Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdik. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 1: So thankful that you're here today, and I am going
Speaker 1: to go ahead. I normally have you stand to read
Speaker 1: the scripture. It's nineteen versus today, so go ahead and
Speaker 1: sit down and we'll take us slow. God bless you.
Speaker 1: My scripture from today's point of view is Acts chapter eleven.
Speaker 1: This sermon will probably take two weeks to preach. We
Speaker 1: did it last night. The Lord showed up. I thought
Speaker 1: he did till nobody said that was here last night. Yeah,
Speaker 1: to me, he showed up. And so we probably won't
Speaker 1: get to the entire message today. But in Acts chapter eleven,
Speaker 1: it's a very unique and pivotal story as the Gospel
Speaker 1: is going forward through the ministry of the Early Church,
Speaker 1: where it says in verse one, the apostles and the
Speaker 1: believers throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received
Speaker 1: the Word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem.
Speaker 1: The circumcised believers criticized him and said, you went into
Speaker 1: the house of uncircumcised men and ate with them. Starting
Speaker 1: from the beginning verse four, Peter told them the whole story.
Speaker 1: Here it is. I was in the city of Japa praying,
Speaker 1: and in a trance I saw a vision. I saw
Speaker 1: something like a large sheet being let down from heaven
Speaker 1: by its four corners, and it came down to where
Speaker 1: I was. I looked into it. Oh, I'll touch somebody
Speaker 1: and say look into it. Yeah. I looked into it
Speaker 1: and saw four footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles,
Speaker 1: and birds. Then I heard a voice telling me get up, Peter,
Speaker 1: kill and eat. I replied, surely not, Lord. How are
Speaker 1: you gonna say no and call him Lord in the
Speaker 1: same sentence, that's crazy. Nothing impure or unclean has ever
Speaker 1: entered my mouth. And the voice spoke from heaven a
Speaker 1: second time. Oh, thank God for second chances, third chances,
Speaker 1: fourth chances. Can I get a fifth chance? Six chance,
Speaker 1: seven chances, eight chance? Do not call anything impure that
Speaker 1: God has made clean. This happened three times, and then
Speaker 1: it was all pulled up to heaven again. Right then
Speaker 1: three men who had been sent to me from cesarea,
Speaker 1: stopped at the house where I was staying, and the
Speaker 1: Spirit told me to have no hesitation about going with them.
Speaker 1: These six brothers also went with me, and we entered
Speaker 1: the man's house, and he told us how he had
Speaker 1: seen an angel appear in the house and say, send
Speaker 1: a joppa for Simon, who is called Peter. He will
Speaker 1: bring you a message through which you and all your
Speaker 1: households will be saved. Now I began to speak, the
Speaker 1: Holy Spirit came on them, and he had come on
Speaker 1: us to begin in the same way. Then I remembered
Speaker 1: what the Lord turned a page has said, John baptized
Speaker 1: with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1: So if God gave them the same gift he gave us,
Speaker 1: who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I
Speaker 1: to think that I could stand in God's way if
Speaker 1: you would nudge your neighbor gently and say get out
Speaker 1: of God's way. When they heard this, they had no
Speaker 1: further objections your honor and praised God, saying so then,
Speaker 1: even to gentiles, God has granted repentance that leads to life.
Speaker 1: So we've gone from in verse one. We've gone from
Speaker 1: What did I write down? I wrote it in my
Speaker 1: nose because I was seeing it before I came out. Oh,
Speaker 1: we went from protest to praise, from protests to praise.
Speaker 1: But that's not the title of my message. The title
Speaker 1: of my message hinges on verse four. Starting from the beginning,
Speaker 1: Peter told them the whole story. Starting from the beginning,
Speaker 1: Peter told them the whole story. Now, look at your
Speaker 1: neighbor and give them my title. Say I'm not calling
Speaker 1: you a liar. I promise I'm not. But there's a
Speaker 1: hole in your story. Come on, say it like you're
Speaker 1: on CSI and they've been in the interrogation room all
Speaker 1: night and the coffee is cold. Look at them again
Speaker 1: and say there's a hole in your story. Look at
Speaker 1: your other neighbors, Say there's a hole in your story.
