Word UP with Webb

When God Opens Doors, Literally

Michael
Speaker 1:

Good morning guys. This is Good Friday. Welcome to Word Up. We are so glad to have you with us today. Resurrection Sunday right around the corner. Is Jesus alive in your life? Have you ever had a moment where you died to yourself and began following him?

Speaker 1:

We had an awesome week this week. It's been a busy week, as you can tell. There haven't been a lot of podcasts, but it has been an awesome week. We've seen somewhere around nine or ten students come to know the Lord this week, and Wednesday night we had an awesome night. It was just a really, really special, special day.

Speaker 1:

And Thursday just continued on, and so I just want to take today and just give you a little testimony about what God did on Thursday at one of our local schools and using his people. There were several people involved in this testimony, and what I want you to get from this is if any one of them, if any piece of the body, had stopped going in the direction God was calling, somebody's life would have been unchanged in the way that God wanted to change it. My challenge to you guys be obedient to whatever God is calling you to. So Wednesday night we looked at the parable of the prodigal son. Now, why did Jesus teach in parables? Why did he use that? Because he knew that we struggle with what we can't see. But he also tells us that the things that we cannot see are greater than those that we can see. He tells us in Hebrews 11.1 that faith is believing that things are so even though you haven't seen them, believing that God is going to provide. And so my challenge to our students is you know, as we come to the altar, as we cry out to God, as we plead with Him and pray to Him and ask for guidance, are we in a place that we're truly surrendered to whatever it is that he wants for us? Are you willing to do what you can't see in order to receive what you can't see? Or are you just negotiating with God on the sins that you can see in your life and the trials that you can see in your life? Are you going to the altar and saying God, I know I've been doing this wrong. I see it. I'll get rid of this piece as long as you'll fix this tragedy or this anxiety that I can see a situation in my life.

Speaker 1:

See, oftentimes we spend time negotiating with God, just like the young son in the parable that Jesus was teaching in Luke, chapter 15, where he asked his father for his inheritance that's coming to him. We go down, we negotiate with God, we agree to get rid of something, to do something, because we want peace. God give me my inheritance early. And then we leave and we go far from home and we use up that peace that we got and we're disconnected from our Heavenly Father. So there's no more provision. We don't feel His presence and we run out.

Speaker 1:

And then the famine comes. The famine comes and then we begin serving the world. As you see, this Jewish boy begins feeding pigs that he's been raised to know that they are unclean animals as a Jew, and now he is feeding them. He is providing for the very thing that he was raised to know and to believe was unclean. And then it goes on to say that he becomes hungry because there's no food and he begins wanting to eat what the pigs are eating. He has stooped so low he's gotten so low because he's been so far away from his father that he now wants to eat the very things that the pigs are eating. But then he looks back to his father's helpers the least of his father's helpers and he says they have more than I do. Guys, we've got to quit negotiating with God. We've got to quit trying to get peace just enough to get through the next situation and to go and to move on and use it all up and think that we can just live life and serve the world and live like the world when all we do we look back to God and the people that we see that they don't have the things of this world. They may not have a lot of money, they may not have a lot of friends, they may not live a lavish lifestyle but ultimately, because they've remained with their heavenly father, they have more than we ever will whenever we run away from home.

Speaker 1:

So Thursday morning we share part of this message and one young man decides that he wants to follow Jesus. He says I've never made a decision to follow Christ and today's the day. All the other students go into the school. We're outside, we're locked out. He prays to receive Christ, makes a commitment to follow Christ. We're trying to get back in the school like go knock on a window and the teacher just randomly sends somebody to the door to open the door. When that child opens the door, his shirt says Christ made me new. Can you imagine? The young man just prayed to receive Christ and the first closed door that he comes to is pushed open by somebody whose shirt says Christ made me new. Have you ever experienced that in your life? But how awesome is it to see what God does? You can't tell me. There probably was not another student in that entire school that had a Bible verse on his shirt and God ordained that child to open the door as a way to just reveal himself to me and to the student who just trusted him.

Speaker 1:

I was already late for a meeting, felt like I needed to go, I needed to hurry, but I couldn't leave because it was so awesome what God had done. I had to go share it. I go to the office and I'm sharing with one of the ladies in the office what God had just done and show her a picture of the two young men. And then I finally go to leave and I'm walking back out across the parking lot headed to my truck and I hear the lady from the office screaming my name. I turn around and I come back and right there there was another student who was in the office, who I was not talking to, who was not even a part of the conversation and she overheard what God had done and she said I want to follow Jesus. Look at the whole picture. If the student had not been obedient initially to respond to God's call, we would have already been gone. If God had not ordained the boy with the verse on his shirt to come to the door, I would have probably just texted a few people and told them about the young man giving his life to the Lord, and I would have got in my truck and been on my way. If the lady in the office had not been willing to run down the hall, open the door and yell for me, the other young lady who overheard the story would still be lost in the wilderness, trying to find her way.

Speaker 1:

What is it that God has called you to do today? Who is it that he's asked you to reach? What has he equipped you for? Are you going to be the one piece that stops somebody from coming to know Jesus, or are you willing to move forward, no matter where he sends you, no matter what it costs, no matter what it takes? Remember, guys, if you will stay true to God's word, stay connected to him, don't negotiate, don't run away, complete surrender. He will use you and no matter what it looks like to the world, you will have all that you ever need.