Speaker 1: Today one of God's choicest vessels is here with us.
Speaker 1: Christine Kine is about to preach the word if we
Speaker 1: keep bringing in Chris Caine to fill the pulpit. When
Speaker 1: I'm gone, y'all are gonna send me out on tour
Speaker 1: three sixty five, because really this is one of the
Speaker 1: most anointed preachers that God raised up, I would say,
Speaker 1: in the last decade. And of course those of you
Speaker 1: who have been around here a long time, you know
Speaker 1: that she founded A twenty one, an anti human trafficking
Speaker 1: organization not just limited to that work, but most known
Speaker 1: for that work. We've been partners with Chris and her husband,
Speaker 1: Nick and A twenty one for years and years and years,
Speaker 1: and today, actually Chris and Nick I didn't tell you
Speaker 1: this yet, but on behalf of the generous people of
Speaker 1: Elevation Church, as we get ready for our year end
Speaker 1: giving season that we're coming up on soon, we want
Speaker 1: to give A twenty one a gift of one hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars to stand with you for the amazing things
Speaker 1: you're doing in the world. That's because of these amazing people,
Speaker 1: that's because of your church. So thank you, thank you
Speaker 1: for all you do. Thank you, Chris for all you do.
Speaker 1: Thank you for being here today. Get on your feet.
Speaker 1: I think you're on your feet right now, but you know,
Speaker 1: jump up even higher, stand on your tiptoes and help me.
Speaker 1: Welcome Christine Kane as she brings the word. We love you, Chris.
Speaker 1: Let's go. What an honor to be here. Thank you,
Speaker 1: Pas to Stephen and Holly and all of our etham
Speaker 1: on behalf of Nick and I because I do have
Speaker 1: the single most ravishing piece of masculine flesh right here
Speaker 1: at the front row and the whole crew. We've got
Speaker 1: our eight twenty one Charlotte team here. We want to
Speaker 1: thank your church for your generosity and partnership in the gospel.
Speaker 1: You know the money you have been partnering with us
Speaker 1: almost from the outset, and such a key partner. Pass
Speaker 1: to Stephen and Holly and the whole church. So generous.
Speaker 1: And I want you to know that during this season
Speaker 1: we have seen an unbelievable amount of rescues and convictions
Speaker 1: of traffickers. And just in the last couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: an entire container load of people were rescued in Cambodia,
Speaker 1: an entire container load. Wrap your head around that. So
Speaker 1: I want you to know that your giving is going
Speaker 1: to good soil and we so appreciate it. People are
Speaker 1: being reached, people are being rescued, people are being restored,
Speaker 1: Traffickers are going to jail. I want to say thank
Speaker 1: you Elevation, thank you to our EPAM. And I am
Speaker 1: so that new song, y'all. I'm about to do laps
Speaker 1: around this building. I go like, if you've got a
Speaker 1: pulse that would raise the dead? That song, that's all
Speaker 1: I'm saying. I cannot wait for that too. Chandler, I
Speaker 1: don't know where you are and the team probably behind
Speaker 1: me somewhere, but it was it is just like unbelievable.
Speaker 1: We need to get that out in the atmosphere. I
Speaker 1: want to thank you, Nick, and I so love your passes.
Speaker 1: I am part of e fam. It's nice to be
Speaker 1: on this side because I am literally on the other
Speaker 1: side every week. Because the good thing is I live
Speaker 1: on the West Coast, so pasta Stephens preaching at nine
Speaker 1: thirty and it's only six thirty am, and I'm not
Speaker 1: in a pulpit till ten am, so I've got enough
Speaker 1: time to get a sermon down and then preach it.
Speaker 1: So it's fantastic to do that, but I do. Actually
Speaker 1: every single week, I feel like I'm I'm part of
Speaker 1: our e fam. I'm your Craig cray Ossy aunt. How
Speaker 1: many know you need a cray cray Ossy? Aren't everyone
Speaker 1: needs one? And so and Pastor Holly. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: texting her. I've just done like fourteen countries in the
Speaker 1: last fifteen or sixteen weeks. I think we've just done
Speaker 1: a lap of the globe and I'm texting her from
Speaker 1: every place, going give me a book. You know, your
Speaker 1: pastor she's an obsessive reader, like next level reader and so,
Speaker 1: but I give her a run for her money because
Speaker 1: I read faster than her. So you can all tell
Speaker 1: her that. And so she recommends all the best books
Speaker 1: in the world to be So, I just want you
Speaker 1: to know that we really are family. I believe I've
Speaker 1: got a word from the lawd today. How many are
Speaker 1: ready to hear God's work? I am you can be seated.
Speaker 1: Thank you to the worship team for taking us into
Speaker 1: the presence of God. I have missed you all, and
Speaker 1: I have missed you. I can't even explain how much
Speaker 1: I feel so home away from home here we're going
Speaker 1: to go to Luke chapter seventeen, to the Gospel of Luke.
Speaker 1: I've been so excited to be with you all, I
Speaker 1: almost can't contain myself. Luke seventeen, verse twenty. Scripture says,
Speaker 1: being asked by the Pharisees when the Kingdom of God
Speaker 1: would come, he answered them, the Kingdom of God is
Speaker 1: not coming with something observable. No one will say see
Speaker 1: here or there, For you see, the Kingdom of God
Speaker 1: is in your midst. Then he told the disciples, the
Speaker 1: days are coming when you will long to see one
Speaker 1: of the days of the Sun of Man. But you
Speaker 1: won't see it. They will say to you, see there
Speaker 1: or see here. Don't follow or run after them as
Speaker 1: the lightning flashes from horizon to horizon and lights up
Speaker 1: the sky. So the Son of Man will be in
Speaker 1: his day. But first, everyone say but first. I love
Speaker 1: that just sounds so American. But first, first, for our Epham,
Speaker 1: I want you to say first, mate, First, everyone say first,
Speaker 1: nay in learning how to speak like a NAUSI it's fantastic.
Speaker 1: But first, it is necessary that he suffered many things
Speaker 1: and be rejected by this generation, just as it was
Speaker 1: in the days of Noah. So it will be. In
Speaker 1: the days of the Son of Man, people went on eating, drinking, marrying,
Speaker 1: and giving in marriage until the day Noah borded the
Speaker 1: ark and the flood came and destroyed them all. It
Speaker 1: will be the same as it was in the days
Speaker 1: of Lots. People went on eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building.
Speaker 1: But on the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur
Speaker 1: rained from heaven and destroyed them all. I bet you
Speaker 1: are so glad you came to church today. I bet
Speaker 1: everyone's like that, Where are we going? We have got Noah,
Speaker 1: We've got a flood. We're now into Sodom and Gomorah.
Speaker 1: Where is she going? On this Sunday? It will be
Speaker 1: like that on the day the Son of Man is revealed.
Speaker 1: On that day, a man on the housetop whose belongings
Speaker 1: are in the house must not come down and get them. Likewise,
Speaker 1: the man who is in the field must not turn back.
Speaker 1: Remember Lot's wife, whoever tries to make his life secure
Speaker 1: will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it.
Speaker 1: I tell you, on that night, two will be in
Speaker 1: one bed. One will be taken, the other will be
Speaker 1: left and I tell Nick often, I am not going
Speaker 1: to be the one that's going to be left behind.
