SPEAKER_01: Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Hole.
SPEAKER_01: I want to empower you today to walk in your true identity as a worshiper and warrior.
SPEAKER_01: Embrace the power of God's Word and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Today, be encouraged with a word from my guest speaker.
SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Born for War podcast.
SPEAKER_02: My name is Pastor Ryan.
SPEAKER_02: I'm the executive here at The Road, and it's a joy to be with you guys today.
SPEAKER_02: Pastor Steve is out, but he will be back next week.
SPEAKER_02: As we get into the message today, I just want to talk from a place that's just Bob's been really kind of speaking to me this summer and ministering to me with an invitation.
SPEAKER_02: And I want to pass it on and just share corporately the things that he's doing with me and kind of what the revelation he's been showing up for.
SPEAKER_02: So before we get started, I want to challenge us to do something.
SPEAKER_02: If you were to have an imagination for a minute, what is the most peace-inspiring sound you can think of?
SPEAKER_02: Let me give a little more framework to that.
SPEAKER_02: Coming home, it's been a busy week, it's been a busy day, whatever, there's been stress involved, and you're just kind of aware, you're looking at the dashboard and your vitals are spiking, and you're going, I need a pause, I need a break, I need a little bit of just catch my breath moment.
SPEAKER_02: And if you were to think about a sound, an audible sound that would bring you, or at least start the experience to bringing those things down, bringing your vitals down and calming your spirit, calming your soul, what does that sound like, right?
SPEAKER_02: And so, just pause for a minute, give yourself a minute to think about what that sound might be.
SPEAKER_02: Perhaps you are imagining the sound of summer rain hitting the glass.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's soft rolling waves of the ocean and a calmy sea landing on a sandy beach, or possibly even a gentle breeze through a forest in the fall when the leaves are getting dry and brittle and you can hear the rustle.
SPEAKER_02: All of those things can probably take us to a kind of relaxing pace.
SPEAKER_02: Did any of you imagine the sound of sizzling bacon?
SPEAKER_02: So this is interesting.
SPEAKER_02: A survey from the Daily Mail reported that the number one sound that helps people feel most at peace is the sound of sizzling bacon.
SPEAKER_02: So you ask yourself, why is that?
SPEAKER_02: Because you could have conflict.
SPEAKER_02: You enjoy the sizzling bacon, but now your mind's drawn to the cholesterol, and you're going, I wrestle here.
SPEAKER_02: But I think just looking deeper into it, there's probably something to grab a hold of for us.
SPEAKER_02: For one, I think we just know it tastes amazing.
SPEAKER_02: And the anticipation of that perfect crunch of sizzling pork fat in your mouth is transcendent, right?
SPEAKER_02: It could be emotional connection and the thought of someone preparing a morning meal for just you.
SPEAKER_02: Just the beginning of a new peaceful day, and the anticipation of the flavor bomb that will soon arrive.
SPEAKER_02: The sound of sizzling bacon and feelings that come up around it are thick with biblical application.
SPEAKER_02: Today I want to talk about need that cultivates a righteous thirst in us and the desire that we have, that we are built with to have that craving as eternal creatures.
SPEAKER_02: If you would please stand with me as we read our opening passage, we're going to be in Psalm 73, 23 through 26.
SPEAKER_02: Again, Psalm 73, 23 through 76.
SPEAKER_02: This is David writing some of his most beautiful poetry about his need and the benevolence of God, and where we can find our humanity connecting to his words here.
SPEAKER_02: So let's just give ourselves a moment to reflect.
SPEAKER_02: Yet I still belong to you.
SPEAKER_02: You hold my right hand, you guide me with your counsel, leading me to glorious destiny.
SPEAKER_02: Whom have I in heaven but you?
SPEAKER_02: I desire you more than anything on earth.
SPEAKER_02: My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak.
SPEAKER_02: But God remains the strength of my heart.
SPEAKER_02: He is mine forever.
SPEAKER_02: Father, we love you today.
SPEAKER_02: God, we thank you for your benevolence, your mercy.
SPEAKER_02: God, your restoration, the resilience you offer.
SPEAKER_02: God, the recovery that you bring to us in moments of need and desperation.
SPEAKER_02: Holy Spirit, I pray right now that you would blow through this sanctuary, God, through the minds and hearts of your children, your beloved.
SPEAKER_02: God, I pray that you would bless the reading and hearing of your word today.
