Summit Life with J.D. Greear

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today on Summit Life with JD. Grear.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
That's how despair and depression actually works. The momentum of
a few true things leads you to a dangerously false conclusion. Oh,
it's all lost, false God, it's useless, My famili's never
gonna change.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
False, I'll never be happy. False.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Your depressed self is whispering these conclusions to.

Speaker 4 (00:21):
You, and you have got to stop listening to them.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Welcome to Summit Life with JD. Greer, lead Pastor of
the Summit Church in Raleigh, Durham, North Carolina. As always,
I'm your host, Molly Videvich. One King's Chapter eighteen records
a definite high point in the life of the prophet
Elijah when he faced off against the prophets of Bail
on Mount Carmel. God came through for Elijah in an

(00:53):
awesome way, and the people repented and turned back to
the One True God. It was an amazing victory. But
then right afterward things seem to go downhill for him.
In downhill rather quickly. Today, Pastor JD. Picks up the
story as Elijah is on the run for his life
and dealing with some heavy emotions. It's safe to say

(01:14):
that the high he felt is long gone, and he's
slipping into the depths of depression. So grab your bible
and a pen, and let's rejoin Pastor JD in First Kings.

Speaker 3 (01:27):
First Kings nineteen two.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, so may
the gods do to me, and more also, if I
do not kill you by this time tomorrow, Jezebel has
not repented, nor has she been deposed.

Speaker 3 (01:42):
Far from it.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
She is still on the throne, worshiping her gods, barking
out orders ordering his death. He's got to go back
into hiding verse three. Then he was afraid, and he
rose and ran for his life, and came to Beersheba,
which belongs to Judah, and he left his servant there.
He went by himself a day's journey into the wilderness,
and came and sat down under a broom tree, and

(02:05):
he asked that he might die safe to say, Elijah
is depressed.

Speaker 3 (02:11):
He's angry with God. Verse five.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
And he lay down, and he slept under a broom tree,
and behold an angel touched him and said to him,
arise and eat. And he looked, and behold there was
at his head a cake verse nine, and behold, the
word of the Lord came to him, and he said to.

Speaker 3 (02:27):
Him, what are you doing here? Elijah?

Speaker 2 (02:30):
He said, I've been very jealous for the Lord, the
God of Host, for the people of Israel have forsaken
your covenant. They've thrown down your altars, and they've killed
your prophets with the sword. And I, even I only
am left. They seek my life to take it away.
What do you see there in those verses that God
is doing. Let me point out that you got three

(02:52):
different approaches to dealing with depression. In those verses, he
ministers to Elijah physically with the touch, with the food,
and with the nap, spiritually by dealing with this wrong
view of God, and psychologically by listening to him right.
God uses all three because He designed us in all
three ways. Now I can diagnose which one of these
is primarily your problem. Usually not always, it's a combination

(03:15):
of these things. And what I'm going to say from
here on out applies mostly to spiritually based depressions and discouragement.
The Biblical Counseling Coalition put out a chart recently called
the development of spiritually rooted depressions and what you'll see
is you've got. You got kind of four stages, and
the first one is disappointment. Disappointment, that's where you've got confusion, sadness, grief,

(03:39):
unfulfilled expectations. That's what's going on with Elijah right. Unfulfilled expectations.
I thought things would be different. God didn't come through.
That leads to discontentment. Discontentment which produces self righteousness, self pity.
That's where Elijah is, I'm the only one. You're not
taking care of me.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Brooding. That leads to number three, despair, you see no
way out.

Speaker 2 (03:59):
You want to start to give up on responsibilities. Stage
four destructiveness were in some cases you become suicidal or homicidal.
Here's what God's word is to the discouraged. Here it
is he is what he says to Elijah verse eleven.
And God said, go out and stand on the mount
before the Lord, and behold.

Speaker 3 (04:19):
The Lord passed by.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
And a great and strong wind tore the mountains and
broke in pieces of the rocks before the Lord.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
But the Lord was not in the wind.

