INCREASE: Victory Is Ours

Every day is the right day, right? Every day. Well, it's my honor and really my pleasure. I got to spend the last couple of days with some really old friends and one new friend, James and Emily Leatherbarrow spent the last couple of days at our house and James had to go back to his church last night in Atlanta.

And we're super honored today, just a ministry that Kristin and I have been involved with for several years. We've known Emily and her family for quite some time and we've been friends a long time. Emily has been in ministry for probably about 20 years, I think. And for the last 15 years, she has been working and rescuing girls out of sex trafficking in Thailand and has a tremendous ministry there.

Emily is an ordained minister, so she I think what the Assemblies of God initially and now with another organization. And her ministry is called Sisters of Grace, and it's in Thailand, she's the founder and president. And she has with her, Aya Channenan, and Aya is the international director for Thailand and Aya is an accomplished attorney. She's actually a trial lawyer.

So if you ever get in trouble in Thailand, like I've got a connection for you. We'll just keep that one on the back burner. But we're going to ask these two wonderful women of God to come up and just present a little bit about their ministry and how God is changing lives and restoring lives and protecting lives in Thailand. Ladies, let's give them a warm welcome.

Well, good morning. We are so excited to be here today. And thank you to Pastor Fred and Kristin for having us. This is such an honor.

God is so good, amen. Woo! Man, I love that worship. I'm so grateful.

The worship team here has got a blessing and anointing on them and just enjoyed worshiping within this morning. We're so excited to share with you about our ministry. Sisters of Grace got started just five years ago. This is our five-year celebration for Sisters of Grace.

So we're excited about sharing what God has done, really miracle upon miracle in the last five years. That little one up there is Gan Suda, and we call her Baby Gan. She's the youngest girls that we rescued last year. We rescued her last year, only four years old, four years old.

So at Sisters of Grace, we do prevention. We get little ones before they're taken into the trade. And I just want to share with you some statistics. They're kind of hard to hear, hard to read.

But as Kristin's, God calls us not to stick our head in the sand. Amen? We're not called to hide. We're called to face the darkness.

Like Pastor Fred said, we have a lion inside us. Amen? And we stick our head in the sand, and we can't see the hard things in this world, then we're ignoring the call that God has on us to fight against the darkness in this world. So even though these are a little bit hard to hear, we want to share with you why we started Sisters of Grace.

If you go to the next slide, there are 2 million children, 2 million children in the world that are victims of child trafficking. Go to the next one. Over 6 million people are sex trafficked globally. They estimate 1.7 of those are kids, and a majority of them are females.

Go to the next one. So you say, why, Emily, and P.I., why did you start Sisters of Grace in Thailand? This is why. It is a billion dollar industry alone in Thailand, the child sex trade.

If you go to the next slide, just some photos, you can go ahead to the next one. The sex trafficking and the child trafficking that's happening in the Golden Triangle, which is a couple of different countries that come together in Southeast Asia, Laos and Myanmar and Thailand, it is the front lines of human trafficking and child trafficking. And so P.I., she was born in Thailand and grew up in Thailand, and she's going to share her testimony with you in a moment. But she came alongside us, my husband James and I that began Sisters of Grace to say, Emily, we can do this.

Without her and without the Lord, this ministry would not have moved forward like it has so quickly. And we're so grateful to the Lord for what he's done. My husband and I, we served another organization, I served that organization longer than he did. For 15 years, like Pastor Fred said, I fought human trafficking as an international director for a children's home.

And I heard the Lord say to me, Emily, you're going to be rescuing little girls and working in this part of the world, rescuing the hill tribe kids for the rest of your life. That is the call I have on your life, right? So when that season ended with that ministry, I was devastated and I encourage you, men and women, I encourage you that when the word that you heard from God doesn't line up with the reality that you're facing. And how do you reconcile that, right?

How do you reconcile? God's called me to serve Thailand for the rest of my life and the ministry that I'm serving, that ministry, that season came to an end. And I'll tell you, encourage you, stand on the word of God. Amen, stand on the word of God, stand on the word that he gave you, trust the Lord.

