The Whirlwind

Introduction:

The Whirlwind (2 Kings 2):

3. never leaves. (v15-25)

1. God is with you: Trust His direction. (2 Kings 2:2-6)
2. God is with you: rely on His Power , not your own. (2 Kings 2:7-14)
3. God is with you: know that He Never Leaves. (2 Kings 2:7-15-25)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:05

  Good morning. Let's pray before we get started this morning.

  00:07-00:24

  Lord God, thank you for the time that you've given us today. Thank you for this opportunity as we're going to dig into your Word. I just pray that you would open our hearts and our minds right now to what you want to do this morning.

  00:26-00:29

  To you be the glory, God. In Jesus' name, Amen.

  00:32-00:38

  Open your Bibles with me please to 2 Kings 2.

  00:41-01:04

  And as you're turning there, I would I just like to ask you, have you ever noticed how differently some people say goodbye? And I'm not talking about about how some people say the word goodbye, and some people say something like adios, or sayonara, or peace out.

  01:04-01:05

  Not talking about that.

  01:07-01:15

  I'm talking about how some people say short goodbyes, and some people say long goodbyes.

  01:16-01:18

  Short goodbyes and long goodbyes, right?

  01:20-01:25

  I remember just growing up, just visiting different houses with my family.

  01:27-01:33

  Some houses that we visited, it would be time to say goodbye, time to say thank you.

  01:34-01:38

  And that would take maybe a couple minutes and then we'd be on our way.

  01:40-01:54

  And at other houses, we'd have to start saying goodbye about an hour before we actually had to leave Because with some long goodbyes, it can be a bit more of a process.

  01:56-02:05

  It's almost like as you move to each room between you and the door, a new conversation just keeps beginning.

  02:06-02:12

  And then, eventually you do reach the door, and then you can leave.

  02:12-02:19

  Well, but with some long goodbyes, how many know that a new conversation even starts when you're outside?

  02:21-02:27

  I remember my sister and I would be in the car, we would be fully buckled.

  02:28-02:37

  My dad would actually have the car running, but the windows are still rolled down as we're trying to wrap up saying goodbye.

  02:41-02:46

  And this is important, you have to hear me here, I'm not complaining at all.

  02:46-02:48

  I'm not criticizing in any way.

  02:48-02:52

  I fully support all of the long goodbyes out there.

  02:52-02:55

  I'm team long goodbyes, okay?

  02:56-02:59

  Sometimes that's just how goodbyes go, right?

  02:59-03:04

  Especially when you haven't seen someone for a while, you miss each other.

  03:06-03:20

  But my point about goodbyes is, and we are about to take a little bit more a serious turn, the reason that we say goodbye is because people leave.

  03:21-03:25

  And now I'm talking about more than just leaving after a visit.

  03:28-03:30

  There are many ways that people can leave.

  03:34-03:38

  Sometimes it's under bad or maybe even sinful circumstances.

  03:41-03:47

  Like, "We have a disagreement, and so I'm no longer speaking with you," leaving.

  03:49-03:54

  Or, "I've been hurt, and I don't want to resolve it," leaving.

  03:55-04:00

  Or, "Tragically, I'm not willing to stay in this marriage," leaving.

  04:02-04:12

  And sometimes, the circumstances can be good, but they're still bittersweet, like moving across the country for a new job, leaving.

  04:12-04:16

  You're certainly excited for them, but it still stings.

  04:19-04:27

  And of course, the leaving that all of us are going to encounter is the death of an important person in our life.

  04:28-04:39

  And in that case, even in the best circumstances, The death of a loved one is the single hardest thing that we have to face on this earth.

  04:41-04:48

  At those times we wrestle with, "How do I even go on after this?" People leave.

  04:51-04:55

  Well today we are going to study how to handle that biblically.

  04:57-05:02

  And we're going to see three truths of God when people leave.

  05:03-05:08

  And as I'm sure that you can already tell, this is not an easy message.

  05:10-05:19

  And I realize that it's incredibly sensitive because all of us have been affected by someone leaving in some way.

  05:20-05:24

  Not just to death, but in all the ways that I mentioned, and there are many more.

  05:26-05:30

  So I would just ask that you would please have grace with me this morning.

  05:31-05:51

  know that my intent isn't to bring back any hurt or pain or sadness at all. My only goal is to present you with what God's Word says about this. Amen? Thank you. Okay, let's turn to the text.

  05:52-05:57

  Again, 2 Kings 2 and we're starting in verse 1.

  05:59-07:18

  It says, "Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal." So pause there for a moment. I realize we only read one verse, but there's already a lot to process. I mean, first off, spoiler alert for one of the most amazing events in all of history. But before we get to Elijah being taken to heaven by a whirlwind, who's Elijah? Right? Who's Elisha? Well, if you want the full story on how these guys came into the picture, you'll find it in 1 Kings 17-19, but I'm going to bring you up to speed today. Elijah was a prophet, meaning he was God's representative or God's messenger on earth, and he performed incredible miracles like calling down fire from the sky that demonstrated God's power. And Elisha was Elijah's apprentice, and he was called into ministry years earlier when Elijah walked by him and threw his cloak on top of him. Seriously, that's what happened.

  07:21-07:45

  Well, in the passage that we're going to read today, the time has come for Elisha to succeed Elijah, but that means that Elijah is going to leave. And that brings us to our first truth of God when people leave. God is with you and our response should be to trust his direction.

  07:47-07:51

  So let's see that by picking it up in verse 2.

  07:54-09:11

  And Elijah said to Elisha, "Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel." But Elisha said, 'As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.' So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, 'Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?' And he said, 'Yes, I know it. Keep quiet.' Elijah said to him, 'Elisha, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho." But he said, "As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." (Sensing a theme.) So they came to Jericho. The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha and said to him, "Do you know that the Lord today will take away your master from over you?" And he answered, "Yes, I know it. Keep quiet." Then Elijah said to him, "Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan." But he said, "As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." So the two of them went on. Stop there.

  09:13-09:19

  So Elijah knows that he's leaving and he's going around saying his goodbyes.

  09:19-09:29

  I don't know if he was a short goodbyer or a long goodbyer, But in fact, everyone in these verses knows that Elijah is going to leave.

  09:30-09:59

  Now, for whatever reason, these prophets don't think that Elisha knows, so maybe they were trying to be helpful in telling him, but Elisha is just like, "Yeah, I know he's leaving. Please just keep quiet about it." Because on top of that, how do you think Elisha felt when his mentor, the person he's been following for years repeatedly three times asked him to stay behind.

  10:02-10:11

  He gave up everything to follow Elijah. And so we have to ask, why? Why would Elijah do that?

  10:12-10:28

  Well, maybe Elijah legitimately just wanted to go through it alone. Maybe. But in studying the passage in context, I believe that Elijah was testing Elisha. And let me explain what I mean.

  10:29-10:34

  These verses are all about the Lord directing things. Did you see that?

  10:35-11:12

  Verse 1, "The Lord is about to take Elijah." Verses 2, 4, and 6, "The Lord has sent me to Bethel, to Jericho, to the Jordan. Verses 3 and 5, "The Lord is going to take your master." So God is directing things, but notice that Elijah trusts God's direction. He keeps going where God wants him to go. And in turn, I believe he's really asking Elisha, Knowing what's coming, are you going to stay committed too?

  11:14-11:31

  And every time, how did we see Elisha answer? He said, "As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." He's all in. Elisha flat out refuses to do anything but follow Elijah.

  11:32-11:34

  He's also trusting God's direction.

  11:36-11:44

  Now, for us today, not everyone who leaves us is doing so because that's where God is leading them.

  11:46-11:50

  If someone's in sin, then they're obviously not following God's direction.

  11:52-12:15

  But whether they are in the right or the wrong, let's be honest, trusting God's direction is not our typical response when someone leaves. I would argue the most common response we have isn't to trust God's direction, it's to give Him directions, right? "God, what are you doing?

  12:15-12:31

  It's not time for this person to leave yet. Do not let this happen." Now please hear me. It is a good thing to ask God questions, to cry out to Him, and to pray for change.

  12:33-12:43

  The problems come when we want to be God instead of trusting that He is God and we are not.

  12:44-13:11

  Exactly. Now of course the greatest example of trusting God through difficulty is Jesus Christ himself. The Bible tells us in Luke 22 that before Jesus endured suffering like no one else would, before Jesus hung on the cross, what did he do? He asked God questions. He cried out to God.

  13:12-13:26

  He prayed for change. Jesus prayed, "Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me." But do you know what he said next?

  13:28-14:03

  He said, "Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done." And I know that there are people in this room who have lost someone in the past few years, in the past few months, and I am not minimizing the pain or the struggle or the challenge of that in any way. But we have to submit to God's will. Don't give God directions. Trust His direction.

  14:06-14:09

  Our second truth of God when people leave.

  14:11-14:16

  God is with you. Rely on His power, not your own.

  14:19-14:23

  So let's jump back to the passage, continuing in verse 7.

  14:26-14:33

  "Fifty men of the sons of the prophets also went and stood at some distance from them as they were both standing by the Jordan.

  14:35-15:15

  Then Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water, and the water parted to the one side and to the other, till the two of them could go across on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, "Ask what I shall do for you before I am taken from you." And Elisha said, "Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me." And he said, "You have asked a hard thing, yet if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you.

  15:16-15:22

  But if you do not see me, it shall not be so." Stop there for just a moment.

  15:23-15:30

  So with some of these other prophets watching, Elijah and Elisha approach the Jordan River.

  15:31-15:38

  Elijah rolls up his cloak, hits the water, it miraculously parts for them, and they walk across.

  15:39-15:42

  Kind of reminds you of when Moses parted the Red Sea, doesn't it?

  15:44-16:20

  And after that, perhaps for the first time, Elijah acknowledges to Elisha what they both know, that he's going to leave. And he asks what he can do for Elisha before that happens and in verse 9 we read Elisha answer, "Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me." Now we could do a whole Bible deep dive just on that sentence but let's cut to the chase.

  16:22-17:28

  Elisha is asking for what he needs to continue Elijah's mission. He's not asking for a double portion like he wants to be twice as famous or twice as powerful as Elijah. He's asking for a double portion because he's seen Elijah serve God and he wants that and then some. He wants what Elijah has with God and even more. But if Elisha's request is holy, if it's a humble request, why did Elijah say it's a hard thing? Maybe like me reading this you wondered why didn't Elijah just give it to him? And this is the key. Whose spirit is it Really? Who really has the power? Is it Elijah's power that lets him rain down fire from the sky?

  17:30-17:36

  Is it Elijah's power that lets him part the Jordan like we just read a moment ago?

  17:38-18:03

  No. It's God's spirit. It's God's power. And that's why Elijah says it's a hard thing, because it's not up to Elijah to give God's spirit. But Elijah does believe that if Elisha sticks with him and continues to trust God's direction, he will receive his request.

  18:05-18:09

  So let's keep reading, picking back up in verse 11.

  18:11-18:35

  It says, "And as they still went on and talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it, and he cried, 'My father, my father, the chariots of Israel and its horsemen!' And he saw him no more.

  18:37-18:42

  Then he took hold of his own clothes and tore them into two pieces.

  18:43-18:50

  And he took up the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan.

  18:52-19:10

  Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the water, saying, 'Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?' And when he had struck the water, The water was parted to one side and to the other, and Elisha went over.

  19:13-19:14

  It's absolutely incredible.

  19:15-19:19

  Can you even imagine seeing something like that?

  19:20-19:22

  I mean, I can't, honestly.

  19:24-19:30

  But what I think we can imagine is what Elisha is going through.

  19:31-19:38

  Because to some degree we all know the feeling of loss, of someone leaving.

  19:39-20:02

  And I think the Bible makes it pretty clear that Elisha is overcome with emotion, overcome with grief. And he demonstrates it by tearing his own clothes. And then he picks up the cloak, probably the same cloak that years earlier Elijah used to call him into ministry.

  20:04-20:07

  I mean, what do you think that cloak must have meant to him?

  20:10-20:36

  Now, there are varying opinions by biblical scholars on why Elisha said, "Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?" But to me, based on the previous verses that we read, it's the grief talking. I think, I think it's the grief talking even though I know what you're thinking. Elijah technically didn't even die.

  20:38-20:51

  But I think that Elisha picked up the cloak and out of his emotion he was just screaming into the air as he slammed the water. But when he did that, what happened?

  20:52-20:57

  Just as they did for Elijah, the waters parted.

  20:59-21:20

  And again, this is the key. Whose power parted the waters? We know it's not Elijah's power because he's not even around anymore. And the cloak is a symbol of the position that Elisha now has, but the cloak itself doesn't have any power.

  21:20-21:25

  No, it's God's power, now with Elisha.

  21:27-21:37

  And in the same way, when any one of us is in that whirlwind of people leaving, it's so important not to try to handle it ourselves.

  21:39-21:42

  We need other loved ones' support, of course.

  21:42-21:47

  God designed us to be in community, to love each other, and to help each other.

  21:49-22:03

  ultimately we have to rely on God's power to restore us after we grieve. We have to rely on God's power to follow His direction through that as we just read.

  22:07-22:38

  So think of it this way. I played on the basketball team when I was in high school. And one practice we're doing an outlet pass drill. So we're partnered up and one guy is just taking off running down the court. The other guy pretends to grab a rebound, turns around, launches a long court pass to him. Well we get to my turn. It's my turn to run. So I take off sprinting.

  22:40-22:46

  But the problem is, when I turn around to receive this pass, it's short.

  22:48-22:53

  And so I slam on the brakes, and I reach back to try to catch it.

  22:54-23:04

  And unfortunately, the way that the ball landed on my finger was so precise on the finger that was extended.

  23:06-23:07

  I hope everybody's sitting down.

  23:08-23:15

  The top bone smashed into the bottom bone and it shattered into a lot of pieces.

  23:18-23:25

  Now with a complex break like that, is that something that I'm able to fix by myself?

  23:26-23:27

  No way, right?

  23:27-23:29

  I have to go see a surgeon.

  23:31-23:40

  I have to rely on someone with the ability to actually open up my hand, put everything back together, and close it up.

  23:41-23:42

  I can't do that.

  23:44-23:50

  Now of course we believe that all healing is God's healing, but you see my point.

  23:51-24:05

  Just as I was completely reliant on a surgeon to fix the break in my finger, we are completely reliant on God to fix us being broken when we're grieving.

  24:08-24:30

  God is the only one who can lift us out of the emotional turmoil of losing someone and at the same time enable us to serve him through the midst of that. We are completely reliant on God and we have to rely on God to do exactly what he did for Elisha in this passage.

  24:33-24:54

  And having done that, now we're going to see God declare to Elisha and to everyone else, "Look, I may have taken Elijah, but I, God, haven't gone anywhere." And that's our third point for today.

  24:55-25:00

  God is with you. Know that He never leaves.

  25:03-25:10

  So we are going to go back to the text, picking it up in verse 15.

  25:13-25:34

  It says, "Now when the sons of the prophets who were at Jericho saw him opposite them, they said, "The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha." And they came to meet him and bowed to the ground before him." Pause for just a second there.

  25:34-25:54

  Remember those guys who watched Elijah part the Jordan River and get taken to heaven? Well, if there was any doubt in their minds that Elisha was carrying on Elijah's legacy, They now watch him perform the exact same miracle that they just watched Elijah do.

  25:56-26:00

  And from that, they conclude something that is absolutely profound.

  26:02-26:09

  The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha. And this is so important to grasp.

  26:11-26:19

  First off, Elijah's spirit is exactly what we saw Elisha ask for. So God granted his request, right?

  26:21-27:02

  But remember, whose spirit is it really? It's God's. So another way of saying the spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha is the Spirit of God rests on Elisha. In other words, immediately after taking Elijah, God demonstrates he is now with Elisha. God immediately reminds everyone, "Yes, I may have taken Elijah, but I, God, am still here." So just please keep that in mind.

  27:04-27:04

  And let's keep reading.

  27:05-27:13

  Verse 16, "And they said to him, 'Behold now, there are with your servants fifty strong men.

  27:14-27:16

  Please let them go and seek your master.

  27:17-27:23

  It may be that the Spirit of the Lord has caught them up and cast them upon some mountain or into some valley.

  27:24-27:29

  And he said, "You shall not send." They wanted to go look for Elijah.

  27:31-27:43

  But when they urged him until he was ashamed, he said, "Send." They sent there 450 men, and for three days, they sought him, but did not find him.

  27:44-28:02

  And they came back to him while he was staying at Jericho, and he said to them, "Did I not say to you, do not go?" Now, Elisha is clearly a better man than me, because in Elisha's shoes, I would be looking at these guys in disbelief, like, are you serious?

  28:04-28:07

  God literally told all of us he was going to take Elijah.

  28:08-28:13

  But they just kept hounding him until he was so embarrassed, he let them go and look around.

