Part IV God Is Bigger

If the opposition in front of you looks bigger, louder, and stronger, this message is a reset for your nerves and your faith. We’re in part four of God’s waiting room, and we keep coming back to one stabilising truth: God is bigger than any competitor. What feels like a close contest from the outside is, spiritually, a no contest when God is in your corner. 

We walk through biblical moments where the threat is real but the outcome is never in doubt. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego face a furnace turned up past human limits and still come out untouched, without even the smell of smoke. Isaiah 40 challenges the instinct to compare God to anything we can build, buy, or control. Then we head to Exodus, where Pharaoh’s sorcerers appear to copy a miracle, but Aaron’s staff swallows every rival, a sharp picture of how God doesn’t just match the enemy, He outclasses him. 

We also tackle discernment and spiritual warfare in plain language: false signs can look convincing, so we “test the spirits” and keep our eyes on Jesus. From there, we get practical about mindset and preparation: the waiting room is where hope builds faith, faith builds belief, and the armour of God equips you to stand steady. If you’re tired, intimidated, or tempted to quit early, let this be the push that helps you wait well and step out strong. 

If this helped, subscribe, share it with someone who’s in a hard season, and leave a review so more people can find it. What’s one “competitor” you need to stop fearing today?

Good morning, good afternoon, wherever you are in the world - Welcome to Grapevine Ministries.

Transcript

Part Four And The Big Idea

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Okay, we're back again. Sorry, I um I think I've got the I've got the number of my lessons mixed up, but I can honestly tell you that this is part four of God's waiting room. So uh in that in mind, let's get on with it. And it won't be as heavy as last week when I was quoting different figures and to give you an understanding of of how big our God is. All right. Now, I'm going on with a little bit further with that today. And the although this is part four of God's waiting room, this is talking about God is bigger than any competitor. And then what we need to do now is to see that we need the comfort in God's waiting room, and

No Contest When God Is With You

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that is knowing that God is bigger than any of our competitors. I mean, as a matter of fact, and I mean it's even uh from a contest perspective, it's just a no contest, though sometimes it looks as though it is. Can you just imagine what it would feel like if you entered a boxing ring with your opponent being bigger and stronger and having never lost a fight? But God has told you that there was no way that you could be defeated because God was with you, and that shows a level of faith and belief in God and everything about him, that you would have such peace in your mind that you would go out there and just fight your match the way that you would normally fight your match, but knowing, knowing without any shadow of a doubt that God had your back, and irrespective of what the crowd was telling you, what uh was visually there in front of you, you just knew without a shadow of a doubt that you could not lose this fight. Another classic example is let's go to the Bible and we look at Shadrach, Meshach, and Amenego, who were the Hebrew, these were Hebrew officers in Babylon, okay, during the captivity, who refused to worship King Nebuchadnezzar's golden statue. Because they were so smug about not doing this,

The Furnace That Could Not Burn

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the king got mad and madder, and he asked that the fire that they were going to be thrown into for being disobedient was going to be seven times hotter. Now, if you read through the scriptures, you'll actually see that it was that hot that even the people that were stoking the fire were actually being burnt up. But not only were they not burnt, but instead of the three of them being in the fire, Jesus appeared in the fire with them, and after that, when they came out of the fire, not only were they not burnt, but they did not even have the smell of smoke on them. And I mean, that alone would have got you to go, OMG. Right? So if we look at Isaiah forty, eighteen through to twenty, this is what it says, is to whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness compare with him an idol, a craftsman casts it, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains. He who is too impoverished for an offering chooses wood that will not rot. He seeks out a skilled craftsman to set up the idol and so it will not move. Now Isaiah's wording is very, very clever. He says, Now to whom are you going to liken God? An idol, he says. It's almost incredibly specific. It is as though someone says, To whom you are going to be like Tiger Woods, Dave McPhee, oh please, there's no competition, or anybody else you want to compare it to. It's like uh, say, I mean, I used to be into martial arts a long time ago, and you know, you've got say Chuck Norris and uh Bruce Lee. And from Bruce Lee's perspective and what he'd done and everything else, uh, it was a it was a no-brainer that he would actually beat up win in a fight between him and Chuck Norris. Even to the extent when they did this in one of the movies. Now, I could go on and explain all about that, but I I'll get distracted again and we won't talk about it. What I'm supposed to talk about. Now, the key aspect of this is that God being our craftsman, he doesn't just go one better than the enemy, he makes it impossible for there to be any doubt he is the master creator and the craftsman. Let's just turn back a little bit and let's go to Exodus 7. Remember how Moses and Aaron went to visit Pharaoh prior to uh his letting the Israeli people go free with the Egyptians, and remember how Pharaoh's sorcerers they were able to duplicate um with miraculous display

