hey this is pastor John Ryan Cantu from PNEUMA church in Houston texas thank you for listening

to the message today i hope that it blesses you and all those that you share it with god bless you

Thank you, Lord. Praise God.

You can take your seat, but don't take it yet.

Actually, just remain standing with us because I'm going to ask you to stand up in just a few seconds.

So real quick, a couple of announcements that I want to make.

We've been asking for some blankets because we're going to have a blanket distribution.

So if you could be bringing those, the deadline is the 29th.

You can deliver them to Juan or Maria here. Raise your hand, Juan or Maria.

They are in charge of our PNEUMA's closet.

Also, next week, we're doing a toy distribution.

So Santa's going to be...

Santa's not...

Any kids here?

I got to preach truth from the pulpit, man.

Okay.

Somebody dressed up as Santa is going to be here next week

doing toys, delivering toys. So if, if you want to come and you know, if you, if you have plenty of

God has blessed you this year and there's plenty of toys that you're giving to your kids, don't,

don't, don't come and get another one, you know. But if you know somebody who is in need, bring

them and it's going to be a blessing. That's going to be next Sunday. I'm sorry, next Saturday on the

21st. Amen. Go with me to the Gospel of Luke chapter one. Before we start to read, I want to

publicly congratulate my wife because she, yeah, yeah, we can, we can call her Master Melissa

because she got her, she got her masters in counseling and praise God. I'm so proud of her.

It's been a tough year. It's been a year of her commuting two hours each way, three times a week to do her internship.

And it was, I'm probably more glad she's done than she is.

But praise God, I'm proud of her. The Lord is going to use her in this area.

He already has been. So, yeah, I just wanted to announce or congratulate my wife.

Luke 1, 26 through 34. Are you there?

Amen. It says this in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David.

And the virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, greetings, oh, favored one, the Lord is with you.

But she was greatly troubled at the saying and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be.

And the angel said to her, do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God and behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and shall call his name Jesus.

And he will be great and he will be called the son of the most high and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father, David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever.

And of his kingdom, there will be no end.

And Mary said to the angel, how will this be since I'm a virgin?

And the angel answered, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow you.

Therefore, the child to be born will be called holy, the son of God.

And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son.

And this is a six month with her who was called barren for nothing will be impossible with God.

And Mary said, behold, I am the servant.

Somebody say servant of the Lord.

Let it be to me according to your word.

And the angel departed from her.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you, my God, for this word that you've spoken over your servant.

Lord, I just pray that you would speak it over your people this morning, my God, that we would receive it with open hearts and open minds.

My God, whatever you want to do, whatever you want to say, Holy Spirit, be on my lips this morning, Father.

In Jesus name. Amen. Amen. You can be seated. Amen.

We are just a week and a half away from Christmas where we celebrate the birth of our Lord.

Whether Jesus was born in December or not is irrelevant.

What is important is that we celebrate the greatest gift ever given to the world from God to humanity. Amen.

And every every year around this time, that's when we usually talk about Mary and Joseph, the earthly parents of Jesus.

We really only talk about them during Christmas time. And normally my Christmas sermon happens the week right before Christmas, which is next Sunday.

So come next Sunday. But God really spoke this this message to me.

And and it fits very well with the story of Mary and Joseph.

Towards the end of every year, we usually start to reflect a little bit on on the past year, you know, whether it was good or bad.

And we just were hopeful. We're hopeful that next year is going to bring blessings and abundance. Right.

But how many of us are thanking God for this year? Praise the Lord.

Maybe it was tough, but hey, man, you're here.

You're here.

God brought you through it.

He got you through it.

And whenever we talk about Jesus, you know, we talk about him as the greatest gift, the greatest blessing.

He's the savior of the world.

He's the Lord of all.

He's way maker, miracle worker, all of that stuff.

But at one point in the life of Jesus, he was also somebody's burden.

Mary is this very young woman.

Historians suggest that she was about between 14 and 20 years old.

When she gave birth to Jesus, she's not legally married yet.

And so she's got to deal with the stress of being an unmarried pregnant woman in the ancient Near Eastern times.

And then when she gives birth to Jesus, she's got to flee from her home.

She's got to go to Egypt because Herod is trying to kill her son, Jesus.

And so that's just what we know about.