Speaker 2 (04:27):
After the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord
was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake, a
fire but the Lord was not in the fire. And
after the fire the sound of a low whisper or
a still small voice verse thirteen. And when Elijah heard
the still small voice, he wrapped his face and the
cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of
the cave and behold. Then there came a voice to

(04:50):
him and said, what are you doing here?

Speaker 3 (04:51):
Elijah? All right, so what's this about?

Speaker 2 (04:54):
It was a very important detail, and she got to
understand to unpack this passage that you might have skipped
over Horeb. Do you know another name for Mount Horeb,
mount Sinai. Mount Horeb is Mount Sidna. You remember what
happened about Sinai. That's where God gave the tank commandments.
And when God descended on that same mountain to Moses,

(05:14):
what did it look like?

Speaker 3 (05:16):
Fire? Wind, earthquake?

Speaker 2 (05:19):
And God, in Moses's case, was in the fire, remember
the burning bush, He was in the wind, he was
in the earthquake. Those things were the presence of God.
And now with the Elijah, those same things happen. But
it specifically says God was not in the fire, God
was not in the earthquake. God was not in the tornado.

(05:42):
So what is the meaning of that here? It is
God's voice in our lives does not always come in
the ways we expect him to. But that does not
mean that God is not speaking. That's the point that
he's trying to make. Hey with Moses, I was in
the fire. You were thinking that when I showed up
in your situation, I'd come with the same kind of things.

(06:05):
You thought that there would be this epic revolution, but
there wasn't, and you assumed that that meant that I'm
not working. But you are wrong. The verses fifteenth through eighteen.

Speaker 3 (06:13):
Look at it. You'll see what God says he's doing.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
He's raising up a pagan king named Haziel who's going
to bring judgment on Ahab and his wicked witch of
the West wife, Jezebel.

Speaker 3 (06:22):
You may want to write this down.

Speaker 2 (06:23):
Elijah thinks that God has let him down. But God
has not let Elijah down. Elijah's limited view of God
and how God works has let Elijah down. So you
want to take a point right down. Number one, In
a time of discouragement, you must defer to the.

Speaker 3 (06:36):
Wisdom of God.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
In a time of discouragement, you must defer to the
wisdom of God. Because God is often doing his best
work in ways that you don't know. You ever get
to a stage in your life when you look back
on another stage in your life when it really looked
in that stage like God was not there, He's not working,
and then like five years later you're like, oh, I
totally see that God was doing some of his best

(06:59):
work right there.

Speaker 3 (07:00):
Right.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
So if you watch, if you with five years with
limited time perspective, can already see what God was doing
in some of the dark times.

Speaker 3 (07:09):
Don't you think they.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Given enough time like eternity and enough perspective like heavenly wisdom,
you're gonna see a reason for all of it.

Speaker 3 (07:16):
You must defer to the wisdom of God.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
Number two, here's a second thing being taught. You must
embrace the love and the grace of God. You got
to embrace the love and the grace of God. He said,
where do you get that? JD.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
I'll show you. Remember I pointed out the detail.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
God calls Elijah out of the cave in verse eleven,
but Elijah don't actually get.

Speaker 3 (07:34):
Out there to verse thirteen.

Speaker 2 (07:36):
So what's happening is Elijah just you know, is he
why does he not go out in verse eleven.

Speaker 3 (07:43):
All right, well, what happens in verse twelve? Do you
see that tornado? Right? Earthquake? Fire?

