Made New

Our last awakened meeting of last year, it was in December. It was a morning gathering. It was a really precious time. And the Lord gave me a message and then confirmed it in beautiful ways. The title of the message was New Beginnings.

We talked about the manger and the cross and how both of those things represent new beginnings. And the Lord was speaking things over my life. Specifically, I shared some of that in December. But then the Lord showed me that that message, that time together, was actually to serve as the doorway or a thresh into what we're going to talk about tonight. The title of the message tonight is Made New.

We're going to talk about transformation, you know, as you enter a new year. And I feel like I see this phrase that I'm going to share with you a lot, but I feel like this year I've seen it more than ever. New Year, New you. Have you guys seen that? Maybe it's.

There's one ad that's on repeat on my Instagram feed and even in my email. I don't know how all that works. I guess I clicked on it once. It's. I think it's called Go Pure, and it's this certain cream for turkey neck.

The testimonies are crazy. Those ladies swear that there's been no filter on their neck. And so I'm still praying about buying that cream. The new year, the new you. Right?

We see that phrase with these skincare ads. The younger girls are like, what? What's turkey neck? Oh, it's coming. It's coming, girls.

Go Pure. If you feel like blessing me and blessing yourself, we can try it together. We can do before and after shots with the vanity mirror. I told Summer, who gets our giveaways, and she does the best job. I said, maybe at women's meetings that I lead.

We shouldn't have any giveaway with the word vanity in it anyway, but we do. So New Year, New you with spa treatments, gym memberships, ads for skin care. And honestly, I usually avoid these kind of themes at the beginning of the year because of the familiarity of them. It's kind of a pride thing for me if I feel like it's what people expect. Like, I don't want to be the lady that just goes to an event and speaks on Esther or Deborah.

It's really an issue. If the Lord wants me to speak on that, I need to. But even as we're approaching this new year and this idea of being Made new, I want you to know that the Lord has been speaking to me. There's some things that I'm going to be declaring tonight. It's not like it's going to be so profoundly different to things you've heard in the past, but I believe that the Lord wants me to release it as a prophetic, timely word over each of you.

This is going to be a year of transformation. This is the year of being made new. Because there are mindsets and ways of doing things that have become patterns in our lives. And the older I get, the more routine I realize I am. And, like, when I come out of my routine, I feel like I'm gonna break out in a rash.

But here's the reality. Some of the patterns, rhythms are good, but we have to make sure they're God patterns. And this is the year to come out of some patterns in our lives. This is the year that patterns and cycles are gonna be broken if we surrender. I reference this a lot, and probably more recently than ever.

It's been over five years ago now, when Pastor Stephanie declared over me in a prayer meeting, terri, the Lord is bringing you in to be the woman you always wanted to be but never dreamed possible. I had no idea how I would get there. And honestly, if the Lord would have shared with me the details of what it would cost and what would happen in my life to get there, I don't know that I would have said yes to it. But I can tell you this evening that I'm glad he didn't give me the option. If we will surrender, he's going to break things we never thought could be broken over our lives.

And I want to tell you right up front, those things that we say, that we just go, you know, I'm just not a whatever person. That's a positive thing. I'm not a workout person. I'm not a clean eating person. I'm not a vegetable person.

Those things that bring life, and those are practical and kind of awkward examples, but I just want to commend to you, let's try not to say those kinds of things this year, because who you say you are may not be the same of who the Lord says you are. So let's look at Romans 12:1 and 2. You probably, some of you predicted that we would look at these verses of Scripture, and you were right. But the Lord's going to speak to us, and very specifically, and I believe intricately, if we'll allow him. I'm going to read these verses of Scripture, and then I'm going to give you five takeaways tonight.

I'm going to tell you right up front the first three takeaways will go quickly, and you might get really excited that you're going to be in bed by nine. The last two, you will be out of here by nine, hopefully before, but maybe not in bed. The last two will take a little longer. And really, each point I'm going to expound on in different ways as I get to the different ones. So let's lean in.

