SPEAKER_00: Welcome to our podcast.
SPEAKER_00: We hope this powerful word from City Center Church transforms your mind and improves your relationship with Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Be sure to check out our website at CityCenterChurch.com for all of our sermons, outreach events, and the opportunity to partner with us to advance the kingdom of God through your generosity.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for joining us, and let's get into the word of today.
SPEAKER_01: The Holy Spirit's been doing something in our community.
SPEAKER_01: He's trusting this house and he's sending people to us.
SPEAKER_01: I've had the privilege of meeting many new people that have been coming week after week, new visitors.
SPEAKER_01: And if if you're if this is your first time here today, I'd like to welcome you.
SPEAKER_01: If I haven't met you in person, my name is Tommy.
SPEAKER_01: I'm one of the pastors here on staff.
SPEAKER_01: And um you just picked a great Sunday to be with us.
SPEAKER_01: We're starting a new series today called Built for This.
SPEAKER_01: And this will be a four-week series over the next four weeks.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna walk through the four seasons of spring, of summer, fall, and winter, because our our spiritual lives also move through seasons.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Spring teaches us how to how to begin again, how to start fresh.
SPEAKER_01: Summer reveals whether we have developed roots strong enough to endure the heat.
SPEAKER_01: And it's hot out there.
SPEAKER_01: Fall.
SPEAKER_01: Fall teaches us how to recognize a harvest and release what has completed its purpose in your life.
SPEAKER_01: There are leaves left on many people from previous fall seasons that the Lord wants to remove from you to prepare you for the next season, and you keep holding on to those leaves.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna talk about that.
SPEAKER_01: Winter teaches us how to trust God when everything appears quiet and nothing seems to be growing and everything looks dead.
SPEAKER_01: Every season has a purpose.
SPEAKER_01: And every season is gonna require a different response from every single person in this room.
SPEAKER_01: The promise of this series isn't that every season will be easy.
SPEAKER_01: The promise is that God has been preparing you to remain faithful through all the seasons, whether you've noticed it or not.
SPEAKER_01: You weren't only built for seasons where everything makes sense to you.
SPEAKER_01: You weren't only built for seasons where doors are flinging open and staying open.
SPEAKER_01: You weren't only built for seasons where your prayers are being answered and in the way that you are requesting them, and you can see clearly the hand of God moving over your life.
SPEAKER_01: You were also built to remain faithful when the seasons change and you weren't expecting it.
SPEAKER_01: You were built to endure the heat.
SPEAKER_01: You were built to trust God while things are being stripped away.
SPEAKER_01: You were built to stand when the ground looks dry and empty.
SPEAKER_01: You may not have chosen the season that you're in, but God has been building you for it.
SPEAKER_01: Look at your neighbor and say, You've been built for this.
SPEAKER_01: Look at your other neighbor, the one you completely ignored, and tell them, I've been built for this.
SPEAKER_01: Today we begin with spring.
SPEAKER_01: And I know we have an extreme heat warning, and it's not spring today, but we here in the house, it's spring.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: And we're gonna look at a story that doesn't immediately look like spring.
SPEAKER_01: As a matter of fact, the story doesn't actually happen in spring.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna go into the story of Isaac, who found himself living through a season that he didn't choose for himself.
SPEAKER_01: The land was in famine.
SPEAKER_01: So let's read.
SPEAKER_01: Let's read.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna go to Genesis chapter 26.
SPEAKER_01: Genesis chapter 26, if you have your Bibles.
SPEAKER_01: The first book of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: If you're somewhere in the middle or in Revelation, you haven't been to church in a while.
SPEAKER_01: Genesis chapter 26.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna read verses 1 through 6, and then we'll we'll jump probably to verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: 26, Genesis 26, verse 1.
SPEAKER_01: It reads like this Now there was a famine in the land, besides the previous famine in Abraham's time.
SPEAKER_01: And Isaac went to Abimelech, king of the Philistines in Gerar.
SPEAKER_01: The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, Do not go down to Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: Live in the land where I tell you to live.
SPEAKER_01: Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and bless you.
SPEAKER_01: I believe the Lord is already speaking to someone going through famine right now.
SPEAKER_01: Your famine might be financial, it might be in your relationships, it might you might be going through a spiritual famine, and you're ready to run where you might find temporary relief.
SPEAKER_01: For some, the word may actually be move, move in faith, and he will bless your steps when wherever your feet lead you.
SPEAKER_01: But for others, I want to give a warning before you move, you better be sure that the Lord told you to move.
SPEAKER_01: Because for someone in this room and watching online, the word of the Lord might be stay.
SPEAKER_01: Stay where I planted you, stay faithful to what I told you, stay obedient, even when the ground looks dry.
SPEAKER_01: Notice that the promise wasn't that Isaac wasn't gonna face difficulty if he stayed.
SPEAKER_01: His promise was, I will be with you and I will bless you.
SPEAKER_01: If God told you to stay, the famine doesn't have authority to cancel what he spoke over your life.
SPEAKER_01: That's a prophetic word for someone today.
SPEAKER_01: Then verse 6 says, So Isaac stayed in Gerar.
SPEAKER_01: Let's jump to verse 12, Genesis 26, 12.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Isaac planted crops in the land, and the same year reaped a hundredfold because the Lord blessed him.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac is standing in a land marked by famine, looking at ground that gave him no visible reason to expect a harvest.
SPEAKER_01: But God had spoken.
SPEAKER_01: How many know that when God speaks, it has to come to pass?
SPEAKER_01: And Isaac decided the condition of the ground was not gonna have more authority than the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: See, spring doesn't begin when flowers appear.
SPEAKER_01: Spring begins when somebody believes God enough to plant in ground that still looks dead.
