Pastor Brian and Jacque Lother
Jacque: I will sing of the goodness of God. Yes, yes, yes. Oh, oh, we can do better than that. We clap for both the goodness of God and how good Brian plays about the goodness of God.
Brian: Not just me. It's Randy
Jacque: Oh, Randy
Brian: And Brad.
Jacque: And Brad. You guys are awesome. Yes. Thank you. Just a couple things as Brian is his making his way here. Jeff has a funny event planned for us: going to see the music man at the Chanhassen dinner theater, and there are only three seats left. So talk to him today if you want to join in on the fun. And next Sunday is a picnic. Yes, a picnic at the Corcoran Park. Bring your own lunch and just come and visit. It's just going to be a great time. Look forward to it.
Brian: It will be a great time as long as the weather is like this.
Jacque: And even if the weather isn't, it's still a great time to be together.
Brian: There is a shelter there.
Jacque: Yes, it rained last time when the kids had so much fun and we were all safe.
Brian: You can practice like mudslides and stuff. So it'll be fun. Bring your dirty clothes.
Jacque: Just come for the picnic.
Brian: A few weeks ago, we took an offering for Kelly and Catalin and Influence church. They sent a short thank you video, and we would like to play that for you at this time.
[Video]
Jacque: They are reaching their goals and we keep praying for them and praying for us and praying for Afghanistan and praying for our governor and praying for our president and praying for our state. You know what? You have no reason to be bored. There is so much to pray for. There is so much going on. We have dear friends, Dan Peters and his brother Jim, who are really in a very critical place right now. Dan had a heart attack just recently and his brother Jim has hospitalized with COVID. Jacque has got friends, Barb Lindahl and her husband is in the hospital with COVID. Their son, David, is on a respirator right now with COVID. They need our prayers. People all over the country need our prayers. Apaul is not with us today because she is with her daughter and son-in-law whose father is very close to passing. We need to just keep praying for people. We need God's presence.
This has been a really, really hard year for Jacque and I on so many different levels. Not just because both of our mothers passed away within three weeks of each other and then a good friend sandwiched in between, but we had other good friends, close friends to us this past year that have passed away. There have been other circumstances that have been also very difficult, disappointments. How many know that at times when you go through disappointments, a cloud of unbelief can settle over you. That's just a natural consequence of one setback after another. Sometimes some people have not even realized how unbelief can creep into our lives when you have one setback after another, after another, after another. Sometimes people go through what I call like major battles, really crucial situations like the Peters family right now and so forth. There are other people who've gone through really, really serious battles that begin to question God's promises to you.
We just recently heard of a church, it's out on the west coast and they went through tremendous upheaval. There was certainly a lot of toxicity at times in the framework of that church, but three of the pastors on staff have just not only left the staff, but they have become agnostics. One of the pastors that were on staff committed suicide. These are real battles. These are real circumstances that come into people's lives. We need to hold fast to our faith. We need to hold fast to who Jesus is. I forget who is who said it, but they said something like this, they were not Christians. And, but they said, you know, I really, really do like Jesus. I just don't like very many of his followers.
Sometimes the way we have followed Jesus hasn't truly represented who Jesus really is. Sometimes we begin to forget the promises of God even to the point of no longer looking to the word of God for encouragement and faith. We fill our lives with other items and other things to mask our pain and to help us get through the day. We find ourselves watching more and more and more television. We sometimes take alcohol or drugs and other things into our system to just get us through the day, get us through the night, get us through the week, and we no longer look to the word of God for encouragement. I don't think this is the exception. I think this is becoming more and more the norm in our world and in our culture.
The fact of the matter is many people have found themselves in circumstances that are very far removed from what they had hoped for. I think a couple, when they find themselves filing for divorce, if they reflect back upon what they were anticipating when they first got married, that's not what they were expecting. Was it? When you have a child and that child is born and, and you find out as a lady you are pregnant and, and you are excited about this baby, this child that's born, and then when he is four years old, he comes down with leukemia. That's wasn't what you were expecting.