Speaker 1: A story within a story, acts Chapter eleven. It's really
Speaker 1: about the purpose of God, but it's told through the
Speaker 1: perspective of Peter, through the writing of Luke. For Theophilus
Speaker 1: to describe simultaneously both the ministry of Peter and the
Speaker 1: purpose of God. Did you know that your story is
Speaker 1: a story within a story. There's always a story within
Speaker 1: the story. There's the surface story, and then there is
Speaker 1: the story that is beneath the surface, and then there
Speaker 1: is the story that is overarching. And sometimes we don't
Speaker 1: even realize how how many missing pieces there are of
Speaker 1: the stories that we tell ourselves. Even worse, we don't
Speaker 1: even really understand the missing I would call it a
Speaker 1: plot hole. You've been watching a show and they just
Speaker 1: there's just a plot hole in the in the in
Speaker 1: the story. We were watching this Christian movie called Friday
Speaker 1: Night Lights with Saint Tim Riggins and and they had
Speaker 1: a plot hole in it. We were talking about this
Speaker 1: and Lilah Garrity drove her car into Buddy Garritty's car
Speaker 1: dealership through the window. In the next episode, everything was
Speaker 1: fine and she had her car back. And even in
Speaker 1: our family we adopted that we call it. Can I
Speaker 1: get a garrity? When you do something stupid in our
Speaker 1: family and you want total immunity and forgiveness and never
Speaker 1: bring it up again. As far as the east is
Speaker 1: from the west, can you cast us in the sea?
Speaker 1: You have to ask for a garrity? How many of
Speaker 1: you have ever needed God to give you a garrity? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I can preach on anything and the truth of the
Speaker 1: matter is in Acts chapter eleven. You know, it's a
Speaker 1: microcosm for what we experienced so many times in our lives,
Speaker 1: where when there is space, a story fills it. And
Speaker 1: then the space between what you know and what you
Speaker 1: think you know sometimes is the story that you tell
Speaker 1: yourself that keeps you stuck. Are y'all too sleepy for me? Preacher?
Speaker 1: Can I do this like I want to? When the
Speaker 1: church was first starting and I was an inexperienced pastor,
Speaker 1: just a whipper snapper and a monarchy T shirt with
Speaker 1: some antique denim jeans and some Martin Mason boots, I
Speaker 1: was oblivious about certain things, and I invited this man
Speaker 1: to come share his story with our church. The church
Speaker 1: was only about two years old, and I had him
Speaker 1: share with the whole church his story. The next week,
Speaker 1: somebody called our church office and requested to have a
Speaker 1: phone appointment with me. And the person who called was
Speaker 1: a man of God. He had a radio ministry and
Speaker 1: I had heard his voice on the radio so many times,
Speaker 1: so when we finally talked on the phone, it was
Speaker 1: surreal to hear his voice because I'd heard him on
Speaker 1: the radio and never talked to him for didn't even
Speaker 1: know that he knew who I was. So I felt
Speaker 1: kind of important when they said so and so wants
Speaker 1: to talk to you and set up a phone appointment. Ooh,
Speaker 1: phone appointment. And so when the day came to have
Speaker 1: the call, he said, hello, pastor. It's beautiful, rich baritone voice.
Speaker 1: Very soon, Hello Pastor. I said, hey, it's so good
Speaker 1: to talk to you, and he said, you might want
Speaker 1: to hear what I have to say before you say that. Now.
Speaker 1: What he said next was an education. He gave me
Speaker 1: a seminary education and a five minute phone call. He said,
Speaker 1: I watched your interview with so and so, the person
Speaker 1: I had brought up. Let me do it in his voice.
Speaker 1: I watched your interview and it was very entertaining, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't very accurate. I said, well, all I did
Speaker 1: was let him share his story. And he said, well,
Speaker 1: there's a few holes in that story. Then I'd like
Speaker 1: to fill in. See the man I was talking to,
Speaker 1: he was playing this victim role, and when he told
Speaker 1: his story, it was everybody who didn't help him, everybody
Speaker 1: who didn't care about him, everybody who mistreated him. He
Speaker 1: didn't mention the people who gave him rent payments. He
Speaker 1: didn't mention the people who gave him second chances, third chances,
Speaker 1: fourth chances. He left a lot of that out. But
Speaker 1: I never forgot what the older, more experienced pastor said
Speaker 1: because I've been trying to apply it to my life.
Speaker 1: There's a few holes in your story. Now. I don't
Speaker 1: mean to get all up in your macaroni at this
Speaker 1: time of the day, because I know it's early, but
Speaker 1: are there a few holes in the story that you've
Speaker 1: been telling yourself about yourself, about others, about your parents,
Speaker 1: about your kids, about God? Are there some holes in
Speaker 1: your story? I want to take this text for a
Speaker 1: moment and interrogate it. I want to see what Peter
Speaker 1: said in verse four that took us from what did
Speaker 1: I say again, from protests to praise. It started with
Speaker 1: this whole group. It started with a rumor. Now, back
Speaker 1: in the Bible days they spread rumors. Things have changed,
Speaker 1: we have evolved societally. In the Bible, they spread rumors
Speaker 1: and they weren't always accurate. So in verse one, if
Speaker 1: you revisit it with me for a moment, they're talking
Speaker 1: about Peter going to eat with the gentiles. Did you
Speaker 1: hear what Peter did. Already, he was down there eating
Speaker 1: bacon and sausage and poor grimes with those gentiles. I
Speaker 1: already was down there playing poker. Already, he was drinking
Speaker 1: beer and watching cinemax and h f you know stuff.