Because if that's what you heard from God, that's the call he has on you, he'll make away. And so I started serving a homeless shelter in Atlanta. I'm from Atlanta, Georgia, by the way, sorry, say that, from Atlanta, Georgia, I have three kids. I have a 17 year old, a 15 year old, and an eight year old because I'm crazy, now I'm scared.

You gotta be a little crazy to do this ministry, right? But so I had family and got a job, different job, working at homeless shelter, but I come home every night and I said to James, baby, I just, I would weep, my heart, I am not in the calling that God has on my life. I'm not in the calling. And finally James said to me, Emily, just start your own ministry.

And I was like, oh, sure, no problem. I do say the same thing, right? Yes, I go on my ministry. Yeah, but that's scary, right?

That's scary, stepping out on your own, starting something on your own is scary. But one year later, the first miracle, one year later from that moment, we had in America, a 501c3 nonprofit organization was completely formed, all the paperwork done and we had a board. Praise God. Yes, so awesome.

That was our first step, that was our first step. And then after that, I called I, and I said, okay, we've got the nonprofit in America, but we've got to get the ministry started in Thailand. And so I called her and I said, I have two weeks, PTO. Who knows what PTO means?

A lot of people in this room, right? Paid time off, that's what I had. I had two weeks of PTO and I said, I, in two weeks, can we find a home to rent, find a house, another sign, all the paperwork and fly me back from Thailand to America? And I told her, just let's do it.

Let's try it. Let's try it. Let's try it. Two weeks, two weeks.

We got an airplane, we flew to Chiang Rai from the US to Bangkok, from Bangkok to Chiang Rai. And they kept taking us to these big pieces of property. Huge pieces of land that were for sale, right? And my husband and I had gotten our first donation was $1,000.

We were so excited. But I was like, rental house, rental house. And they would drive us to the next big piece of property and everything for sale. And finally, I told I, let's stop.

I went before the Lord. How many people know? Should have done that the first time? I went before the Lord, I said, God, please help us.

And the Lord said, find a church. And who here fights with God? Anybody? Yeah, you have a moment.

I'm like, okay, but Lord, I need a house. God is like, find a church. And we went and visited a small church. And afterwards, we went to the pastor.

And we said, pastor, if we start a children's home here, for these girls that are at risk of child trafficking, if we started children's home, would your church accept our kids? We're trying to find a church. And he said to us, he said, come back behind my church. I want to show you something.

And we went back behind that church. And there was a row of Sunday school classrooms. And he had cleaned every classroom out and just put bunk beds. And he didn't have any money.

He didn't have a program. He didn't have anything. He was just rescuing kids in his Sunday school classrooms. Yes.

And he said, please, please start your ministry here. We need you. This part of the world where these kids are being taken every day. So he said, take this little road back behind my church.

There's a big house for sale. And we were like, for sale? Well, here, there's no rental houses entirely, apparently. So we walk back behind the church.

We take the road. He said, just do it. Just do it. Go see it.

So we take the road back behind the church. And as we walk on the right hand side, we begin to see an elementary school. Playgrounds, picnic tables, basketball courts, soccer field. We're like, oh my goodness, when this be just the most beautiful place to start a children's home.

We walk up to the house. And there's the sign for sale. And the number. And Ayah gets on the phone, P.I gets on the phone, and calls the number.

And she goes from the Thai language is very beautiful, Sing Song. Sayuadikah. She goes from speaking. She goes from, it is like Sing Song.

It's me. I think it is. And she goes from singing that beautiful Sing Song Thai to Akha, which is her hill tribe language. And she begins speaking that.

And I'm like, what is going on? Turns out the woman that owned that home was a hill tribe woman that had married a wealthy Japanese man five years before. Married him. He built the house for her, and they divorced before they ever moved in.

And she put it on the market and said, I'll never rent this house. And it sat on the market for years, waiting for us. Yes. Because God is good.

And when she told her, when she told the woman that we're going to use the home to rescue hill tribe girls, she said, OK, I'll rent it to you. And so that was our first rental house. If you show the next picture, you can see it. There's our first rental house.