We live in a world where there are all sorts of circumstances and situations that happen. We find ourselves in circumstances that are far removed from what we had had the faith for and what we had hoped for. These circumstances can often feel like tremendous setbacks in our lives, but I want to tell you some good news today that with God, every setback can become a set-up. With God, every setback can become a set-up. Part of that has to do with how we respond to the setback and the circumstance. I would like to take a look at a few of the, we would call them, great people of faith in the scriptures, the heroes of the faith. Many of which found themselves in circumstances that were very unlike anything their faith and hope had expected. Have you ever had hope and faith for something and found yourself in completely the opposite circumstance or situation from what your faith and your hope had expected? Yet it was in this unexpected place that God developed an incredible character in your life?
I can honestly say starting basically in January, 2020 to the present time, this has been the hardest roughly 20 months of our ministry, probably the hardest. The last 20 months have been the hardest and our 47 plus years of ministry. Yet I can honestly tell you today that I believe I'm closer to the Lord and I have a deeper relationship with Christ and my marriage is better than it has ever been, weathering all of the struggles and all of the difficulties and all of the problems that we've had to incur the last 20 months. We've also seen God do some wonderful, incredible things in the last 20 months. So it's not all gloom, despair and misery on me. I'm not auditioning for He-haw. But we have to recognize the times that— a couple years ago, when we were finishing just kind of the end of 2019, we were not expecting what was on the horizon to happen.
This was very unexpected. We found ourselves in an unexpected place, but in that unexpected place, God has formed his character and his very nature into our lives. God has established character in his people, which in turn has released the power of God in my life in a way that's not ever yet prior to that I really experienced. Because of that, I believe God is taking that circumstance, which could easily be defined as a setback, and he has used it as a setup to push us forward into what our destiny is and what God's purposes are for our lives. We have to hold on to that. I have some I would like to read today and look at, and the first one is found in 1st Thessalonians, chapter 2, verses 17 and 18.
This is the apostle Paul, because the apostle Paul was a church planter. He was a itinerate evangelist. He was called to not only the Gentiles, but also the Jews. He was kind of a two-pronged guy, but one of his main callings was to the Gentiles. And so he did these missionary journeys where he traveled and he established all these churches and he had found relationships, established relationships with these churches. Then he longed to go back and see how they were doing and so forth, because he was concerned about their spiritual growth. any times he wanted to go back and see some of the churches he planted, but there was a situation that came up or an obstacle. Let's read it.
Jacque: Do you have any idea how very homesick we have become for you, dear friends?
Brian: This is written to the churches in Thessaloniki, which was a region. He is saying, do you have any idea how homesick we became for you?
Jacque: Even though it hadn't been that long. And it was only our bodies that were separated from you, not our hearts. We tried our very best to get back, to see you. You can't imagine how much we missed you. I, Paul tried over and over to get back, but Satan stymied us each time.
Brian: Do you ever feel as though everything you try and do, Satan is trying to stymie you in it, there is a resistance, there is an obstacle and it feels like you are running up against like a steel door and you keep putting your head down because you know, greater is he that's in me than he is it's in the world and you run it. And then you realize that somehow you are not making it through that steel door. This is what was happening with the apostle Paul. He tried on many occasions to get back, but he says, "Satan stymied us each time."
Jacque: Who do you think we are going to be proud of when our master Jesus appears, if it's not you? You are our pride and joy.
Brian: Here is a question I believe we have to answer. Can Satan actually stop and throw out the will of God? Well, the answer to that is actually no. The answer to that is actually no. Yet God will allow the enemy. What may seem like certain advantages against his people. God will allow that. God will allow the enemy to create what we might call certain advantages against his people. He may allow that, but in this portion of scripture, we see that Paul a setback. Setbacks are really where unbelief seeks to stop our forward progress. We are all walking with God. We are all making strides towards a certain goal. Setbacks are where unbelief seeks to stop our forward progress in God, our forward progress even in life. That's what a setback is. However, if we become Christ-like in the crisis, if we become Christ-like in that— can you fix that for me? It's all messed up. Thank you. Thank you. I need some people to help me get dressed.