Speaker 1: Just putting it out there, just putting it out there.
Speaker 1: Two women will be grinding, grained together. One will be
Speaker 1: taken and the other left. Where Lord, they asked him,
Speaker 1: He said to them where the corpse is? They're also
Speaker 1: the vultures will be gathered. This is the word of
Speaker 1: the Lord. And I bet you are so pumped up.
Speaker 1: You're like Chris, we haven't seen you for a little while.
Speaker 1: What do they put in the water over there in
Speaker 1: the California. I am so fired up. I'm going to
Speaker 1: be in San Diego with elevation nights on Wednesday night.
Speaker 1: I mean, you are just packing stadiums and arenas around
Speaker 1: the country, putting praise and worship into the atmosphere. Stop
Speaker 1: getting me sidetracked. But I cannot wait, That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 1: And so I hope anyone that's on the West coast
Speaker 1: is going to join us this week. It's going to
Speaker 1: be powerful. We're going to be San Diego and La.
Speaker 1: But anyway, I'm getting back to the text right now.
Speaker 1: So Hugh Jesus, he's having a discussion about the end
Speaker 1: times I mean, this is this is a big word
Speaker 1: eschatological discourse. I had to practice that, say that three
Speaker 1: times you'll be speaking in tongues even if you're a
Speaker 1: cessationist right there, and so he is having a time
Speaker 1: a discussion about the end times, and I mean it's
Speaker 1: pretty intense. He's talking about the Kingdom of God being
Speaker 1: realized in the fact that Jesus is here. Jesus came,
Speaker 1: the Kingdom of God came, but it's not fully realized yet,
Speaker 1: which of course we're aware of. There's war and there's famine,
Speaker 1: and there's crime, and there's violence, and there's pain and
Speaker 1: there's loss, and there's death, and there's grief and there's
Speaker 1: suffering and there's heartache, and there is so much going on.
Speaker 1: So we know that the kingdom is not fully realized.
Speaker 1: It will be one day when that sky splits and
Speaker 1: Jesus comes back. And this text is reminding us that
Speaker 1: when that sky splits and Jesus return, nobody is going
Speaker 1: to be sitting around wondering going, oh did he come.
Speaker 1: Here's what people are going to go. Are we gonna know?
Speaker 1: I'm like, sweete, you'll know. And so it's the sky
Speaker 1: is gonna light up. It's all going to happen. And
Speaker 1: I mean he's talking about the already and not yet,
Speaker 1: that's what it would be called they already the kingdom's
Speaker 1: realized in Christ, but not yet fully until it comes
Speaker 1: to gain. And I mean it gets intense. He's talking
Speaker 1: and he about Noah and Sodom and Gomorrah and the
Speaker 1: end times. And here I'm just going to give you
Speaker 1: a disclaimer upfront. I basically don't overclue what he's talking about.
Speaker 1: And anybody that will tell you that they do is lying.
Speaker 1: Some of you are freaking out because I'm about to
Speaker 1: save you a lot of hours down rabbit trails on Facebook.
Speaker 1: I'm about to set you free right now, because right
Speaker 1: now one would be thinking, is this text written for today?
Speaker 1: We've had a since I've seen you last, a few
Speaker 1: things have happened on the earth. There has been quite
Speaker 1: a few things that have gone on. We've gone through
Speaker 1: a global pandemic together except for you're in Florida or Dallas,
Speaker 1: but all the rest of the e fam around the world,
Speaker 1: the rest of us actually we've had a global pandemic,
Speaker 1: and we've had so much pain and political instability and
Speaker 1: social instability and moral instability in the whole world. Have
Speaker 1: you noticed has lost its mind? It's gone, Craig grab
Speaker 1: a lot's happened since I was here last, And you
Speaker 1: could think, wow, Christine's now turned up if she could
Speaker 1: to pull out like some charts. Like you know, when
Speaker 1: I got saved in the late eighties, it was all
Speaker 1: about we had charts and we you know, were talking
Speaker 1: about the end times and it seemed like it was
Speaker 1: the end. And it's kind of like, but listen, this
Speaker 1: is what Jesus says. This is exactly what he says
Speaker 1: about it all. Ultimately, he says, nobody knows the day
Speaker 1: or the hour. I just got you back four hours
Speaker 1: in your day of rabbit traus, because everyone's trying to
Speaker 1: predict everything. And Jesus said, look, peace out, it's all right.
Speaker 1: Nobody knows. Live like it's gonna happen tomorrow, and live
Speaker 1: and prepare like it's not gonna happen for generations. And
Speaker 1: you can do both things simultaneously. It's not that hard.
Speaker 1: But you would think, do you remember, like during during
Speaker 1: the pandemic life, there was that season that was like
Speaker 1: natural disasters, and then there was locusts and then I'm like,
Speaker 1: are we in the ten Plagues of Egypt? Like, what
Speaker 1: is going on? So it would be easy, but I'm
Speaker 1: not here to talk about that. What I'm here to
Speaker 1: talk about is in the midst of this discourse about
Speaker 1: the end times, in the midst of talking about Sodom
Speaker 1: and Gomorrah and Noah and all the end and Jesus returning,
Speaker 1: and it sounds so much like twenty twenty two, You're like,
Speaker 1: what is going on? Everything's going great? Great Jesus drops
Speaker 1: three random, apparently random words in the middle of this discourse.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just right there he looks seventeen thirty two.
Speaker 1: As Jesus is talking about all of this great end
Speaker 1: time stuff, he just drops in like remember Lot's Wife.
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, okay, remember Lots The second shortest verse
Speaker 1: in the entire scripture. Do you know what the shortest
Speaker 1: verse is? You are such a well taught church and
Speaker 1: you Pastor Stephen takes you deep into the Hebrew and
Speaker 1: the Greek and the Arabaic. The second shortest verse in
Speaker 1: the scripture. You're gonna get that on Bible trivia now,
Speaker 1: is remember Lot's Wife? What a random thing to throw
Speaker 1: in the midst of a discourse about the end times
Speaker 1: to throw in the midst of a discourse about the
Speaker 1: already but not yet nature of the Kingdom of God,
Speaker 1: which most of us have awakened to at a whole
Speaker 1: new level over the last three or four years, he says,
Speaker 1: remember Lot's wife. And I'm like, okay, I've been doing
Speaker 1: chicks ministry for like one hundred I've been doing chicks
Speaker 1: ministry for you know, thirty years. I've had a lot
Speaker 1: of men, but sermons on chicks. I don't remember ever
Speaker 1: hearing one about Lot's wife. I mean, there's one hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy women mentioned in some way in scripture, one
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy, and yet there is only one woman
Speaker 1: in the Gospels that Jesus Christ ever tells us to remember.
Speaker 1: Only one. There's not a lot of real estate in
Speaker 1: the red letters of Jesus. So three words that he
Speaker 1: gives over to that remember Lot's wife in the midst
Speaker 1: of an eschatological discourse, in the midst of talking about
Speaker 1: the already but not yet nature of the Kingdom of God,
Speaker 1: he drops in three words, remember Lot's wife. I would
Speaker 1: wonder whether in twenty twenty two it would be a
Speaker 1: good time to remember the one woman that Jesus told
Speaker 1: us to remember. Out of one hundred and seventy women,
Speaker 1: remember Lot's wife. If I was one of the other
Speaker 1: one hundred and seventy cheeks, I'd be a little bit annoyed.
