Jo: Have you ever stood at the crossroads and wondered what is the next step? That next step will change everything about me. 

You've prayed, asked God, brought God into the matter, talked to friends you can trust. What if that silence is a sign? How do you know?

Jesus Himself says: He who has ears to hear let him hear. Not just with our ears but hear with our heart and be ready to obey. 

Today, we're going to unpack the path of hearing God's Word the way Jesus intended us to heart it, distinguishing between the hearing and the listening, explore why listening isn't passive. 

We want to equip you to recognize God's voice and respond in faith. 

Tracey: Are you listening? Obedience activates listening. 

"I trust You but I don't always trust me." 

"I want You to show me how to listen. Teach me what this means."

Samuel came with his yes available before he knew what the assignment was.

I rush in and rush out. I'm not there to listen.  

We enter in relationship with Jesus and beco...

Jo: Once you drop those children off, that sudden quietness from the home, in the car -- it can either be a moment of peaceful stewardship or the beginning of a chaotic season that pulls your heart away from what really matters most. And, we're standing on the threshold of a new school year. We have the divine opportunity to stop and ask ourselves: Are we fitting a new school year into the godly values that we established back at our home or are we fitting our home into the new school year schedule and all the commands that are already coming at us? Also ask: Are our routines built to serve the Kingdom of God or are we simply just running on a treadmill of the world? 

What's God's voice saying to us?

We want your calendars, your life to be honoring that covenant, love relationship with the Lord. It's out of that love relationship that everything in your life should flow -- this school year, our calendars are the same way. And, you want to build your home that reflects and produces th...

I want to give you some hope and I want to give you some Scriptures to pray the Word of God and the promises of God that perhaps will help you as you walk through these hard times. 

God wants us to walk and live a life everyday that exalts Him, looks to Him, leans on Him. How do we do that when there's so much heaviness around us? Take off that heaviness and put on a garment of praise. 

Isaiah 61:3 - To console those who mourn in Zion, To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; That they may be called trees of righteousness, The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

Begin to walk that promise as if (God has) already manifested it in your presence. 

God was saying: If you really believe My promise, believe what I have said to you about this situation, as you have been praying it and sharing it, go live it. 

Live the joy of God's promises. 

As we begin to pray for our family members who are struggling, o...

There truly is a war going on today for the heart and soul of our teenagers and our young adults. As Christian parents, we no longer have the pleasure to just sit and let time pass us by. We have to get active, intentional about the teaching and living by example. 

Mattie Claire Jones is going to tell her testimony -- how her parents were very intentional as she was a teenager and now a young adult to point her to Christ, to show her how to get into life and they lived that example for her. 

(The difference they made in your life growing up that set the pace and the pattern for where you're headed in your life today.) 

Jo: I don't know a parent or grandparent that's not on their knees praying for the heart and soul of their children and grandchildren. 

By knowing your parents, I see some of the things they did that made an impact on your life and the decisions you're making for life today. One of the biggest things is that they recognized their responsibility to give unconditional ...

When you walk into a dark room, what is the first thing that you generally do? You reach for the light switch to turn on the light. 

How important the light is -- I keep hearing everywhere I go (through the media, grocery store, church), things are getting dark. Why is that? Well, partly because we, as Christians, are turning out the light or we're failing to turn on the light when go from from place to place and when we walk into the dark. It's up to us. We need the light. We need to be the light. And, we need others to see the light through us. We need to automatically do it. And it ought to be in us wherever we go, that people see the light, their need -- that they're in darkness and they need the light.

A quick reminder of some things we can do and be intentional that if we're not already doing them, then perhaps we can make them repetitive in our daily life that eventually they just happen, and wherever we go, we're that witness, light to a dark world -- that would want them to ...

Jo: I want to lean back on a podcast that I did recently about what our teens are doing -- the mess that they are getting into and how they are getting into it. What can we as a family, parents and grandparents do to guide them or to spare them from getting involved? 

When I realized that teens (13, 14, 15 year olds) are out in the streets on the weekend being destructive, we have to ask the question why. Why are they there? Why do they want to do this behavior? Also, how are they doing this? How are they given this freedom, this time to go and be destructive? 

We want to speak truth to you today that this never happens at your home. But also, if you see signs of potential at your home, what you can do. What do you implement now to set those guardrails/boundaries around our teens so that we can raise them up in the knowledge of the Lord? 

 Parent, grandparent, if you are looking at your children now, and you are discerning there is an issue, that issue started in the heart and to ad...

Have you ever lost your joy? You've tried everything but you can't seem to do it. What do we do? How can we restore the joy of our salvation? 

Losing your joy is not losing your salvation, but it's losing the experience of it. The difference between being saved and being joyful in your salvation is immense. 

David experienced this and yet he gives us the footprints to walk with the joy of our salvation. He didn't ask God to save him again. 

We focus on the restoration. 

Joy is a delight that is deep down within you. It comes out of your spirit man. You're in a state of triumph, success -- not that everything around you is successful. But you possess that pleasure within you, that no matter your circumstances, there's a delight deep down within you. Our joy, true joy, is a testimony to other people around us, but it must be that authentic joy. 

Five Ways for God to Restore that Joy

1) Be honest with yourself and confess you've lost your joy. Stop trying to cover it up, justify why...

I want us to think about what might be on God's mind as we celebrate the 4th of July, the birth of this nation and what God did -- the "but God" moments that God did to birth this nation for us to remember Him and the purpose of this nation. 

God instructs us today to remember Him.

On the 4th of July, one thing we want to remember is what God did and what He went through to move through the heart of men and to move through circumstances to birth this nation. And then we celebrate God, celebrate the birth of this nation, and we celebrate our freedom, celebrate our religious freedom.

What was it that God was doing when He had America on His mind before He ever birthed it? It was to bring forth a nation, a people that knew God, lived for God, feared God, and would help spread the Gospel throughout the four corners of the earth. There was also, at that time, a plot of the enemy -- a plan for the people to forget God and for the people to be silenced that we would not share God, we would...

Jo: Sabrenia introduce yourself to our audience. 

Sabrenia: I've known Jo for ten plus years. I'm married, retired. I have 9 grandchildren and 3 children. 

Jo: You have a business that keeps you active; it's your calling. You flow through your business. 

Sabrenia: We have a little farmer's market. My husband and I enjoy it. 

Jo: I want you to share your testimony -- how God has transformed your life through the years and made you who you are today, using you.

What was the most life-changing event that caused you to be all-in for God?

Sabrenia: I was saved in my youth and rocked along through my youth, my life as a young adult, young wife, young mother. I just did not have a relationship, but I was going to church. I was doing the things that I was supposed to do as a Christian. But, what I didn't realize was there was no relationship.

In my 40s, my husband and I, we hit a major bump in the road. It was a financial bump. When I saw we were taken to rock bottom, that's where we we...

Recently, I was catching up on the news online and I was truly disturbed by the number of stories that I was reading talking about Teen Takeovers. I was astounded that this was a mass thing happening throughout our nation. 

Let me warn all of us: We need to open our eyes and see what is really happening. 

What is happening in broad daylight is that teenagers are taking over city streets. They're not protesting, but they are being destructive. They're rampaging, smashing windows, hitting bystanders, shutting down intersections, mobs in the streets, looting stores -- all destructive behavior. And they appear to be loving it, having a good time. This is not just happening in one place -- north, south, east and west throughout the United States. (Orlando, Detroit, Washington D.C., Los Angeles) The people telling these [news] stories are saying the children are marginalized, being traumatized at home, just expressing themselves to find their identities. 

You know, as a Christian parent, ...