Jacque: It's your collar.
Brian: Thank you. All right.
Jacque: Is that better?
Brian: That's better. Yes. Thank you. If I get messed up again, you can just jump over without me asking you to do that. But if we Christ's like in the crisis, that's one of the things that I've really prayed a lot of. As most of you know, I do pauses throughout today. I get my grandchildren to do them with me now. I say," Charlie, you want to do a pause?" Sure. And then Fin comes along. "Fin, do you want to do a pause?" Yeah. So we all sit down, they fold their hands, and I say, "Do you want to do a one-minute or a three-minute pause?" Fin will say, "I want a one minute pause." Sometimes when it's just Charlie and I, we will do a three-minute pause.
I do a pause regularly throughout today. One of the things that I pray is that I will have more of Jesus in me, that more of the river of life of God will flow into me, that I take moments out of every day to just say no matter where I'm at— I could be in the car. It could be out on the deck, I could be sitting on the couch, I could be out cutting wood, and sometimes I'll just pause to say, Jesus, I need more of you. God will start to create his likeness in us, in our crisis. God will begin to transform our setbacks to set up. Because you know what God's real goal is for us? God's real goal for us is not to get us into a bigger house even if we need one. God's goal is really not to get us a better car if our current car isn't working very well, that's really not God's goal. It's not that he doesn't want to take care of us, provide for us, but God's goal for us is to create in you and me, the very essence of Jesus Christ, for us to become like Jesus.
Every circumstance that we come into, every setback that happens, he is going to make a way for us to become Jesus in that setback, and that's a setup. That's a setup. And so God will use the very thing that seemed like a disadvantage to us, to at times, release the very destiny and purpose of God in our lives. God will use what we have. We might only have five loaves and two fishes. That might be all that we have, but he will use those things to create the very destiny and purposes that God has created for us. Sometimes some of our problems are this: we actually don't even understand that we have a destiny and purpose in God. We wander aimlessly in a sense throughout life, because we haven't grasped the hold of that purpose that God has for us.
The apostle Paul had it in his heart: I need to travel. I need to start churches. I need to do this. I need to do that. I need to evangelize. I need to revisit these places that I've planted. Yet where did God lead Paul? Do you know where he led him? To jail. God led Paul to jail and not journeys. He led them to jail. There were setbacks. There were times he tried to get there and it was easy for him to think Satan stymied me, but in those dark, mildewed Dungeons and jails that Paul served time in, Paul allowed God to form the very character of Christ in his life.
You can see when you look historically at the end of Paul's life, how much more he was like Jesus than he was when God knocked him off the horse on his way to Damascus. Paul allowed the character Christ to emerge in his life. Look at acts chapter nine, verses 15 and 16. We really don't like to read this verse when we think of what our journey with Christ is going to be like. But here is what the Lord said to Ananias right after Paul had his Damascus road encounter his experience with Jesus. This is what Jesus said to go tell Ananias to tell him.
Jacque: But the Lord said to Ananias, go. This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel.
Brian: He was to go tell Paul, you are to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings. He is going to have a Royal audience during the course of his life. He is going to be speaking to Kings and magistrates and rulers and Gentiles. If God were to give you a prophetic word and that word was, you are going to be speaking to presidents and kings and Queens and emperors, you would think—
Jacque: I'm pretty special.
Brian: I'm pretty special. You would think I'm pretty special, but then there is a little bit of a caveat that God throws in there for him, and it's this.
Jacque: I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.
Brian: I didn't sign up for that. How many of you signed up for suffering when you gave your heart to Jesus? Let's face it. That's really not the kind of the gospel of the Western world. Come to Jesus and suffer. Come to Jesus and enter into a hard life. come to Jesus and enter into setbacks. That's really not the gospel that we like to preach and declare here in America. We like a gospel that kind of fits into our economic system over here.
Jacque: Come to Jesus and get blessed.
Brian: Yeah. Come to Jesus and get blessed.
Jacque: And you do get blessed.
