Have you ever felt God's presence amplified in the company of others? Our latest sermon leads us into the beautiful complexities of seeing Jesus mirrored in our friends and family. Community brings us closer to understanding the multifaceted nature of Jesus, while also bolstering our confidence in the scripture's authenticity through its meticulous detail.
Embracing God's mysteries and the ways He unveils His character to us. Whether it's learning to find joy in the mundane or recognizing God's hand during seasons of growth and preparation, this episode is an invitation to pursue Jesus. We also ponder the delicate art of sharing prophetic insights, ensuring we guide without overstepping, allowing the Holy Spirit to move uniquely in each person's life.
Have you ever felt God's presence amplified in the company of others? Our latest sermon leads us into the beautiful complexities of seeing Jesus mirrored in our friends and family. Community brings us closer to understanding the multifaceted nature of Jesus, while also bolstering our confidence in the scripture's authenticity through its meticulous detail.
Embracing God's mysteries and the ways He unveils His character to us. Whether it's learning to find joy in the mundane or recognizing God's hand during seasons of growth and preparation, this episode is an invitation to pursue Jesus. We also ponder the delicate art of sharing prophetic insights, ensuring we guide without overstepping, allowing the Holy Spirit to move uniquely in each person's life.
Hey, what up? It's Mark Carter on, the Pastor of Fierce Church. Welcome to our podcast. I'm so pumped that you're able to join us today. I hope this encourages you, inspires you, strengthens you, gives you hope to keep pressing on, and it's my prayer that this sermon gives you a more expansive view of God's love for you. Enjoy the message.
Speaker 1:So hey, I was not a great student all the time when I was in high school. If I liked the class, I was good, and if I didn't like the class, I didn't really pay attention too much. Guys Like I would roll in sometimes to class and, oh, we got a quiz. I don't even know what we've been studying, because I didn't like chemistry okay, and I still don't like it. But when I would not pay attention to those classes, it got better as time went on. But when I wouldn't pay attention, there would be this feeling of like just compobulation, almost Like I don't really know what we're doing, I don't. She's talking about stuff. I don't get it. Man, I'm way behind now. I don't know where we are, and there's a consequence for that. Of course, you don't get good grades. That's how that works out.
Speaker 1:Have you ever neglected something and then had a consequence for it. Maybe you got a bill and you're like I'll get to that for sure, and then you didn't, and then it doubled, you know. Or maybe you got a ticket and you're like, oh gosh, I'm going to have to go online and pay this, and then you just you put the thing away and then you never found it again. Suddenly this thing keeps occurring, more and more. Penalty. If you've ever done that. Or maybe sometimes it's not just like a bill, maybe it's a relationship that we just the truth is man, we just been neglecting it and now there's a consequence, there's a cost, and sometimes we get into that situation where, like, I don't even know where we are now, I don't know where to start, I don't know what to do. Here's what can also go wrong. We can get lost, even in a relationship with God because, honestly, we can neglect it.
Speaker 1:We talk about God moving. Is God moving in your life? We're going to talk about is God moving in your life today? Sometimes you might hear that and be like I don't even know what you're talking about. Man, god moving, what is that? I feel you stick with me, man, stay with me through the sermon.
Speaker 1:Others of you, maybe you know what that's like. And maybe you at some point you know, maybe you sense the Lord saying hey, you know, maybe you're a teenager, hey, you got to go to this youth group. He's impressing on your heart, there's something in you that knows I got to go to this. And then you push it off though once, and you push it off twice, and you push it off thrice and it goes away and you don't feel it anymore. Or maybe you've really sensed, you know you're in a little different, more advanced life stage. You know, I feel like God wants me to be intentional with some younger folks because I need to love up on them, maybe even sometimes give them a little gift, but encourage them on their journey. And you get prompted about that once, or even twice, and then the prompting stop. God stops bothering you about it because you couldn't be bothered and you don't necessarily know what that might cost.
Speaker 1:Is God moving in our lives? Possibly Is there something that he's been trying to communicate to you and I, but we're just in such a fast paced culture, we're already so good at being distracted and there's nothing in our culture that's going to reward you looking for God's perspective that's going to reward you trying to get your mind and life around what God wants. I want to submit to you today that God really wants us to not only know what he's doing in our lives, but know who he is, who's doing it in our lives. So here's a bottom line for you More than good behavior, more than a mission, jesus just wants to be with you. He doesn't just want good behavior, he doesn't just want you to go do stuff for him. He does want those things, but more than anything, he wants to be with you and that's one of his lessons to his disciples. We're in a moment in today's narrative we're a week after Easter. I know right now we're a week before, but in this passage we're a week after the real Easter and Jesus has appeared to his disciples several times and he's going to appear to them a third time when they're all a group, and he's not yet giving them instructions like hey, man, this is what I want you to do. Here's the axe stuff that you're going to go do. He just keeps showing up and he's doing it to show them things about what he's doing in their lives, but he's doing it to show them his heart.
