Yesterday has Forgotten You | Tomorrow Needs You - Pastor Naeem Fazal

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey guys, this is Naim and you've reached the Mosaic Church podcast. So excited that you're part of our listening community and love for you to be even more connected. So check out our website, there's more content there and there's more opportunities for you get connected in our ministries and events as well. Also, love for you to share this content if this is blessed to you. I know that God wants to use you to bless other people with it. So share this podcast you will. Lastly, would you consider supporting this ministry? This is made possible by other people's generosity and I'd love for you to pay it forward. Join us to reclaim the message and the movement of Jesus together. So would you consider giving to this ministry? I know that God is able to do immeasurably more through us when we come together. Thank you so much. God bless you. Enjoy. Thank you so much for that. Hey, so if you're a guest here and you're wondering what's happening, we're starting a brand new series, three week series called Tomorrow needs you and it's based on. Yeah, a book that I just. That just came out that I wrote. Yeah, I did. Now we do series and we've done series of other books, but it's the first time in the history of Mosaic we've done a series of based on my book. And I think it's really important that we talk about these issues because this book is pretty intense in terms of like this speaking into a particular need that I believe all of us has this idea that we struggle with and the struggle is this, that do you matter? I think we all live our lives in certain way and we, you know, live out our roles in life. We provide. Some of us, we are good friends, we do all these things to. There are good things. But the question at the end of the day is do we really matter? Is it making a difference and do you matter? The truth is you. You so. You so matter. You so matter. And my hope is, is that we would spread this all over the world. This idea that tomorrow needs you. So last week I was in Cincinnati because I'm doing a three week series here. But then also I'm doing like a whole year long book tour in different parts of the US and so last week I was in Cincinnati, Ohio. People, Cincinnati. O you saying woo. Are you from Cincinnati, Ohio? One dude. So is there a thing, Peter? H o o h. See here's the problem. Being dyslexic, okay. I just switch things around. It's. What, what is it? Oh, okay. Okay. Did you guys know this crowd right here is like, what are. What's happening on this side? What is happening? This is the Midwest. This is the Midwest right here. Okay. So anyways, yeah, so I was there, and they were so gracious. They let me talk about the book. They highlighted my book, sold a lot of copies, and they flew me out there, rented a car for me, put me up, the whole thing, okay? But they rented me an electric car. Electric car. Now, any electric car users in the house? Anybody? Electric car? Anybody? You don't want to admit it? What's wrong? They're like, I don't know these days. I don't know. Okay, okay. A few of us. I've always thought about it, honestly, but I was like, you know what they rented for me? I'll do it. I'm like, it's cool, but it's different in those cars. It's different. There's a lot of things going on that I'm like, okay, is the car on? Is it on? Is it going? What's happening? So everything was cool. But then I didn't realize. Didn't realize that where I picked up the car, the hotel was 40 miles away. No big deal if you're a gas driver, right? I'm saying 40 miles per hour, whatever, okay? But then it's 40 miles back again to pick up, you know, to go back, to fly out. And then there's all kinds of other miles, like getting to places, getting to the church, doing the things and all that. And I didn't realize that you can't go just to a quick trip, you know, I'm saying gas station. First of all, there's nothing quick about it, okay? It takes forever. And I kid you not, I was flying. I was on my way. Flying back, you know, on my way to the airport to fly back. And I rolled the windows down, I shut off the ac. I was like, please, just get there. Cause I was like, reading the thing. I'm like, you know how you look at your phone and it's like, oh, you're good with battery. You got 30%. Two seconds later, you were at 10%. So it seemed like this car was doing that. I was like, okay, it's 40 miles. It should work. It should work. But I just went a mile. You just took off 10. Why? Why did you take off 10? Like, what's happening here? And I had a moment where I'm like, you know what? I regret this. I regret this decision. I should have never done that. Now, question for you. Have you ever made a decision, you're like, I regret this. I regret this. Now, if you are one of those people who go, no regrets, bro. No regrets. Leave. Okay, first of all, we don't trust you. Okay? We don't trust you because everybody has what we all do. We all do. We're like, I regret eating that. I regret saying yes to that. I regret saying no to that. I regret swiping right. You know what I'm saying? I regret. I regret. I regret a lot of things. We all do. But here's the thing, though. Here's the thing. Problem is, sometimes when we do things and make calls or things happen to us, we regret not standing up, not saying something, and we regret. And our regrets kind of take over. In fact, they take over so much, they begin to shape who we are and how we show up in the world. We end up not. Our regrets end up regressing us, like, hindering