Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. 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: I want to share with you from John chapter six,
Speaker 1: verse forty eight through fifty. And if you want to
Speaker 1: join me on the app that you have on your phone,
Speaker 1: or if you brought a physical copy of God's Word.
Speaker 1: If not, we'll just put it on the screen there
Speaker 1: for you. I'll be sharing from the NIV nineteen eighty
Speaker 1: four version. No, I'm serious, there's different ones, so you'll
Speaker 1: see a few of the words are different. That was
Speaker 1: not a joke, but they change it, they revise it,
Speaker 1: and so this may be a few words different than
Speaker 1: what you're reading and what I normally preach from. But
Speaker 1: listen to this Jesus. It says, I am the bread
Speaker 1: of life. Your forefathers ate the man in the desert,
Speaker 1: yet they die. But here is the bread that comes
Speaker 1: down from Heaven, which a man may eat and not die.
Speaker 1: I like that so much when I read it I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go back for seconds. Let's go back. Let's go back,
Speaker 1: Let's read the whole thing again. That's what you came
Speaker 1: for anyway, is the word of God. That thing came
Speaker 1: alive to me last night I was preaching it. I
Speaker 1: was talking to my pastor, Pastor Craig Rochelle, after church
Speaker 1: on the porch. I started pacing all around the backyard
Speaker 1: telling him how these verses just have been coming alive
Speaker 1: for me. I was preaching to him on the phone.
Speaker 1: Whether he wanted to hear it or not. I think
Speaker 1: he put me on speaker or mute or something like that.
Speaker 1: When cut the grass, but it said, I am the
Speaker 1: bread of life. Your forefathers ate the man in the desert,
Speaker 1: yet they die. But here is the bread. Somebody said,
Speaker 1: here is the bread. Here is the bread that comes
Speaker 1: down from Heaven, which a man may eat and not die.
Speaker 1: I want to use just as a title today expiration date,
Speaker 1: and touch somebody next to you and say check the label. Amen,
Speaker 1: you may be seated. It's so crazy how you can
Speaker 1: think you really know somebody for years and then they
Speaker 1: just do something that makes you question everything you thought
Speaker 1: you knew about them. You sound like you're going through something,
Speaker 1: are they sitting next to you? I mean, I can
Speaker 1: tell you Holly's favorite movies, her favorite color, her favorite stores,
Speaker 1: her favorite brands within her favorite stores. I know a
Speaker 1: lot of things about that woman. I know her favorite books,
Speaker 1: audio books. I know her favorite book club that she's
Speaker 1: having this week, what she's reading for her book club
Speaker 1: this week. But even sometimes in the context of a
Speaker 1: marriage that you really think you know somebody, they would
Speaker 1: just shock you. The other day, she horrified me because
Speaker 1: I thought I knew her so well until I went
Speaker 1: in the refrigerator and I pulled out some cheese. I
Speaker 1: was just going to eat a few blocks of cheddar
Speaker 1: from my low carb lifestyle, says for a snack, And
Speaker 1: I looked at it and it said it was expired
Speaker 1: three months ago. Fridge was so full, you know, But
Speaker 1: I saw that, so as I'm going to throw it away,
Speaker 1: she stands in front of me and blocks me from
Speaker 1: putting the cheese. She says, oh, oh, you gotta smell
Speaker 1: it first, and I'm like, no, babe, I don't. It
Speaker 1: says right here on the label it's expired. And she said, oh,
Speaker 1: I feed you expired food all the time, and she said,
Speaker 1: the expiration date is just a suggestion. I'm like the
Speaker 1: devil is a lie o. Smell it. You know, you
Speaker 1: think you know somebody, turns out they're poisoning you trying
Speaker 1: to collect that life insurance. Want to see about that
Speaker 1: term life insurance. But you know it really should be
Speaker 1: in your relationship with God that you think you know him,
Speaker 1: you think you know what he's like, and just as
Speaker 1: your life experiences accumulate, and just the ways that you
Speaker 1: witness Him working in your life that you didn't expect
Speaker 1: and that you didn't predict and that did not fit
Speaker 1: your preconceived notions of what God was like eighteen years ago.
Speaker 1: He doesn't change, but the way that we see him
Speaker 1: should and must. It must expand, it must. Y'all won't
Speaker 1: like this word because you think it's like an atheist word.
Speaker 1: Evolve to include the parts of who He is that
Speaker 1: we didn't know about in our arrogance and our pride,
Speaker 1: because as we've become broken by the trials of life,
Speaker 1: it leaves spaces for God to get in. And he
Speaker 1: couldn't get in when we were all sealed up type
Speaker 1: by thinking we were perfect. But then when you live
Speaker 1: a little while wave at me in the back. When
Speaker 1: you live a little while, you get about to that
Speaker 1: age where you start to say, well, I thought I
Speaker 1: saw everything. I thought I knew who was a good
Speaker 1: Christian and who wasn't I thought I knew. I thought,
Speaker 1: I thought I knew what God would always do and
Speaker 1: what God was always like. But he was just always
Speaker 1: surprising them. In the person of Jesus Christ, as he
Speaker 1: walked the earth, he was showing them progressively who he was,
Speaker 1: and he wasn't changing to be something that he wasn't.
Speaker 1: They were just seeing what he had been all along.
Speaker 1: That required a sort of rewiring because if you go
Speaker 1: off of what they thought in the Old Testament, they
Speaker 1: saw a lot of wrath and vengeance because that was
Speaker 1: the way that they saw God through that lens. But
Speaker 1: as you track through the Redemptive history, the God of
Speaker 1: the Bible is revealed as one who not only is
Speaker 1: full of love and full of grace, but he is love.
Speaker 1: He is grace. See it doesn't say God has love.