Speaker 1:Let's take a look John 21, verse one After these things, jesus manifested. Somebody say manifest. Jesus manifested himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberius and he manifested himself in this way. That's twice, right there, first verse he manifested himself. What do we mean by manifest? That means he showed himself. He revealed himself. He showed them some things about himself. And it wasn't just that, oh, see, like I'm resurrected. And it wasn't just hey, you can have courage now because, see, I overcame death and in the future you'll be able to be very courageous. It wasn't just that. He was revealing stuff about who he is.
Speaker 1:This word manifest, we don't have this in English. It's in biblical Greek. It's an aorist tense. That means it's a completed action that continues on and has influence in the future. It keeps affecting things in the future. So if you read a book, well, you completed reading the book. But now, if that book was impactful, you keep being impacted by that book as you go, even if you get married, okay, well, you had the marriage, but then now there keeps being ripples in your life. That would be aorist tense in English if we could talk about it in such a way. This manifesting Jesus is showing them. Here's me, and I want it to keep bearing fruit in your lives, and that's what he wants to do to us today. He wants to manifest.
Speaker 1:Simon Peter and Thomas, called Dittimus, nathaniel of Canaan, galilee, the sons of Zebedee and two others of his disciples were together. That's really important. They were together. Simon Peter said to them I'm going fishing. And they said to him we will also come with you. So, simon Peter, you know they're like. They're kind of like in this limbo stage. They're like Jesus, okay, you're appearing to us. You haven't really given us the directions that you told us to meet you in Galilee. But also, we're hungry and we still, you know, we need some money. So we're going to go fishing and make some money so that we can exist while we're waiting on whatever the next step, whatever the next plan is in Jesus's cosmic timetable. But they're together and it's so important. They're together because before they were Jesus's disciples, they weren't together. Most of them were spread out. They weren't necessarily doing anything together. But did you notice? Peter says I'm going and everyone else wasn't like promptly, like oh yeah, that's a good idea. I probably need some fish too. No, they were used to being together. I said, peter, we're coming too, because we'd like to be together now. Before we were all separate, now we're together and they go together to do this fishing thing.
Speaker 1:There are things about God manifesting himself to us that we can only learn together. You've got your own personal relationship with God you do but there's things that you'll only learn about him when you watch how he relates to somebody else, what they say God is doing in their lives. Okay, so sometimes I'll only learn one aspect of God's personality. When I hear about how my friend Brandon talks about him, I'm like, well, that's true, that's cool. I never really thought about that way, but that's correct. Or my wife will say something in passing about her prayer time. I'm like, wow, that's pretty deep. Jesus never really revealed that part of himself in that way to me, but I love it that he's talking to you that way. That's what was happening with these folks. See, john knew there's ways that Jesus has communicated directly to me. But then I watch him with Peter and I see a little bit different aspect of God's personality.
Speaker 1:See, as Lewis wrote about this in a book called the Four Loves, he said each of my friends, there's something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I'm not large enough to call the whole person into activity. Now that Charles is dead, I shall never again see Ronald's reaction to his joke. Far from having more Ronald, now that Charles is away, I have less Ronald.
Speaker 1:Having friends being together shows us more about who Jesus is and how he wants to relate to all of us. My friends. That's one of the reasons we encourage you to come to church and baby. Come to church every time, every weekend. Do it because not just because we like you and we want you around, but because you can learn things about Jesus. Only when you were around some people that you would never learn on your own Did you notice. It's a body of Christ. It's a whole body. It's not appendages flung around town. It's a whole body and they're together. They're supposed to be dead. They got used to being together. Now they're together again. You never know. You'll never know how much of God you don't know until you're around your brothers and sisters.
Speaker 1:3b. They went out and got into the boat. Here we go, and that night they caught nothing. Now this is gonna be very reminiscent of Luke, chapter 5. This has happened before. Three years ago this happened. It's happening again, but when the day was breaking, they caught nothing. But when the day was breaking, jesus stood on the beach. Yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. So Jesus said to them children, do you have any fish? They answered no. And he said to them cast the net on the right side of the boat and you'll find some. This is exactly what happened before, when Jesus first introduced himself to Peter. Peter was out in the boat all night fishing and he didn't catch anything. And Jesus said well, go ahead and throw the net on that side, and they had too much that they could even carry. Now he's doing it again. So they cast, and then they were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish. Therefore, the disciple whom Jesus loved Now, that's John.