Praise God. And in those two weeks, two weeks, we found a rental house. We signed. A P.I.

is a lawyer. We signed all the paperwork for the rental house. And the NGO paperwork, that's the nonprofit paperwork in Thailand. That came in in the two weeks.

I had to be there to sign in person. It came in in less than a month. Some organizations don't get their paperwork for four years. Miracle after miracle, we signed every paperwork.

Sign the lease. We found a house mother that was wanted to stay with, that would be there when we started accepting girls. We found a house mother. In two weeks, we flew back from Chiang Rai to Bangkok on the airplane like this.

And I keep saying that Emily, this is nothing but God. God already people have everything up front. And we just run after him. Yeah.

I was like, I know, should we tell him to slow down? Like, wait, Lauren, here we come. But that was God. He sees these kids.

He sees the need. And he had gone before us. Amen? You go to the next slide.

This was our first group of girls. If you see the little girl there, that's happy. All our girls have nicknames. But happy has her headdress on.

That's a every hill tribe has their own tribal outfit that they wear. And that's actually the hill tribe that P.I. comes from. And that is the Akka tribe.

And that's one of their headdresses that they have. And that's our first group of girls that we took in. If you go to the next slide. That's my husband in the back.

He's so handsome. And there's my three kiddos mixed in there. And with all of our other children, which are our girls and sisters of gray girls. If you go to the next slide.

In 2022, the Lord provided for us four acres of land. And in 2023, if you go to the next slide, we built our first dorm, a 42 bed dormitory. And then in 2024, we completed all the work on 100 seat dining hall that includes laundry facilities and rooms for our staff are all in that building. And so I.A.

and I have walked step by step just following, running after God, as he's providing miracle after miracle. This is five years, you guys. Some ministries, some organizations, and five years, they're just getting started. We already have the dorm.

Why? Because God sees these children, amen? And if you go to the next slide, sisters of grace this year, because we have the new dorm, we were able to rescue five more girls. So we have 15 little girls that we prevented from child trafficking.

And at Sisters of Grace, we do things differently. So at Sisters of Grace, other children's homes in the area near us, there's a lot of children's homes. But one thing that they don't do is they don't really make them a family. The kids are more there.

It feels a little more like what you think of an orphanage, right? Where they're feeding them, they're sending them to school. A lot of them are Christian praise God, so they are hearing the gospel. But it's not the home dynamic that P.I.

and I wanted to start that home dynamic, something different. So every summer break, when other kids are going back, sending back to the village, right? You don't want to put them back in that situation that we rescued them from. They're getting rescued from abuse, neglect, the risk of being sold.

So when other kids are going back, our girls stay home. And I.I. share P.I. Sorry, she has two names.

Share with them your testimony and how God brought you in to the ministry. So when she said P, P means it's Thai language. Sister. Sister I.

Sister I. When she called me P.I. It means sister I. OK.

I'm not confused. Thank you so much, Pastor. Thank you, Christian, to have us here today. I'm so grateful that God bring me, connect with her.

And God can use me the way he wants to use me. I grew up in village, Akha village. My dad is Chinese. So in Thailand, Akha or other tribe, you tribe, you are not considered as a Thai citizenship.

We don't have any citizenship. So even though they're born in Thailand, because they're born in the hill tribes, they won't consider them citizens. OK. I have citizenship through my dad, who is Chinese.

Thai citizenship through my dad is ridiculous. It doesn't make any sense, but it was. I have citizenship, and this is how God really from step one, he prepared me to become a part of this disobress journey. But my dad passed away when I was 10, and my mom cannot handle any situation like that.

And she started to take drugs, and she had to drive. And finally, she just designed to leave us in we have been completely abandoned. And I have to go to live in one children's homes in Qing Rai, and how I grew up. That children's homes defeat us, like what Emily said.

They give us food. They send us to public school. But all I can feel is in Thailand before this treatment as chicken. And Emily's there here in America, you call it cattle.

Right. Like, yeah. Like, like, her in cattle. Yes.

But in Thailand, it's chicken chicken. Yes. So I couldn't feel like they fulfill what one children, one child need. It's not just food.

It's not just school. But we need your love, right? But I couldn't feel it. Then I have been in that student home for six years from middle school to finish my high school.