Speaker 2 (07:50):
In fact, the tornado and the earthquake are so bad
it said it tore the mountain in pieces. If it
tore the mountain in pieces, what would it have done
to Elijah had Elijah going out there? In verse eleven,
so God keeps Elijah in the mountain so that the
mountain listen, absorbs the intensity of the tornado. The mountain
absorbs the fire, the mountain absorbs the earthquake. And so

(08:10):
when Elijah comes out, all he experiences of God is
a still small, gentle voice. You see, the tornado, the earthquake,
and the fire are all pictures of God's judgment. Elijah
was hidden in the cleft of the rock the cave,
so that the mountain would absorb those things and they
would not touch Elijah. The mountain absorbed the judgment. So

(08:33):
Elijah got grace. But maybe even more than that, what
he's giving to Elijah catch this is a picture of
something that we, you and I are going to see
much more clearly. So you knew that Elijah, You know this.
He never dies. He gets swept up in a cherry
to fire. The only people in the Bible doesn't die,
but he shows up again. Do you remember where he
shows up? You don't know if your Bible know this.

(08:53):
He shows up again right before Jesus dies, on top
of a mountain, standing with Jesus in all of his glory,
and standing with him is Moses. Now, Moses, if you
recall sold you just saion Ago also met God at
that exact same place, Mount Sinai.

Speaker 3 (09:13):
And remember this.

Speaker 2 (09:15):
When God came to Moses Moses, God said, if you
see me, you'll die. So God put Moses in the
cleft of the rock, just like he put Elijah, and
he passed by so that he would not be destroyed.
So now what you've got watch this is Moses and
Elijah standing on top of the mountain in the presence
of the glory of Jesus, and it's not hurting them

(09:36):
because they are for the first time seeing what that
mountain represented, and that is Jesus, who would be the rock,
who would absorb the tornado, the fire, and the earthquake
of God's judgment, so that all we could get is
the low and gentle whisper of intimacy and tenderness. What
they saw in mystery, we see in clarity. What they
saw in shadow, we see in substance. Jesus received the

(10:01):
tornado of God's judgment. He in Hebrew terms, inherited the wind.
He got the earthquake of God's justice. There was a
little earthquake when Jesus died on the cross. He got
the fire of God's justice that burned through him. So
that you and I watch this. We experienced all three
of those things in the first four chapters of Acts.
The Holy Spirit comes like a mighty rushing wind, but
the wind does not destroy.

Speaker 3 (10:22):
The wind fills us with power.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
It appears as a cloven tongue of fire above our heads,
but the fire does not destroy.

Speaker 3 (10:28):
It gives us resurrection power.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
They pray and act for and God shakes the room
with an earthquake, but the earthquake does not destroy him.

Speaker 3 (10:34):
It fills them with boldness.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
Jesus got the fire, the tornado, and he got the
earthquake of God's judgment, so that you and I could
get the low whisper that releases into us a tornado,
an earthquake, and the fire of God's power. You see,
he's the rock, He's the what took that so that
you got great, so that you hear the low whisper
of God saying in you, abba father the book of Romans,

(10:56):
he sheds abroad through his spirit love in your heart,
and he wished for see you.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
I am your daddy, You are my child. You are my.

Speaker 2 (11:04):
Beloved son, and whom I am well pleased. You're my
beloved daughter and whom I'm well pleased. The spirit testifies
in our spirit that we are the children of God and.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
Cries out, Daddy.

Speaker 2 (11:14):
And seeing that means that whenever God doesn't do what
I think he really should do, I don't have to doubt.

Speaker 3 (11:19):
His goodness or his control. Let me think about it.

Speaker 2 (11:22):
God's goodness towards me was forever demonstrated at the cross
when he prayed for my forgiveness, even when I was
pounding nails into his hands. Do I need to doubt
his goodness toward me now? It's like John Owen said,
the greatest insul you could give to God after the
cross is to doubt his love for you. I don't
doubt his goodness when I feel like I'm alone in

(11:43):
a time of discouragement or disfonancy, I'm not. I'm not
why I guess him and he proves I'm not. Because
that's where Jesus went into the garden and actually was alone.
He prayed to God the Father, and God the Father
turned his back away, and so that Jesus would say
to him, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
But because Jesus went through that and thus forsaken for me,
I know that when I walk through a garden that
feels like guess so many that I am not alone,

(12:05):
that he is.

Speaker 3 (12:05):
Walked with me.

