The Book of Keeshon Patrick

“It’s Only Crazy, UNTIL IT HAPPENS.”

Before I get going, I pray that he allows my words to be plain, and easily understandable in hopes to bless your life. I hope that if you are struggling with faith or any doubts, that this will feed your spirit. Each word typed is not me, but the God within me. May he get all the glory. Now, let’s get rid of that Fading Faith.

Let’s start here: What is Faith?

Hebrews 11:1 says, “Faith is the confidence in what we hope for and the assurance about what we do not see.”

Faith is CONFIDENCE in Christ.

There is a certain walk a person has when they are walking with confidence. Most of the time it’s; chin up, chest high, and an exuberance that is unshakable. Most of us build our confidence on positivity. Things like a raise at your job, a compliment, or getting a good grade. Only if the feelings from these things could last forever, BUT let’s be real.

The truth is, many of us are not as confident and in return, we lack faith. Now, I am not saying that you have to be confident in yourself, in order to have faith in Christ; actually I am saying the opposite. If you have faith in Christ, then there is no reason why you should not have faith in yourself. His grace alone is sufficient enough, for you to believe that he will never leave you, nor forsake you. To make it plain, because of his grace God will not give up on you. If you know that you serve a God like that, why is it so easy to lose faith?

Maybe it’s because our expectations of what Christ should be doing, does not match His will. Let’s break that sentence down by using everyone’s FAVORITE verse, Romans 8:28. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.”

Now here is the reality pill of this verse, number one “In all things God works for the good of those who love Him.” Pastor Mike poses the question, “What happens when the thing that you were believing in him for does not happen?” This made me think of a few questions of my own. Do we actually love him or do we love what he does for us? Do we love him when we are going through our valley? Why am I asking these questions? Well, mainly because we think that we love him all the time, but when we are honest, we will probably notice, that the only time we truly love him is when everything is going well in our lives. That’s when we have the most confidence (faith) in Christ, when he is answering every prayer or raining down every blessing we asked for. That is when many of our faith is the strongest. It does not take faith to believe that everything that is good is God, but it does take faith to believe that He’s using the bad things to fulfill our purpose, just as much as the good things.

Reality pill number two, “who have been called according to His purpose.” You know the things you want for yourselves, but he knows the things that you NEED. So, if you do not have something that you want, that may not mean that he is punishing you. It might mean is that it does not fit into the Will of God! So, maybe instead of holding it against God, thank him for saving you from something that you may not be ready for. Stop losing faith in God, for not having something that is supposed to be in the next chapter of your life. Little do we know, if we stop writing our book at our disappointments (at our moments of Fading Faith), then we will never allow ourselves the opportunity to write our testimonies.

Now that we have defined faith, let’s talk about the cure to Fading Faith!

In this video, from 43:00-1:16:00, you get to see Transformation Church, giving to different charities, churches, communities, families and staff members. When I watched this for the first time, my faith was not low or fading. My faith was actually in a decent place, yet within these moments I felt something brewing inside of me. Something that I had never felt at that capacity before. Something that instantly felt contagious.

SEEING OTHER PEOPLE GET BLESSED, WAS BLESSING ME.

It was at this moment that I realized the cure to fading faith. The cure is when you can get just as excited for the blessing that you witness other people receive, as you can get for the blessings that you receive. I begin to shed tears, watching these lives get changed and watching these people receiving blessings that they could have only obtained by having Crazy Faith. But I begin to bawl, when I realized that if God can bless them, then he can also do the same for me.

“It’s only crazy, until it happens.”

Uncategorized

Go To Sermons: Part I: Stop Holding It

April 23, 2020April 27, 2020 keeshonpatrick

RELEASE! LET IT GO! DROP IT NOW! STOP HOLDING IT!

Before I start writing this, I pray that God anoints each word, to help you with whatever you are holding onto in your life. Do not be ashamed, I have been there before as well. I pray that He uses this to help you Stop Holding It. I pray that he gets all of the glory. Amen.

