Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, this is Andre Butler, pastor of Faith Experienced Church.
You're listening to the Faith Experience podcast. Thank you for
joining us. We hope that this message helps you engage
your faith and experience the future God has for you.
I'm glad to hang out with you guys and this
year what God has put on my heart. And you
know we've been talking about We've been answering the question God,
(00:23):
where are you? Because sometimes we find ourselves in situations
where it feels like God's not there. In fact, we
read a scripture last week in Jeremiah twenty nine and
verse eleven, where God said, I know what I'm doing.
I have it all planned out, plans to take care
of you, not abandon you, Plans to give you the
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future you hope for, and by mine is even if
you know God, even if you've been walking with God
for a while, there are times where things are tough
and you can feel like you're experiencing the opposite of
the scripture, that God doesn't know what he's doing, that
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he has nothing planned out, that instead of taking care
of you, he's actually abandoned you. Instead of you get
in the future you hope for, you get in the
future you dread it. And and the series what we're
doing is trying to help you to see things as
they are, help you to see that indeed, God does
know what he is doing. God is there with you,
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that even in the midst of your trouble, God is
a God who can protect you. He's a God who
will bring you out. He's a guy who will still
give you that future you've been longing for, that future
that you've been hoping for. And so last week we
began this series by just simply finding out that even
though it may not feel like it, God does care.
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Somebody turned down. Turn your neighbor and tell him God cares.
Learn that God cares many cares about you. The Bible says,
he cares about how you feel, cares about your emotions,
He cares about your prosperity. He actually wants you to
do well in life. He cares about your future. He
wants to make sure you go to heaven one day.
(02:18):
And today we want to pick up in March chapter
four again, beginning with verse thirty five. And this is
the story that we looked at last week. We're just
gonna look at a little bit more closely today. And
it says as evening came, Jesus said to his disciples,
let's cross to the other side of the lake. So
they took Jesus in the boat and started out, leaving
the cross behind. All the other boats followed. But soon
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a fierce storm came up. High waves were breaking into
the boat and it began to fill with water, and
Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with
his head on a cushion. So once again recognize that
they're in this on this trip. Apparently when they first
got in the boat, the weather was fine, but once
they got in the boat, there's this massive storm, you know,
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seemed to come on them, and it's so bad that
the boat is actually filling with waters, actually sinking. And
yet when they look to find Jesus they find him
sleep on a pillow. So the Bible says, the disciples
woking up shouting, teacher, don't you care that we're going
to drown? It doesn't look like he cares. They're screaming
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and they're doing everything they can to save their lives,
and he sleep well. It says, when Jesus woke up,
he rebuked the wind and said to the waves, silence
be still, and suddenly the winds stopped and there was
a great calm. And thank God, the great calm is
coming for all of us. You will get out of this.
You will have the moment that we heard about in
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our panel today where you'll look back at your notes
and you'll say, you know what, God brought me out
of that. I know it. May I feel like that
right now. You may feel like, no, this is it,
this is gonna do me in. But I'm here to
tell you God's bringing you out. This is gonna be
another notch on goud. Come on now, there's gonna be
another victory that you have. You're gonna look back. I
don't know if it's gonna be in a month or
in six months, but you're gonna look back at the
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trouble you're in right now and say, you know what,
it felt like God didn't care. It felt like I
was never gonna get through this. But God brought me
out of this. God gave me victim. I'm preaching better
than y'all saying amen this morning. Come on, God gave
me victory. Look what the Lord has done. Well here,
that's what happened. They ended up in this great storm
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and looked like they were going to die, and then
Jesus stopped the whole thing. But I want to focus
on the next thing that Jesus said, because this is
really interesting. Then he asked them, why are you afraid?
Do you still have no faith? So after he dealt
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with the storm, he turned and dealt with them. These
are his disciples, they've been with him for a while.
He says, why are you afraid? What's the reason? What's
your explanation for being afraid? And didn't that seemed like
a strange question? You know, what do you mean? Why
am I afraid? I mean, did you just see what happened?
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We were in a storm, The boat was full of water,
we were sinking, we were about to die, and you
were sleep and you asked me, why am I afraid?
Some of us, this is what God's saying us today,
Why are you afraid? And you're like, are you kidding?
What do you mean? Why? Why aren't you afraid? But
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Jesus actually expected them to ignore what they saw and
how they felt, to the place where imminent death didn't
even scare them. He wanted them, He expected them to
keep their eyes and their mind on what he said
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and the fact that he was with them to the
place where no matter what would happen, they would know
that they were getting to the other side. And you
have to recognize God wouldn't send you on a journey
to the other side if he didn't know how to
make sure you would get there. So this is what
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Jesus expected. He expected them to kind of put on
their faith glasses. You know, I got my shades this morning.
I don't know these arebuffs and I don't remember. But
you know, this is how Jesus lived, right. You know,
Jesus will look at things. I don't know what. How
didn't take the lights out? Did I? Okay? You know
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Jesus wouldn't look at things. He wouldn't base his faith
on what he could see or what he could feel.
He entirely based his faith on what God said, And
in this case, Jesus had said something. Let's look at
verse thirty five again. As evening came, Jesus said to
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his disciples, let's cross to the other side of the lake. Well,
when he said let's cross to the other side of
the lake, there was enough power in that statement to
make sure that they would cross to the other side
of the lake. So the reason why he could go
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to sleep even though they were in the middle of
a storm, was because he knew he had said, let's
cross to the other side of the lake. So he
actually slept with his faith shades on because as far
as he could see, we were getting to the other side.
In fact, he saw himself at the other side. That's
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how he felt, I'm already I better hurt him and
get some sleep because we're gonna be there in a minute.
And he affected them in the middle of a storm,
in the middle of the boat being full of water,
to put on their faith shades and say, guess what.
I don't see a storm, I don't see any water.
All I see is Us on the other side. And
I'm here to tell you today, whatever's going on in
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your life. You might see some things you don't like,
you might feel some things you don't like. But God
expects you to ask the question what did God say?
To put on your faith shades and say, all I
see is what God said. The doctor said, I'm sick
and dying, but I see myself heal. My financial manager said, man,
you going bankrupt, but I see myself debt free. My
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family looks like it's falling apart, but I see my
family happy and serving God. Twenty twenty two looks like
it's going down to drain, but I see twenty twenty
two as a year when I get dumb before my trouble.
Come on, now, God expects you to make a decision today.
Stop looking at what your body says, what your mind says,
what everybody else says, and ask the question, what did
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God say? Turn out and tell him, Ask them what
did God say? Turn somebody out and tell him what
did God say? Come on, when your face were trouble,
your first thought needs to be what did God say?
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Come on, Matthew Chapter fourteen, Come on, don't be laughing
at my swag. Come on, now, you remember that song
we sing, Weymaker even when I don't see it, You're working,
even when I don't feel it. You're working. See how
can I sing that? How can I believe that? Because
I'm focused on something. I'm focused on what God said
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instead of what I see. Faith walks based on what
God said, not what I see. Matthew fourteen, very similar story.
Immediately after this, Jesus insisted that his disciples get back
into the boat. And cross to the other side of
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the lake. Notice that he said, cross to the other
side of the lake while he sent the people home.
And after sending them home, he went up into the
hills by himself to pray. Night fell while he was
there alone, and meanwhile the disciples were in trouble. There
it is, he said, you know, God says you're gonna
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get double before your trouble. That doesn't necessarily mean the
trouble won't come. Jesus told him go to the other
side of the lake. And guess what. When they were
doing what Jesus said, trouble came. Sometimes that's how it works,
because you have an enemy. He's trying to take you out.
Don't be surprised. Ible says, don't be don't be surprised
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by this fiery trial that you're facing. This shouldn't be
surprised that something bad happened. You shouldn't be surprised that
certain things show up. You are in a war zone.
That's what planet Earth is. It's a spiritual war zone.
The good news is you're on the winning side. So
once again they're in the boat. The Bible says, they're
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in trouble, far away from the land, for a strong
wind had risen, and wins always seem to rise once
Jesus speaks his word. And they were fighting heavy waste.
About three o'clock in the morning, Jesus came toward them
walking on the water, and when the disciples saw him
walking under the water, they were terrified and their fear.
They cried out, it's a ghost. But Jesus spoke to
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them at once. Don't be afraid. I believe that's what
God is saying to some people today. Don't be afraid.
That's what somebody this many turned down, and tell them that.
Don't be afraid. Putting out in comments. Don't be afraid.
Find somebody else, tell them, don't be afraid. I'm'a find
one more person. Tell them, don't be afraid. This is
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a no fear zone. This isn't fear experienced church. This
is faith experienced church. We don't walk, we walk by faith.
He said, don't be afraid, take courage. I am here.
Then Peter called to him, Lord, if it's really you,
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tell me to come to you walking on the water. Yes, come,
Jesus said, so. Wait, a lot's happened here. Number one
of these are really jumpy guys man, they see him.
It's a ghost, right, and so he immediately speaks up,
he it's me, don't be afraid, and he must have
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been close enough for them to hear him in the
middle of a storm, rememb there's a strong wind, and
yet he says, don't be afraid as me, and they
could hear him, so he's pretty close. He's already made
most of the journey. And so of course, as we said,
he said, don't be afraid. There's a lot of mention
of faith and fear in these stories, and that's really
what this is about today. And then Peter knew enough
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about Jesus to know that his whole thing was what
you see me, do I want you to do? So
he said, you know, and apparently he's still even though
they heard his voice, he must have been far enough
away from that that it wasn't entirely clear that it
was him. So Peter says, well, if it's you, I'm
gonna test you because I know you want me to
do what you do. So if it's you, tell me
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to come walk on the water with you, you know,
it's almost like I dare you to do this. And
then he you know, Jesus calls your bluff will come.
