Journey of Faith Part 4 – Lawson and Aaron Perdue – 12/30/2024

Praise the Lord, everyone. I’m so glad that you’re here today. We’re gonna be sharing today on the journey of faith, but we’re gonna talk about dealing with something that I believe many of you are dealing with, or you know people that are dealing with. We’re gonna talk about dealing with the spirit of rejection and how you deal with that by the Spirit of the Lord, because it’s the Spirit of the Lord that actually produces momentum. Friends, it’s so good to have you today with us, and I’m glad to have Aaron. We’re talking about the journey of faith. You know, faith is a journey, it’s not just a destination. And a lot of great things of faith just take time. They don’t just happen overnight. And so we’ve been sharing about that all week. It’s really great teaching from the scripture. And you know, there’s some things that I’ve received and they’ve been almost instantaneous. There’s other things that I’ve received that I believed over 20 years for, but I just keep believing God.

Yeah, we talked about Isaac, how in his life, you know, he was dealing with difficulty. There’s a great famine going on, but God called him, told him to stay put, and he did, and he dwelt. And because he was planning on staying, he started sowing.

Right.

You know, when people plan on leaving, they stop giving. They stop sowing, they stop caring, they stop investing. But Isaac, he really believed God. He was gonna, you know, do what God told him to do. So he was planning on staying there, so he began to sow. And it says in that same year he reaped a hundredfold harvest.

Right.

And that he began to prosper, continued prospering until he became very prosperous. And you kinda see that beginning, continuing, becoming. God spoke something to me several years ago, but he showed me that His blessing, the Spirit of the Lord, that blessing that comes with the Spirit of the Lord being on you, it generates momentum.

Right.

And I was looking at my own life. You know, years ago, I was kind of stuck. It felt like I wasn’t going anywhere. I just finished my master’s degree in classical music, and I was broke, you know, I was sleeping on an air mattress. So I was barely surviving. But God showed me that I was blessed.

Amen.

And He spoke to me and said, “You’re blessed by the Most High God, the possessor of heaven and Earth.” That’s the same blessing that Melchizedek spoke over Abram in Genesis 14. And I began to do things, start businesses, do things that started generating some finances. But within one year, I paid off all of my student loan debt. So I was $30,000 in the hole, but after a year… And didn’t have a regular job, I was just kind of freelancing, teaching lessons, and buying and selling things. I paid off my debt and then I started my doctorate.

So, let’s stop just a minute. So you were 30 years old.

24.

24. No, you were 24 years old when you start… When you were doing your masters, but you began to believe God. You were a flute player. You had no regular job. And you believed God. It’s so important, that, what we believe, to pay off your college debt. And it was about $30,000, and you paid that off within one year.

Yeah.

You got exactly what you believed for.

Yeah. And it wasn’t easy either. So, sometimes that momentum, it’s hardest at the beginning. If you’re trying to move something very heavy that’s on wheels, you know, getting it started, that initial push-

Right.

Takes the most work, takes the most force and effort. But once things start rolling, then it starts generating momentum.

Sure.

So God kind of showed me how there was momentum that kinda started, and just that continual trust in him, continual putting faith in him, continual, you know, sowing and giving, just kept that thing growing and growing. So when I started my doctorate, we talked and you said, you know, “If you believe God, I believe that by the time you finish your doctorate, you’ll have $100,000 net worth.”

Right.

And when I was finishing my coursework, I eventually moved here to become a pastor. I actually moved here with $200,000 net worth. I was able to put a down payment on a house.

Right.

You know, I remember I put $50,000 down on a house that was $250,000. And I lived there for a few years, eventually got married, and I sold that house for a profit. I sold it for $420,000. So after, you know, what updates I did and everything, I made $140,000 on that house-

Right.

And then I took the equity from that home, the profit from that, rolled it into another home, bought another home for 600,000. It’s now worth over a million. It’s nearly paid off. But God just showed me how there was that momentum that was being generated.

Now, I wanna talk about a couple of things in that part of the story.. I wanna talk about… I dropped you off, right? When you were going back to get your doctorate. I dropped you off at DIA, and then when I was driving back, the Spirit of the Lord prompted me. And I called you and I said, “Aaron, if you’ll believe God, by the time that you graduate from college with your doctorate degree, you’re gonna have a net worth of at least $100,000.” And I wanna talk about your response. You said immediately, it didn’t take you 10 seconds. You said, “I believe it and I’ll have it.” It’s so important, again, what we believe.