Speaker 1: God is love. We beheld his glory, the glory as
Speaker 1: of the only begotton of the Father, full of grace
Speaker 1: and truth. He was always full of grace and truth.
Speaker 1: We just beheld it in the person of Christ. But
Speaker 1: it's progressive. And there is a reason that God does
Speaker 1: not show you everything all at once. It's called mercy.
Speaker 1: If he shows you the whole thing, you would die,
Speaker 1: you would give up, you would quit, and you would
Speaker 1: be so overwhelm. So because he is kind and because
Speaker 1: he is wise, he progressively shows you himself, and he
Speaker 1: progressively shows you his purpose for your life. So you
Speaker 1: can't figure it out all at once. And if you
Speaker 1: are a planner aka control freak, this will stress you out.
Speaker 1: It stressed the disciples out. He would not tell them everything.
Speaker 1: They would show up to preach you. I'm a preach
Speaker 1: a little bit. In fact, it's worse than that, okay,
Speaker 1: John chapter six, He's like, let's get away. John the
Speaker 1: Baptist has just been beheaded. Things are going crazy. Let's
Speaker 1: get away. He didn't tell him there'd be a crowd
Speaker 1: waiting on the other side, not because he didn't know,
Speaker 1: but probably because he knew they wouldn't go with him
Speaker 1: if they knew. So some things God does not show
Speaker 1: you about what's waiting for you on the other side
Speaker 1: because he knows you won't go if he tells you
Speaker 1: what's there, so he'll get you there and then show
Speaker 1: you the reason that he came to begin with. Well,
Speaker 1: he starts healing people right, he starts blessing, he starts teaching.
Speaker 1: It gets late the disciples. I know you've heard this
Speaker 1: story before, even if you only went to church once.
Speaker 1: It's like Hall of Fame Bible story. Five thousand men,
Speaker 1: women and children, five loaves of bread, two fish, one
Speaker 1: little boy who Peter beat up and took his lunch.
Speaker 1: I put that in as a it's a speculation. It's
Speaker 1: a speculation just thinking about how that boy gave his lunch.
Speaker 1: I have kids. I've never seen them voluntarily give it
Speaker 1: anything to the Lord and so or anybody. But but
Speaker 1: there's there's this sense in which they they were, they
Speaker 1: were they were gleaning what they could about the identity
Speaker 1: of this Christ that they chose to follow by the
Speaker 1: activities that they saw him do. And yet what what
Speaker 1: God confusing was that a lot of times people would
Speaker 1: get so caught up in what he did that they
Speaker 1: would miss the point of who he was. So John
Speaker 1: gives us seven statements in his Gospel alone that he
Speaker 1: collects that start with the name of God that was
Speaker 1: revealed to Moses at the Burning Bush. I am this
Speaker 1: is the first one. I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1: And how many are grateful that the first thing that
Speaker 1: Jesus wanted to be identified with was sustenance carbohydrates. How
Speaker 1: many are grateful that the first thing he wanted you
Speaker 1: to know is I am not only your provider. I
Speaker 1: am your provision. If I'm just your provider, then you
Speaker 1: need what comes from my hand. But if I am
Speaker 1: your provision, you can trust my heart to know that,
Speaker 1: even if it's not coming your way, everything you need
Speaker 1: for life and godliness is in me. I am the
Speaker 1: bread of life. I am the light of the world.
Speaker 1: If you can't see your next step, it's all right.
Speaker 1: I'll give you enough light for the next step that
Speaker 1: I've called you to take, not the next fifteen hundred.
Speaker 1: It is a progressive revelation. I am the gate that
Speaker 1: means you come in through me, you go out through me.
Speaker 1: Church is not the gate. Other people are not the gate.
Speaker 1: They don't get to decide what your life becomes or
Speaker 1: what it doesn't. I am the Gate. I am the
Speaker 1: good Shepherd. I will lead you through the valley of
Speaker 1: the shadow of death. It's just a shadow, because I
Speaker 1: am the resurrection and the life. Even the things that
Speaker 1: have died in your life are subject to resurrection. I
Speaker 1: serve notice on dead bones. If the breath of God
Speaker 1: hits the bones in the valley, they have to rise
Speaker 1: up and live in the name of the Lord. I
Speaker 1: am the vine, the true vine. There's imitators, there's substitutes,
Speaker 1: but they can't sustain you. I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1: And in order to get them to see it, he
Speaker 1: has to bring them all the way back to their experiences,
Speaker 1: and many of these experiences happen before they weerever around.
Speaker 1: And in order to get you to see that God
Speaker 1: is your provider, I want to show you something from
Speaker 1: Exodus chapter sixteen that really speaks to me about and
Speaker 1: how in some seasons of my life I feel like
Speaker 1: the demand is greater than the supply. The disciples weren't
Speaker 1: the first one that got put in a situation that
Speaker 1: was too much for them. So I'm preaching to people
Speaker 1: who are looking at too much in an area of
Speaker 1: your life today. And I believe, if nothing other than
Speaker 1: the device that is in your pocket, we are living
Speaker 1: in a time of too much, too much information. They're
Speaker 1: showing us now through studies on compassion fatigue, that by
Speaker 1: knowing everything bad that happens in the world, we are
Speaker 1: becoming unable to mobilize to do anything about the real
Speaker 1: things that we can affect, because we are so overwhelmed
Speaker 1: with too much, too much. The Disciples saw the crowds.
Speaker 1: They said, it's getting late, Jesus. This is John chapter six,
Speaker 1: before he said I'm the Bread of life. This is
Speaker 1: what led up to that statement. This is the story
Speaker 1: behind the statement. He wasn't just saying something out of context.
Speaker 1: He took the bred and multiplied it and everybody was fed.
