Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2: I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 2: I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope
Speaker 2: this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope it
Speaker 2: gives your perspective to see God is moving in your life.
Speaker 1: Enjoy the message.
Speaker 3: I think they'll be praising God like that in Fort Worth, Texas, Tulsa, Oklahoma, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Toronto, Canada, Detroit, Michigan, Hartford, Connecticut, Newark,
Speaker 3: New Jersey, and Washington, DC.
Speaker 1: Elevation Nights is just a few weeks away.
Speaker 3: Go to Elevation Nights dot com and get your tickets.
Speaker 1: It'll be good.
Speaker 3: We'll be there worshiping God together. We can't wait to
Speaker 3: worship God with you. Also, thank you to all of
Speaker 3: the amazing men and women who have signed up to
Speaker 3: lead an e group over this next semester. Thank you
Speaker 3: for opening your home, your heart. Thank you for saying
Speaker 3: yes to God. Pray that God is going to bring
Speaker 3: just the right people in those groups who can help
Speaker 3: each other. I pray that God would make connections, divine connections,
Speaker 3: that God would be.
Speaker 1: Like a spiritual matchmaker.
Speaker 3: I'm not necessarily talking about a romantic match, although if
Speaker 3: the Lord wants to do that.
Speaker 1: Through an E group, he's God. Amen.
Speaker 3: But just that God would help you find somebody where
Speaker 3: they can say, oh, I went through that, and here's
Speaker 3: something God gave me. When theologian said that Christianity is
Speaker 3: one beggar telling another beggar where they found bread. And
Speaker 3: sometimes God gives somebody something.
Speaker 1: That you need in the season that you're in.
Speaker 3: And so when you walk through those E group tents
Speaker 3: today or when they come online in a little while
Speaker 3: and say hey, sign up, don't put it off and
Speaker 3: don't tell fifteen excuses why you're too busy.
Speaker 1: I'm tell you that's the problem with you. You're too busy.
Speaker 3: You're too busy, and sometimes you don't slow down enough,
Speaker 3: so you spend a lot of effort, but you don't
Speaker 3: get a lot of result.
Speaker 1: It's going to come through a line in this season
Speaker 1: of your life.
Speaker 3: So this is an amazing opportunity. Holly, You've written an
Speaker 3: amazing study. Brit the whole team. I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 3: I'm so excited about the change that will be experienced.
Speaker 1: That's on.
Speaker 3: Just go to Elevisionchurch dot Org and join an negrew.
Speaker 3: Right now, it's time for the Word of God.
Speaker 1: Let's go.
Speaker 3: The Book of Philippians, Chapter one. The Book of Philippians,
Speaker 3: Chapter one, verse twenty through twenty six. No, no, no,
Speaker 3: let's go all the way back to verse eighteen. I
Speaker 3: was going to speed it up for time, but I
Speaker 3: want to read from verse eighteen.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to read from verse eighteen. And then.
Speaker 3: The Lord gave me this scripture, and then he gave
Speaker 3: me a picture. And I want to give both of
Speaker 3: you today.
Speaker 1: But what does it matter.
Speaker 3: The important thing is that in every way, whether from
Speaker 3: false motives or true, Christ is preached.
Speaker 1: And because of this I rejoice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I will continue to rejoice, for I know
Speaker 3: that through your prayers and God's provision of the Spirit
Speaker 3: of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn
Speaker 3: out for my deliverance.
Speaker 1: Verse twenty says.
Speaker 3: I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no
Speaker 3: way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that
Speaker 3: now as always Christ will be exalted in my body,
Speaker 3: whether by life or by death. For to me, to
Speaker 3: live is Christ and to die is Gain. If I
Speaker 3: am to go on living in the body this will mean.
Speaker 1: Fruitful labor for me. Yet, what shall I choose?
Speaker 3: I don't know. I'm torn between the two. I'm torn
Speaker 3: between the two. I'm trying to make a decision. I
Speaker 3: don't know which to choose. I'm torn between the two.
Speaker 3: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is
Speaker 3: or by far? But it's more necessary for you that
Speaker 3: I remain in the body. Convinced of this, I know
Speaker 3: that I will remain. Tell your neighbor you're gonna make it.
Speaker 3: Convinced of this, I know that I will remain. Now.
Speaker 3: I will continue with all of you for your progress
Speaker 3: and joy in the faith, so that through my being
Speaker 3: with you again, you're boasting in Christ. Jesus will abound
Speaker 3: on account of me. I know you've been standing for
Speaker 3: a long time, but stay on your feet one more moment,
Speaker 3: because the Lord told me to give you an instruction
Speaker 3: today that will be very specific for you.
Speaker 1: Goes like this, look forward, not far.
Speaker 3: Okay, been distracted, overwhelmed, feel like you're kind of going
Speaker 3: crazy sometimes coming from every direction.
Speaker 1: The Lord said, look forward, not far.
Speaker 3: Tell your neighbor look forward, not far, And now on
Speaker 3: your way to your seat. How your neighbor one thing
Speaker 3: you're looking forward to this week. Just go ahead and
Speaker 3: tell them real quick, one thing you're looking forward to
Speaker 3: this week. I'm looking forward to Pastor Steven finishing the
Speaker 3: sermons so I can go to Chipotlet.
Speaker 1: I know how y'all are.
Speaker 3: I'm looking forward to the sermon that the Man of
Speaker 3: God is about to preach. I'm looking forward to. Put
Speaker 3: it in the comments too. I'm gonna read a few
Speaker 3: from online. Somebody shout out something appropriate that you're looking
Speaker 3: forward to this week, real quick. In the room, looking
Speaker 3: forward to it, looking forward to it. Everybody in the
Speaker 3: chat put I'm looking forward to it, and then tell
Speaker 3: me one thing you're.
Speaker 1: Looking forward to forward not far.
Speaker 3: It really helped me because when I walk out to preach,
Speaker 3: it's always a little unpredictable.
Speaker 1: I never really know how it's going to go, and so.
Speaker 3: I do a little trick. And this is a little
Speaker 3: bit squeamish for me to tell you about. You might
Speaker 3: roll your eyes. And Abby's going to cringe on the
Speaker 3: front road because she hates when I say romantic things
Speaker 3: in front of thousands of people.
Speaker 1: About her mother.
Speaker 3: Bowis squeeze Holly's hand before I go back to get
Speaker 3: ready to preach.
Speaker 1: If she's not like deep and rapturous worship, if she's.
Speaker 3: In the Chicaina glory, I just just walk out and
Speaker 3: let her have a moment with Jesus. I want to
Speaker 3: cut in, but if she's halfway aware, I'll just squeeze
Speaker 3: her hand. And it's my reminder that in a few minutes,
Speaker 3: however long it takes me to preach this sermon, in
Speaker 3: about three and a half hours, no matter what happens
Speaker 3: up here, I'm going home with her. Here's what that's
Speaker 3: called psychologically anticipatory pleasure. And I don't mean what you
Speaker 3: think I mean by that. The chances are all we're
Speaker 3: going to do is eat, take a nap. If there's
Speaker 3: something we're watching, we might watch it and probably fall
Speaker 3: asleep trying to watch it, but something to look forward
Speaker 3: to after it's over. It somehow fortifies me for what
Speaker 3: I need to do up here. And reminding myself in
Speaker 3: a role as preacher or pastor does not exist the
Speaker 3: entire definition of who I am as a person. It
Speaker 3: takes the performance anxiety off, because whether you love it
Speaker 3: or hate it, I'm going home with her. And she
Speaker 3: never told me I preached a bad sermon.