Peter's like, wait, why, I was just kidding Broun. I mean,
it's cool. No, Peter actually is Peter Man. He you know,
he's one of those people that has no problem being bold,
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and he has a problem, you know, being wise, but
he has no problem being bold. So the Bible tells
us if we keep reading here, you know, the Bible
says here. So Peter went over the side of the
boat and walked on the water toward Jesus. So he
gets out the boat, takes that first step, finds out
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just like walking on this stage, because when Jesus said
the word come, there was enough power in that one
word to give this man the ability to supersede nation
nature to walk on water. So he does it. He
walks in water to go to Jesus. But then I
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know the next thing that says here. But when he
saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified
and began to sink. Now, wait a minute, didn't I
just read that before they even saw Jesus, they were
dealing with the strong wind in waves. Isn't that how
this story started? Right? They were in trouble, far away
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from land, a strong wind had arisen and they were
fighting heavy waves. So the wind and the waves were
not new. There was strong wind and there were heavy
waves before he even stepped out of the boat. But
now he steps out of the boat, he's walking to
Jesus based on what Jesus said, and he loses his focus.
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He stops focusing on that supernatural word come, and instead
he starts focusing on the reasons why you normally wouldn't come,
the wind and the ways. It's really, why does that
it even He really didn't even focus on the water,
because wait a minute, you can't walk on water. But
he starts looking at all these other things. And this
is part of the reason why some of us are
even asking God, where are you? He says, Lord save me,
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And this is our way of saying, Lord save me,
because we just lost focus. It's not that God went anywhere.
It's not that he changed what he said. It's simply
that you have stopped looking at him. You stop looking
at the promise he gave you, and you start looking
at what's going on around you. And when you get
in fear, you will sink. When you say in faith,
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you will walk, but fear will cause you to sink.
Every time this man lost his focus. So the Bible
says he began to sink, and and and he says,
and of course he says, save me, Lord, and I
love this. Jesus immediately reached out and grabbed him. Every
time I read this, this always jumps out in me,
because what's wild about this is that he clearly got
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very close to Jesus. You know, Jesus didn't you know,
the Bible doesn't say Jesus, you know, ran across the
water that had have been cool to see. The Bible
didn't say that. Jesus, you know, jumped in and swam
and you know, you know, grabbed him and and you know,
you know, took him back to the boat. It says
Jesus immediately stretched forth his hand. So that means that
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Peter was almost there, like another couple steps, and he's
made it. It was right before he had his final breakthrough,
that he had his he had seemingly his greatest challenge.
And for some of us, that's what's going on right now.
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You are right there, I mean, you are right there.
You've been believing God for this for who knows how
long you fought over who knows far how many battles.
God has done some miracles through you. God has done
some miracles for you. You've been walking on the water,
and just when you're about to have your breakthrough, everything
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breaks out. All of a sudden, things seem to be
falling apart. And what you need to do in this moment,
more than ever, is keep your focus on what God said.
You might be facing your greatest battle because you're on
the doorstep of your greatest accomplishment, because you're on the
doorstep of your greatest victory. That's why things are falling.
I'm talking to somebody bout the holies fear. You might
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be sitting at home, But that's why you were saying, God,
why is all this happening? Because the enemy knows that
if you have another couple more steps in you, he
is done. That battle is over, and from here on
out you'll be telling people about what the Lord has done.
So you cannot allow yourself right now to give up.
This is the time to put on your faith shades
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and say what did God say? God said, Come So
even though it looks bad and it feels bad and
everybody thinks I've lost my mind, because God said come,
I'm gonna keep on walking on the water, and I'm
gonna have my victory. But notice the key once again.
You can't be focused on the wind. You can't be
focused on the waves. You can't be focused on how
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you feel right now. You need to ask yourself the
question very simply, what did God say? Turn to somebody
and ask him what did God say? I want to
end this by noticing Jesus immediately reached out and grabbing
He said, you have so little faith? And then he said,
why did you doubt me? Why did you doubt me? See,
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that's the challenge. We end up in a situation we're
doubting God, and you don't have any reason to doubt God.
He can do the impossible. He cannot only do the impossible.
He can cause you to do the impossible. But you
gotta stay focused on what he said. Well, let's look
at a different type of story in Genesis chapter twenty two,
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because sometimes we have to hold on to what God said,
even when for God to do what he said would
take the impossible. And let me shoot tell you what
I'm talking about. Genesis twenty two, verse one, it says
sometime later God tested Abraham's faith. Abraham, God called yes.
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He replied, here, I am take your son, your only son, yes, Isaac,
whom you love so much, and go to the land
of Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on
one of the mountains, which I shall show you. So
God speaks to Abraham and he says, I want you
to take your son. This is the son you believe,
for you had him at one hundred years old, and
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I want you to take him to this mountain. I
want you to sacrifice. And Abraham had a covenant with
God and that meant that he needed he had to
obey what God told him to do. And Abraham understood that.
So he's now going to obey God and take the
thing he wanted the most in the world and sacrifice
it for God. And do recognize that God does require
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our lives. That's what salvation is. It's not just praying
a prayer. It's giving God your life like he gave
you his life. Right, you don't get to pick and
choose what areas of my life God's involved in. That's
not what it means to be a Christian. That's what
not what it means to be a follower. Jesus. To
be a follower of Jesus means that Christ is my life.
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I don't pick stuff. I seek God and find out
what he's picked. I don't pick my calling. I don't
pick my job. Then I don't pick my church. I
don't even really pick who I'm married. I don't even
pick you know, I talked to God. Okay, y'all was
all happy loving this message until that moment. But it's true.
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So God saying, Hey, this is what I'm expecting you
to do. Verse eight. So of course, if we were
to keep reading, you find out that his son eventually
kind of says, hey, Dad, you know what's going on.
You know where's the land? Where's the sheep? And this
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is Abram's response, God will provide a sheep for the
burnt offering my son. And they both walked on together.
And when they arrived at the place where God had
told him to go, Abraham built an altar and ranged
the wood on it. Then he tied his son Isaac
and laid him on the altar on top of the wood.
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There's a message in there about the fact that Isaac
trusted his dad this much. And Abraham picked up a
knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. And at
that moment, the Angel Lord called him from heaven Abraham. Abraham. Yes,
Abraham replied, here I am, don't lay a hand on
the boy. The angel said, you not hurt him in
any way. For now I know that you truly fear
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of God. You have not withheld from me even your son,
your only son, which of course paved the way for
God to not have not withhold his son from us.
Because Abraham was willing to give his son to God.
God was willing to give his son to us. So
there's some deep things in there. I won't try to
teach today. He said, why would God require that? Because
he was working on something? Okay, But then look at
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Hebrews chapter eleven. Let's get a different perspective on this.
Talking about the same instance, it says it was by
faith that Abraham offered Isaac as a sacrifice when God
was testing him. Abraham, who had received God's promises, which
would include the promise of a son, was ready to
sacrifice his only son, Isaac. Get this, even though God
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had told him Isaac is the son through whom your
descendants will be counted. Wait a minute, and if you
were to back up. We won't go there for times sake.
You can find scripture where God made it very clear
to Abraham that he'd be the father of many nations,
but that it would happen through Isaac, meaning Isaac was
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going to get married and have kids, and then they
would get married and have kids. And they get married
and have kids. But the idea was that Isaac was
going to be the one that was going to give
him grandkids. So God said, Isaac is going to be
the one that does these things. But then God tells
him kill Isaac. You see the problem. But God, you
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said this, but you're telling me to do this. So
it's really wild about this? Then? Is that? The Bible
says Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able
to bring him back to life again. And in a sense,
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Abraham did receive his son back from the dead. So
here's how Abraham did this. He put on his faith shades.
God said in Isaac, will my seed be called? Now
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I know he told me to kill him, But God said,
and Isaac, will my seed be called? God said, So,
I don't know what God's gonna do here. Maybe he
gonna raise him from the dead. But I know that
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when God gets done, Isaac is gonna be alive because
God said, and Isaac, shall my seat be caught? And
what I love about this is, up until this point
in the Bible, you've never seen anybody raise from the dead. Now,
if you are Christian at all, you read the Bible,
all you know there are cases after cases after cases
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of people being raised from the dead. We know Jesus
was raised from the dead, but at that point in time,
there wasn't no instances of anybody being raised from the dead.
It never happened, was never heard of. He was so
confident in what God had said that he made it up. Well,
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God got to raise him from the dead, and he'll
do that, because in Isaac, shall my seed be called?
He literally just came up with it. I don't know
how God's gonna do it. If he got to raise
him from the dead, that's what he gonna do, because
I believe he will do what he said. There's something
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we can learn in this. Abraham held on to his
faith despite the fact that it would take God doing
something he had never seen or even heard of before,
and so he got what God promised. And sometimes that's
when we get caught up. I just can't see how
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God can fix this. Anybody been there? Come on, I'm
there right now. Anybody been here? You put your hand up,
even if your hand out, they're not. Look at all
those hands. I just can't see. It is impossible if
you're not careful. You know, like this guy in Second King,
chapter seven, You remember that story. If I would talk
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about how the city I believe of Samaria was in
such great famine that people were eating their children. The
prophet of God came and said, this is what God said,
by this time tomorrow, and he gave some economic indicators,
but bottom line was this nation's going to be prosperous.