Speaker 1:That's the author, that's the writer here. He's so humble that he refers to himself as the disciple that Jesus loved. He's like I ain't even important man. All I know about me, like, this is my identity. I'm just that dude that Jesus likes. Now we're all that Okay. That's really your core identity. If you follow Christ, if you've become his adopted son or daughter, that's your truest thing about you is you're the one Jesus loves Like. That's the most deep thing about you. That's how John understood himself. He said my name's not important, just the guy that Jesus loves. He says this to Peter it is the Lord. So when Peter, simon, peter, we're gonna go into that.
Speaker 1:So when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment and he stripped for. He was stripped for work and he cast himself into the sea. He was like forget this, puts it on, jumps in. It's almost kind of ridiculous. They would put his robe on and then jump in the sea. We're skipped down to verse nine. So when they got out on the land, they saw a charcoal fire in place and fish placed on it and bread. Jesus said to them bring some of the fish which you've now caught, or that he just caused them to catch. Simon Peter went up and drew the net to the land full of large fifths 153. And although there were so many, the net was not torn. Did you notice something about this? This is weird.
Speaker 1:Scholars talk about this. There's weird detail in here. Okay, if you compare this to other ancient writings like the Iliad and the Odyssey, there's not this level of detail in something that would be fiction. Okay, when folks in that time are writing a story. They're not like us. They're writing all the thoughts and all the everything that happens. They don't say. And then Achilles went down to the river and you know he decided to bathe and he started with his left arm and then he moved on to his right and he brushed his hair aside. They don't go into that level of detail because it's just fiction and that time it wouldn't have been appropriate. Why does John go into this level of detail? He says it was 153. Exactly, that's somebody fish. He said it was weird. He put his robe on and he jumped in the sea and it was kind of funny, it was ridiculous. Why is John saying that? Because John was there. This is a memory. This is in fiction. John is saying oh yeah, and it was 153. I remember we had to sell that later that day. It was cool.
Speaker 1:My friend, I want you to have confidence in your Bible. Like even you don't always understand it right when you look at it, but when you study it through its historical and grammatical and biblical context, you find out that man God ain't lying to you, he ain't trying to trick you. He's telling you exactly how it is exactly the right way. Jesus said to them verse 12, come have breakfast. None of the disciples dared to question who are you, knowing that it was the Lord. Another way to say that is none. Of them said Jesus, is it really you? They didn't dare to question that because they knew it was him. Verse 13,. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and the fish likewise. This is now the third time that Jesus manifested himself to the disciples after he was raised from the dead and from them.
Speaker 1:It's not just that Jesus wants good behavior. It's not just that he's appearing to talk about his mission. Jesus wants just to be with them. Check it out, he's gonna. He's showing them about his heart. He's saying, guys, I just I want to be together. And now what he said? He said come have breakfast. Sometimes we feel like I got to stay away from God until I get things a little bit more in order. And if Jesus would say to you and me every morning come, come on, have breakfast. Now it was the breakfast that Jesus caused them to catch. But he says come, come have breakfast. And Jesus would say to you and me hey, come, come early in the morning, grab your coffee. I gave you that coffee. By the way, come, bring your coffee. Sure, bring another muffin. Yeah, that's from me too. Go ahead and bring that. But let's hang out, let's talk. I want you to see my heart. I want us just to be together, not gonna chew you out, I don't want you to feel bad about anything, I just want us to be.
Speaker 1:Now, everyone of these, except John of the disciples, rejected and ran away when Jesus' time of trial came. And yet Jesus isn't mad. He's like come on, let's have breakfast, let's do this. Children, do you have any fish? He went from. First there was disciples, then they turned into friends. Now he's calling them children. This is very much like a term of endearment. He's saying oh, my little ones. There's times, even my older girls okay, I'll say oh, my sweet girl, it's because I'm a papa and even though, yeah, she's a whole woman now to me she's still my sweet little girl.
Speaker 1:Jesus is saying this to his guys, my boys, my guys whom I love Come on, man, come on over here, let's hang out. I want you to see my heart. And he wants them to see showing them. Also, he's manifesting to them I'm the one who provides for you. You didn't, you didn't get what you went out there for, did you See, jesus knows? When we didn't find what we were looking for, jesus knows what you're disappointed with. He says hey, never fear, I'm your provider, I'll get you what you need at the right time and in the right way. I want you to notice this about the text. You probably noticed it before. You might not have had language for it.