Speaker 1: I know she probably thought it, but she never said
Speaker 1: it out loud.
Speaker 3: And on the chat right now, there's all kinds of
Speaker 3: people say and I'm looking forward to the chiefs winning today.
Speaker 3: I'm looking forward to seek him more this week. See
Speaker 3: you got spirit and flesh, Spirit and flesh all in
Speaker 3: the comments.
Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to teach my students. Well that's cool.
Speaker 1: I thought that was cool. Just when I read it,
Speaker 1: I thought, well, that's not.
Speaker 3: You're looking forward to somebody doing something for you as
Speaker 3: you're doing something for somebody. What a cool way to think.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you've teln the truth or not,
Speaker 3: but might as well frame it that way. Looking forward
Speaker 3: to closing a door, looking forward to a few days
Speaker 3: off work, looking forward to.
Speaker 1: My I won't say that out loud, looking forward to.
Speaker 3: Feeling better. I'm looking forward to. Yeah, it's going too fast.
Speaker 3: I don't know how to slow it down, but I
Speaker 3: think it's important always in your life to have something.
Speaker 1: To look forward to.
Speaker 3: It's real dangerous if you ever get in a place
Speaker 3: where you can't look forward to anything and feel joy,
Speaker 3: you need.
Speaker 1: To talk to somebody. That's a dangerous place for you
Speaker 1: to stay.
Speaker 3: And I don't just mean for a moment where you're
Speaker 3: tired or overwhelmed and you just want everybody leave you alone.
Speaker 3: But if you ever get to a place where there
Speaker 3: is a prolonged sense of the postponement of joy, do
Speaker 3: you know what I mean by postponing joy? Where you're like, well,
Speaker 3: I might be happy one day, but I can't see
Speaker 3: anything in my immediate future that I look forward to.
Speaker 1: That is a dangerous way to live. Now.
Speaker 3: It doesn't mean that everything you do every day has
Speaker 3: to be something that you enjoy, Snowflake, but it does
Speaker 3: mean that there ought to be something, even within the
Speaker 3: most challenging seasons of your life, that you can go.
Speaker 1: I look forward to that.
Speaker 3: That's why I want every married couple doing date nights.
Speaker 3: I want you to do it so you can look
Speaker 3: forward to that time and you can understand that even
Speaker 3: if we've been busy all week, I mean, and then
Speaker 3: I'd be an expensive date night, make a sandwich. But
Speaker 3: set aside a time that you can look forward to
Speaker 3: that you can know, you know, especially if you have
Speaker 3: kids or little kids or something like that. Set it
Speaker 3: up where you know, Okay, we are so busy managing
Speaker 3: this corporation, called our kids.
Speaker 1: Excuse me, this terrorist organization called our kids.
Speaker 3: That we need a time set aside that I can
Speaker 3: look forward to connecting with my girlfriend, my boyfriend, the
Speaker 3: one that I used to spend hours on the phone with.
Speaker 3: And I think that's really important that you put something
Speaker 3: that you can look forward to, even if it's.
Speaker 1: A little thing.
Speaker 3: That's why I got the fridge stock with fair Life shakes,
Speaker 3: because after I've done all my squats and all my curls,
Speaker 3: I know there is the taste of artificial sweetener waiting,
Speaker 3: just something to trigger my tongue to let me know you.
Speaker 1: Did good today. Well done, now, good and faithful servant again.
Speaker 3: I'm taking a moment to set this up because if
Speaker 3: I don't set it up practically, if we jump straight
Speaker 3: to what Paul said from prison, you will think that
Speaker 3: this message only applies when you're going through the hardest
Speaker 3: situation in your life. But I saw a principle this
Speaker 3: week that was so practical that it reminded me about
Speaker 3: something that Brendan Manning said in one of his books.
Speaker 1: When a man went to.
Speaker 3: Visit Mother Teresa at the House of the Dying in Calcutta,
Speaker 3: and this brilliant ethicist John Kavanaugh went to see her
Speaker 3: for three months, and on the first day he met
Speaker 3: Mother Teresa, and the report goes that he was trying
Speaker 3: to figure out what to do with the rest of
Speaker 3: his life and he felt foggy about it. Now stop
Speaker 3: right here. You might feel the same way today. You
Speaker 3: might not be going to see Mother Teresa. She came
Speaker 3: Delevation Church, or you clicked on the link and you're
Speaker 3: feeling like, what do I do with the rest of
Speaker 3: the mine life? Or what do I do in this
Speaker 3: next week? Or what do I even do for my
Speaker 3: next step? Well, Mother Teresa, upon meeting the man, said
Speaker 3: what can I do for you? And he said, I
Speaker 3: would love for you to pray for me. And she said,
Speaker 3: what would you like for me to pray for you?
Speaker 3: And he said, pray that God will give me clarity,
Speaker 3: that God will give me clarity. And she said, I
Speaker 3: won't do it. I won't do it. I've never had clarity.
Speaker 3: And he said, but you always seem to have clarity.
Speaker 3: And Mother Teresa said, I've never had clarity. What I've
Speaker 3: had is trust. So I will pray that you will
Speaker 3: trust in God. The apostle Paul, writing to the church
Speaker 3: that he founded, which was the first church in Europe
Speaker 3: incidentally was founded when he was in.
Speaker 1: Prison an other time. Is now writing to spend eight
Speaker 1: hundred miles from Rome, where.
Speaker 3: He is sitting awaiting a verdict of his current imprisonment
Speaker 3: for preaching the gospel to the church that he loves,
Speaker 3: and he's worried about them and burdened for them. Yodean
Speaker 3: SYNIKEI are arguing there seems to be within the Philippian
Speaker 3: church a since that when the teacher left class, we
Speaker 3: can do whatever we want. He checks in to let
Speaker 3: them know I'm proud of you, but you need to
Speaker 3: keep making progress.
Speaker 1: And in doing that, he shares with them an update
Speaker 1: about his situation. As well.
Speaker 3: As we are expecting Paul to give the exact details
Speaker 3: of whether or not he will be released to continue
Speaker 3: to preach the gospel or whether he will continue to
Speaker 3: be restrained by his chains, he does something very interesting
Speaker 3: and different.
Speaker 1: He begins to share with them not about the conclusion.
Speaker 3: Of his trial, but about the courage that God has
Speaker 3: given him to face it. Y'all missed your chance to
Speaker 3: say say, amen, I've been pastoring this church almost twenty
Speaker 3: years and y'all still know when I said something good,
Speaker 3: I don't.
Speaker 1: Have to get loud for it to be good. I said.
Speaker 3: Sometimes God won't give you the conclusion. He will just
Speaker 3: give you courage. And the people like Mother Teresa and
Speaker 3: the Apostle Paul who are really confident, it is not
Speaker 3: because they have so much clarity. It's not because they
Speaker 3: always know what to do next. It's just that they're
Speaker 3: always focused on what God has called them to do now.
