While the earth remains, seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”
Embracing Seasons: Trusting God's Timing
About this episode
Dr. Jerry Grillo joins Philip Cameron for a conversation that crackles with prophetic insight on faith, divine timing, and the courage to step into impossibility. Drawing on the story of Israel crossing the Jordan River at flood stage, Dr. Grillo unpacks why God deliberately positions His people at the edge of the impossible — not to discourage them, but to reveal that "you cannot cross into your possession by yourself." He introduces a striking image: "Your seed is a photograph of your persuasion of tomorrow," connecting the act of sowing with a deep, settled conviction that the future is better than today. Weaving together Genesis, Ecclesiastes 3, and the Hebrew concept of Kairos time entering Kronos time, Dr. Grillo explains how every season — dark or bright — carries a hidden blessing. He challenges believers to stop spectating from the sidelines and step into the game, warning that wilderness protocol will never produce promised-land possession. The tape-measure illustration lands hard: measuring God against your circumstances is the surest way to miss what He is doing. Whether you are a pastor staring at a building you cannot yet afford or a believer stuck in a season of pause, this episode delivers a coaching-level word on trusting God's timing. Explore more of Dr. Grillo's teaching at drjerrygrillo.com.
Part of our Faith collection of conversations.
Quotes worth sharing
“The seed is a photograph of my persuasion of tomorrow. The three greatest words in the Bible came out of Paul's mouth: I am persuaded. Those are the three most powerful words — I am persuaded — because you will never move beyond your own persuasions. Your seed is a photograph of your persuasion. Your seed, my seed, is a voice that my future is better than my today.”
“You can't walk into the palace with peasant protocol. Wilderness protocol will not increase you in promised possession. What you required in the wilderness, you will need differently in possession.”
“If you can have faith not to measure me but to trust me in the impossibilities, I will cut this curse off all the way back to the beginning. Before Adam fell, I had already redeemed you. Before Adam sinned, I had already made you a deliverer. I had already blessed this thing, paid for this thing, set this enemy up for defeat. They're already talking about you. All I need you to do is put your foot in the water.”
More by Dr. Jerry Grillo
What's Discussed
Dr. Jerry Grillo, pastor of 180 Church in Hickory, North Carolina, delivers a high-voltage teaching on divine seasons and faith-driven action. Anchoring his message in Israel's flood-stage Jordan crossing (Joshua 3) and Ecclesiastes 3, he explains that God engineers impossible pauses — 40-year wildernesses, impassable rivers — to strip believers of self-reliance and wilderness protocol. He introduces the concept of Kairos entering Kronos: God's timeless kingdom breaking into human chronology. His core challenge: a seed sown is a photograph of your persuasion that tomorrow is better than today. He warns that spectator Christianity produces wilderness deaths, while those who put their foot in the water trigger God's supernatural intervention — cutting the river off all the way back to the city of Adam.
- Seed as Photograph of Persuasion
- I Am Persuaded: Three Most Powerful Words
- Life Responds to You, Not Happens to You
- Kairos Time Entering Kronos Seasons
- The Tape Measure and Measuring God
- Jordan at Flood Stage: Staring at Impossibility
- Lightening the Load for Promised-Land Possession
- Coaching vs. Cheerleading in the Church
Scripture in this episode
For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven:
Episode Transcript
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Intro
Philip:Here on Daily Faith, my name is Philip Cameron, and I am thrilled to have you with us today. We are so excited. We have Dr. Jerry Grillo with us today. I'm telling you now, this man speaks, lives, moves in the realm of faith, and I've had guys speak on faith in my life. I've been doing this for 50 — more than 50 years — and I've had a lot of folks that speak, and they speak the jargon of faith, but those that speak the seed of faith, that's a totally different thing altogether.