Brian: There are blessings, but the blessings that God has for us, oftentimes look entirely different than the blessings that we imagine and envision. The blessings of this past 20, roughly months in our lives and in America, the blessings of the last 20 months, haven't been perceived at all as a blessing by many people. It has been looked at as whatever. We don't even need to run down that rabbit trail. We just know it hasn't been thought of as a blessing, but God has been in all of this forming his very nature and character in our lives. And so Paul emerges here and Jesus is often found in the most unexpected places.
Paul became, Christ-like more Christ-like in the crises that he engaged in and found himself embroiled in. God turned what Paul probably thought was a setback into a setup. How was this a set up? Well, very simply, this was what the setup was: while he was in prison. He wrote the books of Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon when he was in prison. Now, let me ask you a question. How many of you are thankful he was in prison? How many of you are thankful that he suffered great things so that you and I could have the incredible revelation of the book of Ephesians and Philippians, where he says "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." That was written from prison. The book of Colossians and Philemon, smaller books may be thought of as less significant, but nevertheless, still very rich in content.
All of these, he wrote from a prison cell. I wonder if he had been traveling, planting churches with all that stuff to do— talk to Kelly and Catalina about how much work it is to start a church. All that work and starting a church, I wonder if he had had the time to write Ephesians and Philippians and Colossians and Philemon. I wonder if he would have found the time to do that. And so today our lives, the whole church of Jesus Christ has been enriched in beyond measure because of the setup that his setback was. Consider the apostle John here. He was exiled to a lonely life on the island of Patmos. John was a people person. I think John was kind of like you.
We needed a piece of music copy this morning, and Randy said to Jackie, I should be the one to go this because I don't like people as much as you do, and I'll get back here right away.
Jacque: He was kidding when he said that. He loves people.
Brian: He loves you.
Jacque: But you don't send me on those errands. I will have a lot of conversations before I come back.
Brian: I don't send you on those errands because you will come back 10 minutes after the service starts because you are talking to somebody. This is the kind of person John was. John was a people person. What kind of torture do you think it was for him to be exiled on an island all by himself. But you know what happened to John in that season of exile? He became a listener because that's all he had to do: to listen. There was nothing to do, so he just listened. As he listened, you know God did? God gave him the whole revelation that we see in the last book of the New Testament. Do you think of John would have been out busy evangelizing and doing all these things, do you think he would have sat down because he was such a people person? Would he have actually sat down quieted himself enough to receive that incredible revelation from God? No. And yet his setback became a setup for the kingdom of God to go forward.
We know the story of Joseph don't we? He was a dreamer. He had dreams when he is a little kid. Everybody hated his dreams because it seemed like he was the top dog in all of his dreams. You've got to be careful who you share your dreams with. You've got to be careful who you share your dreams with. He shared his brain dreams of his brothers and his brothers didn't like it, threw him in a well. They were going to kill him, but decided to make a little money out of it, sold them off into slavery. Now he is down in Egypt and he is a slave. And he gets hired by a guy by the name of Potiphar, who was kind of a government official, higher-up government official. Joseph was young good-looking and Potiphar's wife started to make eyes at him, so to speak and have— we'll just let your imagination go from there. Okay. She tried to encounter him in a romantic way and he resisted. She tore his cloak off. Of course, she felt rejected from this Jewish servant boy that wouldn't respond to her advances and got mad, told her husband. The husband believed her, not Joseph. He got thrown in jail. How many times have you not been believed? How many times have you wanted to defend yourself? Claim your rights.
Jacque: When things are unfair.
Brian: That's right, when they are unfair. When they are unjust. I'm not saying we shouldn't up for injustice, we need to do that. That's one of the earmarks of being a follower of Jesus. We look at the disenfranchised and the marginalized and we reach out and help them. That's what we do. That's what Jesus does. When Jesus is in us, that's what we do. Joseph found himself in a dungeon, in a jail. I tell you what, those jails back in those days, weren't anything like the jails today. I don't even want to be in our jail today, never mind a jail from 3,500 years ago. Yet what did he do when he was in the dungeon? He began to minister and serve the jail keeper. And we know the story, don't we, how he ministered to the jail keeper. And he ministered to the other people who were in prison. Eventually, he rose to be the number two person in the whole kingdom of, of Egypt, which was the power position that actually saved his family when they came into a famine.
