Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2: I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 2: I wanted to thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 1: Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope
Speaker 1: it gives your.
Speaker 2: Perspective to see God is moving in your life.
Speaker 1: Enjoy the message.
Speaker 2: I thought I would take a moment and just illustrate
Speaker 2: how sometimes where something shows up is not where it started.
Speaker 1: At.
Speaker 2: This sermon that you're here today came from a note
Speaker 2: that I made last year, and sometimes where something shows
Speaker 2: up is and where it starts. By the time you
Speaker 2: hear the sermon, it's already been hopefully in the process
Speaker 2: of me thinking about it for a long time, because
Speaker 2: I don't want to just think of something Saturday and
Speaker 2: say it on Sunday.
Speaker 1: I even realized that about about your life.
Speaker 2: You showed up today and I'll see you, but I
Speaker 2: don't really see what it took for you to get here,
Speaker 2: or you know, what is affecting your mind.
Speaker 1: As I preach, sometimes people will say that's the best
Speaker 1: sermon you ever preached.
Speaker 2: I'll say, that's just the best you ever listened. When
Speaker 2: they're good, but the sermon starts before it starts. I
Speaker 2: always tell the parking team, like, hey, help me out
Speaker 2: when people are coming in. Smile at them, wave at them,
Speaker 2: put them in a good mood. It'll make my job easier.
Speaker 2: Because the sermon starts before it starts. It starts before
Speaker 2: it starts, it starts checking in your kids, or starts.
Speaker 2: So make sure make sure that you get as good
Speaker 2: of a start as possible. And this time of year,
Speaker 2: we're so focused on new beginnings. But the longer you live,
Speaker 2: the less you really believe in new beginnings, and the
Speaker 2: cliches don't really comfort you in the same way or
Speaker 2: inspire you at the same level anymore. Knew you No, no,
Speaker 2: I didn't grow three inches. Yeah, you see me. You
Speaker 2: can't really get a new start to your story. What
Speaker 2: you can do is change the ending. And the only
Speaker 2: real way for you to affect the ending is to
Speaker 2: understand the starting place. Is very important that we understand
Speaker 2: the scripture that I read in the context of the times,
Speaker 2: because there would have been an outside gate, the outer
Speaker 2: wall of the city, with a gate for entrance and
Speaker 2: inner gate as a line of defense, and then this
Speaker 2: space between the gate where justice was supposed to be
Speaker 2: served negotiations happened, and people would buy and sell, And
Speaker 2: that was the space between the gates where the negotiations
Speaker 2: of life and the deliberations took place. But between the
Speaker 2: gates the realm of your decisions, the realm of your
Speaker 2: thought process, the space between what you see with your
Speaker 2: eyes and what you do in your life, what you
Speaker 2: hear with your ears, and how you act when you
Speaker 2: go home.
Speaker 1: That's space. That's where the battle is won and lost.
Speaker 2: Now, by the time the battle is won, there has
Speaker 2: already been significant work done. Nobody wins the Olympics at
Speaker 2: the race. They won the Olympics in the dark at
Speaker 2: four thirty. Where their success showed up is not where
Speaker 2: their success started. And usually if you see an issue
Speaker 2: in somebody's life, where it showed up is not where
Speaker 2: it started. It's the same with victories that it is
Speaker 2: with defeat. I told a story last week about my dad,
Speaker 2: and the reason I like to tell so many stories
Speaker 2: about my dad is because he's not here to correct them.
Speaker 1: I can tell him how I want to tell him.
Speaker 2: The one I told HI about him last week made
Speaker 2: him sound kind of bad, but I thought I would
Speaker 2: tell a good one about him. Now my dad was
Speaker 2: a good dad, especially if you compare him to the
Speaker 2: standard that he didn't have a dad to show him
Speaker 2: how to do it, and he was making.
Speaker 1: It up when he was doing it. He was just
Speaker 1: kind of he was winging it.
Speaker 2: And I have mad respect for that, because it's hard
Speaker 2: enough to be a dad when you've seen a dad.
Speaker 1: But he had to make it.
Speaker 2: Up, and so some of his tactics were not FDA approved.
Speaker 2: Some of his tactics were kind of street tactics. One
Speaker 2: time I told my mom I wanted to kill him. Yeah,
Speaker 2: my finest moment, I'll kill him. I want to kill him.