When God Outdoes Every Copy

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what Moses was doing, and we have it recorded one such way in Exodus 710. It says, so Moses and Aaron went to the Pharaoh and did just as the Lord commanded. Aaron cast down his staff before Pharaoh, and it turned into a serpent, and it became slithering across the floor. Then Pharaoh summoned his wise men and the sorceress, and they did a magical trick like all Egyptians do, and they made the exact same thing through their hocus pocus, and each man had cast down a staff and they become servants. But the big difference, Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs. We can't be sure whether or not Pharaoh's servants were just using sleight of hand or whether they could actually produce a supernatural result. I suspect the latter, but the important distinction is that Aaron's staff swallowed up theirs. What is the point? It's just showing that God is bigger than the competitor. Everything that you look at. Now, in fairness, the competition can look pretty scary at times. I mean, look at Goliath and the way that the children of Israel were there, and there is reality behind the threat. Okay, if you go to Thessalonians, no, two Thessalonians two verse nine, it says, The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wickedness, deception for those who are perishing because they

False Wonders And Testing Spirits

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refuse to love the truth, and so they could not be saved. Now, please note in this particular passage, there's those that serve Satan will clearly be unable to duplicate miraculous activities. We should never be taken in just because something looks miraculously active. We should never be taken in by something that just looks like it is just so far out of the ordinary. You think that it's not possible in the natural. That's why we are to try the spirits and to see what God is doing. But listen, we are not to get too concerned about the enemy. Keep looking at Jesus, and it won't matter what the competition is doing right or what they're doing wrong. So, like I said, if you look into 2 Thessalonians 2, and the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring nothing by the appearance of his coming. Don't you just love that? Here is Satan's man performing signs and wonders, leading thousands upon thousands of people astray, looking at all of the world like an irresistible force, unconquerable and all powerful, right up until the moment that Jesus Christ kills him with one breath in his mouth. You just gotta love the way that God does things. I know some Christians worry a lot about the devil, demonic activity, and the power that attracts it, but we must always remember John's words in 1 John 4.4. It says, Little children, you are from God and have overcome them. For he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. What a reminder of it, you know, and a lot of people use this a lot of times, and I I know they do take it out of context and everything, but um greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world. It simply means that if Jesus dwells within you, you have the Holy Spirit inside of you. The Holy Spirit is more powerful and sharper than a two-edged sword, and the word of God is exactly the same. The devil wants us to be afraid. He will do anything to have us quivering in our boots. Whilst we're in God's waiting room, he will try and scare you to death literally. Now, our problem is that one that is too unique for God to handle, that we are exceptions, but it just isn't true. Whoever you are, whatever your circumstances, if God's got you in the waiting room, he is preparing you for the challenge that is ahead. Now listen to this on June 18, 1941,

Waiting Room Training For Battle

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the light heavyweight um Billy Conn was challenged by Joe Lewis for the heavyweight title of the world. For twelve magnificent rounds, Cohn managed to stay away from Lewis's powerful blows. He was ahead on points, and it looked like he might do the impossible and win the fight by just staying away. But in his own words, not mine, in his own words, he got cocky. He had he landed a left hook on Joe's chin in the 12th, and seeing Joe wobble, he said, this is what he said, I can knock him out, he thought. I can knock him out. But he got too close with less than one minute to go in the 13th round. Joe at long last caught up with him. He nailed him with two stiff left jabs, buried a right into his ribs, and then two more jabs and a right hand and an uppercut and a left hook, and it was all over. He literally was able to see that he had full advantage. All he had to do was wait. Just one minute he had to wait, but he got so sure of himself that he decided that he was going to do what he thought was impossible just because he you know was looking a little wobbly on his legs, and so as he was doing this, he had to come in close to actually be able to actually throw those punches, but Joe had had the advantage all along, and as soon as Billy got there, he actually it was all over. See, listen, make no mistake, Satan got in his best blows at the cross, but that was also his downfall. Listen to what I'm saying, guys and girls. It it's proven redemption for all of us. We're on the winning side. To everyone, the battle has been won. There was no denying it on the cross, and everyone heard Jesus' last words, it is finished, and that part of the journey was finished, and it was also the beginning. See, the devil doesn't know everything, he honestly believed that he had the upper hand, and this was it. Great, he had managed to get him to the cross, and he took on everybody's sickness, everybody's disease, he was there for the remission of our sin. He bore it all upon the cross, and the devil started celebrating a little bit too early. So you've got to be encouraged by this. In many ways, our life is like league baseball, in which a man approaches a young boy and asks the kid what the score is, and it's 18 to nothing. He said, We're behind. He replied, Oh, I'm sorry. I'll um I'll bet you're discouraged. And he goes,