  28:15-28:18

  But anyway, verse 19.

  28:20-28:39

  Now the men of the city said to Elisha, "Behold, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my Lord sees, but the water is bad and the land is unfruitful." He said, "Bring me a new bowl and put salt in it." So they brought it to him.

  28:40-28:48

  Then he went to the spring of water and threw salt in it and said, "Thus says the Lord, I have healed this water.

  28:49-29:01

  From now on, neither death nor miscarriage shall come from it." And so the water has been healed to this day, according to the word that Elisha spoke.

  29:02-29:12

  So, Elisha is backtracking the path that he walked with Elijah, and after recrossing the Jordan, he's now back in Jericho.

  29:13-29:15

  And what do we see him do?

  29:15-29:19

  He miraculously heals the water of the whole city.

  29:21-29:28

  God is again establishing that his power that was with Elijah is now with Elisha.

  29:29-29:56

  So, in other words, God is saying for the second time since taking Elijah, the spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha. God is again saying, "I am still here." Now, let's keep reading, and for anyone who has ever thought that the Bible is boring, better buckle up.

  29:57-30:11

  Verse 23, "He went up from there to Bethel, and while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him, saying, 'Go up, you bald head!

  30:12-30:18

  "Go up, you bald head!" And he turned around and when he saw them, he cursed them in the name of the Lord.

  30:19-30:25

  And two she-bears came out of the woods and tore 42 of the boys.

  30:27-30:32

  From there, he went on to Mount Carmel, and from there, he returned to Samaria.

  30:36-30:37

  What just happened?

  30:40-30:48

  But seriously, this passage is one of the most controversial that I have ever studied.

  30:50-30:54

  Some scholars consider this a major mark against Elisha's character.

  30:55-31:07

  And I think we all, reading this for the first time, struggle with the question, "Is that okay?" What does God think about this?

  31:09-31:22

  And I believe that as difficult as this event is for us to understand at first, this is God saying the exact same thing for the third time.

  31:24-31:27

  The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha.

  31:29-31:31

  I am still here.

  31:33-31:34

  Where do I get that?

  31:35-31:43

  Well, the truth is God used prophets to perform miracles and to perform acts of healing.

  31:44-31:47

  And we just read Elisha do both of those.

  31:48-31:53

  But God also used prophets to perform acts of judgment.

  31:55-32:06

  And in fact, if you read the chapters preceding this one, you'll see that God specifically used Elijah to judge hundreds of false prophets who were worshiping a false god.

  32:08-32:10

  And Elisha is God's prophet now.

  32:13-32:19

  Now, these boys were taunting Elisha to "go up." Go up?

  32:21-32:27

  Well, it's not really common for someone to "go up" like Elijah just did, is it?

  32:29-33:29

  So what they were really saying was, "Hey, Baldy, if you're really God's prophet, why don't you go up into the air like Elijah just did?" And look, even something like that might not sound like a big deal to us, but the truth is, according to the law, insulting God's prophet is exactly equivalent to insulting God himself. And they were also questioning if God had even established Elisha as his prophet at all. So it wasn't the offense to Elisha that brought out the bears, it was the blatant disrespect of God. Now, do not walk out of here thinking that it's our place to bring judgment because it is not. Judgment belongs to God.

  33:31-33:36

  And I hope this is obvious, but you also can't send bears after someone who offends you.

  33:40-33:57

  But what we need to focus on instead is what God repeatedly declared to Israel here, and he declares to us today through his Word that though people leave, God is always with his people.

  33:58-34:00

  He's not leaving.

  34:03-34:11

  But though God isn't leaving, I have to remind you that someday each one of us is going to leave.

  34:13-34:21

  Probably not in the same way that Elijah did, but I guarantee you all of us are going to leave.

  34:23-35:21

  And just as we're studying the truths of God when someone else leaves, we have to consider what happens when I leave. Now, you should plan for what happens to the people that you care about when you leave, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about do you know where you're going when you leave? And only you can answer that for yourself. Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Do you recognize that through his death and resurrection he made the only way for us to leave this world and arrive into God's presence? As It's almost the same thing that God is declaring in this passage through Elisha, that He never leaves.

  35:22-35:31

  When you trust in Jesus Christ, when you receive His forgiveness, He will never leave you.

  35:32-35:36

  And from that point on and for eternity, He is with you.

  35:37-35:40

  And praise the Lord, you are with Him.

  35:43-35:56

  And you know, it just struck me studying this passage, Elijah's name means "My God is Yah" meaning Yahweh, the God of the Bible.

  35:58-36:01

  And do you know what Elisha's name means?

  36:03-36:13

  The name Elisha means "My God is salvation." Is Jesus your salvation today?

  36:16-36:23

  In this life, Jesus is the only way that we can respond to the truths of God that we study.

  36:24-36:31

  Trusting God's direction, relying on God's power, knowing that God never leaves.

  36:35-36:38

  And as we close, I actually have something to confess to you.

  36:40-36:50

  If you look down at your outline, it says three truths of God, but while the responses differ, the truths are really all the same.

  36:51-36:52

  God is with you.

  36:53-36:54

  God is with you.

  36:55-36:56

  God is with you.

  36:58-37:07

  And the reason for that is I believe that that is the truth that God wants us to hold in times of loss.

  37:10-37:14

  Because people inevitably leave us one way or another.

  37:16-37:18

  And no person is going to be with us forever.

  37:20-37:26

  We have to know deeply that God never leaves us.

  37:28-37:35

  God promises that even as he does allow people to leave our lives, we will never be alone.

  37:36-37:41

  And that's a promise that only God can truly provide.

  37:44-37:51

  So please don't let "God is with you" just be a generic or meaningless set of words.

  37:53-38:07

  Because through God's actions as Elijah left the earth, we can see that when people in our lives leave, we have to act according to the truth that God is with us.

  38:09-38:20

  With His presence through Jesus, we can endure as people leave us, and ultimately, we can be with Him when it's our turn to leave.

  38:23-38:24

  Will you pray with me, please?

  38:27-38:31

  Lord God, we thank You for who You are, God.

  38:34-38:43

  We thank You, Lord, that You created this entire universe, and You created each and every one of us.

  38:45-38:54

  And yet, God, out of Your love, You didn't just create everything and then walk away.

  38:55-39:01

  that You chose to be with Your creation, to be with Your people.

  39:04-39:22

  God, I thank You that for anyone who confesses with their mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believes in their heart that You, God, raised Him from the dead, We never have to be alone.

  39:25-39:41

  And God, I thank you that through your presence with us, we can endure all the trials of life, even the hardest trial, God, of losing someone that we love.

  39:43-39:57

  God, as we prepare to worship you now, I just pray and ask that all of us would feel your presence, God, with us right here, right now.

  39:59-40:22

  And God, I pray that even as we leave today, that we would be more aware, God, of how you are with us wherever we go. Thank you God. Thank you for your love. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read 2 Kings 2

1. What was your big takeaway from this week’s sermon?
   

2. Did you ever have a difficult time trusting God’s direction? How can we guard our relationship with God during those times?
   

3. Ultimately God is the only one with the power to restore us, but what are ways that we can support or show God’s love to a grieving brother or sister in Christ?
   

4. It is easy for “God is with you” to become a truth that we ignore, or don’t fully absorb. Why is that? How can we avoid trivializing God’s presence, and how could that strengthen us through losing someone?

Breakout
Pray for each other that may see and feel God’s presence from within the whirlwind.

Who Will You Choose?

Introduction:

We Choose Barabbas Because (Matthew 27:15-23):

1. We are too Self-centered (Matt 27:17-18).
2. We are too willing to Listen to others (Matt 27:19-20).
3. We are too eager to Worship idols .

   John 19:15 - "They cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him! Pilate said to them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar."

How Do We Stop Choosing Barabbas?

Jeremiah 29:13 - "You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart."

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:01

  All right.

  00:02-00:03

  Thanks for that introduction, Andrew.

  00:03-00:04

  Appreciate that, bud.

  00:05-00:14

  Before we get started, I just want to pull the curtain back a little bit as to what goes in to the four of us getting up here during July.

  00:14-00:24

  So we start back in January, and once a month we get together and we meet, and we try to -- Jeff shows us how to break down a passage, how to figure out what it's talking about.

  00:24-00:25

  We do outlines.

  00:25-01:03

  We go through different things every week, and then we rehearse, and then finally in we get up and do this. So I've been working on this passage for six months since January, okay? And I feel like God's really been taking me through different paths through this message, really trying to narrow it down to present it to you and give God's Word to you accurately. For six months that's been going on. And then Darren, big Darren, that sings up here, sitting in his living room one day, God reveals the same thing that took six months to reveal to me, revealed to him in five minutes.

  01:04-01:05

  And he put it on Facebook.

  01:08-01:12

  So I just took Darren's post and printed it out, and that's what we're going to talk about today.

  01:15-01:17

  All right, are you guys ready to hear what God revealed to me?

  01:18-01:19

  All right, let's pray before we do that.

  01:20-01:22

  Father, I thank you for this day.

  01:22-01:24

  I thank you for this opportunity to be here.

  01:25-01:26

  God, I'm humbled.

  01:29-01:31

  Father, give me the words to say.

  01:32-01:34

  Let them not be my words, but your words.

  01:36-01:39

  God, please help this to touch each and every person here as it has touched me.

  01:41-01:43

  In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

  01:46-01:53

  So early on in Sarah and I's marriage, we had decided that we got to a point where we wanted to buy a new car.

  01:54-01:56

  It knew to us it was going to be used.

  01:56-01:57

  We couldn't afford a new car.

  01:59-02:01

  But we had our checklist of things we wanted.

  02:02-02:10

  You know, the main three things we wanted was low miles, fully loaded, and in the right price.

  02:11-02:12

  And we had a couple other things.

  02:12-02:16

  But to be honest, what we wanted was a car that everybody would turn their heads and look at.

  02:17-02:21

  When we pulled into church on Sundays, we wanted everybody to go, wow, look at that.

  02:21-02:22

  Because that's why you go to church.

  02:23-02:24

  (audience laughing)

  02:26-02:27

  Amen, right?

  02:30-02:30

  So we were all excited.

  02:30-02:33

  I think we'd been married maybe a year or two at the time.

  02:34-02:36

  So we're looking online, we would go to dealerships, whatnot.

  02:38-02:47

  So this one time we came upon an ad and it was if God had taken our prayers to him 'cause we'd asked him to give us that perfect flashy car.

  02:48-02:51

  And it was as if he had dropped it in our laps.

  02:52-02:57

  And we're looking one night on a very reputable website where no scams ever happen, Craigslist.

  03:01-03:11

  So this car comes up, two years old, very low miles, fully loaded for $3,000.

  03:13-03:14

  Boom, deal of a lifetime.

  03:14-03:16

  And they were willing to ship for free.

  03:18-03:18

  It's perfect.

  03:19-03:26

  It was if God perfectly made that ad for us or some 12-year-old with Photoshop in his mom's basement.

  03:29-03:30

  But that was our car.

  03:30-03:31

  We wanted it.

  03:31-03:37

  And everybody around us is going, "Guys, you do know this is completely fake, right?" "No, no, no.

  03:37-03:38

  This is the car for us.

  03:39-03:40

  This is the car we want.

  03:41-03:41

  This is ours.

  03:42-03:47

  God made it for us." And everybody's going, "Guys, pay attention.

  03:47-03:53

  This is not real." We had convinced ourselves that everybody just didn't want us to have a deal of a lifetime.

  03:54-03:56

  They were jealous of this awesome car we were going to get.

  03:59-04:03

  I'm not going to lie, we came embarrassingly close to pulling the trigger on that.

  04:05-04:06

  Luckily for us, we didn't.

  04:08-04:14

  But deep down inside, Sarah and I knew that choice was wrong, but we wanted to do it anyway.

  04:14-04:16

  We intentionally were making the wrong choice.

  04:17-04:17

  Why?

  04:17-04:44

  remember what we wanted to do, probably because we were stubborn and we wanted to prove that at 22 years old we knew what we were doing. But we'll do that, right? We'll do that in a lot of areas in our life. We'll intentionally make the wrong choice, even when we know it's wrong. We'll do it anyway. Why? It's for always a myriad of reasons. But we'll do it. If you're honest with me, there's been a time in your life that you've done that.

  04:47-04:52

  The passage we're going to go over today is about a choice that was made almost 2,000 years ago.

  04:53-04:58

  And the people that made that choice intentionally made the wrong choice.

  05:00-05:07

  And even though that was made all those years ago, we're still making that same choice today.

  05:10-05:11

  So let's look at this.

  05:12-05:15

  We're in Matthew 27, verses 15 through 23.

  05:16-05:23

  And just to set the scene for a little bit, we're kind of stepping right into the middle of the road where Jesus is going to the cross.

  05:24-05:32

  He's been arrested, people have questioned Him, and we're picking it up right where Pilate is talking to the crowd.

  05:33-05:38

  And at this time, this is the Roman Empire that we all learned about in the history books.

  05:38-05:43

  They had conquered a lot of the world, and in that, Israel was under that.

  05:43-05:55

  And so the Israel leaders, the Jewish leaders, the elders, the spiritual leaders of the Jews, they had a very corrupt relationship with the government, or with the Roman government.

  05:56-06:02

  So there was all kinds of behind locked doors deals going on and things like that.

  06:03-06:06

  But it's important that you understand that as we go through this.

  06:06-06:08

  So let's pick it up in verse 15.

  06:09-06:29

  "Now at the feast, the governor was custom to release for the crowd any one prisoner whom they wanted. And they had this notorious prisoner called Barabbas. Let's just pause right there for one second. So this guy Barabbas, the best way I can describe this guy is a terrorist.

  06:29-06:48

  He's an anarchist. We all know what that's like right now. We see that going on in our own country. But he's a terrorist. That's not something I really have to explain to a lot of people. He's a bad guy and both sides needed this guy removed. Both the Jewish people and the Roman people. He caused problems across the board.

  06:51-07:07

  So that's who Barabbas is. Let's pick it up in 17. So when they gathered Pilate said to them, "Whom do you want me to release for you? Barabbas or Jesus who is called Christ, for he knew it was out of envy that they had delivered him up.

  07:08-07:25

  Besides, while Pilate was sitting on his judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, "Have nothing to do with this righteous man, for I have suffered much because of him today in a dream." Now the chief priests and elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus.

  07:26-07:31

  The governor again said to them, "Which of these two do you want me to release to you?

  07:31-07:45

  And they said, "Barabbas." Pilate said to them, "Then what shall I do with Jesus, who is Christ?" And they all said, "Let him be crucified." And he said, "Why?

  07:45-07:50

  What evil has he done?" But they shouted all the more, almost a riot type.

  07:51-08:01

  "Let him be crucified." Church, there's a lot of heavy content in this passage.

  08:02-08:08

  But I want to focus on the choice that was made by the crowd and the Jewish leaders.

  08:11-08:17

  And as I was studying this, I tried to put myself in the shoes of different characters in this passage.

  08:17-08:20

  And one that I kept kind of focusing on was Pilate.

  08:21-08:23

  Pilate's this arrogant guy.

  08:24-08:25

  He thought he was big stuff.

  08:25-08:28

  And if you asked him, he would have told you he was big stuff.

  08:31-08:33

  And he needed a win.

  08:33-08:38

  Because if we read earlier, he had done some pretty bad stuff to the Jewish people, and he needed this win.

  08:39-08:40

  So this kind of fell into his lap.

  08:41-08:43

  Here's this guy Barabbas that was already arrested.

  08:43-08:46

  He was going to destroy Barabbas one way or the other.

  08:47-08:51

  But then he had this guy Jesus that the Jewish leadership didn't really like.

  08:53-08:55

  but he was going to give them a prisoner.

  08:56-09:06

  And I kind of picture him almost coming out, you know, thinking the crowd's cheering for him, and really not, you know, and kind of throwing up like, "Hey, you guys want me to release a prisoner?

  09:06-09:14

  Here's this guy that none of us like." Or you can have Jesus that you guys just don't like as a person.

  09:14-09:15

  He hasn't done anything, you just don't like him.

  09:16-09:18

  And I kind of picture him almost turning his back and walking away.

  09:19-09:26

  And when they said Barabbas, him almost stopping in his tracks and being like, "What'd you just say to me? Barabbas?

  09:28-10:03

  Do you...terrorist Barabbas? You want him?" But Jesus hasn't done anything. He even says that. He says, "Why? What evil has he done?" And they ignored it and just said, "Crucify him. Give us Jesus." And we see later, not to be a spoiler alert, but he gave them Jesus and washed his hands and said, "Whatever, I don't want to be a part of this." But I want to focus on the choice that they made.

  10:04-10:06

  They chose Barabbas over Jesus.