And one of the men who was there said, man,
if God were to make windows in heaven, that couldn't happen.
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And he said to him, well, you'll see it, but
you won't get to eat any of it, because he
doubted what God said because of what he saw, and
if we're not careful, we'll follow his example instead of
following Abraham's example. Abraham's example was very similar to us saying, today,
you know what, You're the God who was able to
do exceedingly abundantly above all I can ask or even think.
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Your thoughts are higher than my thoughts, Your ways are
higher than my ways. You can do the impossible. So
even though I don't see how you can fix this,
even though I don't see how I can get to
the future you long for, I'm gonna put my faith
shades on and I'm gonna say, you know, what, what
did God say? And if God said I'm getting double
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from my trouble, I don't know what he gonna do,
but I'm getting it. If God said I'm gonna be healed,
I'm getting that. God says my family will serve the Lord.
I'm getting that. I don't care what it looks like.
I don't care if I can't figure it out. I
know that if God said it, God will do it.
I'm a focus on what God said. Come on, somebody said, again,
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what did God say? Muscles simple message today, But as
when we got to get a hold of we gotta
get refocused here. We've got to get, you know, recalibrate
our faith here and focus on what matters. If God
said it, he will do it. If God spoke it,
he will bring it to past. Has he said it
and will he not do it? Has he spoken it,
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and will he not bring it to pass? Is it
not impossible for God to lie? You've heard it said before.
If God were to say the sky is purple, it
would turn purple because he said it's purple. If he
said it, he will do it. And there is nothing
on this planet that can stop it from happening except you,
because he needs your phase. What's the question? What did
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God said? God likes doing the impossible, but it does
require us believing for the impossible. It's go a step further.
Y'all get anything out of this. It's flowing a little
different than I thought it would, but as long as
y'all getting it. Second Chronicles shot the twenty The reason
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happened after this that the people of Moab, with the
people of Amen and others with them besides the Ammonites,
came to battle against Jehosaph Fad. Then some came and
told your host of Fact saying, a great multitude is
coming against you from beyond the sea, from Syria, and
they are in Hazizon tomorrow, which is ingody. The idea
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is they're pretty close. Jehostah fact Fear get this and
set himself to seek the Lord and proclaim to fast
throughout all Judah. So Judah gathered together to ask help
from the Lord. That's what he's seeking the Lord, for
I need help, and Judah came, and that's help of
the Lord. And thank God, God offers help, Bible says
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the Hebrews, for that we can come boldly to the
throne of grace and obtain mercy and grace to help
in time of need. So Bible says, once again, they
gather together to ask help of the Lord, and from
all the cedars that juitter. They came to seek the Lord.
So notice that they find out that three armies are
coming to attack them, and they already know they can't
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they can't defeat them. So we will say the president
today caused National Day of Prayer, and he sets himself
and the people set themselves to seek the Lord. And
they're just they're just coming to God to say, God
help us. There's nothing we can do. We jumped down
the verse twelve, and he says, Oh, Our God, here's
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Jojosephat's prayer. Will you not judge them, for we have
no power against this great multitude that is coming against us,
nor do we know what to do what's he saying here,
He's saying there's nothing we can do, and we don't
know what to do. Anybody relate to that, and nothing
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I can do to fix this, and I don't know
what to do. Say so, our eyes are on you.
That's the right place to put your eyes. Verse fourteen.
Then the spirit of the Lord came upon Jehaziel, the
son of Zachariath, the son of Beniah, the son of Jyale,
the son of matt and Iah, a levite of the
sons of the a of Asap. But you know what's
interesting about this is the sons of Asap we're anointed
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to be musicians. That's what they were. They were musicians.
And you know, God didn't choose to jump on a
prophet in that moment. He chose to jump on a musician.
And sometimes you got to recognize God will not speak
to you through who you expect him to speak to
you to. You know, I mean, you remember that place
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in the Bible where God had a donkey speak to
the prophet and the donkey saved his life. You know,
sometimes we want to tell God who went, we're and
how and God say, wait a minute, I'm God. Remember
sometimes we want to have God tell We want to
tell God how to speak to us about our situations. God,
is such a big, bad situation. I need you to
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speak loud and clear this time. Can you peel back
the roof and put your head down and just say
it's me, Please, God. I don't need that little nudge.
I don't need no little whisper. I don't need none
of that. I need straw heavy voice from heaven and
sins seven people to confirm what you said. Lord and God,
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like I already nudged you. There's some faith involved in
that too. And sometimes what God will do is he'll
speak to you through that nudge or even through other people,
and then he expects you to do what He said
through them, and if you don't, you just deal with
the consequences. Remember with Israel in Egypt, God didn't speak
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to Israel. God spoke to Moses and told Israel, told
Moses what to tell Israel, and they didn't do what
Moses said. They died. I'm getting deeper than I want
to get here today. By line is God speaks to
Jehzel and he says, listen to all of you, Judah,
and your inhabitants of Jerusalem, and you, King Jehosah Fat,
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thus says the Lord to you, do not be afraid
nor just made because of this great multitude, For the
battle is not yours, but God's. Tomorrow. Go down against them.
They will surely come up by the ascentims, and you
will find him at the end of the brook, before
the wilderness of Jeriel. You will not need to fight
in this battle. Position yourself, stand still and see the
salvation of the Lord who is with you, Oh Judah
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and Jerusalem. Do not fear or be discouraged. Don't be dismayed,
don't fall, don't break apart, for the Lord is with you. Right.
So notice this word they get from God. And if
we know the rest of the story, we know that
they immediately accept that they fall in their face, they
worship God. Then they go ahead and get everybody, and
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they're gonna head out to the battle tomorrow. They're in
such faith that Jehosaph fact didn't decide this by himself.
He actually consulted with the people, and they decided to
put the choir ahead of the army because they knew
that we were just going to spectate. So we're gonna
go ahead and start cheering for our team ahead of
time because we already know God's gonna do because we
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know what God said. They still got three armies coming
to attack them. It still looks bad, but we know
what God says. So come on, choir this, go ahead
and saying praise the Lord for his mercy, and do
it for the Lord is good. And can you imagine
the other the people that are attacking them, like what
is that? Are they singing? Right? So we know and
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what happens. God has them fight each other. They all die.
When they get there, they find three days worth of spoil.
And we talked about that maybe a couple of weeks ago.
All right, But what's one thing I want you to
get a hold of here, is that for you to
focus on what God said, sometimes you need to figure
out what God said. One of the things that you
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have to find from God sometimes you got to get
from God is the word of the Lord for your
particular situation. And there's another word for that. In fact,
Inphesians chapter the sixth, let me read it to you,
it's talking about the armor of God. It says, put
on salvation as you're a human and take the sword
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of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Now,
the New Testament is translated from the Greek and the
original Greek. There were two words in particular that were
translated word. One of them is logos, which is the
written word right so you're literally reading logos right now.
The other is Rama. The rama word of God is
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a little different. In fact, let me read to you
what Van's Expository Dictionary says. It says here the reference
is not to the whole Bible as such, that's logos,
but to the individual scripture which the spirit brings to
our remembrance for use in time of need. Did you
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see that it's the individual scripture which the spirit brings
to our remembrance for use in time of need. He
go was gonna say a prerecords is being the regular
storying of the mind with scripture. You got to know
scripture for God to bring it to your remembrance. But
there are times where God will give you a rain
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of word. Well, God will will either speak directly to
you or God will bring to your members a particular scripture,
and that's the scripture you're supposed to stand on. And
this is sometimes where we miss it. I know. Sometimes
Peo will come to me and say, Pastor, can you
pray for me about this, that and the other? And
I say, Okay, what scripture are you standing on the
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majority of the time I say that They go, well,
we could, well, no, you need to get from God
the sword for this battle. Well you understand with guns,
right that you know there are times where you know,
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you know, a assault rifle would bet you run through
Afghanistan trying to save American citizens. You need an assault rifle.
But if you in the city Detroit, and you in
a in an alley and you you fight for your life,
something a little small might work a little bit better.
And there are times where you you know you need
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a specific word to stand on. That word is the
sword of the spirit that will take the enemy out.
Sometimes you can't take the whole Bible to a battle,
can y'all? Y'all with me? You can't. You can't quote.
You can't even you know, when you when you're dealing
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with all these thoughts and and you're fighting a storm
and all that is going on, you can't even think
of eighteen scriptures right now. I just need one. Just
give me that one scripture that God has breathed on
for this situation. Because when he breathes on it, that's
when I got that. When he breathes on it, that stuff,
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let's go to the other side. When he breathes on it,
that's where the power is. So what did you say
about this situation? God? And God says, this is what
I said. I will supply all your need according to him.
So all of a sudden, the bill shows up. No,
my God shall supply all my need. They say, well,
you can't pay this bill. My God supplies all my need.
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Well you're about to run out, you know, we're about
to take your house. My God supplies all my need.
And sure enough God shows up in the last moment
and pays off with you. But see you've got that word.
What's your reign of word? What's the scripture? God is
quick into your heart for you to hang on to,
for you to use as a weapon against the enemy.
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And if you're saying, I don't know, do what Jr.