SPEAKER_01: I want to preach today for about three and a half hours.
SPEAKER_01: There's an extreme heat warning outside.
SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to protect you.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, we're in AC.
SPEAKER_01: It's comfortable.
SPEAKER_01: Pastor Robin just said that for the last eight weeks, worship has been extending and the Lord has been moving.
SPEAKER_01: He's also been doing that in the Word, if you haven't noticed yet.
SPEAKER_01: For those taking notes, notice that I grabbed the microphone at 11:04 a.m.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so if we leave at 12, it's not because I preached too long.
SPEAKER_01: It's because the Holy Spirit moved during worship.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all were enjoying it, and now he's gonna speak.
SPEAKER_01: So I want to preach and just stop today.
SPEAKER_01: Spring doesn't begin with spring.
SPEAKER_01: Father, I thank you for your word.
SPEAKER_01: I ask you to speak to every heart in this place and those watching online according to your perfect will.
SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen and amen.
SPEAKER_01: Spring.
SPEAKER_01: We're launching this series with spring.
SPEAKER_01: Who here loves spring by a show of hands?
SPEAKER_01: Like spring is your favorite season.
SPEAKER_01: A lot though, a lot of people brought their hands down.
SPEAKER_01: So spring is not your favorite season.
SPEAKER_01: I I actually love the rain.
SPEAKER_01: I love the rain.
SPEAKER_01: I love the thunderstorms that spring brings.
SPEAKER_01: Um, whenever there's a tornado, and that kind of happens between spring and summer, but when there's a tornado and the alarms start going off on the phone, my family runs to the basement.
SPEAKER_01: I'm the one who runs outside.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to see, I love when it rains.
SPEAKER_01: Um, what I don't like about spring, that's when the bugs come out.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Spiders, flies, mosquitoes, bees.
SPEAKER_01: I hate bees.
SPEAKER_01: I I can't stand by someone said that if all the bees disappeared in the world that we wouldn't survive.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, let's try it.
SPEAKER_01: Let's try, let's get rid of it, let's test that theory.
SPEAKER_01: I don't like bees.
SPEAKER_01: Everything that was hibernating in the winter comes out in spring.
SPEAKER_01: In my life, I see I'm from Los Angeles.
SPEAKER_01: So, so in Los Angeles, we don't deal with snakes.
SPEAKER_01: I I've I've never seen a snake all my life in Los Angeles.
SPEAKER_01: But when I moved to Kansas, I've had three encounters with snakes.
SPEAKER_01: Three encounters.
SPEAKER_01: I remember them visibly.
SPEAKER_01: And those three encounters, they have all been in the spring.
SPEAKER_01: In the spring, actually, now that I think about it, I don't like spring.
SPEAKER_01: I don't like spring.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe that's why I came to this story.
SPEAKER_01: Not that this story takes place in spring, like I said, but I'm talking about a spiritual spring.
SPEAKER_01: A spiritual spring.
SPEAKER_01: Genesis 26 opens with a sentence that doesn't sound very encouraging.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Now there was a famine in the land.
SPEAKER_01: That's that's that's that's like bad news.
SPEAKER_01: That's how it starts.
SPEAKER_01: Now there was a famine in the land.
SPEAKER_01: That's how this season in Isaac's story begins.
SPEAKER_01: It begins with a famine.
SPEAKER_01: A famine meant more than a difficult week or or a disappointing season.
SPEAKER_01: A famine, hunger, actually threatened everything.
SPEAKER_01: It affected the crops, it affected the livestock, the economy, the family, it affected the future.
SPEAKER_01: You see, when the rain stopped, the the ground hardened.
SPEAKER_01: When the ground hardened, the seed couldn't produce.
SPEAKER_01: And when the seed can't produce, people start making decisions about where they are gonna go in order to survive this famine.
SPEAKER_01: For Isaac, the season had changed, and nobody asked Isaac whether he was ready for it.
SPEAKER_01: That's one of the most difficult things about seasons.
SPEAKER_01: They don't wait for your permission before they change.
SPEAKER_01: You can be comfortable with the way things are, and suddenly something shifts.
SPEAKER_01: A door closes, a relationship changes, a job you thought was secure isn't secure anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Your health changes, people around you change.
SPEAKER_01: City center church enters, transition.
SPEAKER_01: Hello.
SPEAKER_01: We used to work, well, we used to work, stops working, and you find yourself standing in a season that looks completely different from the one that you expected.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac didn't choose the famine, but he did have to choose how he would respond to it, and that's where this series begins.
SPEAKER_01: Being built for a season doesn't mean that you control the season, it means that God has been forming something inside of you so that you can respond faithfully and obediently when the season changes.
SPEAKER_01: You may not have chosen the famine, but you still have to decide whether the famine that you're in is going to control you.
SPEAKER_01: The text says that this famine, notice this, this famine happened, and still in verse 1, besides the previous famine in Abraham's time.
SPEAKER_01: Scripture does not waste words, it's letting us know something.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac wasn't the first person in his family to face this kind of season.
SPEAKER_01: His father Abraham had also lived through a famine.
SPEAKER_01: And when famine came to his father Abraham, check out what Abraham did.
SPEAKER_01: Abraham went down to Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: Abraham left the area where the famine was and he went down to Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: So now Isaac is standing in a season, in a famine, that looks very similar to one his father had already faced.
SPEAKER_01: That means Isaac wasn't only dealing with the pressure of his present circumstances, he was also dealing with an inherited pattern.
SPEAKER_01: We we in Genesis 26, we jumped part of the story after verse 6, verse 7 through 11.
SPEAKER_01: You read it when you get home.
SPEAKER_01: There's a story in there where Isaac lies about his wife.
SPEAKER_01: He says that that's my sister.
