May 23, 2025 • 50 mins
We love comfort. But it may be getting in the way of God’s plan for our lives. See why being comfortable may not be what God wants for us.
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Mark as Played
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Episode Transcript
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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.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
I wanted to thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope
it gives you perspective to see God is moving.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
In your life. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Well, take a seat. We're so glad you're here today.
We're continuing in the series Savage Jesus from the Gospel
of Mark. Believe me when I say that, I never
thought i'd say. This is the tenth installment of this series.
I usually preach short and sweet, but I got in
the Gospel of Mark and then I couldn't get out.
So today we'll be in Mark chapter six. I want
(00:40):
to introduce my scripture by way of a story. When
I wrote my first book, I had the privilege to
record the audio book myself, and they sent a very
professional recording engineer from the publishing company to record the book.
And he would stop me and correct me if I
made any mistakes, if I got a little too southern.
(01:05):
He was a Northern Pharisee and he judged my accent
and he'd say, it's little Twangie. Let's get it again,
or if I smacked my lips or mispronounced the word,
he'd back it up and make me catch it again.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
And it was annoying, but.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
I appreciated his professionalism. And because the publisher was the
largest publisher in the world. Now, not the publisher that
I wrote for. The publisher that I wrote for was
owned by a publisher who was owned by a publisher
that was the biggest publishing company in the world. This
guy worked for the big publisher and because of it,
he had worked with a lot of big names. And
(01:41):
this was my first book and my first time and
I kept having to take breaks and my mouth would
get dry, and so during one of those breaks, I
realized that this guy had worked with a lot of
famous people, and I asked him to tell me a
story to entertain me during my break. I said, tell
me about somebody you worked with that was difficult, And
(02:03):
he told me a story about a very well known
political figure. I don't know if the story is true,
but why let the truth get in the way of
a good story.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
That's my motto. So I'm gonna tell the story.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
I'm not going to say the name, but it was
a famous political figure. Who was recording his memoir about
his life. That was after he had served his term
for eight years something like that in office.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Now I can tell you who it was.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
But he said that when they were recording the memoir,
it was very long.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
It was about a seven or eight hundred.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Page book, and it had to be an abridged version.
And so when they were recording the audiobook, they had
to decide which sections to.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Leave and which sections to skip.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
And at one particular point in the memoir, there was
a section about a scandal that happened in this particular
notable figure's life related to offices of oval nature and
things of this sort, that happened during his tenure in
(03:09):
what some call the highest office in the United States
of America.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
And when he was.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Telling me about it, he said, when they got to
the part about the scandal, he said that the person
who wrote the memoir, the former president.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Said this is falling apart.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Said uh, he stopped, and he was going to skip it,
and he stopped the recording and he said, I don't
think people really, I think people are sick of hearing
about this by now. I think we can skip this part.
(03:48):
I mean, do you think this is really significant. And
the audio engineer said that it was a real challenge
to look back at somebody who had been the most
powerful man in the world at one point, and he said,
I had to look at him and say, yes, mister President,
(04:08):
this is significant. And that's my title for my message today.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Look at your neighbor.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
And say, in your best Bill Clinton voice, tell him
this is significant.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
This is significant. Our scripture lesson.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
For Today comes from Mark chapter six, something that marked
the evangelist included in his gospel record that he thought
was significant for us to know about the ministry of
Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Mark six, verse forty five records.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Immediately, Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and
go on ahead of him to beth Sadom. He did
not tell them to pack ponchos. He did not give
them a warning about the storm that they would encounter,
just a simple instruction. I wonder if God doesn't tell
us everything, because he knows we couldn' handle.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
The details.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
So he dismissed the crowd and sent the disciples to
get a head start. I'll eat you on the other side.
You're almost gonna die on the way. He didn't tell
him that, but after leaving them, he went up on
a mountain side to pray, and later that night the
boat was in the middle of the lake and he
was alone on land. He saw the disciples straining at
the oars because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn,
(05:28):
he went out to them walking on the lake.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
He was about to pass by them, but.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
When they saw him walking on the lake, they thought
he was a ghost, because God often looks like fear
from a distance. They cried out because they all saw
him and were terrified. Immediately, Mark's favorite word. He spoke
to them and said, take courage.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
It is I. Don't be afraid.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Then he climbed into the boat with them and the
wind died down.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
They were completely amazed.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Touch the neighbor you've been ignoring and say this is significant.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
So if you've ever been around church at all, you've
heard this Bible story.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
If you've ever been anywhere near a church, you've heard
about this Bible story. If you ever happened to drive
by a church by accident, you heard this. If you
ever played on church softball team, you heard curse words
and this Bible story. It's a significant story because it
teaches us that Jesus Christ is lord of all creation. Theologically,
(06:38):
he is sovereign. He is sovereign. It's an epiphany story
in that it gives us a revelation of Jesus Christ
that is consistent with the revelation of Jesus Christ that
was given in the Old Testament in a concealed form,
when a bush burned and a man named Moses was
meeting with God. The disclosure at that point was I am.
(07:02):
Moses said, who are you? God said, I am.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Now.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
It's interesting how God would spend the next several centuries
filling in that blank. That they would need to know
him to be water in a dry place, that they
would need to know him.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
To be a warrior in their battles.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
They would find all of this out, that He is
sustainer in their weariness. Really, the rest of your life
will be filling in that blank, and just about the
time you think you've got it figured out who God is,
life will so shift beneath your feet that you will.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Realize you didn't know him at all.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
The disciples have been with Jesus now for quite an
extensive class. They've seen him touch lepers, they've seen him
heal paralytics. They've even seen him raise dead people in
certain situations, and yet there was something that amazed them
in this moment, something that they had not seen about
(08:02):
him before. It is significant that Jesus told them to
go forward and the wind was against them. That's significant,
significant because a lot of times I assumed in my
life that if God sent me to do something, the
wind would work with me. That's pretty much the premise
of early Christianity. You know, turn your life over to
(08:25):
God and he'll take your burdens away. Turn your life
over to the Lord, and you know, what used to
keep you up at night won't keep you up at
night anymore because it'll be replaced by other stuff that'll
keep you up at night.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Fill in the blank. You realize that a lot.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Of times claims to faith are actually our efforts to
manipulate God, until we discover in the course of time
that just because the wind is against you doesn't mean
that God is not for you. Many times, the confirmation
that God has spoken to you is the fact that
the wind is against you. We're discovering this in our
(09:05):
study of the Gospel of Mark. We are learning that
resistance is often the greatest place for revelation. Would you
please take that elevation pin that cost about eleven or
twelve cents, and before you steal it from the church
and use it to sina check this week, write it down.
Resistance leads to revelation. Resistance leads to revelation. The wind
(09:31):
was against the disciples not because they disobeyed the words
of Jesus, but because they went in the direction of
his command.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
He sent them to beth Seda. They went to Bethseda.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
I got it when it was Jonah, because the wind
was against Jonah because he wasn't going to Ninevah.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
He was going to Tarsish. And God said, go to Ninevah.
And when you go to.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Tarsish, when you should go to Ninevah, expect the wind
to be against you. Because God didn't send you to Tarshish,
he sent you to NINEVH. So I expect the wind
to go against me. When God told me to go
to Ninevah and I went to Tarshish. But when he
told me to go to best Sayda, and I went
to best Sayda, I expect the wind to work with me.
I expect God to bless me when I come to church.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
I expect good parking.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Places because I came to church. I expect those shoes
to go on sale because I came to church. I
suspect a promotion because I came to church. Makes me
mad when somebody who didn't come to church, they slept
in and they get a raise, and.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
I get fired.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
And I can't understand how God could be with me
and the wind could be against me. But often the
confirmation of the Word of God is the resistance of
the enemy to show you you're.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
On the right track. Here's why.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Feel I preach it.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Here's why I'm gonna help somebody. You want to turn
around and go back home because the wind is against you.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
The wind is against you.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
So that you will know that it is the Lord's
presence with you that makes you successful. If the wind
was working with you, you would think the wind.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
When you got to your destination.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
If it were easy, you would think the wrong things.