Philip:So we just want you to know, this part of what we do in our ministry is we have an outreach called the Orphan's Hands, which is primarily — in the last 33 years we've been building homes for young men and women that are put on the streets when they are, you know, finished at 16, they're put on the street. And we've built a fabulous place called the River Village, and these kids have come to us and we put them back in school and we get them educated, and all the same time we're sharing the gospel with them and the power of the gospel. And so what's happened to these kids is they've become sons and daughters, and then once they become sons and daughters, they actually become missionaries.
Philip:So this last year — long before Ukraine happened — part of the DNA of our ministry was to feed orphans and feed widows and rebuild houses. I mean, that's what we did for a decade, three decades before Ukraine. But when Ukraine happened, our kids mobilized to start caring for the refugees of Ukraine, so they've been doing this for the last year and have had some amazing things. I'm sure we'll see video in a moment. But listen how God connects things, and this is what I want to talk to you — I believe the Holy Ghost is going to talk to you today about this. Everything you do now is connected to the next step. He changes us from glory to glory. We are in a process of development. Where you are today is not where you were six months ago, or it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be. You've got to be pressing on the upward way.
Philip:You've got to be pushing forward to expand your spirit and your vision and your purpose in life. So what happened was — a pastor — the earthquake took place just over a month ago in Turkey. The devastation is beyond anything you can imagine. 500,000 buildings have been destroyed. 1.6 million people are homeless right this minute. 20 million people affected. It has gone for hundreds of miles, flattening. Andrew called me the other day and showed me a city of 1.6 million people that is 95% destroyed. They have excavated only a fraction of these buildings that are flattened, and how they build their buildings is concrete — they pour a concrete floor, so it's this thick, a concrete floor, the whole sides of the building, then they'll build the next walls and they'll pour another concrete floor. So what's happening is when the earthquake happens, all the force combines and flattens. So they have found 50,000 bodies so far — 50,000 bodies — and they're only a fraction of the way into the excavation of the 500,000 buildings that are destroyed.
Philip:It's beyond belief. So listen how God works. A pastor in Istanbul has a wife from Moldova who knows about the Orphan's Hands, what we've been doing in Ukraine. And they contacted us and said, please, you people seem to have compassion, can you help us? Andrew had just come back from being in Moldova. A week later he was back in Turkey. A team drove one of our vans all the way down from Moldova, right down through Bulgaria, Romania, Bulgaria, into Turkey, and they've just been this last week buying tents, assembling and erecting tents, buying food and clothes. And so we are just — we're going to show you some of that today, and I think you'll be amazed.
Philip:Before I want to — in this video I'm going to show you just now, you're gonna see a blue van and a white van. Those vans were bought for us by a church in Alabama. Listen now, they sowed that seed a year ago. They gave us an amazing offering to allow us to buy those vans, and my fear was that Russia would invade Moldova — and I'll talk about that in a few minutes as well — and we had to get these vans to transport our kids out of the country. So the seed that they gave to rescue our kids has continued to grow, has fed people in Ukraine for the whole year. Thousands upon thousands of people have been cared for by the stuff that we've bought and carried to them in those vans. So what I'm telling you is the seed that you sow never dies, it just moves on to the next stage and multiplies and grows.
Philip:So one of those vans is in Turkey right now because the seed is continuing to grow. So I encourage you today, be faithful in your seed, because it never ever leaves your life. Watch this video, look for those two vans, you'll see what God has done through faithfulness. Watch this.
A year ago their world was a happy place. They had jobs, their kids were in school. The corner shop sold bread and cheese and everything else. Their world was just like yours. Until, through the mist and snow, monsters came. The tracks rattled on the ice-packed fields. The guns pointed towards the world they lived in. It takes less than a second to obliterate everything that they had spent their lives building. There are no accurate numbers of how many have died. The end is nowhere in sight.
We have been in Ukraine for years. From the first explosion we were involved. We took this assault personally. The Orphan's Hands could not stand on the sidelines and do nothing. Our amazing group of young men and women did the unimaginable. Once again they drove into a war zone. Once orphans themselves, they have felt personally the hand of grace and redemption. To go to this devastated world seems to them as normal as having a meal or going to church. They drove for hours, unable to stop and stretch their legs, as inches on each side of the vehicles were live mines. Every few miles they were stopped at checkpoints by nervous soldiers. They were running along the line between the Russians and Ukrainians.