We don't even know about the financial burden that might have come as a result of this unexpected baby.

We don't know about the late nights when baby Jesus was, you know, having a hard time sleeping and had an ear infection and got sick and all that stuff.

We we don't know about the pressure.

I have no idea what type of pressure it was for Mary and Joseph to raise the would be king and Messiah of the world, given that title, son of God.

So there's there's a lot of things that we don't actually know about the struggles that Mary and Joseph had to endure when it came to raising Jesus.

after the story is told, you and me, we preach about it.

We preach about the blessing that Jesus became to the whole world,

but Mary and Joseph got to see the burden that Jesus was in their own life.

And that's the title of my sermon this morning,

The Burden of the Blessing.

The Burden of the Blessing.

How many of us know that a blessing is never just a blessing?

You know what I'm saying?

And if you've got kids, you know, right?

but I'm talking about like these God-given blessings.

Like you got favor over your life.

You got a calling over your life.

The blessings of God are burdensome.

And we can be honest about that.

We can say that.

To Abraham, God said, look, I'm going to bless you

and you're going to be a blessing to the world.

But first you got to leave your home

and you got to travel to a land of the unknown

and dwell there as a foreigner.

That's a burden.

I don't know about you.

That's a burden.

to Joseph, Old Testament Joseph, God said, I'm going to set you in high places and I'm going to

make you a ruler. But first you're going to have to be a slave and you're going to have to be in

prison and hated by your family and your brothers. That's the burden to Moses. He said, I will use

you as a deliverer to bring my people out of Egypt. I'm going to use you to go head to head

with Pharaoh, but you're going to have to go head to head with Pharaoh and you're going to have to

lead a people who aren't even going to like you. And then you're going to take them out of Egypt

and then have to live with those people for 40 years in the wilderness.

That is a burden.

That's a burden.

And we can even look at some of these examples of men like Abraham and like Moses

who only ever got to see the burden.

They never even got to see the blessing.

The blessings of God don't come without burdens.

I need you to know that today.

I need you to get this.

I got your attention this morning.

Y'all are a little quiet during worship.

I didn't want to say anything.

Y'all are a little quiet.

the blessings of God don't come without burdens.

And the reason this is so important,

I want you to get is because too many times as Christians,

we're praying to God to take away these burdens that are actually blessings in

disguise.

Right.

And,

and because sometimes we don't allow ourselves to endure the burdens,

we never actually wind up with the blessing because the burden was the material

that you needed to build the blessing.

The burden was the ticket to the blessing.

Jacob had to endure this struggle in order to be declared blessed by God.

I believe that God wants us to be reminded to look for the blessings that are hidden in the burdens.

Look for the blessings that look like burdens.

Because some of y'all are more blessed than y'all give God credit for.

oh pastor you don't understand it's been a year it's been such a hard

year i can't wait for 2025 like that's just gonna solve everything a number a new number

what what if what if it wasn't a tough year what if it was actually a year of preparation

what if it was a year that you had to go through because god was trying to get you to another level

and in order to get to that level you had to you you had to be you had to be humbled a little bit

What if it was that type of year?

What if it wasn't just a tough year?

What if it wasn't just marriage problems that you were going through?

What if it was God performing some much needed heart surgery on that marriage to get it healthy again to where it needs to be?

To be a marriage that is godly.

And it feels ugly in the moment because there's a lot of tension and there's a lot of fighting and there's a lot of arguing and there's a lot of sleeping in different rooms.

But God is doing something to bring it to a better place that it's never seen before.

See, when you are actively pursuing the heart of God,

I'm talking to the Christians that are actively pursuing the heart of God.

And if that not you then there going to be another message for you at another time But for those of us that are actively trying to do the will of God and we saying God I want to get to a better place I want to go deeper with you I want to I want to get right with you How many of us are in that position right now

How many of us are saying, God, I want to do your will. I want to be where you want me to be.

So if that's you. There is favor over your life.

There's favor.

and and if you allow God room to do what he needs to do in you if you move out the way and you allow

God into that marriage into that relationship into your health into your finances into that hatred

into that bitterness I can keep going when you give God room to work and get your hands off of

everything. There is a blessing to be found somewhere in the pain, somewhere in that confusion

and somewhere in that sickness. And I'm not going to stand here today and tell you what I,

that I know what that blessing is because I don't, but I do know that God works things out for the

good of those who love them and who are called according to his purpose. That's what the Bible

tells me. That if I love him and if I am called according to his purpose, he's going to work

things out. That means I could have gotten myself in a mess. But if today I love him and I am called

according to his purpose, he is going to work that mess out. That's what the Bible tells me.