Speaker 1: And so by the time one author said, a lie
Speaker 1: can make it around the world, by the time the
Speaker 1: truth gets his shoes left stuff. And here's what's crazy.
Speaker 1: The story about what Peter did got back to Jerusalem
Speaker 1: before Peter did. The story beat Peter back to Jerusalem,
Speaker 1: and he's seventy miles away sharing the gospel. The gospel
Speaker 1: of Jesus Christ has just gone beyond the borders of
Speaker 1: one people group, the Jews, to the Gentiles, which was
Speaker 1: God's original intention. When he called Abraham, he said, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna bless you, but I'm not just gonna bless you
Speaker 1: to bless you. I'm gonna bless you to be a blessing,
Speaker 1: and through you all the nations of the earth will
Speaker 1: be blessed. That's always what he wanted to do, and
Speaker 1: now he's doing it. But sometimes we get so lost
Speaker 1: in the story, the story that was handed to us,
Speaker 1: that we missed the bigger story that God is telling.
Speaker 1: And the keyword to me in verse one was it
Speaker 1: said the apostles and the believer throughout Judea heard the
Speaker 1: word was heard. They heard something. Do you hear about? What?
Speaker 1: Do you hear what they did? Do you hear what
Speaker 1: they did? Did you read the article? No, I've just
Speaker 1: read the headline. You go to evolution. What's it called elevation?
Speaker 1: Elevation of church? I heard they don't have a cross
Speaker 1: on the building, or I heard they don't have I
Speaker 1: heard that they have a trampoline on the stage for
Speaker 1: leap year. I heard, I heard, I heard, I heard,
Speaker 1: I heard. You know how much trouble there is when
Speaker 1: when you take the heart what you heard without checking
Speaker 1: it out. So the first thing I want to say,
Speaker 1: I want to do a sermon around this. I want
Speaker 1: to warn you about four types of stories that will
Speaker 1: ruin your life if you let them. Four types of
Speaker 1: stories with some hold in. And the first one I
Speaker 1: want to show you is beware of second hand stories. Yeah,
Speaker 1: beware of what you believe that you have not seen.
Speaker 1: For yourself and for everybody over the age of twelve,
Speaker 1: raise your hand. If you're over the age of twelve,
Speaker 1: raise your hand. And wave it at me real good, Like,
Speaker 1: just let me know that you got all your circulation left. Yeah,
Speaker 1: wave it at me. If we are grown ups, can
Speaker 1: we please make a quality decision to stop letting our
Speaker 1: opinions of others be determined through the filter of the
Speaker 1: opinions of others. The contrast is severe. In verse one,
Speaker 1: it says the apostles and believers they heard about what
Speaker 1: Peter was doing, and they criticized him out of their ignorance.
Speaker 1: But verse five says that they heard what Peter did,
Speaker 1: but watch what Peter has. Peter has a first person
Speaker 1: percon so he's not going off of what he heard.
Speaker 1: He's going off of what he experienced. That's why it
Speaker 1: doesn't It doesn't affect me what you think God is. Like.
Speaker 1: You can tell me God is judgmental and hateful, but
Speaker 1: I don't believe that because I have experienced his law,
Speaker 1: I have seen his goodness, I have felt his touch,
Speaker 1: I have experienced his embrace. And so when you hear
Speaker 1: something secondhand and take it as truth, it can be
Speaker 1: worse than secondhand smoke. Secondhand smoke can destroy your lungs.
Speaker 1: Secondhand stories can destroy your life. Secondhand stories can keep
Speaker 1: you from getting to know people that you would actually
Speaker 1: like if you didn't just meet them through a screen.
Speaker 1: Secondhand stories can keep you from stereotyping genders and races
Speaker 1: and other denominations. I was riding around with a pastor
Speaker 1: one time and we drove by a church and the
Speaker 1: parking lot was full. The parking lot was so full
Speaker 1: that people were parked on the side of the road
Speaker 1: to go to that church. And we were driving past
Speaker 1: it to go to his church. And I was speaking
Speaker 1: for him, and we were going on the way to
Speaker 1: his church, and he pointed at the church with the
Speaker 1: full parking lot and said, that's a weird church. I
Speaker 1: sat under my breath and it's full too. And see,
Speaker 1: when something else makes you feel insecure, you shield yourself
Speaker 1: by calling it weird. So this is what I want
Speaker 1: you to get out of it. Some of you are
Speaker 1: holding on to stories that are not even true about you,
Speaker 1: that were given to you second hand about who you are. Gideon,
Speaker 1: you know, I am the least in my tribe. This
Speaker 1: is an Old Testament story that illustrates it. I am
Speaker 1: the smallest, My tribe is the smallest. I'm the smallest
Speaker 1: in the tribe, and I want to ask you what
Speaker 1: God asked Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden?
Speaker 1: Who told you that? Who told you that story? Sometimes
Speaker 1: it's even well meaning people. I mean, these were not pagans.