Speaker 1: But before that happened, the disciples tendency was like the
Speaker 1: same tendency we have when it's just too much, Send
Speaker 1: them away, send them away. It's just too much. I
Speaker 1: can't fix it all. It's too much. It's too much debt, financially,
Speaker 1: I don't even know where to start digging out of this.
Speaker 1: It's just it's just too much. It's too much, too
Speaker 1: much on my schedule, it's too much. And then if
Speaker 1: the if the spirit of too much stays on you
Speaker 1: too long, it'll become the spirit of not enough. And
Speaker 1: so then you start evaluating your potential on the basis
Speaker 1: of your experiences and and what God is so good
Speaker 1: at in moments like these in our lives. If you're
Speaker 1: in a moment like that in your life, and I
Speaker 1: know I certainly have been where where you start sending
Speaker 1: opportunities away because you don't believe you have the reces
Speaker 1: to meet the need, you can relate with this passage
Speaker 1: and this statement, I am the bread of life. So
Speaker 1: recently and I'm going to share with you exit of
Speaker 1: sixteen in a minute. I didn't forget, but I started
Speaker 1: noticing that I was turning down things that I believe
Speaker 1: God wanted me to do, but it wasn't even because
Speaker 1: I was too busy to do them. I started to
Speaker 1: feel like I didn't have enough to give, and it
Speaker 1: started scaring me that maybe I was going to get
Speaker 1: out there to try to do it and I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have what people expected me to have. So I started
Speaker 1: to send stuff away that God was trying to bring
Speaker 1: to me to multiply his provision and to use me,
Speaker 1: which is what I wanted. But when you stay in
Speaker 1: the spirit of too much long enough, it becomes a
Speaker 1: deep feeling of not enough. And I believe that I'm
Speaker 1: looking at people today. I believe it's a cultural epidemic
Speaker 1: that we have never been in a time where we
Speaker 1: have felt more deprived and depleted and insufficient to face
Speaker 1: life's challenges, because we are constantly exposed to the world's
Speaker 1: entire need, all at once. So Jesus says, your fathers
Speaker 1: ate Manna in the wilderness. Last week, I talked about
Speaker 1: the wilderness, and I talked about finding your water in
Speaker 1: dry places, that God will always put a rock where
Speaker 1: water will come from, even in the driest, most difficult
Speaker 1: seasons of your life. And how that when you're too
Speaker 1: hungry or to thirsty, you become susceptible to substitutes, which
Speaker 1: is why you can be tempted to turn stones into bread.
Speaker 1: The Wilderness passage, which Jesus demonstrated by overcoming temptation and
Speaker 1: the nation of Israel succumbed to the temptation, is mentioned
Speaker 1: in Exitus sixteen. Remember that they came through the Red Sea.
Speaker 1: They had been in Egypt for a long time, suffering
Speaker 1: under slavery. They came through the Red Sea. They dwelt
Speaker 1: in a place called the wilderness. That wasn't the name
Speaker 1: of it. It was several stops along the way for
Speaker 1: a little while after they left Egypt. Apparently they had
Speaker 1: some snack packs, but at the point that the food
Speaker 1: ran out, they were caught in an interesting situation, just
Speaker 1: like the disciples in John six where we're in a
Speaker 1: remote place and we don't have enough to do what
Speaker 1: we need to do. And I want you to look
Speaker 1: at the scripture because it's kind of a test that
Speaker 1: some of you are dealing with right now, the do
Speaker 1: you trust me now? Test. You get so many opportunities
Speaker 1: in your life to trust God again, and every time
Speaker 1: you trust him on a different level, in a different scenario,
Speaker 1: you see a different dimension of who He is and
Speaker 1: what he can do. Now, look at this in Exodus
Speaker 1: chapter sixteen, if I can ever find it, Yeah, here
Speaker 1: it says the whole israre like community. Right there first
Speaker 1: one the hole is your like community. Set out from
Speaker 1: Elam and came to the hazard of Sin, which is
Speaker 1: between Elim and Sinai on the fifteenth day of the
Speaker 1: second month, after they had come out of Egypt, where
Speaker 1: they had been for four hundred and thirty years. In Egypt,
Speaker 1: where they initially went to escape of famine, that was
Speaker 1: in Canaan, but then in Egypt, the place where they
Speaker 1: went to escape the famine became the place where they
Speaker 1: were enslaved by Pharaoh. We dealt with that last week.
Speaker 1: Watched the message. It's free on YouTube and you have
Speaker 1: no excuse not to watch it. Download the podcast, download
Speaker 1: the app, and watch the message. But where it brings
Speaker 1: us to is they're out of Egypt, but they're not
Speaker 1: into Canaan. They are in a place where they need
Speaker 1: God's provision, but they have not fully accessed the promise
Speaker 1: of God. I call this the disappointment of deliverance. It's
Speaker 1: when God brings you out of something, but not all
Speaker 1: the way into anything either. It's when you raise your
Speaker 1: hand to receive Christ and you still have issues with
Speaker 1: your anger. It's when you believe God touched Darren worship
Speaker 1: and you still have bursidis in your right knee when
Speaker 1: you go home. It's when God makes you a promise
Speaker 1: and speaks a word concerning your daughter and her attitude
Speaker 1: gets worse on Tuesday than it was last Wednesday. It's
Speaker 1: the disappointment of deliverance when He brings you out, brings
Speaker 1: you through, brings you forward, but now they're in a
Speaker 1: stuck place. Really to wonder what will we eat? And
Speaker 1: they don't pass the test because instead of gratitude for
Speaker 1: the grace of God that brought them this far, they
Speaker 1: begin to grumble about what's ahead now list is in
Speaker 1: Bible times. We don't deal with this anymore. You know,
Speaker 1: the Bible's outdated times have change. But they they came
Speaker 1: out of Egypt. Watch this when the expiration date on
Speaker 1: their season of suffering had reached the ears of heaven.