Our team finally reached Kherson, a recently liberated city still held in the grip of desperation. They had brought food, wood-burning stoves that will save lives in the bitter deadly cold that is to come. They brought blankets that to many is the only barrier between survival and death. On a dreary day, within the sound of guns and bombs, the most astonishing thing took place. The rescued became the rescuers. Hundreds waited in the rain, shuffling along in a line that ended up in love — a smile, bread, fish, and the words of care from the heart of the redeemed.
As they traveled they came across bombed-out villages, scarred by the strife of bullets, destroyed by the landmines of death. Their water, electricity, and everything else was gone. But the wooden stove had become the guardian against the deadly cold. We know it is impossible for most to even imagine this world. But by giving and praying together for this unfolding tragedy, we can join our hearts and hands to bring the hope that was sent to Earth by the living God. If it were us, we would wait in line hoping that someone somewhere was thinking of us. We must go back. Will you send us? Every gift you give allows us to be his hands.
Philip:So those vans that you saw in that video — one of them is now in Turkey doing the same thing there. The seed never dies, it always continues. And I ask you to help us. If you could, please help us in the Ukraine outreach. The simple address is real simple: PO Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee, 37716. Your giving right now will go into your future. Your giving will allow us to continue caring for these families. At the same time we are now in Turkey, and my son has been erecting tents, and they're going to show some video — just roll over my images.
Philip:I'm talking to you — this earthquake has devastated beyond anything we can ever imagine, and we're helping in that tent village you're seeing just now. My kids were there putting up tents at that very place. And what's funny is some parts are very, very cold and then some places it's almost tropical. And so that's Kathleen, one of our girls, standing at a tent with blankets and stuff on the floor, waiting for families to come. All of the families in this tent village are in government buildings and they'll soon be put into these tents. I'm hoping by today they'll be in there, but this crisis is facing us and we didn't ask for this battle, but God is going to provide the need. So if you can help us, if you would like to help us in Turkey, just say here's a gift for Turkey. And that blue van is a seed that keeps on giving, and your loving care to help these families would be a great help.
Philip:So if you could today — I am so excited to have Dr. Jerry Grillo with me today, and I just feel it as a word from the Lord for your passing, Jerry. God bless you. Thank you for being with me today.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:God bless you. I'm honored, I'm honored, my friend. You're one of my besties. Every time I watch your show I get all convicted. You ever find a life like yours where you didn't pick the battles? It seems like the battles just try to call you up every day.
Seed as Photograph of Persuasion
Philip:That is the truth. That is the truth. Every time I talk to you — you know, there's certain people on the earth that you can have conversation with, and there's people that stimulate creativity in your thinking. You're one of those. When I start talking I always seem to have a spiritual, divine revelation. So iron sharpens iron, you know.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Revelation is permission. If God gives you a revelation of something, he just gave you permission to have it. Well, so — not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord. The seed is a photograph. When you were talking about the seed, I was just thinking the seed is a photograph of my persuasion of tomorrow.
Philip:That is so true.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:The three greatest words in the Bible came out of Paul's mouth: I am persuaded. Those are the three most powerful words — I am persuaded — because you will never move beyond your own persuasions. I can teach all day long, all day. But if I can't change what you are persuaded to think, I can't change your life. Persuasion is everything. Your seed is a photograph of your persuasion. Your seed, my seed, is a voice that my future is better than my today.
I Am Persuaded: Three Most Powerful Words
Philip:That is the truth.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Your persuasion — I am persuaded he is able to keep what I've committed. If I sow a seed, if I can activate myself and see — you have to have a revelation. It ain't just — it's not about just giving. It's a revelation that something in the kingdom of God, if it leaves my hand, it doesn't leave my life. It enters my future with my persuasion.