SPEAKER_01: But if you go to Genesis chapter 12, we see the same thing done by Abraham, who says, That was that's my sister.
SPEAKER_01: We see an inherited pattern.
SPEAKER_01: He had watched what his father did, he knew where Abraham went to survive the famine season that he had gone through, and when the same kind of pressure showed up in Isaac's life, the same destination started pulling on him.
SPEAKER_01: That's how inherited patterns work.
SPEAKER_01: Who am I speaking to today?
SPEAKER_01: You don't always sit down and and and and and and consciously or intentionally decide to repeat those patterns.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes pressure simply activates what you've already seen before.
SPEAKER_01: When you're afraid, you respond the way your family responded to fear.
SPEAKER_01: When you feel rejected, you shut down the way people before you shut down.
SPEAKER_01: When money gets tight, you panic the way that panic was modeled for you.
SPEAKER_01: When conflict comes, you run because running is what you learn from the people that came before you.
SPEAKER_01: And there are moments when you can be walking towards something, not because God sent you there, but because pain taught you that this is where you go when it gets hard.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac started moving toward Egypt because that's what his father did.
SPEAKER_01: Egypt represented provision, Egypt had resources, Egypt had water, Egypt had food.
SPEAKER_01: Egypt looked like the logical answer to famine, and that's what caught my attention in this story.
SPEAKER_01: Because Egypt didn't look evil, Egypt looked very practical.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes the greatest danger isn't an obviously sinful option, sometimes it's it's a reasonable option.
SPEAKER_01: Hear me, that God never told you to choose.
SPEAKER_01: That there's decisions that look responsible, they look logical, there's decisions that are safe.
SPEAKER_01: But if God didn't speak them to you, then then you can still move you outside the place of obedience.
SPEAKER_01: The problem wasn't that Egypt had provision, the problem was that God had not assigned Egypt to Isaac.
SPEAKER_01: So before Isaac could start on his way to Egypt like his father did, the Lord interrupted him in verse 2.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Do not go down to Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: That's what the Lord told Isaac.
SPEAKER_01: Do not go down to Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, Isaac, I know what your father did, I know what your instincts are telling you.
SPEAKER_01: I know the ground looks dry and Egypt looks full, but but you can't respond to this season by automatically repeating what someone else did in theirs.
SPEAKER_01: That's a word for somebody today.
SPEAKER_01: You better grab it.
SPEAKER_01: The season may look familiar, but God may require a different response from you.
SPEAKER_01: Your father ran, but you're gonna stay.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Your family avoided conversation, but but you may have to confront it.
SPEAKER_01: The people before you gave up, but but you may have to keep believing and remain.
SPEAKER_01: Someone else survives by leaving, but God may sustain you by teaching you how to stay in place and how to remain.
SPEAKER_01: You can't assume that because God led someone else a certain way, that He's gonna lead you the same way.
SPEAKER_01: So Isaac, Isaac was the son of Abraham, but he still needed his own word from God.
SPEAKER_01: You you can inherit a testimony, but but you can't live forever on somebody else's instruction and somebody else's anointing.
SPEAKER_01: You need to hear God for yourself, and God tells Isaac in verse 2 live in the land where I tell you.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch verse 3.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you, and I will bless you.
SPEAKER_01: Stay in this land for a while, I will be with you, and I will bless you.
SPEAKER_01: Notice what God did not say.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't give Isaac a timeline for when the famine was gonna end.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't tell him that it was gonna be easy.
SPEAKER_01: He gives Isaac something greater than an explanation.
SPEAKER_01: He gives him his presence.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he promises.
SPEAKER_01: He says, I will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: That's the promise that Isaac has to carry into a season that doesn't make sense.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe that's where some of us struggle.
SPEAKER_01: We keep asking God to explain the season, talk about the season, tell us what's going on in the season, but God is only promising to be present in your season.
SPEAKER_01: And we're thinking, God, tell me how long this is gonna last.
SPEAKER_01: He says, I will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: And we think, tell me, tell me exactly how this is gonna work out.
SPEAKER_01: Like they show it to me, I will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: Show me what everybody's gonna do and the decisions that I'm gonna make in the season.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Nope, I'm gonna be with you.
SPEAKER_01: That's all you need to know.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, give me the entire plan.
SPEAKER_01: But he works more like a scroll, he gives you piece by piece.
SPEAKER_01: He just says, I will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: That's enough for right now.
SPEAKER_01: Most of the time, God won't give you enough information so that it doesn't remove your need for faith, but he'll give you enough revelation to take the next obedience step.
SPEAKER_01: That's all you need for now to obey that one thing that he told you.
SPEAKER_01: You see, there are times when the word of God will keep you in a place that your emotions are trying to escape from.
SPEAKER_01: That doesn't mean that God calls people to remain in abuse, in danger, or destructive situation.
SPEAKER_01: So I want to clear that up.
SPEAKER_01: But it does mean that we we can't assume that every uncomfortable place that we're in is a place that God has abandoned.
SPEAKER_01: Some places are uncomfortable because God is developing something in me that comfort never will.
SPEAKER_01: Some assignments become difficult because roots are being forced to grow deeper.
SPEAKER_01: I haven't forgotten our declaration.
SPEAKER_01: May our roots grow down deep into you, may our lives be built on you so that our faith will grow strong.
SPEAKER_01: Some seasons feel empty because God is teaching us that our confidence cannot be in the condition of the field in front of us.
SPEAKER_01: So God says, Stay, don't go to Egypt, stay here for a while.
SPEAKER_01: And verse 6 gives us Isaac's entire response in five simple words.
SPEAKER_01: It says, So Isaac stayed in Gerar.
SPEAKER_01: That verse is so short, but don't miss what it cost him.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac stayed while the famine was still happening.