Maybe some of you are here today and there's a lot that's broken in your life. There's a lot that

needs fixing. And you're hearing me preach and you're like, God didn't call me to that.

God didn't call me to that burden. That burden is a result of my mistake.

I'm in this mess because of what I did.

You know, God, God might've even told you to go another way and you decided to go this way.

And now you're paying the consequences of, of that decision.

so the question is can there be a blessing from man created burdens i believe so

because when you determine that today somebody say today that's a very important word man

let me let me pause real quick today is such an important word because i hear people all the time

when i'm when i'm talking to them when i'm counseling them they talk about the past they

talk about yesterday. I can't do anything about yesterday. You can't do anything about yesterday,

but you can do something about today. There is power in that word. I don't care where you came

from. I don't care how messed up your life is because of what you did. Today is a brand new day.

And if you put your hands in the life, in the hands of God today, God is going to work things

out. So if you say today, I'm going to serve the Lord today, my family is going to be committed to

serve the Lord. Today, everything that I've been holding on to, everything that I've been trying to

fix on my own, today becomes the Lord. God has a way of taking the ugly in our lives and molding it

into something that is a testimony. You still with me? I shared a few, I don't know, weeks or months

ago that 2023 was like the most stressful year of my life. Most stressful year. It was a year

where I lost my business and, you know, nobody knew it at the time.

But, you know, I can look back and talk about it.

But it was, it sucked.

2023 was horrible.

I still remember the day where it all started.

It was in December of 2022.

I was at my mom's house.

We were having dinner, family time, Christmas time.

And I get a call and I take it kind of secretly.

it's from a bank that's been, you know,

that had financed one of the properties

that we owned.

And I talked to the guy, he says,

hey, you're out of time.

You need to figure out a way to get us paid.

Because come January,

we're gonna foreclose on that property.

Merry Christmas, you know?

And I just, I feel like that was the day

where God just threw a sign to me.

He said, hey, son,

I want you to prepare yourself because 2023 is going to be rough.

And so January came and we're scrambling trying to figure this out.

We make it happen somehow.

We saved this property from going into foreclosure the day before it was going to be sold.

It was already on the auction list.

And we find a way to refinance it and it cost us so much.

I mean, thousands of dollars just to refinance it.

and the interest rate at the time is just horrible and it doesn't even make sense to have it anymore

it's not it's not a good investment property anymore but we have it we save it two weeks later

there's this other property that we had that we finally finished took us about 18 months to get

that thing finished we go to put a sign to get it leased out only to find out that there's another

for sale sign by the bank they foreclosed on us without us even realizing it changed the locks

everything. Nothing we can do about that one. A couple of weeks after that, there was another

property that we were in the middle of and we couldn't sell it. I mean, it was a mess.

We had to give it back to the bank because I was like, man, I don't even want the headache anymore.

We just gave it back to the bank. Every property, we had a lot of properties. Every one that we had,

we lost. We lost. And it was, again, the other properties that we did have that were in good

standing. I mean, we had tenants messing them up. We had to evict some tenants and then we couldn't

re-rent them because all of our money was spent. And it was, if I had hair,

I mean, for real, we lost so much, so much money that year. So much. We racked up so much debt,

incurred so much debt personally because we closed the business, but we still had the debt.

I told you all the story. The worst part of all of this was that I started to feel like a victim.

That was the worst part. I've never been the victim type. I've never been the one to complain

to you about my problems. I've never been the one to go to Facebook and talk about how my life is

horrible. If that's if you're that type of person, you need to change in the name of Jesus.

Don't be that person. Nobody likes that person. Nobody likes that person. Okay. I'm here to pray

with you, but don't talk to me about how big your problems are. Start reversing and talking about how

big God is, right? So I wasn't that type of victim, but I was feeling like a victim to God

because nobody knew about what I was going through at the time. My wife kind of knew at the end of it

where I was like, hey, I got to tell you something. I went to God feeling like a victim. And for a very

short period of time, my prayers were sounding bitter. And I was saying, Lord, you see the mess

that I'm in. And I'm over here and I'm pastoring and I'm ministering to people and I'm loving

people and I'm serving you and I'm preaching and I'm preparing sermons every week. Can you just

fix this? Fix it. I thought you, I remember telling God, I thought you cared about me.