us a little bit. We're not that confident anymore because you made a bad call. And now you're like, oh, my gosh, relationally, you got into a major wreck. And guess what you don't wanna do Drive again. You don't wanna do that. You're like, I don't know. I don't know if I can make the right calls. At some point. You go, I don't know if I even trust if I can make good decisions. I don't know. And that's a real place. It's a real place. And so when we talk about Tomorrow needs you, the first thing I do is address this idea of past. Your past. Some of us, we need to break up with our past today. In fact, the. The. The. The section. The first section in this book is called Tomorrow has forgotten you. And as I've been on this podcast, a lot of podcasts, and I will be as well. And they always talk about the title. They always talk about this idea of. Of. Of Tomorrow needs you. And they're like, I love this title. We love this title. Oh, my gosh, what an amazing title. How'd you come up with this title? And I'm like, well, not a cute story. Not a cool story. What is it? I was like, well, well, it's my dad. It came from my dad. See, my dad, he got really low at one point and thought he didn't. No one needed him. And he tried to take his life and he survived. And I remember kind of talking and processing that whole thing, incident with him. And he just flat out told me. He was like, no one needs me. And he looked at me right in the eyes, and he's like, you don't need me, Lane. You don't need me. You don't need me. No one needs me. No one needs me. And I was like, dad, that's a lie. That's not true at all. Your kids need you. Your grandkids need you. We need you. See, at some point, what happened is my dad started with a lot of regret, a lot of his past, a lot of things. And he was in so much despair, and he just believed the lie that tomorrow did not need him. Because he was always rehearsing the past. Because that's what happens. Because you look at what it was, and you're like, it was great. And now it's not. It was that. And I can't move on. I can't move forward. And you just get to a point where you go, I don't matter. And I just want you to know, if you don't get anything out of this message, you matter. In fact, the world is better because you're in it. You're like, ah. Name. That's not true. Yeah, it's true. It's true. I don't know if you believe it or not, but it starts with you breaking ties from your past. Because your past has defined you. It has haunted you, and it's. And it's pained you because of the choices you've made. Something's been done to you, but you gotta break up with your past. So if you. If you're sitting in a seat, which all of you are sitting in a seat right in front of the seat. Seat pocket. There should be one of these guys right here. Okay. One of these guys right here for you. If you're sitting in the front seat, you should probably have one. We got them for you. We hooked you up. We hooked you up. Okay, can you grab one of those? Can you grab one of those? Okay. Just one of those. Not two. Just one. Just one. Just one. Okay. Wave it up in the air. Okay. Right there. Wave it like you just don't care. Okay. Okay, do that. All right, cool. Awesome. So here's what I want you to do. This is your past. This is your regrets. These are the pain points in your life. This represents something that you've been doing, dragging along from relationship to relationship, to opportunity to opportunity. This is the thing that holds you back. Question is, what is it? Is it a few things? Is it a person? Is it something that you need to forgive yourself for? Is it something that you need to forgive someone else? For? Is it something that you need to ask God for forgiveness for? What is that thing? And what I want to do at the end of this time together, I want you to represent that. Like, either physically write something on this or mentally write something on this stick, and then we're going to break it together. Because I want you to leave. Breaking up, broken up with yesterday, because if yesterday was a relationship you were involved in, if yesterday, your past was a relationship, guess what the past is doing? It does not remember you. You go back on Facebook to go, oh, remember that. Remember that relationship, or remember those people. Those people are not remembering you. Your past doesn't remember you. You might be, like, reminiscing the past. Reminiscing the past. Reminiscing the past and the past. Like, who are you? We're done. We broke up. It was good. Why? It lasted. It was bad while it lasted, but it did not last. It's over. It's done. And so the first thing I believe, what we need to do, if you're gonna believe that tomorrow needs us, is we have to remember that yesterday has forgotten us. We have to break up that relationship. And breaking up is hard to do. You know what I'm saying? It's like, how do you tell yesterday, hey, it's not me, it's you. Actually, it's you. You're the problem. You're actually the problem. And I gotta. I carry you from one relationship to the next, one decision from the next. I just gotta stop doing this. It. It's good. No, no offense, but I. I passed. You're done. It happened. It's. It was bad. It was good. It was ugly, it was beautiful. Regardless, it's done. Because if you don't do that, it'll haunt you. So there's a book, the book of Genesis, tells a story of a person who's one of the famous guys in the scriptures, okay? The Old Testament. And when you read the scriptures, you find. Especially in the Old Testament, you find this. This phrase. You know, the people of Israel will