Hostaphact did he set himself to seek the Lord? What's
that scripture? Because God's got a for every situation. It's
got to rain about your kids, it's got to rain
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about your marriage, it's got to raiment about your about
your ministry, about your church. What is it that God
is quickened to your heart? Sometimes he'll save you with that.
I didn't plan and say this, and I'm starting to
get over time, y'all. Okay. I remember when I was
pastoring in Atlanta and we had a we had a
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nice facility, and we were we had bought some land
and we were planning to sell the facility. How to buyer.
They were gonna give us some really good amount of money.
We're gonna turn around and build on that land. But
there was an element of faith here because what was
happening was, you know, the amount of money we were
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told it would take to build on that land just
kept going up. And this was right. You know. You
remember this was like right before two thousand and eight,
so that the market was doing this, it was crazy,
and so construction prices were going through the roof. So
you know, when I first set out to do the deal,
it looked like this is gonna work. Got to believe.
But now it just keeps getting worse and worse and worse.
But here I am at the end of negotiations. And
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I mean when I say at the end. I mean,
the lawyers have done enough everything they're gonna do, and
they kind of like, okay, this is we were pretty
much there, you know, you're ready to sign. And I
just felt kind of funny about it. And you know,
I mean I was. I guess I was thirty, I
don't know a little younger. And I remember walking around
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my kitchen literally just thinking about it. And I walked
up to my sink and I don't know what I
was washing or doing, and I heard this scripture come
from my heart. Count the cost, you know that scripture.
No man builds a tower without counting the cost. It
was a rain of word, and I knew immediately, oh,
don't do this deal. And I didn't, and you know,
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to thousand and eight happened, and we would have been
at church without a building, supposedly building a building for
who knows how many years. But God gave me a
raym up that saved us. That was a word. But
you know, God can't give you a ram a word
if you don't know the word. So you got to
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start like reading your Bible every day. But he gave
me that word and it was And so this is
one reason why you want to spend time in the Bible.
One reason why you want to spend time in prayer
so that you know you can when God does want
to drop stuff in your heart, you can recognize it.
But having said that, let's go back to the main point.
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You can't say what did God say if you have
been taken to find out, to take the time to
find out, what did he say about your situation? What's
your come James chapter one. See, once you got that
raindal word from God, man, then you'll find there's peace there,
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there's grace there. You can walk on the water. But
you gotta get it. And sometimes you'll get it from
meditating in the world of God, just reading the Bible
and studying it and something will pop up at you. You know,
it's like the words jump off the page. You know,
God's saying something to you. But other times you get
it in this way. And James chapter one. Of course, Paul,
excuse me, James is talking to the church. He's talking
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about being in tough times, you know, and so if
you're the reverse two he says, my brethren counted all
joy when you fall into various trials. Ooh, that'll preach
consider it all joy when you fall into. Not if
you fall in. When you fall in, everybody's gonna fall
(43:50):
in at deathe tough times. So when it happens, I
actually look at it as a good thing. And he
goes on to talk about not because God sends trouble
your way. God's not sending anything to you to hurt
you or to you. But who is saying that trouble
will work for you. It will develop your patience, which
will help you get your place. You don't lack anything.
Verse five. So if any of you lacks wisdom, well,
(44:12):
lacks wisdom, win when you're in tough times. I mean,
this time, it's tough, it's struggling. I'm trying to keep
my joy up, but I don't know what to do.
That sounded like we just finished reading God. I do
not see the way out. I don't. I don't know.
I don't. I don't know how to win this. Well,
(44:33):
if you lack wisdom, ask of God. God gives to all,
which means he will give to you liberally bountifully. One
scripture in one hundred and forty fifth Psalm says that
God gives with an open hand. He's got an open
hand in front of you. God knows the way out
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of your trouble, and God wants you to know the
way out of your trouble. I'm gonna say it again.
God knows the way out of your true and he
wants you to know the way out of your trouble.
So he says, just come and ask me. He says,
he gives literally and the upbrad of not meaning that
God will not correct you because you asked for him.
God will not hold back the answer from you. God's
not holding back the answer. He's not playing a game.
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He's not encrypting things so you can't hear them or
understand them. If you're not hearing clearly from God. The
problem isn't God. And sometimes the problem is God already
told us and we didn't like what we heard, so
we like, well, that ain't it? So Lord, what is
it he keep telling you? And Lord? What is he
(45:39):
keep telling you? Lord? And you? Three months? Six month
nine mother year? Lord that Lord ain't talking to me
the Lord up in here, and like, come on, man,
not only want to come. I'm dealing with that now.
Lords saying this and then and I'm like, oh Lord,
why because that's impossible. Wait a minute, He does the impossible. No,
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he says, man, just ask and it would be given
to you. God is not hiding his word from you.
He's hiding his word for you. Come on, now, he's
there saying, if you seek me, you will find me.
If you set yourself to seek me, then you're gonna
find that. I'm gonna give you the answer that you need.
But some of us we need to set ourselves there.
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Some of us, guys, we're used to setting ourselves in
front of the television. We got the headset on, we
got the PlayStation in our in our hands, and we'll
do that for hours. But we won't give God fifteen
minutes to hear a rain of word that could change
our life forever. Come on, you know what it means
to set yourself. Some of us, we set ourselves in
front of the Netflix, and we'll ben just show five, six, seven,
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eight episodes till through three in the morning. But we
won't give God thirty minutes to find out what he
has to say about my hell. We know what it
means to set yourself somewhere. We do it in a
movie theater. Every time we go to a movie, we
sit down. We set ourselves for two to three hours.
If you just gave God those two to three hours
and heard from God, then you'd be happy when you
went to the movies. But you gotta take the time.
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Come on, somebody say time. You gotta take the time
to find out what did God say to me about this?
And then when you heard what God said to you
about that, now you can put on your faith glasses
and no matter what you see it, what's going on?
You can say, But God said, and get to the
(47:31):
other side. What did God say? You tell me when
I come in, you come to me hypastica and you
pray for this? All right, what's your scripture? Let's agree
on it. Well, this is what God said. I was
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reading my Bible and this scripture jumped out at me
and I knew that was for this situation. I was
praying and God said, tomorrow, this is what's going on.
I want you to do this. And see a lot
of times we're looking for answers. We want God to
do something. Healed this, change their heart, do that, do this,
do that, and the answer comes in the form of
a word instruction. There was a woman at taking King
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Chapter four. The Bible says her sons were about to
be taken from her. She was in such deep debt.
She goes to the Man of God, you know, help me,
And then you would think that he would give her money.
He gave her a word, go get vessels. Go gather vessels,
not a few, and fill them up with oil. She
did it. Not only does she have money for that situation,
she had money for the rest of her life. There's
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other places in the Bible the same thing happen. Namen
was a man who had leprosy. He came to the
Man of God and he he you know, And the
Man of God didn't even see him, didn't even bother
even meeting him. He just sent word out dip in
the Jordan river seven times and Aama gets upset, Like
I thought he was gonna do something spectacular. I thought
he's gonna call down something from heaven and no, no,
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he just gave a word. But when they am and
did what was said, he was healed. What did God say,
Stop looking, Stop trying to tell God how to fix
your problem. That's for somebody me too. He's God. If
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he tells you to do something, you do it, You
hang on to it, and you watch God bring you
ventory One more thing, Salt miner. I'm just gonna end here.
Just want to remind you of something somebody said, again,
what did God say? That's the big question, what did
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God say? I like this. I love the scripture. I
think it's a great ending to what we're doing today.
Salt ninety two twelve says this, the righteous shall flourish
like the palm tree. He shall grow it like a
cedar in Lebanon. The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree.
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If you're somebody that's living right for God, that's really
what the Old Testament. The righteous are people who lived right.
This is your future. You will flourish. I'm preaching better
than y'all saying a man I said you will flourish.
You see something similar Psalm one. That you'll be like
a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings
forth its fruit and it season. You will not wither.
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You will not wither, you will not wilt, you will
not lose it. You're you're not gonna fall apart. You
will flourish. But I love the fact that he says
we will flourish like the palm tree. Why I was
I was in Florida this week got some sun. Hallylujah
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came back to Michigan and said, why on earth am
I here? Palm trees are the kind of trees that
when you do have hurricanes and things like that happened
in general, you don't see those break. You see all
kinds of trees on the ground. The palm trees are
literally designed by God to bend, but they don't break.
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In fact, when whatever's happening is over with, the palm
tree bounces back up and is even stronger after the
storm than it was before the storm. You are a
palm tree. You might be bending right now, but you're
not gonna break. You got some holy ghost buoyancy, some
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bounce back ability. You're gonna bounce back, and you're gonna
be even stronger than you ever were when you went
in it. You came in at this level of strength.
You're coming out even stronger and wiser, with a story
to tell about how God's been good to you. But
you will flourish, flourish. So I want to encourage you
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about that. No matter what the enemy is throwing your way,
God's word is stronger. So the question isn't what are
you facing today? The question is What did God say,
I'm on lift handsword he Let's thank God for the
word of God. Thank you Father, Thank you for tuning
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in to another Faith Experience podcast. Remember God as a
future for you.
Hey, this is Andre Butler, pastor of Faith Experienced Church.
You're listening to the Faith Experience podcast. Thank you for
joining us. We hope that this message helps you engage
your faith and experience the future God has for you.
