The Devil In 3D

In order to resist the enemy, we have to learn how to recognize him. Here are three ways the enemy tries to get into our minds.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our
podcast and I wanted to thank you for joining us today.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving
in your life.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Enjoy the message.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Just to hit it real quick from first Speeder five
eight and nine, which serves as a theme. We won't
preach from it today, but be alert and of sober mind.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Your enemy.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
The devil prows around like a roaring lion. See I
always read it wrong. I thought he was a lion.
I thought he was bigger than me and stronger than me.
But I found out that he's just loud like a lion.
And the place where he roars is in my mind.
That's where he's the loudest, in the thoughts that I have.

(00:48):
And so he's looking for someone to devour. Did you
ever wonder why all those Twitter feeds and Instagram feeds
and Facebook feeds, why they call him feeds. It's because us.
They're eating your mind alive. Did you know that? And
so he devours people in any way that he can.

(01:09):
He's looking for someone the command is resist him. But
how many know it's hard to resist what you don't recognize.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
And if we're to resist.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
The enemy, because I don't know about you, but I
don't intend to live the rest of my life as
a Christian and be a slave to my own imagination.

Speaker 1 (01:34):
Amen. I don't intend to.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
Live the rest of my life forgiven by Christ as
a prisoner to my past and replaying memories of moments
that have come and gone, but I can't escape them
in my mind. And so I really intend if it
takes me the rest of my life, and it might,
because it seems like sometimes I take two steps forward
and three steps back. But I'm trying to get free.

(01:59):
I'm trying to take my mind back so I can
serve God with my mind and love the Lord my
God with all my heart, with all my soul, with.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
All my mind, with all my strength.

Speaker 2 (02:10):
And I don't want to be drained, so I go
into each day with no energy and broken focus. I
really want to be able to see clear the way
ahead so I can follow Christ into my future.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
And that's the intention of this series.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
But in order to resist the enemy, we've got to
recognize him, or we'll spend our whole life, resisting all
the wrong things, resisting silence when sometimes that's where God
speaks the loudest, resisting or trying to avoid awkward situations.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
And God's middle name is awkward.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
He'll run out of food on purpose to see what
you're going to do in an awkward situation. He'll sit
down next to a disreputable woman. It'll well and make
it awkward. So the disciples have to decide if they
really believe that this message is for everyone.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
And so let's take a look today.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
At this idea of recognizing the enemy so we can
see how he's at work in our lives. And this
may be a weird title, but I want to call
this message the devil in three D? What does he
look like in real life, not our cartoon image of him,

(03:29):
our coloring book devil. Once we get the cape off
of him and try to understand how he really operates
to try to master our minds and set up a
seed of influence and our souls. Through controlling our emotions,
we can start to do battle.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
And you know, Paul said.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
One time, we are not ignorant of Satan's devices, devices,
Satan's devices, and of course I don't think this is
the devil, but I wanted to give you three things
just to.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Make it memorable that start with the letter D.

Speaker 2 (04:08):
And rather than continue on talking about Peter this week,
I want to move into the Old Testament for a
few moments and tell you a story about a Bible
character that I know you've heard of, named Moses, and
I want to use this one example from his life
is probably not the one that he would choose for
us to evaluate, because he made a great mistake and

(04:29):
it cost him dearly. But hopefully, like First Corinthians ten says,
we can use him as an example so the same
thing doesn't happen to us. How many of you want
your kids to learn some stuff from your experience that
they don't have to learn through their own pain. And
so let's look at this. I'll read it to you.
I'll be honest with you. I never appreached on this

(04:50):
passage before because I was intimidated by it. And really
it's a little confusing. You'll see that it seems a
little harsh what happens in this passage.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
And honestly, I knew that if I.

Speaker 2 (05:02):
Ever preached it, that God would probably speak something to
me that I wouldn't want to hear because I relate
to a little thing that happens in this Bible story.
But I want to share it with you now as
we lean into this message. The devil in three D
and of course Moses's devil was a little.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
Different than ours.

Speaker 2 (05:22):
He would have said Pharaoh, who was the ruler of Egypt,
the one that he had to demand emancipation for the
people of God from. He never really asked for that assignment.
He didn't seek that assignment. He wasn't looking for a
life purpose. God just interrupted what he thought was his
second half of life and gave him something different to

(05:45):
do and wasn't terribly convenient. But now we're looking at
Moses at the end of his life, and this is
what the Bible says Numbers chapter twenty, verse one. In
the first month, the whole Israelite community arrived at the
desert of Zenn and they stayed at Kadesh. Their Miriam
died and was buried. Their Miriam died and was buried.