always talk about their lineage. And they would say, oh, we are, you know, from Abraham, we were the line of Abraham, Isaac, and those of you who know. And the next name is Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, there's always this Jacob. Jacob's always of the end. He was the third guy he's always mentioned. But the story is very unique and it speaks into why God wants to speak to you this morning about your past. So Jacob starts off, and he has a brother named Esau. And here's how it's how his birth takes place. Okay, so the first passage of scripture we read is this. He says the first baby. The first baby that was born, it's staying. Was born. What? What color? Red. Red. And since his skin was like a hairy robe, which is. Oh, wow, I thought I was hairy. You know what I'm saying? There's a lot of grooming there. Okay, anyways, but he was hairy robe. And so it says he was named Esau, which means hairy. Are you kidding me right now? I'm so glad that we have evolved as humans. You know what I'm saying? And his parents, to name something, you know, not like, obvious, because the next baby, it says here, the second baby that was born and he was holding. He was holding what onto Esau's heel. So the baby was named Jacob, which means heel. What, like you're a heel? You're a heel. In other translations, it also says. Well, it could also mean trickster. Well, I'll take heel. You know what I'm saying? Liar. Deceiver. What? What could you imagine? Could you imagine living in that kind of shade your whole life? I think for some of us, you can relate because you were born into something, and it was not your fault. You were born into dysfunction, you were born into abuse, you were born into an addiction, and it was never your fault. You were born into an oppressive culture, either religious or emotional, and it scarred you and marred you, and you don't know what to do. And at the end of the day, you're like, is it me? Am I so horrible? No, I think what it is is that you, because you were so little, you didn't get to choose. You were just called something, spoken over, and then you kind of had to live it out. Everybody calls you a heel. Everybody. And what happens is that you might go, ah, I don't know if I could relate to that. But I'll tell you what you can relate to and, and that is this, that you have a moment in life. You go, I think what I'm doing with my life, I think I'm playing a character in a story that I did not write. And it was written for me. Like, I'm just playing a part that was written for me. You'll be called this and you'll act like this. And so what happened with Esau and what happened with Jacob is that they actually lived out their lives based on their name. And he was red hot blooded. Whatever. Esau became a trickster. In fact, he tricked his brother and got his blessing. Esau was an Older brother. And his mom was like, hey, listen, I think, you know, there's not a whole lot going on for you, but I think you should just go ahead and stay, steal your brother's blessing. Because it came with not just like IW Knight. It was more like, here's money as well. Like, you get all of it. You get some stuff. And so he did it. He listened to his mom. He did it. And that did not go over well. He lied. He pretended to be his older brother because his dad was almost blind, and he stole it. You think that it went well? You think it well now? No, it didn't. But somehow he's just compelled to do it. He made a bad call and wondering, why did I do this? Because what happened is this. This is Esau's reaction after that. Esau what? Did what? Hated. He hated Jacob because of the blessing from Isaac. He hated him. And then he said this. Then he said this. Could you imagine? This is sibling rivalry at the max. Okay? You think you have family drama? Check this out, okay? Check this out. He thought to himself, my father will soon. What? Die? He's going to die. He's going to die. And guess what? I'll be. I'll be what? Sad. I'll be sad for him then. Then what? I'm going to kill Jacob. Step one, mourn. Step two, murder. Like that's what I'm gonna do. Now, obviously he didn't thought to himself because someone wrote this down. So he told everybody to. Because Jacob got wind of it and took off. Left his family and just took off, Took off. And then his past followed him, his ways. In one sense, whatever was spoken over him followed him. And he began to trick other people. He tricked his uncle. Then his uncle tricked him into marrying someone he didn't want to marry. It's a big, whole ordeal. And it's just a life of being tricked and tricked, being abused and abusing. You see, friends, we do this as humans. Whatever is done to us, if it's not processed, we will. We will just pass down. Like your pain, your trauma. If you don't process that, you're going to inflict it on someone else. And so God gets a hold of him and he goes, okay, we have to have a conversation. Because your life is so much more than this, than the part that you're playing that someone else was. That someone else wrote, here's what you got to do. You got to take hold of that pen. And the way you do that is you. You've got to get real about About. About the stuff in your life. Because God can't heal something that you are continually hiding. And he can't. You can't have a breakthrough, right, if you don't bring it to him. And he's like, okay, we're gonna talk about this. And so God says, here's the problem. Your problem is, is what you did to Esau. Your problem is you were the oppressor. You were the deceiver. You were the abuser. You abused your relationship with him. You