Aaron Mm-hmm.

Most of the time, what we’re receiving is what we’re believing and what we’re speaking.

Mm-hmm.

Right? The other thing I wanna talk about in that story, because after you got your doctorate, right? You graduated, you didn’t have the 100,000, you had double that.

Mm-hmm.

You had a $200,000 net worth, right? So you moved here, you bought this house, and then you sold that, right? In a few years, you made $140,000. But what did you do… What was the first thing you did off of the 140,000?

I tithed off of that. I wrote a $14,000 check to the church. And I remember actually when I sold it, it was kind of a difficult time. We listed it, like, the day before COVID kind of happened. And the governor shut, you know, the state of Colorado down. So the day we listed it, I was kind of in a rush ’cause I knew something like that was gonna happen, to clean the house, get it ready to sell. And I remember we listed… We were initially gonna have it go live on a Friday, but I talked to my realtor, I said, “We didn’t have this thing go live on a Thursday.” And we did, it was the last day that they could do showings in person. But we had like a dozen people look at the house. And the first person that saw it actually offered an over-asking offer. And, you know, we accepted it. You know, they had their inspector come, didn’t really see anything wrong with it, you know, wanted to buy it. But they were in the military. They were supposed to move here to be a professor at the Air Force Academy, but the military shut down, you know, the various orders and things. So the contract fell through-

Because of COVID.

They had to re-list it. And at that time, people were kind of unsure what was gonna be happening. Later on, things had started to skyrocket in real estate. But at the time, like, we re-listed it and didn’t have any showings at all-

Right.

For several weeks. And we decided to pull it off the market to reset the clock. But our realtor left the sign out. And it just so happened, someone’s looking at another house in the neighborhood, and just saw our sign and called the realtor, and ended up getting it. And it was kind of a difficult process. You know, they were a first-time home buyer. Their inspector found 1,000 things wrong with the house.

Oh, it was a terrible-

It’s a little bit of a battle. But I just said, “God, you know, if you help me sell this thing, I’m gonna”… You know, I’m a tither, I’m a giver. I’m gonna tithe off the increase.” And it went through. And, you know, I remember writing that tithe for $14,000. I was really excited ’cause that was the biggest tithe, you know, biggest chunk of giving I’d done it at one time.

And I wanna talk about this. In the realm of provision, giving is a huge aspect. And I had an uncle one time, he actually came to Andrew Wommack’s Bible studies with us in 1978 in Lamar, Colorado. But this, he said, “You know what? If I have a million dollars, I’m gonna give 100,000.” But you know what? The man would not tithe $10 off the 100 that he had. And if you won’t tithe a dollar off the 10 that you have, or $10 off the 100 that you have, or 10,000 off the 100,000 that you have, you’re not gonna tithe 100,000 off a million.

Mm-hmm. So, some people aren’t challenged, right? Tithing off their paycheck, but then when they have a major windfall, financially, that they forget about it, right? And so they limit their selves by their response to God’s covenant. So I’ve been a tither since I’ve been a child, since I got my first paycheck. When I was 13 years old, when I made, right? $1,300, actually 1300 and some. But I remember bringing a check, because I always give a little bit more. I made just over $1,300 and I brought a check to my Sunday school class for $135. So I’ve been tithing since my first paycheck. And you know what, I’m super, super blessed. And I wouldn’t… Listen, I wanna be a giver. And my dad taught me that very simple principle. And I… Mom and I go far beyond the tithe, we actually give about 30% of our income,

Well-

Back to the ministry.

You know, I always… You know, in our family, I’m usually the one that, you know, pays the bills, kinda adds things up, you know, keeps things running, financially. And I always tell my wife, you know, what our tithe was, you know, how much we gave throughout the month, and last month was a huge giving month for us. Like, we were giving like crazy people. And, you know, whenever we go to special meetings, my wife likes to give special gifts. And you know, we went to several different special meetings, several special things happened last month. You know, we went to a Mark Hankins meeting. And I had a $1000 check written out, ready to go. And God spoke to both of us, that it was on us. So I wrote an additional check for 4,000. So we gave 5,000 there. The next week, we’re here in Colorado. There’s a guest minister here. We went to go hear him. Jonathan Shuttlesworth. We gave him $1,000, and then, a couple days later, we had several ministers at our house. And my wife wanted to give, you know, you and mom were there, but two other ministers there. And she wanted to give everyone $1,000 cash. And we were just… So, I was telling my wife, you know, what our giving was and what our tithe was, and she said, “Well, the tithe doesn’t even count.”