Life Responds to You, Not Happens to You
Dr. Jerry Grillo:So listen to me, all you that have watched Daily Faith. Listen to me. The worst question you could ever be asked is, how is life treating you? I was sitting in a store the other day and an old man came up and said, how's life treating you? Worst question you could ever be asked. Why? Because life is not deciding how to treat you. Life's not happening to you, life's responding to you.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:That is the truth. The battle is coming, you didn't pick it. This is why — I was praying the other day, I asked the Lord, I want to be anointed. He said most people that ask me to be anointed want to be seen. They don't want to be anointed, because to be anointed you have to be willing to fight the battle. The anointing is not about the pulpit. The anointing is about carrying the favor of God for the plan of God. It's about Goliath. It's not about the throne. David showed up, it wasn't his battle. You know, God will put you — listen to me — God will put you in the most impossible places, and then he will make you stare at the impossibility and put a pause in a season. Seasons are God's servants.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:There's a revelation — your seed will help create a season of harvest, but seasons are created by God. Hell doesn't create your season, God creates seasons. According to Genesis 8:22, as long as the earth remains, seedtime and harvest — God made seasons back in Noah's day. God decides to make seasons. Every season of your life, whether it's a good season or a bad season, according to Ecclesiastes, to everything there is a season, a time and a purpose. So every season in your life is Kairos entering Kronos with the perpetuity of a blessing.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Philip, if you look up in Ecclesiastes, Solomon says everything is beautiful in its season. You ever read that? Everything is beautiful in its season. That means every season, whether it's dark, whether it's heavy, or whether it's good, God hid something in it. And if you look up in the Hebrew, the word time, the word season, the word time, and the word purpose — in Ecclesiastes 3:1 — the word season there in the Hebrew is Kairos. Kairos means a divine entry. God has a divine entry to every time. Time there is Chronos. So my today is God's yesterday. We're living in God's history.
Kairos Time Entering Kronos Seasons
Dr. Jerry Grillo:The kingdom of God moves back on us as I move forward. The quantum physics of it is that when I enter into today, I've already entered into God's yesterday. The kingdom's finished. The kingdom doesn't measure itself.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:This is the worst tool you will ever have in the kingdom of God. You know what this is? A tape measure. This is your problem. Because when you are facing impossibilities, you better not pull out the measuring stick and try to measure God in a season of being paused. Because if you try to measure God, you will forget God is trying to do it with you and get you through that flood-stage impossibility. So God sets pauses in everybody's life. He puts the pause in their life — 40 years they're wandering in the wilderness — and then he puts them at the Jordan River in the season of flood stage, where you can't walk across it, you can't swim across it. And then they've got to sit there. It's a different season, they're gonna wait to cross, taking off their shoes and wade across.
The Tape Measure and Measuring God
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Why does God allow us to get to the Jordans of our life when the blessed thing is at flood stage? Why? Let me tell you — you're staring, and you're staring, and you're looking, and a pastor's saying, it's that stinking river. I could buy that property if I had the money. It's that stinking river. If I had the problem — if I had the land — if the seed's coming, and God says keep looking at it. And here's why, here's why. Number one, here's why: God wants you to know you cannot cross into your possession by yourself. You're going to need God's help to get it done. And God says I'm gonna give you a revelation. He said I'm gonna cut this thing off for you, but you stare at that thing for three days. You look at it for three days.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Number two, I think God wanted them to sit there. I think he wanted them to take time to recollect, to remember, to recall, to review who he was in their wilderness. He was a cloud by day, he was the fire by night. He said I need you to recollect. I need you to review. I need you to remember — if it hadn't been for God who was on your side, you would never have gone 40 years on just enough, barely enough. He said but now I've got you at a pause, because just on the other side of that river is your possession.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:And also what God used that three-day pause for was for them to lighten the load, to get rid of all the junk. Every pot, man — if I'm gonna walk through that river in flood stage, I'm gonna get rid of every pot and every pan that I don't need, everything I've collected over 40 years of wandering. It doesn't matter when you're wandering around, but when you're getting into the promised land, you get rid of your junk. Get rid of the junk you're carrying and lighten your load to get you there. Come on, you can't carry yesterday's manna into tomorrow's blessing. You can't carry today's word into — you can't walk into the palace with peasant protocol.