(06:05):
Now there was no water for the community, and the
people gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron, and they
quarreled with Moses and said, if only we had died
when our brothers fell dead before the Lord. Why did
you bring the Lord's community into this wilderness that we
and our livestock should die here?

Speaker 1 (06:26):
Why did you.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
Bring us up out of Egypt.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
To this terrible place?

Speaker 2 (06:31):
It has no grain or figs, grape vines or pomegranates,
Wi Fi or Starbucks. It's trying to bring you into
the text. I don't want you bored trying to listen
to this Bible story. And there is no water to drink.
Moses and Aaron went from the assembly to the entrance

(06:53):
to the tent of meeting and fell face down, and
the glory of the Lord appeared to them. That's when
God's glory shows up when you've run out of answers.
That's when God's glory shows up when you admit God,
I'm powerless to do this on my own.

Speaker 1 (07:10):
I need you God.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
I've tried everything, and still these people are driving me crazy.
But I'm here at the entrance to the tent and I.

Speaker 1 (07:19):
Need you to speak.

Speaker 2 (07:20):
So for everybody who came into church with a cocky
attitude today talking about I wonder what this sermon is
gonna be about.

Speaker 1 (07:26):
And he better hurry up and.

Speaker 2 (07:27):
Get to it, because I don't really even want to
be here, up here in that karate kid shirt looking
like a Halloween costume, say something, won't you. You're not
gonna get it. But those of you who came in
here humbled under the mighty hand of God, he might
just speak because you're listening now. Then the Lord said

(07:49):
to Moses verse seven, take the staff, that same staff
that you raised over the Red Sea, and it parted,
that same staff that you.

Speaker 1 (07:59):
And threw on the ground.

Speaker 2 (08:01):
And I proved who I was to you because I
turned the staff into a snake, and you picked it
back up and it became a staff again.

Speaker 1 (08:09):
That same staff that.

Speaker 2 (08:10):
Turned the Nile River into blood until your enemy had
no choice but to release you from bondage.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
That same staff that when you.

Speaker 2 (08:19):
Raised it up, the Amalekites.

Speaker 1 (08:21):
Were no match for the Israelites.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
That same staff. Take it now. I want you to
get erin and get everybody together and speak to the
rock before their eyes, and it will pour out its water,
and you will bring water out of the rock for
the community, so they in their livestock and drink. So
Moses took the staff from the Lord's presence, just as

(08:45):
he had commanded him. He and Aaron gathered the assembly
together in front of the rock, and Moses said to them, listen,
you rebels.

Speaker 1 (08:55):
I'm gonna start saying that around my house. More to
the kids.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
We bring you water out of this rock. Isn't anything
I do enough for you. I've been leading you through
this wilderness for thirty eight years, and it's never enough.
It never stops. It never stops. Somebody shout, it never stops.
I screamed that one day on vacation, top of my lungs.

(09:23):
I'd been such a good dad all day. I took
my kids swimming, I went on a bike ride with
the kids. We went and ate Japanese food, and we
sat with people we didn't know, and I pretended to
think it was funny when he flipped the bowl into
his hat, like I never saw it before. I was
a good dad that day. I was a great dad
that day. I read to him at bedtime, and still

(09:44):
at the end of the day, they were fighting, and
all of a sudden, I heard myself screaming at my kids.

Speaker 1 (09:50):
Have you ever had an out of body experience.

Speaker 2 (09:52):
Screaming at your kids and you were surprised? What you
said next? And you were thinking I might have to
bleep myself at it myself.

Speaker 1 (09:59):
I don't know what's coming out next. The Holy Ghost just.

Speaker 2 (10:02):
Left and something else took over.

Speaker 1 (10:04):
And now I'm watching.

Speaker 2 (10:05):
Myself and I'm scaring of myself, and I shouted at
the top of my lungs.

Speaker 1 (10:09):
It never stops. Now we can laugh about it. It wasn't
funny at the time.

Speaker 2 (10:20):
Listen, your rebels, must we bring you water out of
this rock. We already did this one time, thirty eight
years ago. This has happened before. God kept your shoes
from wearing out. Then Moses raised his arm and struck
the rock, which God did not instruct him to do,

(10:42):
twice with his staff, and water gushed out, and the
community and their livestock drank. So on the surface what
Moses did worked, But just because it worked on the
surface doesn't mean it was wise and does not mean
it will have a sustainable effect. And this is why

(11:05):
when you control people with your anger, or your pouting.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Or your manipulat.

Speaker 2 (11:14):
See I can't even say the words a foreign concept.

Speaker 1 (11:16):
To me, manipulation, You end up very lonely.