Well, it does count.

It does. But she just… You know, it was a big month. You know, we gave, I think $12,000 that month-

Just in regular giving. So, now I wanna share on this, because this is so important.

And not everyone might not have thousands to give. Some people might have singles, or tens, or hundreds, or-

Listen-

Some people might have tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands to give-

And-

But God looks at the heart.

Right.

And faith is about just going with His flow.

Right.

Being led by the Spirit. Just trusting Him, letting things flow through you.

Yes.

And trusting Him. And just doing what He’s called you to do.

Amen.

And there’s just tremendous blessing attached to that.

Amen. You know, Andrew Wommack one time said, “A definition of prosperity is one hand to receive and one hand to give, and enough for you when it flows through.” And that’s one definition. And you know what? There is enough for you. And you cannot beat God giving. I used to have this lady at my church sing this song like, “You can’t beat God giving.” And I’m telling you, I’ve proved it in my own life. And you just can’t beat God giving, because He is more than enough. And you know what? It works whether you got a penny, or $10, or 100,000, So stay tuned, we’ll be back right after this break with more to share on the journey of faith. Hi friends, today we’ve been teaching on the journey of faith, and we actually have a lot more information on this on our website at charischristiancenter.com. We have hundreds of hours of downloadable audio, downloadable video, and a free children’s curriculum on our website. So check it out at charischristiancenter.com today. Blessings. When you know who He is, when you know that He’s your provider, and He’s your healer, and He’s your peace, and He’s your righteousness, and He’s your sanctification. When you know that He’s your provision, when you know that He’s with you, praise God. When you know, you pray differently. Friends, I’m so glad that you stayed with us. And Aaron’s been sharing on his teaching on the journey of faith. And you were talking about how the Spirit of God generates momentum. And I know some of the things, even in the realm of giving and receiving, it’s because the Spirit of God spoke to you. And I know you and Heather, you guys don’t limit God to 10% at all. But you have believed God, and you have listened to the Holy Spirit, and God has blessed you and helped you.

I actually have a dream to one day give a million-dollar offering. And you know, it’s not gonna happen if you can’t give $10.

Right.

Or $100. So there’s a momentum that’s generated over time. And the spirit of God really does generate momentum. That’s why I wanna share with some people watching this, you know, teaching today. Maybe you feel like you’re just stuck in life. God can regenerate momentum.

Amen.

You know, He can kickstart things again. And the anointing oil does that. And I wanna look at something in scripture here. In 1 Samuel. We’ll go to chapter 15, verse 35. So this is at the end of Saul, King Saul’s rule. You know, Saul was the king over Israel, and just things weren’t working out right. Saul did not work out. He was the plan A, but plan A was not working out. Some of you were really trusting God, believing God, and something didn’t work out. And you might be frustrated, feel like you’ve lost momentum.

Lawson Right. Let’s-

You need the anointing oil. You need the Spirit of God in your life. And He’ll… Sometimes plan B is better than plan A.

Amen. You know, you’ve been talking about the journey of faith. And faith to begin, faith to continue, right? And then faith to, what? Faith to begin, tell me.

Faith to begin, faith to continue, faith to become.

To become. So faith to begin, faith to continue, faith to become. Saul started out good, he had faith to begin, but he didn’t have faith to continue. He lost sight of the goal, he lost sight of the vision, he lost sight of the purpose of God. And so he kind of fell off the wagon, so to speak, and God had to direct Samuel to go another direction.

Yeah. And here in 1 Samuel 15:35 it says, “Samuel went no more to see Saul until the day of his death.” So he was just, “I’m done with this guy. He’s a moron. I’m”… Maybe there’s some people in your life that are about like that.

I’ve had a few,

You know, it’s in scripture here. But it says, “Nevertheless, Saul mourned for Saul.” So he kept mourning over this. Even though he wanted to move on with the plans of God, it said he was mourning, just in a state of perpetual mourning. God does not want you to just stay stuck in a perpetual, ongoing state of mourning.

Right.

Now, I actually study this in scripture, that there are scriptural times for mourning,

Right.