Romans 12. Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, therefore I urge you, sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is.

His good, pleasing, and perfect will. Five takeaways on how we're made new. Number one. We must bring God's mercy into view. We must bring God's mercy into view.

Romans 12 urges us to offer our lives as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. It goes on to say, this is our proper and our true worship. Am I super loud to you guys? Okay, good. That wasn't passive aggressive, Emmy.

I just feel like I'm screaming my head off. But if it's just the monitors. Cool. It's probably at Pastor J level. Feels loud.

He likes the monitors really loud. Okay, sorry.

We are to offer our lives as a living sacrifice, but we're to do it in view of God's mercy, not in view of striving or trying to be a good enough girl to earn the favor of God or earn the reward of God or to earn the pat on the back from God. No, we do it in view of God's mercy.

In Psalm 46, the Psalmist is surveying a battlefield. Maybe that's where some of you are. I can only preach out of my own landscape right now in my life. But maybe you're just surveying after a war has ceased. A battlefield.

That's what the psalmist is surveying. There's chariots laying on their sides, broken bows and spears. The terrain is littered with bodies and debris. But the war has been decimated. And a silence.

There's a silence, an eerie silence that pervades. And maybe that's where you are. You know, you've with trepidation, you're coming out of 2024. You don't know what 2025 is going to hold. But there is the war, and the intensity of the war is at least at a reprieve.

And there's this silence. And that's what the psalmist is experien. And then he writes in verse 10, he's speaking for God, who is commanding something. Listen to Psalm 46, verse 10, cease striving and know I am God, I am exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth. The phrase there cease striving comes from the Hebrew imperative verb meaning sink down, let drop, relax, we're getting a window.

There has been this physical, external battle, but the psalmist's inner battle, he's going through an inner battle with the grind of his own personal weakness. That's usually how it goes, right? When there's a storm or an external battle, then you're in a battle in the revelation of your own personal weakness. And that's where the psalmist is. But in the midst of that, his cry before the Lord, which becomes a command to you and I, ends in a truce in view of God's mercy.

That battle that rages inside of you in self deprecation, or your own regret, or the things that you have failed in, or the things that have happened to you, the things that have happened against you, whether it's one or the other of those categories, or both. Now, in view of God's mercy, we've got to bring a truce before God, saying, no, I'm going to cease striving.

The psalmist arrived at a decision that required every ounce of faith that he could muster. He had to remove himself as the main character from the story to be made new. We've got to remove ourselves as the main character of the story. But the only way we can do it is in view of God's mercy. We've got to know the beauty of this one.

We've got to let God be God. The Lord is good and his mercy endures. Jehoshaphat's army, the army of Israel, was facing impossible and impossible circumstances, bigger armies, and their declaration is the Lord is good. Why? Because they were in view of God's mercy, His mercy endures.

But we've got to cease striving. And we'll only see striving when we're not in view of ourselves, but we're in view of God's mercy. We've got to see striving to be better. We've got to cease striving to justify the bad, to fix others, to fix ourselves, to fix the circumstances of our lives. We've got to cease striving and despising the weaknesses of our lives, the difficulties of our lives, in view of God's mercy alone, we will be made new.

That's takeaway number one.

Were made new in view of God's mercy. Number two. We must stop confronting to patterns, conforming. I'm sorry. We've got to stop conforming to patterns.

Let me say it this way. It's a little subtitle in my notes. We need to eliminate the mantra. Do you? I love that.

I love that phrase. I love to say. I say it to people in our office. Mary, I see you back there. I tell her a couple times a week.

Do you? Boo. But really when we say it. Not when I say it to you, Mary, but a lot of times we say it in the context of someone's asking for our input on something and we're not feeling it. Do you like this outfit?

Do you? Right. Do you think this is a good idea? Do you? But really, we have begun justifying our patterns and we tell each other, do you?

And we tell ourselves, no, I'm going to do me. I'm not talking about being authentic. I know it's important to be authentic to who we are, but I'm going to talk about that in a minute. Because God wants to change things in us that we've called our personality. And they're really just patterns he wants to break.