If the wind wasn't against you, you wouldn't need the
Lord to come and step into the wind and speak
peace to the wind. So the wind has to be
against you to prove that the Lord is with you.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
Calm down, verdict.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
This is just the introduction and so Jesus, savage Jesus.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
The Jesus that's in the Bible, not the Jesus this.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
On Pinterest, Savage Jesus, real life Jesus, Monday morning Jesus. Yeah,
Friday Jesus, Saturday Jesus. Not the Jesus that is playing
a harp and stroking the wool of the lamb. But
the Jesus who sends his disciples into a storm and
(11:57):
watches them strength.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
I got to go.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
You don't believe this. You about to be really jealous.
I got to go and sit on the mountain where
Jesus prayed. And the man who took us there last year,
he knew everything about everything.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I think he was Jesus. He took us up.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
There, he said, here's where Jesus was praying in March
chapter six. And then he pointed to the lake that
the Bible mentions where the storm was, and from that
mountain you can see the whole lake. And he dropped
this on us right before he left us. He said,
so the whole time they were straining, Jesus could see them.
(12:44):
And he walked off and I cried, I have a
picture of me sitting on that mountain and there's Kleenex
all around me because Holly just kept handing them to me,
one after another, that he saw them in the storm,
that he saw them in the storm. And then I
was after I got done crying, because I realized he
sees me in my storm, and.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
He knows what I'm going through, and he knows.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
What I deal with, and he knows what people have
done to me, and he sees tears that I've cried
on my pillow that nobody else knows about him, that
he sees what's going on in my soul. That I
can cover up in front of people, but I can't
hide from him. After I got done crying about that,
I got kind of angry because I thought, if he
(13:30):
could see them, why didn't he stop it? All of
a sudden, it felt kind of cruel to me that
he would send them into a storm and see them
in the storm and not stop the storm. So I
think it is significant that the Bible says that he
(13:53):
saw the disciples verse forty eight, straining at the oars
because the wind was against them.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Shortly before dawn.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
He went out to them, this is forty eight b
walking on the lake.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
He was about to pass them by.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
I thought he would never leave me. I thought he
would never forsake me. I thought he promised his presence
to me. And so he's about to pass them by,
and they were afraid. One interesting thing about this particular
record in Marx's Gospel is that it was recounted by
(14:32):
a man named Peter.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Have you heard of him.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
He was a very outspoken disciple of Jesus Christ. He
was the one I don't know if you're like this.
He would say what everybody else thought.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
He would.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
He was filter free, and so when he was right,
he was really right.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
When he was wrong, he was real wrong. I'll prove
it to you.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
He said, you are the Christ, the son of the
Living God. She said, you are petross this rock. You're Peter,
not Simon, not shifty, upon this rock. I'll build my
church the rock of his revelation of who Jesus was.
A few verses later, Jesus said, get behind me, Satan,
and he was pointing at Peter, because Peter said, you
can't go to the cross. And Peter opposed the very
(15:22):
thing that Jesus came to do. All in the same
Bible chapter. This is Peter. Peter is the one telling
Mark about this story so Mark can write it down.
Peter is the one recording the audiobook. Okay, Peter is
the one giving Mark the gospel account. Mark wasn't a disciple.
Mark was an evangelist. He compiled the story, and Peter told, look,
(15:45):
I'm gonna say you something.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
We have four of these.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
We have four gospel accounts. The gospel is the good
News of Jesus Christ. When we say the Gospel of Mark,
it's the gospel according to Mark. When we say the
Gospel of Luke, the Gospel of John, the Gospel of
mac that's the gospel account that they wrote down. John
said that Jesus did so much. If you wrote a
whole book, if you tried to write down everything he did,
(16:11):
the whole world could not contain it. If you wrote
down all the works Jesus did, wikipedia would break. So
they had to decide what was significant enough to put
in the gospel account that would prove what they wanted
to prove about who Jesus was. So when Mark got
(16:32):
ready to write, he said, Jesus walked to the disciples
in a storm, and when he got in the boat,
the winds died down. When Matthew got ready to write it,
he included something that Mark left out. And I'm going
to read you now from Matthew fourteen. It's the same story,
but there's one detail in this story that is omitted
(16:53):
in Mark's gospel, which is based on the recollection of Peter,
and it's in Matthew's gospel but not Mark's.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
So here's what we'll do.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
This will be an interactive class. When I get to
the part that wasn't in Mark's gospel, stop me.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
When I get to.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
The part that where you're saying, wait, that wasn't in
the other one that you read before, I want you
to wave your hands and stop me. This is the
only time that you are allowed to tell me to
stop preaching. You can tell me to preach anytime you
want preach faster, But when I get to this part today,
I want you to stop me at every location. Let's
start in verse twenty two. Immediately Jesus made the disciples
(17:28):
get into the boat and go on ahead of him
to the other side while he dismissed the crowd. After
he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountain
side by himself to pray. Later that night, he was
there alone, and the boat was already a considerable distance
from land, buffeted by the ways because the wind was
against it.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So far, so good, We're good. Keep go on, keep
go on.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
Yeah, similar, very similar, very similar, few words, different sim stuff.
Shortly before dawn, Jesus went out to them walking on
the lake. When the disciples saw I'm walking on the lake,
they were terrified. It's a ghost, they said, and cried
out in fear. But Jesus immediately said it didn't take
courage it as I don't be afraid. Lord, if it's you,
Peter replied, tell me to come. Okay, okay, okay, what's.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
Wrong with you? Lord?
Speaker 2 (18:11):
If it's you, Peter replied, tell me to come to
you on the water.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Come.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
He said, this is amazing. Hey, hey, if I was
writing my memoir, I'll put this in.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Because what's what happens next. Then Peter got down out
of the boat, walked on water, and came towards Jesus. Oh,
I'm totally putting that in.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
I'm totally including the part where everybody else was in
the boat crying out in fear and I was walking
on water, transcending the laws of buoyancy.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Mabe. If I ever walk on water and then I
die and they're writing.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
A story about my life, you make sure they don't
take that part out. If I ever walk on water,
and I know I do metaphorically in your heart, but
if I ever physically, if they.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Ever write about me, I'm not saying they will.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
But if they do, leave this and touch somebody say.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
This is significant.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
So how can Peter This is a good question. How
can Peter walk on water? And when it comes time
to tell Mark what to write about this night on
the sea, tell Mark, you know, I think people probably
(19:29):
just about sick of hearing about this. Do you really
think this is thirty? Your neighbors say yes, mister president,
this is significant.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
I wonder if.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I wonder if you left it out because of verse thirty.
I mean, because verse so far this is amazing.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Peter.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Peter's like, if it's you tell me to come, She's like,
it's me come, and.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
You know the wind is blowing so you can't hear that. Good.
So Peter's like, did you hear it?
Speaker 3 (20:11):
He said it is me come?
Speaker 2 (20:13):
And John John's like no, he said, Peter, You're dumb,
because I mean two people.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Can hear the same thing. It's Yanny, not Laurel.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
But by the way, it's Yanny. It's Yanny. It's Yanny.
Come to the altar. It's Yanny. You need your ears open.
I lost half the church. You hear the same word
(20:50):
a different way. And the other disciples were operating on
what Jesus told them before they left, which is go
go to bed, say I'll meet you on the other side.
Peter is operating out of what he feels in the moment,
and he says to Jesus, if it's you tell me
to come? And I've often preached about Peter getting out
(21:13):
of the boat, but sometimes the more significant faith is
the willingness to stay in the storm, not the impulse
to escape it.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
I'm not saying Peter was wrong.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I'm just saying that it takes faith to keep rowing
when you can't see the shore. Sometimes it takes even
more faith to stay in the boat than it does
to step.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Out of it.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Peter gets to this part of the story in his recollection.
He does not see fit to include the part of
the story where he said to.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Jesus, if it's you tell me to come, And.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
I wonder if it's because of what happened in verse
thirty that he left this out of his gospel account
because the Bible says that he took several steps towards Jesus,
and for a moment he was walking on the water,
and for a moment.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
He was experiencing a miracle.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
But verse thirty says, when he saw the wind, see
he heard the word.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
But then he saw the wind.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And I relate to this because sometimes I pay more
attention to what I see than what God said. And
anytime I give more focus to what I see than
what God spoke, I start to sink. Peter's doing pretty
good as long as he's going off of what he heard,
(22:41):
because faith comes by hearing, and hearing comes by the
word of God. And all you need is one word
from God. Peter wasn't walking on water. He was walking
on a word. And when you have a word from God,
your kids can be acting crazy, honey, can be acting funny, you.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Can be in the.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Darkest night of your life, but declare He is Lord.