Speaker 1: These were observant Jewish Christians who just wanted to get
Speaker 1: it right. But what happened in their day happens in ours.
Speaker 1: Where you know, when God originally blessed his people, he
Speaker 1: wanted them to take it beyond just these borders. But
Speaker 1: over time, you know, tradition gets in the way of truth,
Speaker 1: so then you start thinking that your tradition is the truth.
Speaker 1: And if you've ever had a family member say something
Speaker 1: to you like, oh, well, you're getting kind of big
Speaker 1: for your briches. Is that just a monkst corner thing,
Speaker 1: you know, you make a move forward, Oh well, you're
Speaker 1: getting too big for your briches. It's a way of
Speaker 1: trying to keep you stuck in the tradition of what
Speaker 1: our family has accomplished and what we do. And so
Speaker 1: I'm so subconscious. For most of us, it's a story
Speaker 1: that runs in the background and we never even know it,
Speaker 1: but it is a story that someone else told themselves
Speaker 1: and then they passed it on to us, and we
Speaker 1: took it as our own, and we stay stuck in
Speaker 1: a story for eighty years of our life that we
Speaker 1: could have broken out of if we would have believed
Speaker 1: the voice of God. I hear my preaching mentors saying,
Speaker 1: slow down, verdict, So let me do that for a moment.
Speaker 1: What stories are you holding onto that are old, that
Speaker 1: are keeping you from what's new and what's now and
Speaker 1: what's true and what's real. Secondhand stories, it's a dangerous thing.
Speaker 1: If you ever played the game where you pass a
Speaker 1: thing down the road, I could start and say milk
Speaker 1: is on sale, and by the time it gets to Christy,
Speaker 1: by the time it passes all the way down this road,
Speaker 1: you know, it would turn into you know, Donald Trump
Speaker 1: is the pastor of Elevation Church by the time it
Speaker 1: got down that row. And it's never been worse than
Speaker 1: it is right now in our world that we don't
Speaker 1: read the whole story, just the headlines. So then it
Speaker 1: becomes oh, well, you're not this, and you're only that,
Speaker 1: and you can't this, and all white people and all
Speaker 1: black people and all men and all women and this
Speaker 1: community and that community, and it is a generic way
Speaker 1: of keeping us from peeling back the labels, because labels
Speaker 1: always limit, and when you label yourself, you limit yourself.
Speaker 1: So all that to say, there might be a few
Speaker 1: holes in your story, some things that you have told
Speaker 1: yourself that aren't necessarily he said, it was very entertaining,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't very accurate. And sometimes you tell yourself
Speaker 1: a story to survive, just to make it. And what's
Speaker 1: sad to me about it is somebody might have rejected
Speaker 1: you at one point in your life because of how
Speaker 1: they felt about themselves, and then you took it as
Speaker 1: an indication of your value. Oh well, they walked out
Speaker 1: of my life. There must have been something wrong with me.
Speaker 1: That's their story, not yours. That's their story, not yours.
Speaker 1: That's their story, not yours, and you don't have to
Speaker 1: own it. And I love Peter because he is so reckless.
Speaker 1: And so the reckless Reverend comes in, but he's got
Speaker 1: himself under control, and he just told them the whole story.
Speaker 1: Don't you want God to show you the whole story
Speaker 1: of your life? And when he starts the story, he
Speaker 1: starts with everybody's favorite main character in the story. Look
Speaker 1: at verse five. You ready for this? This is how
Speaker 1: every story starts watches I Number two, beware of self
Speaker 1: centered stories. Oh man, when you put yourself at the
Speaker 1: center of every story, you're gonna be stressed out. There's
Speaker 1: not enough peptobysmal in the world for you to keep
Speaker 1: your stomach calm if you put yourself at the center
Speaker 1: of every story. And this is for all of us
Speaker 1: who are easily offended. All right, did you see how
Speaker 1: they looked at me? They don't like me. They like you, fine,
Speaker 1: they're sleepy, they don't like their husband. It's not you. Oh,
Speaker 1: look at somebody and set them for you say it's
Speaker 1: not you, it's not you. They weren't mad at Peter.
Speaker 1: They were stuck in a structure and a system and
Speaker 1: a way of thought. When I make myself the center
Speaker 1: of the story, I take on unnecessary stress. Sometimes when
Speaker 1: I'm preaching, I think I'm not doing good if everybody's
Speaker 1: not you know, saying amen are something like that. But
Speaker 1: what if you were up till three thirty in the
Speaker 1: morning and you didn't get your sleep. I'm gonna take
Speaker 1: that as a reflection of my preaching. I don't think so.