I thought I was favored.

Is this what favor looks like?

I thought you loved me.

I thought I was a child of God.

And praise God for the Holy Spirit conviction

because as I started to say these things,

the Holy Spirit reminded me at the same time,

I am a child of God.

I am loved by God.

I am favored by God.

He does care about me.

In fact, God cares so much about me

that he has to let me feel this burden

so that I can grow from it.

And so I determined in that moment

that I needed to become better.

This is not a God problem.

This is a me problem.

I'm the issue.

So I still remember the day I said,

you know what, from this day forward,

I'm gonna be a better steward of my money.

I'm gonna be wiser in my business dealings.

I'm gonna be more cautious.

I'm gonna be more discerning.

I'm gonna honor God with all that I have.

And as I started to make these commitments to myself in the presence of God, I determined to stop living in the burden and begin living in the blessing that would one day come from the burden.

OK, I decided that I was going to fix my eyes on the blessing while walking through the burden.

See, because I could have let it turn me bitter. I could have let it kill me.

I could have let it tarnish my faith and make me resent the ministry.

But because I knew that I am a child of God, I am favored by the most high.

I knew that God would turn my burden into a blessing.

Because God will never waste an opportunity to turn your stupid into his glory.

And so if you are favored by God today, doesn't matter what you did yesterday.

If you are in his hands, he will turn whatever mess you have into something beautiful.

Can I just testify?

Because this year, 2024, one of the most blessed years of my life.

Thank you this side.

Y'all don't love me or what?

It's all right.

It was a it's a I caught myself since Thanksgiving, man.

I can't tell you how many times I've said this.

I said to God, Lord, why have you been so good to me?

How? How is it that you are so good to me?

My family's healthy. My marriage is healthy.

Our finances are healthy. Our church is beautiful.

Our ministry is beautiful. It's growing. It's healthy.

My peace, my joy, all time high, all time high.

And I don't say this to boast because y'all know that I'm not that type of person.

But when I think about where I was last year, I just I got to testify of what being in a burden can and does produce when you are a child of God.

And if I'm honest, I'm a little I'm even a little scared because I know that God works in seasons and I would love for this season to just keep going.

In Jesus name, yes.

2025 is my year again.

but what I want you to know church is that no matter hear me no matter if you're in the burden

or the blessing maybe you sitting on the mountaintop you you you good maybe you in the valley You in the desert You in the promised land Whatever it is it is a blessing to be favored Mary didn have to see the blessing of a resurrected Jesus to know she

was already blessed. She knew she was blessed when God called her to the burden.

So let me go back now and talk about when God actually calls us to the burdens, okay? Because

Mary's burden was different than the one I described of myself.

Mine was a burden as a result of my decisions and God being good and faithful turned it around.

But other times God is actually going to call you to a burden.

Like he did Abraham, like he did Joseph, like he did Mary, even Jesus.

Jesus was called to suffer.

The apostle Paul was called to suffer.

I mean

I don't know why we get so excited about the call of God

I'm serious when we read scripture it repeatedly shows us

that when God calls it's going to involve a high level of discomfort

there was a reason that when the angel

appeared before Mary she was troubled the reason

the text says that she was greatly troubled and she tried to discern what sort of

greeting this might be. See, when God calls somebody, the naive person, the one who's never

been called by God before, and there's nothing wrong with that. There's a first time for everything.

But that person hurries with excitement and says, yes, Lord, what is it? What is it? What do you

need me to do? I'm ready. I'm ready. Use me. Use me. Use me. And I love the enthusiasm. We need more

of it. But I think it's because those people don't realize that when God calls us to blessings,

they start out as burdens. Really, really do. A couple of weeks ago, we had our serve conference

and the whole goal of the serve conference was to get people to see the privilege of serving God

and serving people. Right. But let's let's be honest about that. And my wife said it beautifully.

I get to serve. But serving is burdensome. Right. Because to serve means to give.

As you serve, you give more of yourself and there's less of you to give.