Speaker 1: Everything you go through in your life, everything that even
Speaker 1: the enemy does in your life, anything you do to
Speaker 1: yourself in your life, it can't go on forever. And
Speaker 1: here's why it can't go on forever, because you are
Speaker 1: not in charge of the calendar of events of the
Speaker 1: purpose of God in the world. So even if the
Speaker 1: devil is messing with you in your mind, even if
Speaker 1: the devil is messing with you in your family, he
Speaker 1: can't just mess with you for as long as he wants,
Speaker 1: as much as he wants. God had to give the
Speaker 1: devil permission to hurt job. He didn't just get to
Speaker 1: do what he wanted to do for as long as
Speaker 1: he wanted to do it. God said, now that's enough.
Speaker 1: Somebody shout that's enough. And when God saw his people
Speaker 1: struggling in Egyptian slavery at a certain point, he said,
Speaker 1: now that's enough. And when he spoke to Moses, he said,
Speaker 1: I've seen my people mistreated, and I see how their
Speaker 1: backs are breaking with heavy labor, and I hear how
Speaker 1: they're crying out to me, and that's enough, and I
Speaker 1: came down to deliver my people and bring them out
Speaker 1: of Egypt. Every season of suffering, every season of struggle,
Speaker 1: has an expiration date. God is suffering. God is in charge.
Speaker 1: The enemy doesn't run my life. So when that ended
Speaker 1: and a month passed, they've come through the Red Sea.
Speaker 1: But now they need something to eat. And this is
Speaker 1: why I thought Jesus brought it up to say, I
Speaker 1: am the bread of life, just like I did it.
Speaker 1: Then watch this just like I did it in that
Speaker 1: period of time, just like I took care of you before,
Speaker 1: just like you didn't know how before and I did somehow.
Speaker 1: I am just like I was, I am, and just
Speaker 1: like I am, I will be. I haven't been giving
Speaker 1: y'all any love this whole sermon, but this is for
Speaker 1: this section, fifth row, this section. I am, I was,
Speaker 1: I will be. I am I was. How you know
Speaker 1: I am because I was? How do you know I
Speaker 1: will be? Because I am? How you know I am
Speaker 1: because I was. There is a testimony in your life
Speaker 1: to the faithfulness of God that will enable you to
Speaker 1: trust Him in this season, and you just get to
Speaker 1: do it over and over again. If you trust God
Speaker 1: with one test, you get to trust him with another.
Speaker 1: Algebra two is your reward for passing Algebra one. I
Speaker 1: don't like that. You don't get to graduate. You just
Speaker 1: get to trust him again. I will never forget what
Speaker 1: Holly said to me when Elijah was born. She goes, Oh,
Speaker 1: you don't get to quit worrying about your kid after
Speaker 1: you have them, because you know we're rubbing oil her
Speaker 1: stomach and feeding her avocados or whatever. We you know
Speaker 1: everything prenatal. What to expect when you're expecting. By the way,
Speaker 1: that book sucks, I'm on my money back, but it
Speaker 1: put an expectation on us. It is the disappointment of delivery. Oh,
Speaker 1: I had the kid. Now I got to check on
Speaker 1: them all through the body. I'm worried when they're crying,
Speaker 1: I'm worried when they're quiet. I'm worried. And now not
Speaker 1: only do I get to trust the life of my
Speaker 1: child to God when they're a toddler, because that's scary.
Speaker 1: You run around the house protecting them from everything. You know, Well,
Speaker 1: the first one, I mean we have three by the
Speaker 1: third one figured out. But the first one, you know,
Speaker 1: you're plugging electrical sockets with plastic things. Then you get
Speaker 1: to trust God when they're a teenager, and I'll make
Speaker 1: one of those plastic plugs for their friends. So now
Speaker 1: it's like, hey, trust me now, trust me deeper, trust
Speaker 1: me broader, trust me greater I am because I was
Speaker 1: and I will be too. It's the kind of God
Speaker 1: that I am. The bread of life. Here is the bread.
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna show you two things that keep us
Speaker 1: from trusting him. Now, two things that keep us from
Speaker 1: trusting Now they're in the passage. It says in the desert,
Speaker 1: the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. I wanted
Speaker 1: it to say they were grateful to Moses and Erin
Speaker 1: because of all the courage that it took to lead
Speaker 1: us out of Egypt and stand before Pharaoh and last
Speaker 1: through the duration of the ten plagues. But no, people.
Speaker 1: People tend to forget people tend to focus on what's missing,
Speaker 1: and then they tend to have a selective memory. Because
Speaker 1: sometimes what keeps you you want to take notes, this
Speaker 1: is the only chance you have the whole sermon. What
Speaker 1: keeps you from trusting God in the present is your
Speaker 1: attachment to the past. It's like when you've been in
Speaker 1: Egypt too long and you've been gone for a month
Speaker 1: and you start remembering it different than it really was.
Speaker 1: It's when it's a selective memory. I don't mean to
Speaker 1: start any marital fights here, but sometimes even in a relationship,
Speaker 1: it can be a selective memory of what I said
Speaker 1: and what you said. Well, that's what's happening here. It's
Speaker 1: a selective memory. It's like, watch this, what's what they
Speaker 1: say in the desert? They grumbled verse three. The Israelite
Speaker 1: said to them, if only we had died by the
Speaker 1: Lord's hand in Egypt. Remember they were crying God to
Speaker 1: take them out of Egypt. But now they're saying, would
Speaker 1: have been better to die there? Because there is the
Speaker 1: verse on the screen. Shout the word there there we
Speaker 1: sat around pots of meat. Yeah, when they weren't beating
Speaker 1: you with whips and working you twenty hours a day. Okay,
Speaker 1: so fine. Egypt had a meal plan, but it was miserable.