Speaker 2 (12:07):
That though I walk through the valley of the shadow
of Death, I don't have to fear any evil because
you're with me.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
I will never leave you or forsake you, he says.
I don't have to doubt those things, even though I
feel like it. I might feel like all hope is lost.
I may feel like it's all out of control, but
it's not.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
Thanks for joining us today for summitt Life with Pastor JD. Greer.
We'll get back to today's teaching in a moment, but
I am very excited to tell you about our latest
premium resource here on Summit Life. It's called Elijah and Elisha,
an eight day scripture guide through first King seventeen to
Second King six And the beautiful part is that it
parallels our new teaching series here on the program. It's

(12:45):
an eight day devotional that takes you through the amazing,
extraordinary lives and ministries of these two profits. And by
using our normal four part approach to the text, reading, studying, praying,
and applying, you can walk through it on your own
or bring someone along the journey through some key passages
in First and Second Kings. As you'll see, reading about

(13:06):
the great faith of others is a very helpful way
to grow your own faith in God's power. We'd love
to send you a copy of this new devotional today
with your gift of thirty five dollars or more to
this ministry. Give us a call at eight six six
three three five fifty two twenty, or you can give
online at Jdgreer dot com. Now let's get back to

(13:28):
today's teaching once again. Here's Pastor JD.

Speaker 3 (13:32):
Think about it.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
If there was ever a time ever that it looked
like God was out of control, it was the gross
That's when wicked men and women, the Jessebels of that
day are not just trying to kill Jesus but actually
killing Jesus.

Speaker 3 (13:47):
And the spineless whip king.

Speaker 2 (13:49):
In this case, Pilot not a half won't do anything
to stand up for him.

Speaker 3 (13:53):
But instead of it being.

Speaker 2 (13:55):
The greatest time where evil was in charge, it was
actually where God was doing his best work. It was
Friday of despair, but it was a Sunday of resurrection.
And what that means is in my dark times, when
I feel like I'm in a Friday, and sometimes I
feel like that, and when I feel like it's all
that is as crosses around me and i feel like
God's not showing up, and I'm like, my God, my God,
why have you forsaken me? I know that he actually

(14:16):
has not, because every time there's a cross, he always
brings a resurrection.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
If a good, all.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
Powerful, all wise, God was fully in charge of the cross.
I can be sure he's in charge of my life,
even when he's not doing the things that I expected
him to do. So that leads me to number three.
You must confront the lie. You must confront the lie.

Speaker 3 (14:34):
Twice.

Speaker 2 (14:34):
In this passage, God asked Elijah why he's depressed.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
Twice. God asked Elijah twice.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
Elijah responds, get this listen with a mixture of truth
and error, says.

Speaker 3 (14:46):
Exact same thing twice and a mixture of truth and
an error. What's this?

Speaker 2 (14:49):
I'm look at verse Tim, I've been zealous for you.
It's a true or false true thumbs up. The Israelites
have rejected you true or false. True.

Speaker 3 (15:01):
They have killed your prophets. True, I'm the only one left. False.

Speaker 2 (15:07):
God's got seven thousand secret agents in Israel Elijah didn't
know about. And by the way, he's about to raise
up another prophet at the end of One Kings nineteen,
a little fellow by the name of Elisha. Okay, who
is forever condemning you to get the two confused and
not be able to know who's wu right. And you're like, Elijah, Elishah,
what happened to who? I don't get it all right?
But Elisha is gonna have twice.

Speaker 3 (15:27):
The power that Elijah had.

Speaker 2 (15:29):
God's gonna raise up twice the power that Elijah had,
and Elija's totally unaware of that. Oh, and by the way,
there's actually coming another prophet who's gonna show up eight
hundred years later, who is going to be not just
a great prophet, it's going to be the Son of God. Himself,
who is going to bring the salvation that Elijah's just
got the taste of. He alone is left. Do you
realize how wrong that statement is? Elisha's coming, Jesus is coming.

