We came to glorify His name. We've come to glorify His name. We've come to glorify His name. We've come to glorify His name. And God is doing marvelous. Father, we thank you and we praise you for this privilege and this opportunity to lift your name up, to be in your house, to glorify you, to exalt you on today. Father, we ask that you hearten in our minds, receive our praise and our worship on today. We praise you. We adore you because you are great and we just want to thank you for this opportunity. We thank you. Lord God, bring them into your house, worship in their hearts and in their minds. Lord, let your shekinah glory because you are great and greatly to be praise you. We glory in Jesus' name.  Who shall descend unto the, or who shall stand in his holy place? Nor swan, he shall receive a blessing from the Lord and the righteous from the God of his salvation. This is a generation of them that seek him, that seek that face, O Jacob, see light.  Who is the king of glory? The Lord's strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle, ye everlasting door, and the king of glory shall come in. The Lord strong and mighty is the king of glory. Hallelujah, who is the king of glory? The Lord God almighty, hallelujah, and he's the lion of Judah, hallelujah, he's the king of kings, the Lord of lords, the I am that I am, that's the God we serve today, amen. You're the lion of Judah, the whatever we say in the name of Jesus, hallelujah, and it's in his will, it shall be done, because the Lord, he has the final say. These ways we have to have a made up mind that we're going to serve the Lord all the way. No turning back. At this time, we will have special, special music by Minister Marilyn Alexander. So much going on in this world and the safety of the Lord, he that dwelleth in the secret shall abide under the shadow of the all, and in him alone will I trust.  But I'm saved, I almost felt like giving up, but I'm saved, the enemy tried to destroy me, but I'm saved, I didn't know what I was going to do, but I'm saved. He that dwells in the secret place of the most I shall abide under the shadow in the same place, under the shadow in the same place, we're safe, we're safe. If you know you're safe, just lift up your hand to begin to worship him. See, I don't know about you, but I almost lost my life on a number of occasions. I had guns and shotguns up to my head, but in the back of my mind, I said, safe. I don't care what it looks like. I don't care what it feels like. I don't care what the enemy's trying to say, but I'm saved today. I belong to him. This morning, I was sitting outside just looking at the birds and thinking about how the Lord takes care of the birds and feeds the birds. He kept saying to me, how much more? How much more will I take care of my people? We're safe.  We're safe. You don't have to be afraid at night. We're safe.   I don't like him. I don't like his mama. I don't like none of his folks, but it's good to know that we're safe. It is well with my soul. One more time, come on, sing with me. I won't sing anymore, but it said, when peace like a river attended my way, when sorrow like sea billows roll, whatever my loss, he's taught me to say, it is well, it is well. So years ago, Bishop Johnson, he taught us that the man that wrote that song, his family had been killed in a shipwreck. And he took a trip. And when he got to the spot where the ship went down, where he lost his family, he said, it is well. It is well. I don't understand it, but it's well. I don't like it, but it's well. It's well with my soul. O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good on his mercy. Endures forever. O give mercy unto the Lord, for he is good.  When I like what's going on, he's still good. When I don't understand what he's doing in my life, I've learned to say, he's good, he's good, he's good, he's good, because if I praise him, he'll bring me out. I keep thinking about these old songs lately. He brought me out all right. He brought me out all right. When I didn't know what to do, he brought me out all right. So I can say it's well. It's well, it's well, it's well. It's well with my soul. I was talking with my mother. She's here with us today. I'm so glad to have her. She's looking quite beautiful. She got a coat on, but you got to tell her, take that coat off so y'all can see that dress. She's talking and she reminded me of something I hadn't thought about in years at my Aunt Mary. She got married, she was an assistant. She got married to a man and he was a nice man, but he'd been a Catholic all his life and I thought, how's that gonna work out? I don't know, but he did give baptize in Jesus' name, but he never received a Holy Ghost. And a couple of years after that, he was on his deathbed and Aunt Mary prayed, Lord, I wish that you would feel him and let me hear him speak in tongues before you take him. And he was in his room and he had been in a coma for a couple of weeks and she was waiting. That's how the whole folks used to do waiting. They didn't say, well, they're waiting on anything good or bad. They just said, we're waiting. And it's kind of ironic because my grandparents had waited on her, she had been in an accident and every day for months, they waited until the Lord brought her out, but she was waiting and a gentleman came in her room and he said, I'm from so-and-so Baptist Church. Can I pray for your husband? And she said, I guess it won't hurt anything. She thought that and he prayed. And so he began to pray, he began to pray and then he began to speak in tongues and he began to pray and he left the room. And not long after that, my wife's Uncle Frank, he came out of a coma, he set up and he spoke in tongues for 10 minutes or so, laid back down in a coma and the Lord took him away. What I'm saying is God is a faithful God. He's able to do exceedingly and abundantly above all that we can ask or think the problem is sometimes we don't even bother to ask because we don't believe he can do it. But if you ask, he said, let me show myself strong to my people. He will amaze you if you stand and just step out on the promise of God. Giving honor to our bishop and so honored to stand before him, such a mighty man of God. Sometimes you feel like, Lord, I don't wanna get up in front of him, but I thank God for the assignment and our first lady, so lovely, always a blessing. The ministers of God, the saints of God. I was thinking about Solomon, he built a temple for his father, David. And when he finished, he offered a thousand sacrifices and God came to him and says, what do you want? Now, if it had been me, I'd have said, let me get a house and a yard and two fast cars, make it three, my wife's gonna wreck one, I still wanna have two cars. But Solomon didn't ask for all of that. He said, for so great a people is dying. Lord, give me wisdom to go out and to come in, to keep my feet and to keep my mouth, to keep my mind before your people, before so great a people is dying. And that is my prayer these days, Lord, give me wisdom to know how to come out and walk in before your great people, because you died for them, you gave everything for them, and I want to give them my best, so great a people as dying. In the Old Testament, the children of Israel were in bondage because of their rebellion against the Lord. They had gotten caught up in idolatry and they had gone whoring after other gods.  