So we've got to stop doing me. There's a way of living that is a result of imitating the patterns of this world. And we've said, no. This is what I associate with. And there comes a point in your life where doing you isn't working.

I'm not gonna have you raise your hand, but some of you are there. And this is the year to see some things manifest in our lives that we don't even have the faith to pray for anymore. Because it's been that way for. So we've got to stop conforming to the patterns. This is the year to see the things we've accepted because they've been a part of our lives for so long.

Broken. This is the year to see character development at a level that you only thought possible for other people. This is the year you will become the kind of person you have admired. I'm telling you, I've heard it from the Lord, but you've got to come out of the patterns. And it's not based on striving at all.

It's based on the view of God's mercy and the renewing of your mind. But before we can renew our minds, we've got to bring God's mercy into view. Before we can renew our minds, we've got to stop conforming to the patterns. Takeaway number three. To be made new, we must address the storms within.

I'm going to be reading a little out of Ephesians 4. I love how the Lord will confirm the things that are on his heart. He's so faithful to do that. And I've labored over this message. I've really labored because there's things.

The Lord's been speaking to me through it as I've been preparing. But when we were in the having prayer with the intercessors before the service and Pastor Steph leads that time, she just started. And I wasn't in there in the beginning. When I came in, she was just praying about some of the very themes the Lord's been speaking to me about and even References Ephesians 4 and the church coming into the full stature of maturity. In Ephesians 4, Paul was addressing the believers in the church who claimed to be God's friend, but they had behaviors of an enemy.

He said, you act like enemies of God. You act like how enemies of God. The practices of the world are. You imitate those things. And he addresses spiritual infancy.

And he says, this is what spiritual immaturity looks like. You're tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by the wind. He's saying to the church, and I believe he's saying to us as his daughters tonight, this is what spiritual immaturity looks like. It manifests as instability waves and wind. They're external metaphors for things that happen to us in our lives.

I know I'm not the only one that's come out of a really treacherous. Not come out of, but is coming out of a really treacherous. Many of you have. Don't feel guilty if you haven't in recent days, but everyone has at different times in their life. And that's what the waves and the wind represent.

They're external metaphors for things that happen. And I want you to hear me. Our spiritual maturity does not guarantee the elimination of wind and waves.

Quite the opposite. But our spiritual maturity will guarantee a stable place in any storm because God is our strength and our source and our firm foundation. I do not declare over you this year the absence of any external challenges. That's above my pay grade. I don't declare that over you, but I do declare this, that when the seed of the Word of God is inside of you, you will not be moved by life's challenges like you have been in the past.

And I just want to ask you, what waves are you blaming for the way you are right now? Listen, I'm not asking you anything that the Lord hasn't been asking me, and I had to make a list today of the ways in which I am that I've been blaming on the waves. What winds are you cursing because you avoided dealing with the storm inside first? That's what God's after. Ultimately, the real problem is within.

We've got to change the attitude of our minds. I just want to ask you, do you want to grow into what God's called you to be? Or do you want to be stuck in the rut of what you've seen, what you've been through, what you've known? I'm going to ask that again. Do you want to be.

Do you want to grow into what God's called you to be? Or do you want to be stuck in the rut of what you've seen, what's been modeled for you, what you've been through or what you've known? See, to be made new, we've got to bring God's mercy into view. We've got to not look so much at ourselves.

We've got to stop conforming to patterns. We've got to address the storms within. And number four, we must renew the attitude of our minds.

It's how we're transformed, ladies. We're transformed by the renewing of our minds. And we need the word of God for this.

Believers who are not in the word of God. I don't want you to feel condemned. I want you to feel provoked. You're not in the word of God, and the word of God's not in you. You're still going to think and act like the word world.

It's impossible not to. There's one way our minds are renewed. Well, I read it and I don't understand. Listen. That word has power.

You've heard it said. It's the only book that when you read it, the author is always present. It's living and active. It washes over you in ways that you can't even see or understand. Your mind cannot be renewed without it.