Speaker 2 (11:23):
Because the cost of controlling people is to end up
alone and I know I got you pinned up against
your chair right now talking about this sermons, so look
confused and you get through this. But some of the
stuff that works on the surface costs us in the end.
And that's why it's so important that we understand this.

(11:45):
Because what everybody got water, but it cost Moses what
God had promised. And if the passage ended at verse eleven,
you'd say, well, what's so hard about that scripture? Unfortunately,
Verse twelve tell us that even though the water came
out of the rock, what came out of Moses's heart

(12:09):
in that moment prevented him from going further into God's promise.
And even though all the people were happy and the
people were impressed, and the people might not have even
known anything was wrong because they were all too busy drinking,
the people got hydrated. The people got what they wanted,
but Moses lost what God had promised. Verse twelve, the

(12:33):
Lord said to Moses and Aaron, because you did not
trust in me enough to honor me as holy in
the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this
community into the land I give them. These were the
waters of Mirabah, where the Israelites quarreled with the Lord,

(12:58):
and where he was proved holy among them.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
Makes me wish I would have.

Speaker 2 (13:03):
Paid more attention in my Hebrew class, because if I
knew that miraba means quarreling, I would understand that God
does some great miracles in places of great conflict. You know,
it's funny all the little things we miss if we
read the Bible in English because the interpretation. Sometimes the

(13:24):
writers will put little humorous things in there that I
wouldn't know to look for. But this particular word play,
if you go back to verse two and I told you,
I'm gonna give you three d's and I am the
first one is deficit because he is describing a deficit
that the people of God are in. It says in
verse two there was no water for the community, and

(13:45):
the people gathered. Now the Hebrew word for gathered here
that he uses is a word that means to come
together for the purpose of conflict. And see, I didn't
even know Facebook was in the Bible. Talk to me,
they call it a community. But the community came together to.

Speaker 1 (14:05):
Quarrel in that a nice word to quarrel.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
Not to not to fight, not to argue, but to
quarrel and so they're they're fighting with each other and they.

Speaker 1 (14:16):
Don't have patience. But they don't have patience because they
don't have water.

Speaker 2 (14:20):
And before we're too hard on them, these complaining Israelites,
we need to consider that this was a matter of
life and death. This is not the barista messed up
your order and forgot that you prefer almond milk.

Speaker 1 (14:34):
This is something different.

Speaker 2 (14:37):
We can't live but a few days without water, and
so we're desperate. And I've noticed that when people get desperate,
they start doing things they wouldn't normally do.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
Have you noticed this about yourself, that when you get desperate,
you get.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
Edgy, you get touchy, and sometimes you're lashing out at people.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
And it's not about the people.

Speaker 2 (14:59):
Like I had to explain to the kids about my
road rage, it's not really about the driving.

Speaker 1 (15:04):
It has nothing to do with the driving.

Speaker 2 (15:05):
It's just that Dad finds this a convenient place to
be shielded and an anonymous where I can let some
stuff lie that's been building up.

Speaker 1 (15:15):
God, I don't want a real preacher, JJ. You preached
next week. Thank them out.

Speaker 2 (15:21):
It's a whole thing because they came together to quarrel,
and what they didn't no couldn't know, is that they
were on the border of Canaan. The land that God
had promised them was just a few short months away.
But in a time when they should have been preparing
to conquer, the enemy had them in a state of conflict.

(15:42):
Don't you understand that the reason that you've been fighting
like you've been fighting, and even the reason sometimes that
the devil will get you focused on fighting against people,
is because God is trying to bring you into what
He spoke over your life and the promise of his
inheritance in the Saints. And now the closer you get

(16:03):
to that promise, the greater the conflict is going to be.
I think one of the reasons that our church gets
so divided is because the enemy knows that if we
would ever stop fighting and focus on the mission that
we were given by our captain and the savior of
our souls, we would be dangerous to the kingdom of darkness.
But we can't come together because we quarrel too much.

(16:26):
It never stops, we never quit finding new things to
fight about. It's not only that Christians fight against other religions.
We can subdivide on a multiplicity of different levels. Of Christianity,
and we can get into little groups so that we
no longer come together to lift up the name of
the Lord and to take this message to the ends

(16:47):
of the earth.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
But now we're fighting over a translation of.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
The Bible, or we're fighting over what you wear to worship,
or we're fighting over what specific nuance you believe about
the Holy Spirit. But I didn't come to quarrel, so
I don't need to fight with you. I came to conquer,
and I need you in my corner. And I don't
have the energy to spend fighting against the people God
called me to fight with.

Speaker 1 (17:10):
So if you're black, fight with me. If you're a Hispanic,
fight with me. If you're a woman, fight with me.
If you're young, fight with me.