I remember that they never once asked me, how was your day? They were once in that six years. That's the only thing that I always try to speak out that I want to tell them how was my day. But there's no one listens to me.

And also to other girls. There's no one listening to us. So that's how my life gone. And there are many steps that I could really hear that this is God calling me like when I finished middle school in Thailand.

Every level of education you have to test in. No matter how good you are in education in that level, but still you have to test in. So there is the best school in the city that God calling me to go test in. I couldn't believe that.

That's the voice that God talking with me. I just from small village. I don't really know that. No, I believe that by myself, I cannot test in.

It's too hard for me to get into that point. But God, just tell me that. Go do it. And then, oh God, is this what you really want me to do?

And I have to say, OK, I'm a go. And then I start praying for my studying to test in. And I found that, oh, I have no money to sign up. I have to pay almost $1, about $1.

It's $25, less than $1, less than $1. I don't have that money to pay for a sign up. And I have to know that I'll pray to God. I surrender to you.

I don't have capacities to test in, but I follow you. But now I have a problem. I don't have money. God, tell me that.

Go to that school. And you will find the way. Just go to that school. You will find the way.

And right in front of that school, I just like standing in front of school. I'm not there to walk in to the gate. I just standing there. And there is a family I have known back years ago.

He just draws in with his niece that niece or so likes to test in in that school. And he asked me, what are you doing here? Oh, God telling me to come here. God, tell me to test in to this school.

It's somehow scared me. But God keep telling me this. And I just came here to see the miracle of God. And this family gave me that money to sign up.

And that school took me to along the route that I could become a lawyer today. Hey, Scott. $1. That $1 is the open door for my life.

There is many things that happen along the way during the high school and until I test into the law school. But you know, God never stopped telling me to go on his way. That is completely different from my life. I don't have anybody to back up me.

During that my law school, I have to take huge loan to earn that law degree. As soon as I finish my law degree, I should go directly to have my license to practice law. I should go for a bar examination to be ready to work, to earn some money, to pay back my debt. But God works completely different from other people, my pastor, the day I graduated, my pastor said, congratulations, I have a news for you.

Go. Do mission in India, nine months. And I just like, pastor, is that joking? A lot.

Because I have no one to pay for my view, whatever. And pastor said, no, no job. God wants you to go. Do mission in India for nine months.

And I end up 18 months in India. I end up doing mission 18 months. And I come back to Thailand after 18 months that I'm away completely away from any legal stuff, never study. And I have to go to do everything that I must do, like license bar examination.

It's miracle. When I kneel down and pray to God that God, you take me to this situation that I don't have time to study anything for that examination. So now it's your work. You need to do miracle in my life.

This is how it works. And I got those things passed and started working as a lawyer. And then, 2018, she reached out to me. Aye.

Her season, her work with the previous ministry, just and she's crying. We keep connected. And she's just crying. And like what?

She just shared a lot of crying. Yeah. Like just she shared, right? I told her, why don't you just start your own ministry?

And she said, James said that too. But how can we start? That's how we start to talk about Sister Grace. And that is the time I was promoted to become a senior associate.

It's very scary for me to take a lot of plans of work at my forum and to be with her side by side. But regardless of how much I'm scared, right? I hear God calling me to be by her sign. And that's how I found that from the first day that I was put into children homes where I not really have ease with to the path that I could become lawyers and knowing many things in Thailand.

He used me to connect to many people that really support to make today possible. And I could see that God calling and when I just like start to obey him little by little, he chose his miracle. He never stopped to show his miracle. Yeah, so praise the Lord.

I'm so grateful that I call her. And despite her job was going so good. And she was so busy and just take on all these new things. And I called her and I said, P.I.

Would you like to start help me start this ministry? And she just said, yes. Actually, it's not my brain who say yes. You know?

And I just cannot call that yes back. This is what I joke to her that it's not my brain who say yes. But spiritual life just moved that word. Just open my mouth and say yes to hurry.

And cannot wait to see miracle of God working through this old race. And that's how we really feel that this is our miracle. I'm so grateful. And if you go the next slide this year because of the new dorm we were able to take the five new girls.