SPEAKER_01: Notice that there's no negotiation from Isaac, there's no rebuttal.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't ask for confirmation three times before he obeyed.
SPEAKER_01: The text simply said tells us that he stayed.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes obedience looks that ordinary and that simple.
SPEAKER_01: We complicate it.
SPEAKER_01: It's one decision made in response to what God said, even while everything around you is still giving you reasons to do the opposite.
SPEAKER_01: But I want you to notice where God told him to stay.
SPEAKER_01: It was simply the place where God had assigned him for that season.
SPEAKER_01: God had said, stay in this land for a while.
SPEAKER_01: That means Isaac had to learn how to be faithful in a temporary place.
SPEAKER_01: And some of us struggle with temporary places.
SPEAKER_01: Because we only know how to value something when we believe that something is permanent.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to invest in a season that we are expecting to end.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to build relationships in a place where we may eventually leave.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to serve faithfully while we're waiting for the next opportunity.
SPEAKER_01: We treat transition like it was an intermission, as though real life is actually gonna begin again once everything is settled.
SPEAKER_01: But what if the temporary place that God has you in right now is where God wants to reveal whether he can trust you?
SPEAKER_01: What if the temporary place that he has you in right now is where he's testing you, where he wants to reveal if I can trust you with the permanent promise that I have over your life?
SPEAKER_01: Isaac couldn't treat Gerar like wasted time simply because it wasn't the final destination.
SPEAKER_01: We have to understand that God was with him in that place.
SPEAKER_01: God intended to bless him in that place that he thought was temporary.
SPEAKER_01: And what Isaac did in that temporary season would become part of the story that God was writing through the rest of his life.
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you, church, your story is not finished.
SPEAKER_01: Your story doesn't end in the season that you're in right now.
SPEAKER_01: And that's a word for us as a church.
SPEAKER_01: Transition can make people emotionally step away before they physically go anywhere.
SPEAKER_01: We can begin watching instead of building.
SPEAKER_01: Many people can wait for every question to be answered before deciding whether you're going to fully engage again.
SPEAKER_01: We can tell ourselves that once the next chapter becomes clear and we know what's going to happen, then we're going to pray.
SPEAKER_01: That's when I'm going to start to serve, that's when I'm going to start to give.
SPEAKER_01: That's when I'm going to start to invite people.
SPEAKER_01: Once I know what's going to happen, I'll start discipling others and I'll start believing God more.
SPEAKER_01: But this season that we're still in, it matters.
SPEAKER_01: It's not just an intermission before the next thing God wants to do.
SPEAKER_01: This moment that we're in still belongs to God.
SPEAKER_01: And he's doing something in it.
SPEAKER_01: And whatever God does next in my life and in my family's life will be shaped in part by how faithfully we respond to what he's asking of me right now in this season.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac didn't know everything that was ahead.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't know about the opposition that would come when God began to bless him.
SPEAKER_01: All he knew was that God had told him to not go to Egypt and to remain.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we become so anxious to discover the next instruction that we neglect the one thing, the one God that has already given us.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you're asking God, what's next?
SPEAKER_01: While He's still waiting for your obedience to I need you to stay here.
SPEAKER_01: That's that's the next.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you're asking him to reveal the destination, and he's asking whether you'll trust him in the place he has you now.
SPEAKER_01: Before Isaac could plant into the land, he had to stop looking for another place.
SPEAKER_01: He couldn't cultivate the ground while keeping one foot pointed toward Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: He couldn't invest himself fully in the place that God had assigned him while constantly imagining how much better life might be somewhere else.
SPEAKER_01: At some point, his obedience had to become more than simply remaining geographically, he had to become present in the season that God had given him.
SPEAKER_01: And that may be the first sign of spring.
SPEAKER_01: Before there's seed in the ground, before there's growth beneath the surface, and before anybody sees any flower growing, God settles the heart of the person that He's called to cultivate the field.
SPEAKER_01: He's working internally.
SPEAKER_01: You'll never work the ground, the dirt, the soil in front of you while your heart is living somewhere else.
SPEAKER_01: Let's continue with verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 12 says, Isaac planted crops in that land, and the same year reaped a hundredfold because the Lord blessed him.
SPEAKER_01: Those words are easy to read quickly, but I think they they they they actually mean something for us.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Isaac planted in that land, and he planted during the famine.
SPEAKER_01: He planted in the same place that had made him want to leave.
SPEAKER_01: It's another thing to believe that God can work right here in the place that currently feels dry and feels dead.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac had to stop measuring the potential of the land by the condition of the land.
SPEAKER_01: You see, God had spoken over that place, so Isaac had to put seed into it.
SPEAKER_01: That seed itself, the seed, it wasn't worthless.
SPEAKER_01: It was actually valuable, it was grain.
SPEAKER_01: He could have kept that as food and protected it for survival.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, he placed it into the ground that gave him no visible reason to expect anything back.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you have to place something valuable into the ground before the ground has given you any reason to trust it.
SPEAKER_01: Once the seed disappeared beneath the surface, the field looked exactly the same.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing had changed.
SPEAKER_01: The ground didn't applaud his obedience, and there was no visible proof that anything was happening above the ground, but something had begun.
SPEAKER_01: Spring doesn't begin in spring.
SPEAKER_01: Spring begins when you plant the seed.
SPEAKER_01: Spring begins in the quiet.
SPEAKER_01: Spring begins in the dark space of what's happening beneath the surface.
SPEAKER_01: Spring begins with hidden obedience.
SPEAKER_01: It begins when someone gives God something valuable and accepts that for a while it may look as nothing is happening.
SPEAKER_01: Some of us have prayers that are buried in the ground like a seed.
SPEAKER_01: Many people have acts of obedience that nobody saw.
