane takes off. I touch down in Birmingham at 8:00 a.m. the next morning, take a nap, and come to you.
People always say, "My people don't understand." Forget what people think. I told God something in secret that I didn't tell y'all. When I was praying, I said, "God, I promise if you do this for me, I won't abandon."
There are moments where I feel like God asks, "You still committed?" You'll sleep in the airport—are you still committed? If God gave you everything you're praying for right now in six months, would he still hear from you?
This brother could have been with Jesus. Look at Luke 9:57: someone said to Jesus, "I will follow you wherever you go."
How do you invite yourself and then remain uncommitted? How do you ask to be captain and aren't committed? Think about this: you have to be incredibly uncommitted to ghost Jesus to his face.
Imagine I'm preaching right now and somebody randomly jumps up and shouts, "Wherever you go, I'm going, Pastor Mike!" Then I say, "Foxes have holes. Birds have nests. I might be under the bridge tonight, but glory to God." Can you imagine the conversation? He lost his mind. Because then he'd have uncommitted people around him, which is why a lot of us fail—your circle pacifies your inconsistency.
Can you see him getting back to the house? You know how good church works—y'all do it in the house. "Man, Pastor Mike got off." I love when they tag me in it. "Pastor Mike, we're sitting here talking about good church. Tag me when y'all have good church at the restaurant."
But can't you see him at home? "How was church today?" "Boy, Jesus preached. Jesus, the one who remembered the girl who was bleeding for 12 years and Bartimaeus who couldn't see anything—Jesus out there touching people, their eyes opening. I'm talking and he's killing." Then he jumps up and says, "I will follow you wherever you go."
But then his circle gets in his ear. "You lying. Peter, James, John were all with him. But you sleeping in the woods? He ain't got nowhere to lay his head. How you turn water into wine, but you can't turn leaves into a queen-size bed? It's 150 degrees out here." An uncommitted circle helps an uncommitted person.
This is how you're going to get off your fast if you're not careful. Someone says, "What are you doing?" "Nothing, going to get off. We're going to eat when we leave here." "I'm fasting." "You can do one day. They got salads or something." "You're right, you're right." And an uncommitted circle helps you negotiate your commitment.
A fast without an uncomfortable commitment is just a diet.
Jesus says to another person, "Follow me." Watch this carefully. Jesus didn't bother this first guy. He calls the second person directly. You know how uncommitted you have to be to ghost Jesus to his face?
The man says back to him, "Lord, permit me to go bury my father." On the surface, that sounds nice, right? That's considerate, right? Look what Jesus says back to him: "Let the dead bury the dead. But as for you, come with me. We got work to do." The brother never shows up.
Some of you look at this and think, "Jesus is dirty. This man's father is dead, and Jesus won't even let him go to the funeral." But you have to understand the culture. You cannot anachronistically impose your time on the text.
To understand Scripture, you need to understand the culture, the language, and the sub-language. When Jesus said, "Let the dead bury the dead," he wasn't saying your father is dead. What he's saying is, "Your father is dying. Let me get my business affairs in order because I can't get the inheritance until I properly bury him."
He put financial security over commitment. In other words, he told Jesus, "I'm going to get some money. Once I get my money, I'll be back."
This is why the prodigal son told his daddy, "Give me my inheritance." He was telling his daddy, "I don't want to be here, and I'm not going to stay around till you die. Give me what's mine." That statement is disrespectful because he's not asking for money—he's saying he doesn't want his father's presence.
This brother says to Jesus, "Now, I got some stuff to do." Never allow your addiction to security to make you abandon your destiny.
Jesus says to this man, "Do me a favor. Let the dead bury the dead. Come with me." This man responds, "Now, I got some stuff to do." Never allow your addiction to security to make you abandon your destiny.
Can I ask you a question? Who's listening to me right now knows you've been called and ghosted the calling? How many young men are going to die in the streets because you know without a shadow of a doubt God called you to mentor, but you ain't secure yet?
Put this in your notes: I can't be infected with insecurity. Insecurity makes you grab for what you should be letting go of.
I had to go on tour with Fred Hammond and Israel Houghton about three weeks ago. This was the first time I was somewhere without my team. I'm the type of person—even if I'm going to take a loss, I'd rather have my squad with me because it makes me feel secure. I got a lot of insecurities. When you got your people with you, it makes you a little bit more confident about what's going to happen.