So there they're coming in the front gate. That's our five new girls this year that we rescued. If you go the next slide. That's our campus.

So, yeah. So that's an eight foot, it looks tiny because of this guy view. But that's an eight foot concrete perimeter wall. So our girls are safe, praise the Lord.

And that's the dorm in the front going this way. And along the back wall, that's the dining hall. And our dream, and we already have the road poured and the concrete wall in. Security, we've got two gates on the front.

And our dream is right in front of the dorm to build a gym for the girls. A big, like a full basketball gym. So we can host tournaments. And our girls can play volleyball.

We have a ton of volleyball players for some reason. So we're going to put a sand volleyball court in too. That'll come up really quickly. The gym will pray for the gym.

And then we hope to someday put a coffee shop in the front corner. So the older girls have a place to work. And we have many dreams for this. But we ask that if you're touched today that you would pray for Sisters of Grace, pray that God will continue to do his miracles and bless this ministry.

And if you go to the last slide, I just want to share, and I'm sorry we've taken so much extra time, but I just want to share quickly a testimony of one of our girls so you can hear that transformational story. I told you all our girls have nicknames. So this little girl's name is Barbie. And on the right in the yellow is Barbie when she first came to Sisters of Grace.

And you can see how emaciated she is. All her little bones are sticking out. And Barbie was born inside of the prison. Her mom got arrested when she was pregnant, and Barbie was born inside a Thai prison.

And in Thailand, you have to pay to sign the paperwork to get a kid out. So we're grandparents who are also in poverty in the village, in the Hill Tribe villages. Our struggle with so much poverty. And that's why the drug trade has gone through the villages and the drug traffickers turned their eyes from drugs to children.

It's more profitable with less severe consequences, the human trafficking and the child trafficking. And so that's why these villages are easy prey. But Barbie was born inside the prison. The grandparents couldn't afford to get her out to sign the paperwork until she was two years old.

So Barbie lived for the first two years of her life inside of her prison. Her grandparents got her back, but they didn't have the ability to send her to school much. They didn't have the money to take care of her, to feed her. And so when I, P.I.

and I found out about Barbie and brought her to Sisters of Grace, she was totally shut down. Barbie was, she would isolate herself. She was angry. She was stealing.

A lot of our girl's struggle was stealing. She was stealing. Just mean. She's really strong, like super strong.

Like I would not want to have to fight Barbie. I'd be in big trouble. And she's so strong. And so she was mean to the other girls.

So we were just praying and praying. And at Sisters of Grace, we do lots of counseling. That's a focus. So we just kept counseling with her, kept counseling with her, kept loving her.

And I think it's a beautiful story of transformation because about nine months. What takes about nine months? Yeah. About nine months at Sisters of Grace.

Barbie became out of that show. The first time in her life, she'd ever felt unconditional love, safety. The first time she hadn't been afraid, security, and the freedom to be Barbie, to be who Barbie was. And when she came out of that cocoon, that cocoon of fear in her life, Barbie was transformed.

This little girl on the left here with her hand up in the big smile on her face, she is our absolutely best leader. She's only like 10 years old. She leads all the other girls. And she went from fear and isolation and depression to she's the kindest, most gentle, loving child, and through the power of the Holy Spirit, and through ministries like Sisters of Grace, we're rescuing little girls.

And we're so grateful for this church family and your support. Thank you, Pastor, so much. Thank you. Hey, man.

Wasn't that great? And look what God can do. Amen? Shoo.

I'm glad you explained that. It made sense. I was wondering why Curtis kept saying P Fred. I was like, I don't know.

I'm just kidding. No, but thank you so much for sharing. That's incredible. All right, guys.

I'm going to land this plane. 10 minutes. No, this is actually great. I'm going to just piggyback off of the ministry.

And I don't know if you could hear it or not, but that's walking in victory. And what we're going to be talking about a little bit today but into next week, what God really put on my heart is that what is victory and walking in victory? What does that look like? He began to put it on my heart.

I was listening to a song on the way into church. It was a great song about victory. And I'm excited. I'm an excited person to begin with.