Speaker 1:Here and in other post-resurrection narratives, jesus is the same, but he's different. He's Jesus and people like recognize okay, now, that is Jesus. They kind of know him by his heart, but they also they kind of don't recognize him. They're like is that Jesus? That's why they're like well, we don't need to ask is that you? Because, yeah, we know it's you, but they didn't necessarily know it was him completely, because Jesus was the same but he's different.
Speaker 1:This speaks to us of the fact that Jesus can be elusively mysterious and yet, in fact, he's intimately familiar. Jesus can be elusively mysterious. You're gonna find that off as you walk with God. You're gonna find out, even though you figure stuff out. He's always mysterious, he's always elusive and yet, truly, he's intimately familiar. You do know him, even though you don't always recognize him. This speaks to us of. We are finite beings and God is an infinite God and therefore, even though you can know him, you'll never know all of him. There's too much Jesus, there's too much God. And it's not even just that we won't know all of him, we won't even know all of any particular part of him. So check this out. Let me give you an example. First Some of you know this You've been walking with Jesus, maybe even only three months, maybe three years, but at some point you learned something and you're like, oh, that's cool, I'm glad I know that about Jesus.
Speaker 1:But then a little time went by and you learned the same thing and you're like, oh, wow, that's even cooler than I thought. It's just deeper. I knew it, but I didn't know it. Now, like I know it now. And then you went a little further, a couple more years, and you saw it again. God manifested himself to you. You're like holy cow, I knew it was cool, but I didn't know it was this cool. That's how cool your God is.
Speaker 1:See, he's always mysterious. Even though you can know him, you can never know him fully. You can know his goodness, but you'll never know all of his goodness. You can know even the wisdom of his judgment. So, yeah, I believe that God's always wise in his judgments, even when I don't understand it. You know that now, but someday you'll know it so much You'll be like, oh my gosh, it's so awesome. I can't believe how much I didn't know. Check this out, precious.
Speaker 1:If you've trusted Jesus Christ, 10,000 years from now, every day, you'll still be blown away by God. You'll be like, oh my gosh, I knew it, but now I know it again more because you're just knowing him more. He's always too much and he's not too much. He reveals himself to us. That's what he wants. That's what he wants in his relationship with us. That's a pretty dog on good God.
Speaker 1:Now, it's not just that you can't know him entirely, by the way, you're not gonna be walking around heaven after like 300 years and be like well, seen it all. That's not gonna happen Now. You'll never run out of like mind blow from God, even though he is elusive. When we know him, we truly do know him, okay. So these disciples, they really, they really did know him. And many of you, you really do know Jesus. You don't know everything about him. You don't know to the fullness that you will in a while. But you truly do know him. And this is where I want to get you excited for a minute.
Speaker 1:See, in the world of the Bible we're not supposed to boast Like it's not. It's kind of frowned upon, all right. We're not supposed about how awesome we are. We're not to get puffed up, we're not to go bragging about all the things that we did and all that we accomplished, because God knows you wouldn't have been able to do any of that if I wasn't helping you. But he knows pride is soul sickness. It makes us worse and worse. He doesn't want us to boast about anything, but he does give us one thing we can boast about.
Speaker 1:Check this out Jeremiah 9.23. This is what the Lord says. Do not let the wise boast in their wisdom, or the powerful boast in their power or the rich boast in their riches, but those who wish to boast should boast in this alone that they truly know me and understand that I am the Lord, who demonstrates unfailing love and who brings about justice and righteousness to the earth, and that I delight in these things, he says. You know, there's one exception, there's one asterisk If you want to brag about something, brag about this that you genuinely know the living God, and you can brag about that all day because I want other people to want it. So go ahead, fire away.
Speaker 1:What are we supposed to do? What are they supposed to do? How do we respond to God's manifesting pieces of his personality to us? Honoring God's activity in our lives. Number one run toward Jesus when you see him moving in your life. That's what Peter did. He cast himself into the sea. He's like oh, jesus, boom down into the ocean.
Speaker 1:How do you know, though, when God is moving, like how do you know if he's moving in your life? In one sense, he's always moving in your life. We don't always discern what he's doing, but he's always moving. Think about Moses. Moses might say well, you don't. I guess God really started to move in my life when I met him at the burning bush. We say, moses, god was moving all that time before that, even when you were on the run from Pharaoh and didn't get killed Like, god was still working in your life. He was getting you ready all these 40 years just for this moment, right now. God was active. You just didn't see it.
