 People have asked me about my whole, kind of my whole testimony and I've dripped a little bit here and dripped a little bit there. Well, I got an email about someone talking about faith and I don't want to share the person's name. I do want to kind of read a little bit of the email because this particular email, it is to me, I think, other folks can relate to this. Let me find the email. I don't know what I did with the email. It's in here. I did not delete the email. What did I do with this email? I had, there it is. There it is. Let me just read what this person said. She says, can you make a video? Is this, yeah, is a woman. Can you make a video? Because I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who is struggling with this. Okay, I've been steadfast in faith with trusting God from protecting me from COVID, never did take the shot and now I have COVID. I'm trying to see where did I go wrong in my faith or trusting God on protecting me from this virus. Or can you explain what does it mean to truly have faith in God? Because I know without faith, it is impossible to please God. So I'm confused. I thought trusting him and leaning and depending on him will keep me from this, which we have ever since it came out, but now I have it. I'm just trying to examine myself and see what I have done wrong. Now, let me say this. Let me tell you what faith does not do. Are you ready? Faith does not protect you from being harmed. Did you hear me? Faith does not protect you from COVID-19. Faith does not protect you from getting sick. Faith does not protect you from grandma dying or maw or paw dying. Faith does not protect you from your bills adding up. Faith does not protect you from having a bad day. Faith does not protect you from going through a storm. You know what faith does it also do? Faith doesn't guarantee that you will make it through the storm. There are people with a lot of faith who die in the storm. So what's the point and purpose of even having faith? Well, faith is like this. It's not that you will have to find a way out of the storm. Faith doesn't keep you from going through the storm. Faith doesn't guarantee you from coming out of the storm. With faith does it guarantees who's going to be in the storm with you. Are you with me? That's the whole point of faith. I want you all to recall Jesus in the boat with his disciples. In Mark chapter four, verse 35, it's on that day when evening had come, he said to them, let us go across the other side and leaving the crowd they took with them in the boat just as he was and other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose and the waves were breaking into the boat so that the boats were already filling. But he, that being Jesus was in the stern, asleep on the cushion and they woke him and said to him, teacher, do you not care that we are perishing? Look what he says. And he awoke and rebuked the wind and the sea and said to the sea, I'm sorry, peace, be still and the wind ceased and there was a great calm. He said to them, why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith? And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, who then is this that even the wind and the seas or some verse may say the wind and the waves obey? Can I tell you who he is? He's the creator of the wind, of the waves, of the sea. He's the creator of it all. And so all his whole point was guys, what are you tripping off of? I'm literally here, in this case, literally here with you. They marveled at what he can do forgetting what he has already done. Faith is remembering what he's done, what he's capable of doing, whether he does or not as the Hebrew boy says, whether he brings us out or not. We know he can. Whether he brings us through the storm or not, we know he can. Whether he will or not, doesn't matter anymore because faith is doing like Jesus was doing in the boat. Just relaxing. Just the fact that he's there. Do you have Christ as your savior? Well, then guess what? You're good. Whatever comes your way, you'll be good. Is it gonna always turn out the way you wanted to? Not always, no. Now, here's why I'm bringing this up. I've always been a person who no matter what I go through, I felt like I could make it out. And I've got a track record to say, Kory, you'll be able to make it out. You're gonna be okay. Let me tell you how I know. When I was born, the first day for me on this planet did not start off well. The first day that I was born, I almost died. Why? Because my father sold drugs, my mother used drugs and those drugs that she used were in my system. And so they had to keep me in the hospital for a while to get the drugs out of my system because I almost died a couple of times. Once the drugs were out and I was able to breathe on my own and I was able to just live without their care and supervision, they let me go home. I didn't find this out until several years later, of course. The fact that it happened to me, now seeing it later, gave me great comfort to know that, hey, you know what, I'm tough. Now, I wasn't giving proper credit to who actually brought me out because at that time I was not a Christian. Now, life didn't get much better for me after that. We grew up in gang infested areas, high crime areas, always moving, just really bad. We grew up in an area where they were starting to turn cocaine in the free base, now it's crack or what have you. We saw that stuff. We used to make deliveries. We had two, two counter hits put out on us. One hit was so bad that we had to leave the state. We left Indianapolis and moved me walking for a while just so we can be safe. My mother did the best she could. Now, she made some bad decisions, some bad choices, but she was always going to defend us. And I'll never forget one