And then he saw the wind, And the Bible says
when he saw the wind, he began to sink, and
he cried out, Lord, save me.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
And I thought, well, That's why Peter left it out,
because I think.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
People don't really need to hear about this. We can
leave that out, can't we. You know, you want to
leave certain things out of your story, skip over certain
parts and certain failures.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
And there's some stuff, honestly, that you don't need to
share with everybody. There's some stuff that they don't even
need to know about. Sometimes your greatest testimony.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Is that you went through the fire, but you don't
smell like smoke.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
And when Peter was telling Mark what to right, I
imagine Mark saying, shouldn't I.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Put that part.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
In where you climbed out of the boat, And Mark said,
I don't think.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
I don't think you want to leave that out.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Peter said, no, no, it's been a while now, because
this gospel has written decades after it happened, you know,
And by this point Peter has discovered something verse fifty one, Mark,
Chapter six, Verse fifty one. Then he climbed into the
boat with them, and the wind died down. Peter said,
(25:02):
it's not significant what happened when I climbed out of
the boat.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Let's read it again.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
Then Jesus climbed into the boat. Peter said, don't tell
him what happened when I climbed out. Tell him what
happened when he climbed in.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
That's so good.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
I want to sit down and then stand up and
run a lap around this Balentine.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Building all by myself.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
It's not important what happened when Peter climbed out. It's
not important what happened when Peter stepped out. It's not
important what happened when they were straining all night, all
night long, they strained to get to Jesus. But the
wind didn't stop while they were straining. The wind did
not die down because Peter came to Jesus. The wind
(25:55):
died down because Jesus came to Peter.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
And that's the gospel.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Not that I came to God, not because I was
so good, not because I was so glorious, not because
I got my act together. No, I'm not praising him
because I got out of the boat.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
I'm praising him because he.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Got in.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
And the wind died down.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Now go ahead and worship him for eighteen seconds because
I got up because he got in.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Yeah, who whoa, whoa.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I find somebody saying that is significant, Not that I
loved God, but that he loved me, and.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
I'm in a storm right now, but the storm is
not significant because help is on the way.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
It's the contrast of straining versus submission.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
And he was showing them to do what he commanded
the wind to do. Submit, and they they were amazed
at this. They were amazed. They were amazed at the
wind did what he said. In fact, the wind did
(27:38):
what he didn't even have to tell it to do.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Let me appreciate to LJ for a minute.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
He gets bored back here because he has to play
three times on the weekend. And I just want to
tell him this real QUI because I didn't mentioned in any.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Other of the worst experiences.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Last time Jesus calmed the storm, he said, peace be still.
So he calmed the storm with his words this time.
If you check the record, he didn't even say anything
to the storm. The storm stopped just because he sat
down in the boat with the disciples. That lets me
know that all I need is his presence. All I
need is his presence. I don't need proof that he
(28:13):
is with me. When he got in the boat, the
storm sat down. When he sat down, Why he is
the puppet, He is the Lord, He is the.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Great I am.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
He is the bread.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Of life, and he sent them against the wind because
he needed a situation to reveal his sufficiency.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
That's what he needed, and so the storm.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Served that purpose, just like the hungry crowd. Just like
the hungry crowd, because verse fifty two tells us why
they were amazed.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Look at somebody said, this is significant.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Come on, only about forty five percent of you did
what I told you to do.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Tell them this is significant.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
They were amazed for they had not understood about the loaves.
Speaker 5 (29:17):
Their hearts were hardened. What does bread have to do
with a boat.
Speaker 2 (29:28):
And this is where we need to mention a significant miracle.
This miracle is so significant that Matthew, Mark Luke, and
John all put it in their memoir their audio book.
They put it in even though it wasn't a resurrection
(29:48):
or a healing. One day Jesus fed five thousand men,
the women, and the children, and he did it with
a little boy's lunch. I personally think Peter beat up
the little boy and took his lunch.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Only reason why I have kids.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
I've never seen my kids voluntarily do anything sacrificial. So
in my mind, the little boy did not willingly offer
his lunch.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
But you read the Bible. How you want to read
the Bible on your own time? Right now? I got
the microphone. Peter beat up the boy, took his lunch, brought.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
It to Jesus. This is significant. This miracle is so
significant because Jesus, when he was feeding the crowd, he
was revealing himself as to Christ, and everybody ate and
(30:40):
they all got their.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
Fill that day. Pointed out real quick.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
While we have a moment because I don't know when
I'll get to see you again, somebody, you don't come
to church enough.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Just while we're here.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
The miracle came from somebody who was not even included
in the official count.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
It was five thousand men, women, and children.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
God's greatest miracles often come from what people consider insignificant sources.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
That's why you can't let the world.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Ever define your significance, because the world celebrates all the
wrong stuff, all the wrong stuff. We find significance in status.
We find significance sometimes and we even call it our
significant other. Okay, but this is an announcement. You don't
(31:34):
need any other to be significant. I'm not against the term.
I'm not against the term, but you don't have to
be a Duchess of Sussex to be significant. No, not
to be significant in the eyes of God. If significance
was predicated on marital status, Jesus was insignificant. He was
(31:56):
never merit. Neither was Paul. But the world breaks all
the wrong stuff and so we wait for it significance
to be assigned by something.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Outside of God.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
But I am not significant because somebody recognized me as significant.
I am significant because of someone who died for me,
who created me, and who lives in me. This is significant,
real quick, real quick. I'm really proud of Elevation Worship.
(32:29):
They got nominated for a Billboard Award Christian Album Christian song,
Oh Come to the Altar, and I think that's really
cool and I think it's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
And I don't know if we'll win it or not.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Somebody said we probably won't win it this year, and
it's not a competition, but I'd love to beat Hillsong.
Don't put this online, edit this out, and one day
maybe we will. But I'm not waiting to see if
we win the award. Here's why I saw Oh Come
to the Altar when it was born. I remember when
(33:07):
we wrote it and imagined our church singing it, and
then I saw the church start to sing it, and
I saw people baptized while we were singing, Oh, Come
to the Altar. I saw people baptized while we were
singing The Father's arms are open wide. Forgiveness was bought
with the precious blood.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
So I don't need Billboard to tell me what baptism
already did. So if Chris Brown gets an award, that's wonderful.
But if Billboard didn't recognize, Oh, come to the Altar,
touch somebody say, it's still significant. And if people appreciate me,
that's wonderful. But if they never recognized me, I'm still significant.
(33:51):
There's a word for somebody.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
If I got a date, great, If.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
I don't, I'm still significant. If I did the job, wonderful.
If I don't, I'm still significant.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
If you like me, good less hung it out, but
it not Pomps.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
I'm almost Dunn. This is significant.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
This is significant because I saw Chris Brown in a
prison during Love Week. He wasn't a member, was there
voluntarily for the record. He was singing, and he finished
singing and we were leaving. IP preached he's saying, and
a prisoner came up to me and said, before you go,
(34:44):
can you single come to the altar? That's the song
that got me through. And I hope he can get
a billboard. But I watched him single come to the
altar to one prisoner, and that was significant. This is
(35:07):
significant this season. It's hard to see the significance of
the season you're in. You see it better when you're
out of it. That's why it's hard to raise kids.
I love being a parent. I joke about it a lot.
Is actually my favorite thing that I do. I just
(35:28):
play around like as hard as really for me, it's
just super easy. I just I always know the wisdom
and I'm always like watching my kids play all these sports.
It's kind of hard sometimes because now they've got so
much pressure on us as parents.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Maybe this is a suburban thing. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
You gotta be at every recital or your kid's gonna
end up in therapy as a serial killer. It's pressure.
I try to get out there. Sometimes there's running around
and is this significant? Is this significant? And then I
get I get caught up in insignificant things and I
missed significant things like the disciples almost missed the miracle
(36:12):
that day of the Feeding of the five thousand, the
one that's in all four gospels.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
Maybe that's why they all included it, because.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
They all almost missed it because they wanted to send
the crowds away.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
I show you something real quick. This is this is Graham.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
You got it in the back. I didn't use it
the other times, but yeah, this is Graham pinning a joker.
It was good. It was a little tournament that was
the championship match of the tournament.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
It was on a Saturday.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Normally I'd be preaching that particular Saturday, I had somebody
else preaching for me. Look who he's looking at now.