Philip:Say that again. Say that again.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:You can't walk into the palace with peasant protocol. Wilderness protocol will not increase you in promised possession. What you required in the wilderness, you will need differently in possession, because in the wilderness you had no enemies. The enemy in the wilderness is you. The enemy in your season of favor is the Giants. So the battle gets bigger, and now you've got to know I cannot try to measure God. I cannot use my checking account to figure out God's plan. I can't look at what's in my hand and decide how to fulfill God's assignment. God says you're gonna have to be willing to put your foot in the water and trust that I will cut off the flood when you get in it.
Jordan at Flood Stage: Staring at Impossibility
Dr. Jerry Grillo:And within the camp, many people sit on the sidelines. Within the group, with the children of Israel, you have people that were just going along, going along to get there. Then you had the Calebs that said to Joshua — he says, man, you've been faithful, any piece of land you want. He says I'm gonna kill them Giants. I'm gonna kill them. You know, my anointing is to kill the Giants. But you have to — God doesn't anoint a man, he really anoints a plan. Then he finds a man to favor. And when you're in the plan of God, you're in his anointing. If you choose another plan, God will find another man, because God's got one plan.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:And most Christians — I don't know why this is — but most Christians sit on the sideline and watch. They'll get on your daily program every week, they'll get on my show every morning. I've tracked people who've been with me for eight years, ten years, twelve years — not one time did they ever click a button and sow a seed. Not one time did they ever call me up. They just sit and spectate. And God says that's the wilderness people. They will die there. They will never leave the couch of comfort and complacency.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:I ain't talking to those Christians on Daily Faith. I'm talking to you, the people who say I do not want to live in the wilderness. I am tired of sitting on the couch talking about the promise. I want to possess my possessions. Those people have to put their foot in the water, because he said when the priests put their foot in the water, I will go up river and cut this thing off. And look what he did, just to be creative — where does God cut the river off? At the city of Adam. Of all the places, he stops at the city of Adam to say this: if you can have faith not to measure me but to trust me in the impossibilities, I will cut this curse off all the way back to the beginning. Before Adam fell, I had already redeemed you. Before Adam sinned, I had already made you a deliverer. I had already blessed this thing, paid for this thing, set this enemy up for defeat. They're already talking about you. All I need you to do is put your foot in the water.
Lightening the Load for Promised-Land Possession
Dr. Jerry Grillo:And I fear how many Christians never sow a seed, never get involved, they just sit in the stands. Here's why, Philip, here's why — we built the pulpit into cheerleading and not coaching.
Philip:Cheerleading — listen, we've got two minutes left and you just opened up a can of worms.
Coaching vs. Cheerleading in the Church
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Listen, we've got to get out of here. Lean into coaching. You need a coach — why? Somebody's trying to train you to get in the game and win. But if you sit in the stands and live on that feeling and let somebody keep cheering you on, cheering you on, it'll never correct you, never try you, never say well done, never possess your possessions.
Philip:Well, that is the truth. Jerry, every time you come on you speak into my life personally as well. I know people watching — I know that there are pastors right now that are looking at their building. I don't know why, when you said that, it leapt in me, but there's a building on the other side of the Jordan.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:Yeah, and God said if you will stand and get the anointing — they took that ark and they stood in the flood. They carried the anointing into the flood, and that was the trigger point that God cut off the source of the storm.
Philip:I feel like there's a cut-off anointing on this show today. God's about to cut some things off. I feel it as well. Dr. Jerry Grillo is pastor of 180 Church — you see it on his shirt right there, 180, see it — it's a turnaround church. And if you're anywhere near it in Hickory, North Carolina, you've got to go and see him. If you're a pastor, you need this man's teaching in your life. He has books and all kinds of resources that you need to get. It is very simple: DrJerryGrillo.com. And I want you to get a hold of him, and I believe that God will use him to speak, like he does for me. Very few people in my life speak into my life.