But with this opportunity, I couldn't bring anybody with me. It was me, Fred Hammond, Israel Houghton, Dinda Clark. Fred gets up and blesses everybody. Then Israel got up and sang "I Am a Friend of God," and everybody started crying. Then she just turned around and said, "It's your turn." Like, for what? And I'm thinking, what am I supposed to do now?
But after I came home, I said, "Oh, I'm ready now." God stripped me of my security. You'll never be all you're called to be trying to be secure.
Let me say this, and I'm going to get in trouble from all my influencers online because they be watching and reposting my stuff like it's theirs. To all my influencers: stop letting people make you think having a nine-to-five is weak. There is nothing wrong with having a job or a career. Everybody is not supposed to be an entrepreneur. Let me free you—most entrepreneurs aren't successful. The average startup fails.
Do not be on social media because most of us aren't committed. We're suffering with three things: Images, Injuries, and Idols. Images—what we see. Injuries—pain from our past. Idols—the folk that we want to be but may never be.
We just scroll, seeing people saying, "You can be just like me. I made $3,500 yesterday and didn't even do nothing. Sign up for my course." You paid them for a course, and when you meet them, they have nothing of depth to say. I'm not knocking it, but what I'm saying is: the way to your destiny is not absolute.
It is what scholars call the principle of individuality. The principle of individuality states that no two people will benefit from the same thing the same way. If me and you went to the gym for thirty days and did the same exact workout, my body would look different than your body because it impacts me differently.
This is why people are going to kill themselves trying to do what you do and flow like you flow. You can look like me, speak like me, dress like me, talk like me, but you won't be me because who I am is who God called me to be. So what I'm trying to get you to realize is: don't be like this second ghost saying, "I got to be secure. I got to be secure."
The best times I have with my sons ain't PlayStation Fives. The best times I have with my sons ain't lavish vacations. The best times we have is when all of us get in the car and go to Sonic. The whole ride to Sonic, they show how they be corny sometimes, and I heat up on them. I got to teach my boys stuff that the city school taught me that they're not learning in these new environments.
I know how to light somebody up. "Boy, if you don't get your bubble head..." The whole car ride we're just laughing back and forth, and they're joking, and it's educational. One time Xander slipped up and cussed. I said, "Hey, what did you say? I heard what you said. Look at me. You be talking like that with your friends? All right, I'm daddy. It's cool. I don't want you to talk like that, but..." One time he did slip. I was about to... but I don't want him to ghost me when his humanity shows up.
Insecurity is when you use outside relationships for inside validation. My greatest level of commitment is going to be to my family. So my top three—16, 15, 14, 14, 13, 15, 14, 13. As I preach to you, I live it.
I sit up and wonder, "What if one of them ghosts me?" I take the principles I see in these three people and try to speak to it in my life. Number one: you're going to have to be uncomfortable. Number two: security isn't everything. I'm going to say something you're going to miss: the more secure I am financially, sometimes the farther from God I am.
When we were getting ready to start this church in 2009, I was 25 years old. We were having church at the LR Hall. They would have social club, savings club meetings, parties there the night before. I would have to get there at 6:00 a.m. to mop because they wouldn't clean it up. I would mop up needles, drug paraphernalia, alcohol, condoms, wasted trash because they'd be cooking and everything.
Me and this dude named Will Irvin would be mopping all morning. I never forget one day—I was about to give up because God, I know you called me to do this, but like, nine people are coming to church. I'm literally the sound engineer. I'd be on the soundboard while Kurt would be doing praise and worship. Then right at the end, I'd put my jacket on, run out the front door, run down the alley, go through the back door, and make it look like I was walking out. Then I'd walk back in: "Hey, bless you." I'd shake Kurt's hand, Kurt would run out the side door, run around the alley, get back on the board. Then Daryl would sneak over from his church that was paying him and get on the board. And I'd be in there preaching.
One day, I just couldn't take it anymore. I didn't have time to mop. Literally, drugs and everything on the floor, and I'm on my face on the floor just saying, "God, I need you." Conversely, now that I've done everything, if I had to lay on the floor, I'm like, "Give me a lap handkerchief or something. I don't get my pants dirty."
I went into Central Plaza Mall food court when it was open, stood on a table, and said, "Everybody, my name's Mike McClure Jr., Pastor Mike Jr. God sent me here to tell you, you going to be blessed." I had like 20 young people with me, and we were jumping and screaming. Like 16 kids came out of there with us. Then we went to my dad's church and had church after that. I was crazy.