  10:08-10:24

  And when I've read this before, I've always kind of sat there and go, "How in the world did they pick Barabbas?" this terrorist, this evil person that had murdered people, that was so disruptive in everything.

  10:25-10:28

  How did they choose for rabbits?

  10:32-10:38

  And they were supposed to, they just didn't like Jesus, and they should have known who he was as the spiritual leaders.

  10:38-10:43

  They should have known that prophecy was being fulfilled, and they didn't care.

  10:43-10:47

  They wanted him out of their life because they didn't like what he was saying.

  10:47-10:49

  He was calling them out for their hypocrisy.

  10:49-10:51

  He didn't, they did not like that.

  10:56-11:00

  And the scripture tells us three reasons that they chose Barabbas.

  11:01-11:07

  And those church are the same three reasons that we continue to choose Barabbas.

  11:08-11:10

  You might say, Ryan, we don't, we're not choosing Barabbas.

  11:11-11:12

  That happened 2000 years ago.

  11:12-11:19

  Now here's the thing, and this is what God revealed to me, and when he revealed this to me, this entire passage changed.

  11:20-11:23

  'Cause Barabbas represents sin.

  11:25-11:36

  And when you see Barabbas that way, if you would look into your own life, you see that we choose sin every day over Jesus.

  11:38-11:40

  So yes, we choose Barabbas.

  11:40-11:49

  We continually choose Barabbas for the exact same reasons the Jews did.

  11:51-11:53

  So let's look at those three reasons.

  11:54-11:59

  We're going to look at those, and at the end, I'm going to offer a solution how to stop choosing Barabbas.

  12:01-12:02

  Let's go to verse 18.

  12:05-12:10

  We choose Barabbas because we are too self-centered.

  12:12-12:15

  In verse 18, actually, let's back up to 17.

  12:16-12:29

  "So when they gathered, Pilate said to them, 'Whom do you want me to release to you, Barabbas or Jesus who is called Christ?' For he knew it was out of envy that they had delivered him up." Be honest with me again.

  12:30-12:35

  Have you ever made a choice because of jealousy, because of envy, because of self-centeredness.

  12:37-12:42

  We live in this world that focuses on me, me, me, me.

  12:43-12:45

  Social media is all about me.

  12:46-12:51

  We put our family photos up on Facebook, you know, white shirt, khaki shorts, look at us on the beach.

  12:54-12:57

  I know my family and I went to the beach twice, but we didn't dress like that.

  13:00-13:02

  And there's nothing wrong with putting pictures on Facebook.

  13:02-13:03

  That's not what I'm saying.

  13:03-13:06

  But you get my point, everything's focused on me.

  13:08-13:15

  And when it's not focused on me, I get jealous and I'll do everything to get myself back at the center of focus.

  13:16-13:17

  We do that at work.

  13:17-13:19

  Why is that guy getting a promotion and I'm not?

  13:20-13:22

  I work so much harder than that person.

  13:22-13:26

  I'm so much better at my job and they got a promotion and I didn't.

  13:26-13:32

  Or I don't get treated fair enough, so I'm gonna leave and go to another job where the grass is greener.

  13:33-13:36

  and I never take time to focus on what Jesus wants me to do.

  13:37-13:38

  We'll do that in our own marriages.

  13:39-13:43

  Husbands, we'll look at other wives and go, why doesn't my wife treat me like that?

  13:46-13:47

  Wives will do the same thing.

  13:49-13:52

  That wife's husband treats her like a princess.

  13:52-13:54

  Why doesn't my husband treat me that way?

  13:55-13:56

  So you know what?

  13:56-13:59

  I'm gonna get out of this marriage and I'm gonna go find a new one.

  14:02-14:07

  Why am I going through this hard time and my fellow Christian is not going through this hard time?

  14:09-14:12

  I'll remove myself from that and I'll get mine.

  14:13-14:14

  So my life is better.

  14:16-14:21

  And we do that so many times because it's all about me.

  14:23-14:32

  And I would rather listen and try to dictate the score and dictate what I'm gonna do rather than listen to Jesus and follow his path.

  14:35-14:44

  Church, if we would follow Jesus' path that he has laid out for us, the blessing on the other side of that is gonna be so much greater than anything we can imagine.

  14:48-14:50

  But no, we wanna dictate what happens.

  14:53-14:58

  And maybe Jesus has you in that difficult position because he's trying to show you something.

  15:00-15:08

  He has you going through that difficult relationship because of the blessing he has on the other side that you won't get if you don't follow his path.

  15:09-15:10

  His blessings are always better.

  15:12-15:20

  But envy, jealousy, and self-centeredness stop those blessings from happening and they destroy our relationship with Jesus.

  15:23-15:24

  Let's go back to the text.

  15:27-15:34

  Point number two, we choose Barabbas because we are too willing to listen to others.

  15:37-15:40

  Verse 19 and 20 are going to show us two examples of this.

  15:42-16:08

  Verse 19, "Besides, while he was sitting on his judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, 'Have nothing to do with this righteous man, for I have suffered much because of him today in a dream.'" Then in verse 20, "Now the chief priests and elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus." Husbands, wives, we look at verse 19.

  16:08-16:11

  We see Pilate's wife putting peer pressure on him.

  16:13-16:15

  Have you ever done that? Husbands?

  16:16-16:18

  Ever made a decision because your wife wanted it?

  16:20-16:22

  Don't send me emails about that.

  16:25-16:26

  Why? Our husbands, have we ever done that?

  16:27-16:29

  Or wives, have you ever done that?

  16:29-16:34

  Made a decision just because your husband wanted it and never took time to listen to what God had you to say.

  16:35-16:40

  Peer pressure is not something I have to explain in great lengths.

  16:41-16:45

  We see peer pressure from the first day of grade school to the day we go in the grave.

  16:46-16:48

  There is peer pressure all of us.

  16:49-16:52

  And we see that in 19 and 20.

  16:52-16:56

  We see it happening in the home, and then we see it happening in public settings.

  17:00-17:03

  Peer pressure right now is happening so much in our country.

  17:04-17:11

  Every day, the media is telling, "Believe this or you're this." No, no, no, believe this or you're this.

  17:11-17:14

  If you don't believe this, that automatically makes you this.

  17:16-17:19

  And if you don't, well, then I just hate you.

  17:19-17:21

  I want nothing to do with you.

  17:23-17:25

  You can't have this unless you admit to this.

  17:26-17:28

  Peer pressure is everywhere.

  17:31-17:33

  And oftentimes we'll go along with it.

  17:33-17:33

  Why?

  17:34-17:43

  Because we're more afraid of our fellow human beings than we are of being out of perfect harmony with Jesus Christ.

  17:45-17:50

  Our relationship with Jesus should be so strong and so good, it doesn't matter what people are telling us.

  17:54-18:05

  That we should just go, "Listen, whatever you do to me, I don't care because it's far less than me being out of perfect harmony with my Lord and Savior." You might say, "You don't understand.

  18:06-18:11

  I get it at home, I get it at work, I get it everywhere you go." I may not understand, but Jesus does.

  18:12-18:24

  And he proved it as he was standing there in this crowd, is going, "Change what you say or we're going to murder you." We see that in the previous chapter.

  18:25-18:32

  And God just stood there and said, "I will not, because my father is telling me I must do this.

  18:33-18:38

  And what you're telling me to do is a direct violation to what my father wants me to do.

  18:38-18:39

  And I cannot do that.

  18:41-18:42

  I cannot go against my father.

  18:45-18:46

  And he did.

  18:47-18:51

  He stood there and eventually was murdered for us.

  18:55-19:03

  But oftentimes, oftentimes we're so afraid of our human race, we're more afraid of our human race than disappointing God.

  19:04-19:07

  And we'll choose to go with peer pressure because it's easy.

  19:09-19:10

  And that's so shameful.

  19:13-19:14

  So shameful for us.

  19:18-19:19

  Let's go to the third point.

  19:21-19:25

  And for this, I'm actually going to jump over to John 19.15.

  19:27-19:31

  And John's telling the exact same story that Matthew's telling us.

  19:32-19:40

  But the way that John worded it is so applicable for this third point that I wanted to use it.

  19:41-19:44

  So John 19, 15, it's gonna be on the screen.

  19:46-19:53

  They cried out, the crowd, they cried out, away with him, away with him, crucify him.

  19:55-19:58

  Pilate said to them, shall I crucify your king?

  20:00-20:05

  And the chief priest answered, we have no king but Caesar.

  20:07-20:16

  Wow. Church, understand what they're saying. The Jewish people hated Caesar.

  20:16-20:30

  They hated him. And they said, "I'd rather put Caesar in front of Jesus." My sworn enemy, the person I hate, I will put in front of Jesus.

  20:31-20:34

  In church, that is idolatry.

  20:37-20:45

  Anything that you put in front of Jesus that is more of a priority in your life than Jesus, that's an idol.

  20:46-20:53

  So my third point, we follow or we choose Barabbas because we are too eager to worship idols.

  20:54-21:08

  And oftentimes when we think of idols, we think of these little golden statues or a Buddha type, or we think addiction or greed, substance abuse, pornography.

  21:11-21:17

  But let me tell you a story about an idol that I had in my life and to be honest I didn't really even know I had it.

  21:20-21:33

  So we have, Sarah and I have three children. We have our oldest child is a girl, our youngest child is a girl and right in the middle is my poor son. He's five, he's six years old now.

  21:36-22:13

  Full of life, full of energy. But when, his name's Milo. When Milo was three years old, I'm sorry, three months old, he went into the hospital with a respiratory virus. No, it wasn't coronavirus. It was RSV. And we had actually gone through this a year before with my oldest daughter. She had it. She was in the hospital for a few days and she was released. Everything was fine. But with Milo, he went in and we expected to be in there for a few days. Three weeks later, we still weren't out of the hospital.

  22:16-22:20

  And it was a roller coaster of emotions going through that.

  22:20-22:22

  Some of you experienced that with us when it went through.

  22:23-22:24

  I know Jeff was there, Murph, you were there.

  22:27-22:30

  And there was times where it was, "Hey, you might go home tomorrow.

  22:31-22:32

  Hey, Milo might never leave the hospital.

  22:33-22:34

  Hey, we got it figured out.

  22:34-22:42

  We have no idea what's going on." And just this roller coaster of never knowing what was going to happen to my son, my boy.

  22:44-23:06

  And I remember one day, in one of the just lowest points that we were, going to work the one day, working on a job site, and I had, I remember having my sunglasses on and just tears flowing down my face, just crying out to God, going, "God, don't take my son from me.

  23:07-23:41

  I don't care what else you do, don't take my son from me." And in this moment of just deep, deep prayer, and just blocking all the noise out, I remember hearing a voice going, "Ryan, that's not your son, that's mine." And having to break down and say, "Father, if you take my boy, I'm okay with it, and I'll praise you." I had turned Milo into an idol.

  23:42-23:53

  You may say, "Ryan, that's just you being a dad, loving your kid." No, because what I told God was, "God, I'll follow you anywhere, but not to my son's grave.

  23:55-23:57

  You can do anything to me.

  23:58-23:59

  I will do anything for you.

  24:00-24:08

  Don't you take my family." My family became more important to me than anything else.

  24:10-24:18

  And here's the truth, my wife of 13 years, my beautiful kids, they haven't done for me, but my Lord and Savior did.

  24:19-24:20

  Not even close.

  24:24-24:25

  My family was my idol.

  24:26-24:31

  And until I got them behind Jesus Christ, my relationship wasn't going to go any further.

  24:33-24:42

  We were always going to be limited because Sarah, Zoe, Milo, and Avery were more important to me than Jesus Christ.

  24:44-24:52

  An idol is anything that is your number one priority over Jesus Christ.

  24:53-25:06

  And you have to get to the point where either A, you have to remove that idol completely from your life, or in my case, I can't remove my family, but I have to reprioritize where they are in my life.

  25:10-25:15

  Because Jesus will not thrive in my life if he's not the most important person to me.

  25:19-25:28

  But oftentimes, we as Christians are more willing to put anything in front of Jesus, including Barabbas.

  25:30-25:35

  And I know these three points have been a lot of bam, bam, bam.

  25:35-25:36

  We're bad people.

  25:38-25:40

  You know, we're too self-centered.

  25:41-25:42

  We fall to peer pressure.

  25:42-25:44

  We have idols in our lives.

  25:45-25:48

  But before we close, I want to offer you a solution.

  25:49-25:53

  How do we stop choosing Barabbas?

  25:55-25:58

  Or that answer is found in Jeremiah 29, 13.

  26:01-26:14

  Jesus is talking and he says, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

  26:16-26:19

  Come at me with everything you have.

  26:20-26:24

  Make me the number one priority in your life.

  26:25-26:27

  Get in the gospel.

  26:27-26:28

  Search for me.

  26:28-26:29

  Find me.

  26:29-26:30

  He's not hiding.

  26:31-26:34

  All he's doing is come after me with everything you have.

  26:34-26:37

  If you don't go to church here, that's okay.

  26:37-26:49

  Understand that for the past year, we have been going through a study in the gospel of John that is entitled "Knowing Jesus." Not with your head, with your heart.

  26:52-26:58

  the heart for Jesus, that He is everything to us.

  26:58-27:01

  And my relationship with Jesus is the most important thing.

  27:04-27:08

  But what we want to do oftentimes as Christians is we want to do two things with Jesus.

  27:08-27:15

  Either we make Him this unattainable, mythical, magical creature that's unapproachable, and we can never go to it, so why even try?

  27:16-27:17

  Why even try?

  27:19-27:24

  Or we make him this grandfatherly type thing, sitting in a rocking chair.

  27:24-27:26

  He's, you know, "Oh, shucks," kind of person.

  27:27-27:34

  By the way, if I hear one more person say, "The big man upstairs," I'm going to open hand slap him.

  27:36-27:38

  There needs to be respect for Jesus, for God.

  27:39-27:41

  He's not this grandfatherly person.

  27:41-27:43

  He's not this mythical, magical creature.

  27:44-27:59

  He's our Father that sent His Son and put Him in the hands people he created to be tortured and mutilated for us so that we could spend eternity with God.

  27:59-28:10

  Because if that doesn't happen, the second we step into holiness, if Jesus' death hadn't made us holy, when we step into heaven, we're destroyed because God can't be around holiness.

  28:11-28:15

  And the only way that happens is Jesus Christ coming to this earth and dying.

  28:17-28:20

  And God was willing to do what I wasn't willing to do.

  28:21-28:23

  And he went to his son's grave.

  28:24-28:29

  He watched his son get mutilated by the very clay that he made.

  28:32-28:56

  And he said, "Here, do what you will with him, because it's the only way you're going to get to me." If we truly, truly know who God is and have a real relationship with God, it becomes increasingly more difficult to choose anything but Jesus.

  28:56-29:01

  So when the two choices are put in front of us, we have Jesus or Barabbas, it's just, "Bam, get out of here.

  29:01-29:07

  I don't need Barabbas because I'm automatically going to choose Jesus because I've put my self-centeredness aside.

  29:08-29:12

  I'm done listening to peer pressure and Jesus is number one in my life.

  29:16-29:21

  But until we get to that point, we will continue to choose Barabbas.

  29:22-29:24

  We will continue to choose sin.

  29:28-29:37

  When we became children of God, we were given the ability, through Jesus Christ, to say no to sin.

  29:40-29:43

  We just have to not choose Barabbas and choose Jesus.

  29:46-29:54

  So church, leaving here today, who will you choose from now on?

  29:56-29:57

  Jesus or Barabbas?

  29:59-29:59

  Let's pray.

  30:02-30:04

  Father, I thank You for this day.

  30:05-30:08

  Thank you for this opportunity to stand up here today.

  30:11-30:13

  And Father, I wanna pray for two people.

  30:15-30:31

  Number one, I wanna pray for the people that may not even know you as their Lord and Savior, who have no idea what it's like to choose Jesus for the first time, who have been choosing Barabbas every time.

  30:33-30:40

  Father, I beg you, please do not let them leave here today without getting that taken care of.

  30:43-30:54

  Secondly, Father, I wanna pray for my fellow Christians and God, I am the number one culprit of this, of choosing Barabbas over you.

  30:55-31:01

  Father, I pray that from this day going forward, we choose Jesus.

  31:02-31:04

  both as individuals and as a church.

  31:06-31:09

  I thank you, Father, for your grace.

  31:13-31:18

  Father, please bless this church, and bless our weeks going forward.

  31:19-31:21

  In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 27:15-23

1. What was your big takeaway from this week’s sermon?
   

2. As Christians we know that God's plan is better for us and we will be fully blessed if we follow his path. Why do we continue to follow our own self ambitions and try to solve “bad” situations ourselves?
   

3. Read Matthew 26:59-66. We see that Jesus did not crumble under the most severe form of peer pressure, why is it so important that we know God's Word and stand for what is right in our current culture? How can we use God's Word to resist peer pressure?
   