Speaker 1: The devil is a liar. This is good preaching, no
Speaker 1: matter whether you're not at it or not. And you
Speaker 1: know what, I need to get better about that in
Speaker 1: my life because I really struggle thinking that every story
Speaker 1: starts with me how they treated me. And so I say, like,
Speaker 1: you know that God has a reason for everything. And
Speaker 1: what I mean by that is, okay, this is my
Speaker 1: dirty little secret. What I mean is God has a
Speaker 1: reason for this that I am going to like agree
Speaker 1: with and understand. And that's just not the way it is.
Speaker 1: How many know, that's just not the way it is
Speaker 1: a self centered story in parenting when I make it
Speaker 1: about myself. Remember these are circumcised believers. That is an
Speaker 1: external sign of a covenant. It's something that you can see.
Speaker 1: You wouldn't necessarily always see it, but you could see it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna leave that right there in case your kid
Speaker 1: didn't go to the kids ministry today and you can
Speaker 1: do that Bible study home. But you couldn't necessarily see it,
Speaker 1: but you could see it. And here's the temptation when
Speaker 1: we try to go off of what we can see
Speaker 1: and tell ourselves a story and then we start filling
Speaker 1: in the space. Remember Peter is seventy miles away from Jerusalem,
Speaker 1: and they start telling the story. Space creates stories. Physical
Speaker 1: space creates stories. Sometimes you don't need to text certain things.
Speaker 1: You need to pick up the phone and call. Sometimes
Speaker 1: text doesn't get the tone across, and you're gonna spend
Speaker 1: six months fixing a relational mess because you used your
Speaker 1: thumbs rather than your feet to walk over and have
Speaker 1: a real conversation. And so when you have space, you
Speaker 1: create a story. Even the space of time creates stories.
Speaker 1: You know, a lot of time goes by and you're like,
Speaker 1: you start, you start remembering things differently, don't you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's hard for me right now raising kids to remember
Speaker 1: what it's like to be a kid. So if one
Speaker 1: of my kids acts up, my immediate thing is to
Speaker 1: make it about me. They are disrespecting me. I am
Speaker 1: the man of God. And uh, one day, the Lord,
Speaker 1: the Lord really this was. This was like, have you
Speaker 1: ever had one of those god bombs just go off
Speaker 1: inside of you where you just knew that what you
Speaker 1: were thinking was wrong. I was. I was thinking about
Speaker 1: one of my kids. They are so selfish. They were
Speaker 1: making certain certain decisions. I thought, this is so selfish.
Speaker 1: The Lord said, They're not selfish, they're scared. Think about
Speaker 1: what it's like when you start getting flooded with all
Speaker 1: of those hormones. Think about what it's like when the
Speaker 1: rules change on you all of a sudden. And y'all
Speaker 1: don't have big kids yet, but you will remember. You
Speaker 1: will remember certain times in your life where you were
Speaker 1: acting selfish. The reason you were acting selfish is because
Speaker 1: you were scared. And when you get scared, you start
Speaker 1: acting selfish because you are in protection mode. So what
Speaker 1: am I doing? I'm going from God. They're so selfish,
Speaker 1: and God is showing me that the whole story. See,
Speaker 1: there's a whole in your story. There's a whole story,
Speaker 1: and then there's a whole in your story. And sometimes
Speaker 1: we tell ourselves stories about others without realizing that they
Speaker 1: are going through things too. Y'all don't want to say
Speaker 1: amen to this, because it means we have to have
Speaker 1: compassion on people, kind of like God has compassion on us.
Speaker 1: Like we want God to forgive us, like we want
Speaker 1: God to excuse our gaps. We're gonna have to sometimes say, God,
Speaker 1: help me to stop making it about me. God forgive
Speaker 1: me for making this about me. I feel the Holy
Speaker 1: ghost and fire in my bones right now. It's bigger
Speaker 1: than you. It's bigger than you. How could Peter have
Speaker 1: known that what he was being criticized for in this
Speaker 1: moment would lead to the Gospel penetrating the Roman Empire.
Speaker 1: You have no idea what God is doing through this conflict,
Speaker 1: this season in your life. There is a bigger story
Speaker 1: being told. And there is a hole in your story.
Speaker 1: There's a hole in your story. Dear Holly, Dear Holly,
Speaker 1: there's a hole in Did you know this song as
Speaker 1: a whole not in your bucket? There's a hole in
Speaker 1: your story. There's a hole in your story. And we
Speaker 1: can't stand not to know how things are going to
Speaker 1: turn out. So what we do? We make up a story.
Speaker 1: I mean we make up look, sit out. I got
Speaker 1: to tell you about selective stories. Selective stories. This is
Speaker 1: when you don't know what's going to happen next in
Speaker 1: your life. Like think about the uncertainty that the early
Speaker 1: Church was facing under great persecution and yet great purpose
Speaker 1: at the same time of great persecution, and they're both
Speaker 1: happening simultaneously. But what story are you going to choose?
Speaker 1: Selective stories? You are always choosing your story, and some
Speaker 1: of us, for some God forsaken reason, keep choosing horror
Speaker 1: stories we fill in the unknown parts of our future.