So it doesn't take me much to get me up there. But it was just so great because I just really started to think about it. I'm like, man, how do we have victory in Christ? But we live defeated.

I'll say it again. I don't know if you heard me. How do we have victory in Christ? But we live defeated.

And the challenge is I think that when she was sharing her story, if you heard her, she's like, I had plans. I'm worried to fear. All the stuff we normally have. But then God always has another plan, right?

God's plan is always so much bigger than ours. He sees it from a different view, right? We see it up close and personal. But He sees it.

And He guides us to get there. Amen? Well, what he began to lay on my heart was that we live with a temporal, hear me, church. We live with a temporal perspective of victory.

And God wants us to start understanding and seeing victory from an eternal perspective. He has a view and an understanding of victory that we have access to. But I think we live in such a temporal view of it that victory to us is like we want a football game, right? Victory is circumstantial.

And the word victory has so much more to it than just winning one battle. Like we win one thing. And I get it, church, let's not understand in life what I hope to help us with is that we're walking in victory that you're understanding that even when you lose, you're still winning. And this is a challenge because what we're real good at is we can listen.

I'm not taken away from this morning, but I have to be honest. Such a great worship. That was awesome. I was ready to listen.

I was ready to start running around this place. I had to like, God, set on my legs down please because I want to go crazy. But listen, as He's working on my heart, and listen, I'm sure He's talking to everybody differently. But this is an hour, church.

Hear my heart. This is an hour on one day out of the week that I just wonder, I wonder if we can keep it right there, that's great. But when we walk out the threshold of that door, are we walking in victory and taking that with us that we're not just, it's cool. It's great here.

I'm not taking that away. But He wants you to walk in that every single day into your job, into the market. We talk about this stuff all the time, church, but He wants you to take that and walk and run with it. And I think it's because we have just such a small view on what victory actually is.

We have a, I'm going to have to cut this up a little bit, Rick. So you're just going to have to follow me. I appreciate you greatly. When you think of victory, visuals come to mind, right?

Let's run through these real quick. Yeah, this is mine right here, guys. Victory, right? Yeah, oh yeah.

The goat, right? Yeah, if you're mad at him, oh, there we go. This is a lot of people's victory through like, these are your battle and right? Victory is ours.

Go to the next one. Yeah, I don't know if you can see that, but that's David standing on the line, if y'all. All right, go ahead. So what I want to run through real quick with you is the victories, those types of victories are great.

Don't get me wrong, they serve a purpose. But guess what, you saw Tom Brady holding his Super Bowl victory, but he has to go back over next season. And it's funny, I used him because it says the day, like, the day after winning the Super Bowl, he is back at work in the gym, getting after it, to prepare for the next one. See, it's temporal.

That one isn't going to last. Someone else is going to win it next year, right? But I want us to try to get to a place that we are walking in victory, eternal victory. It doesn't stop.

It doesn't end all day long every day. You are walking in victory. And it's not based on what happens in the world. And I'm going to help you out.

Because that line we were roaring about, yeah, what did he do with the world? Someone said he overcame the world. So I want us to today, church, to just plant the seed in our minds. That the thing that lives in us has overcome the world.

And here we are walking around in the world. Are you walking around as an overcomer? Because that's really the challenge. If we want to shout victory, you already have it's already been done.

Are you, this is what I was taking from a P Fred's message in the past couple weeks. I love you bro. Is that we could, that we're either partaking or we're just simply not, right? So this is going to be like, you're either partaking in victory or you're not.

And if you're not partaking in victory and you're living and dealing with the temporal victories and grabbing a hold of them, and that's necessary, like I said. But what happens in the temporal is that when your strength runs out in the temporal victories, right? And it's hard to push through. You get down, you get beat up, you get upset, and it's like, oh man, but when we tap into the eternal victory, then we are giving the strength to overcome.

Do you see how all this will pull together when you begin to understand that you are already working and living from victory and you're no longer working for victory? Oh man, I got two minutes. OK. So now go back, go back, go back.

So here's some victories in the Bible, everyone's favorite. The Exodus from Egypt. We talk about that one all the time. David Ingoliath, the wall to Jericho, healing the sick, feeding the multitudes.