When you are trying to grow within Christ, you begin to notice things that pull you away from the purpose that He wants you to fulfill. Why do we struggle with letting go of these things that bring us so much pain?

For some of us that answer is simple. I cannot let go of that hurt, because I use it as the motivating factor for my life. There are many problems with turning pain into purpose. One problem that I have been facing, is realizing that I will never be able to overcome the pain if I keep using it as fuel. Imagine having a car that takes only premium gas, but you put regular gas in it. What does that regular gas do to your car as you continue to use it? Well, it eventually destroys the engine, but even worse while the car still works; it never gets the chance to reach its full potential. Why? Because the fuel is insufficient.

I am not sure about you, but many times I have allowed into my spirit; the heartbreak, the mistrust, and the judgement that I have received from others. I allowed each of those things to limit the capacity that I could live up to.

What this sermon allowed me to see, is where I was making my biggest mistake. I wanted to let it go… AT FIRST. Until I became comfortable with living with my dysfunctions and insufficiencies. So comfortable, that I stopped running from pain and started gravitating toward things that I knew would cause pain. I was in that dangerous place of holding onto everything from my past, while thinking that I left enough space to be able to get something positive out of my future. BUT, that’s not how life works, because what I thought I was holding eventually began to hold me back.

The mistake that I made was holding everything while still expecting to be able to catch blessings from God, even though my heart, soul, and hands were full. I was at a point that I started blaming God that nothing was improving in my life. I started going to those things that were holding back me more than I ever had. I started losing myself, and it became so bad that I remember the day that I told God, “I am letting it go. I will no longer do this alone. I will trust you and I know that you will fill the void of everything I let go. God, I promise you right now, that I will Stop Holding It.”

Here’s the truth though, even after you have given it to God, you still have your moments that remind you of your pain. You still feel those temptations trying to creep up on you, BUT the difference is now you are no longer fighting your battles alone. You are no longer focusing on those harmful things. You have mustard up the courage to be able to stay focused on Christ! So now, when someone or something tries to interrupt your focus; you know that you are protected by Christ. You know that you are covered.

Say it with me, “I KNOW THAT I AM PROTECTED BY CHRIST! I KNOW THAT I AM COVERED!

Now take time and gather your thoughts, and make a list of the things that you are holding. If it gets too painful then you tear that list up and make a vow with Christ, not me, that this is the last time that you will hold on to any of these things. “God I will Stop Holding It!“

Uncategorized

Give Yourself Time

April 22, 2020April 23, 2020 keeshonpatrick

First thing I want to do is thank God for putting these thoughts in my head. I pray that he anoints each word, so that they will be a blessing to your life. A feeling that has been on my heart lately, is feeling like I’m running out of time. I am 23 years old and I feel like I don’t have enough time… I can’t wait to laugh about that with 33 & 43 year old me.

I’ve had questions and I needed answers but luckily I have THE TEACHER OF ALL TEACHERS. He put in front of me a set of verses, reminding me that there is a time for everything that we are going through. These 8 verses touch nearly everything that we can face as a human. Each of these verses are inevitable as we live. The beauty of it is that if you believe in God, then you believe that he already knows the things we are going to deal with. Therefore, we can trust and believe that He has already created the healing, the blessing, the person, and the strength to help you not only manage these things, but get through them as well.

How did we get so lucky to serve a God, that loves us this much? Right now in this moment he is mending together what we will need for the next season of our lives and we don’t even realize it. Our God is intentional. There is a reason for every good or bad thing that He allows. It is not up to us to figure out that reasoning, but it is on us to believe that it is all for our good.

When you get a chance today, write down a few things that you wish you had more time to do, and then a few things you feel that you spend too much time doing. See if there is anyway you can substitute those activities for each other, without dramatically interrupting your flow. Remember the goal is progression, not perfection.