Times that there is a timeframe for mourning. But there was always a… It was an appointed time, it was a set time. And there’s a set time to come out of that. And it says, “The Lord regretted that He made Saul King over Israel.” You know, God doesn’t have that… That is a very, you know, unusual thing there, for the Lord to regret something,

Right.

So that He had regrets, but He moved on quicker than Samuel did. So it says in 1 Samuel 16:1, “The Lord said to Samuel, ‘How long will you mourn for Saul?'” You’re not supposed to mourn forever.

Right.

“‘Seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel. Fill your horn with oil.'” You know, so many people, believers need to realize that there is oil, there is an anointing, there is a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

You can’t just live off of, you know, an experience that happened 10 years ago, or FIVE years ago, or one year ago. You need fresh encounters. You need fresh oil.

You need to keep moving with God.

Keep moving with God. And sometimes things are going in a different direction than you expected-

Right.

But just keep trusting God. And there is fresh oil for you. “Fill your horn with oil and go, I’m sending you to Jesse, the Bethlehemite, for I have provided myself a king among his sons.”

Yes.

And something significant happens, as he’s going on that way, you know. And he meets Jesse, and you know, these sons start coming out. It says the first one comes out. The first one is the oldest, Eliab. In verse six, Samuel said, “Surely the Lord’s anointed is before him.” But verse seven is very significant. 1 Samuel 16:7, “The Lord said to Samuel.” And Samuel, you know, of all these people in scripture, he could hear the voice of the Lord probably more closely than almost anybody.

Right.

Even as a kid, you know, his mother, Hannah, dedicated him to the temple. He was a miracle child. He was living in the temple. He heard the voice of the Lord in the middle of the night. He thought it was the priest talking.

Right.

He went to the priest and said, “What do you need? I keep hearing you talk.”

Yeah, and then he-

That’s how clearly he heard God’s voice.

Yes.

But he could still make mistakes.

Right, we can all make mistakes.

He could still… So God, even as closely as Samuel heard, God said this. He said in verse seven, “Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

Yes.

You know? And then, you know, Eliab came, then the rest of these sons came. Seven came by. And every single one of those seven, the Lord rejected.

Right.

And he had to hear from God. With his natural eyes, with his natural ears and heart and understanding and thinking he would’ve picked someone.

Right.

But Jesse said, “Well, there’s one more, number eight. But, like, no one cares about him.”

Yeah, he’s out, taking care of the sheep.

He doesn’t stand a chance. He is the runt of the litter. You know, he is just a redhead, flute player. No, he is a musician. He is out there, playing the songs for the sheep. But Samuel says, “Well, go get him. I’m not leaving until he leaves.” And it says, he brought him in verse 12. He was ruddy, bright-eyed, good-looking. And the Lord said… It doesn’t matter what your daddy said, it doesn’t matter what other men of God might have said. What matters is what the Lord says about you.

That is so encouraging, Aaron-

The Lord says, “Arise, anoint him.” And that anointing oil shifted everything in David’s life. The plans, the purposes, the Holy Spirit on his life. And again, maybe some dumb word was spoken over you by some dumb preacher…

Well, let’s stop and talk about this for just a minute. This is so encouraging to me, right? Because I’ve had people under me, right? Who screw up, who don’t do well, right? Who the Lord says, “Go on.” And I’m a long-term relationship person. I don’t like that. But I’ve also had people that I’ve looked up to and that I’ve admired, and those people, in ways, have rejected me. And you know, sometimes that’s hard to deal with. In fact, your wife, Heather, gave me a word. And she said, because of some family members, you know, years ago and currently, “They have rejected you in the past. You have not dealt with rejection very well.” So she gave me that word. And then a person in my church… Actually, Peggy Shirley, Dr. Delron Shirley, who was the dean of Dr. Lester Sumrall’s Bible school, wife came, and she gave a word to me, and it was actually between what your wife, Heather, said, and what she said, it really ministered to me. And she said, “Lawson, you have dealt… You’re dealing with the spirit of rejection.” So she said, “You haven’t dealt well with rejection because of some of these things in the past, and now you’re dealing with people that you look up to, that you admire, that you respect.” So it’s not hard for me to deal with rejection from the world. Why? Because they, a lot of times, reject us, right? That’s par for the course. It’s not even too hard for me to deal with rejection by people that work for me, or even my friends, you know, that are on my level. But this has been a hard pill to swallow, rejection-

Well, God-

By people who you really admire and look up to. But yet God says, “Lawson, now’s the time to change. You need to spread your wings. You need to go beyond this. Let it go. Don’t hold on to it, because they haven’t rejected you, they’ve rejected me.”

