music from hagee ministries’ television studios, today on “the difference,” we welcome international speaker, pastor, and author, samuel rodriquez. He is the president of the national hispanic christian leadership conference. Named among the top 100 christian leaders in america, his ministry calling has helped presidents advance spiritually-led social reform. Today, samuel rodriquez shares from his book “from survive to thrive.” pastor samuel rodriguez: the number one deterrent to surviving, as it pertains to staying in perpetual survival mode instead of living in a thriving mode is biblical illiteracy. If you’re illiterate, biblically speaking, then you’re always going to just survive. Music matt hagee: welcome to “the difference.” kendal and I are continuing our conversation with our dear friend, pastor samuel rodriquez. And we’ve been discussing his latest work, “from survive to thrive.” kendal hagee: yes. Okay. I want to know how do I get out of the survivor mode to being a thriver? Like if I’m surviving right now, but I want to get to that thriver mode, how do I maneuver that? Or what’s the difference between the two? Pastor samuel rodriguez: and there is. Again, everyone’s either failing, surviving, or thriving. You’re either in egypt, the desert, or the promised land. Let me give you some differences. People that survive pray like this, this is the prayer, the quintessential prayer. Matt hagee: survivor’s prayer. Samuel rodriguez: survivor’s prayer. “lord, bless me. Lord, bless me. Lord, bless me,” no quorums. There’s no problem asking god to bless you. Thrivers pray like this; “lord, make me a blessing to everyone I know.” kendal hagee: that sounds good. Pastor samuel rodriguez: it’s not about blessing me. It’s about making me the blessing. Matt hagee: the perspective is shifted. Pastor samuel rodriguez: the perspective is completely different. It’s about the difference between, “lord, answer my prayer” to “lord, make me the answer to someone else’s prayer.” it’s a matter of aligning the heart, the head, and the hand. Kendal hagee: okay. Pastor samuel rodriguez: if you line the heart, the head, and the hand, so you align — what? It’s inspiration, information, impartation. The heart is inspiration. The head is information. The hand is practical impartation. It’s an alignment. So your heart, your head, and your hand are in perfect alignment with the word of god and the promises of god. The number one deterrent to surviving as it pertains to staying in perpetual survival mode instead of living in a thriving mode is biblical illiteracy. Matt hagee: wow. Yeah. Pastor samuel rodriguez: if you’re illiterate, biblically speaking, then you’re always going to just survive. Matt hagee: yeah. Well, I mean, “my people perish for lack of knowledge.” all the information is there. It’s just that it hadn’t been ingested; you know? Pastor samuel rodriguez: but why not? Kendal hagee: why not? Pastor samuel rodriguez: I mean we’re totally taking in news, fake news, misinformation, hype, an illogical emotionally-driven cancel culture exuberance instead of taking in the word of god. The word of god will flip the script. The word of god with the spirit of god or the right heart and alignment, you’re done. And you remove the lids. I talk about removing lids, the lids of anxiety, fear, generational realities, cultural and world views. There are ideologies that drive us. We remove all these lids, and you live john 10:10, the latter part, “an abundant life.” that’s thriving. Matt hagee: yeah. Well, and there, john 10:10 is a great biblical equation, because you know, “i have come to give you life more abundantly.” pastor samuel rodriguez: yes. Matt hagee: “the thief has come to steal, kill, and destroy.” pastor samuel rodriguez: right. Matt hagee: when you look at those stark outcome differences, you can clearly see; is this god or is this the enemy? You know? When you’re looking at your daughter laying in a hospital bed, and the doctor’s saying things are not going well, this is still kill and destroy time. Pastor samuel rodriguez: right. Matt hagee: this is not life more abundantly. Pastor samuel rodriguez: no. Matt hagee: and so you understand which side of the equation you’re working on. Now, the thing to get the equation to balance, to use mathematics, you have to take away the variables. Samuel rodriguez: brilliant. Matt hagee: you know? Samuel rodriguez: brilliant. Matt hagee: and so when you’re talking about, you know, survive to thrive, removing the variables, one of the things that I was listening to you say about biblical illiteracy. I was talking to a nutritionist the other day. And one of the things that he said, and it floored me, is how malnourished americans are. Now, we eat plenty. Kendal hagee: I know. Matt hagee: I mean we’re, in terms of obesity — pastor samuel rodriguez: we, supposedly, we eat more than anyone else. Matt hagee: exactly. I mean it’s not a lack of consumption. Pastor samuel rodriguez: right. Matt hagee: it’s a lack of nutrition. Samuel rodriguez: brilliant. Matt hagee: and, you know, he was saying, “look; it’s not a matter of you don’t have enough calories; it’s the kind of calories you’re eating.” and he said, “whenever you’re not eating the right kind of food,” he said, “you can be as big as you want to be, but you’re malnourished.” and it’s so similar to the spiritual situation that’s happening in this world, because we are living in a bread factory in the united states. There’s christian television. There’s christian churches. Pastor samuel rodriguez: wow! Matt hagee: there’s content everywhere, and it’s living bread. Pastor samuel rodriguez: yes. Matt hagee: but instead of eating the bread of life, we’re consuming all of this other content, and praying that we survive