day mama was crying and she said, when she was crying, I said, mama, are you okay? She said, yeah, I'm okay, I said, are you gonna be all right? She said, I'm gonna be all right because I have to be all right. And that kind of stuck with me that mama was gonna do what she had to do no matter what. And my mother was a fighter. My father was a fighter. When he got out of prison, he met some people. And my father, if anyone is old enough, they'll know who the name Jimmy Minor is in the state of Indianapolis. My father was in organized crime. He was the kind of guy that you just didn't, you know, you didn't mess with. You didn't do certain things because he may not get you, but other folks might come and get you. We live in some bad places. I mean, some real bad places. But God brought us through. These people that came to kill us one night, they came through my room first. And their plan was to come through my room, then to my brother's room. It was the first time we ever had our own separate rooms. Do you know why when they came through the room, do you know why they didn't get me first? My mother startled them and got up with her, with her weapon and chased them out. She startled them. But I should have been dead first because it came through my room. Do you know why they didn't get me? I wasn't a Christian at the time, but there was a group of people called Youth for Christ and they would come through the neighborhoods and they would pick us up. And so this particular weekend, they came and got us and took us camping. And so we weren't there. And so when they came, when the guys came through because I was somewhere where God wanted me to be, they didn't kill me. My brother, he was with me too. Y'all excuse me. He was with me too. I didn't realize the magnitude of that or what God was doing, how he had his hand on me and my family at that time. But I do now. So my mother couldn't take care of me. She didn't have enough money. So she sent me back to stay with my father. My father was my, he's my dude, my man. Now he's passed away. My father was in organized crime. He knows some people. He knows some people. I mean, when I say some people, the lowest to the highest. The Marion County prosecutor, the mayor who became the person, the point person of George Bush's office of faith based initiative, Goldsmith. Goldsmith, I can't remember his name. What's on the first name basis was my father because he kept trying to prosecute my father. My father had IRS debts of 100,000, 80,000, 150,000 to him. And I know this because I saw the letters and I'm thinking, okay, he owes this amount of money. I didn't realize what that kind of money was until later. Like daddy owed that kind of money. Well, he was also a fighter. He taught me that you don't make excuses. No matter what you're going through, you ain't gonna blame the white man. You ain't gonna blame the black man. As a matter of fact, he said, if you wanna find out who's probably gonna be your worst enemy, probably be one of these inwards. And I'm trying to keep it, keep it PG who's gonna be against you. Cause no matter where you are, I don't give you white or black. The folks around you are gonna be the one that's gonna be your, your more likely to hurt you. Well, he taught me no excuses. I mean, I never really told me this. This was my introduction to stop being woke. Ed, you're like this. Dear world Christian, you're like this. This is how I was taught to not be woke. I didn't have a woke chance in hell to become woke. He said, boy, two things. You're gonna do what you're told and you're gonna bring home good grades. Don't bring home any D's or F's. I'm thinking I'm the slickest person on the planet. So I'm not really listening to him because I know how I was with my mother, but I'm with a man now. This is why fathers are important. He said, don't ever bring a grade home and tell me that the teacher don't like you cause you black. He said, I've been, I never hear that come out your mouth. Now he went through his old little diatribe and kind of cussed me out to put the fear of God at me. Well, I had decent, decent enough grades, but I had a, I brought a, was it a D? No, no, no, no, it wasn't even a D. I had a, you know, you get A in gym. If you're a boy and you don't get A in gym, something wrong with you, right? So I had a couple of A's, some B's and I had a C. Now his, his belief was, if you can get a C, you can get a B. If you can get a B, you can get a A. Bring me home my A's. If not, don't ask me for nothing. So I showed him my report card. He says, okay son, is this, it's pretty good, poor card. You got this, you got this C here. So what happened here? I said, dad, it's a tough class. I mean, and this teacher, she's just hard on all, it really, she's hard on all the black kids. She just don't like us cause we black. I forgot what he said. He said, uh-huh. Now, for some of you folks, if you got a black parent and just like this, uh-huh. You better duck. He hit me so hard. And he said, little blanky blank, what did I tell you about saying a white man don't like you? He said, if you get the answer to the questions right, they ain't got no choice but to get your little black A an A. If one plus one is two and you answered correctly, I don't care if she don't like you or not. She go give you the right, she'll give you a check mark, right? So I learned, I learned, we don't make excuses. I don't care if the ceiling falls in. I don't care if the house catches on fire. You better fulfill your duty. You better be found with a fire extinguisher or a water hose putting this fire out, coming out outside talking about the head of the house on fire. You better do something to fix it. Well, here's what happened. I go to Texas Tech to play football. I