Guess who he's looking at when he's I mean, he
just pinned him. The ref just slapped the mat and
he looks up like what. And I like it because
I like it because what he said to me when
(37:09):
he came back up. I said, isn't the cool how
I went and preaching today so I could watch you
in this tournament? And what if I had missed it?
He said, well, if you had missed it, I probably
wouldn't have won it. And I was like, if you
(37:30):
never say anything, just never talk again until you go
to college. Let's end on that note.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
The same thing.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
You could take it down, although I'd be happy to
put it on Instagram for you Instagram.
Speaker 6 (37:54):
Anyway, It's hard to know.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
Sometimes you don't always get to see the gold medal.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
They don't hand out a gold medal.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
In fact, when it says that the disciples did not
understand about the loaves, they were amazed, because show the
verse again, verse fifty two.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
This first got my attention.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Really, this is my whole message, because it says they
were amazed when he got in the boat and the
winds died because they had not understood about the loaves.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
It just happened. It was the thing that happened right
before the storm. It had just happened.
Speaker 2 (38:40):
It wasn't years later, and they forgot it had just happened.
You know how God provides for you, and then you
go into a different test and you forget the lesson
because it's a different test, and God provided.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
For you in a bigger way back there.
Speaker 2 (38:55):
But now you're struggling with a little thing here and
you trip over an insignificant thing when God has already
done the most significant thing, which.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Is to save your soul.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
They understood about the loaves on one level. Physically, they ate.
They understood about the loaves on one level. The crowds
were fed. But what they didn't understand is that Jesus
did not feed the multitudes so they could know what
he did. He fed the multitude so they could know
who he was. The lesson of the loaves is not
(39:31):
I am your burger, king your way right away. The
lesson of the loaves is not that you will never
be hungry, or you will never hurt, or you will
never wonder, or you will never doubt. The lesson of
the loaves is I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
I am. It is me.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
It was me when you were hungry. It was me
when you were lonely. It was me when you were depressed.
It was me when you were anxious. It was me
on the mountaintop, it was me in the valley. The
Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want, I will
fear no evil.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
He is with me in this moment. It's me.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
It was me then, and it's me now. It was
me that got you through that.
Speaker 1 (40:19):
It's me that will see you through this. And if
I am in the boat, the wind must submit.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
To my word, I am with you. And they didn't
get it. They saw the miracle, they experienced the miracle.
They're the ones who handed out the bread to the people.
But you can experience a miracle and miss the significance.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
So God saved you, But what did he save you for?
Speaker 2 (40:55):
So you could spend the rest of your life carrying
the shame he died to take away and nail to hiss?
Speaker 1 (41:00):
Is that what he saved you for?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
God saved you, But what did he save you for
so you could live the rest of your life just
as selfish as you live the first part of your life,
but with a cross around your neck this time?
Speaker 1 (41:11):
What did he save you for?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
You can experience the miracle of salvation but miss the
significant something.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
God didn't just save you from.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
He saved you for a purpose, a mission, a calling.
And the miracle was not just that the people were fed.
The miracle was not just that they ate bread. The
(41:45):
miracle is not just what God does for you. The
miracle is that you see who He is. This is beautiful.
It is so beautiful that it bears repeating. It bears repeating,
and in Mark chapter eight, this miracle is so significant
it happens again. One way you can tell when something
(42:08):
is important is when.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It is repeated.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
So the disciples find themselves in a situation that is
very similar. There's a big crowd and there's no food.
You know, like last time when you were worried and
upset and you didn't think you were gonna make it,
and you made it. And now here you are again,
and the wind's blown again, and you don't think you're
gonna make it. A spoiler alert, you will. That's the
(42:37):
lesson of the lows. That's the lesson of the I
didn't mean to ruin the movie for you, But at
the end of this thing, you're gonna be in bed, saydom,
because if he told you I'll meet you on the
other side, you don't die in the lake in the middle.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Of the nine.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Come on, cherch has he not shown you? Don't you
see it? Don't you hear it?
Speaker 2 (43:03):
It's the same voice, the same God.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
And so he feeds the crowd. In Mark chapter eight,
and the.
Speaker 2 (43:14):
Bible says Mark eight fourteen, the disciples had forgotten to
bring bread. Stand up, it'll make me close, quicker, don't leave,
it'll make me angry. The disciples had forgotten to bring bread,
except for one loaf they had with them in the boat.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
I don't mean to.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Correct the scripture, but there were actually.
Speaker 1 (43:37):
Two loaves in the boat. One of them was the
bread they could see.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
Be careful, Jesus warned them, watch out for the yeast
of the Pharisees and that of Herod. He is warning
them against the seemingly insignificant compromises.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
That corrode your faith.
Speaker 2 (43:59):
Watch out, said, your words are significant, your habits are significant,
your friendships are significant. Watch out for that that yeast.
And when he said yeast, they thought about bread. And
they discussed this with one another and said, it.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Is because we have no bread. They still didn't get it.
Speaker 2 (44:26):
They saw him do it, and they still didn't get
that he was it. They're still worried about provision. You're
still worried about bills. You're still worry We're still thinking
on the level of what we can see. Jesus, aware
of their discussion, asked them a question, why are you
(44:50):
talking about having no bread? Why are you worrying about
something that I've already worked out. Why are you doubting
something that you've already seen me do so many times before?
Speaker 1 (45:11):
Do you still not see or understand?
Speaker 2 (45:14):
Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail
to see? And ears but failed to hear? Do you
still hear Laurel when it's really Yanny?
Speaker 1 (45:24):
And don't you remember.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand,
how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Twelve? They reply.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
When I read that, I thought the significance of the
miracle is in the numbers. You know, five is the
number of grace in the Bible. It represents grace symbolic,
twelve disciples, twelve tribes, a number of government. So I
thought it was about the numbers. But then verse twenty
says when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand,
how many basketballs and pieces did you pick up? And
then I said, well, seven is the number of completion
(46:00):
and four thousand, really I can't really do anything with that.
They answered seven. He said, do you still not understand?
And then I read it again verse nineteen, Verse nineteen,
verse nineteen when I broke, And then I read verse
twenty when I broke, and I realized the significance of
(46:24):
the miracle is that the bread had to be broken
They wouldn't understand this really until he went to the cross.
They ate the bread, but they did not understand the
significance until he was crushed for our transgressions and bruised
(46:46):
for our iniquities, because the bread couldn't be given until
it was broken. When you were in a breaking season
of your life, and you are being broken of your
pride and your stubbornness, your opinions, and you're straining against
(47:07):
the wind, it is easy to begin to believe that
it is going to break you. But God will not
allow life to break you. That's his job. And when
you're in his hands, like the song said, prepare that
chorus of do it again, we're going to sing it.
I'm still in your hands. We're going to sing that,
(47:28):
and we're going to understand that. The lesson of the
loaves is not that everybody went home with a full belly.
Speaker 1 (47:33):
The lesson of the loaves is this. The end of
your story is not that you are broken. The end
of the.
Speaker 2 (47:42):
Story is the basket false. This story does not end
in brokenness. This story ends with leftovers.
Speaker 1 (47:53):
I want to let you know today this is significant.
God is not done with you. That God is not
done with you.
Speaker 2 (48:02):
I'm reaching this word for somebody who's been straining against
the wind.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
Grace is coming to your pope.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
The bread is in the Master's hands, and the bread
was only broken to be given. Lift your hands in
the presence of God, no one moving.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
This is my.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
Confidence that he is faithful, faithfulness.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
I'm stealing you hands.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
This is my conference.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
You never.
Speaker 3 (48:40):
You promised.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
See its greed is your faithfulness, faithness. I'm sealing you.
This is my contents, you nevers.
Speaker 3 (49:02):
You've drawn, missieus. It greed is your faith faith See,
this is my confidence.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
Listen, here's what you do. You take what you learned
from the loaves, and you remember it in the storm.
You take the basketful.
Speaker 2 (49:34):
From the last time that God provided for you, and
the next time the wind begins to rage in your life,
you remember that if Jesus is in this boat with me,
if I draw near to God, he will draw near
to me. And as we worship him as the Son
of God. Today the wind has to die down, anxiety
(49:58):
has to shut it fro out in the presence of God.
Speaker 3 (50:02):
Because we know who he is and we've seen what
he's done. We have faithful what he's gonna do?
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Does anybody believe He's with you in this season in time?