(15:52):
But see, that's how despair and depression actually works. The
momentum of a few true things leads you to a
dangerously false. Oh it's all lost false God, it's useless not.
Families never gonna change false. My friends will never listen false.
The workplace that I work in will never be will

(16:12):
never be good, It's always gonna be toxic.

Speaker 3 (16:14):
False. It's not gonna get any better. False. There's nobody
who cares about me. False. I'll never be happy. False.

Speaker 2 (16:21):
Your depressed self is whispering these conclusions to you, and
you have got to stop listening to them. You got
to defy your depressed self. You gotta start preaching gospel
over your life, and don't mumble when you do it.
You got to take hold of yourself and preach. Don't
be long and by the way, don't do be long winded.

(16:41):
If that's what it takes, don't let me be the
only long winded preacher in your life. All right, you'd
be like I am not alone. I am not alone,
guess Simony and the Cross prove I'm not alone.

Speaker 3 (16:51):
My future is not dimn.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
It feels like it's dimn, but the resurrection shows me
it is not. I will be happy again. I will
have joy again. Tell your depression and sadness that it's
days are numbered. And even if it should, God forbid,
even if it should last, So your dying breath, it
will be vanquished for all eternity, while you, your redeemed,
glorified soul, will escape to everlasting joy in the Father's presence,

(17:15):
in whose presence is fullness of joy, and at whose
right hand there are pleasures forevermore. So, See, if you
never get over it, if you never get over it,
it's still not permanent. If you never get over it
in this life, it's still not permanent. Because God has
a resurrection, and you're going to be in the presence
of Him and whose presence is fullness of joy. Can't
get more joy than that right hand, or pleasures forevermore,

(17:37):
can't get longer than that.

Speaker 3 (17:40):
That's what your future is. So God says to Elijah.

Speaker 2 (17:43):
See, I'm working on a plan beyond anything you ever considered,
and it involves me actually coming to earth, Elijah, you
feel like your efforts.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
Have failed and are wasted. They are not Church.

Speaker 2 (17:52):
When you get to heaven, you're going to see that
there was no wasted act of faithfulness, not one. No
one answered prayer. Every cup of cold water, give it
in Jesus name. He knew about everyone, and every one.

Speaker 3 (18:01):
Them he used.

Speaker 2 (18:03):
Nothing done in God's name is ever wasted. In every
cross of pain and suffering and deprivation that you go
through in faith, God works the miracle of the resurrection.
So Paul says, in the midst of a cross of
his own. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, unmovable, always
abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your
labor is not in vain in the Lord. Because the

(18:24):
resurrection first Qrita is fifteen proves it's not going to be,
which means number four. You got to get back to
your assignment. You got to get back to your assignment
Verse fifteen. The story ends with God telling Elijah to
get back.

Speaker 3 (18:35):
To see it.

Speaker 2 (18:36):
Just get back to being a prophet. Elijah, there's some
people who need the word of God. You got a
king to annoint, You got another young man to train
up named Elisha. That means for you, whatever you ought
to be doing, no matter how despond it and underappreciated
you feel doing it, you got to get back to
doing it being a dad, being a mom, being a wife,
or a faithful husband.

Speaker 3 (18:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
I know the people around you don't appreciate you, and
i know that's a kind of cross, and I'm not
trying to make light of that, but I'm just saying,
you keep working through that cross because God that's how
he brings resurrection. You got to get back to being
a witness to your friends, even when they're not listening,
to keep pressing in on that unreached people group. I'm
saying that for our church planners that are listening right now,
to keep knocking on that door, realizing that God is

(19:18):
through the faithful service of his people and the crosses
that they bear, God's going to bring that resurrection of revival.

Speaker 3 (19:24):
And awakening that you have hoped for for so long
for that nation.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
You see, people tend to think that in the past,
in Bible times, God's work was always clear and dramatic
and easy to trace.

Speaker 3 (19:37):
That's not true. Wasn't true for Elijah, one of the
greatest prophets that ever lived.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
Elijah knew what it meant to be confused and angered
by God.