Speaker 1: I mean literally, if I was like Eve, I'd be going,
Speaker 1: what do you mean? Remember that's wife? I was first
Speaker 1: I came out of a rib, and I've been blamed
Speaker 1: for all of humanity's problems ever since. I mean, if
Speaker 1: I was imagine, if I was Sarah, I'd be like
Speaker 1: I popped out a kid at ninety without an epy jewel.
Speaker 1: What do you mean? Remember Lot's wife? If I was
Speaker 1: like Miriam, I'd be like the first chick worship leader ever.
Speaker 1: She comes out of Egypt, I mean, out of slavery,
Speaker 1: out of bondage, the Red Sea parts. She's like, hang
Speaker 1: on a minute, hold the Red Sea. I gotta grab
Speaker 1: a tambourine. Who grabs a tambourine when you're coming out
Speaker 1: of slavery knowing you're gonna have a dance party on
Speaker 1: the other side of the Red Sea. But Miriam be like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean? If I was Deborah be like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean Lot's wife? Hi, Deborah ruse I
Speaker 1: was the first female judge in all of Israel. Of
Speaker 1: course we know it's because no man stood to the
Speaker 1: I won't go there, but anyway, so we know Deborah
Speaker 1: Rose or Mary Mary be like I popped you out
Speaker 1: in a manger. I mean, he didn't even say to
Speaker 1: remember his mother. A lot of people would be very
Speaker 1: annoyed with it. He said, remember Lot's wife. So of
Speaker 1: course that then sent me on a little a little
Speaker 1: exposition on Okay, what is it that we know about
Speaker 1: this woman that appears on the pages of scripture just
Speaker 1: quick enough to disappear a woman that we don't even
Speaker 1: know her name? I mean Lot's wife. How politically incorrect
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty two, like you are going to get
Speaker 1: up very Lot's wife. So we know in Genesis thirteen,
Speaker 1: you remember when Abraham and Lots separated because they just
Speaker 1: had you know, there was too many animals and the
Speaker 1: herds were too big. So in the midst of all that,
Speaker 1: we know in Genesis thirteen that they separated. In Genesis
Speaker 1: thirteen twelve to thirteen, Abram settled in the land of Canaan,
Speaker 1: while Lot settled among the cities of the valley and
Speaker 1: moved his tent as far as Sodom. Now, the men
Speaker 1: of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the Lord. So
Speaker 1: we know that Abram and Lot separated. Lot set up
Speaker 1: camp right on the edge there in Sodom. And then
Speaker 1: because of the iniquity, the Lord decides by chapter Genesis
Speaker 1: eighteen that you know what he's going to deal with it.
Speaker 1: He's done with Sodom and Gomora. Now, a lot of us,
Speaker 1: especially in the if you've been around the church world,
Speaker 1: and then even if you've been just out in the world,
Speaker 1: you kind of go Sodom and Gomorrah, and instantly you
Speaker 1: start thinking, Man, the sexually moral sins, that's why God,
Speaker 1: you know, destroyed it all. And of course the sexually
Speaker 1: moral sin that you think is the worst is the
Speaker 1: one that you're not committing. But anyway, for everybody else,
Speaker 1: we just choose the one that we're doing is okay
Speaker 1: with God, but for everybody else's one, and so we
Speaker 1: get so caught up in that. But that is true.
Speaker 1: And also there is an aspect of the sin of
Speaker 1: Sodom that most of us in the church have forgotten,
Speaker 1: but is very important to God. And you'll see in
Speaker 1: right there in Genesis chapter Sorry, I'm gonna go to
Speaker 1: ezek you're sixteen forty nine to fifty. I want you
Speaker 1: to see this now. This was the iniquity of your
Speaker 1: sister Sodom. This is from the scripture. She and her
Speaker 1: daughters had pride, plenty of food, comfortable security, but didn't
Speaker 1: support the poor and the needy. In the next verse,
Speaker 1: we'll get to the immorality, but I do want you
Speaker 1: to see what the scripture says. In the prophet Ezekie
Speaker 1: says this was the sin. I wonder with the reckoning
Speaker 1: that's been happening over the last couple of years, and
Speaker 1: we've seen God clean inside the house and outside the house,
Speaker 1: there's a reckoning happening. Whether in some places the church
Speaker 1: just got a little bit too prideful, a little bit
Speaker 1: too comfortable, a little bit too plenty. This is why
Speaker 1: I love this house. I mean, your pastors barely introduced
Speaker 1: me and said, before Christine even comes, we're giving to
Speaker 1: the work of the poor and the needy, and the marginalized,
Speaker 1: and those that are enslaved and those that are dispossessed.
Speaker 1: And you do this in love week, and you do
Speaker 1: that with your end of you giving every single time,
Speaker 1: because it matters to God. It matters to God. Do
Speaker 1: you wonder, if we don't wonder too long, why there's
Speaker 1: such the blessing of God on this house. Why the
Speaker 1: Lord's taking you around the world and you're worship to
Speaker 1: a whole other level. And of course your pastor is
Speaker 1: preaching probably in the world while people listen to him,
Speaker 1: because you have a holistic faith that honors Jesus, honors
Speaker 1: the word, reaches the world, cares about the poor and
Speaker 1: the need. He doesn't just get so comfortable. Understands we
Speaker 1: are blessed to be a blessing, understands that we are
Speaker 1: called to be soul and light in the midst of
Speaker 1: a broken world. But the sin of Sodom was that
Speaker 1: they had forgotten that. And then of course it goes
Speaker 1: on and says they were haughty and did detestable acts
Speaker 1: before me, and so I removed them when I saw this.
Speaker 1: So then in Genesis nineteen, the Lord sends the Angel
Speaker 1: of the Lord to come and rescue Lot and his
Speaker 1: wife and their two daughters. And so literally an angel
Speaker 1: comes and takes them by the hand, you know the story.