Speaker 1 (50:20):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
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 dot org slash podcast for
more information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
You can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2 (50:40):
You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
share it on your social stories and tag us at
Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
I wanted to thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope
it gives you perspective to see God is moving.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
In your life. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Well, take a seat. We're so glad you're here today.
We're continuing in the series Savage Jesus from the Gospel
of Mark. Believe me when I say that, I never
thought i'd say. This is the tenth installment of this series.
I usually preach short and sweet, but I got in
the Gospel of Mark and then I couldn't get out.
So today we'll be in Mark chapter six. I want
(00:40):
to introduce my scripture by way of a story. When
I wrote my first book, I had the privilege to
record the audio book myself, and they sent a very
professional recording engineer from the publishing company to record the book.
And he would stop me and correct me if I
made any mistakes, if I got a little too southern.
(01:05):
He was a Northern Pharisee and he judged my accent
and he'd say, it's little Twangie. Let's get it again,
or if I smacked my lips or mispronounced the word,
he'd back it up and make me catch it again.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
And it was annoying, but.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
I appreciated his professionalism. And because the publisher was the
largest publisher in the world. Now, not the publisher that
I wrote for. The publisher that I wrote for was
owned by a publisher who was owned by a publisher
that was the biggest publishing company in the world. This
guy worked for the big publisher and because of it,
he had worked with a lot of big names. And
(01:41):
this was my first book and my first time and
I kept having to take breaks and my mouth would
get dry, and so during one of those breaks, I
realized that this guy had worked with a lot of
famous people, and I asked him to tell me a
story to entertain me during my break. I said, tell
me about somebody you worked with that was difficult, And
(02:03):
he told me a story about a very well known
political figure. I don't know if the story is true,
but why let the truth get in the way of
a good story.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
That's my motto. So I'm gonna tell the story.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
I'm not going to say the name, but it was
a famous political figure. Who was recording his memoir about
his life. That was after he had served his term
for eight years something like that in office.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Now I can tell you who it was.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
But he said that when they were recording the memoir,
it was very long.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
It was about a seven or eight hundred.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Page book, and it had to be an abridged version.
And so when they were recording the audiobook, they had
to decide which sections to.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Leave and which sections to skip.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
And at one particular point in the memoir, there was
a section about a scandal that happened in this particular
notable figure's life related to offices of oval nature and
things of this sort, that happened during his tenure in
(03:09):
what some call the highest office in the United States
of America.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
And when he was.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Telling me about it, he said, when they got to
the part about the scandal, he said that the person
who wrote the memoir, the former president.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Said this is falling apart.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Said uh, he stopped, and he was going to skip it,
and he stopped the recording and he said, I don't
think people really, I think people are sick of hearing
about this by now. I think we can skip this part.
(03:48):
I mean, do you think this is really significant. And
the audio engineer said that it was a real challenge
to look back at somebody who had been the most
powerful man in the world at one point, and he said,
I had to look at him and say, yes, mister President,
(04:08):
this is significant. And that's my title for my message today.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Look at your neighbor.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
And say, in your best Bill Clinton voice, tell him
this is significant.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
This is significant. Our scripture lesson.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
For Today comes from Mark chapter six, something that marked
the evangelist included in his gospel record that he thought
was significant for us to know about the ministry of
Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Mark six, verse forty five records.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Immediately, Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and
go on ahead of him to beth Sadom. He did
not tell them to pack ponchos. He did not give
them a warning about the storm that they would encounter,
just a simple instruction. I wonder if God doesn't tell
us everything, because he knows we couldn' handle.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
The details.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
So he dismissed the crowd and sent the disciples to
get a head start. I'll eat you on the other side.
You're almost gonna die on the way. He didn't tell
him that, but after leaving them, he went up on
a mountain side to pray, and later that night the
boat was in the middle of the lake and he
was alone on land. He saw the disciples straining at
the oars because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn,
(05:28):
he went out to them walking on the lake.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
He was about to pass by them, but.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
When they saw him walking on the lake, they thought
he was a ghost, because God often looks like fear
from a distance. They cried out because they all saw
him and were terrified. Immediately, Mark's favorite word. He spoke
to them and said, take courage.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
It is I. Don't be afraid.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Then he climbed into the boat with them and the
wind died down.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
They were completely amazed.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Touch the neighbor you've been ignoring and say this is significant.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
So if you've ever been around church at all, you've
heard this Bible story.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
If you've ever been anywhere near a church, you've heard
about this Bible story. If you ever happened to drive
by a church by accident, you heard this. If you
ever played on church softball team, you heard curse words
and this Bible story. It's a significant story because it
teaches us that Jesus Christ is lord of all creation. Theologically,
(06:38):
he is sovereign. He is sovereign. It's an epiphany story
in that it gives us a revelation of Jesus Christ
that is consistent with the revelation of Jesus Christ that
was given in the Old Testament in a concealed form,
when a bush burned and a man named Moses was
meeting with God. The disclosure at that point was I am.
(07:02):
Moses said, who are you? God said, I am.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Now.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
It's interesting how God would spend the next several centuries
filling in that blank. That they would need to know
him to be water in a dry place, that they
would need to know him.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
To be a warrior in their battles.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
They would find all of this out, that He is
sustainer in their weariness. Really, the rest of your life
will be filling in that blank, and just about the
time you think you've got it figured out who God is,
life will so shift beneath your feet that you will.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Realize you didn't know him at all.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
The disciples have been with Jesus now for quite an
extensive class. They've seen him touch lepers, they've seen him
heal paralytics. They've even seen him raise dead people in
certain situations, and yet there was something that amazed them
in this moment, something that they had not seen about
(08:02):
him before. It is significant that Jesus told them to
go forward and the wind was against them. That's significant,
significant because a lot of times I assumed in my
life that if God sent me to do something, the
wind would work with me. That's pretty much the premise
of early Christianity. You know, turn your life over to
(08:25):
God and he'll take your burdens away. Turn your life
over to the Lord, and you know, what used to
keep you up at night won't keep you up at
night anymore because it'll be replaced by other stuff that'll
keep you up at night.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Fill in the blank. You realize that a lot.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Of times claims to faith are actually our efforts to
manipulate God, until we discover in the course of time
that just because the wind is against you doesn't mean
that God is not for you. Many times, the confirmation
that God has spoken to you is the fact that
the wind is against you. We're discovering this in our
(09:05):
study of the Gospel of Mark. We are learning that
resistance is often the greatest place for revelation. Would you
please take that elevation pin that cost about eleven or
twelve cents, and before you steal it from the church
and use it to sina check this week, write it down.
Resistance leads to revelation. Resistance leads to revelation. The wind
(09:31):
was against the disciples not because they disobeyed the words
of Jesus, but because they went in the direction of
his command.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
He sent them to beth Seda. They went to Bethseda.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
I got it when it was Jonah, because the wind
was against Jonah because he wasn't going to Ninevah.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
He was going to Tarsish. And God said, go to Ninevah.
And when you go to.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Tarsish, when you should go to Ninevah, expect the wind
to be against you. Because God didn't send you to Tarshish,
he sent you to NINEVH. So I expect the wind
to go against me. When God told me to go
to Ninevah and I went to Tarshish. But when he
told me to go to best Sayda, and I went
to best Sayda, I expect the wind to work with me.
I expect God to bless me when I come to church.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
I expect good parking.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Places because I came to church. I expect those shoes
to go on sale because I came to church. I
suspect a promotion because I came to church. Makes me
mad when somebody who didn't come to church, they slept
in and they get a raise, and.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
I get fired.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
And I can't understand how God could be with me
and the wind could be against me. But often the
confirmation of the Word of God is the resistance of
the enemy to show you you're.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
On the right track. Here's why.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Feel I preach it.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Here's why I'm gonna help somebody. You want to turn
around and go back home because the wind is against you.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
The wind is against you.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
So that you will know that it is the Lord's
presence with you that makes you successful. If the wind
was working with you, you would think the wind.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
When you got to your destination.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
If it were easy, you would think the wrong things.
If the wind wasn't against you, you wouldn't need the
Lord to come and step into the wind and speak
peace to the wind. So the wind has to be
against you to prove that the Lord is with you.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
Calm down, verdict.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
This is just the introduction and so Jesus, savage Jesus.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
The Jesus that's in the Bible, not the Jesus this.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
On Pinterest, Savage Jesus, real life Jesus, Monday morning Jesus. Yeah,
Friday Jesus, Saturday Jesus. Not the Jesus that is playing
a harp and stroking the wool of the lamb. But
the Jesus who sends his disciples into a storm and
(11:57):
watches them strength.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
I got to go.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
You don't believe this. You about to be really jealous.