So again, was this a setback when he got sewn sold into slavery or was it actually a setup? See God allowed it to become a setup. God pushed forward for it to become a setup. If Joseph would have moped and not kept the character of Christ being formed in his life, if he wouldn't have really given himself to the service of the people that were there who were actually creating the injustices for him, I don't believe God would have promoted him as he did. It wouldn't have happened. And so we see this wonderful story of Joseph and the great, great setup that God created out of it.
And then there is David. David is a young boy. He gets anointed by Samuel to be king. I'll be honest with you. If that would have been me, as soon as I was finished being anointed, I would have said well, let's go build a castle. I'm in charge now. I'm the anointed king. But no, he certainly did not expect to find himself in the wilderness as a fugitive running from the current king. He didn't expect to find himself in that place, especially after he had been anointed. He could have claimed this is my right. I'm the rightful ruler here. Yet when David had the opportunity to take the life of King Saul, which would have allowed himself to then take that position that he had been anointed for, what was his response? I will not lay my hand up against the anointed. See, David didn't think of himself as the anointed. He said promotion comes from God. I'm going to let God do that. Promoting. I'm not going to self-promote. I'm not going to do that. And so it was in the injustice of the wilderness I believe that great character was formed in him. Our circumstances and your circumstances may not be what you envisioned.
Let me encourage you with this. Whatever your circumstances are, they are no obstacle to God. They are no obstacle to God. They are simply a setup for God to show himself strong on your behalf. God is with you. God is with us here at Hope Community. One of the ways that we can rest and trust in God, in these setbacks is to trust in him and just even ask yourself, how would Jesus respond in this circumstance? How would Jesus respond in this circumstance? What would be his response in this circumstance? We've been listening to a few podcasts on just some issues that some mega churches have encountered and kind of the thread that seems to weave itself throughout all of these different churches that have had problems. It's this, that the leadership had a different mission and a different goal than becoming like Jesus, but our mission and our goal needs to be, to become like Christ.
That needs to be what our greatest focus is: how can I become more like Jesus in this circumstance? Not, is this circumstance fair or not fair just or unjust. Because God says that he knows how to defend you, and that vengeance is his. And so when we encounter circumstances— and we live in a fallen world where with people that are selfish and greedy, and then there is demonic presences at work influencing people. So we should actually expect unfairness. We should actually expect injustice in a world that is not filled with righteousness. When those things happen to us, when unfairness happens, when a justice happens, our response needs to be, how can I become more like Jesus in this situation? Our circumstances may not be what we envisioned, but there are no obstacles to God to bring his purposes in our life.
One of the ways that we can trust and rest in him is simply to do what would have done. Because when we become more like Christ, you know what flees? Unbelief. When we become more like Christ, you know what happens in our hearts? a peace begins to settle in our hearts when we become more like Christ. Do you know when I'm at the least amount of peace in my heart? When I am really not at all like Jesus, when I'm fighting for myself, when I'm trying to control, when I'm angry about injustice to me and unfairness to me, when I'm like that, that's when the least likeness is in me.
But how many of you like to be at peace? You like to be at peace. I love to be at peace. I love it to be at peace. It's like, I can take a deep breath. You know what? There were times when I'm not at peace, I tried to take a deep breath and it feels like there is someone's just sitting right on my chest and I can't take a deep breath, but when I'm at peace, when I'm becoming more and more like Jesus, I'm more at peace and I can take a deep breath. I can take a deep breath. Unbelief will flee when we become more Christ-like in our crisis. God will turn our setbacks into setups that push us forward towards our purpose and our destiny.
I want to read just two more portions of scripture. These are found in the book of Isaiah. This will hopefully help encourage you because sometimes we feel like there is just like no way out. We need to hire some strategy team to come in and help us find our way out of the darkness. But God always has a plan for us.
Jacque: We need to remember our abundant God.