And you notice what happens when he’s anointed? It says in verse 13, “Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day forward.”

Yeah.

And David began to see that momentum, that the Spirit of the Lord, that anointing had generated in his life. You know? And when he, you know, went to this battle where Goliath was there, you know, there were thousands upon thousands of Israeli soldiers there. They just needed one to stand up and fight Goliath.

Right.

And so, all these soldiers, they were trained. They had armor, they had their swords. They looked like soldiers, but on the inside they weren’t.

Right. And what separated David from those other people was the anointing of God.

And he, you know… And he connected some of the dots. When he was telling Saul that “I’m the guy to fight this guy.” He said, “Hey, I killed this lion, I killed this bear, and this giant is gonna be the exact same.” He said, “I actually grabbed that lion by the beard.”

Yeah.

Man. And he’s saying, you know, “This Goliath, he’s got a beard too. I’m gonna grab him by the beard and rip his head off.”

Yeah.

You know, I think if he, you know, he hit him with that first stone, you know, it was God’s will. But if he had missed stone one, missed stone two, missed all five, I believe he still would’ve killed Goliath.

He would.

I believe he would’ve grabbed him by the beard and ripped his head right off of him.

Lawson The anointing of God!

The anointing of God is powerful. It is not a coward anointing, the Spirit of the Lord makes you bold.

You know, this giant came at him. And, you know, he said, “What am I, a dog? That you sent this little kid out here with a stick.” And David… And then he said, “I’m gonna”… You know, Goliath told him, “I’m gonna cut your head off and feed you to the birds,” or “I’ll kill you and feed you to the birds.” And David said, “Listen, I’m gonna cut your head off.” He didn’t even have a sword. “I’m gonna cut your head off and I’m gonna kill you, and I’m gonna kill your brothers, and I’m gonna kill these Philistine armies today, and I’m gonna feed you all to the birds.” And you know what? In other words, David was not intimidated when the devil was trash-talking him. David talked back to the enemy. And you’ve gotta learn how to talk back to your enemy. And you gotta learn how to overcome rejection. And sometimes it may be rejection by your family, sometimes it may be rejection by your friends, by people around you. And sometimes… It may be rejection by the world. That’s pretty common, right? The world generally rejects us. Sometimes it may even be rejection by somebody that you really admire and look up to, but it’s the Lord’s doing. You gotta see what the Lord’s doing.

And I wanna say this too. You know, this teaching is actually part of a much broader teaching on the journey of faith.

Yes.

So if this… If today’s really blessed you, I’d encourage you to go to our website and find this teaching on the journey of faith and listen to every day, all the entirety of the teaching, ’cause that’s gonna be the biggest blessing to you. You know? And if this ministry really impacts you, really encourages you, give us a call, become a partner. You know, it’s important for us to sow where we’re being fed. If you’re being fed from this ministry, I’d encourage you to sow, to give back, to plant some seed in the ground. And I believe God will have a harvest for you.

Amen. I believe God will bless you. Thanks so much for watching. Friends, I want to tell you about a great resource that we have available on our website, absolutely free of charge, for your children. It’s a two-year children’s curriculum, teaching them who God is, who Christ is, who the Holy Spirit is, who they are, and many other promises of God, written by a professional curriculum writer. And I developed all the outlines for it. It will be great for your children, and we made it free just for you. Blessings.

Hi ladies, I am so excited to have you personally join us for this year’s Rejoice Women’s Conference. I know that God has something amazing in store for you. I know that He has good plans for us. I hope to see you there, February 6th through 8th. Cathy Duplantis is our keynote speaker. My daughter-in-law, Heather Purdue, will be joining us, as well as I’ve even asked my husband, Pastor Awesome Lawson. And he’ll also be ministering. It’s gonna be a great time. Look forward to seeing you there.

Friends, in the last few months, we have heard from over 50 nations in the world, people from all around the world are downloading our curriculum, our syllabus, our downloadable audio and downloadable video teachings, our confession cards, and all of these great teaching materials. And you can go receive it too at charischristiancenter.com. Receive these resources and be blessed.

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