Speaker 3: And this is a great distinction for all of us
Speaker 3: who are overwhelmed. From a man who had every right
Speaker 3: to be depressed and despondent, for a man who had
Speaker 3: every right to feel and communicate his sense of total
Speaker 3: utter despair comes a book like Philippians, where he says, yes,
Speaker 3: I will continue to rejoice. Why are you rejoicing, Paul?
Speaker 3: Did you just get good news that they're going to
Speaker 3: let you out in a week? Why are you rejoicing, Paul?
Speaker 3: Did Andy Dufrain just take a rock hammer and crack
Speaker 3: halfway through the Shawshank wall Is Morgan Freeman narrating your
Speaker 3: last night in prison?
Speaker 1: Why are you rejoicing? He said, because everybody say because.
Speaker 3: Now one day I want to do a whole series
Speaker 3: when I get the opportunity on.
Speaker 1: Why you need a better?
Speaker 3: Because a better because verse eighteen, Please again, he says,
Speaker 3: I'll continue to rejoice because verse nineteen. Oh no, that's
Speaker 3: not where he says it. He says in verse eighteen, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: And because of this, I rejoice.
Speaker 1: There it is.
Speaker 3: I went too far. I went too far. I'm looking
Speaker 3: for that word, but I went too far. I went
Speaker 3: too far. I dropped down to the end of it.
Speaker 3: I went too far. I meant to show you that
Speaker 3: word because circle because back there for me, in the back,
Speaker 3: justin if you can. And because of this, I rejoice.
Speaker 3: Now whatever this is controls you're rejoicing. Paul's this was
Speaker 3: the purpose of God, the gospel of Jesus Christ, what
Speaker 3: he was sent to do. And since that was still happening,
Speaker 3: and happening at an accelerated rate, Paul said, I have
Speaker 3: a cause to rejoice because my calling is being fulfilled.
Speaker 1: If your cause to rejoice is your.
Speaker 3: Comfort being satisfied, then any moment you are uncomfortable, you will.
Speaker 1: Not have the ability to rejoice.
Speaker 3: You need a better because some of us need a better,
Speaker 3: because when we come to worship, some of us only.
Speaker 1: Praise God on the weeks where we feel grateful.
Speaker 3: What a small god you serve that you need a
Speaker 3: feeling of gratitude to prompt an act of faith called worship.
Speaker 3: Your worship in a god. You can't see your worship
Speaker 3: in a.
Speaker 1: God who's not made by human hands.
Speaker 3: You're worshiping a God who does not exist to serve you.
Speaker 1: You exist to serve him.
Speaker 3: So if the reason that I worship is tied to
Speaker 3: the work that he does on my behalf or the
Speaker 3: wishless that he fulfilled based on my preferences, that is
Speaker 3: a limited lens.
Speaker 1: Through which to see the God that I worship. Sometimes
Speaker 1: it's good for us to lift our.
Speaker 3: Hands because he's great, because he's holy, because he's awesome,
Speaker 3: because he's sovereign, because he's God all by himself, because
Speaker 3: before Abraham was, he was, because he is the great
Speaker 3: I am, because he is perfect in all of his ways,
Speaker 3: because I'm created to do it, because I love him,
Speaker 3: because he first loved me, because he forgave me, because
Speaker 3: he sent his son to die for me, because he
Speaker 3: gave me breath and my lungs, because I'm living on
Speaker 3: borrowed breath, because tomorrow is not promised because God brought
Speaker 3: me this far, and if he never does anything else,
Speaker 3: he's gone enough to be worthy of the next one.
Speaker 3: And Paul is playing games with the devil in this
Speaker 3: letter because at the moment that he has every right
Speaker 3: to be discouraged, despondent, and at the dead end of
Speaker 3: his own despair, he turns his attention outward and begins
Speaker 3: to think about that church that God has called him
Speaker 3: to serve. He turns his attention outward and he begins
Speaker 3: to focus on their future. And it's almost like he's
Speaker 3: setting up an appointment. Walk slow with me here, I
Speaker 3: want to meet you. In this text, you can see Paul,
Speaker 3: who's about fifty five years old at this point in
Speaker 3: his life, saying I don't know when, but I'll see
Speaker 3: you again.
Speaker 1: What's he doing.
Speaker 3: He's creating a sense of anticipatory joy even though the
Speaker 3: timeline is uncertain. He doesn't have clarity, but he trusts God.
Speaker 3: And you can see in this wrestling match that is
Speaker 3: written on the page and preserved for us through the
Speaker 3: passage of time, as Paul is wrestling with his own
Speaker 3: volition and will because there's so much about the situation
Speaker 3: that he can't control. It's not as if when he says,
Speaker 3: what shall I choose, he gets a vote in whether
Speaker 3: or not he's executed.
Speaker 1: Now, just to make sure you understand.
Speaker 3: The situation, Paul is about to be put on trial,
Speaker 3: and they have the power to decide does he live
Speaker 3: or does he die. Paul does not have the power
Speaker 3: to decide whether he lives or dies, but he still
Speaker 3: has the power to choose how he lives in the meantime,
Speaker 3: and so here he is wrestling with the decision that's
Speaker 3: really not his to make. And I thought it was
Speaker 3: kind of funny. And maybe there's even a little swagger
Speaker 3: on what Paul's doing here, because he's telling the devil.
Speaker 1: I haven't decided yet. I haven't decided.
Speaker 3: Yet whether I'm going to let them kill me so
Speaker 3: I can just be done with this and go get
Speaker 3: all my crowns from Jesus. I hadn't decided yet whether
Speaker 3: I just want to get out of here and see
Speaker 3: his face, the one who died for me, the one
Speaker 3: who knocked me off my horse on the Damascus Road.
Speaker 3: I hadn't decided yet whether I want to be done
Speaker 3: with all these trifling pharisees that I used to be
Speaker 3: one of that keep running me from.
Speaker 1: City to city. I hadn't decided yet, or do I
Speaker 1: want to be done with the storms and the shipwrecks.
Speaker 3: And the stonings and just see him and be known
Speaker 3: as I am known. I hadn't decided yet. Do I
Speaker 3: just want to leave? Or do I want to stay?
Speaker 3: And he is an interesting term. He said, I'm torn
Speaker 3: between the two.
Speaker 1: What a picture.
Speaker 3: I'm torn between the two? Recap He's in prison. But
Speaker 3: when it came to describing his condition, he didn't say
Speaker 3: I'm trapped.
Speaker 1: He said, I'm torn. Two things could happen here, and
Speaker 1: I don't know which one God's gonna do yet.
Speaker 3: Either my life could be over in a matter of weeks, months,
Speaker 3: even days, and I could be with Christ. Or I
Speaker 3: could stay here and keep serving Christ longer.
Speaker 1: And I'm torn. Everybody say it, I'm torn.
Speaker 3: I'm torn for everybody today who is feeling torn in
Speaker 3: an area of your life.
Speaker 1: Let the Apostle Paul administer to you these words of encouragement.
Speaker 3: He says, if I am to go on living in
Speaker 3: the body, this will mean fruitful labor. Yet what shall
Speaker 3: I choose? I do not know. And write this down
Speaker 3: and put it on your mirror. It's okay to not know.
Speaker 3: It's okay to not know. It's okay to not have clarity.