Speaker 1: I mean, they were literally touched by an angel. And
Speaker 1: so the angel comes and takes them by the hand
Speaker 1: and leads them out. And this is the only instruction
Speaker 1: that the Lord gives in verse seventeen. And as they
Speaker 1: brought them out, escape for your life. One said, escape
Speaker 1: for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere
Speaker 1: in the valley. Escaped to the hills, lest you be
Speaker 1: slept swept away. And this is the only thing we
Speaker 1: see specifically about Lot's wife in scripture. Remember in the
Speaker 1: New Testament, Jesus said, one woman out of one hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy, there's only one. I want you to remember
Speaker 1: when the world is burning, when everything seems to be
Speaker 1: going cret Cray aka twenty twenty two, when it all
Speaker 1: seems like everything is crazy, I need you to remember
Speaker 1: Lot's wife. So we go, Jesus, What is it about
Speaker 1: Lot's wife the way to remember? So we go then,
Speaker 1: And the only thing we see in scripture in Genesis
Speaker 1: nineteen about Lot's wife, it says in verse twenty six,
Speaker 1: but Lot's wife behind him looked back and became a
Speaker 1: pillar of salt. That's all we know. Lot's wife looked
Speaker 1: back and became a pillar of salt. She became a
Speaker 1: pillar of salt because she was torn between where God
Speaker 1: was taking her and what she was leaving. She was
Speaker 1: prioritizing her past over her future. She had lost sight
Speaker 1: of the fact that the promise of God, the provision
Speaker 1: of God, the purpose of God was ahead, and so
Speaker 1: she got stuck in a place she was only meant
Speaker 1: to be passing through. She was being pulled back by
Speaker 1: what she was leaving more than she was pressing on
Speaker 1: to where God was taking her. And she got stuck, calcified,
Speaker 1: turned into a pillar of salt. And you and I
Speaker 1: called to be the salt of the earth. And right
Speaker 1: now on the earth, the Church of Jesus Christ, in
Speaker 1: many places is stuck, stuck, and the purpose of God
Speaker 1: is ahead, the provision of God is ahead, the promise
Speaker 1: of God is ahead, but we are stuck looking back
Speaker 1: instead of fixing our eyes on Jesus ahead, to move
Speaker 1: into the promise and the purpose and the provision of God.
Speaker 1: It's time for us to remember us wife, and to
Speaker 1: stop looking back. Because for many people, our attachment to
Speaker 1: the past outweighs our commitment to the future. And a
Speaker 1: generation is at stake. And it is amazing as I
Speaker 1: travel and I've just done fourteen nations, and I hear
Speaker 1: so many people talking about Christine. You know, if we
Speaker 1: could just go back, if we could just go back,
Speaker 1: I could talk to pastors and leaders and individuals and
Speaker 1: businesses and people in relationships, and many things could just
Speaker 1: go back to normal. If we could just go back
Speaker 1: to pre pandemic. I'm like, why are we talking about
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. Why are you giving me numbers from twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: This is not twenty nineteen. This is twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1: And Jesus is in twenty twenty two and twenty twenty
Speaker 1: three and twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five. At
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six, the purpose of God is ahead of us.
Speaker 1: All the promises of God are in Christ. Jesus, Yes
Speaker 1: and amen, his promise is still ahead. And the same
Speaker 1: Jesus that brought us here is the same Jesus that's
Speaker 1: going to take us there. But we've got to stop
Speaker 1: looking back. There are people in this room, there's a
Speaker 1: family online, and we're stuck, absolutely stuck going. Man, I
Speaker 1: just just want things to go back to normal. Listen,
Speaker 1: I am not denying, I am not dismissing. I am
Speaker 1: in no way minimizing the pain, the trauma, the loss,
Speaker 1: the grief, or the suffering over the last few years
Speaker 1: in every realm personally, economically, relationally, politically, environmentally, sociologically, morally,
Speaker 1: there is not one sector of society spiritually that has
Speaker 1: not been impacted. But if you and I are going
Speaker 1: to do what God has put us on this earth
Speaker 1: to do, then we've got to stop looking back and
Speaker 1: we've got to start looking forward and start pressing into
Speaker 1: the purpose and the promise of God. You know, people
Speaker 1: are stuck. People are stuck in disappointment, stuck in discouragement,
Speaker 1: stuck in a fence, stuck in bitterness, stuck in unforgiveness,
Speaker 1: stuck in disillusionment, stuck fixated on what went wrong on
Speaker 1: the past, fixated on what we lost in the past,
Speaker 1: fixated on who betrayed us, who disappointed us, who hurt us,
Speaker 1: what didn't happen, Fixated on something we're supposed to face
Speaker 1: and move on from. And you fixate instead of face,
Speaker 1: you get stuck. And so many of us in this hour,
Speaker 1: the herd of the Lord would be you need to
Speaker 1: start remembering Lot's wife because she got stuck. And it's
Speaker 1: little wonder. I mean, her life was back there, she
Speaker 1: had other family back there, she had her friends back there.
Speaker 1: I mean who, I don't know. Did she just renovate
Speaker 1: her kitchen? I don't know, so would there? I mean,
Speaker 1: imagine just one day, an Angel of the Lord comes
Speaker 1: and out we go. And that's literally what happened to
Speaker 1: most of us. Overnight. Overnight things shut down, Overnight things changed, Overnight,
Speaker 1: things blew up, and the Angel of the Lord, the
Speaker 1: presence of God, Jesus said, I'll never leave you nor
Speaker 1: forsake you. His presence was with us. And the issue
Speaker 1: is did we let go of the hand of Jesus
Speaker 1: so that we could keep facing back and fixate on
Speaker 1: what was back there? And we're in twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: but everything about us is still back, and we are
Speaker 1: stuck in a place that we were only supposed to
Speaker 1: be moving through because God's presence is still with us.
Speaker 1: I sometimes wonder how Jesus feels during all of this,
Speaker 1: because he's like, I didn't go anywhere. You know what
Speaker 1: I've become during this is this last two or three years,
Speaker 1: I've become like what I call a Hallmark pinterest Christian. See.
Speaker 1: I used to like roll my eyes at those plithy
Speaker 1: little statements, you know, with nice little flowers and colors.
Speaker 1: And I used to kind of want something deep in
Speaker 1: the Hebrew and something deep in the you know. Nowadays
Speaker 1: I'm like, when I just see, you know, Jesus is
Speaker 1: the same yesterday, today, forever, I'm like, thank you God,
Speaker 1: because nothing else is the same. I'm so glad Jesus
Speaker 1: is the same. Or yeah, I will never leave you
Speaker 1: nor forsake. I'm like, thank you God, because everybody else
Speaker 1: is bailed. And those little plithy statements suddenly become life
Speaker 1: and suddenly go, that's the stuff that actually really matters,
Speaker 1: that's the stuff that sustains you. That that's the stuff
Speaker 1: that keeps you going. And I wonder so many people, Chris,
Speaker 1: you know, I just I didn't sign up for this.
Speaker 1: I'm like, what did you sign up for? Last night
Speaker 1: checked Jesus died for me. I didn't die for him.
Speaker 1: Last I checked that I was supposed to deny myself,
Speaker 1: take up my crust, and follow him. I decided that
Speaker 1: I will follow Jesus. No turning back, no turning back,
Speaker 1: the crust before me, the well behind me, no turning back.
Speaker 1: I have decided to follow Jesus. You see, I'm old school,
Speaker 1: because I'm so old that when I got saved, I
Speaker 1: was mentored and schooled by Christian martyrs and missionaries, not celebrities.
Speaker 1: So when I gave my life to Jesus, I thought
Speaker 1: I was laying down my life. So just the last
Speaker 1: few years has caused us to waiver. I don't know
Speaker 1: where we've been, because yes, we've had a bit of
Speaker 1: a tribulation, but it's not the great tribulation. What are
Speaker 1: we going to do when the great tribulation comes? If
Speaker 1: that's all it took for us to lose hope, so
Speaker 1: many of us are like you know in Luke chapter
Speaker 1: twenty four, where the two disciples are going back to
Speaker 1: Emmaus back because Jesus. They saw him crucified and buried,
Speaker 1: but they didn't know that he rose again, and they
Speaker 1: thought that he was the Messiah, and they were so disappointed.