Speaker 2 (17:17):
Let's get together, old heads, young people, let's fight this
fight together. And there's no water in the wilderness, and

(17:38):
when there is no water, when there is a deficit,
you start reacting.

Speaker 1 (17:46):
Instead of responding.

Speaker 2 (17:49):
I'm appreciate this message, Hollie. I feel it happening right now,
because what I want to say is forget about the
budget deficit. A whole lot more than a budget deficit
in our nation today, and it's a different deficit than
they faced.

Speaker 1 (18:06):
It's not a lack of water.

Speaker 2 (18:07):
I feel like in our world today we are severely
lacking in our ability.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
To empathize with others.

Speaker 2 (18:16):
Because we've got a surplus of opinions and a deficit
of empathy.

Speaker 1 (18:24):
Let me try another one. They didn't like that very much.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
We have a surplus of information and a deficit of wisdom,
because if we don't have insight into information, we will
get caught up in highlights and headlines and highlights and
headlines and highlights and headlines and highlights and headlines, clicking

(18:51):
on crazy stuff and not even bothering to read anything
but the first sentence. And then somebody wants to ask me,
do you really have a water slide on your stage
in the church.

Speaker 1 (19:00):
Because you don't want to come.

Speaker 2 (19:09):
I almost lost my faith in the human race over
that water slide. It's a deficit, and I've been noticing
about myself. Maybe this is why I wanted to preach
the series that I'm having a hard time focusing because
you know, the Devil's devices. I think it's I think

(19:32):
I'm no neurologist, but I think when it's getting hard for.

Speaker 1 (19:35):
Me to read three sentences in a book and now
I'm trying to swipe paper. When I reached up to
swipe a book the other.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
Day, I thought, I got to take my mind back. Actually,
next week, if the Lord will enable me and help me,
I'm gonna try to preach on that very subject of focus,
because I'm talking to more and more people who feel.

Speaker 1 (20:00):
Like their mind is fragmented and can't hold a thought.

Speaker 2 (20:04):
And it's not just because you're getting old and fish
oil won't help it. There's some principles in the Word
of God about distraction that we need to look at.
It's a deficit, a deficit where we have more ways
to communicate and we're connecting less than ever. I think

(20:27):
that's what the skyrocketing porn rates are about. I think
that's what the skyrocketing sleep deprivation rates are about. We
are desperate to connect, and we call ourselves connected and
nothing could be further from the truth.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
And it's too much.

Speaker 2 (20:45):
Costa called it too much to live with, too little
to live for. It's a deficit, a deficit of meaning,
a deficit of insight. And when the deficit is left unaddressed,
you know what happens next. Disappointment, sets in. And that's

(21:07):
the second D is disappointment because I'm looking at how
the Israelites are talking to Moses, right, and I get it.
I get it because when you don't have what you
need to live, you start doing things that you would
not normally do and it's not even you. And you
also want to explain to people. Sometimes I don't even
know who that was. I'm so sorry. Can we take
back the last five minutes? And sometimes you can't. Sometimes

(21:31):
you can undo it. And what the Israelites said to
Moses here apparently hit that button. Now everybody has a button.
All of you who are calm, we just haven't found
yours yet. Really, everybody has a boiling point. Everybody has
something that if you hit that, you will see a

(21:52):
different version of them, and you will completely change their
Enneagram number. If you hit the button, they go from
a seven to a two, a peacemaker to a shooter.

Speaker 1 (22:05):
And it can happen so quick.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
Most is the man of God is violently striking a
rock when God is trying.

Speaker 1 (22:15):
To show his people grace.

Speaker 2 (22:16):
But the reason he did it, and this is why
I can't figure out sometimes in my own life where
it comes from, because I find things coming out of me,
and I'm confused about where it came from, because i
know I'm not mad about what I'm mad about, because
it's not a big enough deal to make me as
mad as I am about what I'm mad about. Please
help me preach to you in this together. And they

(22:39):
just got done telling him they wanted to die. And
it's his fault, because anytime you are facing a deficit
in your own life, you start looking for someone to blame.
Anytime you are confronted with your own barrenness or brokenness,
you want to find somebody else or something else whose

(23:01):
fault it can be.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
And the first thing we do when we run out of.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
Resource is to look for someone else to take responsibility.
If only we had died when our brothers fell dead
before the Lord. Why did you bring the Lord's community?

Speaker 1 (23:16):
Why didn't my mom? Why wasn't my dad around?

Speaker 2 (23:19):
All these or reasonable things to say, but they don't
really help the situation.

Speaker 1 (23:23):
They only make it worse.