I got to go and sit on the mountain where
Jesus prayed. And the man who took us there last year,
he knew everything about everything.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I think he was Jesus. He took us up.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
There, he said, here's where Jesus was praying in March
chapter six. And then he pointed to the lake that
the Bible mentions where the storm was, and from that
mountain you can see the whole lake. And he dropped
this on us right before he left us. He said,
so the whole time they were straining, Jesus could see them.
(12:44):
And he walked off and I cried, I have a
picture of me sitting on that mountain and there's Kleenex
all around me because Holly just kept handing them to me,
one after another, that he saw them in the storm,
that he saw them in the storm. And then I
was after I got done crying, because I realized he
sees me in my storm, and.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
He knows what I'm going through, and he knows.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
What I deal with, and he knows what people have
done to me, and he sees tears that I've cried
on my pillow that nobody else knows about him, that
he sees what's going on in my soul. That I
can cover up in front of people, but I can't
hide from him. After I got done crying about that,
I got kind of angry because I thought, if he
(13:30):
could see them, why didn't he stop it? All of
a sudden, it felt kind of cruel to me that
he would send them into a storm and see them
in the storm and not stop the storm. So I
think it is significant that the Bible says that he
(13:53):
saw the disciples verse forty eight, straining at the oars
because the wind was against them.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Shortly before dawn.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
He went out to them, this is forty eight b
walking on the lake.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
He was about to pass them by.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
I thought he would never leave me. I thought he
would never forsake me. I thought he promised his presence
to me. And so he's about to pass them by,
and they were afraid. One interesting thing about this particular
record in Marx's Gospel is that it was recounted by
(14:32):
a man named Peter.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Have you heard of him.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
He was a very outspoken disciple of Jesus Christ. He
was the one I don't know if you're like this.
He would say what everybody else thought.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
He would.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
He was filter free, and so when he was right,
he was really right.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
When he was wrong, he was real wrong. I'll prove
it to you.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
He said, you are the Christ, the son of the
Living God. She said, you are petross this rock. You're Peter,
not Simon, not shifty, upon this rock. I'll build my
church the rock of his revelation of who Jesus was.
A few verses later, Jesus said, get behind me, Satan,
and he was pointing at Peter, because Peter said, you
can't go to the cross. And Peter opposed the very
(15:22):
thing that Jesus came to do. All in the same
Bible chapter. This is Peter. Peter is the one telling
Mark about this story so Mark can write it down.
Peter is the one recording the audiobook. Okay, Peter is
the one giving Mark the gospel account. Mark wasn't a disciple.
Mark was an evangelist. He compiled the story, and Peter told, look,
(15:45):
I'm gonna say you something.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
We have four of these.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
We have four gospel accounts. The gospel is the good
News of Jesus Christ. When we say the Gospel of Mark,
it's the gospel according to Mark. When we say the
Gospel of Luke, the Gospel of John, the Gospel of
mac that's the gospel account that they wrote down. John
said that Jesus did so much. If you wrote a
whole book, if you tried to write down everything he did,
(16:11):
the whole world could not contain it. If you wrote
down all the works Jesus did, wikipedia would break. So
they had to decide what was significant enough to put
in the gospel account that would prove what they wanted
to prove about who Jesus was. So when Mark got
(16:32):
ready to write, he said, Jesus walked to the disciples
in a storm, and when he got in the boat,
the winds died down. When Matthew got ready to write it,
he included something that Mark left out. And I'm going
to read you now from Matthew fourteen. It's the same story,
but there's one detail in this story that is omitted
(16:53):
in Mark's gospel, which is based on the recollection of Peter,
and it's in Matthew's gospel but not Mark's.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
So here's what we'll do.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
This will be an interactive class. When I get to
the part that wasn't in Mark's gospel, stop me.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
When I get to.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
The part that where you're saying, wait, that wasn't in
the other one that you read before, I want you
to wave your hands and stop me. This is the
only time that you are allowed to tell me to
stop preaching. You can tell me to preach anytime you
want preach faster, But when I get to this part today,
I want you to stop me at every location. Let's
start in verse twenty two. Immediately Jesus made the disciples
(17:28):
get into the boat and go on ahead of him
to the other side while he dismissed the crowd. After
he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountain
side by himself to pray. Later that night, he was
there alone, and the boat was already a considerable distance
from land, buffeted by the ways because the wind was
against it.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So far, so good, We're good. Keep go on, keep
go on.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
Yeah, similar, very similar, very similar, few words, different sim stuff.
Shortly before dawn, Jesus went out to them walking on
the lake. When the disciples saw I'm walking on the lake,
they were terrified. It's a ghost, they said, and cried
out in fear. But Jesus immediately said it didn't take
courage it as I don't be afraid. Lord, if it's you,
Peter replied, tell me to come. Okay, okay, okay, what's.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
Wrong with you? Lord?
Speaker 2 (18:11):
If it's you, Peter replied, tell me to come to
you on the water.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Come.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
He said, this is amazing. Hey, hey, if I was
writing my memoir, I'll put this in.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Because what's what happens next. Then Peter got down out
of the boat, walked on water, and came towards Jesus. Oh,
I'm totally putting that in.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
I'm totally including the part where everybody else was in
the boat crying out in fear and I was walking
on water, transcending the laws of buoyancy.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Mabe. If I ever walk on water and then I
die and they're writing.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
A story about my life, you make sure they don't
take that part out. If I ever walk on water,
and I know I do metaphorically in your heart, but
if I ever physically, if they.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Ever write about me, I'm not saying they will.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
But if they do, leave this and touch somebody say.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
This is significant.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
So how can Peter This is a good question. How
can Peter walk on water? And when it comes time
to tell Mark what to write about this night on
the sea, tell Mark, you know, I think people probably
(19:29):
just about sick of hearing about this. Do you really
think this is thirty? Your neighbors say yes, mister president,
this is significant.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
I wonder if.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I wonder if you left it out because of verse thirty.
I mean, because verse so far this is amazing.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Peter.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Peter's like, if it's you tell me to come, She's like,
it's me come, and.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
You know the wind is blowing so you can't hear that. Good.
So Peter's like, did you hear it?
Speaker 3 (20:11):
He said it is me come?
Speaker 2 (20:13):
And John John's like no, he said, Peter, You're dumb,
because I mean two people.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Can hear the same thing. It's Yanny, not Laurel.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
But by the way, it's Yanny. It's Yanny. It's Yanny.
Come to the altar. It's Yanny. You need your ears open.
I lost half the church. You hear the same word
(20:50):
a different way. And the other disciples were operating on
what Jesus told them before they left, which is go
go to bed, say I'll meet you on the other side.
Peter is operating out of what he feels in the moment,
and he says to Jesus, if it's you tell me
to come? And I've often preached about Peter getting out
(21:13):
of the boat, but sometimes the more significant faith is
the willingness to stay in the storm, not the impulse
to escape it.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
I'm not saying Peter was wrong.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
I'm just saying that it takes faith to keep rowing
when you can't see the shore. Sometimes it takes even
more faith to stay in the boat than it does
to step.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Out of it.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Peter gets to this part of the story in his recollection.
He does not see fit to include the part of
the story where he said to.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Jesus, if it's you tell me to come, And.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
I wonder if it's because of what happened in verse
thirty that he left this out of his gospel account
because the Bible says that he took several steps towards Jesus,
and for a moment he was walking on the water,
and for a moment.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
He was experiencing a miracle.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
But verse thirty says, when he saw the wind, see
he heard the word.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
But then he saw the wind.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And I relate to this because sometimes I pay more
attention to what I see than what God said. And
anytime I give more focus to what I see than
what God spoke, I start to sink. Peter's doing pretty
good as long as he's going off of what he heard,
(22:41):
because faith comes by hearing, and hearing comes by the
word of God. And all you need is one word
from God. Peter wasn't walking on water. He was walking
on a word. And when you have a word from God,
your kids can be acting crazy, honey, can be acting funny, you.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Can be in the.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Darkest night of your life, but declare He is Lord.