And we are in the information age. You can find all kinds of resources and reading programs and summaries. Forget what that's called. Tara Leigh Cobble, Mary. Yell it out.

What's it called? What does she do?

Bible Recap. I bet you couldn't name anything I've ever done. Maybe Terry Leigh Cobble can speak next January. I'm just kidding. I'm Just kidding.

But there's all kinds. She does a recap. And there are all kinds of resources to help you interact with the word of God. But the attitude of your mind will not be renewed without it.

I have a question for you tonight, and I'm asking you it prophetically. Do you want to defy your default setting? I do. A lot of us accept our default setting in a situation as our destiny. This is just who I am.

And we use authenticity as a permission slip to sin or a permission slip to not change. I'm just being true to what I feel. I'm just speaking my mind. Well, in the last couple verses of Ephesians 4, verses 22 and 24, it says you were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires, that you may be made new in the attitude of your minds and to put on the new self created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. Come on, lean in.

Stay with me. Just a few more minutes. Our minds have been corrupted by our evil desires, and that's what's attached to our old selves.

That's what our patterns are attached to. So when we say, do you, we need to ask ourselves, which one?

The old self or the self that God created me to be? Do you? Which one? The one that wants to be happy right now at all costs. That one or the one that I don't want to see reproduced in my kids?

Do you? Which one? The one that's only imitating what I saw modeled for me in my life.

I'm going to ask you this. Do you want to be like the one you came from, or do you want to be the one you were created to be?

We need to say, I don't want to do me anymore. I did me and it almost killed me.

I did me, but now I know. When I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live. We must be made new in the attitude of our minds. Paul says to put off the old way of seeing yourself and to put on the attitude of Christ. Which one will you choose?

Do you? Which one? The one who was made new in the attitude of your mind. That one put on the new self because the new self was created to be like God. So the old self is corrupted.

The new self was created to be like God in order to see ourselves as God sees us. It's not a matter of abstract, ethereal and philosophical debate. It's a matter of practice.

The old self is being corrupted by evil desires. And that old. I'm telling you, it's not a one undone. Paul said, I crucify the flesh daily. It's the patterns of the world.

It's the patterns of our pedigree. It's the patterns of what we came from. It's the patterns of the generations. There are deceitful desires because we think they bring life to us, because they're natural to us. But they're deceitful.

The old self is being corrupted when we follow the patterns of the world. Deceitful desires, what are those? Instant gratification. Those things we think we want. Those things the world tells us we should want.

The things companies spend millions of dollars on ad campaigns to get you to think if you had it, you would be happy. That's the self that's being corrupted. If my house was better, if my kids behaved, if my spouse treasured me, the old self is being corrupted. I'm not saying those things don't affect us. I'm not minimizing pain of circumstances.

Trust me, I understand. When David said my tears have been my food. There have been days in my life in the last few seasons that that's what I felt like. I ate and drank the most my tears. I'm not minimizing pain, but I am talking about our perspective and how it becomes corrupted.

The old self is being corrupted. Every time we have an outburst of anger or reach for things to self medicate. Pills, alcohol, shopping, food, talking about someone to feel better about ourselves, we manipulate situations. We isolate because relationships are too hard. We hold on to grudges.

These are all patterns of the world.

Do you don't do that. You crucify that. You break the cycle and the pattern of that. You. We justify it by saying this is just how I am.

Yet According to verse 24, none of those things are why you were created. We were created to be like God. When I was in high school, I think is when the WWJD bracelet became popular and I had it. I got it at my youth group. If I'm honest, that bracelet would annoy me.

I'd be in a compromising situation in high school or I'd have someone say something snarky to me and I'd want to say something snarky back and I'd look down. What would Jesus do? Well, he'd probably heal them. I mean, I want to lay hands on them, but I don't really want to heal them. I'm not like you, God.

But do we want to be like him? Because we were created to be like Him. And some of you have believed it's a hopeless cause. You can never be like him. You can never be the woman you always wanted to be but never dreamed possible.