I put a billboard over a strip club. Romans 12:1 says, "Strip off every weight and sin." So over a strip club, I put a huge billboard that said, "Strip for me Jesus" because in my head I was like, I want men in church, so I'm gonna take Jesus where a man be. I go to sleep, wake up the next day on CNN—local pastor putting a billboard over a strip club. I'm like, "Oh my god."
I was fearless. I remember being at 95.7, and Big Ruben's brother—God rest his heart—he was like, "Man, people were going to kill you over that." He said a fight broke out one night. These dudes were sitting on the curb, police were going to take them to jail. One dude literally says, "Man, you can't take me to jail, bro. Get baptized tomorrow." And that night I was like, "Leave that young dude alone." You know, I was crazy about God.
Then all of a sudden, you get successful. Now you got brand management. I don't want to go viral. And God be giving me all this crazy stuff to do, and I'm like, "Well, I don't want to mess up my security because I like being liked. Don't you? We can play hard, but I like being liked."
The third ghost says, "I will follow you, but first permit me to say goodbye to those at home." Why, Pastor Mike? Because this man has misplaced priorities.
I love these people right here with my whole heart. I promise to God I do. But if I'm in a football stadium and they're on that football field—and this has happened before—and we get the call that they just told the whole family to get to the hospital because someone is not doing well, I'm going to have to run to that gate. "Hey, kill it. I love you, baby. I love you."
Because like Luke 9:62 says, at that very moment, my hand is on the plow. That doesn't mean I don't love my family. That just means it's assignment time. And because you love daddy, you got to understand: his commitment is our commitment.
Many of you—this is heavy—the devil is using your family. Now, I'm not saying abandon your commitment to them. Listen to me clearly: every time you get ready to be what God called you to be, cousin and mama show up. What I'm telling you now is: in this season of your life, are you going to ghost God?
Number one: you talk to God regularly, but you don't talk to him deeply. Y'all text here and there, but y'all ain't really on the phone. "Hey God, thank you for waking me up this morning. I'm getting ready to go to work. Hey God, thank you for what you did today. Good night." It ain't no depth. You talk to him a lot, but y'all ain't really talking about nothing.
We go to God about our problems, but we don't spend time with him in his presence. We dump all our issues on him, but we don't really go into deep intimacy. Can I ask you a question? When is the last time you told God what was wrong with you instead of asking for something? When is the last time you jumped on a call with God and said, "Yo, I'm out here. Yo, I got to get myself together"?
Number two: you don't bring God around your family. Meeting the family in a relationship means things are getting serious. So how are you cool with God if he ain't touched your family? I'm not going to be that guy. It's not going to be that though. I'm not going to be traveling the whole world preaching, and at my funeral, I've saved 20 million people, won 50 million Grammys, been in 20,000 movies. Then when my kids come up to speak, they look like they don't even know Jesus. "Hey man, my dad were good folk, bro."
No. Not gonna be that. The greatest day of my life is when I become Mike's dad. I can't wait for that. I don't want to be PMJ, Pastor Mike Jr. They be like, "Oh, snap. That's Mason's daddy." The joy that brings my heart—I want that. My daddy loves it. "Yeah, man, I went over to Green Angus Chicken. They like, 'Oh, you Pastor Mike Jr. dad, ain't it?'" My dad gets free wings off my name. Now everywhere he goes, "Hey, you know my son? Take them people their money and hurry up, man."
Number three: I make plans with God, but I don't keep them. Can I ask you a question? How many times have you ghosted God?
Put this in: Follow through is the ability to move from a decision to a conclusion. If there is no follow through, nothing has been committed. Nothing has been concluded.
The greatest fight that a football team will have next year ain't another team. It's the team that won this year, because a group of players are going to step on the field who didn't put in the commitment this group did. We see it all the time. They think because they put on the jersey, they're Alabama. It's like, nah, it's deeper than that.
You know you have shifted to another level of life when it's no longer me versus y'all. It's me versus me. Because the greatest enemy to your next blessing is your last blessing. The greatest enemy to your new you is the old you. You're not fighting your haters. Stop talking about them. Don't nobody even know they exist till you post. Nobody.