was a knucklehead guys because, you know, when successes happen, you think that I'm gonna be all right. I'm gonna be all right. Things came quick. I was a, there were two freshmen that were on varsity that year. Two freshmen, myself and this guy named Bam Morris. Some of you all may know who he is. He played with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Chiefs. Well, what happened to Corey Minor? Well, I'll tell you what happened. I was a knucklehead and got put off the team. Went back home and me and my father got into it a little bit. I'm thinking I'm going back to the school. I don't need you, daddy. I'm a grown man. And so I left. Well, my coach said, no, you can't come back. No, you can't get no scholarship. No, no, sorry. What are you talking about? You need to grow up. Ask your daddy to pay for it. Well, I just left my daddy. I just told my daddy I don't need him. You know, come on, coach. I don't know what to tell you. You've figured out. So for one year, not even for you, not for a year, but a few months, I'm homeless. Not even, no, I hadn't even turned 20 yet, and I'm homeless. And daddy is not getting ready to help me. He said, you need to quit being a little bee. Y'all know the word, grow up and be a man. A grown man's going to take care of himself. You ain't got any kids. You shouldn't have come to me for some money. No, I ain't giving you nothing. Show me you deserve some money. So what did I do? I tried to find every job I could. I had a job selling fire extinguishers and even had an opportunity to present this fire extinguisher, this halon fire extinguisher to this distribution company who ended up taking this halon. They cut me out. I didn't know anything about it. They cut me out and this was a multimillion dollar deal that I got cut out. They didn't know anything about it. I found out later. So could have been a millionaire. But anyway, but God knows what he's doing. So I work and work and work and save up money to put myself back in school. My mother who at the time was still on drugs comes and we're staying together. We're trying to help ourselves out, each other out. Either she or one of her friends took all my money that I was saving for school. Oh, I was hurt and angry. She said she didn't do it. Maybe it was such and such a friend or what have you. So what did I do? Went and worked overtime. Worked more and more just so I can have some more money. I'm going back to school. Whether I play ball again or not. Now I go to school and some people know me and they've seen some tape and so I get invited to a regional combine. But what happens is this, I'm out there getting ready for this regional combine. They didn't have it pro days like they do now. So anyway, I just hear this, I don't wanna do this anymore and I love football. But I wanna do ministry. Let me speed this up. I'm married at the time and I'm focusing on ministry. We moved from Lubbock to Dallas because it's hard to make a living in Lubbock even though the cost of living is low. I am an investment advisor. I'm working for Edward Jones. And so after I leave Edward Jones, I start my own firm. And I've got a nice little office and I get a bigger office and extra offices and multiple employees working for me. And I'm filling myself. I'm thinking I'm the baddest thing. Oh, by the way, at the church, I'm one of the associate pastors and people are patting you on the back. Oh, pastor, brother, that was wonderful. And so you start filling yourself even more. Well, here's what happened. I'm always moving. I'm trying to make this happen here at the church, this happened here at home and this happened on the job. Some of you all know this part of the story and I won't go too much into it but I got frustrated at home because I'm moving too fast and I ended up, unfortunately, having an affair. The worst thing that I could ever do in my life, have this affair. And I believe that was the beginning of my downfall because if I don't, I don't have this woman, then God is not going to even hear my prayers. Well, what happened was this, all of a sudden it's like God just started blowing on everything. And so the vice president, he leaves. This person who's over our mortgage division, he leaves. This person over insurance leaves. Our main office administrator, she leaves. I didn't realize how much she actually ran the office. Then this other one's operations manager leaves. It's like this happened, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. Everything's happening. Lord, what's going on? Well, the Lord was trying to tell me, Corey, you know good. And so I'm gonna deal with you and I'm not gonna deal with you the way that I deal with regular lay people. No, because here you are supposed to be a pastor and I got something for you. Remember guys, people who teach, they are under a stricter condemnation when they fail and I fail hard. What happened was, here it is, people are gonna say, well, Corey, what happened to you? Why did you go to prison? What happened? Here's what happened. Because all these things were going on and I'm taking my eye off the ball. I said, you know what? I'm not going to let this business fold. So I took money from this guy's account, covered the office expenses and when fees or commissions would come back in, I'd put it back in their account. Now it may take a month or so for it to come back in but in the meantime, they need a statement and I would give them a statement that said they have this when they really didn't have that because in my thought pattern, no harm, no foul, they're gonna get their money back, right? I didn't have permission to do that, obviously, and the government does frown on that. Well, the federal statute that I violated was the federal mail fraud