I'm glad to hang out with you guys and this
year what God has put on my heart. And you
know we've been talking about We've been answering the question God,
(00:23):
where are you? Because sometimes we find ourselves in situations
where it feels like God's not there. In fact, we
read a scripture last week in Jeremiah twenty nine and
verse eleven, where God said, I know what I'm doing.
I have it all planned out, plans to take care
of you, not abandon you, Plans to give you the
(00:47):
future you hope for, and by mine is even if
you know God, even if you've been walking with God
for a while, there are times where things are tough
and you can feel like you're experiencing the opposite of
the scripture, that God doesn't know what he's doing, that
(01:08):
he has nothing planned out, that instead of taking care
of you, he's actually abandoned you. Instead of you get
in the future you hope for, you get in the
future you dread it. And and the series what we're
doing is trying to help you to see things as
they are, help you to see that indeed, God does
know what he is doing. God is there with you,
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that even in the midst of your trouble, God is
a God who can protect you. He's a God who
will bring you out. He's a guy who will still
give you that future you've been longing for, that future
that you've been hoping for. And so last week we
began this series by just simply finding out that even
though it may not feel like it, God does care.
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Somebody turned down. Turn your neighbor and tell him God cares.
Learn that God cares many cares about you. The Bible says,
he cares about how you feel, cares about your emotions,
He cares about your prosperity. He actually wants you to
do well in life. He cares about your future. He
wants to make sure you go to heaven one day.
(02:18):
And today we want to pick up in March chapter
four again, beginning with verse thirty five. And this is
the story that we looked at last week. We're just
gonna look at a little bit more closely today. And
it says as evening came, Jesus said to his disciples,
let's cross to the other side of the lake. So
they took Jesus in the boat and started out, leaving
the cross behind. All the other boats followed. But soon
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a fierce storm came up. High waves were breaking into
the boat and it began to fill with water, and
Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with
his head on a cushion. So once again recognize that
they're in this on this trip. Apparently when they first
got in the boat, the weather was fine, but once
they got in the boat, there's this massive storm, you know,
(03:03):
seemed to come on them, and it's so bad that
the boat is actually filling with waters, actually sinking. And
yet when they look to find Jesus they find him
sleep on a pillow. So the Bible says, the disciples
woking up shouting, teacher, don't you care that we're going
to drown? It doesn't look like he cares. They're screaming
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and they're doing everything they can to save their lives,
and he sleep well. It says, when Jesus woke up,
he rebuked the wind and said to the waves, silence
be still, and suddenly the winds stopped and there was
a great calm. And thank God, the great calm is
coming for all of us. You will get out of this.
You will have the moment that we heard about in
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our panel today where you'll look back at your notes
and you'll say, you know what, God brought me out
of that. I know it. May I feel like that
right now. You may feel like, no, this is it,
this is gonna do me in. But I'm here to
tell you God's bringing you out. This is gonna be
another notch on goud. Come on now, there's gonna be
another victory that you have. You're gonna look back. I
don't know if it's gonna be in a month or
in six months, but you're gonna look back at the
(04:07):
trouble you're in right now and say, you know what,
it felt like God didn't care. It felt like I
was never gonna get through this. But God brought me
out of this. God gave me victim. I'm preaching better
than y'all saying amen this morning. Come on, God gave
me victory. Look what the Lord has done. Well here,
that's what happened. They ended up in this great storm
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and looked like they were going to die, and then
Jesus stopped the whole thing. But I want to focus
on the next thing that Jesus said, because this is
really interesting. Then he asked them, why are you afraid?
Do you still have no faith? So after he dealt
(04:50):
with the storm, he turned and dealt with them. These
are his disciples, they've been with him for a while.
He says, why are you afraid? What's the reason? What's
your explanation for being afraid? And didn't that seemed like
a strange question? You know, what do you mean? Why
am I afraid? I mean, did you just see what happened?
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We were in a storm, The boat was full of water,
we were sinking, we were about to die, and you
were sleep and you asked me, why am I afraid?
Some of us, this is what God's saying us today,
Why are you afraid? And you're like, are you kidding?
What do you mean? Why? Why aren't you afraid? But
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Jesus actually expected them to ignore what they saw and
how they felt, to the place where imminent death didn't
even scare them. He wanted them, He expected them to
keep their eyes and their mind on what he said
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and the fact that he was with them to the
place where no matter what would happen, they would know
that they were getting to the other side. And you
have to recognize God wouldn't send you on a journey
to the other side if he didn't know how to
make sure you would get there. So this is what
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Jesus expected. He expected them to kind of put on
their faith glasses. You know, I got my shades this morning.
I don't know these arebuffs and I don't remember. But
you know, this is how Jesus lived, right. You know,
Jesus will look at things. I don't know what. How
didn't take the lights out? Did I? Okay? You know
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Jesus wouldn't look at things. He wouldn't base his faith
on what he could see or what he could feel.
He entirely based his faith on what God said, And
in this case, Jesus had said something. Let's look at
verse thirty five again. As evening came, Jesus said to
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his disciples, let's cross to the other side of the lake. Well,
when he said let's cross to the other side of
the lake, there was enough power in that statement to
make sure that they would cross to the other side
of the lake. So the reason why he could go
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to sleep even though they were in the middle of
a storm, was because he knew he had said, let's
cross to the other side of the lake. So he
actually slept with his faith shades on because as far
as he could see, we were getting to the other side.
In fact, he saw himself at the other side. That's
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how he felt, I'm already I better hurt him and
get some sleep because we're gonna be there in a minute.
And he affected them in the middle of a storm,
in the middle of the boat being full of water,
to put on their faith shades and say, guess what.
I don't see a storm, I don't see any water.
All I see is Us on the other side. And
I'm here to tell you today, whatever's going on in
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your life. You might see some things you don't like,
you might feel some things you don't like. But God
expects you to ask the question what did God say?
To put on your faith shades and say, all I
see is what God said. The doctor said, I'm sick
and dying, but I see myself heal. My financial manager said, man,
you going bankrupt, but I see myself debt free. My
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family looks like it's falling apart, but I see my
family happy and serving God. Twenty twenty two looks like
it's going down to drain, but I see twenty twenty
two as a year when I get dumb before my trouble.
Come on, now, God expects you to make a decision today.
Stop looking at what your body says, what your mind says,
what everybody else says, and ask the question, what did
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God say? Turn out and tell him, Ask them what
did God say? Turn somebody out and tell him what
did God say? Come on, when your face were trouble,
your first thought needs to be what did God say?
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Come on, Matthew Chapter fourteen, Come on, don't be laughing
at my swag. Come on, now, you remember that song
we sing, Weymaker even when I don't see it, You're working,
even when I don't feel it. You're working. See how
can I sing that? How can I believe that? Because
I'm focused on something. I'm focused on what God said
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instead of what I see. Faith walks based on what
God said, not what I see. Matthew fourteen, very similar story.
Immediately after this, Jesus insisted that his disciples get back
into the boat. And cross to the other side of
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the lake. Notice that he said, cross to the other
side of the lake while he sent the people home.
And after sending them home, he went up into the
hills by himself to pray. Night fell while he was
there alone, and meanwhile the disciples were in trouble. There
it is, he said, you know, God says you're gonna
(10:28):
get double before your trouble. That doesn't necessarily mean the
trouble won't come. Jesus told him go to the other
side of the lake. And guess what. When they were
doing what Jesus said, trouble came. Sometimes that's how it works,
because you have an enemy. He's trying to take you out.
Don't be surprised. Ible says, don't be don't be surprised
(10:49):
by this fiery trial that you're facing. This shouldn't be
surprised that something bad happened. You shouldn't be surprised that
certain things show up. You are in a war zone.
That's what planet Earth is. It's a spiritual war zone.
The good news is you're on the winning side. So
once again they're in the boat. The Bible says, they're
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in trouble, far away from the land, for a strong
wind had risen, and wins always seem to rise once
Jesus speaks his word. And they were fighting heavy waste.
About three o'clock in the morning, Jesus came toward them
walking on the water, and when the disciples saw him
walking under the water, they were terrified and their fear.
They cried out, it's a ghost. But Jesus spoke to
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them at once. Don't be afraid. I believe that's what
God is saying to some people today. Don't be afraid.
That's what somebody this many turned down, and tell them that.
Don't be afraid. Putting out in comments. Don't be afraid.
Find somebody else, tell them, don't be afraid. I'm'a find
one more person. Tell them, don't be afraid. This is
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a no fear zone. This isn't fear experienced church. This
is faith experienced church. We don't walk, we walk by faith.
He said, don't be afraid, take courage. I am here.
Then Peter called to him, Lord, if it's really you,
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tell me to come to you walking on the water. Yes, come,
Jesus said, so. Wait, a lot's happened here. Number one
of these are really jumpy guys man, they see him.
It's a ghost, right, and so he immediately speaks up,
he it's me, don't be afraid, and he must have
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been close enough for them to hear him in the
middle of a storm, rememb there's a strong wind, and
yet he says, don't be afraid as me, and they
could hear him, so he's pretty close. He's already made
most of the journey. And so of course, as we said,
he said, don't be afraid. There's a lot of mention
of faith and fear in these stories, and that's really
what this is about today. And then Peter knew enough
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about Jesus to know that his whole thing was what
you see me, do I want you to do? So
he said, you know, and apparently he's still even though
they heard his voice, he must have been far enough
away from that that it wasn't entirely clear that it
was him. So Peter says, well, if it's you, I'm
gonna test you because I know you want me to
do what you do. So if it's you, tell me
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to come walk on the water with you, you know,
it's almost like I dare you to do this. And
then he you know, Jesus calls your bluff will come.