Brian: Yes. Abundant God. Yes. That's so good. That's so good. This is a reference back to the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, this portion of scripture in Isaiah 43, 16 through 21,
Jacque: We are going to read it from the message. It's so fresh. This is what God says. The God who builds a road right through the ocean—
Brian: How would you like to drive on that road?
Jacque: Who carves path through pounding waves. The God who summons horses and chariots and armies and they lie down and then they can't get up. They are snuffed out like so many candles.
Brian: That's really what happened. The Israelites walked through on dry land. As they were walking through, they we are looking at the fish right off to the right and the left. They were in an aquarium with the pathway right through it. God kept them from the Egyptians with a wall of fire while they all got through. After they got through, he took the wall of fire down. The Pharaoh said, pursue them. We know the story. They went in and they all were no more. So let's go on.
Jacque: Forget about what has happened. Don't keep going over old history.
Brian: How many of you struggle with that, going over old history? Old hurts. I remember at times going out when I do kind of repetitive monotonous work, like splitting wood and stuff like that, my mind is not necessarily engaged in what I'm doing, which isn't always good because you can get your fingers cut and split or whatever. My mind wandered to well that person said this and that. And then I get into all these imaginary conversations with all these people and putting them in their place and all this sort of stuff. And it's like, wait a minute. And then I'm halfway into this imaginary conversation, and I look into my heart and there is no peace there. There is no peace there. Why is it? Well it's because I didn't want to forget about what had happened. I wanted to regurgitate it. I wanted to resurrect it. Some things should stay dead. Some things should just stay dead. Forget about what's happened. Don't keep going over old history. There is a whole new history that God wants to write for you.
Jacque: So be alert. Be present tonight.
Brian: Isn't that great? Be present, be present.
Jacque: I'm about to do something brand new. You've got to be watching.
Brian: We've got to be watching. How many of you love brand new things? I do. I love brand new things, but when God does something brand new, it shimmers. There is something really shimmery about the new thing that God does. He says—
Jacque: It's bursting out.
Brian: Just ready to burst at the seam.
Jacque: Don't you see it? There it is. I'm making a road through the desert: rivers in Badlands.
Brian: I love this next part.
Jacque: Wild animals will say, thank you like the coyotes and buzzards because I provided water in the desert.
Brian: But who did he provide water in the desert for the coyotes and the buzzards? No, that's not who he provided the water for. Listen to this; go on.
Jacque: Rivers through the sun, baked earth, drinking water for the people I chose, the people I made, especially for myself, a people custom made to praise.
Brian: So God made this road through the oceans. He made rivers and water. He gave water to his people, but he did it in such abundance that there was enough for the coyotes and the buzzards. When God blesses his people— this is what is bursting for. When God blesses his people there is enough even for the birds that just eat dead flesh.
Jacque: The least, they are kind of like the least.
Brian: Yeah. And this is the nature of God. This is what God has for you. The abundance, the blessing and abundance he wants to bring into your life is so much so great that it will spill over to the unattractive parts of our culture.
Jacque: So instead of living in fear and unforgiveness and lack, we need to lead, to live in, looking forward, expectation.
Brian: That's right, expectation. So many of us live in a mental set of lack. That's why we are always holding on. That's why we are not generous because we really don't have an expectancy that God will multiply and bless in how we give.
Jacque: And that expectation, faith is built on knowing God's love for us.
Brian: It would have been real easy if you were in the desert and God made some water come out of the rock. It would have been really easy to say quick, get all the containers because there is not much of it here. This is the desert. But God had plenty. He had so much so that all the people drank full. There were reserves and there was still enough left over for the least of his creation, in a sense. One more portion of scripture is found in Isaiah 54, 14 through 17. Again, this is what our response should be when we come into a situation that we feel is a setback.
Jacque: You'll be built solid, grounded in righteousness, far from any trouble, nothing to fear.
Brian: How many can you really take that to your heart? I have nothing to fear. I bet you that we all struggle with that a little bit. Don't we? We fear about, is this person going to make it? Am I going to make it? Are we going to get our refinancing or are we going to be able to have enough money to get a car that actually starts in the winter time? You know, on and on and on. The Lord is saying to all of us today that we have what? Nothing.