SPEAKER_01: A lot of you have moments when when you chose grace instead of proving someone that you were right.
SPEAKER_01: Times when when we've kept serving while while we were tired.
SPEAKER_01: People have kept giving while things were tight.
SPEAKER_01: You forgave while while still hurting, and you kept planting, showing up when nobody else would have blamed you for stepping away.
SPEAKER_01: I can't tell on you, but I can tell on me.
SPEAKER_01: Because there was there was immediate that there was no immediate fruit that I saw for a time.
SPEAKER_01: There was a time when I began to wonder whether any of it mattered.
SPEAKER_01: But hidden doesn't mean inactive.
SPEAKER_01: A seed can be completely out of sight while life is already moving inside of it.
SPEAKER_01: See, we often struggle because we only know how to recognize what God is doing once it becomes visible.
SPEAKER_01: We call it a new season when everybody else can see it too, when it springs forth.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac couldn't control the rain, he couldn't force the soil to produce.
SPEAKER_01: He was responsible to plant.
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
SPEAKER_01: The increase belonged to God.
SPEAKER_01: Stop spending energy trying to manage outcomes that only God can produce over your life.
SPEAKER_01: You see, we want to control how quickly people around us change.
SPEAKER_01: We want to control how quickly the next season is gonna arrive.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac had to plant and then trust God with everything happening beneath the surface.
SPEAKER_01: Are you bored yet?
SPEAKER_01: The verse says that he reaped a hundredfold because the Lord blessed him.
SPEAKER_01: The harvest wasn't proof that Isaac had discovered some superior agricultural method.
SPEAKER_01: The land was still in famine.
SPEAKER_01: The difference was the favor of God resting upon his obedience.
SPEAKER_01: Your obedience doesn't mean that you will see immediate increase or even get the outcome that you wanted.
SPEAKER_01: So that's just a disclaimer.
SPEAKER_01: This blessing was connected to the specific promise God had given Isaac, but the story does reveal something essential about the character of God.
SPEAKER_01: God isn't limited by the conditions that limit you.
SPEAKER_01: See, the famine was real, but it but it wasn't greater than the word God has spoken.
SPEAKER_01: And the famine that you're going through today spiritually doesn't have the final word.
SPEAKER_01: God's word has the final word because he is the word.
SPEAKER_01: And if he spoke a word, then that word has to come to pass.
SPEAKER_01: It says that in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
SPEAKER_01: So if a word came from him, it has to pass.
SPEAKER_01: He is not a God that lies.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter the circumstances around you.
SPEAKER_01: If he said it, you better believe that it's gonna happen in his time.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac looked at the famine and he planted anyway because he trusted the God who told him to remain.
SPEAKER_01: Don't go, stay here for a while.
SPEAKER_01: Then the text tells us in verse 13, it says the man Isaac became rich and his wealth continued to grow until he became very wealthy.
SPEAKER_01: You see, at this point, at this point, it would be easy to assume the difficult part of the story was over.
SPEAKER_01: The harvest had come.
SPEAKER_01: This man was now blessed, the blessing was visible.
SPEAKER_01: Now everyone around him would recognize the hand of God and celebrate what was happening, but that's not what happened.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, the next verse, verse 14, it says that he had so many flocks, and then it says, and the Philistines envied him, they envied him.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes resistance doesn't arrive before growth.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes God blesses you, and then resistance arrives because the growth has become impossible to ignore.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 15 it says, So all the wells that his father's servants had dug in the time of his father Abraham, the Philistines, check this out, they stopped them up, filling them with earth.
SPEAKER_01: The Philistines saw the wells and they filled them up with dirt.
SPEAKER_01: That's what envy does.
SPEAKER_01: They understood something important that in that region a harvest couldn't survive without water.
SPEAKER_01: The crops were visible above the ground because God had blessed Isaac, but the source sustaining them was hidden beneath the ground.
SPEAKER_01: You see, so the Philistines they could block the source, they could eventually stop the fruitfulness.
SPEAKER_01: That's what they thought.
SPEAKER_01: So we're gonna block it and nothing's gonna grow.
SPEAKER_01: So so they didn't begin by attacking what everybody could see at the top.
SPEAKER_01: They went after what was feeding it underneath the surface.
SPEAKER_01: And that's why the enemy doesn't immediately attack your testimony, the visible part uh of you.
SPEAKER_01: He begins to attack the internal side, the things that people can't see.
SPEAKER_01: He begins to attack your thoughts.
SPEAKER_01: He goes down deep and begins to draw your heart, he begins to attack what's on the inside.
SPEAKER_01: Why to block the source?
SPEAKER_01: The enemy is not able to remove the promise, but he'll do everything he can to block the place from which your life is drawing water.
SPEAKER_01: You see, the Philistines filled the wells with dirt, but notice what they couldn't do.
SPEAKER_01: They could cover the opening of the well, but they couldn't remove the water beneath the ground.
SPEAKER_01: The source was still there, it had simply become obstructed.
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear what I just said?
SPEAKER_01: The source is there, it's just simply become obstructed, and this is so important because there are moments in our lives when you assume the well has gone dry.
SPEAKER_01: When the truth is that something has blocked your access to the source.
SPEAKER_01: We say we can't hear God the way we used to.
SPEAKER_01: People say that I can't pray like I used to, I worship doesn't feel genuine.
SPEAKER_01: The the word no longer moves me as deeply as it once did.
SPEAKER_01: You start wondering, is this all worth it?
SPEAKER_01: You assume God has withdrawn, but the problem isn't the absence of water, the problem is that too much dirt has been allowed to accumulate around the opening.
SPEAKER_01: Who am I speaking to today?
SPEAKER_01: Disappointment can become dirt in your life, offense can become dirt, pride can become dirt, hidden compromise can become dirt that blocks the source.