Philip:When you're fighting the battles that I fight every day, you need someone to come along and speak a supernatural word in your life, and Jerry, you do it every time. Thank you so much for being here, and I just can't wait to see you again. Every time I see your name on the run sheet for the day, I think, yes, something good is about to happen.
Dr. Jerry Grillo:We love you, Jerry. God bless you.
Philip:Thank you. Love you. Thank you. We'll see you again soon. Thank you. Listen, we need to pray with us and believe God with us for the challenges — you type of Jordans. I stand at a Jordan every day and think, Lord, help me get to the other side. And by God's help, if you'll stand with us, you're gonna see it take place. We love you. Thank you for watching Daily Faith today. We'll see you again, bye-bye.
For over 25 years the Cameron family has been changing the lives of orphans in Romania and Moldova — from providing running water, flushing toilets, and clean wells, to coal for heat, new windows, as well as food and clothing. They championed the physical needs of the orphans in these broken and desolate countries. Many of Moldova's orphans are saved from the horrors of trafficking through homes founded by the Camerons, and in the process orphans become daughters and sons. They come to know their heavenly Father and are forever changed by the love of Jesus.
God helped the Camerons lift these amazing young men and women out of darkness. Now, no longer orphans, they want to return and invade that very same darkness with the light of Jesus Christ. The Orphan's Hands equips these daughters and sons to become missionaries. Your monthly gift of $31 will allow us to rescue and take in more girls and boys, saving them from the hell of human trafficking. Your monthly partnership will allow us to care for those in the Orphan's Hands homes in Moldova and Ukraine. If you want to join Philip and Chrissy in taking care of these precious young people, please contact us today by calling 833-DAILY-FAITH. You can also give by going online to www.dailyfaith.tv, or by writing to Post Office Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee, 37716. So many lives depend on what we do. Thank you for loving the lost.
Common questions
What does Dr. Jerry Grillo mean when he says a seed is a 'photograph of your persuasion'?
Dr. Grillo explains that your seed is a visible declaration that you believe your future is better than your today. It's not just an act of giving — it's a revelation that when something leaves your hand, it doesn't leave your life; it enters your future carrying your persuasion that God is able to deliver on his promises.
Why does Dr. Grillo say God puts a 'pause' in people's lives, like the Israelites at the Jordan River?
Dr. Grillo says God uses those pauses for three reasons: first, to show you that you cannot cross into your possession on your own and need his help; second, to give you time to recollect and remember everything God did for you in the wilderness; and third, to get you to lighten your load — to shed the junk you've been carrying so you're ready to enter the promised land.
What's wrong with asking someone 'how is life treating you?' according to Dr. Grillo?
Dr. Grillo calls it the worst question you can be asked because it implies life is happening to you. His view is that life is not deciding how to treat you — life is responding to you. You are not a passive recipient of your circumstances.
What does Dr. Grillo mean when he says the church has turned the pulpit into cheerleading instead of coaching?
Dr. Grillo argues that cheerleading keeps people feeling good in the stands but never gets them into the game. A coach, by contrast, trains you to compete, corrects you, challenges you, and pushes you toward actually possessing your possessions — whereas a cheerleader just keeps affirming you without ever demanding anything of you.
Why did God cut off the Jordan River at the city of Adam, and what does Dr. Grillo say that means for believers today?
Dr. Grillo says God chose that specific location to send a message: if you trust him in the impossibilities rather than trying to measure him, he will cut the curse off all the way back to its origin. Before Adam ever fell, God had already redeemed you, already set your enemy up for defeat — all he asks is that you put your foot in the water first.
Topics
dr. jerry grillodivine seasonsjordan river faithkairos timeseed and persuasionpromised land180 church hickory nc