See, I don't care where you are, God does not forget about you. And through Jeremiah, he says, I know the thoughts that I think towards you, God says, so Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, but to give you and expect it in, to give you a wonderful in, to give you a better in. Now you're down suffering, but I have not forgotten about you. So God's saying, I have a plan for your life and it's a good plan. It's gonna give you a wonderful outcome. And even though you might have messed up, I have not changed my mind about you. See, even so, sometimes we miss the mark. God does not change his mind about us. He loves us, he wants to use us, and he wants to bless us. But what he doesn't do, he never throws us away. Some people will throw us away. But he says, I will never throw you away. The Lord says, in spite of the drama that's happened in your life. See, because sometimes we can be messy, amen? Amen? Sometimes we can be messy. Look at your neighbor and say, I think he's talking about you. I think he's talking about you. You might be you. Who knew? Who knew? But God said, it's not too late. I still have a plan for your life. I still want to bless you. I still want to use you.    He wants to use you. He wants to use you in the kingdom. You've got work to do, tell your neighbor, I've got a job to do. I've got something to do. Let's pray, Father, we just thank you for this time. Father, we pray for your anointing. We have already been in your anointing, but we pray for the anointing. To cover your words. Speak to our hearts today. Speak, Lord, and we will hear you. And we will obey what you're saying to us. We thank you for it. In Jesus' name, amen. The word that the Lord gave to me today was, it's not too late. It's not too late. I know it may feel like it. It may look like it. People may think it is, but it is not too late. God has a plan for your life and he wants to use you. You may have messed up, but still he wants you to know that it's not too late. Philippians one and six, being confident of this very thing, that he which has begun a good work in you, and in you, and in you, it says that he will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. And I believe that all of us at some point in time had to deal with the seemingly devastating idea of too late. Too late. Meaning that there was a possibility of getting what we wanted, or having what we wanted to happen happened, but the time expired. We waited too long and now it's too late. The deadline came and it went in and now it's too late. We got that pink bill from the Life Company, not the Black Peer, but the pink bill. And the date on that pink bill expired and now the lights are off because we waited too late. And back in Philippians, let me read that again. It says, being confident of this very thing, that he which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of the Lord. That's King James. Let me read it to you out of the Living Bible. It says, I am sure that God who begun a good work within you will keep right on helping you to grow in his grace is a marriage in favor. His grace, his ability to do in you and through you, his grace, until the task, until the assignment that is within you that he's given to you finally finishes on the day that the Lord returns. For the day that the Lord returns for you. But it says, he who has begun a good work.  And I have watched her for 66 years, my whole life. Pursue the will of God for her life. And I saw her do it when people were laughing at her, saying they don't take all that. She's a fanatic, but she kept on pursuing the will of God.  He's gonna use her still in the kingdom of God. See, we're doing it together now. I used to have to watch it, but I'm doing the work now. He's not filled with her. See, when God gives you an assignment, if you let him, he will use you the balance of your days. So God is saying, I started a good work in you. And although it has been impeded, it's been slowed down. I'm going to finish, I'm going to finish because it's not too late. Today I want to look at three of the reasons why sometimes we feel like it's too late. Number one, God gave us an assignment and it's been so long, we believe that it's too late. It's just been too long. He gave me an assignment and I had hair. My hair is gone, that must mean it's too long, Bishop. He gave me an assignment and now I used to have all my teeth, but now sometimes it's hit and miss. You can get some help from the dentist, but it feels like it's too long. Number two, I tried to do what God said, but I wasn't able to finish the assignment that he gave me. I have a lot of school teachers and educators in the house and they understand what it means to finish. So you can turn something in halfway and it's not done and you might get an F because you did not finish. The assignment. Number three, I blew it, I messed up and I am ashamed and for me it's too late. Let's look at the first one. God gave me an assignment, he gave me an assignment, he gave me a promise, but it's been so long. God came to Abraham and Abraham is 75 years old and the Lord says, I want you to leave this country and I'm going to take you to a wonderful land. It's gonna have everything that you need. I'm not gonna tell you where it is, but when you get there, I'm gonna let you know.  So Abraham leaves the land of earth where he is from and he follows God. Fast forward. Abraham is 99 and his wife, Sarah, is now 70 years old and I couldn't help but wonder why God would wait so long to make him a promise. But when he's 99 years old and his wife is 90 years old, he says, I'm gonna give you an air.  You would have thought when he was back in his 20s he might have promised him that, but now he's 99 and his wife, see God waits till it's impossible for anybody to do it but him. And then he said the sage, he said, now I'm going to show up and I'm gonna show out. And so he makes them a promise. And Sarah and Abraham, they realized that Sarah is past the age of childbearing and she's too old and they, and Sarah says, take my handmaiden and she will raise up an air for you. And so Abraham takes her handmaiden and she gives him a son and his name is Ishmael. And Ishmael and Isaac have been fighting, scratching and killing one another to this day. See the danger is when you come up with an alternative plan, I'm gonna help God fix this thing. I'm gonna help him bring it out. You're playing a dangerous game because for thousands of years because of one decision, they may be still having trouble because Ishmael's children are the Arab nation. See that's a dangerous thing. If you're taking notes, write this down. God's plan is always the best plan. God's way is always the best way. Now the thing about God's plan is, one, it's gonna require having some faith because his plan will always require you to step out on faith and do something that you're not comfortable doing. The second thing is, if you do a God's way, usually it's gonna take some time. It doesn't usually happen overnight, but if you will give God some time, let him work it out. Turn to Genesis chapter 21. Genesis chapter 21 verse one and two. So we know that God has made Abraham a promise. We know that Abraham and his wife have messed up and brought an illegitimate heir into the picture that was not supposed to be there, but God did not throw them away, but he fulfills his promise. He says, I'm gonna do it for my own namesake. I put my word out and I need you to know that my word is good in 21 verse one. It says, the Lord visited Sarah as he had said and the Lord did unto Sarah as he had spoken. For Sarah conceived and bear Abraham a son in his old age at the set time, at the set time, at the set time. See, God has his own time and we wanna cook out. I need you to hurry up. I need you to do it right now, but God says, at the set time, I'm gonna move. See, at the set time of which God had spoken to him. So when we get a promise from God, it doesn't matter