Speaker 1: You know what, some of us could give Stephen King
Speaker 1: a run for his money if we put down the
Speaker 1: paper the scary stories we write about what might happen
Speaker 1: in our lives. I mean, if Stephen King has nothing
Speaker 1: on you, you create boogeymen. You create scenarios out of
Speaker 1: the small Have you noticed how the smallest thing can
Speaker 1: put a story? Have you? You know if your new parent,
Speaker 1: raise your hand, they're not sleeping through the night. How
Speaker 1: many you got a baby that's not sleeping through the
Speaker 1: night right now? And how many times have you thought,
Speaker 1: what if this is a sign of things to come?
Speaker 1: And now you got them in rehab and now you
Speaker 1: got them on drunks, strung out on, there's got a
Speaker 1: needle in their arm, and they're just collicky. Flat tire.
Speaker 1: Oh god, it's just gonna be one of those days.
Speaker 1: That's a story. It's just gonna be one of those days.
Speaker 1: Flat tire. Now, the same person might have got a
Speaker 1: flat tire and said, well, God must have been keeping
Speaker 1: me from a wreck that was going to happen two
Speaker 1: miles up the street. That's just a story. You ready
Speaker 1: for this? You don't get to choose every situation, but
Speaker 1: you get to choose the story. Oh, the power of
Speaker 1: God is in that truth. You choose the story that
Speaker 1: you tell yourself. So if something's hard, you can be like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: this is hard. I thought God told me to do it,
Speaker 1: But I guess the Lord isn't in. This is hard.
Speaker 1: It must not be God. What if Jesus would have
Speaker 1: thought about the cross that way? Oh, this is hard.
Speaker 1: This must not be the will of God. I must
Speaker 1: not have heard God on this one. But this is hard.
Speaker 1: That's a story. Here's another story. This is so hard.
Speaker 1: It must be God. That must be the devil must
Speaker 1: have got a memo that I'm onto. So oh think good.
Speaker 1: I'm on the educated. That's what these giants are here
Speaker 1: to signify. It is dangerous when you select a certain story.
Speaker 1: Nobody cares about me. Give me your phone. I will
Speaker 1: show you people who care about you, who checked on
Speaker 1: you this week. But you let that devil in your
Speaker 1: editing room and gave him your typewriter. I'm an old
Speaker 1: school preacher. You gave him the seat in the chair
Speaker 1: to edit your story. You get to choose your story.
Speaker 1: I didn't always believe this, I thought, well, you know, well,
Speaker 1: certain people, they have certain stories. No, No, those are situations.
Speaker 1: Life will give you a lot of suffering. You don't
Speaker 1: get to choose it. But if you're gonna have to
Speaker 1: suffer enough because of the situations that life brings, why
Speaker 1: would you choose to suffer with a story. I don't
Speaker 1: know who this is for. It is probably not somebody
Speaker 1: in this room. You've suffered enough. You've suffered enough. What
Speaker 1: you're going through is hard enough. What you're dealing with
Speaker 1: this heavy enough without telling yourself a story about it
Speaker 1: that reinforces the thought that God is not with you.
Speaker 1: I'm still in Acts eleven. Peter told them the whole story.
Speaker 1: He saw what God did. They heard it. He saw it.
Speaker 1: They heard it. He saw it, they heard it. He
Speaker 1: showed up and said, I heard what you've been saying
Speaker 1: about me. But there's a hole in your story. You're
Speaker 1: telling me what you heard. Let me tell you what
Speaker 1: I saw. I saw the vision of the whole earth
Speaker 1: being reached by the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I saw it,
Speaker 1: I experienced it. I know that God is for me.
Speaker 1: How do you know, well, I was there. I was
Speaker 1: there when He picked me up. I was there when
Speaker 1: nobody else could give me the comfort in the bamb
Speaker 1: in the medicine, but God helped me through that night.
Speaker 1: I was there when I was in the middle of
Speaker 1: an emotional storm that I saw no way through. But
Speaker 1: look at me on the other side, dancing on the shore.
Speaker 1: I was there. You can't tell me God's not real.
Speaker 1: You can't tell me he didn't choose me. You can't
Speaker 1: tell me grace doesn't work. You can't tell me it's over.
Speaker 1: You can't tell me the best is behind me. You
Speaker 1: can't make me tell him. I know too much. I
Speaker 1: saw it. You tell me what you heard. I'll tell
Speaker 1: you what I saw. I feel the spirit of the Lord.