You become depleted. You become tired. Other things, other people in your life have to share your time and your priority.

That's why not everybody likes to serve because it demands something from them.

It's a burden to prepare a class.

Right, Pastor Brandon?

It's a burden.

It takes time away from your family.

It takes time away from the things that you've got to get done.

Yesterday, because we had a busy week and Thursday we were in San Antonio, I didn't get a chance to get to my sermon.

I was here all day preparing my message for today.

That took me away from my family.

Our ushers and our security team and our parking crew and our children's pastors, our teachers, sometimes they're absent from Sunday services, serving other people.

That's a burden.

But they all see the blessing behind the burden.

There's other people, and hopefully you ain't in here, but you probably are.

There's other people who think, wait, I don't want to miss a Sunday service.

Wait, I don't want to work with, I barely like my own kids.

I don't want to work with other people's kids.

there are others who only ever see the burden and then you're mad when God doesn't call you.

Like, what do you think this is about? Who do you think this is for? I'm not preaching to become

famous. I'm not preaching. I'm not preaching for any personal game. I'm preaching because when God

gives me a word, I cannot wait to get behind this pulpit and share the blessing I received

with the people of God. True ministers don't do it for the fame. They don't do it for the money.

They don't do it for the personal gain. They do it to be a blessing to people and to God. My

Saturday burden of being here is Sunday's blessing to God's people. The burden of the parking team

Sunday after Sunday is the blessing to get to park with a little bit more ease. The burden of

PNEUMA kids and our children's pastors is the blessing of your kids getting educated and the

sound doctrine of the word of God and you get to be in here fed without your kids bothering you.

There is a blessing. There is the burden of the prayer team every single week coming over here

an hour before service to pray for the blessing of the glory of God is the blessing of the glory

of God during Sunday service. But I guarantee you the ones who choose to take on the burden

and do it because they see the blessing.

They see the healing.

They see the transformation and the edification.

They see the salvation that happens every single time.

We see those hands go up.

They say, man, that's why I pray back there.

That's why I'm committed to this.

That's why I preach.

That's why I serve.

That's why I take out tables and chairs and set them up

because the fruit, the fruit is the blessing.

what a privilege it is to carry a burden if it means somebody else gets the blessing.

You have to understand that.

And that's something that takes a while to understand because we live in a world that's very me centric.

We live in a world that that's about building personal wealth and generational wealth and all of the good things for for ourselves.

And there's nothing wrong with that.

But when you get into the kingdom of God, there's a new culture that we have to adopt.

And it's not about me.

It's about the kingdom.

And I'm just a servant of it.

Mary wasn't called for any other reason than the fact that she was favored.

And yes, she was righteous and righteousness is a qualification.

But there's probably plenty of other people that were righteous.

Mary was both righteous and willing.

Mary said, behold, I am the servant.

I am the servant of the Lord.

Let it be to me.

How many of us have been giving God excuses

because we're looking at the burden

of what he's calling us to do?

I know who I'm talking to.

We dare not say it directly, right?

You got no fear of God if you just flat out tell God no.

No, we do it indirectly.

We do it indirectly.

Because you're already saying, no, that ain't me.

I never told God no.

No, you do it indirectly.

You do it when the Spirit says, get up and seek God, but you don't do it.

We do it when we know we feel so disconnected from God because we haven't been in His Word,

and we still choose not to get in His Word.

And the thing is, we feel bad about it, right?

We're like, ugh, ugh.

I know I need to be better.

I know I've got to do better.

I've been meaning to.

Next year, I'm going to do better, right?

And we justify our excuses by feeling bad about them.

It's like we tell Layla, we don't want your apologies.

We want your obedience.

Don't tell me you're sorry.

Just change it.

Just fix it.

God is looking for servants, not servants with excuses.

Pastor Brandon gets it.

because he's one of the hardest working servants in this church.

And when we introduce him to people, I say, hey, this is Pastor Brandon.

He's like, I don't like the whole pastor thing.

I'm just a servant, man.

I'm just a servant.

Right?

Yes, thank you.

But he gets it, because that's what it's about.

It's like, the less of me that you can see, the better.

I don't want you to see me when I'm preaching.

I want you to see Jesus.

I want you to hear the, I don't want you to hear my words.

I want you to hear the gospel.

That's what it's about.

What I want you to understand, church, is this.