how long it takes to come to pass. You need to know that it's never too late that God will be faithful to his work. Every promise in him is yay and amen. It doesn't matter how long. It doesn't matter what it looks like. It doesn't matter what it feels like. But if God said he's gonna do it, I'm gonna do it. If God says I'm gonna heal you, I'm gonna heal you. If God says I'm gonna bring you out, I'm gonna bring you out. Just wait on the Lord and be of good courage. Wait on him. He's gonna do it. God gave me a promise and it took too long. Number two, I tried to do what God called me to do, but I wasn't able to finish the task. Let's look at Elijah and Elisha. I must confess that when I was a little boy, I didn't know the difference. I just thought they were talking about the same person. I thought one preacher just didn't know how to pronounce it right. He said Elijah is to Elijah. Then I found out it was really two of them. I still couldn't figure out who was who. So I just kind of left it alone. But now the Lord, he knows how to help us that are not as bright as Bishop. It took us a while, but we got it. But the story of Elisha and Elisha. Elisha was Elijah's understudy. He taught him about the things of God. Just like I am an understudy to Bishop, he still speaks into me and he teaches me things. He sees things that I don't see. See, my vision is here. His vision is like that. See, if we'll be wise enough to glean wisdom from our elders, we don't have to keep starting over and venting the will again and again. So Elisha was his understudy and it's coming down to the end of Elijah's life and God is getting ready to take him away in a whirlwind into the cloud, please, the Lord. And Elijah tells Elijah, God has called me to go to Bethel.  And Elijah says, As the Lord lives, I'm not going to leave your sign because I know God's getting ready to take you away and I wanna see it. I wanna see the miracle when he takes you away in the whirlwind. The second time Elijah says to Elijah, Well, I'm going to Jericho. Just stay here and let me do what I'm going to do. And Elijah said again, As the Lord lives, I'm not going to leave your sign. I'm gonna watch, I'm gonna see when God takes you away. But then the third time, I figured out by then Elijah was messing with Elijah. He must have had a sense of humor like me. He's talking, I would expect Bishop to do something like that. You just wait here, I'll be right back. Leave it standing there for two or three hours. And then he says, I'm getting ready to go to Jordan. Stay here, put your feet up, watch the game and relax. And Elijah said, man, I'm telling you, I'm not going any place. I know God's getting ready to take you away.  I'm not leaving your side. I am going with you to the end. Turning in your body with the second king's chapter two, second king's chapter two, verse nine. And so, and it came to pass when they went over, when they went over the Jordan that Elijah said unto Elijah, ask what I shall do for thee before I be taken away from thee. And Elijah asked, I pray thee, let a double portion of your spirit, of your anointing be upon me. So Elijah asked for a double portion of the spirit that rests on Elijah. When it comes to the things of God, always believe and ask for more. Thank God for our parents and our grandparents and our spiritual parents that they have taken us a long way. But we want to take up what they've given us and take it to another level. See, we honor what was done in the past but we're not going to stay there. We want to move forward in the spirit. My grandfather was a great man of God. Pastor Bobby's father was a great man of God but their children are doing greater works than they did because they expected for them to pick up the mantle and take it to another level. And so he asked for a double portion. Now it's interesting that the Lord used Elijah to do 16 miracles. And Elijah did 31 miracles and he died and it was obviously too late for him to do all that he would believe that he was called to do. In terms of chapter 13, I wanted to show you something. Chapter 13 verse 20 and 21 it says, and Elijah died and they buried him and a band of the Moabs came and invaded the land coming of the end of that year. And it came to pass as they were burying a man that behold they spied a band of men and they cast this dead man into the sepulcher where Elijah's bone lays. It says, and when they let him down and touch the bones of Elijah says he revived, he came back to life, he stood up on his feet. I need you to know it's not too late. God let him know I don't care how long it's been. It doesn't even matter that you died but the glory of the Lord said it's not too late. I'm gonna finish the work. I'm gonna show myself strong. Exactly 32. The third reason, I blew it, I messed up and I am ashamed and it's too late for me. We wanna talk about the redemption of Peter.  And he's talking to his disciples and Peter pulls him aside and says Lord, don't talk like that.  See Peter was what they called a zealot. In other words he was a wild man for God. Peter said if we can't pray about in fiction then I know another way. I got a sword and I know what to do. You know what they talk about when Peter cut that man's ear off? He wasn't aiming for his ear. He was trying to take his head off. And God then Jesus said get thee behind me saying you savor not the things of God. See there is a way that seems right to us but it's a corner way. But if we will do it God's way it will have eternal value. And so it's coming down to that time and he tells his disciples are not many days I'm going to be killed, I'm going to be destroyed. And Peter said I understand what you're talking about but I'm gonna go all the way with you. Ride or die, I'm gonna see you to the end. And Jesus tells him Peter I know you mean well.  See many of us we get saved and we're full of zeal and we start out and we want to do so many wonderful things for the Lord. But because we run into obstacles along the way we have good intentions but we blow it. See Peter intended to go all the way. He believed he was gonna go all the way but when the pressure came on he had to foresee he didn't have the power the Bible said after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you you shall have power, power to live right power to talk right, power to fulfill the promise that you made to God. Look at Mark chapter 14, Mark chapter 14, verse 66 it says and so Peter has made this boast I will go all the way. Ride or die, it doesn't matter what's gonna happen.  Verse 66 it said as Peter was beneath in the palace and they come with one of the maidens of the high priest. And when she saw Peter warming himself she looked upon him and said thou also was with Jesus of Nazareth and he denies saying I know not neither understand what you talking about girl you done lost your mind.  I wish I had a sound effects button. I would push it but I don't but y'all know how it sounds. Thank you, thank you, I got one out there. And so that's one said and the maid saw him again and began to say to them that stood by this is one of them and he denied it again. That's two says and a little after they that stood by him said again to Peter surely you were one of them because that was a Galilean in by speech agrees that you in another words your speech betrays you. And then Peter sanctified Peter saved Peter. The one that says I'm gonna go all the way. Say he began to curse and square old Lord. Bishop the saints don't square do they? They don't curse do they? I'm just checking cause I'd have heard some things y'all. I guess I wasn't supposed to hear Bishop. That he began to curse and to square. It says saying I know not this man of whom you speak.  