Perception Changes The Scoreboard

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Oh no, replied the young boy. We haven't even got up to bat yet. So is the glass that you're looking at half full or half empty? How do you look at your situation? See, sometimes it's all about perception. It in the same way if somebody spoke something to you rather harshly, uh, it could be a combination thing. I'm gonna keep it pretty simple because I don't wanna offend anybody or anything else, but let's just hypothetically say that um your teacher when you were at school said, Jack, Jewel, you guys are never going to amount to anything. You can't even pass your HSC. I don't know what you call it in other countries, but basically you're year 12. He said, If you if you pass, you're gonna just scrape through, but there's no hope for you. You should get a job as a a waiter in a diner or um perhaps a security guard or something. So they were very hurtful words from a teacher, a person who's supposed to be encouraging you, supposed to be getting you to uh uh another letter, encouraging you, letting you know that come on, you can do it, you know, it's you just gotta commit yourself a little harder or whatever. But no, and there are so many people out there that have had that spoken of them, but it is your choice of whether you take those words on and allow them to manifest in your life and to be a constant reminder every time you try to achieve something, that word in your head is saying, Oh, you're never gonna amount to anything, you're never gonna amount to anything. But if you just got there and said, Oh, thanks, teach, really appreciate your confidence in me, but I'm gonna prove you wrong. And so you reject the words that are spoken into you, and you make it a purpose in your life to prove that person wrong. You see that everywhere in society, and a lot of it is determined by how you look at something. Is the glass half full or is the glass half empty? You know, if you're in the waiting room, you may feel that um you're looking at that score in the baseball, it's 18 to nothing. But the thing is, if you're in the waiting room, you haven't yet come up to bat. God is preparing you. Do not see it as a hurdle that you need to get over. Look at it as a stepping stone for you to achieve what God has got before you. But he needs you to be prepared, he needs you to have the full armor of God on you so you are protected from the wiles of the devil. He needs you to be prepared. That's what the sword is for, it's the word of God. You need to

Armour Up And Refuse Fear

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be full of the word, okay, and the shield is to protect you, and you've got the helmet of salvation, the waistband, girdling, protecting all your vital organs. See, the armor of God is all about protecting you with one exception, the sword, which is the word of God. So if we're in God's waiting room, what are we gonna do about it? Why? We wait for our turn at bat. Of course, knowing that in the end the victory is already won. That there can only be no other outcome whatsoever. And it even may look that bad, but God is bigger than the competitors. It doesn't matter who they are, where they're from, what they're doing. How many people do you know that have I mean, I was gonna list them, but I thought, no, you are given too much overstimulation in the last message. But what I'm trying to say is that don't look at your circumstances. I mean, I watch a lot of um police shows on TV, and you always see you know the same sort of thing. Oh, this person comes from hell's kitchens, it's a place in America, it's obviously not a very nice place. Um, so he was doomed from the start. He he's never going to achieve anything, but time and time again, you see of you know, especially Afro-Americans that are living in poverty, and they get out of that poverty, and they can rise up into power places in authority that you would never assume that they get there. Another classic example is um Ronald Reagan. Uh he was a he was a movie star. All right, he was a he was just a um uh spaghetti western, you know, like a really bad version of um Western movies, and yet he became the president of the United States, one of the most powerful men in the world. Uh look at um Arnold Schwarzenegger, for instance, okay? He was just an actor and not a really good actor, uh, but he was big, solid, one world champion, weightlifting competitions and all that sort of stuff. But not only is he now directing movies, he's also become the governor of California. Don't look at your circumstances. Look at what God is preparing you for, look at what God has got in store for you. But the the idea of being in the waiting room is you are preparing, you are strategizing, you are getting all the tools that you need to put you into the position where you know

Build Faith And Step Forward

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that you know that you know, and that is the main thing to remember. Hope builds faith, faith builds belief, and believing is when you know that you know that you know without a shadow of a doubt that you are overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of your testimony, and we've all got a testimony, we have all been up against challenges, and God has brought you through it. You may not see it, you may not actually truly understand it, but the reality of the fact is that everything good comes from God, everything that is not good in your life is of the devil. So I am saying to you right now, okay, prepare yourself for battle, build yourself up in the word of God, do your daily devotionals, read the Bible on a regular basis, build up your armor and your strength, and so when you come out of that waiting room, you'll see that God will reveal that this is the plan and the purpose he has for you, and you are to actually step out into that. It's a bit like when the Israeli people were finally ready to cross over into the promised land. Okay, Moses couldn't go, it was handed over to his two IC, and he was he was prepared because God spoke to him. He says, As I was with Moses, I am with you also. So he didn't have to worry about anything because he was prepared for that battle, and so they crossed over into the promised land, and that was the end of that particular part of their journey. But you know, just have a look at the Israeli people, okay? What they've gone through and and what they've endured, but they're still there and they're still in the fight. You need to be in the fight with them, also, okay. God is in your corner, God has got your back. We look at the cross, and we know that everything was defeated at the cross, and we now live under the new covenant, and so we carry the Holy Spirit within us, and so we are already better off than anybody else was in the Old Testament, and look what they endured and how they come out of it. So you've got to say to yourself, I am the victory. Jesus has already paved the way for me. I can come out of the waiting room and step out with authority because God is with me. Matthew 28 20. Memorize that. It's real simple, real easy, and it's basically saying God is with you. Let's not forget it. Okay. And next week we're gonna talk about how God is bigger than any creature, and I'll explain that in the next week's sermon. Okay? God bless for now. Take care, and I'll talk to you soon. Bye for now.