Peter's like, wait, why, I was just kidding Broun. I mean,
it's cool. No, Peter actually is Peter Man. He you know,
he's one of those people that has no problem being bold,
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and he has a problem, you know, being wise, but
he has no problem being bold. So the Bible tells
us if we keep reading here, you know, the Bible
says here. So Peter went over the side of the
boat and walked on the water toward Jesus. So he
gets out the boat, takes that first step, finds out
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just like walking on this stage, because when Jesus said
the word come, there was enough power in that one
word to give this man the ability to supersede nation
nature to walk on water. So he does it. He
walks in water to go to Jesus. But then I
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know the next thing that says here. But when he
saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified
and began to sink. Now, wait a minute, didn't I
just read that before they even saw Jesus, they were
dealing with the strong wind in waves. Isn't that how
this story started? Right? They were in trouble, far away
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from land, a strong wind had arisen and they were
fighting heavy waves. So the wind and the waves were
not new. There was strong wind and there were heavy
waves before he even stepped out of the boat. But
now he steps out of the boat, he's walking to
Jesus based on what Jesus said, and he loses his focus.
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He stops focusing on that supernatural word come, and instead
he starts focusing on the reasons why you normally wouldn't come,
the wind and the ways. It's really, why does that
it even He really didn't even focus on the water,
because wait a minute, you can't walk on water. But
he starts looking at all these other things. And this
is part of the reason why some of us are
even asking God, where are you? He says, Lord save me,
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And this is our way of saying, Lord save me,
because we just lost focus. It's not that God went anywhere.
It's not that he changed what he said. It's simply
that you have stopped looking at him. You stop looking
at the promise he gave you, and you start looking
at what's going on around you. And when you get
in fear, you will sink. When you say in faith,
(16:00):
you will walk, but fear will cause you to sink.
Every time this man lost his focus. So the Bible
says he began to sink, and and and he says,
and of course he says, save me, Lord, and I
love this. Jesus immediately reached out and grabbed him. Every
time I read this, this always jumps out in me,
because what's wild about this is that he clearly got
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very close to Jesus. You know, Jesus didn't you know,
the Bible doesn't say Jesus, you know, ran across the
water that had have been cool to see. The Bible
didn't say that. Jesus, you know, jumped in and swam
and you know, you know, grabbed him and and you know,
you know, took him back to the boat. It says
Jesus immediately stretched forth his hand. So that means that
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Peter was almost there, like another couple steps, and he's
made it. It was right before he had his final breakthrough,
that he had his he had seemingly his greatest challenge.
And for some of us, that's what's going on right now.
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You are right there, I mean, you are right there.
You've been believing God for this for who knows how
long you fought over who knows far how many battles.
God has done some miracles through you. God has done
some miracles for you. You've been walking on the water,
and just when you're about to have your breakthrough, everything
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breaks out. All of a sudden, things seem to be
falling apart. And what you need to do in this moment,
more than ever, is keep your focus on what God said.
You might be facing your greatest battle because you're on
the doorstep of your greatest accomplishment, because you're on the
doorstep of your greatest victory. That's why things are falling.
I'm talking to somebody bout the holies fear. You might
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be sitting at home, But that's why you were saying, God,
why is all this happening? Because the enemy knows that
if you have another couple more steps in you, he
is done. That battle is over, and from here on
out you'll be telling people about what the Lord has done.
So you cannot allow yourself right now to give up.
This is the time to put on your faith shades
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and say what did God say? God said, Come So
even though it looks bad and it feels bad and
everybody thinks I've lost my mind, because God said come,
I'm gonna keep on walking on the water, and I'm
gonna have my victory. But notice the key once again.
You can't be focused on the wind. You can't be
focused on the waves. You can't be focused on how
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you feel right now. You need to ask yourself the
question very simply, what did God say? Turn to somebody
and ask him what did God say? I want to
end this by noticing Jesus immediately reached out and grabbing
He said, you have so little faith? And then he said,
why did you doubt me? Why did you doubt me? See,
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that's the challenge. We end up in a situation we're
doubting God, and you don't have any reason to doubt God.
He can do the impossible. He cannot only do the impossible.
He can cause you to do the impossible. But you
gotta stay focused on what he said. Well, let's look
at a different type of story in Genesis chapter twenty two,
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because sometimes we have to hold on to what God said,
even when for God to do what he said would
take the impossible. And let me shoot tell you what
I'm talking about. Genesis twenty two, verse one, it says
sometime later God tested Abraham's faith. Abraham, God called yes.
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He replied, here, I am take your son, your only son, yes, Isaac,
whom you love so much, and go to the land
of Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on
one of the mountains, which I shall show you. So
God speaks to Abraham and he says, I want you
to take your son. This is the son you believe,
for you had him at one hundred years old, and
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I want you to take him to this mountain. I
want you to sacrifice. And Abraham had a covenant with
God and that meant that he needed he had to
obey what God told him to do. And Abraham understood that.
So he's now going to obey God and take the
thing he wanted the most in the world and sacrifice
it for God. And do recognize that God does require
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our lives. That's what salvation is. It's not just praying
a prayer. It's giving God your life like he gave
you his life. Right, you don't get to pick and
choose what areas of my life God's involved in. That's
not what it means to be a Christian. That's what
not what it means to be a follower. Jesus. To
be a follower of Jesus means that Christ is my life.
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I don't pick stuff. I seek God and find out
what he's picked. I don't pick my calling. I don't
pick my job. Then I don't pick my church. I
don't even really pick who I'm married. I don't even
pick you know, I talked to God. Okay, y'all was
all happy loving this message until that moment. But it's true.
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So God saying, Hey, this is what I'm expecting you
to do. Verse eight. So of course, if we were
to keep reading, you find out that his son eventually
kind of says, hey, Dad, you know what's going on.
You know where's the land? Where's the sheep? And this
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is Abram's response, God will provide a sheep for the
burnt offering my son. And they both walked on together.
And when they arrived at the place where God had
told him to go, Abraham built an altar and ranged
the wood on it. Then he tied his son Isaac
and laid him on the altar on top of the wood.
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There's a message in there about the fact that Isaac
trusted his dad this much. And Abraham picked up a
knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. And at
that moment, the Angel Lord called him from heaven Abraham. Abraham. Yes,
Abraham replied, here I am, don't lay a hand on
the boy. The angel said, you not hurt him in
any way. For now I know that you truly fear
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of God. You have not withheld from me even your son,
your only son, which of course paved the way for
God to not have not withhold his son from us.
Because Abraham was willing to give his son to God.
God was willing to give his son to us. So
there's some deep things in there. I won't try to
teach today. He said, why would God require that? Because
he was working on something? Okay, But then look at
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Hebrews chapter eleven. Let's get a different perspective on this.
Talking about the same instance, it says it was by
faith that Abraham offered Isaac as a sacrifice when God
was testing him. Abraham, who had received God's promises, which
would include the promise of a son, was ready to
sacrifice his only son, Isaac. Get this, even though God
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had told him Isaac is the son through whom your
descendants will be counted. Wait a minute, and if you
were to back up. We won't go there for times sake.
You can find scripture where God made it very clear
to Abraham that he'd be the father of many nations,
but that it would happen through Isaac, meaning Isaac was
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going to get married and have kids, and then they
would get married and have kids. And they get married
and have kids. But the idea was that Isaac was
going to be the one that was going to give
him grandkids. So God said, Isaac is going to be
the one that does these things. But then God tells
him kill Isaac. You see the problem. But God, you
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said this, but you're telling me to do this. So
it's really wild about this? Then? Is that? The Bible
says Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able
to bring him back to life again. And in a sense,
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Abraham did receive his son back from the dead. So
here's how Abraham did this. He put on his faith shades.
God said in Isaac, will my seed be called? Now
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I know he told me to kill him, But God said,
and Isaac, will my seed be called? God said, So,
I don't know what God's gonna do here. Maybe he
gonna raise him from the dead. But I know that
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when God gets done, Isaac is gonna be alive because
God said, and Isaac, shall my seat be caught? And
what I love about this is, up until this point
in the Bible, you've never seen anybody raise from the dead. Now,
if you are Christian at all, you read the Bible,
all you know there are cases after cases after cases
(25:34):
of people being raised from the dead. We know Jesus
was raised from the dead, but at that point in time,
there wasn't no instances of anybody being raised from the dead.
It never happened, was never heard of. He was so
confident in what God had said that he made it up. Well,
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God got to raise him from the dead, and he'll
do that, because in Isaac, shall my seed be called?
He literally just came up with it. I don't know
how God's gonna do it. If he got to raise
him from the dead, that's what he gonna do, because
I believe he will do what he said. There's something
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we can learn in this. Abraham held on to his
faith despite the fact that it would take God doing
something he had never seen or even heard of before,
and so he got what God promised. And sometimes that's
when we get caught up. I just can't see how
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God can fix this. Anybody been there? Come on, I'm
there right now. Anybody been here? You put your hand up,
even if your hand out, they're not. Look at all
those hands. I just can't see. It is impossible if
you're not careful. You know, like this guy in Second King,
chapter seven, You remember that story. If I would talk
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about how the city I believe of Samaria was in
such great famine that people were eating their children. The
prophet of God came and said, this is what God said,
by this time tomorrow, and he gave some economic indicators,
but bottom line was this nation's going to be prosperous.