Yes, listen.

Yes, the blessings of God often come with burdens, but the burden should not deter you from the blessing of serving God.

I need to say that again.

Do you get it?

the blessings of God come with burdens but the burden should not deter you from the blessing of

serving God a lot of us are at different levels of faith but I think this principle is still true

of any level because at any level there are burdens for some of you it might be a burden to

come to church every week it's a burden it's hard for you because you're not used to it got to get

the kids up got to wake up early you're used to Sunday brunch with your friends you're used to

sleeping in. So it's a burden for you right now to come to church. That's not a burden for me.

My body knows when it's Sunday. Just know it. For some of you, it might be a burden to tithe or to

give because it's something new and you have to learn and you're not used to it. You're used to

spending that money. Now you got to save it to give it. That adjustment is burdensome.

For some of you, it might be ministry. That's why you haven't said yes,

because you've got to work things into your schedule

and you've got to make sure that you can commit

and all that's fine.

Don't commit and not be able to do it,

but you just can't get past the burden of serving.

But get this, church, being in a relationship with God

means embracing the burdens.

I'm going to say that one more time

because I really need you to get that.

Being in a relationship with God

means embracing the burdens.

If you cannot embrace the hardship and the time commitment and the depletion of physical energy and the mental fatigue and the times of uncertainty and the burden of waiting for the proper time and the need to be flexible because God likes to change your plans.

If you cannot embrace the burdens of serving God, you've already missed out on the blessing.

Because the blessing is the burden.

Y'all didn't say amen.

that one. The blessing is the birth. The blessing is the journey to the place that you never wanted

to go. The blessing is giving what you worked so hard to get. The blessing is facing the giants

that you've been avoiding so that they can finally fall. The blessing is the test so that your faith

can grow. It's time for us to refrain our way of thinking. It's not the burden that you're in.

It just a blessing that stings a little bit It not a burden It just a blessing that takes a little bit of work You will never last in your serving God Mark my words You will never last in serving God

If you dwell too long in the burden, I promise you, I would not have made it this far as a pastor.

Had I not changed my way of thinking about ministry, I was almost done year one of senior

pastoring. I was done. The burden was too great. I wasn't really happy. I was stressed all the time.

I kept dealing with people that were trying to make me into something that I'm not. And I kept

hearing the criticism from people by other people. And I was done. And it wasn't until God showed me

the fruits from other people that I began to recognize what I thought was my biggest burden

is actually my biggest blessing

because I have the privilege

of carrying the burden.

I wonder if Mary,

you know, on her way to Egypt,

carrying baby Jesus

in his little swaddling clothes,

I wonder if she was thinking

about the blessing

that she was actually holding.

I really, really think about it.

In the midst of all that fear

and tiredness and worry.

I bet you she was praying,

God, thank you for this blessing.

Thank you that I have something

so valuable to worry about.

God didn't get it.

Thank you that I have something

so worthy of my energy

that causes me to be tired.

how many of us are tired because we got a blessing that makes us tired?

I got two little ones.

I stay tired.

Some of y'all come home, you're exhausted

because God gave you the job that is making you tired.

Give God praise for that.

Give God praise for the things that we have.

If I had nothing, I would have nothing to worry about.

if I did nothing I would have nothing to be tired about

but God has given me a burden

and he thinks that I'm worthy

to carry it who am I

to touch anything that has been in the hands of God who am I

worship team I want you to come up please

the burden that you're in today

church as a result of your yes

I want you to know that it is a blessing to somebody

please hear me please understand that

your burden is somebody else's blessing

somebody had to answer the call

when I think about Mary and Joseph

they were the only two people

to know our Savior in a way that no one else got to know

and maybe it wasn't always pretty

and maybe it wasn't always easy

and maybe there was a lot of confusion

when the Holy Spirit began to manifest upon Jesus

and his life and his ministry

and they didn't always understand

why their son was doing certain things

and they didn't understand why their son

had to be so hated and killed.

Mary, more than any other person,

I'm almost done, let me have your attention.

More than any other person in the world,

Mary suffered a double tragedy

the day that Jesus went to the cross

because she was not only watching her savior be crucified,

she was watching her baby boy be crucified

to a world that she knew would still not choose him

and talk negatively.

You know, mama, when people talk about your children,

mama bear comes out, right?