Speaker 2 (23:25):
Why did you bring us out here into this wilderness
that we should die here? They weren't actually about to die.
God wasn't going to let him die. They were on
the edge of destiny, about to take the land that
God had promised for generations, and they want to die
at the edge of destiny.

Speaker 1 (23:46):
Why'd you bring us.

Speaker 2 (23:48):
Up out of Egypt to this terrible place? There we
had figs. There, we had grape funds. There, we had pomegranates.
There we had grain. I forget to mention the whips.
They forget to mention the mud and the straw, and

(24:11):
they begin to glamorize a past that really didn't even exist, well,
the good old days. I get it, man, it's tempting
to go back there in your mind.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Just as long as you know is.

Speaker 2 (24:34):
Your version of the past is just as imaginary as
your version of the future back in Egypt, the place
that you were praying God to get you out of. Oh,
I'll never forget this. One time a lady came to me.
She said, you need to change some things in the church,
very early.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
In the church.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
And I was woo, I was cocky. I was twenty eight.
So what I said next to home, you respond. So
there's statute of limitations. She listed everything she wanted me
to change in the church.

Speaker 1 (25:05):
Change this, and change that, and change this and change that.

Speaker 2 (25:08):
And either the Lord or the Devil prompted me to
say what follows. I said, so you want me to
recreate the church that you left to come to this one.
I didn't mean it how it came out. I meant
to say, I'll pray about it. I am, but a
servant and a vessel just gushed out came out frustration.

(25:29):
So you understand that frustration operates when your experience is
different than your expectation. So when you are frustrated, it
is not your life that you're frustrated with. It's your
life compared to your expectation of your life.

Speaker 1 (25:51):
That's what makes you frustrated.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
It's that it normally takes me thirteen minutes to get there,
and today it took me thirty and I didn't plan
for that. And so since I was already at a
time deficit and a sleep deficit, and I didn't put
margin on this trip, now I find myself frustrated. I'm
not really frustrated and how long it's taking. I'm frustrated

(26:15):
about how long it's taken compared to how long I
thought it was gonna take.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
And one of the best things we can do.

Speaker 2 (26:22):
For our peace of mind is to crucify our expectations.

Speaker 1 (26:26):
Of others.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
I mean, really, just put it up there on the
cross and get to the place.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
Where we no longer have.

Speaker 2 (26:35):
An expectation of people to meet our needs, because we
understand that our water flows from a different rock, that
our joy.

Speaker 1 (26:45):
Flows from a different place.

Speaker 2 (26:48):
Come on, Epham shout at the phone that I don't
depend on people to provide for me. Well, God has promised,
It's already mine. And so they got really upset man.
And then Moses got upset and he went to God
and he wanted God to be upset like he was upset.

(27:09):
And Moses was mad because God wasn't mad. That's what
happened here. He was disappointed.

Speaker 1 (27:17):
It never stops, after all I've done for you. I've
been here before. I have been here.

Speaker 2 (27:28):
Before, even even in high school when I was the
athletic trainer water boy for the football team. Coach Meyer
recruited me to be the athletic trainer.

Speaker 1 (27:47):
Said you could get a scholarship. And one day I
was mixing that gatorade so sweet, and I thought, I don't.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
Think they give scholarships for that. I think he tricked
me into this. You know, I kind of didn't like
it anyway. It wasn't like I really cared too much
about football. Football's fine, I'll turn it on. I'm not
like some of y'all fantasy lineups and stuff.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
I got a real life. I'm skidding, I'm skinning. I'm
skarting this fine as fine as fine, finem skarting.

Speaker 2 (28:17):
I'm scarting this fine as fine as fine. But man,
it was a relatively simple job. I did it for
over a year, and the main part of the job,
you know, every once in a while, they would let
me tape a wrist or an ankle.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
I think it wasn't even really people that was hurt.
I think they just sent.

Speaker 2 (28:38):
Cast members over because if anybody was really hurt, doctor
Bowens came in.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
So I don't even think I was really taping anybody.
I don't even think it was.

Speaker 2 (28:46):
But I did have one one job, and every time
they would have a water break, it was my job
to turn on the water.

Speaker 1 (28:56):
That's right, Bobby Bousche got nothing on me. Well, I
did it like clockwork. They blow the whistle.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
I was positioned close enough to the spickett, which was
connected to the hose which went to the PVC pipe
in Monk's Corner. It was fancy with a PVC pipe
with the holes in it, trough of sorts with the
water would come out of the pipe. But I was
the man who turned it on, and I turned it
on about three or four times every practice. And one

(29:29):
day I went over there to turn it on and
nothing came out. I don't know who forgot to pay
the bill, but nothing came out. And those football players
went to drink and they lined up.