statute, Title 18, section 1341, mail fraud, to send a fraudulent statement through the mail. Well, it was my first time. Even though I grew up rough in some bad neighborhoods, I actually never had a crime on my jacket before I got caught one time with one of the kids stealing some juice out the store but they just call my mother, I mean, I got a weapon, right? So nothing in my, I'm saying in my jacket, that's how best prison talk but no rap sheet, no priors. So I'm thinking I am going to get a year, two, three years maybe, three at the most, possibly probation. This is the part that really hurt me. When you're doing well, people like you. When you've got money, people like you. When I say we had money, we had money. I could take this card. I could buy every last one of you guys on here. I can buy you, I don't know, a microphone. I can buy you a camera. I can get you set up with your YouTube channel. I can send you a, we were a millionaire. And all that, when you have that, people want to talk to you. They want to be your friend. Hey, brother Corey, can you help, can you this, can you that? Well, as I'm going before the court and I'm asking, hey, can you all just come in and just, just support me? They didn't. It's amazing how trials not only show you who you are, but it shows you who they are as well. And what God did was God got rid of everybody who otherwise did, who I would not have gotten rid of. He got rid of them for me, I believe. People who I did not need in my life. Now, I won't tell you who the person is because I've had a couple of different pastors, a few. But on the stand, he's hearing these things about me. Matter of fact, people from the other church, not the, and somebody will say, is it Tony Evans? No, it's not Tony Evans. People from the other church, they hear about this. No, I'm sorry, they haven't heard about it. And he's there as a character witness, but he's hearing all of these things because you know the government is going to say that you're the worst thing since Saddam Hussein and Satan. And so he's hearing these things and he tells the court. This is my pastor who said I was like the son to him. And you all are going to be the first people to hear this. I haven't told this story in a while. He tells the judge, your honor. And that's my character witness. Hearing these things about him, this is not the quarry minor that I've come to know. And so I think the best thing for him, redemption for him would be for you to give him the maximum amount that the law allows. Oh, I was floored. Because I didn't hear that right. You're telling, you're my former pastor, what am I past at the time, my former pastor, my mentor, and this guy was, when I say sharp with the word, sharp with the word, you're telling the court to give me the maximum. The court's looking for any excuse to give me any kind of lenient sentence. And you're telling them to give me the maximum. So what did the judge do? Well, if your character witness, this pastor, this guy who says, you were like the son to him, tells you, I should give you the maximum, then I'll give you the maximum. No one gets the maximum on a plea deal, me. So I'm devastated. I can't be angry because I'm too devastated right now to even know to be angry. Where do they send me? Not some, you all think that prison is cushy, fed at the federal prison system is cushy. No, it ain't, it's not club fed anymore. They send me to what's called Bloody Beaumont. I don't know what Beaumont's like right now, but then, horrible, horrible. We could, when I left, we couldn't even wear a still towed boots on the compound anymore because they have stomped out. When I say stomped out, take their boots and stomped out guards. Now it's okay to stomped out an inmate, but when you stomped on a guard, that's a problem. A whole lot of stabbings, a whole lot of killings. One guy killed a guard to get his keys to go into another locked room to kill an inmate because they had a beef over a few stamps. Stamps was money. That's why I say when guys sit and talk to me like, I'm not that guy, I haven't been through that, but you don't know what I've been through. And to survive that because they're gonna play with you, they're gonna mess with you. They're gonna test your manhood or take your manhood. If y'all know what I'm talking about, try not to be too graphic. And so I'm there and I'm like, Lord, why? Why me? All the thing I messed up, but why me? I shouldn't, come on, God, what's wrong with you? God, you're supposed to be God. My father, this what I get? I know I messed up, but come on. There are guys in here that have done all this other stuff and they got five years, two years, but I get 20. No, what am I gonna be when I get out of this? Come on, God. So what did I do? I said, you know what? I'm going to just, Lord, you're telling me something. Clearly something that I wasn't hearing. Now you've got me. You have literally, literally a captive audience. When he puts you flat on your back, that's cause all you can do is look up to him. And that's what I did. I spent more time with him. And this is where I'm getting to the scripture. I spent more time with God. I understood God. I understood what he was about. He was not my genie. He was not the person that was going to make everything right for me. Cause if that's the case then everybody would be flocking to God. You, as he says, you didn't come to me because of who I am. You came here because of what you could, what you can get from me. Well, I didn't want to seek his hand anymore. I wanted to seek his face. And so I stood there. Now all the while I'm thinking I got a chance to win my case because, and here's a little technicality and it doesn't make me innocent. Just mean that I wasn't necessarily