abused all this. You. You did this. And you've gotta come to terms with who you are. And here's what I want you to do. I want you to go back and guess what? I want you to reconcile the past. Because you're rehearsing it. And for some of us, we gotta reconcile the past. But here's what. What, this is what he felt, right? Jacob? So Jacob is talking to God right here. And he says, God, of my father Abraham and my father Isaac, which eventually becomes Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He says, lord, you told me. You told me. You told me this is your idea to return to my country and my family. You told me. You're telling me this. You're telling me this. Okay, you said. You said. You said, I'll be treated what? Well, Right? Okay, well, so I did it. So basically what he's saying is, you told me to do something, I'm doing it. Because you better be right. You better be right. Because he sends word to Esau, hey, let's have a meet up. Can we meet for coffee? Can we figure this out? I know you want to kill me, but let's. Can we talk? Can we talk? You got a family now? We got a family. A lot of years have passed. Can we talk about this? He says. He says, but he's praying to God. He's like, please, but here's what I want you to do. God, he says, please save me from my brother Esau. I'm afraid he's going to do what? He's going to kill us all. He's not just going to kill me. He's going to kill my family. He's going to kill everything. Here's why he said that, why he prayed that. Because when he sent word to Esau, hey, let's meet for, you know, let's meet at, you know, the local coffee place here. Esau starts coming and word, word, you know, someone texted him and said, hey, hey, I see your brother's coming. But there's also 400 men behind him. I don't think he's coming for coffee and cake. I think he's coming to kill and destroy everything. So now Jacob is in freak out mode. Let me ask you, when I tell you and I talk to you about whatever has been haunting you, you go, naeem. There's no way. I want to visualize what this is, the thing that haunts me. Because honestly, going back to that grief, going back to that betrayal, going back to that trauma, it's going to kill me. I'm going to have to bring that up again. And you know that happens, right? When we. You relive it, when you tell it again. But the problem is, is that when you. When you. When you bring it out, when you really bring it out into the light, it heals you. And so God says, no, no, you got to go do this. You got to go do this. He's got to do this. So what happens then? Then. Then Jacob has a moment that he's famous for, right? He's Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But he's one guy in the scriptures that did something that no one else has done. Okay? He went on the mat and he wrestled with God. Jacob is the guy who wrestles with God. And they have a moment. And he doesn't know it because in some scriptures it says he was an angel, it was a man, it was the Lord, we don't know, but that he is known in Jewish history as the guy who wrestles with God. And so here's what happens. He starts off, he's wrestling and all that. And then they have a conversation or they're in the middle of it. Oh. And light comes on. And then. And then he says this. He says, I want. He says. And the angel says, hey, don't let. Let me go. Let me go. And he says, I won't let you go unless. What? You bless me. I won't let you go unless you bless me. The energy, the spirit, the heart behind it is like, I'm not. I need. I need serious proof that what you are telling me to do, going back to my past and reconcile it, it's not going to kill me. I need you to let me know. I'm not leaving this place. I'm not leaving this moment with you. I'm not doing this until you reassure me that, man, you are going to bless me. This is going to happen. I need you to tell me this. And so the man said this, asked him this, which is so interesting because he's like. He asked him a ridiculous question, right? Obviously, if you know the person, you're Wrestling with. You probably know who they are. You know, you probably had a meet and greet at first. But he goes, what is what? What is it? What? What do you say? What's your name? What is your name? You know, Jesus did that a lot. He. He would ask obvious questions because he wanted. He's like, what do you want? He actually asked the demon, what is your name? And the demon had to answer, legion. And there, there. There is something about, just like naming your demon that breaks the bond. It no longer has a hold on you. He says, what have you been called your whole life? Could you imagine? He's like a heel. My name is Trickster. Right there, there's a moment of like, this is who I. This is not just what they have called me, but this is how I have lived my life. Life. I was born into this, but then I lived it and I made choices. What is your name? My name is Jacob. What is your name? My name is Abuser. My name is Liar. My name is Addict. My name is Betrayer. My name is this. And then he says this. He says, your name will no longer be what, Jacob. It's not going to be from this moment on, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and men, and what you've won, you've won. See, I think what God wants us to do is he wants us to. Wants to name what we've done, what we regret the most, what has haunted us the most, what has happened to us. And then he wants to change our identity. It starts with us going, I'm gonna break up with yesterday. I wanna tell you a story. I wanna show you a story of a person who is actually in the book. Her name is