But here's my favorite victories in the Bible, the cross. And then the one that matters the most, the resurrection from the dead. See, the difference in those victories, they're encouraging all of that. But if you miss the cross and you miss the resurrection, the eternal victory, the one that gives you strength over all things, the ability to walk through all things.

Because even in the mess, you're going to see what? You're going to see the kingdom. You're going to see what matters most. Because mind you, we will say things all the time, like, oh, this world, you can't take it with you.

It's going to help you. We have the things and we say them, they sound great. But I think this is the problem of why we live the way that we live. Because we haven't switched our focus to an eternal victory, to the one that matters the most.

And we don't live that way in our lives. And the challenge is to beat you up. The challenge today is to hear my heart that we leave here differently, that we stop living in just temporal victory. And we start living with the victory that Christ paid for.

Because that is what is going to change the outside. If they would have gave up, guess what? And I love these stories. These are my favorite ones you talk about because I feel like some people make it like real drawn out like this.

And they're like, listen, what my God did in five years, y'all. Those are my favorite ones because I'm like, I love them people like I still work on them. I'm like, hey, listen, God doesn't have the problem. He can make it happen like now.

That's how good he is. That's how he works. He can do it now. He did in their lives with those two.

And I love that. Two women and he built that big old establishment, rescuing girls now, five years. And all they did have to keep saying is what? And you know what?

You know what victory I'm learning is, church? Victory is the freedom to live out the purpose that God paid for. That's what living in victory is. That's what living in true victory is.

You are freely living out the purpose that God paid for. We don't have time for this one. I'm going to get you next week on that one. So jump down to, yeah, there you go, perfect.

Church, if you hear anything today, and just give me five more minutes, if you hear anything today, hear this, please, our victory starts and it ends with Jesus. It starts and it ends with Jesus. If it wasn't for him, we wouldn't have victory. We wouldn't be sitting where we're sitting.

We wouldn't have the opportunity that we have. We wouldn't have any of this, but because of Jesus, we have victory. Like see, his victory did so many things. I don't know if we know this or not.

Like it cleared the, we have no longer a separated from a relationship with God. It defeated death, sin. Like there's so many things that his victory did. And I feel like we're partaking in just the, tiniest bit of it.

When we can be living in the fullness of the victory of what he paid for every single day and everything that we do. And why we're doing that, guess what it's doing? I'm just going to read the scripture. Go to the, all right, go to the next slide.

All right, stay right there. So the first one that we're going to read is first Corinthians 15, verse 57, and I'm reading the message translation on this one. I do have other translations in here. But the first thing I want to point out is the gift of victory.

It says, but now, in a single victorious stroke of life, man listen, if y'all can shout for line of Judah, song and worship, how about the word of God? But now in a single victorious stroke of life, all three, sin, guilt, death are gone. The gift of our master, Jesus Christ, thank God. Help me, this one, make sure I'm reading this right.

All three, sin, guilt, death are gone. Church, listen, gone. This is the gift of victory that was done for us. This is the gift of victory we get to walk in.

All of it's done. All of it is done. The next one. Oh yeah, this is one of my favorite ones.

The fragrance of victory. Oh, we, hey, I'm just going to say this. I got to say this real quick guys. I'm excited.

I don't know if you know that or not. But this here is called the good news. All right, we have two people that said amen. Listen, this is called the good news.

Your pastor here is about tired of people acting like, I'm not supposed to be excited about good news or that I'm not supposed to live my life being excited that it was all done and paid for and I get to walk in it and I get to tell somebody about it. You know, like some people are like, this is the message that just, it sounds good. Isn't it supposed to? Am I missing something?

He paid, it's all gone, he paid for all of it. And I get to live in it. And guess what I want to do? He sent me on a mission to tell you.

You can do it too. I want you to be just as excited as I am. Because guess what? He paid for all of us.

You find someone that can pay for everybody on this planet, sin, the real stuff, death, all that. Shoo, you aren't excited about it. I'll get excited for you. But this should feel good guys.