4. Typically we think of idols as addictions or greed, but an idol is anything in your life that takes Jesus from being your first priority? How can you recognize an idol in your life? What is something you have allowed to take priority over your walk with Christ? How can you remove or realign those priorities?

Breakout
Pray for each other to work on their relationship with Jesus. Be honest about your walk. Share the areas you’re good and share your areas of weakness.

Submitting to the Seasons

Introduction:

How Should I Handle the Changing Seasons of My Life? (Eccl 3:1-15)

1. I should Wisely adapt to Change and Not resist it . (Eccl 3:1-8)
2. I should Trust in God's timing and Not force my own . (Eccl 3:9-15)

   A.W. Tozer - "It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply."

David Gibson - "Living well in God’s world means recognizing that when it comes to our lives, we are not mini-gods, and this is His creation, not ours. We have all the pieces of our life given to us, and things come and go and seasons change, and it is only God who knows exactly where everything is meant to go, in which order, at what time, and why.”

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Taylor Brown is a CONTROL FREAK!

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Taylor Brown is still a CONTROL FREAK!

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Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:31

  My name is Taylor Brown, I'm the youth pastor of a North Park church, but before I worked at North Park, I was actually an intern here for around a year or so. I was able to preach and get some of my first ministry experience here, so Harvest has a big part of my heart. I'm really glad to be here with you this morning. I've preached at Harvest at two middle schools and at the place down the road with the Camelot. This is my first time ever preaching here, so I'm really excited to be with you this morning in this space. So for the next minute or so, I want you to step into the mindset of a seven to 10 year old.

  00:31-00:37

  If you have a child that age, try to think and process how they see the world around them.

  00:37-00:39

  Are we ready for this mental exercise?

  00:40-00:51

  Now imagine that your parents are leaving you at home by yourself for an entire week because they're going on a trip and they don't want to bring you with them because they actually want it to be a vacation.

  00:51-00:53

  I think all the parents can kind of relate to that, right?

  00:53-00:58

  I know this is a really ridiculous, made up scenario, but please just play along with me.

  00:58-01:04

  So for 168 hours, you get to decide what you do and what you eat.

  01:04-01:08

  Let me ask you, what would you eat over the course of this week?

  01:08-01:15

  Would you carefully meal plan to make sure you hit all the major food groups and eat the right combination of fruits and vegetables?

  01:15-01:16

  Not at all.

  01:16-01:19

  You would eat all the junk food in your house.

  01:19-01:21

  You would eat Oreos by the sleeve.

  01:21-01:23

  You'd be eating whipped cream out of the can.

  01:23-01:26

  You'd be shoving candy down your throats, right?

  01:26-01:34

  Okay, someone's like, "I really want that to be the true scenario this week." Now imagine what you would actually do over the course of this week.

  01:34-01:40

  Would you try to get ahead of your studies during the summer, do all your chores on time, and make your bed every morning?

  01:40-01:48

  No, you'd be watching TV all day, playing video games, staying up until all hours of the night until you finally crashed after a massive sugar high.

  01:48-01:52

  Last question, how would you feel at the end of this week?

  01:52-01:54

  Would you feel well-rested and healthy?

  01:55-02:04

  No, you would have a massive stomach aches, you'd be so tired, because kids don't understand that moderation is important.

  02:04-02:08

  Left on their own, kids will only choose what's fun.

  02:09-02:13

  They won't choose to eat that which tastes the best to them.

  02:13-02:19

  They wouldn't understand these activities in mass quantities are very, very destructive.

  02:20-03:19

  Children who live this kind of lifestyle would be very unhealthy, very sleep deprived, and be very self-centered. In a much greater way, if we weren't in complete control of our lives, we would only pick relaxation, comfort, we would only choose fun. We would completely steer clear of hard work, pain, and trials. And by doing so, we would become spiritual lightweights who missed out on all the joys, all the blessings that come with depending upon the Lord. We become very self-centered people who only care about our wants, our needs, our desires. Thankfully, we are not in charge and we serve a sovereign and all-wise God who is in control of every single aspect of our lives. This morning we're going to focus our attention on Ecclesiastes chapter 3 verses 1 through 15 and learn that there is beauty, purpose, and meaning behind every single season of life that we must walk through.

  03:19-03:30

  This is a very timely passage of scripture to read because we find ourselves in a very difficult season right now in this world and in this country specifically.

  03:31-03:39

  It seems like new issues, new difficulties keep popping up every single week and we don't know what's going to happen next.

  03:40-04:08

  you've lost a job, maybe you're facing an illness, maybe you're really stressed out about the direction that our country is taking, it's really easy to give ourselves over to discouragement and hopelessness during this season that we find ourselves in, this coronavirus season. But God wants each and every one of us to trust in Him and believe that He always does what is right, that He He knows exactly what he is doing.

  04:08-04:17

  So I hope and pray that all of us, myself included, will walk away from this sermon with a greater sense of trust and dependence in our God.

  04:17-04:22

  So if you have your Bibles, please turn to Ecclesiastes chapter 3, verses 1 through 15.

  04:23-04:32

  And the question I want each of us to answer this morning is, "How should I handle the changing seasons of my life?" How should I handle the changing seasons of my life?

  04:32-04:37

  Number one, I should wisely adapt to change and not resist it.

  04:37-04:40

  I should wisely adapt to change and not resist it.

  04:41-04:47

  The first eight verses of the third chapter of Ecclesiastes are popular with Christians and non-Christians alike.

  04:48-04:53

  Even unbelievers will have this section of scripture read at their funerals.

  04:53-05:00

  King Solomon, the author of Ecclesiastes, taps into something very close to everyone's heart.

  05:01-05:34

  really important realities of life that I want us to read about together in verses 1 through 8. Solomon writes, "For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven, a time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to pluck up what is planted, a time to kill, and a time to heal, a time to break down, the time to build up, a time to weep and a time to gather stones together.

  05:34-05:38

  A time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing.

  05:38-05:39

  A time to seek and a time to lose.

  05:40-05:42

  A time to keep and a time to cast away.

  05:42-05:45

  A time to tear and a time to sew.

  05:45-05:48

  A time to keep silence and a time to speak.

  05:49-05:51

  A time to love and a time to hate.

  05:52-05:55

  A time fo war and a time for peace.

  05:56-06:02

  Throughout all of Ecclesiastes, these verses stand out as uniquely poetic and beautiful.

  06:03-06:12

  As I was studying for this message, I realized that these eight verses are made up of 28 different phrases, which can be broken down to 14 different pairs.

  06:12-06:16

  This list includes multiples of seven.

  06:17-06:19

  Now you'd be thinking, "Taylor, why does that matter?

  06:19-06:24

  "Why are you giving us a math lesson right now?" Well, the number seven is very important throughout all of scripture.

  06:25-06:29

  The number seven symbolizes completion or perfection.

  06:30-06:38

  So by using multiples of seven, Solomon is trying to show us this list includes all the things that we can go through in this life.

  06:38-06:44

  One writer puts it this way, this list includes the totality of all things that are contained within any human life.

  06:44-06:48

  This is a complete summary of the seasons of life.

  06:49-07:00

  It touches upon birth and death, planting, sowing, tearing down, building up, crying, laughing, war, peace, love, hate.

  07:00-07:05

  Everything that you can possibly go through in this life is accounted for on this list.

  07:06-07:13

  By reading this, Solomon wants to take a big step back and see our lives from the big picture perspective.

  07:13-07:20

  He wants us to expect massive changes, massive surprises, and even difficulties and suffering.

  07:21-07:23

  Raise your hand if you hate change.

  07:23-07:25

  You love it when things stay the same.

  07:26-07:26

  Not that many of you.

  07:27-07:28

  Who likes when things change?

  07:29-07:31

  I'll never understand you people, but I'm glad that you exist.

  07:32-07:37

  I absolutely hate change and I resist it whenever it comes into my life.

  07:37-07:39

  Case in point, I absolutely hate surprises.

  07:40-07:42

  If you want to ruin my birthday, throw me a surprise party.

  07:43-07:44

  I hate that.

  07:44-07:48

  If I walk into a surprise party, I'm just going to walk right out because I don't want to be there.

  07:48-07:50

  I want to know if the party is going to happen.

  07:51-07:58

  Unfortunately for me, and those of you who don't like change as well, change is inevitable and we have to deal with it.

  07:58-08:00

  We cannot fight against it.

  08:01-08:10

  In these eight verses, Psalm is calling us to submit to the seasons of life and adapt to the changes, adapt to the situations that come into our lives.

  08:11-08:11

  And this isn't easy.

  08:12-08:15

  This takes great wisdom, discernment, and patience.

  08:16-08:22

  When you enter into a season of suffering, into a season of pain, how are you going to handle that?

  08:23-08:24

  Are you going to grumble?

  08:25-08:26

  Are you going to be negative?

  08:26-08:27

  Are you going to complain?

  08:28-08:30

  Or are you going to choose the trust in the Lord?

  08:31-08:36

  We have to recognize that God brings these trials into our lives for a very particular reason.

  08:36-08:44

  Even the season we find ourselves in right now, God didn't just allow it, He brought it into our lives because He is sovereignly in control of everything.

  08:45-08:50

  we go through these situations God wants us to get better and not grow bitter.

  08:51-10:47

  Instead of asking God why is this happening, let's start to ask God what do you want me to learn through this trial? Let me tell you from experience the why question will just drive you insane and stir up doubts and fears in your heart and your mind while the what question will help you to make progress in your relationship with the Lord and become more like Christ. On the other hand, when you experience a season of tremendous blessing and abundance, don't just congratulate yourself. Pat yourself on the back and forget to thank God for his blessings. Don't forget to thank God for his goodness. When something you work really hard for falls apart, don't just refuse to ever try again. Learn from your mistake, learn from your failure and move on. When a loved one passes away or a close friend betrays you, don't just shut down completely and hold everyone else at an arm's length. Mourn this loss and ask God for his help so you can move forward and learn to live with this pain. You can't always control what happens to you, but you can always control how you respond to what happens to you. Did we catch that? You can't always control what happens to you, but you can always control how you respond to what happens to you. Will you respond with hope and wisdom or you respond with foolishness and despair? All right, secondly, how should I handle the changing seasons of my life? I should trust in God's timing and not force my own. I should trust in God's timing and not force my own. Let's move forward and read verses 9 through 15. "What gain has the worker from his toil? I a man to be busy with. He has made everything beautiful in its time. I want that verse to really stick with you. Let's read it again. He has made everything beautiful in its time.

  10:47-11:31

  Also he has put eternity in a man's heart, yet so he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceive that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live. Also that everyone should eat and drink can take pleasure in all of his toil, that is God's gift to man. I perceive that whatever God does endures forever. Nothing can be added to it nor anything taken from it. God has done it so that people fear before him. That which is already has been, that which is to be already has been, and God seeks what has been driven away. So in addition to hating change and surprises, I will admit that I am definitely a control freak.

  11:32-11:34

  Raise your hand if you're a control freak like me.

  11:35-11:39

  You're not very go with the flow type of person, you have to be in control of everything that's going on in your life.

  11:39-11:41

  Who's more of like a relaxed, easygoing person?

  11:41-11:43

  You don't really worry that much about the future.

  11:44-11:48

  Now I really wish that I was more like you and less like myself in that way.

  11:49-11:51

  You know, the control freak has this mentality.

  11:51-11:53

  If you want to get something done right, you have to.

  11:54-11:57

  And that's how I always feel in different ways in my life.

  11:58-12:04

  And case in point, I absolutely hated group projects in high school and college.

  12:04-12:06

  Who else hated group projects?

  12:06-12:07

  'Cause you know why?

  12:07-12:12

  I was the one in the group who cared the most about the projects, so I did most of the work.

  12:12-12:20

  Now some of you were like me, the neurotic people who did everything, and some of you were the slackers who took advantage of people like me.

  12:20-12:30

  In the spring of 2013, I was a senior at Geneva College and I was on the cusp of graduating and I made the unwise decision of saving one of the hardest classes for last.

  12:31-12:32

  Now there's a class called political science.

  12:33-12:40

  This is a class at Geneva that's known for its senseless busy work, its difficulty, and a lot of people push it off until the last moment.

  12:41-12:44

  And our final assignment was a group project.

  12:44-12:49

  I heard those words come out of my professor's mouth and I just like died a little bit inside.

  12:50-12:53

  And he assigned the groups at random, which is even worse.

  12:54-12:59

  Now let me ask you, do you think I was given the hardest working members of this class.

  12:59-12:59

  What do you think?

  13:00-13:04

  I was given the biggest slackers, didn't seem to care if they passed or failed.

  13:05-13:08

  And so I was the one who elected myself to be the leader of this project.

  13:08-13:10

  I was texting people, emailing them.

  13:10-13:12

  After a week, no responses.

  13:13-13:14

  No one responded to me.

  13:14-13:16

  I was getting so angry.

  13:16-13:19

  I was like, there's no way these people are gonna drag me down with them.

  13:19-13:23

  I'm not gonna fail this assignment and mess up my final semester at college.

  13:23-13:24

  So you know what I did?

  13:24-14:04

  Geneva is small enough that I was able to find out where they lived. I tracked them down. I went to their apartments and their dorms. I made them carry out their end of the deal. In one case, I actually looked over a guy's shoulder as he was typing out the assignment to make sure that he was actually doing it. And then you're wondering why is there a picture of this? My friends and I have a Facebook page, a private Facebook page called Four Years at Geneva where we post pictures and videos from our time there. My one friend followed me to document this. He took pictures of me leaning over this guy's shoulder and trying to show him how he was doing the assignment wrong. That was the next picture. There's me lecturing.

  14:04-14:32

  Apparently I was lecturing him for a long time. I don't really know. But my stalking paid off and we got an A minus on the assignment. So it kind of worked out in the end. Who thinks I went too far in stalking these people? Some of you are like, wow, I really judge this guy a lot. I don't know about this. Who thinks I was perfectly justified in what I did? All Regardless of what you think about my stocking story, we can all admit that I am a control freak who has a hard time letting things go.

  14:32-14:34

  We all can struggle with this at times, can't we?

  14:35-14:39

  We can all struggle with letting go of the control that we think we have.

  14:40-14:45

  But the older I get, the more I realize how much of my life is completely out of my control.

  14:46-14:48

  And this realization shouldn't terrify me.

  14:48-14:49

  It shouldn't terrify you.

  14:51-14:59

  it should fill us with peace, comfort, and hope because we know the track record and the character of the God that we serve.

  15:00-15:03

  All of us have certain plans for our futures.

  15:03-15:07

  We all have certain timetables for when we want our dreams to become a reality.

  15:08-15:17

  But Solomon bursts our bubble in verse 11 when he tells us that God has put eternity in a man's heart yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

  15:18-15:26

  In other words, we have a deep-rooted desire as human beings to intimately know the future and completely understand God's plans.

  15:27-15:31

  But unfortunately, God is far beyond our limited minds.

  15:31-15:39

  He is beyond our full comprehension and there are going to be things about His ways that will never make sense to you in this life.

  15:39-15:43

  As Solomon tells in this passage, we were made to live forever.

  15:43-15:47

  And one day, we will see the Lord face to face in heaven.

  15:47-15:49

  His plans will make sense.

  15:50-15:52

  What he did in our lives will begin to come into focus.

  15:53-16:00

  Until that day, we have to be content to have some of our biggest questions about God and this life go unanswered.

  16:01-16:02

  Are we willing to accept that?

  16:03-16:05

  Are you willing to accept that?

  16:05-17:38

  Even though you can't look into a crystal ball and see your future, you can know that your God's planned out exactly what your future looks like. Your future is a firm and fixed plan that God has and nothing and no one can stand in his way, not even you. You know, sadly, we often think that we know better than God does. Sometimes I try to give God advice when I'm praying. You ever do that? I try to tell him what to do, how to do it, and when it needs done. To be clear, it's a good thing to pray for specific things and pray for specific outcomes, but it becomes a huge massive problem when you hold God to these plans and get angry at him. When he doesn't follow your exact timetables. God isn't your employee who you can boss around and tell him what to do. He is your employer. He is your boss. He is the one who is in charge. He is the one who knows what is best for you. What's that song? Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers. I can definitely look that and say that is very, very true. Now this is a illustration that's not going to hit Pastor Jeff very well, but hopefully you all like it. Who is a fan of the Lord of the Rings movies or the books? Now Jeff passed out during the first movie several times, so he's not going to really get what I'm talking about. Now who's never read a single one of those books or watched any of those movies? All right, so some of you haven't. For those of you who haven't read these books or watched some movies, it's basically a fantasy setting and there's these little creatures called hobbits. They're like little dwarfs in this area of this country called Middle Earth.