Danielle, and it is a story of her finding healing from sexual abuse. Now, I will tell you this. We're gonna show the story. But if for you, you're like, this is triggering for me, then, you know, you could please excuse yourself if you want to. It's all good. But a story of redemption and how God changed her name, in a sense. Let's watch this. [00:24:49] Speaker B: Trust, for me, is something that I've always struggled with. I had always known God, but I couldn't fathom how to trust a God if I couldn't trust my own family. I didn't have a great relationship or bond with my father. When I was nine, I was sexually molested by an uncle that lasted for two years. He was finally arrested when I was 37 years old. For 32 years, I harbored and kept all of those feelings within me. I never Told one adult. Telling my family about it was definitely the start of my rock bottom. On November 9th, I felt so out of control inside. I had all of these feelings that I had buried for years, and they were all suddenly coming out. It was two in the morning and I found myself laying on the kitchen floor. And I remember just feeling so alone and thinking like, what are you doing with me, God? What is all of this stuff? How is this stuff gonna come together to make something good or somebody happy? My mom took me to the hospital. I wasn't at all suicidal. I just had lost my joy for living. I got out of the hospital, my mom picked me up and said that your dad is coming. So I immediately went back into anxiety mode because my parents had never had a healthy relationship. So I immediately texted my dad and I said, dad, you can't come. Mom's here. I have a tiny one bedroom apartment and there's no room for you, and I'll never forget. He immediately texts me back. He said, it's about to get real cozy. So my dad came, and that was the first night that I'd spent under one roof with my parents since I was 6 years old. And I remember walking out into the living room and seeing them, and they were watching Jeopardy. And I remember thinking, this must be what it feels like to have a family. And I knew at that moment that this is bigger than me, this is bigger than us. This is God. This is how he works. It took my mental crash to bring back and heal an entire family. That was when I first started getting the feeling of I need to step in the direction of God and learn how to trust him, because this is how he works. I moved back to Charlotte. Saturday I went to CrossFit and saw Naim and Kelly. And Sunday I was in church. On Tuesday, I was in Kim Honeycutt's therapy office. It was just really great being in a space that just felt really loved and that many godly people. I've never been around so many people that loved God so much. I think when I look back, it was that desperation moment that I was on the kitchen floor looking up, like, feeling so alone and so small in this world that I think I finally surrendered to God. And I feel like he was just waiting, like, waiting for me to give up, to stop trying to make my own plan and to trust Him. I've learned that I have to trust God's plan with my future, with my life. I still struggle. You don't just wake up and everything's all great and you Know glorious like it is still work. But I now have faith and hope. I understand that God's plan for me is going to be amazing. I'm getting baptized. For me, it's a. It's a fresh start and letting go of those things that for all these years, I thought I was. And it's my commitment back to God to trust him. [00:29:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Can we give her a hand? Wow. Wow. Why don't you stand with me? Won't you stand with me? And let's pray together. Let's pray together. You know, it is. It is. It's a defining moment for you, for a lot of you today. He's courageous enough that Danielle, you know, she wrote everything on a piece of brick. If you. As you saw. And she held. She held onto that brick for a week, and then she tossed it away. Aren't you glad I didn't give you a brick to hold for a week? But this represents your pain, your past, who represents everything that's been defining you for a long time. Other people's expectations, painful betrayal, maybe even a. Just an ugly divorce, a chronic addiction. I don't know what it is, but here's what I want you to do as we end, which we always do in response, and our response. If you're a guest here, if you're new here, we have these stations. We have the cross. We have communion on either sides and candles, and people go and light candles and receive communion and they go to the cross. But today, I want you to. While we're singing this song, I want you to visualize and then break. Physically break this stick and go to the cross and put. Put it at the foot of the cross. Just throw it at the foot of the cross or any station you're going to. But I want you to do that because I do not want you to walk out of this room carrying and having linked to the regrets and your failures and your flaws and the abuse of your life. But I want you to look forward to the goodness of God. It is not your past that needs to be chasing you, is God's goodness. So let's do that together. Let me pray for us. Lord God, thank you for your goodness in our life. Thank you, God, that you are the God who has chosen to love us in spite of who. Who we are and what we've done. God, thank you so, God, I pray in Jesus name, God, I pray. I pray, God, that you would do something that only you can do. Thanks for listening to this message from Mosaic church in Charlotte, North Carolina. For more audio and video content. Visit us at MosaicChurch TV.