Speaker 1: They were so discouraged. They were so disillusioned. And then
Speaker 1: Jesus came and was physically walking with them, God incarnate
Speaker 1: walking with them. But they were so obsessed, and they
Speaker 1: were so downcast and so overwhelmed by their disappointment, and
Speaker 1: the disillusionment that the God of the universe was walking
Speaker 1: with them and they didn't even recognize him, and they said,
Speaker 1: we had hoped he was the one, and so many
Speaker 1: of us we had hoped that business was going to succeed. Man.
Speaker 1: We had hoped that person wasn't going to die. We
Speaker 1: had hoped that marriage was going to make it. We
Speaker 1: had hoped that kid was going to start following the Lord.
Speaker 1: We had hoped that that promotion was going to come.
Speaker 1: We'd hope that that opportunity, And because our hopes didn't
Speaker 1: come to pass, we're sitting here in twenty twenty two going,
Speaker 1: I'm just so disappointed, I'm just so offended. Now we
Speaker 1: won't add the last bit, but if we were honest
Speaker 1: and not fake Christians, we'd say disappointed with God that
Speaker 1: he didn't do what I wanted, Disappointed and offended with
Speaker 1: God because he didn't come through, and Jesus is standing
Speaker 1: right with us, going I'm right here we had hoped.
Speaker 1: I wonder if the last couple of years has actually
Speaker 1: served to make us, because it hasn't shocked God, God's God.
Speaker 1: I wonder if it has helped us to realize where
Speaker 1: perhaps we had some misplaced hopes in our life. I
Speaker 1: wonder whether if we're stuck in disappointment and stuck in unforgiveness,
Speaker 1: and stuck in offense, and stuck in disillusionment, and stuck
Speaker 1: in discouragement, and stuck in comfort, and stuck in apathy
Speaker 1: and stuck in indifference, and stuck in this place, is
Speaker 1: it because we have a misplaced hope? Because hebrew Sick
Speaker 1: says that Jesus is this hope we have as an
Speaker 1: anchor for our soul, both firm and secure. Yes. Are
Speaker 1: we living in a world with war and with trauma,
Speaker 1: and with pandemics, and with pain and political instability and suffering. Yes,
Speaker 1: but my hope was never meant to be in that
Speaker 1: Jesus is this hope we have as an anchor for
Speaker 1: our soul, both firm and secure. And then the writer
Speaker 1: to the Hebrews says, do not throw away your confidence
Speaker 1: in this hope, for it has great rewards. Let us
Speaker 1: not lose the confession of our hope. Let us hold
Speaker 1: on to it in fact without wavering. I wonder how
Speaker 1: much wavering there's been over the last couple of years,
Speaker 1: Because the minute we lost the thing that we thought
Speaker 1: we needed, we just tapped out. It's just too hard.
Speaker 1: We had hoped, man, we had hoped and got stuck.
Speaker 1: You know, if Jesus is this anchor and all that
Speaker 1: we've seen in this season, is Jesus truly the anchor
Speaker 1: of your life, because then your hope doesn't waver, even
Speaker 1: when everything in the world wavers and everything in the
Speaker 1: world is wavering, everything in the world is wavering. But
Speaker 1: if you're anchored, you know. I remember my husband loves boating,
Speaker 1: and one of the first times we went out. You know,
Speaker 1: I believe the purpose of boats is for sun baking.
Speaker 1: It's the will of God in Christ Jesus for us
Speaker 1: to sun bake. And so I was out there and
Speaker 1: Nick was disturbing my sun baking because he parked the
Speaker 1: boat in the anchorage and he's like, Chris, can you
Speaker 1: throw the anchor out? And I'm like, how just this
Speaker 1: is bugging me? Okay? And so I go down, yes, yes, yes, honey,
Speaker 1: And so I I threw the anchor out and then
Speaker 1: I went back to sun baking. And then about thirty
Speaker 1: minutes later, we kind of hit this other boat in
Speaker 1: the anchorage and Nick's like freaking out. Christine. Christine, I
Speaker 1: told you to throw the anchor out. I go, I did,
Speaker 1: He says, yes, But did you make sure we were anchored?
Speaker 1: Are we? You didn't tell me that, he said, throw
Speaker 1: it out? And I think what some of us have
Speaker 1: realized over these last couple of years is that our anchor,
Speaker 1: because our anchor isn't going to fail, our anchor doesn't
Speaker 1: actually go down to the seabit. Our anchor goes into
Speaker 1: the other side of eternity and is secure up there
Speaker 1: in eternity. But some of us have wavered and started
Speaker 1: drifting and gotten stuck. And you know, an anchor, when
Speaker 1: it's attached to a boat, it's got little links in
Speaker 1: a chain. Some of us have discovered that maybe some
Speaker 1: of those links are a bit rusty, or maybe we've
Speaker 1: been disconnected. Because the anchor will, But are we holding
Speaker 1: the anchor? And if you and I are going to
Speaker 1: go forward and not turn into a pillar of salt
Speaker 1: and be the salt and light on the earth that
Speaker 1: we have been called to live because God chooses in
Speaker 1: the Book of Acts, says the times and the seasons
Speaker 1: and the places that he puts us in. So he
Speaker 1: knew exactly what would be happening in the world in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three. And you know what,
Speaker 1: You and I are not his Plan B, where his
Speaker 1: Plan A. We are a product of eternity, not a
Speaker 1: product of time. God has plucked us out of eternity.
Speaker 1: He has positioned us in time. He's given us gifts
Speaker 1: and talents for the purpose of serving our generation. This
Speaker 1: is not a time for the church to get stuck.
Speaker 1: This is a time to remember Lot's wife and to
Speaker 1: move on and to press on into the purpose and
Speaker 1: the promise and the provision of God in the future.
Speaker 1: But you've got to stay connected to the anchor that
Speaker 1: will keep us stabilized in a very unstable world. Jesus
Speaker 1: is this hope we have. So how do you know?
Speaker 1: You know, in the Writer to the Hebrews, he wrote
Speaker 1: this to the Jewish Christians, that we're facing such persecution,
Speaker 1: like real persecution, not like the kind of persecution we think,
Speaker 1: you know, we call here in the Western inconvenience of persecution.
Speaker 1: But that's another sermon. And so they were like really
Speaker 1: losing their lives and losing their jobs and their families
Speaker 1: and their assets everything for being Jesus followers. So they
Speaker 1: were like, you know what, it would just be easier
Speaker 1: to go back to Judaism, be much easier because we'll
Speaker 1: be accepted by culture, we'll have opportunities again. It would
Speaker 1: just be a lot easier because it's just really, really hard.
Speaker 1: So the Writer to the Hebrews is writing to Jewish
Speaker 1: Christians that are just drifting, that are wavering, that are
Speaker 1: just going back, like the two disciples on the road
Speaker 1: to Emmaeus. They were going back because you know what,
Speaker 1: when you start wavering, when you get stuck, when you
Speaker 1: lose sight of your hope, you'll go back to the
Speaker 1: thing that you came from. And you're wondering why so
Speaker 1: many people are going back to Amaus, Because if you're
Speaker 1: not moving forward with Jesus, you will go back to
Speaker 1: what you came from. You just go back. It's just
Speaker 1: the way that it is. So the Writer to the
Speaker 1: Hebrews is writing to the Jewish Christians in Hebrews chapter two,
Speaker 1: and he says, for this reason, he's just talked about
Speaker 1: the supremacy of Christ. He's just talked about the sufficiency
Speaker 1: of Christ. He's reminding them Jesus is better than the law.