And then he saw the wind, And the Bible says
when he saw the wind, he began to sink, and
he cried out, Lord, save me.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
And I thought, well, That's why Peter left it out,
because I think.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
People don't really need to hear about this. We can
leave that out, can't we. You know, you want to
leave certain things out of your story, skip over certain
parts and certain failures.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
And there's some stuff, honestly, that you don't need to
share with everybody. There's some stuff that they don't even
need to know about. Sometimes your greatest testimony.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Is that you went through the fire, but you don't
smell like smoke.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
And when Peter was telling Mark what to right, I
imagine Mark saying, shouldn't I.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Put that part.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
In where you climbed out of the boat, And Mark said,
I don't think.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
I don't think you want to leave that out.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Peter said, no, no, it's been a while now, because
this gospel has written decades after it happened, you know,
And by this point Peter has discovered something verse fifty one, Mark,
Chapter six, Verse fifty one. Then he climbed into the
boat with them, and the wind died down. Peter said,
(25:02):
it's not significant what happened when I climbed out of
the boat.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Let's read it again.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
Then Jesus climbed into the boat. Peter said, don't tell
him what happened when I climbed out. Tell him what
happened when he climbed in.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
That's so good.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
I want to sit down and then stand up and
run a lap around this Balentine.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Building all by myself.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
It's not important what happened when Peter climbed out. It's
not important what happened when Peter stepped out. It's not
important what happened when they were straining all night, all
night long, they strained to get to Jesus. But the
wind didn't stop while they were straining. The wind did
not die down because Peter came to Jesus. The wind
(25:55):
died down because Jesus came to Peter.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
And that's the gospel.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Not that I came to God, not because I was
so good, not because I was so glorious, not because
I got my act together. No, I'm not praising him
because I got out of the boat.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
I'm praising him because he.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Got in.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
And the wind died down.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Now go ahead and worship him for eighteen seconds because
I got up because he got in.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Yeah, who whoa, whoa.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I find somebody saying that is significant, Not that I
loved God, but that he loved me, and.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
I'm in a storm right now, but the storm is
not significant because help is on the way.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
It's the contrast of straining versus submission.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
And he was showing them to do what he commanded
the wind to do. Submit, and they they were amazed
at this. They were amazed. They were amazed at the
wind did what he said. In fact, the wind did
(27:38):
what he didn't even have to tell it to do.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Let me appreciate to LJ for a minute.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
He gets bored back here because he has to play
three times on the weekend. And I just want to
tell him this real QUI because I didn't mentioned in any.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Other of the worst experiences.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Last time Jesus calmed the storm, he said, peace be still.
So he calmed the storm with his words this time.
If you check the record, he didn't even say anything
to the storm. The storm stopped just because he sat
down in the boat with the disciples. That lets me
know that all I need is his presence. All I
need is his presence. I don't need proof that he
(28:13):
is with me. When he got in the boat, the
storm sat down. When he sat down, Why he is
the puppet, He is the Lord, He is the.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Great I am.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
He is the bread.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Of life, and he sent them against the wind because
he needed a situation to reveal his sufficiency.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
That's what he needed, and so the storm.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Served that purpose, just like the hungry crowd. Just like
the hungry crowd, because verse fifty two tells us why
they were amazed.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Look at somebody said, this is significant.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Come on, only about forty five percent of you did
what I told you to do.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Tell them this is significant.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
They were amazed for they had not understood about the loaves.
Speaker 5 (29:17):
Their hearts were hardened. What does bread have to do
with a boat.
Speaker 2 (29:28):
And this is where we need to mention a significant miracle.
This miracle is so significant that Matthew, Mark Luke, and
John all put it in their memoir their audio book.
They put it in even though it wasn't a resurrection
(29:48):
or a healing. One day Jesus fed five thousand men,
the women, and the children, and he did it with
a little boy's lunch. I personally think Peter beat up
the little boy and took his lunch.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Only reason why I have kids.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
I've never seen my kids voluntarily do anything sacrificial. So
in my mind, the little boy did not willingly offer
his lunch.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
But you read the Bible. How you want to read
the Bible on your own time? Right now? I got
the microphone. Peter beat up the boy, took his lunch, brought.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
It to Jesus. This is significant. This miracle is so
significant because Jesus, when he was feeding the crowd, he
was revealing himself as to Christ, and everybody ate and
(30:40):
they all got their.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
Fill that day. Pointed out real quick.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
While we have a moment because I don't know when
I'll get to see you again, somebody, you don't come
to church enough.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Just while we're here.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
The miracle came from somebody who was not even included
in the official count.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
It was five thousand men, women, and children.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
God's greatest miracles often come from what people consider insignificant sources.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
That's why you can't let the world.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Ever define your significance, because the world celebrates all the
wrong stuff, all the wrong stuff. We find significance in status.
We find significance sometimes and we even call it our
significant other. Okay, but this is an announcement. You don't
(31:34):
need any other to be significant. I'm not against the term.
I'm not against the term, but you don't have to
be a Duchess of Sussex to be significant. No, not
to be significant in the eyes of God. If significance
was predicated on marital status, Jesus was insignificant. He was
(31:56):
never merit. Neither was Paul. But the world breaks all
the wrong stuff and so we wait for it significance
to be assigned by something.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Outside of God.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
But I am not significant because somebody recognized me as significant.
I am significant because of someone who died for me,
who created me, and who lives in me. This is significant,
real quick, real quick. I'm really proud of Elevation Worship.
(32:29):
They got nominated for a Billboard Award Christian Album Christian song,
Oh Come to the Altar, and I think that's really
cool and I think it's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
And I don't know if we'll win it or not.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Somebody said we probably won't win it this year, and
it's not a competition, but I'd love to beat Hillsong.
Don't put this online, edit this out, and one day
maybe we will. But I'm not waiting to see if
we win the award. Here's why I saw Oh Come
to the Altar when it was born. I remember when
(33:07):
we wrote it and imagined our church singing it, and
then I saw the church start to sing it, and
I saw people baptized while we were singing, Oh, Come
to the Altar. I saw people baptized while we were
singing The Father's arms are open wide. Forgiveness was bought
with the precious blood.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
So I don't need Billboard to tell me what baptism
already did. So if Chris Brown gets an award, that's wonderful.
But if Billboard didn't recognize, Oh, come to the Altar,
touch somebody say, it's still significant. And if people appreciate me,
that's wonderful. But if they never recognized me, I'm still significant.
(33:51):
There's a word for somebody.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
If I got a date, great, If.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
I don't, I'm still significant. If I did the job, wonderful.
If I don't, I'm still significant.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
If you like me, good less hung it out, but
it not Pomps.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
I'm almost Dunn. This is significant.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
This is significant because I saw Chris Brown in a
prison during Love Week. He wasn't a member, was there
voluntarily for the record. He was singing, and he finished
singing and we were leaving. IP preached he's saying, and
a prisoner came up to me and said, before you go,
(34:44):
can you single come to the altar? That's the song
that got me through. And I hope he can get
a billboard. But I watched him single come to the
altar to one prisoner, and that was significant. This is
(35:07):
significant this season. It's hard to see the significance of
the season you're in. You see it better when you're
out of it. That's why it's hard to raise kids.
I love being a parent. I joke about it a lot.
Is actually my favorite thing that I do. I just
(35:28):
play around like as hard as really for me, it's
just super easy. I just I always know the wisdom
and I'm always like watching my kids play all these sports.
It's kind of hard sometimes because now they've got so
much pressure on us as parents.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Maybe this is a suburban thing. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
You gotta be at every recital or your kid's gonna
end up in therapy as a serial killer. It's pressure.
I try to get out there. Sometimes there's running around
and is this significant? Is this significant? And then I
get I get caught up in insignificant things and I
missed significant things like the disciples almost missed the miracle
(36:12):
that day of the Feeding of the five thousand, the
one that's in all four gospels.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
Maybe that's why they all included it, because.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
They all almost missed it because they wanted to send
the crowds away.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
I show you something real quick. This is this is Graham.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
You got it in the back. I didn't use it
the other times, but yeah, this is Graham pinning a joker.
It was good. It was a little tournament that was
the championship match of the tournament.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
It was on a Saturday.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Normally I'd be preaching that particular Saturday, I had somebody
else preaching for me. Look who he's looking at now.
Guess who he's looking at when he's I mean, he
just pinned him. The ref just slapped the mat and
he looks up like what. And I like it because
I like it because what he said to me when
(37:09):
he came back up. I said, isn't the cool how
I went and preaching today so I could watch you
in this tournament? And what if I had missed it?