Speaker 1:Might say to David David, when do you feel like the Lord really started to be active in your life. You might say well, you know, it's when Samuel came along and poured the oil of anointing on me that I was gonna be carrying. He prophesied all this stuff on me. We say no, david, we know it was when you were in the field. It was when you're just a little boy, when you're tending sheep and fighting off lions and bears. God was active in you then, creating the person that you're supposed to be now.
Speaker 1:And, my friends, that's what God's doing with you. He's active in your life, no matter what, no matter what you see or don't see. See, god's working behind the scenes. Sometimes he's getting things into position. Other times probably most of the time he's getting your heart into position. See, he's got a shaping ministry in each one of us. He's trying to shape us, form us into the image of the Son of God. He's trying to get us ready. And let me say it this way Most of the time, my friends, it's not about waiting for God to get us to a certain point. That might be cool, that'll be great when it happens, but God, more than trying to get you there, he's trying to shape you in here. That's what he's using all the different pieces of life to do.
Speaker 1:Now we have the Holy Spirit, so sometimes we can discern that, maybe a little bit more than Old Testament folks, but even so it's still a mystery man. So we want to watch out for always trying to interpret what the next scene is. You can be like I think I know what God's doing, this is what's gonna happen next in the movie and check it out. He's mysterious and you didn't figure it out. And then once you finally do see some cause he drops hints sometimes and you'll get to where those hints were dropped and you'll be like, wow, god, you're so awesome. You'll praise him. It's not that you were right, it's that he was right and he just loves you enough to encourage you beforehand. But we want to try to not get stuck predicting what God might do. Rather, we just want to respond to him in the moment.
Speaker 1:So my early twenties I'm working in construction. I've just been through a church split and I'm not doing what I want to do with my life. I'm just doing construction cause I can, because it's there, and I'm walking out at the end of a long hot day and I'm getting in the car and I'm probably a little bit complaining to the Lord in my mind, like I don't know if I said anything, I'm just complaining. Complaining heart and the Spirit of God spoke to me and said be satisfied. And it was one of those like fatherly instructions be satisfied. That's what I need you to do. I need you to practice being content. I need you to practice the virtue of being content, because I'm teaching you stuff about future, things I'm gonna do with you.
Speaker 1:But I need a guy that can be content when everything isn't going the way he wants. I need a guy who isn't gonna complain and whine that sometimes life is just about going to work and they go home and love your wife and kid and that's like. That's the season of life you're in and that's mostly God's will. I need a guy, carter, who understands I love you, bro, but I ain't your genie, okay, I don't just do what you want when you want. I got a plan here and I will bless you, but it's not about you.
Speaker 1:So maybe you're in a season where you're being treated very unfairly and maybe God is manifesting himself to you. He is revealing himself, but what he's revealing is here's what I would do in that moment. It's hard, but I'm inviting you into the fellowship of my suffering, see as the body of Christ. It's weird, but one of the things that Christians live out is I'm embracing partially some of Jesus' suffering as part of his body, and it's really actually intimate. Jesus is saying I don't share this with everybody, I just wanna share this with my friend. This is what it was like a little bit to feel my pain. I'm letting you feel a little bit of the rejection that I felt. Or maybe you're in a moment where you're not totally sure what God's doing, but you're learning he's revealing to you. Oh, I need Jesus. I don't just need him when things are going wrong, I need him all the time.
Speaker 1:I was going through a season when I was about 18, when suddenly I almost know where, I just start to feel convicted and what that means is cut in the heart like I'm doing things wrong, things that didn't bother me before. Things were like oh, this is great. Suddenly I'm feeling like Jesus is saying I don't like that. Just, you know, I don't like that, we should talk about that. And it kept continuing until the point where I said, wow, lord, I need you way more than I thought. I need to trust you entirely for all the things I do wrong because I didn't know I was doing so much wrong. Maybe that's the lesson it might.
Speaker 1:Maybe you're in a lesson like I was when I worked at Domino's Pizza this is a little bit after the construction time and we had a car. That's about the only thing we had and so, hey, let's go deliver pizzas at night. Kansas is at home with the baby and I was with all these folks all night long who deliver pizzas and really, dude, they're just very blue collar folks. They were just real, normal. And here I'm dreaming of like man, god, I want to do awesome things for you. I don't want to change the world Like, I just want to be your guy and let's how about we fill some stadiums, god, let's do that. And he's manifesting himself to me and saying see these normal folks, I love them, and this is most of the people on earth. So can I trust you just to love them if I never do anything else in your life? How about you just take a year and a half and learn to love these people who are making pizzas all night long? Maybe that's a lesson like that you might need, like I did. Maybe the lesson is just learn to love with more discernment. Maybe you're at a place where you keep trying to force something and you're trying to get people around in your life to do stuff, and maybe I'm not. I don't know. But maybe one of the lessons is I need you to just figure out how to love them instead of trying to push them. Don't try to force them to do what you want. Just love them.