Let me hear it. All right, all right.  You shall deny me three times says and when he thought about it, he went away and he began to we see Peter blew it and he thought it was over. And then Peter went back to doing what he was doing before he got saved. And we in our life, we get saved and we say, I'm gonna live right. I'm gonna serve the Lord. I'm gonna do everything he told me to do.  I ain't gonna steal no more.   And I believe the angels in heaven said, right, right. And then we mess up and instead of repenting and getting it right, we think like Peter, it's over, it's done, God can use me and we go back to doing the same things that we did before we got saved. And we find that self getting further and further away from Jesus Christ. And so Jesus dies on the cross and they put his body in the tomb and they roll a great stone in front of it and Mary Magdalene and her crew, they come to the tomb and they come to put spices and perfume on his body, which was the customer that day. So but when she got to the tomb, the stone was rolled away. And look in Mark chapter 16, the 16th chapter, we started the fifth verse. It said that entering into the sepulchre, she saw a young man sitting on the right side. He was an angel clothed in long white garment and they were a frightened. And he said unto them, be not a frightened. Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth which was crucified. Say he is risen, but he is not here behold the place where they laid him. And then I liked it. The angel said, and go tell the disciples and Peter, the disciples and Peter, the wild one, the one that denied him, that let him down. See, we talk about Peter, we talk about how he was just so wrong, but you know what? None of the other disciples went as far as Peter went. They stayed at home. But he said, go get the disciples and Peter. And he says, I'm going to go before them and you're gonna see him, but my point is, he said, gather the disciples and Peter. Yes, Peter, he messed up. Yes, Peter blew it. But God wanted him to know, the Lord wanted him to know, I have not forgotten about Peter. I have not given up on Peter. And he's trying to let Peter know, it's not too late. I still want to use you and God wants you to know today, it doesn't matter where you're being, it doesn't matter what you've done, it doesn't matter that you let him down.  I still have work for you to do, it's not too late. It's not too late. God has purpose and destiny for your life.  He wants to see you go to heaven. God wants to use you in the kingdom of God. He wants to bless you. Don't be discouraged. Don't quit, don't give up, but fight. Fight a good fight of faith. Don't listen to the enemy that tries to tell you, it's too late because it's not too late. God wants to use you. The Lord told me to tell you, I've got some things for you to do that nobody else can do. I've got some work for you to do that nobody else can do. So I need you to come home back, get right with me, get in line and do the work. He said, yes, I know you've blown it. You went some places where you shouldn't have gone. You said some things that you shouldn't have said. You did some things that you shouldn't have done. What I want you to do is to repent.  God made a promise. He says, I'm gonna save you. I'm gonna redeem you. But he also says, but I want to use you in the kingdom. I want to bless you in the kingdom of God.  And I don't care what you're missing. God's saying it's not too late. I'm the God, not of a second chance, but another chance. I will forgive you. I will put you back in line. I will bless you. See, you gotta tell somebody, please be patient with me because God is not through with me yet. But I'm ready to get back in line. I'm ready to be an overcomer. I'm ready to work for the kingdom. See, I'm on my way to better. I'm on my way to doing better. Young people, you need to know God has a plan for your life. Baby's God wants to use you in a way that he can't use us, old folks. So he chose a young cause they're strong. See, I can do some things and after a while I get tired, I'm ready to sit down. God says, I can use a young folks.  Old folks, he says, I can use you cause you got wisdom. You've been with me. You understand my ways. You can give them knowledge and understanding. If you'll speak to them and lay hands on them. I know a young lady, she was going into a bad situation and the Lord spoke to me. He said, I tell her this, that I have put the spirit of peace on her. He says, and tell her, when she goes into this bad situation, he said, just lay your hands on people and impart your peace. Don't pray for them. Don't say anything. But just speak peace in your mind and see God wants to use you. He doesn't use us all in the same way.  But he's using her now in a way he didn't use her when she was young. He's using my mother in ways that now, she can just lay hands on people and people get, receive the Holy Ghost. Dr. Sykes, Minister Edwards, of the Sorden, you need to understand that there have been plenty of times when they felt like giving up. They run into a brick wall and they say, Lord, I messed up, but God says, I can still use you. I can still bless you. See, when we get to those situations, he says, all I need for you to do is repent, get up, get right, get back in line and let me do what I'm trying to do for you.  He wants to use you to bless the people. He wants to use you to bless some neighbors. He wants to use you to bless the people at work. He wants to use you and the people in your neighborhood. God wants to use you in the kingdom of God. And I don't care what it looks like. I don't care what it feels like. I don't care what you think. It's not too late. It's not too late. God says, I can work with that.  I'm gonna do everything God told me to do. I declare that greater is he that is in me than he that's in the world.  And I said, greater is he that's in me. I don't run from the devil. I fight till I win. It ain't over till I win. You have authority. You have power. You have the word of God. I remember reading about or hearing about a brother. He just got saved. And he learned one scripture under his wings. Shout out to us. And such a way she came up and he didn't know what to do. And he couldn't remember sister Bobby, his one scriptures. So he started saying, feathers, feathers. Father, guess what? It works. See God knows his word. If you just say feathers, if you call on the name of the Lord, if you declare the word of God, God will turn it around for you. It's never too late. I don't care what it looks like. I don't care what it feels like. God said, it's not too late. It's not too late. I'm gonna use you. I'm gonna bless you because. It's not too late. God bless you. Let the church say amen. The Lord has spoken. And he spoke a wonderful, consoling message to those of us who attempt to walk with him. I understand and it just comes so clearly to me that the trick of the adversary who is the devil is to try to make us think you missed the mark. You knew what to do, but you found out in your knowing that you missed the mark all along the way. And now you've got to pay the price. But how many know the devil is a liar? The devil is a liar, the truth is not in him.  