Speaker 2: And when he picked me up from school that day
Speaker 2: early dismissal picked me up from school and said he
Speaker 2: had two guns.
Speaker 1: In the back of the truck.
Speaker 2: I was going to get one and he was going
Speaker 2: to get one because he heard I wanted to kill
Speaker 2: him and if I didn't shoot, he was going to.
Speaker 2: I mean, that is not necessarily the type of parenting
Speaker 2: you hear about. I'm focused on the family. But he's
Speaker 2: doing him best he could and he didn't actually do it.
Speaker 2: He let me cry for ten minutes and think that
Speaker 2: he was going to do it. But I never said
Speaker 2: it again. One of his finest moments, though I don't
Speaker 2: know where he got the idea to do this, was
Speaker 2: when he began to talk to.
Speaker 1: Me about addiction. He begin to talk to me about addiction.
Speaker 2: Because his father committed suicide and had been a very
Speaker 2: mean drunk. His father's father had been an alcoholic, and
Speaker 2: somewhere along the line, he made the decision that I
Speaker 2: can't go back and rewrite how this story started in
Speaker 2: our bloodline, but I'm going to impart a vision to
Speaker 2: my son so that he might be the one to
Speaker 2: write a different ending. You can't create a new beginning,
Speaker 2: but you can write a new ending. That's what I'm
Speaker 2: trying to say. You can't change who wasn't there for you,
Speaker 2: but you can write a new ending. And maybe we
Speaker 2: should start this year not as an expectation of new beginnings,
Speaker 2: but new endings that from this point forward, I said,
Speaker 2: From this point forward, Paul said, I pressed toward the mark.
Speaker 2: This one thing I do forgetting what is behind me.
Speaker 2: There is no strength in what's behind me. I stretch
Speaker 2: toward what's ahead. I saw my dad, he would pull
Speaker 2: me a so even from like a really young age,
Speaker 2: like I was eight years old, and he would pull
Speaker 2: me aside and start talking to me about the dangers
Speaker 2: of alcoholism. Eight years old, and he would tell me
Speaker 2: my dad was a drunk, and his dad was a drunk,
Speaker 2: and his dad was drunk.
Speaker 1: He said, you could be the first verdict. It wasn't
Speaker 1: an alcoholic.
Speaker 2: He put it out there like a challenge to me,
Speaker 2: like you could go to the moon.
Speaker 1: You could be the first verdict. And I kind of
Speaker 1: liked that. I was only eight.
Speaker 2: I was eight. I don't know what he thought the
Speaker 2: kids would bringing to school in their juice boxes, Like
Speaker 2: what temptation he thought I was under.
Speaker 1: He could be the first verdict.
Speaker 2: And it got through to me even when I got
Speaker 2: a little older, I could be the first vertice. This
Speaker 2: is not a sermon about don't drink, by the way, Okay,
Speaker 2: I said, I want you to get all nervous like that,
Speaker 2: like I'm one of those preachers, because I have noticed
Speaker 2: a lot of the preachers who preach don't drink or
Speaker 2: eighty pounds overweight. So apparently they skipped all the verses
Speaker 2: about gluttony and okay, okay, you didn't come for all that.
Speaker 1: Let's get back to the scripture. Isaiah said that he
Speaker 1: will be.
Speaker 2: Is anybody leaving, I can't see very well back here,
Speaker 2: I'll stay there, okay, okay, a source of strength to
Speaker 2: him who turns back the battle at the gate. In
Speaker 2: other words, God will strengthen the will of the one
Speaker 2: who makes the decision. It stops here. I'm taking my
Speaker 2: place in the gate to say that I cannot affect
Speaker 2: how the story started.
Speaker 1: But my dad said, if.
Speaker 2: You really want to be the first verdict to beat this,
Speaker 2: you got to beat it in your blood because if
Speaker 2: you taste it, you're gonna like it. So I want
Speaker 2: to challenge you, just don't ever fight it. He was
Speaker 2: trying to get me to see that sometimes the best
Speaker 2: place to fight the battle is before it ever begins.
Speaker 2: To draw a line and say, I'm not even going there.
Speaker 2: I'm not even playing with this. This is not going
Speaker 2: to be a part of my children's legacy. I can't
Speaker 2: control what it's been until now, but from this stay forward.