SPEAKER_01: Exhaustion, unresolved pain can can can begin filling places that once flowed freely.
SPEAKER_01: None of these things mean the source has disappeared, but they they do mean that you can't continue pretending that nothing is obstructing it, that there are people here completely disconnected from the source because the enemy has put a barrier of dirt between you and what's down deep.
SPEAKER_01: And you wonder why you are questioning your faith.
SPEAKER_01: You don't see the point in this anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Why am I still doing this?
SPEAKER_01: You go into the motions.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac could have stood over those wells and complained about what the Philistines had done.
SPEAKER_01: They covered these wells with dirt.
SPEAKER_01: He could have spent the rest of his life explaining who was responsible for filling that, that it wasn't his fault.
SPEAKER_01: The Philistines did it.
SPEAKER_01: He could have pointed to the dirt and said, This is why nothing is flowing.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, look at verse 18.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac is giving us an example here.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug in the time of his father Abraham.
SPEAKER_01: Who needs to reopen what the enemy has closed in your life today?
SPEAKER_01: Isaac removed the dirt from these wells that had been placed there.
SPEAKER_01: And there are people here today that need to remove stuff that the enemy has used to block your access to the source.
SPEAKER_01: This is where repentance enters the story.
SPEAKER_01: Repentance isn't only feeling sorry because something is wrong.
SPEAKER_01: Repentance is allowing God to put his hand on what has blocked the flow and then cooperating with him as that dirt and that stuff blocking him is being removed.
SPEAKER_01: He wants to collaborate with you.
SPEAKER_01: You want fresh water without removing the dirt.
SPEAKER_01: That's not how it works.
SPEAKER_01: You want a move of God without confronting the offense you're carrying.
SPEAKER_01: People want spiritual renewal and revival without changing the habits that have made you spiritually dry.
SPEAKER_01: People want this season to be better while protecting everything that hardened your heart during the difficult part of the season.
SPEAKER_01: But you can't reopen a well without removing the dirt.
SPEAKER_01: For Isaac, reopening the wells didn't mean trying to recreate his father's life.
SPEAKER_01: He wasn't called to become Abraham, but he understood that there were sources his father had depended upon that couldn't be allowed to remain buried.
SPEAKER_01: Why am I saying that?
SPEAKER_01: Because the same is true for this church.
SPEAKER_01: We're not called to imitate every method from a previous generation, but we can't abandon the spiritual foundations that gave the church life.
SPEAKER_01: The simple stuff.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer still matters, church.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer still moves heaven and earth.
SPEAKER_01: Holiness being separated from this world still matters.
SPEAKER_01: The word of God still matters.
SPEAKER_01: Dependence upon the Holy Spirit is still so important.
SPEAKER_01: Loving people, reaching the lost, making disciples, and creating room for the presence of God still matters.
SPEAKER_01: Methods can change, seasons can change, leadership can change, but we can't continue to allow the wells to remain filled with dirt.
SPEAKER_01: And I believe that that's part of what God is doing in city center during this season of transition.
SPEAKER_01: He's not only preparing us for what's coming next.
SPEAKER_01: We don't know what's coming next.
SPEAKER_01: He's not only preparing us, he's inviting us in to examine what must be cleared right now.
SPEAKER_01: This is not a temporary season or an intermission waiting to see what's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01: You and I have a part to play in this season.
SPEAKER_01: So he's not only preparing us for what comes next, he's inviting us in to examine what must be cleared so that the life of God can flow freely through this house.
SPEAKER_01: We can't enter a new season carrying every offense that we're in now.
SPEAKER_01: We can't ask God for unity while continuing to live in a constant state of distrust.
SPEAKER_01: We can't pray for revival on Sunday while remaining spiritually passive the rest of the week.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't work that way.
SPEAKER_01: There's still water in this house.
SPEAKER_01: How many believe that?
SPEAKER_01: There's still water in this house.
SPEAKER_01: The enemy may have come to try to put dirt, but there's still water at the bottom of the source.
SPEAKER_01: The source hasn't disappeared.
SPEAKER_01: The presence of God hasn't abandoned us, the mission has not changed.
SPEAKER_01: There's still a call upon this community and this church, still a harvest that's in front of us, and there's still living water beneath the ground.
SPEAKER_01: But hear me.
SPEAKER_01: Removing the dirt and opening up the well to find fresh water, though it might seem like a great thing, the enemy will always come to attack.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 19 and 20.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac's servants dug in the valley and discovered a well of fresh water there.
SPEAKER_01: But the herders of Gerar quarreled with those of Isaac and said, That water is ours.
SPEAKER_01: So Isaac he named that well Esek because they disputed with him.
SPEAKER_01: His servants dug a well, they argued with them.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac named that well Esek, which means dispute or contention.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 21.
SPEAKER_01: So Isaac moved on.
SPEAKER_01: Then they dug another well, but they quarreled over that one also.
SPEAKER_01: So he named it Sitna.
SPEAKER_01: Conflict followed them again.
SPEAKER_01: So Isaac named that well Sitna, meaning hostility.
SPEAKER_01: Two wells now that he's dug up.
SPEAKER_01: He took the time and energy to dig those up.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, keep digging.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't want to call Justin this week and tell him that's something I had a pool up here.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to tell him, hey, Isaac, uh Justin, can we put a well up here and fill it up with dirt?
SPEAKER_01: And then we're gonna, we're gonna, no, no.
SPEAKER_01: That would have been extra.
SPEAKER_01: That's not the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: That was just me, my crazy mind.
SPEAKER_01: Think about the frustration that Isaac must have been going through.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Isaac was obeying God.