And one of the men who was there said, man,
if God were to make windows in heaven, that couldn't happen.
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And he said to him, well, you'll see it, but
you won't get to eat any of it, because he
doubted what God said because of what he saw, and
if we're not careful, we'll follow his example instead of
following Abraham's example. Abraham's example was very similar to us saying, today,
you know what, You're the God who was able to
do exceedingly abundantly above all I can ask or even think.
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Your thoughts are higher than my thoughts, Your ways are
higher than my ways. You can do the impossible. So
even though I don't see how you can fix this,
even though I don't see how I can get to
the future you long for, I'm gonna put my faith
shades on and I'm gonna say, you know, what, what
did God say? And if God said I'm getting double
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from my trouble, I don't know what he gonna do,
but I'm getting it. If God said I'm gonna be healed,
I'm getting that. God says my family will serve the Lord.
I'm getting that. I don't care what it looks like.
I don't care if I can't figure it out. I
know that if God said it, God will do it.
I'm a focus on what God said. Come on, somebody said, again,
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what did God say? Muscles simple message today, But as
when we got to get a hold of we gotta
get refocused here. We've got to get, you know, recalibrate
our faith here and focus on what matters. If God
said it, he will do it. If God spoke it,
he will bring it to past. Has he said it
and will he not do it? Has he spoken it,
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and will he not bring it to pass? Is it
not impossible for God to lie? You've heard it said before.
If God were to say the sky is purple, it
would turn purple because he said it's purple. If he
said it, he will do it. And there is nothing
on this planet that can stop it from happening except you,
because he needs your phase. What's the question? What did
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God said? God likes doing the impossible, but it does
require us believing for the impossible. It's go a step further.
Y'all get anything out of this. It's flowing a little
different than I thought it would, but as long as
y'all getting it. Second Chronicles shot the twenty The reason
(29:48):
happened after this that the people of Moab, with the
people of Amen and others with them besides the Ammonites,
came to battle against Jehosaph Fad. Then some came and
told your host of Fact saying, a great multitude is
coming against you from beyond the sea, from Syria, and
they are in Hazizon tomorrow, which is ingody. The idea
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is they're pretty close. Jehostah fact Fear get this and
set himself to seek the Lord and proclaim to fast
throughout all Judah. So Judah gathered together to ask help
from the Lord. That's what he's seeking the Lord, for
I need help, and Judah came, and that's help of
the Lord. And thank God, God offers help, Bible says
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the Hebrews, for that we can come boldly to the
throne of grace and obtain mercy and grace to help
in time of need. So Bible says, once again, they
gather together to ask help of the Lord, and from
all the cedars that juitter. They came to seek the Lord.
So notice that they find out that three armies are
coming to attack them, and they already know they can't
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they can't defeat them. So we will say the president
today caused National Day of Prayer, and he sets himself
and the people set themselves to seek the Lord. And
they're just they're just coming to God to say, God
help us. There's nothing we can do. We jumped down
the verse twelve, and he says, Oh, Our God, here's
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Jojosephat's prayer. Will you not judge them, for we have
no power against this great multitude that is coming against us,
nor do we know what to do what's he saying here,
He's saying there's nothing we can do, and we don't
know what to do. Anybody relate to that, and nothing
(31:36):
I can do to fix this, and I don't know
what to do. Say so, our eyes are on you.
That's the right place to put your eyes. Verse fourteen.
Then the spirit of the Lord came upon Jehaziel, the
son of Zachariath, the son of Beniah, the son of Jyale,
the son of matt and Iah, a levite of the
sons of the a of Asap. But you know what's
interesting about this is the sons of Asap we're anointed
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to be musicians. That's what they were. They were musicians.
And you know, God didn't choose to jump on a
prophet in that moment. He chose to jump on a musician.
And sometimes you got to recognize God will not speak
to you through who you expect him to speak to
you to. You know, I mean, you remember that place
(32:23):
in the Bible where God had a donkey speak to
the prophet and the donkey saved his life. You know,
sometimes we want to tell God who went, we're and
how and God say, wait a minute, I'm God. Remember
sometimes we want to have God tell We want to
tell God how to speak to us about our situations. God,
is such a big, bad situation. I need you to
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speak loud and clear this time. Can you peel back
the roof and put your head down and just say
it's me, Please, God. I don't need that little nudge.
I don't need no little whisper. I don't need none
of that. I need straw heavy voice from heaven and
sins seven people to confirm what you said. Lord and God,
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like I already nudged you. There's some faith involved in
that too. And sometimes what God will do is he'll
speak to you through that nudge or even through other people,
and then he expects you to do what He said
through them, and if you don't, you just deal with
the consequences. Remember with Israel in Egypt, God didn't speak
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to Israel. God spoke to Moses and told Israel, told
Moses what to tell Israel, and they didn't do what
Moses said. They died. I'm getting deeper than I want
to get here today. By line is God speaks to
Jehzel and he says, listen to all of you, Judah,
and your inhabitants of Jerusalem, and you, King Jehosah Fat,
(33:52):
thus says the Lord to you, do not be afraid
nor just made because of this great multitude, For the
battle is not yours, but God's. Tomorrow. Go down against them.
They will surely come up by the ascentims, and you
will find him at the end of the brook, before
the wilderness of Jeriel. You will not need to fight
in this battle. Position yourself, stand still and see the
salvation of the Lord who is with you, Oh Judah
(34:13):
and Jerusalem. Do not fear or be discouraged. Don't be dismayed,
don't fall, don't break apart, for the Lord is with you. Right.
So notice this word they get from God. And if
we know the rest of the story, we know that
they immediately accept that they fall in their face, they
worship God. Then they go ahead and get everybody, and
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they're gonna head out to the battle tomorrow. They're in
such faith that Jehosaph fact didn't decide this by himself.
He actually consulted with the people, and they decided to
put the choir ahead of the army because they knew
that we were just going to spectate. So we're gonna
go ahead and start cheering for our team ahead of
time because we already know God's gonna do because we
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know what God said. They still got three armies coming
to attack them. It still looks bad, but we know
what God says. So come on, choir this, go ahead
and saying praise the Lord for his mercy, and do
it for the Lord is good. And can you imagine
the other the people that are attacking them, like what
is that? Are they singing? Right? So we know and
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what happens. God has them fight each other. They all die.
When they get there, they find three days worth of spoil.
And we talked about that maybe a couple of weeks ago.
All right, But what's one thing I want you to
get a hold of here, is that for you to
focus on what God said, sometimes you need to figure
out what God said. One of the things that you
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have to find from God sometimes you got to get
from God is the word of the Lord for your
particular situation. And there's another word for that. In fact,
Inphesians chapter the sixth, let me read it to you,
it's talking about the armor of God. It says, put
on salvation as you're a human and take the sword
(36:06):
of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Now,
the New Testament is translated from the Greek and the
original Greek. There were two words in particular that were
translated word. One of them is logos, which is the
written word right so you're literally reading logos right now.
The other is Rama. The rama word of God is
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a little different. In fact, let me read to you
what Van's Expository Dictionary says. It says here the reference
is not to the whole Bible as such, that's logos,
but to the individual scripture which the spirit brings to
our remembrance for use in time of need. Did you
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see that it's the individual scripture which the spirit brings
to our remembrance for use in time of need. He
go was gonna say a prerecords is being the regular
storying of the mind with scripture. You got to know
scripture for God to bring it to your remembrance. But
there are times where God will give you a rain
(37:13):
of word. Well, God will will either speak directly to
you or God will bring to your members a particular scripture,
and that's the scripture you're supposed to stand on. And
this is sometimes where we miss it. I know. Sometimes
Peo will come to me and say, Pastor, can you
pray for me about this, that and the other? And
I say, Okay, what scripture are you standing on the
(37:34):
majority of the time I say that They go, well,
we could, well, no, you need to get from God
the sword for this battle. Well you understand with guns,
right that you know there are times where you know,
(37:56):
you know, a assault rifle would bet you run through
Afghanistan trying to save American citizens. You need an assault rifle.
But if you in the city Detroit, and you in
a in an alley and you you fight for your life,
something a little small might work a little bit better.
And there are times where you you know you need
(38:20):
a specific word to stand on. That word is the
sword of the spirit that will take the enemy out.
Sometimes you can't take the whole Bible to a battle,
can y'all? Y'all with me? You can't. You can't quote.
You can't even you know, when you when you're dealing
(38:40):
with all these thoughts and and you're fighting a storm
and all that is going on, you can't even think
of eighteen scriptures right now. I just need one. Just
give me that one scripture that God has breathed on
for this situation. Because when he breathes on it, that's
when I got that. When he breathes on it, that stuff,
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let's go to the other side. When he breathes on it,
that's where the power is. So what did you say
about this situation? God? And God says, this is what
I said. I will supply all your need according to him.
So all of a sudden, the bill shows up. No,
my God shall supply all my need. They say, well,
you can't pay this bill. My God supplies all my need.
(39:24):
Well you're about to run out, you know, we're about
to take your house. My God supplies all my need.
And sure enough God shows up in the last moment
and pays off with you. But see you've got that word.
What's your reign of word? What's the scripture? God is
quick into your heart for you to hang on to,
for you to use as a weapon against the enemy.
(39:46):
And if you're saying, I don't know, do what Jr.