Jacque: Nothing to fear.
Brian: Nothing to fear.
Jacque: Far from terror. It won't even come close. If anyone attacks you, don't for a moment suppose that I sent them.
Brian: How many of you said at times that it feels like you are under an attack. God, why are you doing this to me? God is not doing it, but he certainly allowing it so that he can create a setup for us, not a setback for us.
Jacque: If any should attack, nothing will come of it.
Brian: So he doesn't promise us that we won't get attacked, but what he does promise us is if we will let his character be formed in us, he will allow nothing to come of it in our lives.
Jacque: Because he does tell us that he works all things together for good,
Brian: For good for them who love him.
Jacque: He will bring good out of the worst situations.
Brian: And you know what? Don't let the devil tell you, you don't love Jesus.
Jacque: Or you are not good enough.
Brian: You are not good enough. Because you know what? You weren't good enough when he died for you, so why would it change now? He already died for you. So now do you think he is going to live for you? Absolutely. Absolutely.
Jacque: I create the black Smith who fires up his forge and makes a weapon designed to kill. I also create the destroyer, but no weapon that can hurt you has ever been forged.
Brian: So he even allows the blacksmith to make these weapons, and he even allows the enemies to take those weapons and even come and attack us, but the caveat is not one of those weapons has ever been forged that can hurt you. Well, that's a great promise. Isn't it? What wonderful promise that is?
Jacque: The NIV says no weapon formed against you will prosper.
Brian: That's right.
Jacque: Any accuser who takes you to court will be dismissed as a liar. This is what God's servants can expect. I'll see to it that everything works out for the best. And this is God's decree.
Brian: God has decreed this. Now listen, when God makes a decree, you kind of envision a Roman soldier riding into a town, kind of like what they did in Nazareth. They rolled up on the scroll and said, "Okay, all you people, you got to go back to the town that you were from because we are going to take a census. Yeah, but I'm nine months pregnant. Doesn't matter. You are on your way to Nazareth tonight." That's how a decree works. Everybody submits to it. Everybody obligated to come into conformity with it. God's decree is this: anyone who takes you to court will be dismissed as a liar, and I'll see to it that everything works out for your best. Everything will work out for your best. This is what I will decree. As long as we are becoming like Jesus in the process.
Jacque: We don't try to figure it out ourselves or try to work it out ourselves. We trust him.
Brian: What God holds before us is this opportunity to become more like Jesus. You can't be like Jesus and only have everything go your way all the time. You never can. You can only become like Jesus. When you go through the things that Jesus went through. But the wonderful thing about our Lord today is he has been there. The old saying is been there, done that. Been there, done that. I know what you are going through, and I'm with you. I'm with you. I'll be here for you. Just look to me, become like me, respond like me. Don't do it the way the world does. Don't try and get back. Do it my way. Do it the way of Jesus. As we do it the way of Jesus, the setback will become a setup. The setback will become a set up. Let's pray.
Father, I ask in Jesus' name that your grace would permeate, Lord, us. Your grace would come in such a measure. And that Lord, your spirit would remind us when we are in these circumstances that seemingly feel like setbacks, our disappointments to us that what we had hoped for and what we thought we had faith for when none of that happens, and that the difficulties arise, that Jesus, we will realize you are with us, that this is not a setback, that this is not a [Inaudible 1:29:05] of your will. This is not a victory for the enemy, but that Lord we are becoming like you. We are becoming like you. Your nature is being formed in us. Your character is being formed in us. Your faith is being formed in us. And then Jesus, you are doing a work of your grace and provision, and that victory is in store for us. Pastor Jeff, why don't you come? And let's just take a moment to pray for people.