Speaker 1 (29:43):
At the PVC pipe and nothing happened.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
And they started yelling at me, like these rebellious Israelites
started yelling at Moses, started yelling at me, calling me Steve.
I don't even go by Steve. There's an inn on
my name pronounced consonant. This ain't will of fortune. Oh,
I was mad yelling at me for the one time

(30:09):
the water didn't come on. Hundreds of times the water
came on.

Speaker 1 (30:14):
One time it didn't come on. And guess what, I'm
not controlling the water. I'm just the one turning it on.
So they were yelling at me. So I wasn't saved yet.
Let me get that in.

Speaker 2 (30:27):
So I turned around and said God bless ah, y'all.

Speaker 1 (30:31):
Only instead of.

Speaker 2 (30:32):
God bless I've said some different BCE vocabulary that it
is not appropriate for this church setting and holy people
such as yourself, And in that moment, I forgot they
were bigger than me, because.

Speaker 1 (30:44):
I do have a level of crazy.

Speaker 2 (30:46):
That if it kicks in, I will stop caring how
much bigger you are. And I would rather die than
have you cussed me out. I got in my Toyota
church cell and I drove off.

Speaker 3 (31:00):
So oh just kind of came back to me. Man,
I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (31:13):
Because all these times I get Moses's disappointment. I really do,
all these times, and this one time, all I've done
for you, all the meals I've cooked, all the prayers
I've prayed, all the compliments I gave, all the Christmas

(31:35):
presents I bought, all the sacrifices I made, and you
mean this one thing, this one time, and now you
want to yell at me and disrespect me and ignore me.

Speaker 1 (31:49):
I figure Moses is tired.

Speaker 2 (31:51):
Of being taken for granted, tired of people just assuming
that you're always gonna do it.

Speaker 1 (32:00):
It's just easy for you.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
Until I realized that Moses wasn't really disappointed with the people.

Speaker 1 (32:09):
Moses was.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
Still dealing with a fear that he had carried with
him since the time God met him at the Burning Bush,
impossibly before that, forty years earlier, when he killed an
Egyptian to try to rescue one of his fellow Hebrews.
And he never really fit in because he was raised

(32:33):
as an Egyptian, but he was.

Speaker 1 (32:36):
By birth a Hebrew.

Speaker 2 (32:38):
And when he tried to defend the people that he
was one of from the people that he had had
to live with, Moses ended up having to run. That's
why he ended up in the wilderness with the shepherds
staff to begin with. And that's why when God met
him at the bush, Moses said, you got the wrong one.
Picked somebody stronger, Pick somebody more capable, Pick somebody with

(33:05):
more experience. Pick somebody who doesn't struggle with what I
struggle with, because I'll let you down, God, and I'll
let them down. And not only not only is Moses
dealing with this moment, but he's dealing with forty years
of frustration, forty years of frustration that you could argue

(33:28):
were the result of his lack of faith when he
didn't go in and fight and take the land God
had promised. In a sense, what they're saying about Moses
is true and he knows it. It's not him, it's
not them that he is disappointed in.

Speaker 1 (33:50):
So like for me realizing in my adult life that my.

Speaker 2 (33:56):
Core fear and a lot of the reasons that I
withdraw and a lot of the reasons.

Speaker 1 (34:02):
That I lash out.

Speaker 2 (34:04):
It really came to me one time early in my
marriage to Holly, and it was a low key argument,
but all of a sudden it just kind of erupted
and I yelled at her, I'm not stupid, I'm not stupid.

Speaker 1 (34:18):
It never stops. I'm not stupid, she said.

Speaker 2 (34:23):
I didn't say you were stupid, But I wasn't responding
to what she said.

Speaker 1 (34:26):
I was responding to what I felt somewhere in me
was something that told me that.

Speaker 2 (34:35):
I didn't know enough. Probably back to my dad in
some ways he loved me. Wasn't that he didn't love me,
but he kind of felt like it was him against
the world and he didn't have a full deck to
play with because of.

Speaker 1 (34:48):
The way he was raised.

Speaker 2 (34:50):
And somewhere I probably started thinking that I was operating
in life out of a deficit of intelligence. And so
my first instinct when some makes me feel stupid. What
a phrase when they make me feel stupid. How much
power are you giving away to other people when someone

(35:11):
can make you feel stupid.

Speaker 1 (35:13):
That's a weak mind.

Speaker 2 (35:14):
But that's where that's where I find myself sometimes in
that mental wilderness, that mental wilderness, do you know what
I'm talking about?