The determination that we have within us, if it is proper determination is, I won't quit. I'll not quit. You can't make me quit. It can't be too difficult that I'm gonna quit. I'm going to do what the Lord called me to do. I'm going to allow him to use me. In the building of his kingdom, that's why he called me to himself. Hallelujah, Elder Rost. I say this is a grand slam. This is a grand slam home run today. This is just what the church needs at this hour. And I can understand people who had the best intentions got sidetracked in some kind of way, cause them not to be able to accomplish what they were called to do. I came to tell you today that if that's you, whoever you are, the Lord is saying to you, don't quit. Don't quit. I loved Elder Rost when you talked about Peter being excited about Jesus. And he said, I'm determined that I'll go all the way with your Jesus.  Foxes have holes, birds have nests. He said, you don't see it the way it actually is. Peter says, I'll go with you all the way. I'll never stop until this is done. If nobody goes, but you and me, we're going to give. Jesus says, I hear your little heart. You don't have the wisdom to understand what this situation is really about.   And as he talked about when they were ready to take him in, he was accused of being one of Jesus' disciples. He hadn't written down anything for him to say. So when he was accused, he said, no, I'm not. He didn't have the power.  When he kept on, on the third time, she said, your speech gives you up. And then he went to cuss. And Jesus knew how he was feeling because he had predicted it before time. And guess what? Jesus didn't hold a grudge. Come on, somebody. If it had been any of us, you out, we was right or die, not now. I'll find me another person who will go with me, Jesus. As he said, when he rose from the dead, he said, tell them I'll meet them in Jerusalem. Tell them and Peter. I love that. Tell the disciples who weren't gung-ho. And tell the one who was gung-ho. Tell him that I said, I'll meet you. Now what an invitation. What an invitation. There's a song that I learned in my youth. The song says, Jesus, my savior from Bethlehem came. Born in a manger to sorrow and shame. Oh, it is wonderful. Blessed be his name. He came seeking for me. Jesus came seeking for the one who had denied him three times. He said, I hold no grudge against you. He said, I still call you and I'm gonna do great things through you. Oh, it is wonderful. How could it be he came seeking for me? Seeking for me. Seeking for the one who let him down in his crisis. He came looking at every one of us who have failed it. He called you. He anointed you.  He's not gonna let you go. He'll never give you up. And so to prove it, he called him, he came seeking for Peter. And when the deal went down, he says, up on this rock, Peter, I'm gonna build my church, my church. I'll build my kingdom. So the one who denied him, he loved him so much. He loved him so much. He used that forwardness that Peter used, the aggressiveness. So all the Lord is asking you is hear me when I call. I'll never let you down. I'll never turn you away. You come unto me. Come unto me. All ye that labor, heavy laden, I'll give your rest.  Hear me and be blessed. My yoke is easy. My burden is light. Now, let us stand. The key, Elder Ross, the key in the Lord holding on to him is that there was room for repentance. And we know the formula for salvation, repentance, repent, be baptized and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. And we read over that so quickly sometimes we start to think about what repentance is. Repentance is a decision to apologize for our wrongdoing and promise, Lord, please forgive me for all of my sins. Lord, I beg you to forgive me. And I'll walk upright before you. The things I've been doing that I know are wrong, Lord, I'm gonna quit it. Come on, somebody. And you say, Lord, forgive me. I'll not do it again. I'm going to walk with you and I'm gonna get it right this time. When we repent, if our heart is right, if you decide it, you're gonna stop doing crazy stuff that you know is against God. The Lord says, if you'll change your attitude. Turn to your neighbor, tell him, change your attitude. Change your attitude. If you change your attitude, the Lord says, I'll use you. He said, the reason I saved you is because I saw something that I could use you for. I gave you a call to do the work of the kingdom. Now, if you repent, I'll restore you. Restoration, restoration is a repair. You don't have to be made over again.  He said, I will never leave you, nor will I forsake you.  This building didn't look like this until just a year or two ago. We had to make some changes. These weren't here, it was a wall across here. But what we decided, if this building would yield itself, we could do something with it that it had never been done before too. And so we fixed it over, we repaired it. So the Lord is saying, don't refuse to repent.  Oh Lord, we thank you, oh God. We magnify your name, oh God, hallelujah, hallelujah. We thank you for the word that you've sent to this house, oh God, today. Lord, we know that you're able to do that that you purpose to do in our spirit, in our heart, Lord. We ask you to change us. We ask you to renew us, oh God. Help us, oh God, to be faithful to the charge, oh God. Help us always, oh God, have a repented spirit that we might please you. We might serve you in the beauty of holiness. We thank you, oh God, for your mercy. We thank you for your love. Thank you for the grace that you have for us, oh God. Hallelujah, hallelujah. We ask you, oh God, to move upon this congregation. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Move, we pray, oh God, hallelujah, on your people, oh God. Give us a desire, oh God, to please you in everything that we do, cause us to walk up rightly before you. You may be praised and glorified in our existence. We thank you, oh God. We love you, Jesus. We love you, Jesus. Hallelujah, hallelujah. We thank you, oh God, for this opportunity to come to you. We bless your name. We give you glory. We give you honor in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, if there's, if there are any individuals who are willing to come for prayer for whatever you need personally, the altar is open, it is open. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Let's praise the Lord, give God praise. I'm so glad. Come on, somebody. All right, it's time to worship the Lord in our giving. I don't know what it is, but it doesn't seem like it's the same service when we come to the offering time. But let me say, I thank the Lord for this congregation, for the fine support that they are of this church. A good job of paying our tithes. Well, we do a better job of paying our tithes. We do a good job of offering. I can look at the record and they tell me what's what. But thank God that this is a tithing church. Amen. And so actually we don't have to turn flips as long as we're paying the tithe to giving the offering. Amen? Amen. Okay, y'all, all right. Okay, let's stand. Let everyone please stand. Let's raise our offering to the Lord. Eternal God, our Father, we thank you for who you are. We thank you, oh God, for your mercy, your loving kindness unto us. We thank you, oh God, that you're our Father. Thank you, oh God, for the many things that you've done in our life, how you've rescued us from time to time. And we thank you that because you allow us to have a spirit and a heart of giving, we should receive the offering that we bring to you at this time. We thank you for the opportunity and we thank you for the willingness to do it. Help us, oh God, to continue to walk in the beauty of holiness and that will be called to do the things that you ask us to do in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, let's come on with our giving. Thank you, Jesus, thank you. Thank you, Jesus, thank you. Thank you, Jesus, thank you, in my heart. Thank you, Jesus, thank you. Thank you, Jesus, thank you, in my heart. This morning, right to each and every one of us says it's over. That's right.