Speaker 1:Peter comes in. It's been a long night man. He was hoping to get some fish, I mean, that's why he went out there, right. And yet he runs to Jesus and once he sees Jesus, it's like all the fish don't matter, like, oh yeah, jesus got the fish. They were pretty important the night before, but now he sees Jesus and that's what happens with us. We can have very important things that seem like, oh, this is so weighty and I'm not saying they're not weighty but somehow, when we just throw ourselves off the boat and run toward Jesus and we begin to get in his presence and we begin to gaze on his beauty and we see his sufficiency for us, we begin to sense oh yeah, I'm seeing in perspective now that this thing is, it is weighty, but God is big and he's got my back.
Speaker 1:So maybe, maybe you blew up at work and you just were a total putz and a jerk and something like that. And you get out of work. What could you do? Well, you could throw yourself into the car and get at Jesus' feet and like, just you know what. I just didn't do it right and I wanna look to you right now and I wanna receive your forgiveness. Help me. You know, just be better. I don't know what I was doing. I don't know why I was so grouchy. Help me out with this. Or maybe you're in a fight with a spouse and you're going through the same old stuff same old again and again and again. But you're also twisting stuff. You're like trying to hurt them. How about you just throw yourself off the boat, run into the closet, jesus, I need to look at Jesus for a minute. Would you just give me help right now, lord, I need. I know that you have all the sufficient, you have everything I need, but I need your power in order to love that person well, right now. And then we need to run.
Speaker 1:I was a kid some of you know about this. It didn't matter what we were doing, if we were playing ball, if we were riding bikes, whatever we were doing outside because we were outside a lot in those times as soon as you heard the jingle of the ice cream truck, it didn't matter what else was going on, you might be, you had a ball in your hand. You're like this is dumb, I don't need this. And you run. You run to whoever has the money and you're like I need a lot of money right now Cause this good human man is coming and he's gonna skip us if we don't go. Everybody knows what it's like to make a mad dash for the ice cream truck. So that feeling, that's what we need to feel about Jesus. Here comes Jesus. I'm running, I gotta get to him. He's got my answer, he's gonna solve my problems. Now I'm gonna meddle for a second. That means I'm gonna maybe get you offended. I guess I mean this, though, with seriousness and with compassion and love.
Speaker 1:This thing can keep us from running to Jesus, because it's a quick dopamine hit and it is endless, and sometimes we're feeling bad about ourselves. We're like, no, I could run to Jesus or I could just flip through this and well, and it won't be the same thing, I won't get peace, but I'll be distracted and I'll see some different things, but you know what the problem with this thing is it messes. You can't be all up into this and keep hearing the ebbs and flows of the Holy Spirit because he whispers baby and he will not have competitors. That's just not how it goes. And, by the way, can I just say this is total soapbox. Here we go, guys.
Speaker 1:We're not even very far into social media, right, or what? Maybe 20 years? Maybe Did you know that in the 20th century it wasn't until the 1950s that they even knew cigarettes give you cancer. By the way, like everybody was like this is great. If you would go back in time to like smoking is dumb, they'd be like you're dumb, we're all smoking. They found out in the 50s. Oh no, it gives you cancer. I'm just saying we should maybe be a little bit cautious. We don't have any wisdom about this thing yet at all. We don't have any perspective.
Speaker 1:And what I find about it? The effect I see it have on me and on some of y'all. Social media constantly makes you audition for people's likes and I just don't like the idea that I'm always auditioning. I don't wanna audition my lasagna, all right. I don't wanna audition what you think about, you know, my duck lips looking up at the thing, giving a kissy face. I don't wanna audition for you and I don't want that effect on my spirit to feel like I need to audition for people. You know, I don't feel like I have to audition for you. You're real people, you're my family, I love you.
Speaker 1:All these bozos out there somewhere who are giving avatars of themselves that are kind of real and kind of not, I'm just saying I think it has a negative effect on the soul long term if we give ourselves to that completely and so we might just wanna hold back and have a look. Hey, it can be used by God for sure. But I'm just saying if our heart is on this hamster wheel of I have the addiction of approval and I need to audition for everybody to see if they like it, my friend, you don't need them to like you and you don't need to audition. We like you how you are, dude, you don't even have to do anything. You're already loved. You're already liked by Jesus. So, dear God, please let's do something and lock this thing down so we can run to Jesus, please, because more than good behavior and more than just giving you a mission. Jesus wants to be with you. Let's do one more. So we honor God's activity in our lives by running toward Jesus when we see Him moving in our life. But we also point out God's work to others when you suspect he's working in their lives. Maybe, maybe you do it. You pointed out in other people's lives.