totally guilty of the charge. Sounds funny. Because when I sent those statements, I sent those statements by a local courier, not a FedEx or UPS because if they go out of state then it makes it a federal case. So I didn't use the US mails and I didn't use FedEx or UPS. I used a local courier and had the statement from them. An affidavit signed from them. And also an affidavit from my attorney saying that she didn't investigate. Of course, she turned around and rescinded that. But I'm thinking I've got a shot to get my case to be tossed out. I have hope on that. But I'll never forget the day that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals denied it. You know, you ain't getting out. This is clear. Because I knew God had something better. There still needed to be some growth. And it couldn't be that I got out of prison because of something that I did. Because who would get credit? Me. But it had to be a move of God to bring me out. And so that's what happened. One of my favorite stories in the Bible is the story of Joseph. How he, now Joseph wasn't the greatest of guys and he hadn't really committed any crime of the fact that he was a bit braggadocious and arrogant. And so he needed to be seasoned and taught. And I remember this time where Joseph was asking one of the men when you get out, tell the king, remember me. And I used to pray, Lord, remember me. Remember me, Lord, remember me. And it's like he wouldn't. One thing happened. My mother passed away. One thing happened, guys. I stopped asking God to release me. Yeah, my kids are at home growing up without daddy. I talk to them over the phone. My wife's there holding on and things are tough. I mean, from what she went through to have everything lose the cars, lose the house and have a pickup and survive on her own. But let me tell you what got us through. What the young lady was asking about was about faith. God did not stop the bad things, the repossession, the foreclosure, them having to scrimp and scrounge for some money. My mother passing away. Me having to do all this time in some horrible places in some horrible conditions. Some of you all don't know about, you're talking about loose the chains. No, most of you have not ever had chains around you being shackled up or confined to this little room and you're sticking right beside your toilet with another inmate or in the room by yourself being in solitaire or being in the chute. Not a good picture, not a good lifestyle but God was working on me and God was teaching me and he was growing me. And do you know that in that moment, I felt the most love from God ever. Not when I was up there and had money. That's not when I knew he was God to me. I knew he was God but when it really resonated when I'm there and it's just he and I, it's just me and him, I'm sorry, alone. And I can read my Bible and I can pray. So what does faith do? There's one song and I'd probably go ahead and play it because, and I may get the copyright strike but it's not coming from the computer, you can just hear it in the background. But the song by Marvin Sapp, my testimony. So glad I made it. I can't listen to the song and not cry because I know what he's done. I can testify what he's done for me because if he gave me one year and I got out, I'd be the same. But faith, the getting through part, it's the being with him while you're going through it. Are you with me? So no faith doesn't protect you from COVID. You can think it is, you can think it doesn't and then once you get it, then what happens to your faith? You can know faith doesn't keep you from losing money because when you do, now what happens to your faith? Your faith can't be based on the things that God gives you. It has to be based on God who you can have. I don't know if anybody's hearing this but if you want 2022 to be successful spiritually, you need to just focus on God and whatever you give me, God, I don't care what it is. And I mean me, cause we say it, we're good at saying it. You know what they say, a pair of lips would say anything. We're good at saying it but will you mean it? One thing I can say, the one thing the Lord can testify on me, God can testify on my behalf is that no matter how bad it got, I still, I still trust him. And I'm laying in my bunk bed in prison and when that lady called my name, to tell me that you're going home, we need your wife's address and phone number. Cause we're getting ready to get you up out of here. And I had time left. You can't tell me, you can't tell me what God won't do. You can't sell me on anything. I know who brought me to the dance or who's taking me home, amen? And so I'm telling you, if you want a successful 2022, you may have some things that you don't get. You might not get that car, that job but if you get more time with him, cause what do they say? Who is this man who even the winds and the seal bay? I know who he is. The one who delivered me out of that prison cell. What does he say? Let me give you this passage and we'll go ahead and end. I want you to see the passage says in Galatians 6, 9 and let us not grow weary in doing good for in due season, if we do not give up, we will reap if we do not give up. End due season, guys, what that means is not when you think it's your time for the season, not when you think it's time but in end due season in his season, when he knows you're ready, you shall reap your reward. Is it going to be a car? Probably not. Is it going to be a new husband or new wife? Maybe, is it going to be all your bills paid? I don't know, but you know, whatever you're going to reap, you know whose hand it's going to be attached to. It's going to be attached to him. So do this for yourself. Be faithful and mean it and watch 2022 be a blessing for you. Amen.