Speaker 1: But you forget that and you choose familiarity over freedom.
Speaker 1: Wish we were back in Egypt, big old pots of protein,
Speaker 1: the Golden Corral, meat section of Egypt, pots of meat,
Speaker 1: all the food we wanted. A buffet seven talking about Egypt. Now,
Speaker 1: they gave you mud and made you make bricks without
Speaker 1: enough straw, but you don't remember what they didn't give you.
Speaker 1: An Egypt seven puts meal food we want to You
Speaker 1: brought us out into this desert to starve the entire
Speaker 1: assembly Toda. The people you try to help the most
Speaker 1: will often turn on you. But that's a life advice.
Speaker 1: That's not what the message is. Today. The Lord said
Speaker 1: to Moses, all right, I'm gonna kill them all. Now
Speaker 1: watch this. This is how you start out thinking God
Speaker 1: is this is This is for most of us. And
Speaker 1: I'm preaching in the South United States of America. We
Speaker 1: got churches all over. But you see, your first concept
Speaker 1: of God, if you're introduced through religious system, is that
Speaker 1: God is You're not always pictured like Triton on the
Speaker 1: Little Mermaid, like just zapping stuff, and sometimes he zaps
Speaker 1: you and gives you a healing, but sometimes he zaps you,
Speaker 1: gives you diarrhea just like he just and I'll be
Speaker 1: scared of God like oh, I don't want to say that,
Speaker 1: He might buzz me. And you start thinking of God
Speaker 1: like that. But then Jesus comes along. He says, no, No,
Speaker 1: God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship
Speaker 1: him in spirit and truth. I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1: The first thing I want to be identified with is
Speaker 1: I provide for you. I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1: You start off thinking of God in this way, but
Speaker 1: then over time you begin to see that grace is
Speaker 1: really that good. And yet, if your attachment to the
Speaker 1: past in the way that you saw God as somebody
Speaker 1: who was just to punish you and keep you in
Speaker 1: line and make sure that you have no fun while
Speaker 1: you're here on this planet, if that is your view
Speaker 1: of God, it is very difficult for you to progress
Speaker 1: in it until you need the grace of God, until
Speaker 1: you get in a season where you can't do enough,
Speaker 1: and you get to a thing in your life that
Speaker 1: you can't overcome, and you get to a place in
Speaker 1: your life where you can't clean it up, and you
Speaker 1: make a mess that so big that you end up
Speaker 1: in the pig pen and you want to eat what
Speaker 1: the pigs eight and all you can do is come
Speaker 1: back home to your father. And then you see him
Speaker 1: on the road and you're like, oh, the whole time
Speaker 1: I was away from you, this is what you were like.
Speaker 1: You were waiting for me the whole time. But you don't.
Speaker 1: You don't see that all at once. It's progressive, and
Speaker 1: so he gives them. Watch this grace for their grumbling.
Speaker 1: They're not even praying correctly, and he still gives them
Speaker 1: what they need. I will rain down bread from heaven
Speaker 1: for you. And this is how you're gonna deal with it. Okay, guys,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna meet your needs. I'm gonna provide for you.
Speaker 1: Here's how. Here's how you're to respond to my provision.
Speaker 1: Now listen closely. This is important. This applies to us.
Speaker 1: It's not exactly the same for us because this is
Speaker 1: a physical manifestation. Most of the ways that we see
Speaker 1: God's provision through the Spirit of Christ is through the spiritual.
Speaker 1: The tangible is important, but it's nothing compared to this spiritual.
Speaker 1: So this is how God provides peace and joy and
Speaker 1: contentment and faith and hope, and all of the stuff
Speaker 1: that really matters, the stuff that doesn't perish, the stuff
Speaker 1: that doesn't get moldy, the stuff that doesn't get old,
Speaker 1: the stuff that you don't have to throw out after
Speaker 1: three months, the stuff that last. He said, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: give you. I'm gonna give you bread from heaven. The
Speaker 1: people are to go out each day and gather enough
Speaker 1: for that day. Somebody say enough. It's in the passage,
Speaker 1: he said, I want you to take enough for that day.
Speaker 1: In this way, I will test them to see whether
Speaker 1: they will follow my instructions. I want to test them
Speaker 1: to see if they trust me. I want to know
Speaker 1: do you trust me? Do you trust me enough to
Speaker 1: believe that I am enough? And do you believe that
Speaker 1: if I am enough, so are you. Because if I'm
Speaker 1: in you and I'm your God, and I made you
Speaker 1: and I put you in a situation, I would never
Speaker 1: put you in a situation that I would not make
Speaker 1: you enough for shot. If it's your word, I'll give
Speaker 1: you a minute, so he said. On the sixth day. Now,
Speaker 1: as they get ready for the Sabbath, I want them
Speaker 1: to prepare what they bring in, and that will be
Speaker 1: twice as much as they gather on the other days
Speaker 1: so that they don't have to work on the Sabbath.
Speaker 1: But it was kind of a system that they set
Speaker 1: up where it was like, get what you need for today.
Speaker 1: Our father word in heaven. How about your name, you
Speaker 1: candom come, you will be done on earth. This is
Speaker 1: in heaven. Give us next week our daily bread, Give
Speaker 1: us last month our daily bread. You see how it
Speaker 1: can be two things. It can be your attachment to
Speaker 1: the past where you remember what you used to eat
Speaker 1: in Egypt. Or it can be your fixation on the future.