Speaker 1:Maybe this is what John did for Peter. Did you notice? It's kind of worded funny. The disciple whom Jesus loved, versus verse seven said to Peter it is the Lord. So Simon, peter heard that it was the Lord and he cast himself into the sea. So John's watching this. Okay, Peter is. He's looking at the fish, oh my gosh. And then he looks at the man on the shore and then he looks at the fish and the man and the fish and the man he's like this is just like it was before. Is that Jesus? I think maybe it is. And you know John's over there and he's just more watching Peter and Jesus. And he's like Peter, it's Jesus, I'm just confirming it to you, buddy, it's Jesus. And he's like I knew, I thought it was Jesus. And then he jumps into the sea.
Speaker 1:John confirmed for his friend hey, this really is the Lord You're thinking it is. I just want to confirm yeah, I think it is. That's God. Why don't you go jump in the ocean with your clothes on? See our friends help us recognize Jesus in the circumstances of our lives. Sometimes, now, we want to make sure that we guard everybody's process of self-discovery. This is what I needed to know as a young Christian that I didn't. But friends really are for giving a thumbs up, giving an add a boy, add a girl, or just saying hey, man, I see this and I don't think God has forgotten you. I think God really is gonna come rescue you at the right time and in the right way. Friends confirm things in one of those lives, but they have to give people space to find stuff out on their own. That's why it was just all John said was it's the Lord. He didn't launch into a sermon. He said let me give you three points on why I think this is the Lord Peter. He just said I think it's the Lord and off he went.
Speaker 1:My friend, there's something beautiful about discovering the treasure of Jesus hidden in the field for yourself. When someone explains everything about it, you don't get the joy of opening the present. I mean, just think about it. Okay, somebody gives you a present and then they tell you what it is before you open it. It's like, well, dude, come on, man, I didn't wanna know, I wanted to find out myself. There's a joy that comes only from finding out what was in there. And so we can encourage folks, we can give them little nods and nudges. But the best policy is, if you over explain things to people, dude, they're gonna run. They're gonna be like dude, I don't need this. I don't want you to be the Holy Ghost, cause you're not. Let me just find out on my own Bra back off. Let me do this, Let me do this. And they need time sometime to figure it out. I think this is important for parents to remember.
Speaker 1:Okay, so Jacob in Old Testament right, his father's, isaac and Rebecca, and they're kinda backslidden, but for his whole life they've been telling him you know, yahweh is the true God and you need to follow this guy. And he kinda doesn't really get it. He doesn't seem to care. He's a deceiver, kinda just like his mom, and he gets into some trouble and then he gets out. He gets out of town, his brother Esau's after him and he's in danger a little bit and he doesn't get very far. He's about to go to his uncle Laban's to hide, essentially and he has an encounter with God and he says and God, it's Jacob's latter whole thing. And God's saying, hey, by the way, jacob, like I'm real, I'm gonna fill these promises to your family. And Jacob has the audacity to be like, hey, cool, we'll see, I'm gonna go out with my life and we'll see what you do God. Well, by the end of the 14 years, when he's coming back, he's very much like we're gonna do what God wants us to do.
Speaker 1:He's changed as he tried out, finding out more about God, but it didn't happen in an instant. It didn't happen in a moment. And parents, sometimes I don't want to scare you, but I think one of the best things we can do is pray for our kids, because you want them to have a genuine face, you want them to actually know Jesus, not just hear about the Jesus you know. But in order for that to take place, they gotta have a little bit of difficulty, maybe a little bit of insecurity, maybe a little bit of ouch that you can't rescue them from, or you shouldn't rescue them from it, because they're learning oh, god will help me, really, the God my parents always talked about. He's really real. But I didn't launch out on him until people shut up and let me have my own trials and let me find out about who this God is. I need a parent to say amen.
Speaker 1:If you think that's good, we're almost there, friends, we're almost there. Sometimes you're gonna have what's called a prophetic word for somebody. You're just gonna feel it in your gut Like I feel like God is saying this to you. I just wanna give you some advice about that. You can do that as long as you say stuff like I think maybe God might be saying to you you don't wanna come with thus say to the Lord, you need to do this. You're even better if you come with the scripture and be like I'm reading this and I think maybe this applies to you, but here's what we don't wanna do as friends to one another. You don't wanna back anybody into a corner and be like you need to believe this. This is what God is saying to you.