Jeff: This opportunity for setup begins when you first trust Jesus with your life. You may be watching us on livestream, you may be here and you've never, ever in your life asked Jesus to be your Lord and trusted your life to him, determine that you were going to live for him, but now is the day that you can do that. Before we do anything else, we want to give any listeners an opportunity to give their lives to Jesus, because that's when the setup starts. From that point forward, he begins to work in your life for good and not for evil. All kinds of things could have taken place in your life up to this point. As good friends of ours once said, when they gave their lives to Jesus, it didn't get easier, but it did get better. You get a chance for your life to get better right now. If you are listening and you know that you need Jesus in your life, I just want you to put your hand on your heart. Just pray this prayer with me. ''
Jesus Christ, God of heaven and earth, Jesus savior. Jesus, please be my savior. This day, I give my life to you. I decided to trust you. I give into your will. I give you mine. I give you my life. I trust you to lead me now and teach me and make me to be like you. Come and fill me with your spirit. Please, Jesus, forgive my sins and make me new. You are able to say that prayer. We want you to be sure to let us know. You can come to our website. You can put your name in there. You can give us information about yourself. We would love to send you some videos about why you matter to God. In fact, if you are new to Hope and you even know the Lord, we have some wonderful videos about how you matter to God that we would love to send you. There are other wonderful encouragements that we can send anybody who is listening or even here if you are not getting them yet: moments of hope, the promises that pastor Brian does, I promise you. It's a lot of opportunities to receive from Jesus,
We are not done yet. We still need to pray for miracles. One of the good things about the setup and when we are in that place where the Lord is forming a new thing in our heart is that he keeps forming hope in us for the goodness that we have in God. What we never do, we don't just resign ourselves to the hard circumstances and say, well, this is how my life's going to be the rest of my life and I'll just find a way to love Jesus through it. We always trust God for deliverance and for hope and for healing. And so we are going to do that right now. If you are here today, or if you are watching online and you have a need in your life, we are going to agree with you that Jesus saves us because that's the wonderful thing about our God is at the same time that he is forming his nature and his character in us, he is willing to intervene to heal us in the middle of our sickness, to help us in the middle of our financial struggles, to heal our marriages. He is there for everything that we need. If you have a need today, just raise your hand to the Lord. If you have a pain, put your hand where the pain is. If you need healing, put your hand up. If you need any emotional healing, put your hand up and I'm going to pray for you. Thank you.
Lord, you see every hand raised, every heart, you see every set of eyes is looking to you right now. And your love for each of us is incomprehensible. I thank you that right now, there is a smile on your face as you look at us as we are reaching to you, and I thank you that there is a nod of your head that says yes, for your promises to us are yes and amen. Father, we agree with you in releasing your gift of healing, releasing your miracles into our lives, releasing your work of love and grace into our relationships, forming new things, new lives, new futures, new hopes. We thank you for these things for every single one that's connected here right now, and even for those who will watch us in the future. They also can receive from you right now exactly what they need. Thank you for that, Jesus. Amen. Amen.
Brian: Amen. Thank you, Lord, for your goodness. Thank you for your graciousness to us Lord. We were so grateful today that we can place our lives into your safekeeping and that whatever circumstances may come our way, whatever ways the enemy might try and fort us, whatever things that we were not expecting to happen because of our hopes and our faith, even if they do, you will take those circumstances and make them into set ups, Lord. I thank you for the example of the apostle Paul, being able to write letters from prison, and for the apostle John to get such a revelation because he was isolated, but he could listen. Joseph, it would seem he was the victim of injustice, and yet you took that injustice and elevated him to the highest place in the kingdom right under the Pharaoh so his whole family and whole nation would be spared from a famine.
Lord, I thank you that throughout all of your scriptures, you show that you are the God of the setup, not to setback. So we are receive today, Lord, place ourselves into your will and your care and your safekeeping in your mighty name we pray. Let's lift our hands together now.
Now may the Lord bless you and may the Lord keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord turned his face toward you and give you his peace. And may you walk into the setups of our God. This we pray in the name of the father, son and Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you. Have a wonderful, wonderful day. Keep believing God for the set of set he has for you. If you want prayer, Jacque will be here to pray for you and Cheryl and others will be here if you want prayer in person after service. God bless you. Thanks for being here. Thank you for watching online as well. God bless. Bye-bye.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 8-22-21. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.