Speaker 1: Jesus is better than the prophets. Jesus is better than Moses.
Speaker 1: Jesus is better than the angels. He's reminding them of
Speaker 1: the greatness of Jesus. And I've come to elevation to
Speaker 1: remind you of the greatness of you, because he is
Speaker 1: better than anything that you left. Because he is better
Speaker 1: than anything else there you can see, touch, tastes, smell,
Speaker 1: or feel on this earth, because he is supreme over
Speaker 1: the angels, over the Law, over the Prophets, over Moses.
Speaker 1: He is supreme and says, therefore, we must pay attention
Speaker 1: all the more to what we have heard, so we
Speaker 1: will not drift away. We must pay extra attention. In
Speaker 1: the Greek that phrases betty sought at us proso hiin.
Speaker 1: And why do I know, because I know a little Greek.
Speaker 1: I'm little and Greek, and so it says. But my
Speaker 1: mother used to say that to me when we came
Speaker 1: to a big freeway that was busy, hustinner. Betty's sought
Speaker 1: in us proso kiin, be extra careful, And I would say,
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit is saying to his church right now, Hey,
Speaker 1: Betty's sought a us proso kiin extra careful, be careful
Speaker 1: lest we also drift. My dad would take us to
Speaker 1: this beach that had this big undertow in Australia, and
Speaker 1: he'd always put a big beach umbrella on one side
Speaker 1: and towels on the other side of the sand. And
Speaker 1: he'd say, kids, when you go out there swimming, I
Speaker 1: need you to check those markers really often, because you're
Speaker 1: going to be having so much fun out there and
Speaker 1: you're not going to realize the undertoe is going to
Speaker 1: take you out, So regularly check your markers. And he
Speaker 1: would always say, because kids, never forget, the only thing
Speaker 1: you have to do to drift is nothing. And while
Speaker 1: many of us right now have got so many misplaced types,
Speaker 1: we're just like doing nothing. It's too much hard work
Speaker 1: to pray, too much hard work to read my Bible,
Speaker 1: too much hard work to come to church. It's very
Speaker 1: quiet in this Presbyterian church right now, you're you're all
Speaker 1: in the room. It's too much hard work. But I'm
Speaker 1: here to remind you all you have to do to
Speaker 1: drift is not commit some great sin. Just do nothing.
Speaker 1: Just do nothing. And all of a sudden you go,
Speaker 1: why am I stuck? Why is it twenty twenty two
Speaker 1: and I don't feel anything fresh in my relationship? With Jesus.
Speaker 1: Why am I stuck? And I don't feel like I've
Speaker 1: gone anywhere and I'm just on a treadmill? Why am
Speaker 1: I stuck? Because inadvertently you're drifting because you're doing nothing.
Speaker 1: And we got good at doing nothing, didn't we. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's hard work putting on hard pants. Nowadays we just
Speaker 1: like our sweats. Twenty twenty changed our fashion for life.
Speaker 1: It's like, oh, who wants to get up and do something?
Speaker 1: What do you mean? Do something for the Lord? What
Speaker 1: do you mean fulfill the mission of God? What do
Speaker 1: you mean? Move forward? And we're stuck. We're stuck spiritually,
Speaker 1: we're stuck emotionally, were stuck physically, was stuck relationally because
Speaker 1: we do not How do you know, well, what might
Speaker 1: be some signs in this day that you might be drifting?
Speaker 1: I don't know. You go like, how do I know
Speaker 1: if I'm stuck, if I'm drifting, if I've lost sight
Speaker 1: of my hope Jesus? Well, well, maybe he's just a
Speaker 1: few things. Pretend we're connected to an anchor and we're
Speaker 1: checking the links in the chain. Maybe you know that
Speaker 1: you're drifting if a blue check mark matters more to
Speaker 1: you than a heart checker. Oh, it's so we're obsessed. Man,
Speaker 1: If I could just be verified by man, it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter that God validated me two thousand years ago at Calvary. Oh, oh,
Speaker 1: if I'm just verified. If it's more important for you
Speaker 1: to be known than to make Jesus known, if it's
Speaker 1: more important for you to have likes than to become
Speaker 1: like Jesus, if you care more about how many are
Speaker 1: following you than how many are not following Jesus. Just
Speaker 1: maybe you've drifted, just maybe and lost our source of
Speaker 1: hope when my will becomes more important than God's will,
Speaker 1: when I just am so encouraged in the whole world's
Speaker 1: like you, you wonder why we're stuck. We're stuck because
Speaker 1: we're seeking our own will, because we just and then
Speaker 1: we just have all of these misplaced hopes because we
Speaker 1: think God, you didn't come through for me. And He's like,
Speaker 1: I never really promised you that I said. All the
Speaker 1: promises of God are in Christ, Jesus, Yes, and in
Speaker 1: Christ Jesus amen. Not all of everything that you want,
Speaker 1: not your selfish ambition, But the promises of God are
Speaker 1: in Christ. Jesus, Yes, and in Christ Jesus. Amen. In
Speaker 1: Look twenty two, remember Jesus when he was in G seventy.
Speaker 1: Even God himself had a moment where he said, I
Speaker 1: don't want to do this, but nevertheless, is there any
Speaker 1: other way? Would you take this cup from me? When
Speaker 1: was the last time that you thought, Oh, everything in
Speaker 1: me wants to jump into bed with that person that's
Speaker 1: not my spouse. But nevertheless, everything in me wants to
Speaker 1: watch that. But nevertheless, and then we wonder why we're stuck.
Speaker 1: It's so amazing to me where we've lost sight of
Speaker 1: our source of hope. It was never in other things,
Speaker 1: It was always in Jesus, and he hasn't gone anywhere.
Speaker 1: I know we've had a pandemic, but Jesus is still here.
Speaker 1: I know we've had political instability, but Jesus is still here.
Speaker 1: I know we've got inflation, but Jesus is still on
Speaker 1: the throne. God is still on the throne. All the
Speaker 1: promises of God are in Christ. Jesus. Yes, and amen,
Speaker 1: Maybe you've drifted when you know you care a whole
Speaker 1: lot more about everyone else's business than you do about
Speaker 1: the father's business. We've got a whole industry on that
Speaker 1: we're wondering why people are stuck because everyone knows everything
Speaker 1: about everyone else's business and has an opinion about it.
Speaker 1: It is amazing. Did you remember that in Luke where
Speaker 1: Mary lost God for a few days? Do you remember
Speaker 1: that when Jesus was a boy and she lost him
Speaker 1: for three days? For every mother on Ephan watching this,
Speaker 1: every mother in the room, that just sets us all free,
Speaker 1: because we've all forgotten our kid sometime at school, in
Speaker 1: the supermarket somewhere. But Mary lost God for three days.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's awesome. And then when she comes to
Speaker 1: the temple and finds him. Now, I tell my kids
Speaker 1: never do what Jesus did in this instance. You're to
Speaker 1: follow Jesus in every way, but not this, because he
Speaker 1: says to it, woman, I'm like, do not try this
Speaker 1: at home? He says, why were you looking for me?