Speaker 3: It's okay to not have a five year plan. It's
Speaker 3: okay to not know how you're going to get out
Speaker 3: of this exactly.
Speaker 1: It's okay not to know. If Paul, who said.
Speaker 3: And we know that in all things God works together
Speaker 3: for the good of them that love him and call
Speaker 3: according to his purpose, said I don't know about this one.
Speaker 1: You have I don't know moments.
Speaker 3: That you have been hiding because you think that somehow
Speaker 3: means you don't have faith. And it is okay to
Speaker 3: say I don't know. In fact, just say it right now.
Speaker 3: It'll feel like one hundred pounds lifted off.
Speaker 1: Say I don't know.
Speaker 3: She Just gonna say it proper. I do not know,
Speaker 3: I have not the information. Don't say it formal, Just
Speaker 3: say I don't know. Paul says, I don't know which
Speaker 3: one I want yet. I kind of want to get
Speaker 3: out of here, but I kind of think I need
Speaker 3: to stay. It'd be awesome if I never had to
Speaker 3: deal with the opposition that I'm dealing with.
Speaker 1: Again, it's hard out here for a preacher, but.
Speaker 3: I kind of think you need me because you all
Speaker 3: are fighting back home.
Speaker 1: I kind of think you need me because I've heard
Speaker 1: some rumors about you.
Speaker 3: And I don't know if I want to get out
Speaker 3: of here or if I need to stay in this
Speaker 3: for a little while. And he's acting like he gets
Speaker 3: to choose, like he won the coin toss, but nobody's
Speaker 3: coming to ask him. So what is he really wrestling with.
Speaker 3: Paul is wrestling with detention, of looking forward into a
Speaker 3: future that is uncertain, with unwavering confidence in Christ. Everybody
Speaker 3: in this room is facing the same challenge. Your future
Speaker 3: is not certain and your hope is Christ. I just
Speaker 3: hit everybody in the room.
Speaker 1: How do you preach to so many backgrounds of people?
Speaker 3: And there's rich people and poor people, and there's young people,
Speaker 3: and there's old people, and there's religious people, and there's
Speaker 3: people whose eyes look like they just that, you know,
Speaker 3: right before they came to church, they may have something
Speaker 3: they went in the Holy Spirit. And how do you
Speaker 3: to all those people? Because every single one of you,
Speaker 3: your future is uncertain and your hope is Christ. And
Speaker 3: in this way you are no different than Paul. And
Speaker 3: so he says, I don't know, I'm torn I kind
Speaker 3: of want to just see Jesus gotta be nice that
Speaker 3: this was all over. I guess because I was preaching
Speaker 3: on prison I was doing research and I mentioned Shaw
Speaker 3: Shank redemption and then turn off the TV, all of
Speaker 3: you that are real religious. We watched The Green Mile
Speaker 3: this week too with John Coffey, and The Green Mile
Speaker 3: is trippy. I'm gonna give you spoiler alert. The movie
Speaker 3: is like forty years old, so if you haven't seen
Speaker 3: it by now, you deserve to have it spoil But
Speaker 3: at the end you find out that the man, the
Speaker 3: prison guard, he can't die. Well he's gonna die, but
Speaker 3: he's like one hundred and two and he doesn't know
Speaker 3: how long he's going to have to live.
Speaker 1: And that's the end of the movie.
Speaker 3: And me and Graham were watching it together and he goes, well,
Speaker 3: that was kind of anti climactic.
Speaker 1: I thought it was going to be scary.
Speaker 3: I said, son, that is the scariest thing I've ever
Speaker 3: seen in a movie. You don't understand now, but you
Speaker 3: will that the thought that this is gonna go on
Speaker 3: forever like this. I said, that sounds cool to you.
Speaker 1: Right now.
Speaker 3: You're seventeen. I'm forty four. Trust me, this is a
Speaker 3: horror movie. That was the scariest scene I've ever seen it.
Speaker 3: I've never seen anybody jump out the bushes.
Speaker 1: That was scarier. I've never seen a chainsaw that was scarier.
Speaker 1: The fact that I don't know how long I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be here. In fact, they've even done studies. They did
Speaker 1: a surgery on people and they told them, now.
Speaker 3: The surgery, after six months, the condition might be reversible.
Speaker 3: And then they did other people and they said it's
Speaker 3: not reversible.
Speaker 1: You're just gonna have to live with this.
Speaker 3: The people that they told in six months, will check
Speaker 3: and it might be reversible.
Speaker 1: You might get better, come back in six months. They
Speaker 1: were less happy. Then the people who were told it's
Speaker 1: this way forever get used to it.
Speaker 3: Because the people who were told this is how it's
Speaker 3: going to be, they began to adapt.
Speaker 1: And when they begin to.
Speaker 3: Adapt, they started to see that I can live with this.
Speaker 3: It's not what I wanted, but I can live with this.
Speaker 3: It's not what I asked for.
Speaker 1: But I can live with this. It's not what I
Speaker 1: would have chosen, but I can live with this.
Speaker 3: The people who were told it might be reversible, they
Speaker 3: were living in a suspended state of anticipation that.
Speaker 1: It might get better and it might not.
Speaker 3: And what was worse than the pain they were suffering
Speaker 3: was the deferred hope that it might get better. Because
Speaker 3: if you just tell me this is the way it's
Speaker 3: going to be, then I'll make arrangements around the way
Speaker 3: that it is. But to give me the possibility that
Speaker 3: it could change, but I'm not sure when or how
Speaker 3: it might is the most painful hope at all.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the ache of faith for
Speaker 1: a moment.
Speaker 3: I want to talk about when you know there's something
Speaker 3: more in you, but it can't express itself because of
Speaker 3: what's blocking you. I want to talk about when you
Speaker 3: know you have love to give but no one to
Speaker 3: trust to give it to. I want to talk about
Speaker 3: the ache of faith today when you know that God
Speaker 3: brought you through this for a reason, but you can't
Speaker 3: see what it is yet.
Speaker 1: Paul said, I'm torn right now. I'm aching in faith
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 3: A part of my heart wants to be with you,
Speaker 3: but a part of my heart says this is hard,
Speaker 3: and I don't know.
Speaker 1: Which one is better.
Speaker 3: On one hand, he says, I think it's better to
Speaker 3: be with Christ. In fact, he says something interesting in
Speaker 3: twenty three. I desire to depart. I want to get
Speaker 3: out of this. It's better by far.
Speaker 1: But let's go.
Speaker 3: Real slow, so everybody can apply this in their life
Speaker 3: how they need to.
Speaker 1: It would be better for me if go back to
Speaker 1: verse twenty three.
Speaker 3: And I'm torn about it, and I think it would
Speaker 3: be better for me if by far.
Speaker 1: But okay, so notice what he's doing.
Speaker 3: He's setting it up that my preference would be that
Speaker 3: I go to Jesus now and get my reward. And
Speaker 3: I'm not saying anybody in here just wants to die.
Speaker 3: I'm just setting that up as a metaphor. I would
Speaker 3: like for this to be over, but I would like
Speaker 3: for this to end. But twenty four it is more
Speaker 3: necessary for you that I remain in the body.
Speaker 1: Twenty five.
Speaker 3: Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and
Speaker 3: we'll continue with all of you for your progress and
Speaker 3: joy in the faith. I want to do the whole
Speaker 3: sweeping thing again.