SPEAKER_01: He had stayed where God had told him to stay, he had planted, God had blessed him, and now he was reopening the wells.
SPEAKER_01: Yet every time they found water, someone wanted to fight over it.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we assume opposition is proof that we miss God or that God is not there.
SPEAKER_01: But Isaac was in conflict while he was in obedience.
SPEAKER_01: The presence of resistance over your life doesn't mean the absence of God in your life.
SPEAKER_01: That's for somebody here today.
SPEAKER_01: The presence of resistance over your life doesn't mean that God is absent from your life.
SPEAKER_01: What stands out to me is that Isaac didn't allow every conflict over each well they dug up to discourage him.
SPEAKER_01: He kept digging.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't spend the rest of his life fighting over the well of a sec.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't build his destiny around what happened at the well of Sidna.
SPEAKER_01: He kept moving, he kept digging, he kept moving, he kept digging.
SPEAKER_01: There are some wells that are worth defending.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that.
SPEAKER_01: But there are also some battles that'll consume an entire season if you refuse to release them.
SPEAKER_01: That's what being spirit-led means.
SPEAKER_01: It means you know what to fight for and you know what God said.
SPEAKER_01: No, move on from that.
SPEAKER_01: I got something better for you.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you have been fighting over that one thing for so long, committing to prove that you were right about that last well, that you no longer have the strength to dig the next one.
SPEAKER_01: I feel the Lord telling someone, stop fighting over Essech and Sidna because I have something better for you, says the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac eventually dug another well, verse 22.
SPEAKER_01: And this time no one argued over that well.
SPEAKER_01: He named that well Rehoboth and said, Now the Lord has given us room and we will flourish in the land.
SPEAKER_01: Rehobath means room or a broad place.
SPEAKER_01: Isaac had to go through some things to reach Rehaboth.
SPEAKER_01: Rehobath was reached by a man who refused to let the season he was in make him stop obeying.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe that's a word for us today.
SPEAKER_01: God is creating room.
SPEAKER_01: But room isn't permission to become comfortable.
SPEAKER_01: The room is meant for us to flourish.
SPEAKER_01: The room is supposed to allow us to reach more people.
SPEAKER_01: The room gives us space to disciple the next generation.
SPEAKER_01: If we as a church keep digging and reach our Rehoboth well, it will give us the room we need to effectively grow disciples that reflect Jesus to transform the root, the world.
SPEAKER_01: Our Rehobath will make room for the broken.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: It will make room for the forgotten and the people who never thought there would be a place for them in high.
SPEAKER_01: House of God.
SPEAKER_01: I believe there is a wigle bath in front of us, but we can't rush past the process that prepares us for that.
SPEAKER_01: We must remain where God has spoken plant while the field still looks dry.
SPEAKER_01: We need to remove what has blocked the wells and refuse to let the conflict define our future.
SPEAKER_01: That is how spring begins.
SPEAKER_01: But the story still points beyond Isaac.
SPEAKER_01: I want to reconcile this with the new covenant, the new testament.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Isaac, he placed a seed in the middle of a famine on dry ground, and trusted God to produce a harvest.
SPEAKER_01: And then centuries later, Jesus, the Son of God, the Messiah, our Christ, used that same image to explain what he was about to do in John 12, 24.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus Himself said that unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed.
SPEAKER_01: But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus was speaking about himself.
SPEAKER_01: He knew that the cross was imminent, that the cross was coming.
SPEAKER_01: He knew his body would be placed inside a tomb and everything would look finished and buried and dead.
SPEAKER_01: And it would look like the season that he was in had actually won.
SPEAKER_01: The promise would appear buried and hope would disappear.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus didn't enter the tomb as someone whose purpose had been defeated.
SPEAKER_01: He entered the ground like a seed, not buried, but planted.
SPEAKER_01: In our human logical mind, what looked like death in Jesus going down, we couldn't see that he was already carrying resurrection inside of him.
SPEAKER_01: And when Jesus walked out of the tomb, he didn't only rise as proof that one man had defeated death.
SPEAKER_01: Paul actually calls him the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: He was the first one, but he opened the way for all of us to have new life.
SPEAKER_01: The empty tomb was heaven's announcement that the harvest had begun.
SPEAKER_01: Spring doesn't begin with spring, it begins when the seed goes into the ground.
SPEAKER_01: It begins while while everything is still hidden, while nobody can see what God is doing.
SPEAKER_01: And while the surface gives no evidence that life, life is moving underneath it.
SPEAKER_01: There are so many people today that are in your spring season.
SPEAKER_01: It looks like everything is dead on top, but something is happening on the bottom.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you are standing in that kind of season right now.
SPEAKER_01: You've obeyed, you haven't seen the harvest, you've prayed, but the ground still looks dry.
SPEAKER_01: You've remained faithful, but you're tired of living in the place where God has you.
SPEAKER_01: You've been digging through disappointment, conflict, and things that have blocked your heart.
SPEAKER_01: So today the invitation isn't to pretend that the famine is over.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not trying to ignore or negate the circumstances, but just like we preached a few weeks ago, when you start looking for the healer, you start forgetting about the healing.
SPEAKER_01: And that'll come to pass.
SPEAKER_01: You stop looking at your circumstances, and you start looking at the one who can change your circumstances, and you get to know him and a relationship with him, everything else will come.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe God is telling you stop running.
SPEAKER_01: Stop trying to find provision on your own.
SPEAKER_01: Where others have found provision.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe he's asking you to become present again in the place that he assigned you today in this season.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's a seed that you've been protecting because you're afraid to release it, because you're afraid that you're gonna lose it.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's dirt in the well that you know has to be removed so you can tap into the source again.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you've been living at a sec or Sidna for too long, fighting for things that the Lord has told you to move on from.