I want you to be what God called you to be because sadly, we say the most but do the least. We overpromise and underdeliver. We promise we'll pray, but we don't. We promise we'll be tithers and we don't. We promise we'll treat our family members better. It's all this stuff we tell God and we just don't do. And this is dangerous because eventually, your words stop carrying weight.
If all I do is lie to you for three years and I finally look at you and say, "I promise I didn't do it," the first thing you'll say is, "You said that last time." Can I ask you a question? What if God looked at your prayer and was like, "You said that last year"?
I don't want to end the day heavy and everybody leave frustrated, so I'm going to leave on this note. I was playing spades, and I hung around a lot of people, but I was kind of sheltered. My parents were real strict on me. So I didn't really like spades. All I know is I'm supposed to just do this.
I got my hand, and I'm looking at it, and I'm like, "Oh my god." They put down a five of hearts. I got a two of spades. I grabbed that card. A few minutes later, I put down an eight of hearts. You want to make a Black person mad? I was introduced to a word I never heard before. They were like, "NO, NO." They start digging through my past. "OH NO. He reigned. He reigned."
I'm sitting there like, "What? What?" They looked at me like, "You can't do that, bro. If you got a heart, you got to play a heart. You can't throw the spade down when you ain't got nothing left."
Then the dude looks me in my face and explains: once you reign, you're forever known as that. I didn't know that was permanent. Every time you sit down at the table, if you throw something down... they be like, "Let us see. Let us see."
They explained to me that once you reign, you're forever known as that. I didn't know that was permanent. Every time you sit down at the table, if you throw something down, they be like, "Let us see. Let us see." They're always watching, always checking your cards.
I'm about to say something that's so funny, so plain, but it's gonna carry weight. This year with God, I just don't want to be a reigner. I just don't want to renegade. I don't want to get to August and God like, "Boy, we gotta shut it down." And the devil be like, "No, no, go back. Go back to February."
That's what the devil is. The Bible calls him the accuser of the brethren. So if there is a divine tribunal taking place, a courtroom, and they're getting you approved for your blessings—think about if heaven had an underwriting department. They're taking your blessing through underwriting. You made your request and then the devil runs in like, "No, no, no, no, no. They said they weren't going to go back to so and so this year. You can't bless that reigner."
You're going to have to have the courage to commit.
Father, in Jesus' name, today we don't pray for stuff. Stuff ain't the issue. A new house would be beautiful. Some money would be beautiful. The husband, the wife would be incredible. The scholarship would just be so on point.
But God, if you give me all that stuff and I don't become committed, it's going to become a cancer to me. I'mma stay at home and wash the car instead of coming to church. I'mma get in that relationship and fall out of touch with you.
So today, God, my prayer is so simple: Help me stay committed.
God, right now, even if they're only 9 or 10 years old, let them be committed to just being a good son, a good daughter. God, let them be committed to going to school and not getting in trouble, not saying bad words, not being in places they shouldn't be.
To every teenager who got real problems and real issues and peer pressure, God, don't allow them to succumb to the peer pressure of life.
God, to every adult in this room, please—and I say please from the depths of my heart—give them the strength to remain committed to what they're telling you they're going to do.
That's what I love so much about you, God. I can only be uncommitted to what I say out my own mouth. There are ten commandments that you ask me to honor. Everything outside of that is my commitment.
So God, I thank you right now for the level of commitment that you're calling us to. God, help me continue to be the best example I can be. There are a lot of places in my life where I need to grow, places where I need to develop, places where I need to mature. And I'm committed to trying my best, God, to be all you called me to be.
God, I pray right now that you would put good people around us who will help us honor our commitments because it's easy to cave in. It's easy to be convenient.
God, right now, as we prepare for this fast: In order to eat healthy, it's expensive, God. To eat healthy is expensive. To get a salad is $7. To get a sandwich is 99 cents. So everything challenges our commitments.
So, right now in this moment, God, I pray that we take our commitments serious.
God, I so don't want to be a church where the only person blessed is a preacher. The only person blessed are the church leaders. I don't want that. Never going to happen. That's not us.
I want a church where every person is walking in their full potential for God. God, I don't even need a thousand people. Just give me 10 who going to be committed.
You know commitment is so important, God, that you said in your word, if two or three are just committed, if two people just touch and commit, you'll be in the midst. So God, help us remain committed.
I thank you for what you're doing in our lives. It's in Jesus' name.