  17:39-17:56

  And the beginning of the first movie, a wizard named Gandalf comes to town, and Frodo, a hobbit, he sees him, he runs to the wagon, and he says to Gandalf, "You are late." And Gandalf looks at Frodo in the face and he says, "A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins, nor is he early.

  17:56-18:02

  He arrives precisely when he means to." You know, a lot of times we say the same thing to God.

  18:03-18:03

  God, where are you?

  18:04-18:09

  God, don't you care about what I'm going through? I need you to show up right now.

  18:09-18:13

  And God's trying to give us the same exact message that Gandalf gave to Frodo.

  18:13-18:19

  I am never late, nor am I early. I arrive precisely when I mean to.

  18:20-18:23

  Regardless of how you feel, God never forgets about you.

  18:23-18:28

  God never delays. He knows exactly what He is doing. He knows what is best for you.

  18:28-18:31

  And that's why He doesn't always give you what you want.

  18:32-18:35

  That's why he brings trials and hard times into your life.

  18:36-18:40

  These hard times are evidence that God loves you, not that he hates you.

  18:41-18:49

  God brings these times into your life to smooth out your sinful and rough edges and mold you into the image of Jesus Christ.

  18:49-18:59

  As you read the Bible, it becomes very clear that every single godly man and woman used by God to do great things had to go through immense pain.

  18:59-19:10

  The famous theologian A.W. Tozer once wrote this, "It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply." That really changes our perspective, doesn't it?

  19:10-19:13

  I in no way want to trivialize your pain this morning.

  19:14-19:18

  I in no way want to minimize the grief that you may be feeling right now.

  19:19-19:25

  Walking through the valleys of life is never an easy journey and there are gonna be days where you feel like giving up.

  19:26-20:00

  There are gonna be days where you feel like life is random and chaotic, but I want you to know this morning that God never, ever wastes your pain. Ever. The road to sanctification, becoming more like Christ, is paved with suffering, but its destination is eternal life. The road of worldliness is paved with comfort and relaxation, but its destination is everlasting destruction. So I want you to answer these questions honestly morning. Do I believe that my God's perfect plans are better than my own?

  20:01-20:54

  And secondly, do I trust in the Lord or do I trust in myself? Do I trust in the Lord or do I trust in myself? Trusting in the Lord isn't a one-time decision you make at your conversion when you bow the knee to Jesus as your Lord and Savior. It is a difficult decision that needs to be made multiple times a day. There is no harder decision than choosing to trust rather than doubt. Choosing to have hope rather than giving in to hopelessness. Our view of God is often blocked by our insecurities, our fears, and our doubts, but true faith is keeping your eyes fixed on Jesus when you suffer and go through pain. True faith is believing that God is good, that God is in control when you're walking through the valley of the shadow of death and you cannot see what lies ahead.

  20:54-21:00

  True faith is trusting in God even when it seems like he doesn't know what he's doing.

  21:00-21:03

  Even when it seems like he's not in control of your situation.

  21:04-21:10

  True faith is believing that God will make something truly beautiful out of everything in this life.

  21:10-21:17

  You know this life is really similar to standing really close to a massive painting at the Carnegie Museum of Art.

  21:18-21:23

  If you've ever been there, just try to imagine yourself standing in front of this massive, massive painting.

  21:24-21:30

  And you're at one end, and you see these beautiful combinations of yellow, blue, red, and green.

  21:31-21:34

  And this part of the painting fills you with a lot of enjoyment and excitement.

  21:34-21:39

  As you move down, you come across these seemingly random splotches of brown and grey.

  21:39-21:42

  And this section just seems kind of random and pointless to you.

  21:42-21:48

  And you continue to move on and there's one part of the paint that's just pure darkness.

  21:48-21:53

  It looks like the painter just threw a bucket of black paint against the canvas for no reason.

  21:54-22:00

  As you back up, you are blown away by the scope and the beauty of this masterpiece.

  22:00-22:05

  Those sections that seem just random and pointless add depth and nuance to the painting.

  22:06-22:11

  Those sections of black make the other colorful parts just pop that much more.

  22:11-22:14

  You know, one day we're going to see our lives like that.

  22:14-22:19

  One day we're going to see our lives from an eternal perspective and everything will change.

  22:20-22:23

  We'll see that trial we went through that seemed to have no meaning.

  22:23-22:26

  We'll finally understand that's why God did that.

  22:26-22:28

  That's why he led me through that.

  22:28-22:34

  You'll see all the people that you were able to bless by being Christ-like through that experience.

  22:34-22:38

  All the threads of your life will come together and finally make sense.

  22:39-23:28

  realize that God was in control all along. Our lives were not chaotic. Our lives are the work of a divine painter. I'm gonna close our time this morning with a quote that really comforts my soul. "Living well in God's world means recognizing that when it comes to our lives we are not many gods and this is his creation not ours. We have all the pieces of our life given to us and things come and go and seasons change and it's only God knows exactly where everything is meant to go, in which order, at what time, and why. So instead of doubting the Lord's goodness and stressing out about what might happen in the future, let us trust this masterful artist and believe that he will make something truly beautiful out of whatever we're going through right now, no matter how ugly and dark it may seem. Let's pray.

  23:30-24:07

  Sovereign God, we thank you for who you are. We ask for forgiveness for the ways we fail you. We thank you that even though we fail you, you love us and the grace of Christ upholds us. We thank you that when you see us, you see the perfection of your Son, you see the holiness of Jesus. Lord, fill in where we have weaknesses. Help us where we are inadequate, Lord. Help us to keep our eyes fixed on your Son and believe that you know exactly what you're doing. Lord, Lord, there are those in this room who are really struggling right now and feel like they have no idea what to do next.

  24:07-24:11

  Lord, come alongside them this morning and comfort them and speak to their hearts.

  24:12-24:19

  And for those of us who are about to go into a trial and don't even know it, please prepare us and get us ready to trust in you.

  24:20-24:21

  In Jesus' name, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Ecclesiastes 3:1-15

1. Why should it encourage us to know that the Lord is sovereign and in complete control of every single aspect of our lives?
   

2. Why does the Lord bring trials and difficult seasons into our lives? How is the presence of suffering in our lives the proof of God's love for us?
   

3. Discuss examples from the Bible where God used pain and suffering to prepare His servants for ministry. Share a time when the Lord used a painful trial to help you become more like Christ and bless others.
   

4. What does it look like to trust in the Lord and not yourself? How can you strengthen your dependence upon God over the upcoming week?
   

5. How can we as believers make the most of this current quarantine? How is the Lord calling you to grow and bless others?

Breakout
Pray for the strengthening of those suffering during this uncertain “lock-down/quarantine” season.

Jesus In The Clutch

Introduction:

How Do I Know Jesus Will Come Through In The Clutch?

1. Because He's My authority . (1 Pet 5:6)
2. Because He Cares . (1 Pet 5:7)
3. Because He's Stronger than my opponent . (1 Pet 5:8-9)

   Genesis 49:8-10 - "Judah is a lion's cub; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down; he crouched as a lion and as a lioness; who dares rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples."

Revelation 5:5 - And one of the elders said to me, "Weep no more; behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scrolls and its seven seals."

Revelation 20:10 - "and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever."

4. Because He Always sees it through . (1 Pet 5:10-11)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:06

  Well, good morning. I'm very, very thankful to be up here in front of you all and to have this opportunity.

  00:07-00:11

  Before I start, let me just start with a word of prayer, and then we'll get going this morning.

  00:14-00:20

  Heavenly Father, thank you for what you've been doing in my life, God, to lead me up to this moment.

  00:20-00:23

  God, I thank you that you have led me through this message.

  00:23-00:31

  Lord, I thank you for another opportunity to gather together here today as a church and to hear your word, hear your truth.

  00:32-00:34

  God, I pray that we would hear these things from your word.

  00:36-00:43

  We would apply it directly to our lives and that we would grow closer to you and stronger in our walk with you as well.

  00:44-00:47

  I lift all of these things up in Jesus's name, amen.

  00:50-00:52

  So open up your Bibles with me please to 1 Peter.

  00:53-00:54

  Be in chapter five.

  00:55-00:58

  We'll be going through verses six through 11.

  01:01-01:10

  And a few months ago, my wife, Lexi, and I, we went for a walk, or actually a run, before coming here to church on a Sunday morning.

  01:12-01:16

  Already a weird day, unusual day, because I was up any earlier than I had to be on a weekend.

  01:16-01:17

  Never happens.

  01:18-01:24

  So we came back from this run, and we realized that there was a puddle on the kitchen floor.

  01:25-01:26

  Okay, that's weird.

  01:26-01:27

  It was underneath the dishwasher.

  01:28-01:34

  Maybe it wasn't all that weird because we had had a leak underneath our sink for the last couple of days.

  01:36-01:48

  So we let our landlord, who just happens to be my father-in-law, Joe, he's here today, we let him know the issue and he was set to bring a plumber out in the next coming days, maybe even that next day.

  01:49-01:55

  We thought, you know what, why don't we just shut the water off to the dishwasher so we don't have a puddle every day.

  01:55-02:29

  Okay, so here I go underneath our sink having absolutely no idea what I was doing. Here I come, this is my plumber stance by the way, I get underneath here, open up the door, find a little lever, go to pull it, gives a little bit of resistance, but then it turns. Get up, I don't know what I was really expecting in this moment but thought, "You know what? That can't be it. It's too easy. It's the first lever I saw.

  02:29-02:33

  I pulled it and nothing happened." So there must be another one underneath there, right?

  02:34-02:46

  I go again back underneath the sink. There's a second lever. Looks just like the first one, only it's further back this time. I go to pull that one and it gives a lot of resistance.

  02:48-03:13

  But I think to myself, "Well, it's got to be it. I mean, this is the lever." So I pull on it more, pull on it more, and pull on it more, and then all of a sudden, bang. My hands just drop straight to the ground, and there is a gigantic hole behind our sink, and water is rushing out of it like a waterfall. I mean, straight fire hose.

  03:15-03:20

  And the sound of this water coming out of the wall still haunts me to this day.

  03:22-03:26

  So it's a complete disaster and I'm now in scramble mode.

  03:26-03:29

  First thing I do is I call up my father-in-law, "Where are you?

  03:29-03:30

  Help!

  03:31-03:37

  How do I shut the water off?" And my next question was, "Where are you?

  03:37-03:40

  Can you please help me?" He was 25 minutes away.

  03:41-03:46

  It was gonna be a long shot. He's trying to just talk me through how to shut the water off. I'm running downstairs.

  03:47-04:03

  I'm checking in the garage. Meanwhile, Lexi's upstairs and having no clue what else to do is just underneath the sink with a bucket and just pouring it back into the sink because we've got nothing else left to do. We are on the deck of the Titanic.

  04:05-04:21

  And I remember at one point opening up the garage because that was a potential place where I could shut the water off and looking up at the ceiling and just seeing the water through the ceiling, into the garage, onto our car.

  04:22-04:28

  And in that moment, just thinking, "Oh my gosh, I'm flooding our house.

  04:29-04:36

  I am going to flood our house." So this went on for what felt like five hours, but it was really only a couple of minutes.

  04:37-04:49

  And then finally, at the last minute, right before the water that was all over the kitchen went into the living room, to our hardwood floors, possibly ruining them and warping them forever.

  04:50-04:55

  I went back to a knob that I tried to turn before and just turned it harder.

  04:55-04:57

  And eventually that shut the water off.

  04:57-05:00

  But at the very, very last minute.

  05:02-05:06

  So young and naive I was just those long months ago.

  05:09-05:13

  And if you don't know, Andrew did say in the introduction, I work in sports talk radio.

  05:13-05:17

  So in my mind, a lot of things go back to sports analogies.

  05:17-05:19

  That's just how my mind has been wired.

  05:20-05:26

  And in sports, we like to call this moment of triumph, this moment of victory, coming through in the clutch.

  05:27-05:29

  Just sounds cooler, basically.

  05:30-05:37

  And these moments of triumph and victory in the last seconds are easily recognizable, and they separate some athletes.

  05:38-05:43

  It's like when Ben Roethlisberger threw that touchdown pass in the corner of the end zone to San Antonio Homes and the Super Bowl.

  05:45-05:46

  That was coming up in the clutch.

  05:47-05:56

  When Sidney Crosby scored the golden goal in the Olympics in overtime to defeat Team USA, that's coming through in the clutch.

  05:57-06:02

  It defines these legends, these sports heroes, if you will, as loosely as you can use that term.

  06:04-06:05

  The moments that people remember.

  06:07-06:16

  And I learned some valuable lessons that day with the water put too much pressure on an older skinny plastic pipe and always know how to shut your water off.

  06:18-06:36

  But my shutting off the water is of course far from that glorious moment and was more God giving me grace in that moment. And in saying that I can't help but to think that Jesus Christ is that legend. He's that figure for all of us brothers and sisters in the faith.

  06:37-07:11

  He's capable of coming through in those moments when you feel lost, feel desperate, feel confused, scared like I was with that water. Or in the moments when you've been fighting through something, a sin in your life that you're trying to overcome, a financial hardship, or just any difficult decision that you've had to make that you've been wrestling with, You just need some clarification. Just need some direction. That extra push to get you through it and on to the other side. To get victory over that thing.

  07:13-08:25

  And that's when you can rely on Jesus Christ. That's when He shows you His power and shows He is worthy of all your trust and can come through in the clutch for you. And you may hear that and you think, "Well, that's, I mean, He made up Jesus in the clutch, really awesome, sports, whatever, but how do I know that this is true? How can I know that when I've exhausted myself and my abilities and things are at their worst that Jesus will lead me through? Let's go to his word, as we should all the time in these scenarios and as we should daily as Christians, and let's see for ourselves why we can have that confidence, why that's not just a cute saying. Turn in your Bibles with me please if you haven't to 1st Peter chapter 5 starting in verse 6. This is Peter writing from what he refers to as Babylon which is most likely Rome and he's addressing this to Christians scattered all over including Asia Minor which is now modern day Turkey and he's writing this to encourage them as they are still under Roman control and they're suffering much persecution. So let's read.

  08:28-08:57

  "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him because he cares for you. Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a firm in your faith, knowing the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.

  08:58-09:09

  And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.

  09:10-09:13

  To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

  09:15-09:21

  So how do I know Jesus will come through in the clutch? Well, number one on your outlines, because he's my authority.

  09:23-10:15

  Let's go back to verse 6 here real quickly. It says, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God so that the proper time he may exalt you." I love that this passage starts out this way. Why? Because it establishes right away that if you don't get your own pride out of the way, if you don't humble yourself before your Lord and Savior under his mighty hand. If you think you know better and you can do a better job and you know the right moves to make than the one who created you and created everything around you, who knows all your faults, all your weaknesses, who understands the situation that you're going through and on a deeper level than you could even possibly comprehend, then you'll fail. Every time.

  10:17-10:34

  Holding on to your pride will ruin you. And if you want more assurance on that, you can look no further than the verse before this statement in verse 5 in 1 Peter, where it says, "Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders.

  10:34-10:55

  Clove yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble." So not only does our pride ruin us, but did you see what else is is added on there, the little cherry on top of your hottie sundae, that God is actually opposed to the proud.

  10:56-11:00

  He's on the other side of you whenever you're too prideful.

  11:01-11:02

  He hates that.

  11:03-11:05

  This brings it to a whole other level.

  11:07-11:14

  This is taking the field, and God Almighty, big, giant God, is on the other side.

  11:15-11:18

  He's looking to go against all your best efforts.

  11:20-11:23

  This is like following a GPS in an area that you've never been before.

  11:25-11:28

  And you're driving along, and all of a sudden, you start to feel pretty confident in yourself.

  11:29-11:30

  Say, hey, that tree looks familiar.

  11:31-11:33

  I think I know where I am right now.

  11:34-11:37

  So all of a sudden, you decide not to follow that GPS anymore.

  11:38-11:42

  And you start to go down roads that maybe the GPS didn't tell you to go down.

  11:44-11:56

  And now somehow every turn that you take, every shortcut that you take, every right turn that you think you're making along the way is somehow leading you farther away from your destination.

  11:57-12:00

  And it just keeps getting worse and worse and worse.

  12:01-12:05

  And you're driving yourself even further away from your goal, from your victory.

  12:06-12:09

  And ultimately in this case, from God.

  12:10-12:11

  It's working against you now.

  12:14-12:19

  So before you can go any further in asking for Jesus to come through for you, it has to start here.

  12:21-12:22

  It has to start with humility.

  12:24-12:27

  With being willing to admit that you don't know the best way out.

  12:28-12:29

  Or the best way forward.

  12:31-12:34

  Be humble so that God can lift you up in due time.

  12:35-12:40

  Be humble so that God can offer you His grace, as it says in verse 6.