He said, well, if you had missed it, I probably
wouldn't have won it. And I was like, if you
(37:30):
never say anything, just never talk again until you go
to college. Let's end on that note.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
The same thing.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
You could take it down, although I'd be happy to
put it on Instagram for you Instagram.
Speaker 6 (37:54):
Anyway, It's hard to know.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
Sometimes you don't always get to see the gold medal.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
They don't hand out a gold medal.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
In fact, when it says that the disciples did not
understand about the loaves, they were amazed, because show the
verse again, verse fifty two.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
This first got my attention.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Really, this is my whole message, because it says they
were amazed when he got in the boat and the
winds died because they had not understood about the loaves.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
It just happened. It was the thing that happened right
before the storm. It had just happened.
Speaker 2 (38:40):
It wasn't years later, and they forgot it had just happened.
You know how God provides for you, and then you
go into a different test and you forget the lesson
because it's a different test, and God provided.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
For you in a bigger way back there.
Speaker 2 (38:55):
But now you're struggling with a little thing here and
you trip over an insignificant thing when God has already
done the most significant thing, which.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Is to save your soul.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
They understood about the loaves on one level. Physically, they ate.
They understood about the loaves on one level. The crowds
were fed. But what they didn't understand is that Jesus
did not feed the multitudes so they could know what
he did. He fed the multitude so they could know
who he was. The lesson of the loaves is not
(39:31):
I am your burger, king your way right away. The
lesson of the loaves is not that you will never
be hungry, or you will never hurt, or you will
never wonder, or you will never doubt. The lesson of
the loaves is I am the bread of life.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
I am. It is me.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
It was me when you were hungry. It was me
when you were lonely. It was me when you were depressed.
It was me when you were anxious. It was me
on the mountaintop, it was me in the valley. The
Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want, I will
fear no evil.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
He is with me in this moment. It's me.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
It was me then, and it's me now. It was
me that got you through that.
Speaker 1 (40:19):
It's me that will see you through this. And if
I am in the boat, the wind must submit.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
To my word, I am with you. And they didn't
get it. They saw the miracle, they experienced the miracle.
They're the ones who handed out the bread to the people.
But you can experience a miracle and miss the significance.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
So God saved you, But what did he save you for?
Speaker 2 (40:55):
So you could spend the rest of your life carrying
the shame he died to take away and nail to hiss?
Speaker 1 (41:00):
Is that what he saved you for?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
God saved you, But what did he save you for
so you could live the rest of your life just
as selfish as you live the first part of your life,
but with a cross around your neck this time?
Speaker 1 (41:11):
What did he save you for?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
You can experience the miracle of salvation but miss the
significant something.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
God didn't just save you from.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
He saved you for a purpose, a mission, a calling.
And the miracle was not just that the people were fed.
The miracle was not just that they ate bread. The
(41:45):
miracle is not just what God does for you. The
miracle is that you see who He is. This is beautiful.
It is so beautiful that it bears repeating. It bears repeating,
and in Mark chapter eight, this miracle is so significant
it happens again. One way you can tell when something
(42:08):
is important is when.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It is repeated.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
So the disciples find themselves in a situation that is
very similar. There's a big crowd and there's no food.
You know, like last time when you were worried and
upset and you didn't think you were gonna make it,
and you made it. And now here you are again,
and the wind's blown again, and you don't think you're
gonna make it. A spoiler alert, you will. That's the
(42:37):
lesson of the lows. That's the lesson of the I
didn't mean to ruin the movie for you, But at
the end of this thing, you're gonna be in bed, saydom,
because if he told you I'll meet you on the
other side, you don't die in the lake in the middle.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Of the nine.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Come on, cherch has he not shown you? Don't you
see it? Don't you hear it?
Speaker 2 (43:03):
It's the same voice, the same God.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
And so he feeds the crowd. In Mark chapter eight,
and the.
Speaker 2 (43:14):
Bible says Mark eight fourteen, the disciples had forgotten to
bring bread. Stand up, it'll make me close, quicker, don't leave,
it'll make me angry. The disciples had forgotten to bring bread,
except for one loaf they had with them in the boat.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
I don't mean to.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Correct the scripture, but there were actually.
Speaker 1 (43:37):
Two loaves in the boat. One of them was the
bread they could see.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
Be careful, Jesus warned them, watch out for the yeast
of the Pharisees and that of Herod. He is warning
them against the seemingly insignificant compromises.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
That corrode your faith.
Speaker 2 (43:59):
Watch out, said, your words are significant, your habits are significant,
your friendships are significant. Watch out for that that yeast.
And when he said yeast, they thought about bread. And
they discussed this with one another and said, it.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Is because we have no bread. They still didn't get it.
Speaker 2 (44:26):
They saw him do it, and they still didn't get
that he was it. They're still worried about provision. You're
still worried about bills. You're still worry We're still thinking
on the level of what we can see. Jesus, aware
of their discussion, asked them a question, why are you
(44:50):
talking about having no bread? Why are you worrying about
something that I've already worked out. Why are you doubting
something that you've already seen me do so many times before?
Speaker 1 (45:11):
Do you still not see or understand?
Speaker 2 (45:14):
Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail
to see? And ears but failed to hear? Do you
still hear Laurel when it's really Yanny?
Speaker 1 (45:24):
And don't you remember.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand,
how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Twelve? They reply.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
When I read that, I thought the significance of the
miracle is in the numbers. You know, five is the
number of grace in the Bible. It represents grace symbolic,
twelve disciples, twelve tribes, a number of government. So I
thought it was about the numbers. But then verse twenty
says when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand,
how many basketballs and pieces did you pick up? And
then I said, well, seven is the number of completion
(46:00):
and four thousand, really I can't really do anything with that.
They answered seven. He said, do you still not understand?
And then I read it again verse nineteen, Verse nineteen,
verse nineteen when I broke, And then I read verse
twenty when I broke, and I realized the significance of
(46:24):
the miracle is that the bread had to be broken
They wouldn't understand this really until he went to the cross.
They ate the bread, but they did not understand the
significance until he was crushed for our transgressions and bruised
(46:46):
for our iniquities, because the bread couldn't be given until
it was broken. When you were in a breaking season
of your life, and you are being broken of your
pride and your stubbornness, your opinions, and you're straining against
(47:07):
the wind, it is easy to begin to believe that
it is going to break you. But God will not
allow life to break you. That's his job. And when
you're in his hands, like the song said, prepare that
chorus of do it again, we're going to sing it.
I'm still in your hands. We're going to sing that,
(47:28):
and we're going to understand that. The lesson of the
loaves is not that everybody went home with a full belly.
Speaker 1 (47:33):
The lesson of the loaves is this. The end of
your story is not that you are broken. The end
of the.
Speaker 2 (47:42):
Story is the basket false. This story does not end
in brokenness. This story ends with leftovers.
Speaker 1 (47:53):
I want to let you know today this is significant.
God is not done with you. That God is not
done with you.
Speaker 2 (48:02):
I'm reaching this word for somebody who's been straining against
the wind.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
Grace is coming to your pope.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
The bread is in the Master's hands, and the bread
was only broken to be given. Lift your hands in
the presence of God, no one moving.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
This is my.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
Confidence that he is faithful, faithfulness.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
I'm stealing you hands.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
This is my conference.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
You never.
Speaker 3 (48:40):
You promised.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
See its greed is your faithfulness, faithness. I'm sealing you.
This is my contents, you nevers.
Speaker 3 (49:02):
You've drawn, missieus. It greed is your faith faith See,
this is my confidence.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
Listen, here's what you do. You take what you learned
from the loaves, and you remember it in the storm.
You take the basketful.
Speaker 2 (49:34):
From the last time that God provided for you, and
the next time the wind begins to rage in your life,
you remember that if Jesus is in this boat with me,
if I draw near to God, he will draw near
to me. And as we worship him as the Son
of God. Today the wind has to die down, anxiety
(49:58):
has to shut it fro out in the presence of God.
Speaker 3 (50:02):
Because we know who he is and we've seen what
he's done. We have faithful what he's gonna do?
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Does anybody believe He's with you in this season in time?
Speaker 1 (50:20):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
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 dot org slash podcast for
more information and if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
You can share it with your friends.
Speaker 2 (50:40):
You can click the share button, take a screenshot and
share it on your social stories and tag us at
Elevation Church.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Thanks again for listening. God bless you
Host
Steven Furtick
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