Speaker 1: From twenty three on.
Speaker 3: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is
Speaker 3: better by far. So there is something drawing Paul. He says,
Speaker 3: to live is Christ, to die is gain. I could
Speaker 3: just go to heaven. That would be easier for me.
Speaker 3: It would be easier for me twenty four. But you
Speaker 3: need me, and this would be easier, but this would
Speaker 3: be needed, and I'm torn. It would be easier for
Speaker 3: me just to let go and surrender and ask God
Speaker 3: to take me now. But you need me here, and
Speaker 3: because you need me, I'm gonna let go of what
Speaker 3: would be easy, And Paul says, I'm gonna let my
Speaker 3: purpose pull me. Wow, come here, Graham, come here, Gavin
Speaker 3: Grahama on my left arm, right over here, all the
Speaker 3: way down the stairs, Gavin on my right arm.
Speaker 1: Real, gentle Gavin is going to be with God.
Speaker 3: Graham has stay here and help us pull me a
Speaker 3: little bit.
Speaker 1: I want, I want to be easier. You need me.
Speaker 3: And at some point during Paul's wrestling match, because what
Speaker 3: he's doing here is modeling for you what to do
Speaker 3: when you are caught in a space where you don't
Speaker 3: have clarity but you need courage, where you don't know
Speaker 3: how to handle this, but you need his help and
Speaker 3: you can't really figure out what to set in front
Speaker 3: of you. For some of you, you don't even know
Speaker 3: what to look forward too, so it is difficult to
Speaker 3: attach faith to a future that you can't even articulate.
Speaker 3: So you don't even really know what you're asking God
Speaker 3: to do. And it would be easier just for you
Speaker 3: to give up, but the need started pulling out. Graham
Speaker 3: pulled me like you're stronger than Gavin. And at some
Speaker 3: point the need keep going. The need became strong enough
Speaker 3: to release Paul from what he wanted so that he
Speaker 3: could respond to what was needed. I am teaching the Bible.
Speaker 3: I guess my last day in Valentine.
Speaker 1: You see what I'm doing.
Speaker 3: I'm pulled by purpose. So watch this come here. One
Speaker 3: thing is pulling me.
Speaker 1: To give up. Oh, it'll be easier to go up
Speaker 1: to heaven in the suite.
Speaker 3: By and by fly away, Oh glory.
Speaker 1: But just by the time he's ready to fly away,
Speaker 1: something's pulling him back.
Speaker 3: And he said, this would be easy, but this is
Speaker 3: what you need. And so at some point, Christians, we
Speaker 3: got to decide. Are we just going to be driven
Speaker 3: by decisions of what's easy.
Speaker 1: Are we going to be pulled by purpose into what
Speaker 1: is necessary?
Speaker 3: And I came to let you know that there is
Speaker 3: a necessary next in your life.
Speaker 1: Help me Hamm in Oregon. There is a necessary next
Speaker 1: if the brook dried up, there's a widow in Zarapat
Speaker 1: down to her last.
Speaker 3: Meal, and God is positioning you in this season for
Speaker 3: a need you don't even know about yet. So it's
Speaker 3: very important right now that as we look at the
Speaker 3: example of Paul, which to me I told you was
Speaker 3: a picture, it's a picture of somebody being pulled.
Speaker 1: It's a picture of everybody.
Speaker 3: In this room who is being pulled the easy thing
Speaker 3: and the needed thing, the easy thing and the needed thing,
Speaker 3: the thing that you want.
Speaker 1: Let's see.
Speaker 3: Sometimes when you get old, you get far sighted. You
Speaker 3: get far sighted. Holly, start looking me funny.
Speaker 1: The other.
Speaker 3: We were in a restaurant and she was looking at me, funny.
Speaker 3: I was paying the bill and she was looking at me, funny,
Speaker 3: What are you looking at it? I thought she was
Speaker 3: looking because I tip bigger than her. I thought she
Speaker 3: was scrutinizing my tip percentage because y'all pray for her,
Speaker 3: because I'm generous. And I thought she was scrutinizing the bill.
Speaker 3: But then later that night she was looking at me funny.
Speaker 3: I was in bed reading the book and she was
Speaker 3: looking at me, funny. She was looking at me funny.
Speaker 3: And a few days later I came home and she said,
Speaker 3: I left something for you in the bedroom beside the bed.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, She's like, no, it's still something that
Speaker 1: I think you need. And that woman looked at me
Speaker 1: stone cold ice in her veins and said, it's time.
Speaker 1: I watched it at the restaurant.
Speaker 3: I'm not gonna sit there while you pull out your flashlight.
Speaker 1: For fifteen minutes trying to read is it a five
Speaker 1: or a seven? They keep it so dark in the restaurants.
Speaker 1: Can I preach about.
Speaker 3: How the devil is busy with the light dimming ministry.
Speaker 1: The Prince of darkness? She said, it's time. I said, no, No,
Speaker 1: I got more year.
Speaker 3: I can make the font seventy two, and I'll use
Speaker 3: my iPad when I preach.
Speaker 1: She said, no, you might want to use a paper bible.
Speaker 1: It's time. And you're far sighted.
Speaker 3: I said no, I'm actually close sighted or whatever the
Speaker 3: other one, because I can I can see it at
Speaker 3: this far. I just can't see it at it's close.
Speaker 3: She said, that's what far sighted means, means you can
Speaker 3: see far, not close. She said, there's another name she
Speaker 3: had done researched. She said, there's another name for it
Speaker 3: when you get over forty, it's called aging eyes. Soft
Speaker 3: way to say getting old, aging eyes, aging eyes. There
Speaker 3: was even some Greek words she used for I don't
Speaker 3: even remember. It had presby something in it. Somebody can
Speaker 3: Optimologists can send us a text about this message and
Speaker 3: correct everything I'm saying this wrong.
Speaker 1: But she said, it's time. Y'all can't even take me
Speaker 1: seriously with those own things.
Speaker 3: You're gonna have to get used to it, because I
Speaker 3: need to see what's right in front of me in
Speaker 3: this season, and I'm afraid that if I can only
Speaker 3: see what's far away. Paul said, I want to be
Speaker 3: in heaven with Jesus. But God said that's too far. Paul.
Speaker 1: One day, one day, I'll give you a well done,
Speaker 1: but not to.
Speaker 3: Day, because I still got stuff.
Speaker 1: For you to do that's right in front of you.
Speaker 3: And convinced of this process, I decided that I'm going
Speaker 3: to make what's right in front of me that I
Speaker 3: could miss if I was too far sighted my focus.
Speaker 3: So the word of the Lord is whatever is right
Speaker 3: in front of you that God has given you to do.
Speaker 3: That is your focus in this season, and all you
Speaker 3: have to do with the parts you don't know about
Speaker 3: God's plan for your life, because you know Jeremiah twenty
Speaker 3: nine to eleven is a wonderful scripture, for I know
Speaker 3: the plans I have for you, plans to prosser you,
Speaker 3: not the harm you plans to give you hope in
Speaker 3: a future that was spoken to prepare them for their
Speaker 3: captivity in Babylon, which would last seventy years. And he said,
Speaker 3: in the meantime, while you're in Babylon, you need these
Speaker 3: because while you are waiting for the future that you
Speaker 3: believe God has for you, I don't want you to
Speaker 3: get far sighted and miss what's right in front of you.