Speaker 1: You choose the story. Now, if this is the most
Speaker 1: difficult season of your life, right now, you still get
Speaker 1: to choose the story. Did you clap because you're going
Speaker 1: through hell? You get to choose what you tell yourself
Speaker 1: the story of this season. Okay, because watch this. One
Speaker 1: person says I'm going through the valley of the shadow
Speaker 1: of death. Somebody else says, there's a table for me
Speaker 1: in the presence of my enemies. It's the same situation,
Speaker 1: but it's a different story. Y'all forgot how to shout
Speaker 1: while I was gone last week. Shout if you know
Speaker 1: that the devil might take your money, he might rob
Speaker 1: you up a few years. But you can't have my story,
Speaker 1: my joy, my annoying, my authority, get under my feet, snake. Now,
Speaker 1: one of my best friends is going through the most
Speaker 1: horrible season of their life right now, and he and
Speaker 1: his wife lost everything last year. Lost everything. I don't
Speaker 1: mean that like we say it. You know, your video
Speaker 1: game progress got lost. I'm not talking about that. I'm
Speaker 1: talking about stripped. I'm talking about I felt like I
Speaker 1: was watching the Book of Job. I thought they would
Speaker 1: lose their faith. I really did. And what would make
Speaker 1: me mad. Every time I would call to encourage them,
Speaker 1: they would start encouraging me, and I was like, stop it.
Speaker 1: This is your encouraging phone call. You ever been trying
Speaker 1: to unlock the door and somebody else's unlocking it at
Speaker 1: the same time. Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it,
Speaker 1: stud it. And so she said something the wife. They
Speaker 1: lost their their ministry had to move to the other
Speaker 1: side of the country, and much of it was his decision,
Speaker 1: it wasn't her decision. And then at the consequence of
Speaker 1: his decision, she ends up having to leave everything that
Speaker 1: she's known, the town they grew up in, the ministry,
Speaker 1: all of it left, it gone, gone other side of
Speaker 1: the country. Then she gets diagnosed with cancer. So I'm like,
Speaker 1: for real right now? Her all right? So I saw
Speaker 1: her after all her hair was gone from chemo, and
Speaker 1: after she was, you know, thirty three percent smaller than
Speaker 1: she was when I saw the all of the stuff
Speaker 1: was in full effect. She started talking about thank God
Speaker 1: for the insurance. No, I don't want you to clap yet,
Speaker 1: because think about this, she said, even though we lost everything,
Speaker 1: if we hadn't moved across the country, we wouldn't have
Speaker 1: gotten put on different insurance, and our old insurance wouldn't
Speaker 1: have covered this. Hold on, don't clap yet. So I'm
Speaker 1: thinking I'm kind of an attitude about it, like, well,
Speaker 1: if God can get you to the other side of
Speaker 1: the country for better insurance, he's just stop the cancer.
Speaker 1: That's how I think I know, yealler Halo's just glowing
Speaker 1: right now. Y'all trust the Lord with all your heart,
Speaker 1: leaning on your own understanding. Sometimes I lean on my
Speaker 1: own understanding, and I'm like, this is ridiculous. I said,
Speaker 1: and I didn't say it out loud, but I'm sitting
Speaker 1: over there thinking it, thinking like, well, did God really
Speaker 1: have to make you lose everything, get you across the country,
Speaker 1: give you insurance. If he's a healer, I'm thinking that.
Speaker 1: I called him yesterday. I was like, I keep thinking
Speaker 1: about this insurance thing y'all keep saying is bugging me.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make any logical, tactical sense. The great I am,
Speaker 1: who can part the red sea, can't stop you from
Speaker 1: getting cancer. He just get you on a better insurance policy.
Speaker 1: I said, I don't get it. She said, it's not
Speaker 1: your story. Y'all better help me shout, or we're never
Speaker 1: gonna get to the eleven thirty. I want you to
Speaker 1: look at that devil and say, it's not yours. She
Speaker 1: said if I believed, if I believed that this was
Speaker 1: the end for me, I wouldn't survive. But if I
Speaker 1: believe that I will see the goodness of the Lord
Speaker 1: in the land of a living. She said, that's my story,
Speaker 1: and I'm sticking to it. Let the devil know come
Speaker 1: hell her high water. I get to choose the story
Speaker 1: that I tell. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel empowerment
Speaker 1: in this word, I get to choose the story that
Speaker 1: I tell. I get to choose. Be careful about selective stories,
Speaker 1: Be careful about self centered stories, be careful about second
Speaker 1: hand stories, and be careful about short stories. Just sitting
Speaker 1: down like you want me to finish now, be careful
Speaker 1: of short stories. This point is not for Holly. She
Speaker 1: has never in her life. I might have to pay
Speaker 1: for this when we get home, but it's gonna be
Speaker 1: worth it to get the point across. My wife when
Speaker 1: she was growing up, her dad used to say when
Speaker 1: because there were three women in the house, well, three
Speaker 1: daughters and a wife, so he was just it was
Speaker 1: him versus the estrogen, and the estrogen was just so powerful,
Speaker 1: and so when they would start telling a story, he go,
Speaker 1: he go, how long is this story going to be?