SPEAKER_01: The Spirit of God is calling you forward today.
SPEAKER_01: The famine doesn't cancel the promise.
SPEAKER_01: The dirt doesn't mean the water is gone.
SPEAKER_01: You see, for some, it might be stay where you are, stay here for a while, don't move.
SPEAKER_01: Wait for my next instruction.
SPEAKER_01: For others, it might be plant, plant something, plant, even though the ground looks dead, plant.
SPEAKER_01: For others, it might be remove the dirt from the wells.
SPEAKER_01: So the source that the enemy has tried to block springs up in your life again.
SPEAKER_01: Every head bowed, every eye closed.
SPEAKER_01: If you know today that God is dealing with your heart, if any part of this sermon from this word today has touched your heart, and the Holy Spirit has spoken to you right where you are.
SPEAKER_01: Would you will you lift your hand long enough, high enough and long enough so I can see?
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jesus, Father.
SPEAKER_01: I thank you for everyone in this room today.
SPEAKER_01: I thank you for those that are have their hands lifted right now, Lord, and surrender to you, believing, Lord, that in this season you have not given up on them, that your word is going to come to pass, Lord, that your promise over their life, no matter what season they're in right now, or whether it be that they need to stay, whether it be that they need to start planting, whether it be that they need to start removing the dirt that is blocking the source and the connection to you, Holy Spirit, will you go to where they are right now, to their heart, and just give them a supernatural peace that even though the circumstance around them, the famine may not change, that you are walking with them in this season.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
unknown: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: If you're able and willing, would you please stand and and and don't check out, don't leave yet.
SPEAKER_01: Just like the Lord said to Isaac, stay in this place for a little while.
SPEAKER_01: Just stay here, don't go, stay for a little while, and while the worship team gets ready to lead us into one more song, there's one more thing I want you to see.
SPEAKER_01: Something I noticed in verse 19 and 20.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna backtrack just a little bit because it stood out to me, and and I couldn't let it go.
SPEAKER_01: I came in this morning and I thought I was gonna finish a sermon there, and and the Lord spoke to me through this these verses again.
SPEAKER_01: You see, we've been reading in the New International Version, but the New Living Translation puts it this way verses 19 and 20.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Isaac's servants also dug in the Gerar Valley and discovered a well of fresh water.
SPEAKER_01: But then the shepherds from Gerar came and they claimed the spring.
SPEAKER_01: They came to claim the spring.
SPEAKER_01: Now I understand what this text is saying, it's talking about a natural spring of fresh flowing water.
SPEAKER_01: But when I read these words, I couldn't get past the way they sounded and what the Holy Spirit was trying to tell me.
SPEAKER_01: They claim to they came to claim the spring.
SPEAKER_01: We're started this series with the spring season.
SPEAKER_01: And I know that I'm speaking to somebody who has been praying, who has been digging, who has been planting and believing God for a new season.
SPEAKER_01: You've worked, you've dug, you've stayed where where you when you wanted to run.
SPEAKER_01: And now that you're beginning to believe again, it seems like spring is coming, and the enemy is trying to claim your spring.
SPEAKER_01: He's trying to claim it through the voice that tells you that nothing is really gonna change.
SPEAKER_01: He's trying to pull you back into the same disappointment that that hardened your heart in the first place in this season.
SPEAKER_01: The enemy will try to consume your attention with a fight until you have no strength left to cultivate, which God is already bringing to life.
SPEAKER_01: And some of you need to decide today and declare: I will not let an old fight claim this season.
SPEAKER_01: I won't let offense claim this season, I won't let fear take my spring, I won't let somebody what somebody did to me take my spring away.
SPEAKER_01: I won't let disappointment claim what God is beginning to do in this spring season.
SPEAKER_01: I want to open the altars today, and if you raise your hand, uh and you know that the Holy Spirit is speaking to you, and even if you didn't raise your hand, if you know the Holy Spirit speaking to you, I want to invite you to come forward.
SPEAKER_01: I want to invite you to step out of your seat, start a movement.
SPEAKER_01: I will say this every single time I preach.
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing magical about this place.
SPEAKER_01: The power that's happening is you stepping out of your seat and coming forward in response to what the Holy Spirit is speaking to you today.
SPEAKER_01: I'm asking you to come because what the enemy is trying to take away, God is saying it's not gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01: I'm claiming your spring.
SPEAKER_01: The enemy is after your spring, but you're built for this.
SPEAKER_01: Keep coming out.
SPEAKER_01: See people coming down from the balcony.
SPEAKER_01: Come, come, come down, make your way over here.
SPEAKER_01: I sense hope is beginning to rise in people, but offense keeps pulling you back.
SPEAKER_01: You take one step forward, and then the enemy comes and fills dirt into the well, and you take two steps back, and you feel like you can't move on.
SPEAKER_01: You know that God is calling you into something new, but the dirt and the disappointment of this season are still trying to own your heart.
SPEAKER_01: It's time you tell the enemy, you cannot have my spring.
SPEAKER_01: This spring belongs to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: The enemy came to claim the spring today, but today we're declaring that the spring has already been claimed by God.
SPEAKER_01: If you believe that, shout Amen.
SPEAKER_01: As the worship team leads, if you're out there, just worship, be in one accord, just unite in one spirit, and and then just extend your arms this way.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna pray up here for some of you.
SPEAKER_01: This is just a personal moment between you and the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: The prayer team will pray for some of you.
SPEAKER_01: I feel bad, I won't pray for you.
SPEAKER_01: But this is a moment between you and the story in the hearts today.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for joining us today.
SPEAKER_00: If you enjoy this powerful message, feel free to subscribe and share this message.
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SPEAKER_00: Thank you once again and check out our other podcasts to further your relationship with Jesus Christ.