If you run into anybody that tells you that you shouldn't feel good about this word or be excited about what it has done for you, I'll just love them anyways. That's what you do. So the fragrance of victory, 2 Corinthians 2, 14 and 15, it says, in the Messiah in Christ, God leads us from place to place. In one, someone read that for me.

What do you think that is guys? Oh, it don't stop. So what must have to happen then if it stops? You got, you went to the wrong parade.

You exit stage left when it was still gone. Guys, it doesn't stop. It is one long, he takes us from place to place. Did you hear that?

So wherever you're at, whatever you're doing, wherever you're going, whether you're here or you're in Thailand or wherever else you're traveling to Atlanta, wherever you're going, like he goes with you and you have victory in all of those places. It doesn't stop. So through us, he brings knowledge of Christ. Everywhere we go, people breathe in.

Ooh, the exquisite fragrance. Ooh, we, because of Christ, we give off a sweet scent rising to God. Oh my goodness. So if you didn't know, now you know that you carry a scent.

Yeah, listen. Yeah, some people are like, I don't know. I get it, guys. Listen, I don't know.

But here's what I do know. Ooh, that scent that you carry, the good scent, the great scent. It's all because of Jesus. But everywhere in the victory that you're living, you're letting that out everywhere you go.

It's making an impact everywhere you go. Like, listen, guys, this is a big deal. Are you living in victory? Are you living from the victory that he paid for?

That gives you access to. Like, are we doing that, church? Because if you are, it should be letting that off, which is recognized by those on the way of salvation and Roma. Come on, church.

Fragrance of victory. Ooh, we. All right, I got 15 more slides. I'm just kidding.

I'm almost done. I got two more and quick points. Surpassing victory. I had to throw this in there.

I fought about this. You know you're talking about flanking with God. I fought about this. Because I'm like, God, I ain't putting this in there.

This is everyone's favorite verse to use. It's going to seem so basic. But Romans 8, 37, and I'm reading out of that Amplify version, it said, and yet in all things, we are more than conquerors and gain an overwhelming victory through him who loves us so much that he died for us. Guys, that definition of that word, I put the point as surpassing victory.

Because a lot of people say that. But I think you missed the key point there, the key word, more than conquerors. You're more than surpassing victory. You're not just a conqueror of victor.

You surpass it. You're more than that. There's so much more to that than just you're more than conqueror. No, you're more than that.

If you're just calling yourself a conqueror, you're setting the bar way down here. Because he said, you're more than conquerors. And we have surpassing victory when we understand what we have in the victory we can have access to and walk in every single day if we just understand victory from his perspective. Because he says you're more.

You're surpassing victory. And the last one, the power of victory. First John 5'4". Wait, you can go ahead and come up if you would.

This is the amplified version as well. That's where everyone born of God is victorious and overcomes the world. For everyone born of God is victorious and overcomes the world. I don't know if you missed it or not, but he gives you a promise right there.

For everyone born of God is victorious. And listen, and if you're not, it's okay. I want to introduce to him. But can I just see a hand of who in here is born of God?

Look at all the hands. I don't know if you guys are victorious. I don't know if you're reading with me. These are my words.

These are his words. I'm just reading them. Says for everyone born of God is victorious and overcomes the world. Church, what are we living in and walking in every single day?

And in the world. And a thing that you have inside of you, his overcoming. Remember what Pastor said when he about busted out this thing last week? I know someone else thought, I'm like, go pop out.

He said that he's in there trying to get out. He's overcome the world. The thing that can overcome all of these secondary things that we struggle with is in here wanting out. And this is the victory that has conquered and overcome the world.

You continue in persistent faith in Jesus, the Son of God. Because your faith has the ability. Your faith, the power that's in your faith, the power that's saying yes, God, I'll go to Thailand. I'm trying to rent a house.

They're trying to show me bigger lands. I believe as I was listening to that God said, no, this is what I'm going to give to you. I'm going to let you set eyes on us so you can pray about it. And this is what it's going to grow to if you just trust in me.

Because you have victory in me. And look what he did. He grew that thing. And he wants to do the same in your life.

Church, he wants to do the same in your life. So here's my question today for you. And you can go ahead and say, if you want, I'm going to get you out of here. If you stand, it'll help me go as fast as I can.