Speaker 1: That's the second thing that keeps you from receiving God's
Speaker 1: provision right now. Wish we were in Egypt there we
Speaker 1: had see it and then and then when the Messiah comes,
Speaker 1: then he will then there, back there, then one day
Speaker 1: back there. Then the provision is never then or there.
Speaker 1: It is here and now the provision is always here.
Speaker 1: The bread is always here. And what makes the bread
Speaker 1: enough is who touches it. What made the bread multiply
Speaker 1: was when they put it in Jesus' hands. See, this
Speaker 1: is the principle. It is your proximity to the presence
Speaker 1: of Christ that becomes your provision for the challenges that
Speaker 1: you face. And so if you stay close to Him,
Speaker 1: even if it's in a wilderness, even if it's through
Speaker 1: a mistake, even if it's insurmountable, even if you don't
Speaker 1: know how, if you will stay close to Christ, your
Speaker 1: bread will be blessed, and it will be enough, and
Speaker 1: it will go around, and there will be twelve basketfuls
Speaker 1: of leftovers. He is the bread of life. When they
Speaker 1: set up the Tabernacle, they made a table with acacia
Speaker 1: wood overlaid it with gold. The acacia wood is humanity,
Speaker 1: the gold is divinity. They put twelve loaves of bread,
Speaker 1: six stacks on each side, to represent the covenant that
Speaker 1: God had with his people. Twelve loaves, twelve tribes, twelve disciples,
Speaker 1: twelve basketfuls of leftovers. But they were not in the
Speaker 1: Holy of Holies. They were only close to it. They
Speaker 1: were right outside that place. It was called the table
Speaker 1: of show Bread, or watch this the bread of the presence, presence,
Speaker 1: the bread of the Presence. When it came into the temple,
Speaker 1: it was bread. But when it got close enough to
Speaker 1: the Holy of Holies, where the presence of God was,
Speaker 1: it became blessed. The closer it got to the presence
Speaker 1: of God, the less common it became. When it came
Speaker 1: in it was just a loaf. But when it got
Speaker 1: close enough to the Holy of Holies, where the presence
Speaker 1: of Yahweh is. See, I'm trying to say, you don't
Speaker 1: have to be enough. All you have to do is
Speaker 1: get close enough to the one who is more than enough.
Speaker 1: And I declare, My God shall supply all your knees,
Speaker 1: not one or two, not one day in the sleep,
Speaker 1: by and bye. Here Now is the bread of life.
Speaker 1: Where's my organ? Here? Now here is the bread. That's
Speaker 1: what Jesus said. Here is the breath. Somebody shout here,
Speaker 1: here is the brad. It's not in tomorrow. You cannot
Speaker 1: fight tomorrow's battles with today's strength. You are wasting today's
Speaker 1: grace trying to fight tomorrow's battles. When we were talking
Speaker 1: about something yesterday, she said stop stop, stop, stops. She said,
Speaker 1: she said, I'm getting maggots in my manner. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: show you this. You're like, whoa, that's a weird thing.
Speaker 1: This is how y'all talk, this pillow talk around the
Speaker 1: fernic house. Matter of fact, it is because when I
Speaker 1: preached it right. First thing is oh, man, the past,
Speaker 1: Oh like, I used to have so many friends, but
Speaker 1: now they've all, well, you just gotta leave Egypt. God
Speaker 1: can bring you new friends. God might bring you some
Speaker 1: friends this time and they pick up the check. It
Speaker 1: might be up. I don't know. But when in the wilderness,
Speaker 1: you gotta be able to trust and not be too
Speaker 1: attached to the past. And please don't quit your job
Speaker 1: over this message. I hate it. Everybody always hears what
Speaker 1: they want to hear. I'm talking about the paradigm of
Speaker 1: the past Egypt thinking where they hand you your food.
Speaker 1: So God's like, here's I'm gonna do. I'm gonna rain
Speaker 1: down bread from heaven. And then it happened. He told
Speaker 1: Moses he was gonna do it. Then he did it. Now.
Speaker 1: First he gave him meat in the evening to remind
Speaker 1: them of Egypt. He's like, I'm not doing that anymore
Speaker 1: from now on for the next thirty nine years. This
Speaker 1: what you're gonna eat. Now, when God switches the form
Speaker 1: of provision, your first instinct is going to be to
Speaker 1: resist it because you won't recognize it. When God starts
Speaker 1: doing new things in your life. At first, it'll just
Speaker 1: look like trouble, but you won't recognize it's really training.
Speaker 1: Send the crowds away. You can't deal with this. This
Speaker 1: is unfamiliar, so they wake up. Let's go verse thirteen.
Speaker 1: I think that'll be enough. The evening quail came and
Speaker 1: covered the camp. In the morning, there was a layer
Speaker 1: of dew around the camp. Bring me my box while
Speaker 1: I read this next verse. When the dew was gone,
Speaker 1: Bible said thin flakes like frost on the ground and
Speaker 1: appeared on the desert floor. Now I never saw Mana,
Speaker 1: but it said thin flakes like frost. I was just
Speaker 1: picturing the Bible. I never ate Mana, but it said
Speaker 1: thin flakes like frost. Touch somebody say they're great, but
Speaker 1: he put it. Can you do it on the camera?
Speaker 1: And the people were like, huh, never saw this before.
Speaker 1: I mean, we know how to eat in Egypt. In Egypt,
Speaker 1: we had a meal card. But sometimes you don't know
Speaker 1: how to receive something that God has given you, because
Speaker 1: when you've never seen it, it's hard to receive it.