Speaker 3: Put it in the comments. I don't want to miss it.
Speaker 3: Tell your neighbor, I don't want to miss it. And
Speaker 3: sometimes the reason I miss it is because it's right
Speaker 3: here and I'm looking.
Speaker 1: Out there now.
Speaker 3: This is for all of the worriers that call themselves planners.
Speaker 3: You do know that every time God gives a gift,
Speaker 3: the enemy attacks.
Speaker 1: It with a perversion.
Speaker 3: Planning is God's gift to you. Worry is the perversion
Speaker 3: of God's gift called planning, And people who are good
Speaker 3: at planning.
Speaker 1: Are also world class warriors.
Speaker 3: So worrying is watch this when I don't have clarity
Speaker 3: about the situation because.
Speaker 1: I'm looking so far.
Speaker 3: And I'll illustrate this one other way because I'm passionate
Speaker 3: that you get the picture. Because I don't want to
Speaker 3: just preach these messages. And when they say Tuesday, do.
Speaker 1: You go to church? Yeah?
Speaker 3: What he preaches by own God. I want you to
Speaker 3: have something that you can remember. And what I see
Speaker 3: you doing is this going forward? Right, God direct my past.
Speaker 3: But you are looking so far. I promise you I
Speaker 3: will not take one more step. Get a white shot
Speaker 3: so they can see what I'm saying, y'all. I will
Speaker 3: not take one more step. It's too risky for.
Speaker 1: Me to go forward looking that far.
Speaker 3: I mean, maybe I could do it.
Speaker 1: It's way, it's way.
Speaker 3: Remember I'm forty four. It's way too risky for me
Speaker 3: to take that step. If I'm gonna go forward, that's
Speaker 3: what I'm gonna look at next. Now, somebody who wants
Speaker 3: me to come up there and give them a hug,
Speaker 3: wave at me real quick. Okay, I'm coming for you
Speaker 3: in the back row right there. I see who I'm
Speaker 3: coming to. Everybod else, put your hand out I'm coming.
Speaker 1: All the way to you. That's my future. But I
Speaker 1: am not coming to.
Speaker 3: Give you that hug, which I'm going to give you
Speaker 3: in just a few moments.
Speaker 1: I am not I'm gonna come that far. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna. I'm gonna come toward you. That is the.
Speaker 3: Future, But I am not going to look that far,
Speaker 3: because if.
Speaker 1: I look that far, I'll fall.
Speaker 3: That's the definition of anxiety. That's why Peter didn't make
Speaker 3: it all the way to Jesus, because he saw.
Speaker 1: The wind in the waves. And when you look too far,
Speaker 1: you fall.
Speaker 3: But if you take this next step by faith and
Speaker 3: say to the devil, my purpose is pulling me. Now.
Speaker 1: This is the next sandwich I need to make. This
Speaker 1: is the next bill I need to pay.
Speaker 3: I'm not gonna think about the other eighteen thousand dollars
Speaker 3: in debt right now. This bill, this baby step, this
Speaker 3: phone call, this workout, this breath disappointment, this phone call,
Speaker 3: this day, this hour, this minute. And I'll tell you
Speaker 3: what I found out that the word of God I'm coming, Sis,
Speaker 3: I'm coming. I found out give me my camera before
Speaker 3: I come, that the word.
Speaker 1: Of God is like headlights on a car.
Speaker 3: When you're driving at night, you can only see as
Speaker 3: far as your head lights, but you can make the
Speaker 3: whole trip that way three feet at a time. I
Speaker 3: promise you, I'm gonna look here while I'm walking there,
Speaker 3: And this, to me is the balancing act of great faith.
Speaker 1: Look forward, but not far. Look forward now, No, watch,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna do this. I'm definitely not gonna do that.
Speaker 1: I got that much down.
Speaker 3: But if the enemy can't get you to look back
Speaker 3: on your past, he will try to get you to
Speaker 3: go so far into your future.
Speaker 1: Okay, what's u that?
Speaker 3: It is just as dangerous for me to look at
Speaker 3: where I'm going all the way up there as it
Speaker 3: is for me to look back at where I came from.
Speaker 3: So it's dangerous not to look forward. It's dangerous not
Speaker 3: to have anything to look forward to. It's dangerous for
Speaker 3: you not to have a plan for this year of
Speaker 3: your life. It's dangerous for you to not have structure
Speaker 3: around your day. It's dangerous for you to not have
Speaker 3: a budget. It's dangerous for you to not have an
Speaker 3: eating plan. It's dangerous for you not have a Bible
Speaker 3: reading plan, because you will need a plan to produce
Speaker 3: what you're called to produce. It's dangerous not.
Speaker 1: To look forward.
Speaker 3: It is just as dangerous to look too far forward,
Speaker 3: to try to control things that only God can control.
Speaker 3: To start thinking about the product while you're still in
Speaker 3: the process.
Speaker 1: Of making it.
Speaker 3: You don't know what it's going to be. And if
Speaker 3: you look too far and go, Okay, I'm going.
Speaker 1: To be sober the rest of my life.
Speaker 3: Too far, too far. That can be where you're headed,
Speaker 3: that can be where you're going. But what I want
Speaker 3: you focused on right now is that the presence of
Speaker 3: God is enough to keep me out.
Speaker 1: Of these chains. Today. I'm not drinking it today.
Speaker 3: I'm not doing it today.
Speaker 1: I'm never eating sugar again. That's too far. Don't eat
Speaker 1: it this week? Can we do this week?
Speaker 4: Who?
Speaker 1: Big old jump? Just like that? Can we do it
Speaker 1: for a week? And in this way, your faith is
Speaker 1: like headlights? Paul said in verse twenty. I eagerly expect
Speaker 1: you're taking my video. You could do it. I a
Speaker 1: preached this just to you. Paul used the term that
Speaker 1: you can tell them it too. I want you to
Speaker 1: remember it. Oh, this is amazing. You're getting a hug
Speaker 1: on the way to the hug. Ooh, that's awesome. You
Speaker 1: don't even know what you just did for me. You
Speaker 1: preached the sermon.
Speaker 3: You see how much that meant to him that I
Speaker 3: hugged him. You see how much that meant that didn't
Speaker 3: even what I came up here to do. What if
Speaker 3: God wants to use you on the way to where
Speaker 3: you think you're going in a greater way than you
Speaker 3: could ever be used when you get there.
Speaker 1: What if I had been far sighted?
Speaker 3: What if I couldn't see where I was supposed to stop?
Speaker 1: You? Like the glasses, I feel dignified with these. I
Speaker 1: feel theological with these.
Speaker 3: I feel like I need God to hand me these
Speaker 3: for the times of my life when I can't see
Speaker 3: what's right in front of me.
Speaker 1: Soap here this is not back forward, but not far
Speaker 1: What is there along the way that God wants to
Speaker 1: show you? What is there along the way that God
Speaker 1: wants to do? Paul was so good at glasses.