Speaker 1: Did you not know? I must be about the father's business. Oh,
Speaker 1: we are so distracted and stuck in everybody else's business,
Speaker 1: forgotten to be about the Father's business on this earth
Speaker 1: and to do what God has called us to do.
Speaker 1: You know, maybe you've stuck and drifting when you talk
Speaker 1: about it to everyone else more than you pray about
Speaker 1: it to God, when you post more than you pray,
Speaker 1: your source of hope is no longer Jesus, because man,
Speaker 1: I just hope someone hears my something. And I am
Speaker 1: trying to get from people what I can only get
Speaker 1: from God. And I wonder why I'm stuck. So I
Speaker 1: could go on and on, but we're stuck in so
Speaker 1: many different ways. We're stuck in our attitudes. We're stuck
Speaker 1: in where we're looking for affirmation, where we're looking for significance,
Speaker 1: where we're looking for security, where we're looking for this
Speaker 1: sense of value, where we're looking for this self actualization.
Speaker 1: I mean, they're going to build some dig up a
Speaker 1: time capsule sometime in the future and go what was
Speaker 1: the most common phrase in twenty twenty two, And it'll
Speaker 1: have this thing like you do you boo, And they're
Speaker 1: going to need the interpretation of tongues. And then they're
Speaker 1: going to need to go no, don't do you boo.
Speaker 1: I feel like running around going no, no, no, no no,
Speaker 1: don't do you boo? Do Jesus boo. It doesn't go well.
Speaker 1: Do you remember in the Book of Judges, when everyone
Speaker 1: did what was right in their own eyes? It never
Speaker 1: goes well. We get stuck. Stuck, remember us, wife, stuck
Speaker 1: because we lose sight of our source of hope. He
Speaker 1: hasn't gone anywhere. So what do we need to do
Speaker 1: as we move forward? Church? Because see, you have to
Speaker 1: know your source of hope if you and I are
Speaker 1: going to keep moving forward and fulfill the will and
Speaker 1: the purpose of God. We were not finished elevation Church.
Speaker 1: Our greatest days are ahead of us and not behind us.
Speaker 1: There are more people to reach. There are more people
Speaker 1: to be saved, more people to be delivered, more people
Speaker 1: to be healed, More marriage is to be restored, more
Speaker 1: have seen relationships to be reconciled. We cannot stop, we
Speaker 1: cannot look back. We've got to press on and lay
Speaker 1: a hold of all of that for which Christ Jesus
Speaker 1: has laid a hold of us. But that is entirely
Speaker 1: cultural in this moment, because everyone wants you to stay
Speaker 1: stuck in your offense, stuck in bitterness, stuck in unforgiveness.
Speaker 1: And what's at stake is a generation in the future,
Speaker 1: That's what's at stake. Stay stuck in your mistakes and
Speaker 1: stuck in your figures. As if you can't move on
Speaker 1: and into the promises of God. The whole narrative of
Speaker 1: this generation is to stay stuck, and yet everything about
Speaker 1: the Kingdom is moving forward towards God's grand tell us,
Speaker 1: so we can't get stuck. Jesus is in the middle
Speaker 1: when the world is burning down and the bank can
Speaker 1: come up. While the world's burning, Jesus is like, could
Speaker 1: you remember Lot's wife? Don't look back, don't even look
Speaker 1: back at your great success days. We glance back at
Speaker 1: the God for them. By some of you were still
Speaker 1: talking about your trophy from high school football. That was
Speaker 1: forty years ago, and you've been stuck ever since. We
Speaker 1: don't want to become that as a church. We don't
Speaker 1: want to be talking about what God did, what we
Speaker 1: used to, seeing what we're used to. No, no no, no, no,
Speaker 1: have greatest days right hand. We can't look back. We've
Speaker 1: got to press on. We've got to move forward. And
Speaker 1: the only way we're going to do that going into
Speaker 1: this season is that you and I, as followers of
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ, all our epham around the world, we've got
Speaker 1: to remember what our source of hope is so that
Speaker 1: when trials come, because they will, Jesus said, when trials
Speaker 1: do come, you will have in this world trials. Peter says,
Speaker 1: do not be surprised by the Fiery Travel Trial. I
Speaker 1: feel like, to all half the Christians, why were you surprised?
Speaker 1: Don't you read the Bible? Obviously not. I think James
Speaker 1: was considered it pure joy. I'm like, consider a joy.
Speaker 1: But anyway, that's whatever is that we have to know
Speaker 1: where our source of hope is because that hope is
Speaker 1: limitless in a world that is hopeless, in a world
Speaker 1: that is gripped with fear, in a world that is
Speaker 1: gripped with animosity, with divisiveness, with chaos. We Christians have
Speaker 1: to have this sense of hope. But it only comes
Speaker 1: in christ That's what we've learned. It's not going to
Speaker 1: come in money, position, title, accolades. No, no, no, we've
Speaker 1: seen all of that the last few years. Full anywhere
Speaker 1: we had misplaced hope. Jesus is like, how about a
Speaker 1: hope realignment? Because I'm about the only one that you
Speaker 1: could be sure of. And so the very first staff
Speaker 1: meeting we had on Zoom. So we're in March twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three and twenty twenty. I'm already prophetically into next year,
Speaker 1: and so we're in March twenty twenty and no one knew.
Speaker 1: It was like week one of the pandemic, so nobody knew.
Speaker 1: So we would meet like everybody else. We've got at
Speaker 1: a twenty one nineteen offices in fifteen countries, so we
Speaker 1: had everyone on zoom. And for the last two years,
Speaker 1: I've been calling it the upper Zoom Room, and so
Speaker 1: we've been meeting in the upper Zoom Room, and all
Speaker 1: of us were on lockdown. I live in California, so again,
Speaker 1: unless you were in you know, Texas or Florida, the
Speaker 1: rest of all of our country offices were on lockdown.
Speaker 1: And so I said to them, we're prisoners of sorts
Speaker 1: right now. But we can't we can't change that. We
Speaker 1: can't change that. We're all prisoners. We're all on lockdown
Speaker 1: around the world. I said, But although we can't choose
Speaker 1: the fact of whether we're prisoners or not, we can
Speaker 1: choose the kind of prisoners that we're going to be.
Speaker 1: And in Zachariah chapter nine, verse twelve, the prophet says,
Speaker 1: return to a stronghold, you prisoners of hope. Today I
Speaker 1: have declared that I will restore to you double And
Speaker 1: what happened was the children of Israel were in bondage,
Speaker 1: and they were in captivity in Babylon for seventy years.