Speaker 1: I just need to know should I should I? Should
Speaker 1: I get comfortable in my chair? Should I? Should I
Speaker 1: fluff my pillow? Should I get an MRI? How long
Speaker 1: are we going to be here in the story. I
Speaker 1: thought that was so rude that he would say that,
Speaker 1: But I'm kind of like, now I know what he
Speaker 1: was saying, because it's not I don't want to hear it.
Speaker 1: I just want to pace myself with my attentions. Man,
Speaker 1: make sure I make take some notes and you know,
Speaker 1: so I can refer back to point number three A
Speaker 1: and ask you know. But it's always so eloquent, as
Speaker 1: you know. I don't mind anyway. Anyway. She says something
Speaker 1: all the time to people that I've never said to anyone.
Speaker 1: She'll say, somebody been telling a story. This happened last week.
Speaker 1: True story. Okay, because I said this last night. She
Speaker 1: knows what i'nna saying. She said last week to somebody
Speaker 1: they were starting to tell a story. I'm yawning. I
Speaker 1: look into did but I gotta enter yng. I'm a
Speaker 1: I'm thinking the more I know, the faster they'll do this.
Speaker 1: And she goes, she goes, oh, this is a great story.
Speaker 1: Please tell me everything and don't leave out any details.
Speaker 1: Shop And when it said Peter told the whole story,
Speaker 1: I thought about Holly. I thought about the whole story,
Speaker 1: all the details. And sometimes you let doubt cut you
Speaker 1: off in the middle of a sentence. That God is
Speaker 1: speaking in your life, So be careful about the short story.
Speaker 1: Be careful when people try to summarize your life into
Speaker 1: a neat little care category. Be careful when you tell
Speaker 1: yourself a story like that's all there is. That's not
Speaker 1: all there is. There's more to the story. There's a
Speaker 1: hole in your story right now, and I wonder what
Speaker 1: you're going to fill it with. When Peter went down
Speaker 1: to preach to Cornelius, he went down to tell him
Speaker 1: the good news about Jesus Christ. When he recounted it
Speaker 1: to the circumcised believers in Jerusalem, he left one part out.
Speaker 1: Let me show you what he left out of his story.
Speaker 1: He left out the sermon that he preached while he
Speaker 1: was there. I want to show you just one thing
Speaker 1: before I sit down and put this mic up and
Speaker 1: send you home happy. I want to show you why
Speaker 1: some of you are stuck in a part of your
Speaker 1: story that was never intended to be the end. Because
Speaker 1: when Peter got up to preach to Cornelius in Acts,
Speaker 1: chapter ten, verse thirty nine, he said something about Jesus
Speaker 1: that we are all witnesses. I saw it. I know
Speaker 1: what you heard. I saw it. I was there. I
Speaker 1: saw him save me. I saw him pay the price
Speaker 1: for my sins. I saw him shed his blood. I
Speaker 1: saw him with the lashes on his black back. I
Speaker 1: saw him as a sheep before the sheer, and he
Speaker 1: didn't say a word. I saw it for myself, and
Speaker 1: we are witnesses of everything that he did. In the
Speaker 1: country of the Jews and in Jerusalem, they killed him.
Speaker 1: They hung him on a cross. Comma. They hung him
Speaker 1: on a cross. Comma. They hung him on a cross Comma.
Speaker 1: The word of the Lord for you today, my brother,
Speaker 1: my sister, don't stop at the comma. Don't stop at
Speaker 1: the comma, because the next verse says, but God, I
Speaker 1: love those two words like I love the breath in
Speaker 1: my lungs. But God, we were trespassers. We had broken
Speaker 1: his law. We did not deserve mercy. Somebody shout, but God.
Speaker 1: Seeing if you stop at the comma, you never get
Speaker 1: to see the button. God was raising him from the
Speaker 1: dead by the time the story started to spread. Resurrection
Speaker 1: is possible when you realize he didn't stay on the cross.
Speaker 1: When they nailed him on the tree, they put a
Speaker 1: nail in his hands. But early one Sunday he shaw
Speaker 1: Thomas something. Put your finger where the nails were. There's
Speaker 1: a hole in your story. This is the gospel of
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ. There's a hole in your story. Follow me
Speaker 1: down to the guarded tomb where they laid his body
Speaker 1: in a cave. His body is not there. He has risen.
Speaker 1: There's a hole in your story and the best is
Speaker 1: yet to come. And he who began a good work
Speaker 1: in you will be faithful to complete it if you'll
Speaker 1: believe He get us sound right now, gep of us sound.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
Speaker 1: you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
Speaker 1: you that this ministry is possible. You can click the
Speaker 1: link in the description to give now or visit Elevationchurch
Speaker 1: dot org slash podcast for more information and if you
Speaker 1: enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You can share it
Speaker 1: with your friends. You can click the share button, take
Speaker 1: a screenshot and share it on your social stories and
Speaker 1: tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again for listening. God
Speaker 1: bless you.