Speaker 3: He looked and saw, Oh, these chains that are on
Speaker 3: my wrists are going to be a testimony so that
Speaker 3: the guards can get saved. Because I want to have
Speaker 3: a bigger church when I leave this prison. Then I
Speaker 3: did cool. I'm going to have a prison campus That's
Speaker 3: how Paul thought about it. That's what happens when God
Speaker 3: gives you a glasses. God give me the glasses this
Speaker 3: week to see what's right in front of me. And
Speaker 3: then along the way, I see some things. I learned
Speaker 3: some things.
Speaker 1: We'll have some moments, but I'm gonna get there.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna do what I promised to do, what I
Speaker 3: set out to do. And I'm hug the one that
Speaker 3: I thought.
Speaker 1: God bless you, God bless you. You're like my.
Speaker 3: Holly, gave me this set his time, at his time,
Speaker 3: and God wants to give you these because you are
Speaker 3: missing what's right in front of you. I have one
Speaker 3: more thing I want to show you. Are you full?
Speaker 3: I can save it until next week, or I can
Speaker 3: bring the whole thing and break it down right now
Speaker 3: in case you don't feel bad. You know, I can't
Speaker 3: trust you to come back every week. I got to
Speaker 3: give it to you while you're here.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: Listen as I make my way back down, Notice what
Speaker 3: I'm doing. I'm going far. I'm not looking far right.
Speaker 3: I'm going far, but I'm not looking far.
Speaker 1: That's what God.
Speaker 3: Wants you to see. I eagerly expect and hope Verse twenty.
Speaker 3: It's a Greek word that Paul used, not for glasses.
Speaker 3: But he makes this word apple carudokia, or any of
Speaker 3: you in the church the first year that I preached
Speaker 3: that apple carldokia.
Speaker 1: It means to stretch the head forward, apple carudokia.
Speaker 3: When he says, I eagerly expect and hope that I
Speaker 3: will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient
Speaker 3: courage so that whatever happens, Christ will be exalted in
Speaker 3: my body, he says, apple carldoki. He says, I stretch
Speaker 3: my head forward, but not far, because I'm in chains
Speaker 3: right now, forward, not far, little steps, little things, little
Speaker 3: moments forward, but not far. And not to make this negative,
Speaker 3: but I want to give you the antithesis of Paul's perspective.
Speaker 1: Late to so much.
Speaker 3: See, when the children of Israel had the opportunity to
Speaker 3: enter the Promised Land under the leadership of Moses, they
Speaker 3: forfeited that. They forfeited that it was theirs, and they
Speaker 3: forfeited that it was what God wanted them to have,
Speaker 3: and they forfeited that. So the account is pretty well known,
Speaker 3: but I don't know that the details have ever really
Speaker 3: been looked at up close. When the spies that went
Speaker 3: to check out the land where they would have to
Speaker 3: fight the battles to win the promise.
Speaker 1: You have to fight the battles to win the promise.
Speaker 3: And when they came back and said, you know, it's
Speaker 3: pretty amazing in there in numbers, chapter thirteen, go ahead
Speaker 3: and put that scripture on the screen, please, They gave
Speaker 3: Moses this account.
Speaker 1: We went into the land to which you sent us, and.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna stop on the sentence for a moment. It
Speaker 3: does flow with milk and honey. Here is its fruit?
Speaker 3: Where is its fruit?
Speaker 1: Here?
Speaker 3: They brought it back on a pole. Two of them
Speaker 3: carried the fruit of Canaan. These people had never eaten
Speaker 3: the fruit of the land.
Speaker 1: Many of them had only.
Speaker 3: Existed in Egypt, and so they had never had this kind.
Speaker 1: Of fruit before.
Speaker 3: Well, just about the time that they're looking at the
Speaker 3: fruit and seeing a picture, catch this phrase of what
Speaker 3: their tomorrow could taste like, what they're tomorrow could taste like.
Speaker 3: Sometimes God will give you a taste of what your
Speaker 3: tomorrow could be like, what it could be like if
Speaker 3: you were open and free of what it could be like,
Speaker 3: if you were focused and not distracted of what it
Speaker 3: could be like if you were a servant, rather than
Speaker 3: seeing yourself as a continual chaser of status. God will
Speaker 3: give you a glimpse and a taste of what tomorrow
Speaker 3: could be like.
Speaker 1: Here is it's.
Speaker 3: Fruit, But the people who live there are powerful and
Speaker 3: are fortified and very large.
Speaker 1: We even saw.
Speaker 3: Descendants of anak there. Go back to verse twenty seven.
Speaker 3: Here is its fruit. It's fruitful, it's beautiful, it's amazing.
Speaker 3: We saw it with our own eyes. It's fruitful and
Speaker 3: it flows. But watch this verse twenty eight. It's fortified
Speaker 3: and we're going to have to fight.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: Fortified means that it's protected. Some of you will remember
Speaker 3: that the first city that they thought was Jericho. Significance
Speaker 3: about Jericho was not the size of the city.
Speaker 1: It was the height of the walls.
Speaker 3: So when they said it's fortified, they said, it's got
Speaker 3: really big walls. Right, it's fortified. It's fruitful, but it's fortified.
Speaker 3: Now here comes the decision. Paul said, what shall I choose?
Speaker 3: One is pulling me toward purpose, one is pulling me
Speaker 3: toward what is easy. I'm gonna go with the purpose
Speaker 3: of God in this season of my life, Apple Caradoki,
Speaker 3: I'm stretching my head forward, and that.
Speaker 1: Just the moment that the people of God could have
Speaker 1: gone forward, they got far sighted.
Speaker 3: They started thinking about who they were gonna have to
Speaker 3: fight when they got there.
Speaker 1: But here's the bad thing about.
Speaker 3: Forecasting a fight before you are even on site to
Speaker 3: fight it. You don't realize that God is going to
Speaker 3: give you the backup when you show up. You don't
Speaker 3: know the future that when you look at those fortified
Speaker 3: Jericho walls, those hard things in your life, those tall things,
Speaker 3: those strongholds in your life, you don't realize that as
Speaker 3: you think about them in the future, they are fortified.
Speaker 3: But when you get there, God's gonna give you a
Speaker 3: trumpet to blow, and when you blow that trumpet, something
Speaker 3: supernatural is going to happen that only God could do.
Speaker 1: You couldn't do it.
Speaker 3: I like shaking my glasses at you feel like a
Speaker 3: wise old man full of passion and insight, because when
Speaker 3: you get there you will have to strength for there.
Speaker 1: You've got to go forward, but not too far. You
Speaker 1: gotta go forward and don't start thinking about what is
Speaker 1: this gonna be in three years? What is it gonna
Speaker 1: be at three minutes. When we first start tech.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you remember this trunk, but people
Speaker 3: used to always meet with us. The church grew so fast, right,
Speaker 3: and we would meet with people. And at the time,
Speaker 3: most of people coming to the church were teenagers and
Speaker 3: their parents. There was no in betweens. And I figured
Speaker 3: out what happened. The teenagers came, they thought it was cool.
Speaker 3: The parents came to see if it was a cult,
Speaker 3: and that exactly what happened. And we just grew both
Speaker 3: ways there and then the parents came there like not
Speaker 3: a cult, but it is pretty cool, you know. And
Speaker 3: everybody stayed and we preached Christ and God did amazing miracles.
Speaker 3: But when we sat down for the first time to
Speaker 3: meet with many of the couples that were coming, they
Speaker 3: would ask a question, and I think three in a
Speaker 3: row asked this.