That'll never happen when the reality is whose word is the final word? Because God says the patterns of the old self are corrupt.

You were created to be like him. And if he created you to do it, it's possible.

But when your mind's been corrupted long enough with patterns of thinking and patterns of speaking, you identify with things that you struggle with more than the image of God you were made in. And that has to change. And we're living in a time of propaganda and you know the message of self awareness, self love and authenticity. It's not really that any of those things are inherently wrong, but the way we have framed them is not. With a renewed mind, I'm just being real.

And again, that's just a permission slip to stay stuck in your pattern. Are you being real to the pattern of the world or the patterns of the women before you in your family? Or are you being real to who God created you to be, which is like Him.

Little light happy preaching for you in this January. Awaken another cultural norm. Kind of a catchphrase is live your truth.

Well, that works if it's God's truth. But to say, no, I'm just going to live my truth. I heard a preacher say recently, to hell with your truth. Your truth is demonic. That old self truth isn't good.

The truth is in Jesus. He's the way. He's the truth. He's the life. You can't come to the Father without Him.

You can't be right with God without Him. You can't be cleansed without Him. You can't make it without Him. It is Him. His truth that is the breath in your lungs.

It's his hand on your life. His grace that justifies. It's he who raises one up and brings down the other. The truth is, is in Jesus and Jesus alone. And the truth is who he created you to be.

So we've got to become renewed in the attitude of our minds. And I'm speaking it over you like as a prophetic word from heaven. Imagine yourself whole because it's who he created you to be.

Imagine yourself free. Talking about really free because that's who he created you to be. Imagine yourself patient and able to wait and not respond to every feeling that passes through your central nervous system because that's who he created you to be. Imagine yourself slow to speak. Come on, ladies.

Imagine yourself quick to listen for his voice and opinion because that's who he created you to be. You don't need to speak your mind. You need to speak Jesus. You don't need to speak your fear. You need to speak Jesus.

You don't need to speak your perspective. You need to speak Jesus. You don't need to do you.

You need to live the me that trauma can't kill.

You need to live the me that drama can't distract. You need to live the me that the world cannot corrupt.

To be made new, we've got to bring God's mercy into view. Put the whip down. Stop beating yourself up. Stop lighting the candles of penance because of your regret.

We're made new in view of his mercy, not our ability to be good enough. To be made new, we've got to stop conforming to the. We've got to address the storms within. We've got to stop conforming to the patterns. We've got to renew the attitudes of our minds.

And number five, to be made new, we must put on our new selves.

Yeah, the ones we were created to be again. Ephesians 4, 22, 24. You were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires. To be made new in the attitude of your minds and to put on the new self. To put on the new self created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

We've got to put on the new self which was created to be like God in righteousness, holiness. We've got to choose. Do I want to live out the corrupted self or do I want to live out what I was created for? I don't mean just right in this moment, what we would write in our journals. I mean in every scenario, do I want to live out the corrupted self or do I want to live what I was created for?

I was created to be conformed to the image of God. I was created to be made new. At your core, ladies? At my core is not generations of a certain death bringing way of living. I reference Father of the Bride with Steve Martin a lot.

He says, you know, I'm an overreactor. I come from a long line of overreactors. I talk about, you know, being half Italian and half Jewish and being born angry. You know, I was raised by the Italian Catholic version of Judge Judy, literally. Not, not literally, but pretty close.

If you've ever met my mom. Things are black and white like I. But and, and I'm thankful for the strength that my mother taught me and the things that I gained from my father as well. But at my core, at your core, we've got to be able to say, at my core, I'm a child of God. That's who I am.

I'm not an overreactor. I'm not a loud talker, I'm not a gossiper. I'm not one that just has a little more trouble with life. No, at my core, I'm a child of God. At my core, I'm a new creation in Christ.

At my core, at your core, you are righteous and holy.