Speaker 3 (19:47):
He had questions just like.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
You, and he was desponded and he was depressed. God
was always working. He's working in your situation. He still small,
powerful earth shat mountain, moving fire inducing voice, is still
speaking in your heart in tenderness and grace.

Speaker 3 (20:10):
I told you.

Speaker 2 (20:10):
Charles Spurgeon struggled with depression for most of his life.
Doctors later figured out it was related to a condition
he e called gout that produced a lot of these
symptomatic things. That meant that for all of his days
he struggled with depression. Never got over it. Wasn't the
lack of faith by any means. He's one of the
greatest men of faith to live in the nineteenth and
twentieth century. Never got over it. Spurgeon decided to see

(20:34):
depression not as the absence of God's word. Spurgeon decided
to see depression listen to this as itself a word
from God. He opted to use it to trust that
God meant something by it or through it. He assumed
that God, through his depression, was giving Spurgeon and the
people he led a picture of something, and that picture

(20:55):
of something was better, and it was deeper than even
an easy earth life and a body that works like
it's supposed to. He assumed that that depression was a symbol,
a pointer to an eternity that would be much better
than anything we could ever achieve on earth, an eternity
in the presence of Jesus, in whose presence is fullness
of joy, and in whose right hand are pleasures forevermore.

(21:19):
Once Suspergeon's congregation, he said, listen to this I quote.
I find myself frequently depressed, perhaps more so than anybody
else in this room of ten thousand people, I the
pastor of the Man of God, and more depressed than
anybody else in here. I find no better cure for
that depression than to trust in the Lord with all
my heart, and seek to realize afresh the power of

(21:41):
the peace speaking blood of Jesus and his infinite love
in dying upon the cross, to put away all my transgressions.
You hear what he did. He preached to himself. He
preached to himself. You need to preach to yourself. You
need to stop listening to your depressed self well, and
start preaching to your depressed self, because.

Speaker 3 (22:02):
The only thing that can get you.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
Out of a deep value of despondency is a deeper
arm of resurrection, power and love. So I just Corey
Timboom said this. She said, she said, there is no pits,
There is no emotion that is so deep and painful
that God's arm is not deeper. Still, you got to
realize whatever pits you're in, I say fifty nine wanted too.

(22:26):
The Lord's arm is not short, and that it cannot say,
the Lord's ear is not heavy, that he cannot hear
that God takes depression. God takes it, and he says,
You're not alone. And I never stopped loving, and I'm
always working. And if you hang on in time, you'll
see that resurrection come. She'll be steadfast, unmovable, always a
bounty in the work of the Lord, because your labor's
never made, it's never a mad and you never doubt

(22:47):
my love, fear.

Speaker 1 (22:49):
The only thing that can overcome a deep well of
despair is an even deeper arm of God's grace, lifting
us out and setting us on high ground again. Encouraging
message today on Summit life from pastor, author and apologist J. D.
Greer as JD was speaking, Maybe you felt a new
passion and excitement to follow God to live a life

(23:11):
that's pleasing to him. If so, we would love to
get you a new scripture reading guide that aligns directly
with the teaching airing on the broadcast right now. It's
an eight day guide titled simply Elijah and Elisha. The
secret behind Elijah's power here on earth was his fierce
devotion to the God of Heaven, and Elijah left behind
an amazing legacy not because he was thinking of this life,

(23:34):
but because he was focused on the greater things that
were ahead. This is an eight part study with interactive
workbook style questions and scripture study along with devotionals, prayer
and response. We'll send you a copy of Elijah and Elisha,
an eight day scripture guide through First King seventeen to
Second King six as our way of saying thanks when

(23:55):
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(24:17):
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Sign up today at Jdgreer dot com. I'm Molli Videvich.
Tomorrow we're diving into the second half of this two

(24:38):
part teaching series as we turn our attention to Elijah's protege, Elisha.
We'll see you Friday here on Summit Life with Jdgreer.
Today's program was produced and sponsored by Jdgreer Ministries.