Speaker 1: And they came back and they thought Jerusalem and the Temple,
Speaker 1: they were coming back, Man, things are going to be
Speaker 1: back to normal. Except it wasn't. The city was decimated,
Speaker 1: the temple was in ruins, the city walls were in ruins,
Speaker 1: and they were surrounded by enemies. And the prophet said
Speaker 1: to them, you were once prisoners in Babylon. Now you've
Speaker 1: gone back, and there's a big rebuilding project that has
Speaker 1: to happen in Jerusalem. But you need to become prisoners
Speaker 1: of hope. So he says, return to your stronghold, Jesus,
Speaker 1: you prisoners of hope. And I said, oh, we're making
Speaker 1: a decision in this ministry. We're not going to be
Speaker 1: prisoners of despair, or prisoners of fear, or prisoners of doubt,
Speaker 1: or prisoners of negativity, or prisoners of unbelief. But we
Speaker 1: are going to be prisoners of hope. Why Because Jesus
Speaker 1: is this hope we have as an anchor for our soul,
Speaker 1: both firm and secure. And he hasn't gone anywhere. He
Speaker 1: said he'll never leave us, not for say, he said,
Speaker 1: all of the promises of God are in Him, in
Speaker 1: Christ Jesus, Yes, and I am amen. Yes we've got
Speaker 1: a pandemic, Yes we've got political instability. Yes we've got
Speaker 1: a lot of problems morally and sociologically and environmentally. But Jesus,
Speaker 1: is this hope I have as an anchor for my soul,
Speaker 1: both firm and secure. And then I made them all
Speaker 1: right down, and I said to them, the prophet said,
Speaker 1: and I will restore to you double nay. Listen. During
Speaker 1: a pandemic and during there's a war, we had to
Speaker 1: evacuate our Ukraine office and move them to Warsaw. Of course,
Speaker 1: just the women and children. Some of those kids haven't
Speaker 1: seen their dad for a year. They're still over in Kiev.
Speaker 1: And we had to evacuate that office. And in the
Speaker 1: midst of it all we said to them, I said,
Speaker 1: I need you to get a pen and paper. Of course,
Speaker 1: they were millennials, all my staff, so they didn't know
Speaker 1: what that one was. So I had to show them.
Speaker 1: This is a pen and paper, and I said, I
Speaker 1: want you to write on that piece of paper the
Speaker 1: word double. I said, I don't know how this is
Speaker 1: going to happen, I said, but in a sense. I'm
Speaker 1: glad this has happened, because you guys are about to
Speaker 1: realize how much you've been writing in the slipstream of
Speaker 1: mine and Nick's faith. I said, you think, I said,
Speaker 1: You're about to learn that it's not a blue check
Speaker 1: mark or a cute Instagram post with a nice filter
Speaker 1: that's got the anointing on it. See, I said, before
Speaker 1: before there was ever any Internet, or before there was
Speaker 1: ever any you know, social media, or before there was
Speaker 1: any marketing plan, I said, I don't know. I see.
Speaker 1: I know what it is to be marked by God,
Speaker 1: and I know what it's like to go into the
Speaker 1: prayer closet and to lay a hold of God and
Speaker 1: the promises of God and the purposes of God and
Speaker 1: the provision of God. I said. For some of you,
Speaker 1: you think, but you know, marketing does all of this.
Speaker 1: I said, You're about to discover that being marked by
Speaker 1: God is much better than being marketed by man. That
Speaker 1: all the promises are in God. I said, So you're
Speaker 1: going to go into your rooms and you're going to
Speaker 1: learn how to pray, and you're going to learn how
Speaker 1: to see God breakthrough. And I said, and when we
Speaker 1: come out of this lockdown, period. I'm believing God that
Speaker 1: during our lockdown, when it would seem in possible to
Speaker 1: see people, women and children and men rescued, when it
Speaker 1: would seem impossible to see traffic as prosecuted and sentenced
Speaker 1: and in prison, I said, I'm believing God that we're
Speaker 1: going to see double This is in March twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: I said, because the same God's with us now that
Speaker 1: he's with us when we're not in a lockdown. So
Speaker 1: I'm believing for double the rescues. I'm believing for double
Speaker 1: the convictions. I'm believing for double the partners. And as
Speaker 1: I live and breathe by the grace of God, I'm
Speaker 1: here in October twenty twenty two, by the grace of God,
Speaker 1: during some of the most catastrophic unstable times on the planet.
Speaker 1: We have never had more victims rescued in the history
Speaker 1: of A twenty one, never seen more people away or
Speaker 1: reaching more people in the same way that this ministry
Speaker 1: has exploded. You can be seated, and I'm going to
Speaker 1: wrap up because we're prisoners of hope, not because we're
Speaker 1: also but because God's awesome. Because when you know your source,
Speaker 1: and you know what your source of hope is when
Speaker 1: all your circumstances don't align, you don't crumble, and you
Speaker 1: don't drift, because Jesus is this hope we have. So
Speaker 1: let me read this over you. Elevation Philippians three thirteen.
Speaker 1: It's time, elevation, to start forgetting, to start straining, and
Speaker 1: to start pressing. It's time, brothers. I do not consider
Speaker 1: that I have made it my own, but one thing
Speaker 1: I do for rights, forgetting what lies behind and straining
Speaker 1: forward to what lies ahead. I press on toward the
Speaker 1: goal for the price of the upward call in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: So what we need to do is to be a
Speaker 1: church that says, you know what, I'm not staying stuck.
Speaker 1: Whatever has happened in my life. Yes, I know there
Speaker 1: have been challenges. Yes I know there's been trauma. Yes
Speaker 1: I know there has been bitterness, and there's been unforgiveness.
Speaker 1: And yes I know there's been offenses. I'm being disappointed
Speaker 1: and I've been discouraged, and I've been disillusioned. I understand,
Speaker 1: but it's time that I forget. That doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: I pretend it didn't happen. I'm not diminishing that at all.
Speaker 1: The blood of Jesus doesn't give you amnesia, but it
Speaker 1: does give you a life beyond your past. It gives
Speaker 1: you a life you know, and your history does not
Speaker 1: need to define your destiny. You say, I'm forgetting those
Speaker 1: things don't lie behind both the good and the bad.
Speaker 1: And I'm straining. Oh. I haven't strained for a while
Speaker 1: because I've been needing my cheerios in my fed. But
Speaker 1: I'm gonna start to get a little bit uncomfortable now
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna start to strain. I'm gonna start to
Speaker 1: exert a force, and I'm gonna press We're gonna press
Speaker 1: on to what it is that God has. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: exert a steady force against empathy, against indifference, against comfort,
Speaker 1: against defense or bitterness or disappointment or disillusionment. And I
Speaker 1: determined that I am gonna lay a hold of all
Speaker 1: of that for which Christ Jesus letty a hold of me.
Speaker 1: I might be small, but my Goddess bid I might
Speaker 1: be limited, but my God iss littless. I might be finite,
Speaker 1: but my God he's in for that. And I am
Speaker 1: able to do exceedingly abundantly about and beyond anything that
Speaker 1: we don't ask hypel thing according to that power that
Speaker 1: works in our Elevation Church. Remember Lot's what don't look back,
Speaker 1: press on forward in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, if you
Speaker 1: enjoyed today's podcast, there are a couple things I'd love
Speaker 1: for you to do. Make sure to subscribe, rate, and
Speaker 1: review this podcast. You can also help us reach others
Speaker 1: by investing today at Elevation Church dot org, slash gift
Speaker 1: and thanks again for joining us on the Elevation Podcast.