Speaker 1: They said, well, what's the plan.
Speaker 3: For Elevation Church if you get hit by a bus pastor?
Speaker 3: And when the first person asked it, I was like,
Speaker 3: oh no, Second person asked them like, I don't know,
Speaker 3: third person asked them like, do you know something about
Speaker 3: a bus driver that is there?
Speaker 1: I mean bus phobia.
Speaker 3: Still kind of cringe when I see a bus kids
Speaker 3: just traumatizing. What is the church going to do without you?
Speaker 3: They would ask, And I finally looked at the third ones.
Speaker 3: I don't even know what church gonna do with me.
Speaker 3: I never did this before.
Speaker 1: What happens if you get hit by the bus? What
Speaker 1: happens if I don't. I don't even know the second one.
Speaker 1: How could I know the first one?
Speaker 3: And I believe in a succession plan, and I believe
Speaker 3: in contingencies, and I believe in plan beasts. But I
Speaker 3: also believe that you need to trust God, that you
Speaker 3: need to trust God, trust him so you don't trip.
Speaker 1: Trust him, so you don't trip trust him.
Speaker 3: Right now, Paul says, so that now as always, Christ
Speaker 3: will be exalted in my body. So there are two
Speaker 3: groups of people in here. The first one is like
Speaker 3: the Israelites and when they thought about what was ahead
Speaker 3: of them in the fight and the expense of it.
Speaker 3: And those of us who live in states of mind
Speaker 3: that are always forecasting the fights in the future. This
Speaker 3: is what happens in Fen of Exodus. I think this
Speaker 3: is one of the or in numbers. This is one
Speaker 3: of the saddest scriptures that you will ever see. The
Speaker 3: people of God who were poised in promise to be
Speaker 3: possessors of the land. They start questioning, God, why is
Speaker 3: the Lord bringing us to this land only to let
Speaker 3: us fall by the sword our wives and children will
Speaker 3: be taking as plunder. Wouldn't it be better for us
Speaker 3: to go back to Egypt? And you can't go forward
Speaker 3: looking back like that, and you can't go forward trying
Speaker 3: to forecast what's going to happen with a wall that
Speaker 3: God is going to knock down that you don't even
Speaker 3: know about yet.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't it be better for us to go back to Egypt?
Speaker 1: First four? And they said to each other, we should
Speaker 1: choose a leader and go back to Egypt. Paul does
Speaker 1: just the opposite. In the moment of uncertainty. He says,
Speaker 1: I'm not going back anywhere.
Speaker 3: I'm going forward, and I'm going to focus on what's
Speaker 3: right in front of me at this moment, and I'm
Speaker 3: letting go of what I can't control. Is this your word, man,
Speaker 3: because there is somebody in here who is being.
Speaker 1: Pulled back, dragged back, pimpted back, distracted back. And the
Speaker 1: word of the Lord is forward, not far, not far.
Speaker 3: This is going to be a step by step miracle.
Speaker 3: This is going to be a breath by breath miracle.
Speaker 3: This is going to be a day by day, moment
Speaker 3: by moment miracle. And God is doing it in your life.
Speaker 3: Just so long as you know that you can stretch
Speaker 3: your head forward in faith. You can only see three feet,
Speaker 3: but you can make the whole trip that way. And
Speaker 3: by the way, Holly, they were one hundred and fifty
Speaker 3: miles from Egypt, only fifty miles from Canaan. It would
Speaker 3: have been closer for them to keep going forward than
Speaker 3: it would to go back. I came to tell somebody,
Speaker 3: You're closer than you think you are.
Speaker 1: You cannot go back now. No, No, listen to me.
Speaker 1: You have come too far, you hear me.
Speaker 3: You have come too far to forfeit this. After all
Speaker 3: that He's done, after all that you've seen, after all
Speaker 3: that he brought you through.
Speaker 1: Don't you want to run on and see what the.
Speaker 4: End is going to be?
Speaker 3: Somebody say, I will go. I sall go, and Father,
Speaker 3: I thank you for your prevailing word. All flesh is
Speaker 3: like the grass of the field. It pales and it withers,
Speaker 3: and it fades and it dies.
Speaker 1: But the word of the Lord stands forever.
Speaker 3: God, I thank you for the great faith of the
Speaker 3: Apostle Paul, who gives us a picture today of what
Speaker 3: it means to be in a space that never would
Speaker 3: have been his choice. But I thank you Lord that
Speaker 3: he gave us a picture of what to do when
Speaker 3: the situation that is surrounding us does not correspond to
Speaker 3: the promise that is inside of us.
Speaker 1: I'm stretching forward.
Speaker 3: If all I can stretch forward is my head, I
Speaker 3: stretch my head forward. If all I can stretch forward
Speaker 3: is a weak prayer, I stretch that forward too, because
Speaker 3: I know that you did not bring me this far
Speaker 3: to leave me.
Speaker 1: I thank you God that you do have.
Speaker 3: Plans, a hope, a future for each and everyone that
Speaker 3: you sent me to minister to today. I thank you
Speaker 3: that this week they're going to get your glasses. I
Speaker 3: pray God this week that when parents are starting to
Speaker 3: worry too much, teenagers would hand them some glasses. I
Speaker 3: pray that when teenagers are starting to get too distracted
Speaker 3: by what's out in the front, that a parent will
Speaker 3: hand them some glasses.
Speaker 1: I pray that when we're all alone in.
Speaker 3: The secrecy of our own self sabotage and the thoughts.
Speaker 1: That we think that torment us.
Speaker 3: That you would give us your glasses so that we
Speaker 3: would go forward and realize that you are not far.
Speaker 3: Thank you for drawing near to us today. God, it's
Speaker 3: amazing how you meet with us. Thank you for the
Speaker 3: promise that when we draw near to you, you will
Speaker 3: draw near to us, and that if we humble ourself
Speaker 3: under your mighty hand, you'll lift us up in due time.
Speaker 3: I pray for each person today who is experiencing a
Speaker 3: prison sentence of sorts. I pray that they would not
Speaker 3: have clarity, but that they would trust in God.
Speaker 1: I pray that you would trust in God. I trust
Speaker 1: in God. Singing myself.
Speaker 3: Will never fail. That's my prayer for you. That's what
Speaker 3: Paul said, Trust God.
Speaker 1: Ye see, that's for me. In my house, we trust
Speaker 1: in God. We will serve the Lord. Serving win is cloudy.
Speaker 1: Serving Winn is tight.
Speaker 5: Trust in God serving winness confusing. My purpose is pulling
Speaker 5: me forward. Right now, come on, let the word think in.
Speaker 1: Respond in worship, and the word will go deeper. The
Speaker 1: word will go deeper. You worship hard, trusted.
Speaker 4: You must sa.
Speaker 1: I want that bridge. Now lift your hands a head
Speaker 1: the f Come.
Speaker 4: On, sap my the mine.
Speaker 1: Have the bye.
Speaker 3: I gotta read, I gotta read.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2: Special thanks to those of you who give generously to
Speaker 2: this ministry. Is because of you that this ministry is possible.
Speaker 2: You can click the link in the description to give
Speaker 2: now or visit Elevationchurch dot org slash podcast for more
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Speaker 2: Elevation Church.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening. God bless you