Welcome to a new edition of Whiteboard Friday. My name is Alayda Solis. I am an SEO consultant and founder of Orientea and today I am here to share with you Long-Handed Fruit SEO. We all know that we want to maximize the opportunities, the chances for success in SEO. And for that what we tend to do is to prioritize those tasks, those activities that will tend to have higher output, a higher impact and lower effort. And although it's true that this usually depends on the context of our SEO process or project, the restrictions, the opportunities, the resources, the flexibility, etc., the reality is that it tends to be always this, let's say, strategic agnostic type of activities that tend to be always there for us to leverage, right? But however, what we tend to do in our SEO processes is this, right? We start the SEO process with audit research from keyword competition research to technical SEO, content-outed, competition analysis, backlink analysis, etc., and this tends to take a little bit of time, like for weeks or so, for example, let's say, then we need to analyze all of the data, etc., in order to generate actionable, prioritized SEO recommendations that at the end of the day are the ones that we share with our SEO clients or SEO stakeholders in general for execution, right? So all of this process tends to take a little bit of time. Unfortunately, the issue here is that after this time, we tend to face challenges about, like, yes, impatience of the stakeholders or the owners of the project, right? And it's natural, however, as I mentioned before, we can, and what I propose here is to develop this low-hanging fruit analysis in parallel of the usual SEO process, audit in order to detect these low-hanging fruits that we tend to have, and I will share later on which, in order to start implementation right away, right? This might seem counterintuitive because you may say, oh my God, I'll add that extra work besides the one of the audits, but the reality is that ideally here, we should set already some frameworks, some reports with data that we tend already, if you have in the SEO process, in order to implement this, right? And the benefits of this low-hanging fruit analysis and then implementation that we can start right when we are already doing the usual audit is that it will mitigate impatience from clients or stakeholders. We will start with those actions that will be much easier or simpler to coordinate, right? So what I'm talking about here about low-hanging fruit, realistically, I am going to go through three scenarios here of these low-hanging fruit opportunities that, very likely, will also be applicable for any of your projects, right? Improving the click-to-rate of top-rank pages. If we go and take a look of our current rankings, using whatever ranking tools that you use, Google Search Console even, you can take a look at which are those top-rank pages that are already ranking for relevant queries that are important, meaningful for you that have opportunities to improve their click-to-rates, that the click-to-rates are too low for the rankings of these pages and you can try to identify if some of the things off with the snippets, with the titles, with the meta-descriptions, for example, or if these pages are not maximizing the visibility because of the lack of structured data implementation and the reason why they are not generating rich snippets or including a very important meaningful relevance or feature, for example, and that is the reason of why the click-to-rate is too low and you can go and straightforward improve those, right? With the snippets too, I have to say, I have found many more scenarios in which Google was writing the title, which is now more common than before, and even if Google tries to write in a way that is still meaningful and relevant, the core key aspect of that particular page a few times have been eliminated or maybe the core page is still there but when you compare it with your top competitors, with all the pages ranking, in that same SERPs, you identify that they are actually showing additional data, additional insights that you are not because of being cut out and that is certainly a misopportunity for you. So go and take a look and prioritize the analysis, first straightforward analysis with the data that you already have for those snippets and those sort of features that you could be leveraging but are not. Then you want to take a look also at those relevant queries that you are ranking with non-relevant pages. Maybe in the past you created pages that better match the intent for those queries, not anymore, or maybe you created at some point many different pages talking similar queries that make sense in the past but not anymore either, right? And you may find scenarios of cannibalization issues or lack of content issues, right? And for that what I would highly, highly, highly recommend is to analyze for which of your relevant queries you are ranking with more than one page to identify, to assess if this is detrimental in that scenario, if less people are clicking or know where to click because of that if you could be consolidating these pages in order to run better, to pass the value to a single page and to consolidate all of the metrics in a single page instead and for that highly, highly recommend to check those relevant queries for which you have a couple of more than a single page, right? And then if, which is the right page to rank if it is better to just 1001 redirect to a single URL or to differentiate this additional page that you have there because you can identify that it might be also valuable to just tweak it a little bit or optimize a little bit to refer it and to rank to another query that is equally as relevant for you too. Second scenario here for low-hanging free opportunities is to optimize internal links of almost ranking pages, right? You probably have these pages that are not yet in the top three or top five positions as these others but are in the top 10 already, top six, top seven, et cetera, et cetera almost ranking for very, very important, meaningful, highly search, highly relevant and search queries but when you analyze these pages you identify very quickly that they are relevant, the content is okay but it's the lack of backlinks that is holding you back, right? So how do we do this? Whenever you're analyzing these pages you want to grab you want to take a look at all the backlinks per page like very quick backlink how did I hear all the internal links per page when you call your website you will see how many internal links each of those have from different, all of the different pages of your website and you want to pretty much consolidate this data in a single sheet to identify those cases of these pages for which you're in position four, position fifth, position six that potentially may have a lot of backlinks but very few internal links or vice versa you're linking from each of your internal pages but have very, very few backlinks so there might be opportunities here to and for that you should better link to almost ranking pages for popular queries that you're not internal linking well from the FUR for the top navigation from synchro diary navigations for example and for those popular pages that have a lot