Hostaphact did he set himself to seek the Lord? What's
that scripture? Because God's got a for every situation. It's
got to rain about your kids, it's got to rain
(40:06):
about your marriage, it's got to raiment about your about
your ministry, about your church. What is it that God
is quickened to your heart? Sometimes he'll save you with that.
I didn't plan and say this, and I'm starting to
get over time, y'all. Okay. I remember when I was
pastoring in Atlanta and we had a we had a
(40:28):
nice facility, and we were we had bought some land
and we were planning to sell the facility. How to buyer.
They were gonna give us some really good amount of money.
We're gonna turn around and build on that land. But
there was an element of faith here because what was
happening was, you know, the amount of money we were
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told it would take to build on that land just
kept going up. And this was right. You know. You
remember this was like right before two thousand and eight,
so that the market was doing this, it was crazy,
and so construction prices were going through the roof. So
you know, when I first set out to do the deal,
it looked like this is gonna work. Got to believe.
But now it just keeps getting worse and worse and worse.
But here I am at the end of negotiations. And
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I mean when I say at the end. I mean,
the lawyers have done enough everything they're gonna do, and
they kind of like, okay, this is we were pretty
much there, you know, you're ready to sign. And I
just felt kind of funny about it. And you know,
I mean I was. I guess I was thirty, I
don't know a little younger. And I remember walking around
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my kitchen literally just thinking about it. And I walked
up to my sink and I don't know what I
was washing or doing, and I heard this scripture come
from my heart. Count the cost, you know that scripture.
No man builds a tower without counting the cost. It
was a rain of word, and I knew immediately, oh,
don't do this deal. And I didn't, and you know,
(41:59):
to thousand and eight happened, and we would have been
at church without a building, supposedly building a building for
who knows how many years. But God gave me a
raym up that saved us. That was a word. But
you know, God can't give you a ram a word
if you don't know the word. So you got to
(42:22):
start like reading your Bible every day. But he gave
me that word and it was And so this is
one reason why you want to spend time in the Bible.
One reason why you want to spend time in prayer
so that you know you can when God does want
to drop stuff in your heart, you can recognize it.
But having said that, let's go back to the main point.
(42:43):
You can't say what did God say if you have
been taken to find out, to take the time to
find out, what did he say about your situation? What's
your come James chapter one. See, once you got that
raindal word from God, man, then you'll find there's peace there,
(43:06):
there's grace there. You can walk on the water. But
you gotta get it. And sometimes you'll get it from
meditating in the world of God, just reading the Bible
and studying it and something will pop up at you. You know,
it's like the words jump off the page. You know,
God's saying something to you. But other times you get
it in this way. And James chapter one. Of course, Paul,
excuse me, James is talking to the church. He's talking
(43:28):
about being in tough times, you know, and so if
you're the reverse two he says, my brethren counted all
joy when you fall into various trials. Ooh, that'll preach
consider it all joy when you fall into. Not if
you fall in. When you fall in, everybody's gonna fall
(43:50):
in at deathe tough times. So when it happens, I
actually look at it as a good thing. And he
goes on to talk about not because God sends trouble
your way. God's not sending anything to you to hurt
you or to you. But who is saying that trouble
will work for you. It will develop your patience, which
will help you get your place. You don't lack anything.
Verse five. So if any of you lacks wisdom, well,
(44:12):
lacks wisdom, win when you're in tough times. I mean,
this time, it's tough, it's struggling. I'm trying to keep
my joy up, but I don't know what to do.
That sounded like we just finished reading God. I do
not see the way out. I don't. I don't know.
I don't. I don't know how to win this. Well,
(44:33):
if you lack wisdom, ask of God. God gives to all,
which means he will give to you liberally bountifully. One
scripture in one hundred and forty fifth Psalm says that
God gives with an open hand. He's got an open
hand in front of you. God knows the way out
(44:53):
of your trouble, and God wants you to know the
way out of your trouble. I'm gonna say it again.
God knows the way out of your true and he
wants you to know the way out of your trouble.
So he says, just come and ask me. He says,
he gives literally and the upbrad of not meaning that
God will not correct you because you asked for him.
God will not hold back the answer from you. God's
not holding back the answer. He's not playing a game.
(45:17):
He's not encrypting things so you can't hear them or
understand them. If you're not hearing clearly from God. The
problem isn't God. And sometimes the problem is God already
told us and we didn't like what we heard, so
we like, well, that ain't it? So Lord, what is
it he keep telling you? And Lord? What is he
(45:39):
keep telling you? Lord? And you? Three months? Six month
nine mother year? Lord that Lord ain't talking to me
the Lord up in here, and like, come on, man,
not only want to come. I'm dealing with that now.
Lords saying this and then and I'm like, oh Lord,
why because that's impossible. Wait a minute, He does the impossible. No,
(46:01):
he says, man, just ask and it would be given
to you. God is not hiding his word from you.
He's hiding his word for you. Come on, now, he's
there saying, if you seek me, you will find me.
If you set yourself to seek me, then you're gonna
find that. I'm gonna give you the answer that you need.
But some of us we need to set ourselves there.
(46:23):
Some of us, guys, we're used to setting ourselves in
front of the television. We got the headset on, we
got the PlayStation in our in our hands, and we'll
do that for hours. But we won't give God fifteen
minutes to hear a rain of word that could change
our life forever. Come on, you know what it means
to set yourself. Some of us, we set ourselves in
front of the Netflix, and we'll ben just show five, six, seven,
(46:43):
eight episodes till through three in the morning. But we
won't give God thirty minutes to find out what he
has to say about my hell. We know what it
means to set yourself somewhere. We do it in a
movie theater. Every time we go to a movie, we
sit down. We set ourselves for two to three hours.
If you just gave God those two to three hours
and heard from God, then you'd be happy when you
went to the movies. But you gotta take the time.
(47:08):
Come on, somebody say time. You gotta take the time
to find out what did God say to me about this?
And then when you heard what God said to you
about that, now you can put on your faith glasses
and no matter what you see it, what's going on?
You can say, But God said, and get to the
(47:31):
other side. What did God say? You tell me when
I come in, you come to me hypastica and you
pray for this? All right, what's your scripture? Let's agree
on it. Well, this is what God said. I was
(47:52):
reading my Bible and this scripture jumped out at me
and I knew that was for this situation. I was
praying and God said, tomorrow, this is what's going on.
I want you to do this. And see a lot
of times we're looking for answers. We want God to
do something. Healed this, change their heart, do that, do this,
do that, and the answer comes in the form of
a word instruction. There was a woman at taking King
(48:16):
Chapter four. The Bible says her sons were about to
be taken from her. She was in such deep debt.
She goes to the Man of God, you know, help me,
And then you would think that he would give her money.
He gave her a word, go get vessels. Go gather vessels,
not a few, and fill them up with oil. She
did it. Not only does she have money for that situation,
she had money for the rest of her life. There's
(48:37):
other places in the Bible the same thing happen. Namen
was a man who had leprosy. He came to the
Man of God and he he you know, And the
Man of God didn't even see him, didn't even bother
even meeting him. He just sent word out dip in
the Jordan river seven times and Aama gets upset, Like
I thought he was gonna do something spectacular. I thought
he's gonna call down something from heaven and no, no,
(48:59):
he just gave a word. But when they am and
did what was said, he was healed. What did God say,
Stop looking, Stop trying to tell God how to fix
your problem. That's for somebody me too. He's God. If
(49:19):
he tells you to do something, you do it, You
hang on to it, and you watch God bring you
ventory One more thing, Salt miner. I'm just gonna end here.
Just want to remind you of something somebody said, again,
what did God say? That's the big question, what did
(49:42):
God say? I like this. I love the scripture. I
think it's a great ending to what we're doing today.
Salt ninety two twelve says this, the righteous shall flourish
like the palm tree. He shall grow it like a
cedar in Lebanon. The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree.
(50:03):
If you're somebody that's living right for God, that's really
what the Old Testament. The righteous are people who lived right.
This is your future. You will flourish. I'm preaching better
than y'all saying a man I said you will flourish.
You see something similar Psalm one. That you'll be like
a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings
forth its fruit and it season. You will not wither.
(50:28):
You will not wither, you will not wilt, you will
not lose it. You're you're not gonna fall apart. You
will flourish. But I love the fact that he says
we will flourish like the palm tree. Why I was
I was in Florida this week got some sun. Hallylujah
(50:48):
came back to Michigan and said, why on earth am
I here? Palm trees are the kind of trees that
when you do have hurricanes and things like that happened
in general, you don't see those break. You see all
kinds of trees on the ground. The palm trees are
literally designed by God to bend, but they don't break.
(51:17):
In fact, when whatever's happening is over with, the palm
tree bounces back up and is even stronger after the
storm than it was before the storm. You are a
palm tree. You might be bending right now, but you're
not gonna break. You got some holy ghost buoyancy, some
(51:41):
bounce back ability. You're gonna bounce back, and you're gonna
be even stronger than you ever were when you went
in it. You came in at this level of strength.
You're coming out even stronger and wiser, with a story
to tell about how God's been good to you. But
you will flourish, flourish. So I want to encourage you
(52:02):
about that. No matter what the enemy is throwing your way,
God's word is stronger. So the question isn't what are
you facing today? The question is What did God say,
I'm on lift handsword he Let's thank God for the
word of God. Thank you Father, Thank you for tuning
(52:24):
in to another Faith Experience podcast. Remember God as a
future for you.
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