Редактор субтитров А. Синецкая Корректор А. Кулакова Folks, there's been something that's puzzled me for many, many years and it's something I'm going to cover today on manifest. It's a question I've had. And it's very important because many of you watching, I mean, this is going to involve many of you,

maybe 80% of the congregation, the people that's watching me around the world.

And that is why can some people forgive and forget and others hold onto something?

I've seen both sides.

I've seen people that can just, the man, they just say, I don't mean anything, that's just

how they are.

I'm moving on, that's bothering me.

Then I've seen other people that will take a situation and they literally hold onto it for years. So I want to cover why that happens. Now I want to give you my resume. I was born June 23rd, 1959. Presently I'm 66 years of age. I come from four generations of ministers. I am the fourth generation. And if we go back to R.O. Rojohn, Bay of Fred Stone, myself, and we add up the number of years, all of us were in ministry combined. I've been in ministry now 49 years and my dad was over 60 years. So if we add everybody's years that they were in ministry, it's 200 years of ministry. That doesn't mean my ministry goes back, our family ministry goes back 200 years It means that all those ministers when they ministered on earth combined averages 200 years I start preaching when I was 16 years of age Which means I've been preaching about 49 years traveling about 47 out of those 49 years full time in our Revivals especially in the 1980s and 90s would often go an average of two to three weeks every single night. Some would go five and a half weeks, seven and a half weeks, one revival in the fall at Tennessee when 11 weeks, every night but one night where it snowed. So we have seen God do some tremendous things. We've written, if I count the little mini books, the small books, the 32 page books, all of the books, we've probably written about 100 books. We have a global television ministry. We have six major ministry facilities that God has blessed us with. If you would see upstairs, it's crazy. There are boxes and boxes and boxes of cassette messages, master tapes, thousands of messages from revivals. We have made many, many friends and many, many great pastor friends. Probably half of the friends we've made over the years are now in heaven. And that's just, that's what's going to happen as you mature in the Lord. But I saw something while traveling many years ago and I'll be very honest with you, this used to really bother my wife and and I and I'm going to give you an example now this is right after we were first married nineteen eighty two eighty three eighty four we were in the state of North Carolina and this particular area of North Carolina it's a great area with wonderful people but they have eight churches that were of the same denomination that we were connected with. And so one church may be five miles up the road,

and other churches, 15 miles up the road. So I would visit there quite a bit in minister, but something would have happened. I would be at one church and the people, we'd have a great revival, and they'd say, now brother, pair we heard you're gonna be at the church 15 miles up the road. Now we'd love to go, we won't be there because we just don't care for those people.

And it's really weird with these eight churches instead of just visiting each other fellowship. 15 miles up the road. Now we'd love to go, but we won't be there because we just don't care for those people.

And it's really weird with these eight churches instead of just visiting each other, fellowshiping. And I said, what is the deal that this church won't come over here? That one won't come over there. And I finally could go into that area because it was so contentious. And the problem was that many years ago there was one main church, it would split off. and then that church would grow and it would split off.

So these were built on church split.

Then other times we start having these really, really lengthy revivals that would go for a long time. And I never would forget this. I mean, when we would have these great, great revivals, there would be another church of art and nomination that I was connected with. A 10 miles down the road and as this revival in this level congregation would go on the Pastor would get up and tell the people I wouldn't go over there if I was you and the churches Never participated because I found out later that some of the ministers were afraid that if their people went to another church They might like the other church better and end up attending there. That was the reason why they didn't support the meeting if it wasn't in their congregation. Then we'd have local church revivals that would extend and visitors would begin to show up, but sometimes we'd have one, two, three hundred visitors. Sometimes it would be larger churches up to a thousand visitors, but the visitors would come and take the parking places, they would take the seats in the auditorium or take a puse where people normally sat. Guess what happened? The people that normally sat there began to complain because they didn't get their seat. And this is what just really confused me. They would pray for revival, whether we've been praying for revival for years, but when revival came, they were not ready for it. So what I discovered after all these years of preaching is when they wanted to revival, they wanted a certain kind of revival. They wanted people who were not saved, who were a business people. They wanted to find as people in the community to it to end. They didn't want really rough centers coming in that could have corrupt their congregation. And so what I did, I eventually, now I have had some meetings that have gone on two weeks recently while back I should say. But I stopped just, I just basically do Friday Saturday and Sunday or Sunday or Wednesday because I just got tired of dealing with those kinds of things. Now let me flip the serum before before I get into the subject, but I've gone to many, many other places where there are great pastors. And the, what, what great pastors, great churches, and a great team. So what makes a place great, or what makes a place below average? Here's the thing. Number one, it all starts with the leadership. Those that have great churches are father figures, And Paul said you have many teachers, but you don't have enough fathers. So those that just have preachers that come in and they leave and they stay for 18 months and it comes another for 18 months and another for 18 months and that's the average in some churches they never seem to grow. So it's the thinking of it's a leadership and the number two it's the thinking of the people. You can have right and wrong thinking and that's where we're going

in just a moment. You can get stuck in a rut and if you do it's going to hinder the growth of your spiritual life and the growth of other people. Number three is the perception of the community. Some churches did not grow because things happened in that congregation and years ago maybe the things took place in the town heard about it, it knew about it. So they're not interested in us hitting that particular church.

Some churches need a complete makeover. years ago maybe the things took place and the town heard about it and knew about it. So they're not interested in attending that particular church.

Some churches need a complete makeover.

I've told some congregations, you either need to move your location, go to another place

because of where you're located or you need a different pastor or you need a name change

and what you really need is some fresh blood and some new people that have just been saved

and one of the Lord are on fire for God.

And so the church grows for different reasons. Now let me give you one story. Years ago there was a pastor that went to a kind of a small town, but the church had started growing incredibly, and he kept wanting to what's the secret of the growth, because it was, you know, at the other places he went to, it didn't grow like this, and they would It went from 50 to 75 to 100.

So one Saturday he decided to go over to the church instead of his office at home and

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