Speaker 1: Do you ever wonder why you sabotage yourself sometimes when
Speaker 1: you're starting to succeed at something, because when frustration and
Speaker 1: failure is familiar to you, you will recreate it without
Speaker 1: even knowing that you're doing it. Sometimes we surround ourselves
Speaker 1: with people who treat us crappy because being treated crappy
Speaker 1: to us is emotionally familiar. So when somebody treats you nice,
Speaker 1: you're suspicious what do they want? And like for me,
Speaker 1: I have a hard time believing that people could just
Speaker 1: like me. It's hard for me to believe because I
Speaker 1: think at some point during my life I was like, well,
Speaker 1: if I preach good, or you know, if I can
Speaker 1: generate a job, like I have all these staff members
Speaker 1: that I'm responsible for. So there's this feeling like you
Speaker 1: start thinking you're the bread after a while, and you
Speaker 1: start thinking if it wasn't for what you did. So
Speaker 1: then when somebody tries to really love you for who
Speaker 1: you are, you're like, h hold on, now this is
Speaker 1: too close. And watch this. When the bread came from
Speaker 1: heaven that God was trying to provide, and it rained
Speaker 1: down and covered the ground, Look at the Israelite's reaction
Speaker 1: when they saw it verse fifteen. They said to each other,
Speaker 1: what is it? They did not know what it was.
Speaker 1: They never saw it before. Some of us are resisting
Speaker 1: the resource that God is sending into our life at
Speaker 1: this moment, because we do not recognize it as His
Speaker 1: presence and his provision. Some of us right now have
Speaker 1: what we have been asking God for in a form
Speaker 1: that we don't recognize. That is before us. And the
Speaker 1: trick is this, that God will give you this day
Speaker 1: your daily bread, not there in Egypt, not then when
Speaker 1: Messiah comes. But here is the bread. I am the breadth,
Speaker 1: the bread of presence. Is this, God give me the
Speaker 1: grace in this moment now. If I try to reach
Speaker 1: back to my past mistake, I'll miss it. If I
Speaker 1: try to reach forward into my future and fixate on
Speaker 1: that and try to plan everything out, I will miss it.
Speaker 1: But here is the bread. That's the word. Here is
Speaker 1: the bread. Somebody say, here, here is the bread. Look
Speaker 1: at the person next to you say, here is the bread.
Speaker 1: And so you're pointing to the provision and you're going,
Speaker 1: what is it. In fact, the reason they called it
Speaker 1: mana is because in Hebrew, manna is an ambidextrous term.
Speaker 1: It means what is it, and it also means what
Speaker 1: it is, So they didn't know what to call it
Speaker 1: because it was new. When God does something new, in
Speaker 1: your life. At first, you don't know what to call
Speaker 1: it or how to receive it. And what keeps you
Speaker 1: from receiving it. Sometimes is your past and sometimes is
Speaker 1: your future. So they named it mana. What is it?
Speaker 1: What it is? What is it? I don't know is
Speaker 1: what it is? But I know one thing I know.
Speaker 1: I am so whatever it is, I am is in
Speaker 1: the middle of it, working it out for a purpose
Speaker 1: that is beyond my human perspective. Here is the bread.
Speaker 1: Here is the bread. And then some of them thought
Speaker 1: they were smarter than God, you know, because the Bible
Speaker 1: says when they saw it, even though they didn't recognize it,
Speaker 1: Moses said to them. He explained, it is the bread
Speaker 1: that the Lord has given you to eat. And this
Speaker 1: is what the Lord has commanded. Each one is to
Speaker 1: gather as much as he needs. It's the power of enough.
Speaker 1: Each one is to gather as much as he needs.
Speaker 1: Taken omer, half a gallon for each person you have
Speaker 1: in your tent. And the Israelites did as they were told,
Speaker 1: give us this day our daily bread. Some gathered much,
Speaker 1: some little, And when they measured it by the omer,
Speaker 1: he who gathered much did not have too much. I
Speaker 1: like that it's not too much. It's enough. I am
Speaker 1: the bread of life. It didn't have too much, And
Speaker 1: he who gathered little did not have too little. It
Speaker 1: was enough. It's enough. Somebody say it's enough, make the confession,
Speaker 1: say it's enough. And just all over every area of
Speaker 1: your life where the enemy has been speaking too much
Speaker 1: or not enough. I want you to look at whatever
Speaker 1: God put in the ground in the form of his
Speaker 1: grace and his provision in this season enough your life,
Speaker 1: and declare, it's enough. He's enough. I'm enough. It's enough.
Speaker 1: He's enough. I'm enough. Get the lesson to your neighbor.
Speaker 1: It's enough, he's enough. I'm enough. Now. The reason I'm
Speaker 1: enough is because he's enough. And so if he's enough
Speaker 1: and I'm enough, it's enough. It's not too much, it's
Speaker 1: not too little. It's enough. But some of the Israelites,
Speaker 1: some of them look at verse nineteen. No one is
Speaker 1: to keep any of it till morning. Some of them
Speaker 1: paid no attention to Moses. They kept a part of
Speaker 1: it until the morning. But what's what happened in the morning.
Speaker 1: In the morning, because they did not trust God to
Speaker 1: give them enough for today? Who the man I had maggots,
Speaker 1: because God's presence and provision is always in today. Your stress,
Speaker 1: your ulcer, your your your sleeplessness. Much of it is
Speaker 1: because you are letting maggots get in your manna. See,
Speaker 1: here's what happens. So Bob turns to Judy and he's,
Speaker 1: like Moses said, there'd be more in the morning, but
Speaker 1: maybe just in case, put a little of that right
Speaker 1: there in your pocketbook, and just in case. You know,
Speaker 1: we can't eat all of it today because we've never
Speaker 1: seen this before, and it's hard to trust that there
Speaker 1: will be enough for tomorrow. But that's exactly what faith is,
Speaker 1: you see it. That's exactly what faith it is. It
Speaker 1: is to deal with today and to trust for tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Strength for today, bright hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine
Speaker 1: with ten thousand beside. Great is thy faithfulness, Great is
Speaker 1: thy faithfulness. Morning by morning. When I wake up tomorrow,
Speaker 1: there will be manna. When I wake up Tuesday, there
Speaker 1: will be more when I wake up Wednesday. In my weakness,
Speaker 1: he is strong. When I wake up Thursday, He'll see
Speaker 1: me through. When I wake up Friday, He's fighting for me.