Speaker 2: By the grace of God. I am a new creation
Speaker 2: in Christ, and I'm gonna beat it in the bloodline.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna make a stand for the next generation. There
Speaker 2: are going to be some changes at the gate.
Speaker 1: The place to beat it.
Speaker 2: Is before it begins, because if you let it in,
Speaker 2: you've already let it win.
Speaker 1: It's like this in marriage.
Speaker 2: By the time you let resentment in, you've already let
Speaker 2: bitterness win.
Speaker 1: It's like this in our thought process.
Speaker 2: By the time we let worry in, we've already let
Speaker 2: anxiety win. And this is the year we no longer
Speaker 2: fight the devil on his level, because Isaiah said, there
Speaker 2: is a strategy you can turn back.
Speaker 1: The battle at the gate.
Speaker 2: It's a powerful thought. Sometimes people make fun of me
Speaker 2: and we go out to eat. They say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: I forgot you don't drink. Yeah, fine, judging you drink
Speaker 2: what you want to drink. I drink fourteen diet Mountain
Speaker 2: News today. I got no judgment for your liquid consumption.
Speaker 2: I's got a different drug. What I'm saying is this
Speaker 2: is a decision I made. It is a standard that
Speaker 2: I have set. And the problem in Isaiah is they
Speaker 2: is that the leaders who should have been setting the
Speaker 2: standard for the people have lowered the standard and left
Speaker 2: the people vulnerable.
Speaker 1: This has no relevance to our modern day. Of course,
Speaker 1: the Bible is an ancient book.
Speaker 2: In fact, Isaiah says he gives a picture of it.
Speaker 2: He says that the leaders who are supposed to be
Speaker 2: sitting in their seat of judgment rendering decisions of virtue
Speaker 2: and justice. Verse seven, He says, they stagger from wine
Speaker 2: and reel from beer, the priest and the prophets.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't this make church more interesting?
Speaker 2: The priests and the prophets stagger from beer and are
Speaker 2: befuddled with wine. Y'all, I have a hard enough time
Speaker 2: making sense when I'm up here sober. Can you imagine
Speaker 2: what I would sound like if I had of you?
Speaker 1: He said.
Speaker 2: They stagger when seeing visions. They cannot see correctly, so
Speaker 2: how can they leave correctly? They stumble when rendering decisions.
Speaker 2: They are the ones who are supposed to calibrate the
Speaker 2: calling of the nation, and yet they are so drunk.
Speaker 2: Maybe it's a metaphor. Maybe it's not just that they're
Speaker 2: drunk on alcohol. Maybe they're drunk on pride. Maybe they're
Speaker 2: intoxicated with power, maybe a self aggrandizement that has caused
Speaker 2: the leaders of this day to begin to weigh self
Speaker 2: interest in a different scale than the best interests of
Speaker 2: the people.
Speaker 1: And yet Isaiah says something.
Speaker 2: That rings true today, that God will be a source
Speaker 2: of strength to those who turn back.
Speaker 1: The battle at the gate. Notice, he says that no
Speaker 1: matter who sits in the gate.
Speaker 2: God is still the source of strength to those who
Speaker 2: turn back the battle at the gate. It would be
Speaker 2: worth answering the question, who is the source of your strength?
Speaker 2: I haven't decided it by now. You need to decide
Speaker 2: it really quickly, because if the source of your strength
Speaker 2: is who you're sitting beside, you will live a very
Speaker 2: disappointed life. If the source of your strength is a
Speaker 2: number at the bottom of your balance sheet, something will
Speaker 2: hit your life so hard that you can't buy your
Speaker 2: way out of it, and you will find out really
Speaker 2: quickly that net worth is a terrible place to put
Speaker 2: your sense of self value. If the source of your
Speaker 2: strength is how people look at you, or treat you,
Speaker 2: or think about you. If the source of your strength
Speaker 2: on any given day is the condition of your health,
Speaker 2: you will always be susceptible to the elements. And so
Speaker 2: Isaiah says, he will be a spirit of justice to
Speaker 2: the one who sits in judgment, and a source of
Speaker 2: strength to those who turn back the battle at the gate.
Speaker 2: To make God the source of your strength means that
Speaker 2: you depend on him as one Psalmist said, you lift
Speaker 2: your eyes to the hills. From whence cometh your health.