She suffered a dual tragedy

because this is not only my Lord,

this is my son.

I gave birth to him.

I raised him.

I fed him when he was hungry.

I tended him when he was sick

before he was tending to other people's needs.

I tended to him.

But her burden became the blessing

that you and me and all of us in this room share.

I wonder if Mary ever had that conversation with God

where she said, Lord, why did you call me to this?

why me I know I've had those moments I know I've had those moments questioning calling I've had

those moments questioning seasons like Lord why am I me a faithful man of God why am I here in this

place of trouble why am I in this place of despair why are things not going right in my life

But what a blessing, what a blessing to be burdened by God.

Every burden, church, weighs something.

That's what burdens are.

It's weight.

It's weight that you carry.

How many of us have burdens in this room?

Come on, raise your hand.

You gotta be shy.

Just raise your hands.

We all got burdens.

We all have burdens.

Life doesn't come without burdens.

You're going to be burdened.

It is the highest honor to carry the burden of the highest God.

Remember that.

Because it tells you that God has entrusted you.

You're in this because God knows that you can get through it.

You're in the trenches because God knows the growth that can come from it.

you're in this mess because God knows that this time next year,

you're going to be here telling a testimony of what God did.

God knows.

God knows that the test of your faith will only make your faith grow.

He knows it.

Thank you, God, for every burden that you have given me.

Paul encourages the church of Galatians.

I'm done with this.

I'm going to ask you to stand.

I want to leave you with this

man, woman of God

you are doing your best

you're doing your best

I'm out here just doing my best

doing my best, trying to live righteously and faithfully

I want to be in the hands of God

I want to be in the will of God

and it's tiring

sometimes it's frustrating, it's exhausting

makes me want to quit

but listen to these words that Paul says very simple very simple words that he tells the church

of Galatians let us not grow weary of doing good for in due season we will reap if we do not give up

doing good gets hard man staying faithful gets hard choosing God over temptation that gets hard

giving. When you don't have much to give, that gets hard. Coming to church when you had a week

and you just want to sleep in, that gets hard. Ministry gets tiring, but don't get tired of doing

good. Don't get tired of doing good because the burden that is upon you is a holy one.

Right there where you're at, why don't you close your eyes? I'm going to ask the prayer team to come

up. And I want to just say this general prayer over you. And then I want to ask if there's anybody

in need this morning, anybody who's carrying a burden, I want you to come forward. And I want,

I want us to pray with you. I want us to pray with you because that's what we do. We believe

and we, we fight as prayer warriors that, that God is going to, to get you out in due season.

but let me pray over you real quick heavenly father i thank you jesus thank you my god

because your very life exemplified a burden that could turn into a blessing

your whole life was burdensome my lord from the moment you got here jesus

people were trying to kill you satan was after you people talked about you people

people tried to kill you, Lord.

They call you the man of sorrows.

Lord, I thank you.

I thank you, my God,

because your life that you endured

became my blessing for life eternal.

I thank you, Jesus.

And I pray for anybody in this room, my God,

that is passing through a trying moment right now, my God.

Those of us who are in seasons of anxiety, my God.

Those of us that are in the wilderness, my God.

I pray that we would see, Lord,

that when we actively pursue you, my God,

that we would begin to see the blessing,

the blessing that we're in, Father God,

that we would see the burden as a blessing in the making.

In Jesus' name, I pray strength, my God,

fresh wind of strength, fresh wind of hope right now.

I pray that hope would be restored, my God.

There's somebody in this room who doesn't have any hope.

I pray in Jesus' mighty name right now

that hope would begin to simmer, Father God.

I pray, Lord, that a light would be flickering on right now in Jesus' name to remind them that there is hope in you, my God.

I pray that joy from this moment forward, my God, would begin to rise up in that depressed life, Father God.

I pray for peace, my God, in that life of chaos right now in Jesus' holy name.

I pray, Father God, that the blessing would come from the burdens that we walk in.

Oh, in Jesus' mighty name and holy name.

Thank you, Father.

These altars are open, church.

If you are in need of prayer, come, come.

Don't hesitate.

Come, let us pray with you.

Thanks for listening.

If you'd like some more information on PNEUMA Church, visit us on our website at mypneumachurch.org.

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Thanks again, and God bless.

Thank you.