  12:40-12:45

  And that word grace being something that is given to us that we don't deserve.

  12:47-12:50

  Stop trying to do it all on your own and in your own strength.

  12:51-12:51

  It's silliness.

  12:54-12:57

  And I've been there before, recently, like this week recently.

  12:58-12:59

  I know what that's like.

  13:01-13:02

  Know that God is your authority.

  13:04-13:08

  We've been called to obey His authority and humbly serve Him with our lives.

  13:09-13:15

  And it's a lot easier to know and accept that God is your authority when number two is also true on your outlines.

  13:16-13:20

  Which is that I know Jesus will come through in the clutch because He cares.

  13:22-13:23

  Let's look at verse 7.

  13:25-13:32

  It says, "Casting all your anxieties on Him because He cares for you." Our God is not socially distant.

  13:34-13:39

  He didn't just create us, maybe with a mask on, and just walk away.

  13:40-13:41

  That's not what our God did.

  13:42-13:58

  He didn't just place us in the world on this broken earth to just kind of fend for ourselves and figure out the many trials and tribulations of this life and say, "Hey, even through your struggles you just got to find a way to come back to me." No, that's not how it works.

  13:59-14:00

  He's in our every day.

  14:01-14:02

  He knows our emotions.

  14:04-14:14

  What makes us happy, what makes us excited, what makes us angry, what frustrates us to no end, and what we really need to satisfy our souls.

  14:15-14:19

  And as mentioned in verse 7 here, what makes us anxious as well.

  14:21-14:25

  Like whenever we've run out of options and we just kind of throw our hands up and we say, "You know what?

  14:26-14:26

  That's it.

  14:26-14:27

  I've got no other answers left.

  14:28-14:33

  All I can do is just look up." Have you ever been there before?

  14:34-14:35

  That feeling?

  14:37-14:38

  Cast your anxieties on him.

  14:40-14:40

  Why?

  14:41-14:42

  Because he cares.

  14:44-14:50

  Every year my wife Lexi and I go on a trip to the Dominican Republic, except for this year of course because it was canceled.

  14:51-14:57

  And every year we get to see a great example of how caring makes a difference.

  14:57-15:04

  The local leaders there are pouring into the kids that we run the basketball and volleyball camp with.

  15:05-15:11

  And they're taking time out of their every day to pour into those kids and to meet their needs, every one of their needs.

  15:12-15:23

  Physical needs by feeding them meals, their emotional needs by just sitting down and having a conversation with them about what's going on in their lives, what's going on at home.

  15:25-15:30

  those coaches can relate to them very well because they've been through some of the same things.

  15:32-15:43

  And also meet their spiritual needs by having Bible studies with them, by going through Scripture before we start every day at camp. And they show to them that they care about them.

  15:44-15:51

  Here I am investing my time and my energy to you in meeting those needs personally for you.

  15:53-16:00

  And it all comes together, it all means that much more to these kids when somebody shows they care.

  16:01-16:06

  That they aren't just a number. And that's what God is telling us here through Peter.

  16:08-16:39

  And what a statement that is, really, if you think about it. I mean, here God says, "I already know what is making you anxious. I know it. And I love you, and I care for you, and I'm big enough to handle it. So bring it on. Cast all your anxieties, cast all your fears, all your sins, all your failures, everything. Lay it on me, and I can handle it.

  16:41-16:47

  I can lead you through it. I'm inviting you to pass over all your baggage onto me.

  16:49-16:53

  Don't leave anything on the table, because I'll know if you do.

  16:54-17:07

  Bring it all to me so that I can lift you up, so I can come through for you in your most desperate moments. So please come to me in humility, because I care for you.

  17:10-17:50

  So now knowing that God is my authority and that he cares for me, here's another truth of why Jesus will come through in the clutch of my life. And it's number three, because he is stronger than my opponent. Let's look at verse eight. It says, "Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour." Now, this is certainly a bit of a change here with the message. Now, all of a sudden, Peter is warning us to stay focused, To stay alert, to stay aware of the things that we're saying, the people that we are spending time with, how we're acting, who we're surrounding ourselves with.

  17:52-17:52

  Why does he say that?

  17:54-17:56

  Well, it's because we have an enemy.

  17:57-18:03

  And our enemy is described here as prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.

  18:04-18:05

  That's the adversary.

  18:07-18:08

  And do you get that image?

  18:09-18:18

  I think of just a lion hunched down, maybe in some tall grass somewhere, straight out of like a National Geographic show.

  18:19-18:20

  It's like licking its lips.

  18:20-18:31

  It's looking toward the horizon at a young or injured wildebeest, ready to just pounce on it the minute that the herd turns its back, the minute that it can get it alone.

  18:34-18:41

  And I think that's the picture that's being painted here, that our enemy, Satan, is always prowling around.

  18:43-18:46

  He's always waiting to just pick us off the minute we turn away from God.

  18:47-18:54

  The minute we isolate ourselves, and the minute we're easy to pick off, turn our back on God.

  18:56-19:00

  So hold that thought and hold that image in your head for just a couple minutes.

  19:01-19:06

  You've probably heard many times that Jesus is characterized as a lion in Scripture.

  19:07-19:11

  He's the lion of what? Judah. The tribe of Judah.

  19:12-19:13

  One of the twelve tribes of Israel.

  19:15-19:24

  And the idea of a lion being attached to this tribe goes back to Genesis 49, when Jacob is delivering parting words to each of his twelve sons.

  19:26-19:37

  And when he got to Judah, his fourth, he said in Genesis 49, starting in verse 8, "Judah is a lion's cub. From the prey, my son, you have gone up.

  19:38-19:43

  He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, and as a lioness, who dares rouse him?

  19:45-19:52

  The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him.

  19:53-20:04

  And to him shall be the obedience of the peoples." So here the lion has the imagery of being majestic, of being kingly in nature.

  20:04-20:07

  Like who dares rouse up this lion?

  20:07-20:09

  Who would dare to do something like that?

  20:10-20:14

  And that's significant because this is the tribe that's full of great kings.

  20:16-20:25

  From King David, King Solomon, And ultimately, of course, the King of Kings, the King of Heaven and Earth, King Jesus, comes through this line.

  20:27-20:31

  And the scepter there in Genesis 49 is the staff that kings often have in pictures that you might see.

  20:32-20:42

  It's that symbol of authority, and it says it shall never depart from Judah, meaning Jesus reigns as King and will forever.

  20:44-20:49

  So based off of that, we know for sure that Jesus is a lion.

  20:51-20:58

  Now let's go back to verse 8 in 1 Peter, and let's read this carefully and look at the distinction.

  21:00-21:12

  It says, "Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion." It doesn't say your enemy prowls around as a roaring lion, like he already is.

  21:14-21:16

  but just that he wants to act like one.

  21:17-21:18

  He wants to devour you.

  21:19-21:24

  He wants to control you, to try to be your king, and make you think that he is one.

  21:26-21:26

  But he's not.

  21:28-21:30

  He merely tries to act like one.

  21:31-21:33

  There is a huge difference there.

  21:35-21:47

  And I can't talk lions and kings without getting into one of my favorite movies of all time, One that I requested to watch multiple times per day as reports from my parents as a child.

  21:49-21:49

  Aladdin.

  21:49-21:50

  No, The Lion King.

  21:52-21:55

  Here in The Lion King, we have Mufasa and we have Scar, right?

  21:56-21:59

  Where Mufasa is clearly a real king.

  22:00-22:04

  Where under his rule, the pride is going well, everything's relatively peaceful.

  22:04-22:06

  Clearly he's what's best for the kingdom.

  22:08-22:09

  And then there's Scar.

  22:10-22:11

  Satan, if you will.

  22:12-22:17

  just trying to come in there and mess everything up, to ruin things.

  22:18-22:27

  He even kills his own brother Mufasa and then tells Mufasa's son that it was his fault, making him run away forever so that he can have the kingdom.

  22:29-22:36

  And he takes over the land and he drives it right into misery and despair because of all of his evil intentions, because that's what he wanted to do from the very beginning.

  22:38-22:47

  Scar wasn't a real lion. He wasn't a real king. He just prowled around looking to devour as if he was one.

  22:49-22:58

  He was a fake. And spoiler alert, if you haven't seen the movie that came out in 1993, I believe, he was ultimately defeated.

  23:00-24:05

  And guess what? So Satan has also. We know that for a fact. We can find that answer in God's Word as well. We've seen it twice going back to our study in Revelation that Pastor Jeff led us through. First in Revelation 5.5 where coming on to the scene is one that can only read the scrolls and break the seven seals and take his throne. The only one that can do that. 5.5 says, "And one of the elders said to me, 'Weep no more. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered so that he can open the scrolls and its seven seals.'" And then in Revelation chapter 20, when Satan is thrown into the lake of fire to be tormented forever. And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were.

  24:06-24:12

  They will be tormented day and night forever and ever." There's the victory.

  24:14-24:31

  That's the lion. Point being here, God is stronger than my opponent. God's already won. That mountain in front of you that seems impossible to climb, that that stronghold, that enemy you've been dealing with, doesn't stand a chance.

  24:33-24:36

  There's nothing or no one he can't.

  24:38-24:45

  So we're called to resist Satan, the fake, knowing that we have the power and the Holy Spirit to do so.

  24:46-24:50

  And we do so knowing that we're also not alone, as verse 8 tells us.

  24:51-25:18

  That our brothers and sisters sitting here next to us today, and sisters across the street at Northway, our brothers and sisters in the rest of the Pittsburgh area and the United States, and certainly our brothers and sisters across the world who suffer much persecution for their faith know exactly what we're talking about here. They go through the same temptations and the same sufferings that we've gone through ourselves.

  25:20-25:28

  And that leads me to the fourth reason why I know that Jesus can come through in the clutch in my life and in your life.

  25:30-25:33

  And number four is because He always sees it through.

  25:34-25:36

  Let's look at verses 10 and 11.

  25:39-26:17

  "And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. And if I can go back to a sports analogy just for a second, I know. But in 2017, a game that maybe some of us would like to not remember, especially if you're a Steelers fan, maybe a game you would like to remember if you're Taylor Halland, but the New England Patriots played the Atlanta Falcons in the Super Bowl.

  26:19-26:23

  And the first half was just a disaster for New England.

  26:24-26:26

  21-3 they were down at halftime.

  26:26-26:29

  Eventually they got down 28-3 in that game.

  26:29-26:30

  Everything was falling apart.

  26:31-26:34

  New England's defense looked like they were clueless.

  26:35-26:37

  Even the great Tom Brady threw an interception for a touchdown.

  26:39-26:42

  But then if you're a sports fan, you know how the rest of the story goes.

  26:44-27:18

  that New England ended up coming back and they were racing the biggest deficit in Super Bowl history and winning that game in overtime 34 to 28. But I can't help but to think that our suffering can be like that sometimes, right? We go back to that first half, we're the Patriots and our life is just running us over. Just beating us into submission and blowing right past us without us having much to say about it at all. Just being left confused and broken. We feel helpless.

  27:20-27:52

  And whether we're feeling the weight of that directly as a result of our faith, or we're just struggling to keep our faith through this difficult time, it feels like we're fighting insurmountable odds. But in verse 10 it says that after we've suffered a little while, similar to what he was talking about in verse 9 just before this, after you've done so, He will restore you and make you strong, firm, and steadfast. God isn't just in it for the short term, for the first half.

  27:53-27:57

  As Christians, we know we are to share in the sufferings of Christ. We're promised that.

  27:59-28:08

  We're promised to have hardships if we truly live for Jesus. That people will oppose us, They'll persecute us. They'll attack us sometimes.

  28:09-28:12

  Just as they did to Jesus Himself whenever He was walking the earth.

  28:14-28:22

  And if people can do that to the Son of God, God in human form, then they can certainly do it to you while you're here.

  28:23-28:23

  We should expect that.

  28:26-28:27

  But we can't be discouraged by it.

  28:29-28:48

  1st Hen tells us that after we've suffered for the cause of God and for building up His kingdom while He's here on earth, That's when God will strengthen us and truly restore us and make us strong because we're serving him. And so let's take a step back for a moment and let's think about this.

  28:49-28:55

  Let's think about what person we know that can exemplify this the most.

  28:57-29:03

  Who suffered for a little while, greatly actually, and then rose to victory.

  29:05-29:54

  It's Jesus Christ on the cross. The ultimate example of coming through in the clutch, is it not? Jesus comes to this earth knowing what many men did not know yet, and that their real problem was not with the Roman rule or with humans that were persecuting them, but their real enemy was their sin. That was the real problem at hand, and he came to take it and to conquer it. He preached God's Word to his followers. He showed his people the way. He went against many social norms of the time, only to get captured, tortured, and hung on a cross, humiliated in front of everyone.

  29:58-30:07

  But he was supposed to be the Messiah. He was supposed to be the Savior of all mankind and he gets crucified after he professed himself that he was God.

  30:09-30:09

  That's it?

  30:10-30:11

  Really?

  30:11-30:55

  All hope lost? Of course not. In the greatest and most important comeback story of all time, the greatest example of coming through in the clutch, right when it looks like Jesus has been defeated, he couldn't be contained by the tomb. He took over our sins upon himself because he knew no sin himself, and he buried them forever. The stone rolls away and our Savior and Lord overcomes death and sin to bring us victory over our sin, if we believe in Him, and open the gates of heaven for his people to dwell with him forever.

  30:57-31:16

  That's the Lion of Judah. That's the eternal glory in Christ, and that's why we can say in verse 11, "To Him be the power forever and ever. Amen." That's the truth. So Jesus plays the long game.

  31:17-33:02

  We know that because we're free from the bondage of sin because of his work on that cross. And no matter how bad things get, doesn't matter if you feel unreachable or unworthy, Jesus can come through for you in your darkest moments because he's your authority, because he cares for you, because he's stronger than your opponent and your situation no matter what it is. Nothing is too big for Him. And because He's in it for the long haul, He's not going anywhere. And He deserves honor and glory with how you live your life daily and how we live our lives every single day. And to close, I'd like to read from Psalm 139. And you don't have to turn there. In fact, if you would, I'd like you to just close your eyes. And I want you to put everything else you might be thinking about away, and where your mind may have wandered throughout this message. Maybe it's lunch after this or whatever. And I want you to just take in these words from David in Psalm 139. And I hope this is a great encouragement for you as you go about your battles, go about your week, even go about the rest of your today. No matter what you're facing, and maybe it's just an opportunity to rest in His presence in these really strange times in our country.

  33:04-33:11

  Psalm 139 starting in verse 7 says, "Where shall I go from your spirit?

  33:14-33:20

  Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there.

  33:21-33:24

  If I make my bed and shield, you are there.

  33:26-34:02

  If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, 'Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,' even the darkness is not dark to you. The night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you. Do you believe that?

  34:04-34:24

  Do you believe that no matter where you go, no matter what you experience, even if you've never experienced it before, and we know that a lot of us have been in that place over the last few months or so, that there isn't a place or a moment when God isn't with you.

  34:26-34:34

  And through 1 Peter chapter 5, we know His power. We know that we can have confidence in Him.

  34:36-34:46

  I'm gonna pray to close us and then we can all sing a song together that was inspired by Psalm 139 as the worship team makes its way up.

  34:49-34:53

  Father God, I thank you for just the truth in your Word.

  34:55-35:00

  I thank you that we can have confidence in you to come through in the moments where we don't have any answers left.

  35:03-35:08

  And I thank you that you are big enough to handle anything that we're going through, that it's not a secret to you, God.

  35:09-35:11

  That you are our authority.

  35:12-35:13

  We can stand firm in that.

  35:15-35:19

  Help us to humble ourselves so that we can seek the help of You.

  35:21-35:31

  And I thank You, Lord, that You care for us, that You're in our every day, You know our thoughts, our emotions, everything that's going on with us on a deeper level than we can even understand ourselves.

  35:34-35:50

  And I thank You that You are stronger and that You prove that through Your Word, that We can go from the beginning of the book to the end of the book, being Your Word, the Bible, and know that You ultimately win.

  35:52-35:57

  God, I thank You that You don't just play in the first half.

  35:59-36:06

  You aren't going to just sit around and give up, that You always see it through, that You're there until the very end.

  36:08-36:21

  I thank you for these truths and I pray that each one of us can take those and apply it to our lives and have confidence and we wouldn't have fear with anything that we are facing in our lives.

  36:22-36:27

  Thank you Lord for your power, your strength and the truth that you reveal to us in your word.

  36:29-36:31

  In Jesus' name I pray, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read 1 Peter 5:6-11

1. Are there anxieties in your life that you keep from God? Is there a reason you do that?
   

2. What does your adversary “seeking someone to devour” look like in your life?
   

3. How would you describe being “firm in your faith” mentioned in 1 Peter 5:9?
   

4. What are some ways that we can humble ourselves daily so that God may exalt us?
   

5. Is there a time that God came through in the clutch for you?
   

Breakout
Pray for each other’s anxieties that may be keeping you from your faith in God.