Speaker 1 (35:23):
And I'm afraid.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
I'm afraid sometimes up here, not that I'm going to
get the Bible wrong or that I'm going to dishonor God,
but unfortunately that I will disappoint you. And every time
we start a new series, I feel it, you know,
because I try to create expectation this is going to

(35:47):
be the best series ever. And then I hope Baby
Jesus and Mother Mary and the Holy Ghost will somehow
help us, because I don't want to disappoint you. And
I'm sharing this altho biographically, but I'm wonderings like do
a lot of us function in this place that I

(36:09):
don't want to disappoint you? And that's why I hide.
And now I find myself I don't even want to
pick up the phone when people call, because now if
I can text them back, I can carefully craft my response.
Even in the smallest ways. I see this fear, I
see myself withdrawing. I see myself wanting to isolate, and

(36:34):
it's a tendency that I don't fully understand.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
Because I do love people. I really do love people.
I've always loved people.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
I was the dude that hugged everybody in his graduating
high school class, the whole two one hundred and thirty.

Speaker 1 (36:48):
Of them, hug them all.

Speaker 2 (36:50):
But I find myself sometimes wanting to withdraw, find myself
wanting to walk out, find myself wanting to get out.
I wonder why, you know, like, am I losing my
love for people? It is all this getting to me,
like lights and cameras and all that. But I realized
I realized in the weirdest way one day what it

(37:13):
was when a lady said to me, I've I've been
going to your church seven years and I've never met you.
And I said, I'm so sorry. I took it like
an accusation, you know. She said, no, no, it's a
big church.

Speaker 1 (37:24):
We love. The minister said, okay, good, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (37:26):
That's I'm really sorry, though, that's bad.

Speaker 1 (37:29):
I met your pastor in seven years. I'm sorry. She say,
it's fine, it's fine.

Speaker 2 (37:33):
Stop apologizing now. It's awkward because I'm making it awkward.
Then she made it awkward. She said, you're much taller
on the screen.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
Well that helped you already.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
See I'm insecure woman, but I don't want to let
you down, you know. So, So when Moses has this
moment and I'm calling in a moment, but it's really
not a moment because anytime something comes bursting to the surface,

(38:05):
like Moses hitting that rock twice when God specifically spoke
to him to speak to the rock, not to strike it.

Speaker 1 (38:15):
And I know why he struck the rock because this
is the third issue. It's the issue of dependence. You know.

Speaker 2 (38:23):
This staff was the thing that he carried with him.
Like Tom Hanks had a volleyball, Moses had a stick.
And now in this moment where the community needs water
and this is to be their last test, but they
don't know it. This is to be their last test
to see if they really trust God, and Moses fails

(38:46):
the test. What I could not understand is why did
God tell him to take the stick if he didn't
want him to use it. Why did God tell Moses
take the staff and then don't use it, just hold
it and speak to the rock. Until I remember what

(39:13):
Moses said to God when God first called Moses, I'm
not good at speaking. And before God could let Moses
lead his people into the promise, he had to know

(39:37):
do you trust me enough? When God said Moses, you
can't lead the people, it wasn't for punishment, it was
for protection. If Moses would have led them in in
the condition that his heart was in, with years and
years and years and years of resentment building up, they

(39:59):
would have all all got killed the first time God.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
Spoken, they didn't do what he said.

Speaker 2 (40:05):
Because God needs someone who is not dependent on their staff.
I know you struck the Red the Nile River, and
the Red Sea, and I know that this staff has
been used to perform great miracles, and I want you
to hold it in your hand, but have the faith
not to use it. I want you to speak to

(40:27):
the rock, and he struck it instead. And God said,
you don't trust me enough. You've allowed this resentment to
build to.

Speaker 1 (40:38):
A point that it has killed your potential.

Speaker 2 (40:43):
When we allow resentment to build and build and build
and build, when we never really believe that we are
what God said we are, when we are constantly taking
people's assessment of us as the ultimate reality, it limits.

Speaker 1 (41:01):
Our participation in the promise of God.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
It doesn't keep God from loving you, but it keeps
God from being able to lead you into the great
and precious promises that have your name on them. God said,
I just need you to trust me. I know you stutter,
I know you stammer. I know you're afraid of letting

(41:25):
me down. But it's never been about you, Moses. It
was never about your mouth. It was about my mighty
hand and my outstretched arm. It was never about your rod.
It was about the rock.

Speaker 1 (41:44):
So what are you trusting in today, my friend, the
rod or the rock?

Speaker 2 (41:53):
Because First Corinthians ten tells us plainly that this happened
as an example for us, that the Israelites who wandered
in the wilderness were an example for us, for you
and me in our daily lives, in our efforts to.

Speaker 1 (42:11):
Trust God in the face of our own frailty, he said.