Speaker 2: Your health cometh from the Lord, the maker of heaven
Speaker 2: and earth. And he will not suffer your foot to
Speaker 2: be moved. The Lord which keepeth thee will not slumber
Speaker 2: nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is
Speaker 2: your shade upon your right hand. And the someone not
Speaker 2: smite thee by day nor.
Speaker 1: The moon by night.
Speaker 2: He will preserve your soul even Forevermore. To know that
Speaker 2: all your help comes from God, that all your hope
Speaker 2: is in Jesus. That all of your help comes not
Speaker 2: from the right, not from the left, not from the north,
Speaker 2: not from the south, not from the economy, not from
Speaker 2: the job touch. Somebody say not you, God is my source.
Speaker 2: Now go ahead and clap right now. If you know
Speaker 2: God's got your bet. In fact, stand up on your
Speaker 2: feet and shout about it. If God is your source
Speaker 2: in every season of your life, in every famine, I
Speaker 2: have a friend named Jesus.
Speaker 1: He is my source.
Speaker 2: I am so tempted to preach on this part of
Speaker 2: the verse that I.
Speaker 1: Almost forgot what came before it.
Speaker 2: Isaiah said, in that day, the Lord Almighty will be
Speaker 2: a glorious crown, a beautiful wreath for the remnant of
Speaker 2: his people. Now, what is a wreath and God is
Speaker 2: a remnant besides a Christmas decoration. A wreath symbolizes victory,
Speaker 2: and he is preaching victory to.
Speaker 1: People who are about to experience defeat.
Speaker 2: He's preaching, of course, about the impending as Syrian evasion
Speaker 2: to the to the northern territory of Samaria, the crown
Speaker 2: jewel of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, set on a
Speaker 2: ferral valley.
Speaker 1: He's speaking to them about their potential, and he's.
Speaker 2: Telling them how their protection is gone, and so now
Speaker 2: they're going to face a season of defeat. And in
Speaker 2: the same breath that he promises to be a source
Speaker 2: of strength, he warns them of a coming defeat. But
Speaker 2: yet he speaks about victory in the context of defeat.
Speaker 2: He says, in that day, the Lord Almighty will be
Speaker 2: a glorious crown, a beautiful wreath for the remnant of
Speaker 2: his people. God said he will be a wreath for
Speaker 2: the remnant. The wreath symbolizes victory. The remnant represents what's left.
Speaker 2: God always has a remnant, no matter what you've lost
Speaker 2: in your life or who walked away from you. God
Speaker 2: always leaves a remnant. No matter how wicked this world
Speaker 2: gets or how dark the times that we live in
Speaker 2: may seem to be. God always has a remnant in
Speaker 2: every office. God has a remnant in every church. God
Speaker 2: has a remnant in every city, and every generation. God
Speaker 2: has a remnant. God always has a remnant. There's always
Speaker 2: a little bit of oil in the house, even if
Speaker 2: you feel like you're starving to death. God always has
Speaker 2: a remnant. There's always a little boy with a lunch.
Speaker 2: If you call him forward and put it in the
Speaker 2: hands of the Master, it will multiply. Because God always
Speaker 2: has a remnant. No matter how many leave Gideot, there
Speaker 2: will always be three hundred. And God is able to
Speaker 2: win with the remnant. God said, I'm gonna bless what's left.
Speaker 2: I will not be limited by what you lost. I
Speaker 2: will be a wreath for the remnant. I'm gonna bless
Speaker 2: what's left. I'm gonna bless what's left. Stop weeping over
Speaker 2: what's lost. I'm gonna bless what's left. I want you
Speaker 2: to shout right now over what you've gotten left.
Speaker 1: I want you to shout right now over the gift
Speaker 1: you have the strength you have, the friends you have,
Speaker 1: the opportunities you have, the time you have.
Speaker 2: God said, I'm gonna bless what you got left. If
Speaker 2: you will not stay stuck in what walked away, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna bless what you got left. You can win with
Speaker 2: what you got left. I feel like preaching. I feel
Speaker 2: like preaching to the remnant. Where's the remnant at where?
Speaker 2: Who wants who went through the fire and came out
Speaker 2: of boud.
Speaker 1: Go to bless what's left.
Speaker 2: No matter what happens at the leadership level, I'm looking
Speaker 2: for someone who will turn back the battle at the gate.
Speaker 2: And in that day the Lord Almighty will be a
Speaker 2: glorious crown of beautiful wreath for the remnant of his people.