Lifecycle of Redemption

Introduction:

Lifecycle of Redemption (Psalm 107:10-22):

1. Recognizing our need for it is as hard as we make it (Ps 107:10-12 | Ps 107:17-18)

   How do we recognize our need for redemption?

   1. How are things working out for you now?
   2. Are you trying to do it on your own?
   3. Is there some nagging sin you're dealing with?
   4. How's your walk?

2. But being redeemed is practically free as we make it (Ps 107:13,19)

   How do we cry out to the Lord?

   1. In humility
   2. In reverence

   Psalm 145:19 - "He fulfills the desire of those who fear him; he also hears their cry and saves them"

   3. In faith
   4. Submissively

   Psalm 66:18 - "If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would have not listened"

3. And fulfills our needs abundantly (Ps 107:14,16,20)

   Psalm 50:15 - "and call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me."

   Revelation 4:11 - "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."

   How do we respond to being redeemed?

   1. Thanks and gratitude (Ps 107:15,21,22a)
   2. Sharing what he's done for you (Ps 107:22b)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:03

  We'll be in Psalm 107 today and we'll be in verses 10 through 22.

  00:04-00:08

  While you're turning there, I'd like to share some life updates with the congregation.

  00:09-00:11

  You might know that I'm a father of two young kids.

  00:11-00:16

  I have a daughter Lydia who's five now and Silas is around two and a half.

  00:16-00:20

  And with them getting older, they're able to learn and take in a lot of stuff now.

  00:21-00:25

  They're ripe for that age where you can mold them, you can define their behaviors.

  00:25-00:30

  My wife Jessica and I will often read to them bedtime stories from a children's Bible.

  00:30-00:36

  We want to teach them about God, his character, his son Jesus, and what he did for us on the cross.

  00:37-00:40

  We want to do that in a way that they can understand that.

  00:40-00:45

  We want it to be with a message that's true, but simplified for them.

  00:45-00:52

  I think there's a lot of families that maybe raise their children on a similar Bible, but it's one where there's a lot of illustrations and pictures.

  00:54-01:55

  pictures in it are drawn idealistically, right? Everyone's clean, everyone's happy, and the thing that I get a kick out of with this is there are situations in the Bible where you know that you would be terrified or things are just going crazy and everyone's still drawn oddly calm. Like they illustrate Daniel just hanging out with the lions, even the lions they have smiles on their faces, and Lazarus being raised from the dead he just appears from the side of the building like, "Hey y'all, you know, I've been dead four days, whatever." And I get it, my kids are young, but when you read the Bible cover to cover, you find and discover that it's wrong, right? There's life and death situations, war, pain, struggle, it's all there. After all, not only is this God's word, but it's also an historical book too. So today we're going to be looking at some passages that are on that raw, true life side, when there are extreme lows and extreme highs.

  01:56-02:01

  Our passages today, we're going to be starting at the extreme lows and moving our way up to the highs.

  02:01-02:08

  Now, if you've ever watched a comic book movie in the past, you know, last decade, they follow a similar pattern, right?

  02:08-02:25

  They might not start at that low, but there always comes a point in the story where things are at their bleakest. Then somehow, through humbling themselves, through willpower or friendship, They overcome and win, they end on this high note, right?

  02:25-02:30

  That transformation, that shift from low to high, that usually comes through redemption.

  02:31-02:33

  There's stories about redeeming themselves.

  02:34-02:36

  That's the focus of our passages today.

  02:36-02:40

  We're going to be talking about redemption and our need for it.

  02:40-02:44

  But before we get diving into the scripture, I want to talk about that word, redemption.

  02:46-02:49

  It's one of those biblical terminologies that often gets secularized.

  02:50-02:52

  So we need a little bit of clarity here.

  02:53-02:58

  When I hear the word redemption or redeeming, two things come immediately to my mind.

  02:59-03:01

  A Bob Marley song and Chuck E. Cheese.

  03:02-03:05

  You might be wondering what both of those have to do with one another.

  03:05-03:08

  They don't, but maybe you can find a connection yourself.

  03:09-03:13

  The reason I think of Bob Marley is because he has a song called Redemption Song.

  03:13-03:17

  My dad used to play his albums in the car and around the house, so it's a bit of nostalgia.

  03:18-03:24

  But there's one part in the song where he sings, I'm not gonna sing, but he sings redemption songs, redemption songs.

  03:25-03:29

  So I looked up the lyrics 'cause I wanted to understand what does redemption mean to Bob Marley?

  03:30-03:34

  Well, I found that he was writing about freeing yourself from mental slavery.

  03:35-03:41

  And I don't wanna get into his beliefs, but I do wanna make the point of correlating the words freedom with redemption.

  03:42-03:44

  So let's hold that on in the back of our minds.

  03:45-03:47

  So now, what about Chuck E. Cheese?

  03:47-03:52

  Well, I think of it because we all know that nobody goes there to see the guy dressed up as a mouse.

  03:53-03:55

  We go there for the prize counter.

  03:55-04:04

  For all those outside the loop or living in a different country, Chuck E. Cheese is a family entertainment center where they have food games and corondolace ball pits.

  04:06-04:11

  A big part of their operation is a chain of exchanges or redemptions, right?

  04:12-04:16

  You buy tokens to play games, to earn tickets, to redeem them for prizes.

  04:17-04:29

  They had like little rubber snakes and bugs and candy for like five to ten tickets each and always something ridiculous like a 50cc dirt bike for 500,000 tickets that's been there since '97.

  04:29-04:30

  Nobody's going to get that.

  04:32-04:39

  Again, it's a bit of nostalgia here, but their whole business was centered around exchanges of this and that to get or redeem for something.

  04:39-04:44

  So we have these two concepts that make up redemption, freedom, exchanges.

  04:45-05:02

  we can also glean a few more general concepts. To buy back, to free, to repair, restore. Biblical redemption has similar parallels. There's this idea of purchasing or exchanging something for freedom, but it's not between men.

  05:03-05:22

  Biblical redemption is between us and God, and the thing we're being freed from is our sin. See, after the fall, the cycle of needing redemption and ultimate began ultimately have the goal of getting us back to the state that God originally intended us to be in fellowship with.

  05:23-05:32

  So God is buying us back from that socially distant state to live in eternity with our Creator in a restored or redeemed state, free from sin.

  05:33-05:34

  So how does that work?

  05:35-05:37

  How do we go about getting redeemed?

  05:37-05:40

  What is this life cycle of redemption?

  05:41-05:45

  Let's go to God's word and pick up Psalm 107 and read verses 10 through 22.

  05:46-05:51

  Here we're going to read two stories of redemption, the first being in verses 10 through 16.

  05:51-05:52

  We'll start there.

  05:53-05:58

  Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons.

  05:58-06:03

  They had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the counsel of the Most High.

  06:03-06:05

  So he bowed their hearts down with hard labor.

  06:06-06:08

  They fell with none to help.

  06:08-06:12

  Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them from their distress.

  06:12-06:16

  He brought them out of the darkness and the shadow of death, and burst their bonds apart.

  06:17-06:22

  Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man.

  06:23-06:27

  For He shatters the doors of bronze, and cuts in two the bars of iron.

  06:28-06:32

  We'll continue on with our second redemption story, verses 17 through 22.

  06:33-06:38

  Some were fools through their sinful ways, and because of their iniquities suffered affliction.

  06:39-06:42

  They loathed any kind of food, and they drew near to the gates of death.

  06:43-06:46

  Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them from their distress.

  06:47-06:50

  He sent out His Word and healed them, and delivered them from their destruction.

  06:51-06:56

  Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man.

  06:56-07:01

  And let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving, and tell of His deeds in songs of joy.

  07:02-07:06

  My immediate reaction when reading this was, it's pretty dark and bleak, right?

  07:06-07:09

  Each story starts out extremely hopeless.

  07:10-07:14

  Both start with a situation of extreme affliction, the lobes.

  07:15-07:16

  The first story, there's imprisonment.

  07:17-07:19

  The second, sickness to the point of death.

  07:20-07:21

  How did they get there?

  07:21-07:24

  Well, scripture doesn't say exactly, right?

  07:24-07:29

  Whether they were taken by force for imprisonment, or maybe they didn't go to the doctor and that's why they're sick.

  07:29-07:34

  But we clearly see that they waited until their needs were extreme.

  07:34-07:38

  And that brings us to the first point on your outline, our need for redemption.

  07:39-07:43

  Number one, recognizing our need for redemption is as hard as we make it.

  07:44-07:47

  This is verses 10 through 12, 17 through 18.

  07:48-07:51

  So people are pretty good at messing up and making things harder than they need to be.

  07:52-07:56

  You see in both stories, the cause of their affliction, it's sin.

  07:57-08:01

  The first, it's sinful rebellion against God and His Word and spurring His counsel.

  08:01-08:04

  And the second, it's foolish ways and iniquities.

  08:05-08:07

  I think we can agree that the cause and effect are evident.

  08:08-08:11

  If you do something sinful and wrong, there's bound to be some consequences.

  08:12-08:15

  One difference between these two stories, though, is verse 12.

  08:16-08:16

  Read it again.

  08:16-08:20

  It mentions that God Himself brought about their affliction.

  08:21-08:32

  And I don't think I'm reading this wrong when I'm extrapolating from it, but it clearly states, "He bowed their hearts with hard labor." A.K.A., God himself was directly responsible for their affliction.

  08:33-08:37

  See, in the second one, it's just like, they sinned and they got sick, right?

  08:37-08:43

  Maybe they were neglecting their health or they were drinking themselves silly, but does it matter, right?

  08:43-08:49

  Between these two stories, does it matter that God intervened in the first one to bring about their affliction and not in the second one?

  08:50-08:50

  No.

  08:51-08:53

  After all, it's not God who started their troubles, right?

  08:54-09:11

  I mean, when I read these two stories, these situations, they seem almost parental in nature, right? They remind me of how I discipline -- well, and Jessica -- discipline our kids, right? There's some times when you have to step in immediately and you have to put that foot down, right?

  09:11-09:13

  You don't talk back to me and disrespect me that way.

  09:15-09:20

  Other times, you just have to provide warnings and let the kids kind of destroy themselves.

  09:21-09:24

  off of mommy's exercise ball. You're gonna slip and fall.

  09:24-09:37

  Five minutes later, "Ahh!" and I'm consoling my child, probably Lydia. I'm just rolling my eyes and just thinking to myself, "You know, I told you so." That's what I see God is doing here.

  09:38-09:52

  They reveal their iniquities. And I'll go out on a limb here, but practically all examples of my life, when things are going rough, I can trace it back to similar behaviors, lack of relationship with God, thinking I can do it on my own.

  09:53-10:09

  And I don't think I'm alone here. After all, how often is it driven into our heads as Americans, right, that you can be and do whatever you want? We live in a country that affords us every opportunity available, so don't let anybody stop you from doing what you want to do.

  10:10-10:16

  That gung-ho, can-do attitude often leaves little room for God and plenty of vacancy for sin.

  10:17-10:34

  So we're slogging through, aiming for a prize or some end goal along the way, or just rebelling against God, committing iniquities. So what do you expect to happen? And as things unravel and your situation gets worse, when do you expect it to change? I mean, how do you expect it to change?

  10:35-10:40

  That's why the first point I say, recognizing our need for redemption is as hard as we make it.

  10:41-10:50

  Depending on how stubborn or bullish you are, coming to the end of yourself and understanding You need God's redemption can come quickly or it can take a fair bit of time.

  10:51-11:02

  See, I relate to both of these examples because it took them a while to recognize their need for redemption. After all, they ended up in those extreme lows, in prison, on the verge of death.

  11:03-11:47

  See, I tend to do that myself. I rely upon myself to keep, I just keep digging that hole downwards, right? My work is one area where I struggle the most with this. See, I work with a team of people, technology, we obviously all have our specialties, but every one of us gets seen as like a subject matter expert in a given area. So, you know, I'll help people out. People often come to me to help them out with some certain problems, but some days it just turns into constant distractions, right? I can't get my work done, so I then get behind and it just snowballs throughout the entire week. I spend more time working, so I'm tired and it gets hard to separate that work stress from home. So then it just builds, builds, builds.

  11:48-12:01

  The whole time I feel like, "No, if I can just do this, if I can finish this, get this done, then it never goes according to plan." So I'm not physically in prison. I feel overwhelmed and imprisoned by my own futile efforts, sickened by them.

  12:02-12:12

  Like I said, some of you might recognize your need for redemption quickly. A need to get out of your situation and that you need God's help with that. But coming to that recognition is key.

  12:13-12:19

  So on your outline, our sub-point under number one, how do we recognize our need for redemption?

  12:21-12:26

  Coming to this recognition requires taking some stock in your situation, right?

  12:27-12:28

  And we're gonna ask ourselves some questions.

  12:29-12:34

  Not all of these are gonna apply, but here's some questions we can ask ourselves to gauge where we're at.

  12:35-12:38

  So letter A, how are things working out for you right now?

  12:39-12:40

  Are things going well?

  12:40-12:43

  Or would you say something's out of control?

  12:44-12:46

  My guess is if you're asking this question to yourself, then it's the latter.

  12:47-12:51

  Understanding that something, understanding there's something wrong is important.

  12:52-12:56

  It's not, it's a distinction that there's something bigger to this than just a mishap or an unfortunate event.

  12:57-13:00

  Letter B, are you trying to do it on your own?

  13:01-13:03

  Where are you placing your trust and strength from?

  13:04-13:05

  From yourself or from God?

  13:06-13:07

  From his word, from his people?

  13:08-13:09

  We're not meant to do life alone.

  13:10-13:13

  Is there anyone aware of your situation and are folks able to pray for you?

  13:14-13:16

  You're not as strong as you think.

  13:17-13:17

  Letter C.

  13:18-13:20

  Is there some nagging sin you're dealing with?

  13:21-13:22

  Sin is a major catalyst for trials.

  13:23-13:26

  Both verses 11 and 17 explicitly mention this.

  13:27-13:28

  It was the cause of their affliction.

  13:30-13:36

  So is there anything you're doing or continuing to do that is feeding into your situation?

  13:37-13:40

  Finally, letter D, how's your walk?

  13:41-13:42

  Are you fellowshipping with God and other Christians?

  13:43-13:49

  Asking God to show you through this, reading his word, understanding his character, and pursuing what he instructs us as Christians to do?

  13:50-13:57

  Now this isn't a comprehensive list by any means, but the idea is to get to a point where you recognize your need for redemption.

  13:58-14:06

  I mean, you can continue to beat your head against the wall or dig your hole, but once Once you're ready to turn it over to God and ask for his redemption, what do you do?

  14:07-14:09

  How much is it going to cost you?

  14:10-14:17

  Well, there's good news because the next point in your outline, number two, but being redeemed is practically free.

  14:18-14:20

  Verses 13 and 19.

  14:21-14:25

  One thing you might notice is that verses 13 and 19 are the exact same.

  14:26-14:31

  Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble and he delivered them from their distress.

  14:32-14:45

  Now, I don't see anything before that that says that they recognized they were being sinful so they went to the soup kitchen, they said "Five Our Fathers," they donated to charity and then they promised God, "I'm never going to do that again." No, it's simple.

  14:46-14:48

  What did they do to get redeemed?

  14:49-14:50

  They cried out to the Lord.

  14:51-14:53

  Now what does that mean to cry out?

  14:53-14:55

  Is it like weeping and sobbing?

  14:56-14:56

  I don't know, maybe.

  14:57-14:58

  I mean, that could be part of it.

  14:59-15:04

  emotional outpouring of feeling of distress and helplessness, but it's beyond that.

  15:04-15:08

  There's a pleading, a desperation, a reliance upon God.

  15:08-15:15

  You've recognized your need for God's deliverance and have come to the end of yourself, so you're turning it all over to Him.

  15:16-15:18

  Come to the cost question, right?

  15:19-15:21

  What did they pay with in our stories?

  15:22-15:23

  Again, nothing.

  15:24-15:26

  No works, deeds, or negotiation with the Lord.

  15:26-15:31

  And I think there's a lot of time where people can get caught up with this concept, right?

  15:31-15:38

  They try to penalize themselves or think that there's something that they need to do to earn God's mercy and grace for their eventual redemption.

  15:39-15:43

  But if you think that's the case, then I have bad news for you.

  15:44-15:47

  Like it or not, there is nothing you can do to earn God's redemption.

  15:49-15:53

  We all fall short of the glory of God, but more on that later.

  15:54-15:56

  They cry, God responds.

  15:57-16:01

  So after we recognize our need for redemption, how do we ask for it?