Speaker 1: And I can rest on the Sabbath because He is
Speaker 1: the Bread, and I break the spirit of not enough
Speaker 1: off of your life. Today. I break the spirit of
Speaker 1: I can't and I'll never I break that spirit. In
Speaker 1: the name of Jesus. Here is the bread. He is
Speaker 1: the bread, and He's given you right now an opportunity
Speaker 1: to trust him on the next level and to discover
Speaker 1: who he is all over again. He doesn't change. It's
Speaker 1: just the more you experience where you're in a desert
Speaker 1: place and when Lazarus dies and you wonder why would
Speaker 1: God let something die that you love? But then you
Speaker 1: see him show up and call Lazarus out of the tomb.
Speaker 1: Because you already knew that he was a healer, but
Speaker 1: now he wants to show you I am resurrection. You
Speaker 1: understand that everything in your life is designed to show
Speaker 1: you not only who God is, but who you are
Speaker 1: in Him. Now. The reason He lets us need things
Speaker 1: is so that we don't get confused about where our
Speaker 1: help comes from. The reason he wants you to get
Speaker 1: it every morning, all those little plans you stay up making,
Speaker 1: all those little things you scribble down about what if
Speaker 1: and what this, and that the stuff that's gonna screw
Speaker 1: up your life is going to hit you from behind anyway,
Speaker 1: pray about it, praise God through it. You can't keep
Speaker 1: the man until tomorrow. You can't eat in Egypt anymore.
Speaker 1: This is a new place, This is a new season.
Speaker 1: God has given you what you need for the season
Speaker 1: you're in. Here is the bread. Here is the bread.
Speaker 1: So in every moment I'm looking for it. Oh, here
Speaker 1: is the bread. There I go again, going out here
Speaker 1: thinking about here is the bread. Here I am again
Speaker 1: replaying five minutes ago, five months ago. Five no, no, no,
Speaker 1: Here is the breath. Somebody say, here is the bread.
Speaker 1: When I put this message online, I'm gonna call it expiration,
Speaker 1: but you know the real messages. Here is the bread.
Speaker 1: Stop trying to eat stuff that has gone sour. Stop
Speaker 1: thinking in ways that you have outgrown. Stop coming down
Speaker 1: to a level of who you used to be. Here
Speaker 1: is the bread, the bread of the presence. Stand up.
Speaker 1: I want to pray for people. Oh. I want you
Speaker 1: to get this message. I don't want you to chew it.
Speaker 1: I want you to swallow it, digest it, get it
Speaker 1: deep down so it can strengthen you. Here is the bread.
Speaker 1: The presence of God is everywhere. It just takes you
Speaker 1: a while to recognize it. He's always been there. You're
Speaker 1: just starting to see him now. You start to see
Speaker 1: that he was there in the heartbreak, he was there
Speaker 1: in your childhood. You see him now. He was always there.
Speaker 1: Remember when they walked down the MIAs road, they were like, hey,
Speaker 1: who are you? And he didn't tell him he was
Speaker 1: resurrected from the dead Luke twenty four. And it says
Speaker 1: they were kept from recognizing him until he did something
Speaker 1: with the bread, and when he broke it, they saw him.
Speaker 1: He is what he hell, and he is what you need.
Speaker 1: He doesn't just have what you need. He is what
Speaker 1: you need. He's that thing inside of you that won't
Speaker 1: let you give up. He is that invisible that that wonderful,
Speaker 1: nameless grace that turns horrible things like the cross into
Speaker 1: a triumph called resurrection. He is the bread and he
Speaker 1: is providing for you right now. But you might not
Speaker 1: see it because it looks different than what you're used
Speaker 1: to get. What you need, gather it, Gather it from
Speaker 1: the people that are in your life. I know sometimes
Speaker 1: you get lonely. I do too. Oh you pastor you're
Speaker 1: assuming people come on. It's different to talk to people
Speaker 1: than be with people. Everybody gets lonely. But here is
Speaker 1: the bread. Here is the bread. Father. To the best
Speaker 1: of my ability, I broke the bread today. You are
Speaker 1: the bread. I'm not. You know what they need. I don't,
Speaker 1: Holy Spirit, I pray that you would do that supernatural
Speaker 1: thing that I've seen you do so many times I
Speaker 1: lost count where you take what was said and make
Speaker 1: it exactly what each person needed to hear, whatever continent
Speaker 1: they stream from, whatever campus they drove to make it
Speaker 1: the bread that they need for this season. So if
Speaker 1: it means that they're dealing with new pressure for success,
Speaker 1: be the bread. If it means that they're dealing with
Speaker 1: failure or rejection, be the bread. Feed them what they
Speaker 1: need for the season that they're in. Our Father, who
Speaker 1: in heaven, Hallow it be your name, Sacred, be your name,
Speaker 1: Holy is your name. As our bread gets closer and
Speaker 1: closer to your presence, may it multiply, May it multiply
Speaker 1: in your hands. Give us this day, this moment, this second,
Speaker 1: this bread, our daily bread. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
Speaker 1: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
Speaker 1: You can click the link in the description to give
Speaker 1: now or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more
Speaker 1: information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
Speaker 1: You can share it with your friends. You can click
Speaker 1: the share button, take a screenshot and share it on
Speaker 1: your social stories and tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks
Speaker 1: again for listening. God bless you.