Speaker 1: And then he mentions two different spirits. Watch this in
Speaker 1: verse six. Can we study the Bible.
Speaker 2: He will be a spirit of justice to the one
Speaker 2: who sits in judgment, that's the first one, and a
Speaker 2: source of strength to those who turn back the battle
Speaker 2: at the gate. So you've got the spirit of justice
Speaker 2: to the one who sits in judgment and the source
Speaker 2: of strength to those who turned back the battle at
Speaker 2: the gate. Study that text all week, and I thought,
Speaker 2: I was talking about two different things. But the more
Speaker 2: I read it, the more I realized that this is
Speaker 2: two functions of the same spirit.
Speaker 1: He will be a spirit of justice to the one
Speaker 1: who sits.
Speaker 2: In judgment, a source of strength to those who turn
Speaker 2: back the battle at the gate. The first part of
Speaker 2: the verse is about standards. He will be a spirit
Speaker 2: of justice. He will decide what is wrong and right
Speaker 2: to the one who sits in judgment. Will be a
Speaker 2: spirit of justice and a source of strength to the
Speaker 2: one who turns back the battle at the gate.
Speaker 1: So the same God that.
Speaker 2: Is the source of our strength is to also be
Speaker 2: the source of our standers. And here's the question that
Speaker 2: I came to ask today. How can I expect God's
Speaker 2: strength if I do not embrace God's standers. I'm about
Speaker 2: to throw this my brother. See, how can I call
Speaker 2: God the source of my strength if I have not
Speaker 2: made him the source of my standers. He will be
Speaker 2: a spirit of justice to the one who sits in judgment.
Speaker 1: Now, if I have let that seat open, and I
Speaker 1: have left culture.
Speaker 2: To tell me what's right and wrong, how can I
Speaker 2: look to culture for my standards and then look to God.
Speaker 1: For my strength? How can I look for the world to.
Speaker 2: Tell me how to live, and then expect God to
Speaker 2: give me strength for a standard that was not his.
Speaker 2: How can I call God the source of my strength
Speaker 2: if he is not the source of my standards? How
Speaker 2: can I expect his strength and resist his standards?
Speaker 1: It's good right.
Speaker 2: That's why I feel weak sometimes because I'm asking God.
Speaker 1: To strengthen me.
Speaker 2: But I have given away my strength because I have
Speaker 2: lowered my standard. And then the enemy comes in like
Speaker 2: a flood. But I don't have a standard. And then
Speaker 2: I ask God to give me joy. You know, and
Speaker 2: your present foods the joy?
Speaker 1: Joy? The Lord is my strength, and I want his strength.
Speaker 1: I want his joy.
Speaker 2: But if I have not applied his standard to my
Speaker 2: thought life, and I let my mind think whatever it
Speaker 2: wants to think, and I go to God for strength,
Speaker 2: but I did not go to him for standards.
Speaker 1: I am asking him to.
Speaker 2: Violate the very nature of our relationship. How can he
Speaker 2: be the source of my strength if I won't let
Speaker 2: him be the source of my standards? Who set your standards?
Speaker 2: Who set your standards? Was it.
Speaker 1: Was it God that set your standards?
Speaker 2: I was talking to one guy the other day it
Speaker 2: became very apparent to me pretty quickly that he sets
Speaker 2: his own standards for right and wrong. And I admire
Speaker 2: him for that because I don't trust myself that much.
Speaker 2: I mean, he must be really perfect to have his
Speaker 2: own standard for right and wrong.
Speaker 1: See, I need a God.
Speaker 2: I need a God who's bigger than me, wiser than me,
Speaker 2: who's been around longer than me. I need a God
Speaker 2: who can see around the next corner and know how
Speaker 2: this decision is going to affect my destiny.
Speaker 1: I don't want to occupy that seat. I need a God.
Speaker 2: And sometimes we're so crazy as Christians. We will allow
Speaker 2: the world to set our standards as a church and
Speaker 2: tell us what the church ought to be and not be,
Speaker 2: and put us in a box and call us by
Speaker 2: a denomination. But I will not be standardized by a
Speaker 2: dysfunctional world. I have a higher standard. We are chosen people,
Speaker 2: a royal priesthood, a holy nation, to declare the praises
Speaker 2: of Him who called us out of darkness.
Speaker 1: Like preaching. I'm preaching like this might be my last time.