  16:02-16:08

  Well, we're told in these verses, right, after all they repeat themselves, it's got to be pretty important, we cry out to the Lord.

  16:10-16:11

  Okay, so what does that mean?

  16:12-16:14

  How do we cry out to the Lord?

  16:14-16:19

  Well, I'm glad you also asked that rhetorical question because it's the next sub-point on our outline.

  16:20-16:23

  Letter number two, how do we cry out to the Lord?

  16:24-16:26

  Letter A, inhumility.

  16:27-16:31

  At this point, I'd hope you understand you need God's help, right?

  16:31-16:38

  You can't go begrudgingly to the Lord like, "Fine, please help me, I guess." That's not how it works.

  16:38-16:40

  Your heart needs to be ready for Him.

  16:41-16:45

  All throughout the Bible, when people cry out to the Lord in humility, He responds.

  16:46-16:48

  Letter B, in reverence.

  16:49-16:50

  Reverence is the fear of the Lord.

  16:51-16:54

  It's when you understand his power, his holiness, and you have a healthy respect for that.

  16:55-16:57

  God listens to the reverend.

  16:58-17:00

  Psalm 145, 19 tells us so.

  17:01-17:04

  It reads, "He fulfills the desire of those who fear him.

  17:05-17:11

  "He also hears their cry and saves them." In letter C, in faith.

  17:12-17:16

  Do you believe in God's ability to help you or is this just a last ditch effort?

  17:17-17:19

  It's one of those, "All we can do is pray" type of deals.

  17:20-17:21

  We love that here at Harvest, right?

  17:22-17:25

  You're asking the Lord who created the heavens and the earth to help you.

  17:26-17:27

  Our God is not small.

  17:28-17:32

  But maybe you think your problem is one that God doesn't want to deal with, right?

  17:32-17:34

  He doesn't want to hear about it and he's not concerned with it.

  17:35-17:37

  The scripture would tell us otherwise, right?

  17:38-17:40

  He hears the cries of the affliction.

  17:40-17:42

  He knows the number of hairs on our head.

  17:42-17:45

  He knows us intimately, what troubles us and what we need.

  17:46-17:50

  So there's no separation or categories of affliction when it comes to God.

  17:51-17:54

  It's like, he'll deal with this first, but you've been prioritized behind my gates.

  17:55-17:59

  No, have faith in God's power to help you, and he will.

  18:00-18:03

  Finally, D, how do we cry out to the Lord?

  18:04-18:05

  Submissively.

  18:06-18:08

  So turning over yourself and your situation to God is crucial.

  18:09-18:10

  There's no more room for you.

  18:11-18:12

  Time for you to let God work.

  18:13-18:17

  This includes addressing some of those questions that we asked ourselves prior.

  18:18-18:19

  So you're not walking with the Lord?

  18:20-18:20

  Get on it.

  18:21-18:22

  Sinning? Cut it out.

  18:23-18:27

  Psalm 66, 18 gives us a perfect picture of why we submit when crying out to the Lord.

  18:28-18:30

  Or rather, what would happen if you don't submit?

  18:30-18:39

  It reads, "If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would have not listened." We can't get much clearer than that.

  18:40-18:41

  Lay it all at the foot of the cross.

  18:43-18:47

  So should we go Old Testament on this and bring out the sackcloth and ashes?

  18:49-18:53

  I mean, I guess if you're inclined to, but the heart of a cry out to the Lord is your heart.

  18:54-19:03

  You can cry out silently in prayer or aloud from your rooftop, but again, the important factor is what is driving that cry and your heart and intentions behind it.

  19:04-19:09

  I suppose that's why our point number two was saying that redemption is practically free.

  19:10-19:19

  We aren't paying with money or good deeds, but we are paying with ourselves, giving up our pride, our sin, our time, all that for his redemption.

  19:20-19:22

  Really, that's all I could see would be the only cost here.

  19:23-19:28

  Now, one other thing I wanna bring up is that there is no mention of timing here.

  19:29-19:34

  When it comes to the imprisonment, how long did it take for them to be delivered?

  19:35-19:35

  Well, it doesn't say.

  19:36-19:51

  And for the sick, was it a supernatural healing, something instantaneous, Or did God work through what we would consider to be typical methods of letting our bodily functions rebuild and recover, taking a few weeks or maybe even a couple of months?

  19:52-19:53

  I don't know, it doesn't say.

  19:54-19:58

  The one thing that we can be sure of is that God responded and delivered them from their distress.

  19:59-20:02

  He heard their cries and it did not fall on deaf ears.

  20:02-20:08

  And I know personally, it can be hard to wait for God's deliverance, especially when we're in this hyperactive, instant gratification world.

  20:09-20:12

  But if you're looking for God where He's working, you'll find it.

  20:13-20:23

  If you come back to my work situation example, I find that often when I'm overwhelmed and I've come to the end of myself and I'm asking God for His redemption, it happens.

  20:24-20:26

  It's subtle, but it does happen.

  20:27-20:34

  For instance, there's been many times where I've been on a project or something and people know like, "Hey, Mike, you need help.

  20:35-20:36

  You seem like you got a lot on your plate.

  20:37-20:40

  And you know, it's simple, right?

  20:40-20:43

  But I get redeemed from those issues.

  20:45-20:51

  Or I have meetings that are blocking up my calendar and, you know, people just push them or cancel them.

  20:52-20:54

  So I have more time to do what I need to do.

  20:55-21:02

  And I'm sure I could chalk that up to happenstance or just luck, but for that to happen over and over again when I really need it, come on.

  21:03-21:03

  I know my God.

  21:04-21:07

  He raised his son from the dead so he can push a meeting or two.

  21:08-21:14

  So maybe you're in a situation where redemption is a small need or rather it's very large, a big need.

  21:15-21:25

  But the one thing that we can be sure of, and this is the final point for today, number three is that God's redemption fulfills our needs abundantly.

  21:25-21:29

  Or rather if we're continuing the sentence, and fulfills our needs abundantly.

  21:30-21:32

  This is verses 14, 16.

  21:33-21:41

  So coming to these verses, I mean, these are the most exciting verses in the scripture, the most promising ones here, right?

  21:41-21:44

  It's the result of being redeemed, right?

  21:44-21:50

  And these people, prison, close to death, they submit to God, they cry out to Him, they're in trouble.

  21:50-21:51

  And what do they get?

  21:52-21:52

  A little redemption.

  21:54-22:00

  No, no, you know, like the imprisoned got an extra meal and it says that they got some extra basketball court time.

  22:01-22:06

  sick they got some Tylenol to help their headaches. No, that's not what I'm reading here, right?

  22:07-22:19

  God fills their knees in total. He delivers them. Imprisoned. Freed. Iron bars cut in half. Bonds bursted apart. The sick healed and freed from their destruction.

  22:20-22:25

  You know, when I read this, it's hard not to get amped, like God's coming in like a superhero to save the day.

  22:25-22:27

  But God's not a superhero.

  22:28-22:33

  And what I mean by that is that after redemption, he requires glory.

  22:34-22:37

  See, our comic book heroes we read about, typically they hide in the shadows.

  22:37-22:40

  They stop at a speeding train and then off, off and away.

  22:40-22:43

  They don't linger. They're oh so humble.

  22:43-22:44

  They just want to serve the people of Gotham.

  22:45-22:46

  Not God.

  22:47-22:49

  He demands and deserves glory, and rightfully so.

  22:51-22:54

  And for those on the fence who think I'm making this up, there's a perfect verse that addresses this.

  22:54-23:22

  Psalm 50 15 it reads, "And call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver you and you shall glorify me." In fact that verse kind of sums up the entirety of our scripture today, right? Crying out in trouble, getting redeemed, and now glorify God. I don't know that might seem a bit prideful, right? Selfish, right? Demanding glory? Well maybe to us as people.

  23:23-23:29

  I mean I know if somebody asked me to them, my initial response would be, "Who are you?" Right?

  23:29-23:33

  "Who are you that I need to glorify you?" Let's flip that question back on God.

  23:34-23:48

  Imagine us asking God, "Who are you?" How about the I Am, our Father who created everything by speaking it into existence, who lives outside of time and space, who cares so much about us that he sent his Son to die on the cross for our sins?

  23:49-23:57

  Now, this is kind of getting into another sermon, but what it boils down to is that God is really the only one who deserves any glory.

  23:58-24:01

  Revelation 411 sums this up kind of nicely.

  24:01-24:23

  This is where we're at the throne room, and you have the 24 elders surrounding the Lord, and they say, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, "to receive glory and honor and power, "for you created all things, "and by your will they existed and were created." Just reading this, who or what else can compare to our Lord?

  24:23-24:29

  Now, when it comes to giving God the glory after redemption, I feel like I fall short of this many, many times.

  24:29-24:31

  I don't give him the glory that he deserves.

  24:32-24:37

  It's easy for us to go through a situation and then just move on to the next thing, right?

  24:38-24:44

  Probably more a result of our hyperactive culture, but it's not the appropriate response.

  24:45-24:53

  So on your outline, the last bit of writing today and the sub-point under number three, How do we respond to being redeemed?

  24:54-24:58

  Now unlike the last set of lists, these actually come from the text today.

  24:59-25:02

  So you might have noticed there were a few verses I didn't address.

  25:02-25:03

  Well, they'll be addressed here.

  25:04-25:06

  So letter A, how do we respond to being redeemed?

  25:07-25:08

  With thanks and gratitude.

  25:09-25:15

  This is verses 15, 21, the first half of verse 22, which I will call 22A.

  25:17-25:19

  So in verses 15 and 21, we have repetition.

  25:19-25:30

  Again, the same verse, "Let us give thanks to the Lord for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works to the children of men." Upon being redeemed, there's a lot to be thankful for, right?

  25:31-25:38

  Not just because you were delivered from your situation, but the fact is that God will redeem you over and over again.

  25:38-25:43

  And we know this because in the scripture, it calls His love steadfast, right?

  25:43-25:44

  It's not a changing love.

  25:45-25:46

  It's not a conditional love.

  25:46-25:47

  No, it's fixed.

  25:48-25:50

  We can always come to God for redemption.

  25:51-25:55

  If he's redeemed you 10 times in the past, he's gonna redeem you 100 times in the future.

  25:56-26:00

  Verse 22a adds a little bit more onto our response, right?

  26:00-26:10

  And I labeled it as gratitude, but the delineation I wanted to make here was that thankfulness was more verbal, whereas gratitude is more an action, right?

  26:11-26:16

  The first half mentions in 22, let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving.

  26:17-26:20

  So what is that exactly, a sacrifice of thanksgiving?

  26:21-26:27

  Well, in the Old Testament, it was usually an animal sacrifice, but it was given voluntarily, right?

  26:27-26:31

  And it was shared amongst the Lord, his priests, and the worshippers.

  26:32-26:40

  Now, today we don't have a system of animal sacrifices because Christ fulfilled that in full with his death on the cross and subsequent resurrection.

  26:41-26:46

  But the idea of a voluntary sacrificial offering still stands.

  26:47-26:48

  So how's that done today?

  26:48-26:54

  Well, you know, it could be through volunteering, could be through missions work, ministry work, giving back financially.

  26:55-27:06

  Point is, we should be giving back to God, not out of obligation, because we have Thanksgiving in our heart for what he's done for us, and that calls us to an action.

  27:07-27:14

  So the next way that we need to respond to being redeemed is letter B, by sharing what he's done for you.

  27:15-27:16

  And this is the second half of verse 22.

  27:18-27:26

  Second half of verse 22 reads, "And tell of his deeds and songs of joy." So here we're called to share what he's done for us with others.

  27:27-27:32

  You know, I say that because talking about songs and songs are meant to be sang out aloud among other people.

  27:32-27:34

  I think our worship leader, Darren, would agree.

  27:34-27:36

  That's the point of a song.

  27:37-27:39

  And during this time when it was written, that's what folks would do.

  27:40-27:45

  During feasts and celebrations, they'd write songs of praise and it would get sang for all to hear.

  27:45-27:48

  Now, I myself am not a songwriter.

  27:48-27:51

  My singing voice is not my spiritual gift.

  27:51-27:52

  Let's just put it that way.

  27:54-28:02

  But I think the important takeaway here is the idea of praising and sharing what he's done for you in your own private way, right?

  28:04-28:06

  Or not even private, I mean, just in your own way.

  28:06-28:09

  For instance, praying in small groups.

  28:10-28:15

  I know it's easy in prayer time to immediately launch into your requests and your needs.

  28:17-28:30

  But interestingly enough, I don't know if anybody else has noticed this in their small group, is that during this whole Corona spat, there's been a lot of folks praising and sharing God's deliverance, His redemption, what He's done for them in these trying times.

  28:32-28:39

  Now, maybe you can write a song or sing one that's already written, but again, the idea is share what He's done for you.

  28:40-28:53

  It's an encouragement for others it glorifies God. So there we have it. Our need for redemption is as hard as we make it, but being redeemed is practically free and fulfills our needs abundantly.

  28:54-29:13

  This is the life cycle of redemption. But before we go, I would make a good "As Seen on TV" spokesman if I didn't say, "But wait, there's more." Because this whole time we've been talking about situational redemption, right? Getting into trouble, crying out to God, being redeemed, and our response to it.

  29:14-29:40

  That's gonna happen over and over and over again. It's almost very Old Testament in a sense, right? Where constant animal sacrifices were done for redeeming for the sins of the people. And honestly that's just the nature of our flesh and the characteristics of living in a fallen world. We're gonna go through situational redemption weekly, perhaps daily. And unfortunately that's where a religions stop there too.

  29:41-29:53

  They teach that you have to get right with God and if you want to go to heaven, you're caught in sin or you're unredeemed from it, well straight to hell with you or purgatory or limbo or wherever you want to call it.

  29:54-30:18

  But that's not true. See earlier I said that there's nothing you can do to earn God's redemption and I'm sticking to that because there is nothing that we can offer God that doesn't already have. He spoke the world into existence. He But interestingly enough, there's actually something additional God offers to us that fulfills our needs more than a one-time situational redemption.

  30:19-30:25

  Or rather, it's someone He offered, His Son Jesus Christ, the eternal Redeemer.

  30:26-30:29

  You might be asking yourself, "It gets better?" Yeah, a whole lot better.

  30:30-30:37

  Because placing your trust in Jesus Christ as your Redeemer means there's no more what-ifs or uncertainty of your eternal state.

  30:38-30:48

  And unlike our fight against flesh and sin and the need for situational redemption almost daily, Christ paid for us once with his blood and death for all.

  30:49-30:52

  There's no need to be redeemed by him over and over and over again.

  30:53-31:00

  Reading this passage over, we can see that same archetype or pattern between our need for redemption and our need for Christ.

  31:01-31:05

  The same affliction, outcry, and deliverance, but this time with eternal meanings.

  31:05-31:10

  And these same sermon points apply directly to trusting Christ as our Redeemer.

  31:11-31:22

  So if you listen to this message, and each time I mention our need for redemption or God's deliverance, I want you to replace it with the words "Jesus Christ" with His Son.

  31:23-31:26

  That's what's so wonderful about the Bible and God's Word.

  31:27-31:29

  Old Testament or New, it all points to Jesus.

  31:30-31:32

  So what did we learn today?

  31:33-31:34

  Well, let's substitute some words.

  31:35-31:37

  We learned about our need for Christ.

  31:39-31:47

  Recognizing our need for Him is as hard as we make it, but being redeemed by Him is practically free and He fulfills our needs abundantly.

  31:48-31:48

  Let's pray.

  31:50-31:52

  Heavenly Father, we thank You for this day.

  31:52-31:58

  We thank You for Your Son, Jesus, for redemption through His blood, His death and resurrection.

  32:00-32:01

  We know that we screw up daily.

  32:01-32:05

  We often have to ask for forgiveness and ask for your redemption, Lord.

  32:06-32:11

  And that's going to continue on all the time until we are in eternity with your Son.

  32:12-32:17

  But we have that promise of being in eternity once we trust in your Son, Jesus Christ.

  32:17-32:20

  So we are extremely thankful for that.

  32:21-32:27

  Extremely thankful that you've given us a way out of this grind, out of this fallen world.

  32:29-32:52

  thank you God that you provided a way. Thank you for being able to bring your word today. Thank you for this congregation Lord and we will now end in praise, glorifying you, singing as a response to our redemption through your Son Jesus Christ. We ask this all in your Son Jesus's name.

  32:53-32:53

  Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Psalms 107:10-22

1. What prevents us from asking for redemption?
   

2. Why is redemption practically free and not scot-free?
   

3. How do we cry out to the Lord and why is it important to do it “properly”?
   

4. Why should we give God glory after being redeemed?
   

5. What is the appropriate response to being redeemed?
   What’re your favorite ways to go about doing those responses?

Breakout
Share with one another a time you went through a ‘Lifecycle of Redemption’.