of backlinks for example but they're not necessarily passing well the value to those meant to be ranked pages you can leverage this to better crosslink to those right and for those that are what are they are lacking is not internal links but backlinks you already have great candidates to start your link building campaigns with already so this can also accelerate a little bit the analysis that you're doing in parallel last but not least detect search shift of content decay there might be content that you created some time ago some years ago that it was perfect at that time to target and to rank for certain queries but potentially Google later on betaed or shift the ranked pages for this query because they identified that the intent was different that they changed I have seen many scenarios in which very broad queries that used to list a lot of plp's probably listing pages are nowadays ranking more guides and far less produced in pages right so you want to identify these shifts also potentially some articles that you wrote like a few years ago that were like the top or the best tools for this or that or the top of the best product for this or that they did a little bit of update right and you forgot that they needed to be updated every year for example so these are the scenarios that I am talking about here and for this is critical to go and take a look at your again your run tracking data or even your Google search console identify like the number of clicks the number of the position and the click to rate that your top content your meaningful content through the customer journey have been getting in the last few months to see if it is going down if it is dropping right and if that's the case to go and take a look at it and see if there's opportunity to refresh or diversify a little bit depending on the scenario for which queries the content is dropping and they this existing content to keep its relevance based on the other top rank pages right if you see that you're dropping a lot and which are those of the pages that are like now are ranking you to identify the gap versus yours also create new content to better fulfill than it in case you identify that no no no no the page that I was targeting to rank for this query it doesn't make sense anymore because now Google is ranking much more informational content and this was much more commercially driven or transactionally driven right so you can again prioritize much more faster to the development of these other type of content so as you can see with this very low hanging food I will say with data that you tend to already have whether in the SEO analysis you can accelerate in parallel this analysis to identify low hanging food opportunity that you can start executing right away see results faster mitigate the impatient of your clients and all the gains much easier with your SEO process so hopefully this will serve to you to apply through the different projects that you work in and achieve results faster thank you very much


Our next caller is Kenzie from Ohio. Hi, Kenzie. How can we help you? Guys, it's nice to talk to you. I've listened to you for probably about five years now, so this is pretty cool. So a little background on me. I'm currently 18 weeks pregnant with identical twin girls. I'm a twin, my mom's a twin as well, so I guess it just runs in the family. My background is college soccer at Ohio State. I've ran a marathon and then I had a hip surgery, and then I got into bodybuilding. So that was for about five, three years, then got engaged, so focused, kind of on family. So now being pregnant with my training background, it's been a little difficult. It's not as fun to lift when I'm not lifting as heavy, so that's been a little difficult. So lifting is kind of just two times a week maybe now, if that. So because my twins are identical, I'm high risk, so my activity has gone down a little bit. So I'm just curious kind of getting ahead of myself, but once I have the babies and I'm cleared to work out, what is the best option to start with? Because I know my core will be really weak and probably have lost like a ton of muscle, so I'm just kind of curious with my background, but I know how to do lifts. We have a full gym in my house, so just kind of curious kind of where to go from there once the babies are born. So Kenzie, the hardest thing for you is going to be your competitive mindset and knowing how to steer that correctly.  So that was the first thing that I wanna start off with. I got cut out. Can you hear me? Well, I'm gonna finish telling you or tell Kenzie what I would have told her anyways, whether she can hear me or not. So the thing that I would say is that you gotta be very careful on the desire to, and I know Justin will be able to speak to this really well too, because he has a competitive mindset too, is going slow and gradual, right? So the goal is always to do as little as possible to elicit the most amount of change. In your case, I think that a map starter would be the ideal place to start and the one thing that, again, you're gonna be challenged with is if you've got a competitive bodybuilding type of background, it's not like heavy barbell squats, it's not movements like that, but it's definitely where you should be right now before you progress into something like a maps anabolic. Yeah, you know, when you're training, first off, to post pregnancy, a lot of your success post pregnancy is gonna be what you did before you got pregnant and what you did during your pregnancy. Now, two days a week of resistance training during pregnancy is plenty to prevent a lot of muscle loss and to maintain some strength. So that's actually really, really good, especially considering that you're pregnant with twins, which makes things much more difficult. Post pregnancy, Adam said map starter, that's the best program I would recommend. If you don't have map starter or for people who are listening who aren't familiar with map starter, essentially you wanna train a lot of unilateral exercises. So one leg, one arm, you wanna use a stability ball, you wanna go light and you wanna focus on full range of motion and you really wanna practice the movements, don't push the body. Allow your body to slowly progress and consider this, because I've trained a lot of women pre, during and post pregnancy and the three months post pregnancy is the hardest. After about four or five months, then the body really starts to kick into gear. So what you're doing for that first few months is really just getting your body to move right, getting your core to function again, because you're gonna be so disconnected from some of the muscles in your core. So getting those to fire, getting everything to kind of strengthen. After about four, five, six months, then you'll start to, and this is the comment I used to get from pregnant women all the time or post pregnant women all the time, was after about five or six months, they'd come to me and say, oh, I'm starting to feel like myself again. And then we would start to kind of ramp things up and then their bodies would progress rather quickly. But post pregnancy, you're just trying to move, get your body to reconnect because, and just for lack of a better term, during pregnancy, it feels like, and in some cases this is true, your body's not yours. What I mean by that's not- It's transforming into something else. And that's- It feels very, very accurate. Right, yeah, like to Adam's point, it's such a mental hurdle, especially I think for athletes to really change the mindset and change the approach towards what is sort of like, I mean, it's your home base. Training used to be, it meant something completely different when you'd go to approach it. And so I think just really kind of putting your mind around what's gonna be best, in terms of like listening to your body, feeling your body as you're working out and trying to come in with more of a calm head space, I think that that's really gonna help a lot.  