Speaker 2 (42:16):
The apostle Paul said verse four. They drank the same
spiritual drink. They drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them.
Here's the revelation, and that rock was Christ. It wasn't

(42:36):
about Moses. It's not about me. It's not about you. Yes,
I will let you down. Yes, I will disappoint you,
But I'm not the rock. You know how good that
makes me feel to know I'm not the rock. I
don't have to force it, I don't have to fight it.
I don't have to explode in anger when it doesn't

(42:59):
go my way. I'm not the He is my stable place.
He is my solid ground on Christ, the.

Speaker 1 (43:07):
Solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.
Please stand, I'm closing. Please stand, I'm.

Speaker 4 (43:20):
Closing these Verse thirteen, where the waters of Miraba, where
the Israelites quarreled with the Lord, they quarreled with the Lord.
And verse two it said they quarreled with Moses, but

(43:42):
really they were quarreling with the Lord.

Speaker 2 (43:47):
It wasn't even about Moses. It's not even about you.
It's not even about me. We've been taking things personally,
you know, and we let it build and then it explodes.
Not in church, Oh you look so fancy in here,

(44:08):
your little boozie blessed self, come up in the House
of God carrying.

Speaker 1 (44:11):
A big, old thick Bible explodes when you get home.
It explodes when you're all alone, and.

Speaker 2 (44:19):
You find yourself crying out, desperate for connection and disappointed
with your life, so you start striking rocks and you
start trying to get You know, the water came out
of the rock, and it worked on the surface, but

(44:40):
Moses did not get to enter into the promise of God.
Did God still love Moses? Absolutely? He is Ei, the
God of second chances.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
I sure hope, so I know he is. I know
He's not going to punish me for one mistake.

Speaker 2 (44:57):
I can prove it. I can prove it to you.
Give him that verse I sent you earlier someone fourteen eight.
When the psalmist reflected on this event, he said, you
got it one fourteen eight, the one I sent you
earlier today No is Psalm one fourteen verse e. What
if I started yelling at the people on the screens

(45:18):
to demonstrate Moses's frustration, But it said that God turned
the rock into a pool, the hard rock into springs
of water.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
And God spoke to me through that verse.

Speaker 2 (45:34):
And said, if they'll let me, the place of their
greatest mistake will become the place of my mercy and
their greatest miracle.

Speaker 1 (45:48):
But for this to happen, we can't keep.

Speaker 2 (45:53):
It all up inside and keep exploding in situations and exploding.
It's not anger for everybody. Sometimes it's much more subtle
than that. It's the little waste that you withdraw yourself
from those that you love because I don't want to
be disappointed again. I don't want to be a disappointment

(46:15):
some living my whole life trying to avoid disappointment.

Speaker 1 (46:19):
I'm bringing my expectations.

Speaker 2 (46:21):
Down, down, down, down, down, down down, because now no
one can disappoint me.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
And I'm bringing myself.

Speaker 2 (46:29):
Back back back back, because I don't want to disappoint you.

Speaker 1 (46:34):
It's not about you. This is the test. This is
the test.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
With your rod in your hand, to remember all that
God has done for you, and the rock in front
of you, the presence of God. Speak to it, don't
strike it, Speak to it, confess it before God. Speak
to your weekness, own your inadequacy. God said, I'm.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
Not looking for you to be what I need you
to be. I'm looking for.

Speaker 2 (47:12):
You to trust in what I already am. And so
when Moses said i'm not, God said I am. When
Moses said I'm not, God said I am. When Moses
said I'm not, God said I am. When Moses said not,
God said I am.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
Do you trust him enough to let him handle those
who have hurt you.

Speaker 2 (47:41):
Do you trust him enough to allow him to use
everything that's happened for your good and his glory?

Speaker 1 (47:49):
Lift your hands if you do. The rock is in
this place.

Speaker 2 (47:54):
When my heart is overwhelmed, Lead me to the rock
that is higher than I.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
Meet us in this moment. God, pour out your spirit
in a fresh way for your people.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
Now. I asked that you would speak to that weak place,
broken place, discouraged place. Make that heart beat again for
real water from a rock, so you are beauty from brokenness.

(48:30):
Call to him, Call to him, speak to the rock.
Unless you asking, you need me.

Speaker 1 (48:42):
Enter my decision making process. God, I need you.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
you that this ministry is possible. You can click the
link in the description to give now or visit Elevation
Church Slash podcast for more information and if you enjoyed
the podcast, you can subscribe.

Speaker 1 (49:05):
You can share it with your friends.

Speaker 2 (49:07):
You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
share it on your social stories and tag us at
Elevation Church.

Speaker 1 (49:12):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you