Think of Jeremiah the prophet. When God called Jeremiah to preach, the worship team's gonna come in just a moment. Let's look at Jeremiah 1, 4, 9. This is when God called Jeremiah to preach. The word of the Lord came to me saying, behold, I formed you in the womb.

Before I formed you in the womb. I knew you, the real you, before you were born. I set you apart. I appointed you as a prophet to the nations. Jeremiah's response, Alas, sovereign Lord, I said, I do not know how to speak, I'm too young.

But the Lord said to me, do not say I'm too young. You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Don't be afraid of them, for I'm with you and will rescue you, declares the Lord. Then the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, I have put words in your mouth. The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah and the word of the Lord existed before the world existed.

John 1:1, in the beginning, the Word already existed. The Word was with God and the Word was God. So when Jeremiah says, the word of the Lord came to me, it wasn't just advice or instruction he received. I want you to hear me tonight. The word of the Lord's coming to you.

Not because you're receiving advice or instruction. It's God himself showing up. He is the Word. And he said to Jeremiah, I've got, I've given you an assignment. He said, there's invaders coming from the north.

I want you to warn and instruct my people. And I want you to do it through your tears. I want you to hear me, ladies, as you receive the word of the Lord, which is Jesus. We speak Jesus. We receive the word of Jesus.

He gives us an assignment. But I want you to hear me. There will be crying involved, there will be challenges involved, there will be self doubt involved, there will be the whispers of the demons of your past involved. But we've got to hear the word of the Lord. Before I formed you.

I knew you before you were even in the womb. Receive this individually. I knew you. I wish I could grab each of you by the face and say, before this world got a hold of you. He knew you before depression set in and put you in bed.

He knew you before you got in the situation you're in that you have no idea how you're going to get out of. He knew you before the molestation. He knew you before the abandonment. He knew you before the scenario you've played over in your mind over and over. You wish you could just have 10 minutes to redo it before that.

He knew you before the mistake, before the failure. He knew you before you wandered. He knew you before the addiction gripped you. And I'm telling you, he told me there is at least one lady so addicted to pornography in this place. Before that addiction, he knew you.

He knew you'd struggle. He knew you'd be 40 and single. He knew maybe. He knew you'd be almost 54 and single again.

He knew there would be financial struggles.

He knew the precious ones in your life would walk away. He knew it. You didn't see it coming, but God knew. And in the face of that, he said, I know the plans I have for you, and they are to prosper you, not to harm you. To give you a future and a hope.

Before the first cancer cell manifested in your body. He knew you.

He wants you to take off tonight what corrupted you. He wants you to take it off. He wants you to take off what happened to you. He wants you to take off the mistakes you made. He wants you to take off the way you've been thinking about it.

I'm telling you, I'm preaching to my own soul. He wants you to take off the story you've been telling yourself. He wants you to take off the guilt. He wants you to take off the shame. And he wants you to put on new garments.

Even if it's awkward.

Put them on. Even if it's awkward, ladies. Do it until it's second nature.

Do it until it's not so hard anymore.

Do it until it's how you think. Do it until it naturally comes out of your mouth. We tend to hold tight to the thing that's most familiar. Anger, fear, worry, anxiety, complaining, blaming self, deprecating. Diminishing yourself, criticizing others.

What feels the most natural. I want you to hear me. I feel the spirit of prophecy in this. I want you to hear me. That thing that's the most natural to you is not the truest of who you are.

It's not the truest thing of who you are. Stop believing that what God has put in you, what God has spoken over you, the truth that is in you, Jesus, that's you. Do that you. The word of the Lord came to me saying before I formed you in the womb, I knew you before you were born. I set you apart.

And Jeremiah responds a last sovereign Lord, I don't know how to speak. I can't be a prophet to the nations. I'm too young. Jeremiah gives an excuse. But you know what's great?

Jeremiah's answer to his excuse is actually contained in the excuse. Excuse. He just needed to stop talking sooner than he did. He said, alas, sovereign Lord, that's where he needed to start. Stop.

God's in charge, not you.

God knows what's in you. You don't.