Cause I think Adam opened it up with any hit the nail square on the head, okay? Here's your two options.  Or here's the other thing that would probably happen with someone like you, which I've experienced with clients, is you end up injuring yourself, which is actually quite common. And that really sets you back. Your pelvic floor muscles will probably have some stuff going on there at the very least, some disconnection with some of your pelvic floor, especially if you deliver, you know, the babies, even if you don't, there's gonna be some stuff going on. You're not connected to your core muscles. They all have to stretch. You can't fire them as well.   The relaxing hormone or chemical that's released during pregnancy that loosens your body up. When you have twins, there's more of that.  So going slow is the name of the game. And if you push yourself too hard with lack of stability, you know, pelvic floor muscles not being connected or possibly injured, which is quite common with core weakness, you can run into some problems that then become long-term chronic problems. And it's not uncommon to get a female client who used to be an athlete and then they had a baby and then they tried to work out on their own. Then they'd come hire me and they'd say something like, you know, after I had my son six years ago, I've had this chronic back pain or this chronic hip pain. And then it's like backtracking is very, very difficult. So go very slow, take your time. You've got great muscle memory that's gonna work on your side. It can take about three to five months for you to start to feel like your body is what it used to be or even a semblance of it. So take your time. Map Starter, perfect program. And again, if you're listening and you don't know what Map Starter is, it's a lot of unilateral exercises, a lot of stability and it's using a physio ball through a lot of the exercises. Perfect, thank you guys so much. I appreciate it. No problem, Kenzie. And we're gonna send you Map Starter if you don't have it, okay? Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. No problem, appreciate the sport. Yeah, there was a period of time where this was like, I had a lot of clients that I trained that were either pregnant, gonna get pregnant or just had a baby. Cause I trained, I had a studio for over 15 years and I trained one woman and then she was a part of like a mom's group. And so I just started getting all these moms. And the challenges with pregnancy and post pregnancy are unique. They're very unique to anybody else and it's literally like your core post, you don't, it's like you don't, imagine having to try to get a muscle to contract and you don't even know how anymore. That's literally what it feels like. It's like out of body experience for sure. Yeah, so you gotta take your time and go slow but I can't stress this enough. And Jessica's experienced this right now.  And she's down to 22% and she's just getting leaner and she's like, what's going on? And I'm like, she's like, I'm not even working out that much. I'm only working out to- Her roaring metabolism. Yeah, she's only working out a couple days a week. Same thing. Yeah, she's working out a couple of days a week cause the baby's barely sleeping so she has to focus on sleep. She's like, why? She's like, this is weird. I'm like, honey, you were so consistent with resistance training before the baby and during your pregnancy that you set yourself up really well. Well, that's the thing. Yeah, if you have all that going into pregnancy makes it so much easier to rebound and then also too, it was crazy when Courtney was breastfeeding. It was like, all of a sudden it was like this fat burning machine turned on and so that's another benefit to it even though it's very difficult and it's a struggle, things like that, that your body will provide is pretty interesting. Yeah, I would love to see her not only do starter but I would love to see her follow the Maps Prime Pro webinar that I did. That is something that I would ask her to do too. I think just that'll help get her reconnected to everything. Yeah, you gotta kind of piece it back together. Yeah, and it's something she can do on her living room floor, do it once a week in there. I think it's just a great way to get her back in the routine. The thing whenever I hear someone like that, like right away, I think, oh man, this girl's got competitive background. She's body-building before. Oh yeah, she's gonna want to go to work. Yeah, the desire. I mean, it's just like, it's no different. I mean, it's very different than obviously my knee surgery, right? Having a baby is nothing like that. So I don't want to fucking, I don't want all the women. I know what it's like. I don't want all the women to crucify me for a second. I pull my knee once. What I mean is having a competitive mindset to get back because you know what your body's capable of, and I can relate to that, right? I can't relate to having a baby, but I can relate to the thinking that I can do much more. I did have a hemorrhoid, though. When my body says I can't, and sure as shit, that's exactly, I re-injured myself, set myself back six more months, and so yeah, taking it slow, listening to your body is gonna be crucial. Truth be told, some of the most challenging clients I've ever trained in my entire life were ex-athletes. Oh yeah, they're so hard. They're stubborn. You gotta slow them down. They're stubborn, too. And they don't get it, you know what I mean? Because they have this, they just remember how their body used to be, and it's like, it's not the same, dude. Yeah.


How far have we come towards racial equality since the Civil Rights Era? What does it mean to be black today? How can it be that we have both a black president and at the same time events like Ferguson continue to happen? As PBS presents a national exploration of these questions in black America since MLK and still I rise. WJCT is hosting a local conversation to discuss our progress and challenges with racial equality here on the First Coast. It's WJCT's community thread, the First Coast since MLK.


In entertainment news now, a long-awaited job doggonew for sassy popularly known as Sound Sultan who died early on Sunday, a throat canter has been buried in accordance with Muslim rights. The late multi-talented singer who passed on at the age of 44 following his battle with Anger-Imino Blastic T. Selim Foma was buried at 3 p.m. New York time at the Marlboro Muslim Symmetry Morganville, New York. The late Sound Sultan is survived by his wife, three children and siblings.