Speaker 1:Guys, that's what cults do. That's not what Christians do. There's a Holy Spirit on purpose and it ain't you. So we don't tell people what to do. We don't presume to be teacher. We just say, hey man, I love you, tom.
Speaker 1:I just wanna suggest some things to you, and maybe what you wanna do is see this if you just invite them to Easter next weekend, you don't even have to be the one telling them anything, right, and they won't think it's you. They'll hear the preacher talking and they'll feel the environment. They'll be like, oh gosh, they might. They might start to discern. Maybe God is at work in my life. But you can just take the pressure off you. You don't have to force them into anything. You don't have to talk them into anything. All you have to do is, if God is moving, start to point stuff out by inviting them to an Easter worship experience next week.
Speaker 1:My friend, if we're gonna do this, you gotta get around other Christians. Sometimes I have to say to Christians you need to get away from each other because you're not thinking about other people enough. But as a general rule, to do life healthily as a Christ follower, if that's what you are, you need to get around some peeps. So back to my construction days. I was one of three Christians on this construction crew there's tearing apart a hotel and putting it back together in kind of like a renewed way, like updating it, and us three Christians, we kind of felt like the people who were the bosses. They just didn't particularly like Christians and they weren't afraid to let you know it and so anytime we could, it was kind of like a little bit covert. If we could get assigned to the same room, we would try, because the rest of the environment was so antagonistic that we just had to. Man, I'm just glad to be with a brother. I'm just glad that we can paint this wall and not have to, and we can encourage one another as we go.
Speaker 1:You might wanna go to Fierce man just because, bro, it's an hour of your life, but you might have some brothers that have your back, lady. You might wanna go to Fierce Women because it's only an hour of your life, but who knows? Someone might say one thing that you're like now I know what God is doing in my life. Now I see it because of what you said. Now let me give you free bonus questions. Okay, these are questions that you can ask, so you don't have to say I think God is doing this in your life. Here's some things you can say to a friend.
Speaker 1:If this were a character test for someone in the Bible. How would they pass it? That's what she asked somebody. They're going through a hard time. Hey, I'm not telling you what to do, but I know you're really smart. If this were a character test in the Bible, how would that Bible character pass the test? Because that's what God wants you to do? Probably you don't have to teach him.
Speaker 1:Another question hey, you bring the enemy into it. People don't even think about the enemy and as soon as they do, they start to like, oh my gosh. Yeah, you ask. Hey, you're really smart, I know you're doing a lot right, but the enemy's also shrewd. What might the enemy be doing in this situation? If you were the enemy, how would you set you up, knowing your proclivities to take you down? I know that I seem to know these real quick, but they'll come as you practice them. One more You're really smart. You're not a baby. You've been through a lot of life and a lot of difficulty. Hey, I know you're going through a hard time, but tell me this how would you encourage somebody who is going through what you're going through? Because I feel like most of us have already done that multiple times.
Speaker 1:Now let's just tell you again my friends, jesus doesn't just care about the mission. He doesn't just care about you doing better. He comes to be with us and he comes to cause us sometimes to be a part of how he's revealing his will to others. Let's pray, hey, hey, god, that one of us is doing this whole thing right. We do a lot wrong, as a matter of fact. I thank you, jesus. You just love us so much that you're just like come have breakfast. You don't want anything to stop us or hold us back. I pray that that knowledge, knowing you that way that we would all get it, wave after wave after wave after wave, god, I pray that you would use us in one another's lives with discernment, not to like bludgeon people, but also to not let somebody just founder and not wanna be a bother to anybody, but tell them the truth, in love, about what you might be doing. God, we invite you to make us a church where, even if people had never been here before, they would walk in and they'd say, wow, these people know that Jesus loves them and they love others. Well, because of it. In Christ's name, amen, hey, thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 1:If you don't have a home church and you're looking for a Bible preaching community that has its heart set on passionately knowing Jesus and being his witness in our generation. Check out Fierce Church. We'd love for you to join us, either digitally or in person. Also, if you're looking for leadership development related content, don't forget to check out the Fierce Leadership Podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts from. Special thanks to those of you who give generously to support this ministry. It's because of you that this is possible. You can click on the link in the description to give now or visit Fierce Church for more information. If you enjoyed this podcast, why not subscribe? Share it with your friends, click on the share button, take a screenshot and share it on social media or wherever you would share such things. Whatever challenges you're facing, I know you can make it. Don't give up. Hang on to Jesus. He won't let go of you. Jesus loves you so much and we love you. I hope someday we get to meet in person. Thanks again for listening.