SPEAKER_02: Open us up to what you have for us in your Holy Scripture, and that we would be fed from your table in Jesus' mighty name.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: God bless you.
SPEAKER_02: You may be seated.
SPEAKER_02: It's not, I mean, if you've been hanging out with us for a while, you realize that as a staff team, we run hard, we run fast, and we hit the fall, pace increases, we find another gear, and we go pretty hard through the spring.
SPEAKER_02: So that said, for most of us, summertime has thoughts of, you know, downshifting, finding neutral if you can, getting beside some still water, finding some green pastures, right?
SPEAKER_02: Restoring our souls.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, this is the truth for our staff team.
SPEAKER_02: It's a time where a lot of us can get away.
SPEAKER_02: You come around, you know, sometimes it's a skeleton office here in the summertime, and so there's this anticipation that summer will look this way.
SPEAKER_02: There's a desire that builds, certainly in me, that we're going to get some time to steal away to be renewed and to get with the Father.
SPEAKER_02: And what I'm experiencing this summer is that it's not been happening.
SPEAKER_02: And I've been hungry for it, and it's been a pace of life.
SPEAKER_02: I've noticed a growing desire in myself as I faced busy times, hard situations, and a schedule that has just honestly felt too full.
SPEAKER_02: And my awareness of the growing need to get to the river of life, right?
SPEAKER_02: Back to Jesus and soak my weariness there.
SPEAKER_02: Soul care, the hunger for the Father's refreshment, my soul longing for living water.
SPEAKER_02: This is true for all of us when we stop and pause and we can experience it.
SPEAKER_02: And so today I want to talk about, if I had a thesis, it's our need or desperation has the potential to drive us towards the Father for resources, solutions, comfort, and peace from the impending storm raging at our doorstep.
SPEAKER_02: There is a moment after the need has been met, resolved, and the storm subsided, that the aroma of the kingdom of God still lingers in our soul and heart.
SPEAKER_02: I dare say that probably the majority of the room has come into a place or a moment of great need, even a moment of despair, the gift of desperation that drives us, where we're at the end of ourselves.
SPEAKER_02: We are no longer operating in our own capacity.
SPEAKER_02: Everything we've tried, our playbooks, our multiple plans have failed, our wisdom gone, and we're at the end of ourselves.
SPEAKER_02: That drives us to our knees.
SPEAKER_02: As sons and daughters, when we come to that place, we come before Him desperate, earnest, honest, quite sincere, and we take it to Him.
SPEAKER_02: We take our need, we take our request to Him time again, and we're patient.
SPEAKER_02: We'll wait with Him oftentimes, waiting to test and prove God's word in our lives until He shows up with the miracle, with the blessing, with the truth.
SPEAKER_02: David says in his Psalms, often many times he's quoted saying, you know, I will wait on the Lord all the day long.
SPEAKER_02: Some of us have been in that space where we have to have waited on God all the day long, and his answer has come in our 11th hour.
SPEAKER_02: His perfect timing, but our 11th hour.
SPEAKER_02: And we're kind of like, awesome, thank you.
SPEAKER_02: I received that miracle, but I would have preferred it yesterday or last week or last year.
SPEAKER_02: But he's benevolent in that because he's showing us that when we fully press in, trust, and care for him, and give him all of it, he is faithful.
SPEAKER_02: He shows up, we give it time, we give it space, he brings his light, he brings his truth, and he brings the answer that we need.
SPEAKER_02: Even sometimes that answer doesn't even look how we thought it was going to.
SPEAKER_02: We could all ask and take a poll.
SPEAKER_02: When God has shown up the biggest for you in your life, did it look the way you thought it would?
SPEAKER_02: And all of you would say, no, but it was perfect.
SPEAKER_02: It was perfect.
SPEAKER_02: And that's how the Father meets us.
SPEAKER_02: And it's from that place, when you've been on the other side of the desperation, you've received your miracle, that you can leverage the rich soil in your heart.
SPEAKER_02: There's fertile soil with intentionality on our side that can be cultivated into a continual thirst and hunger for God.
SPEAKER_02: The pressure is lifted, and the relief from the situation subsided.
SPEAKER_02: Yet there is a lingering feeling of the ointment and balm of the Spirit and the aroma of the kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: It's ministry healing over us, still fresh.
SPEAKER_02: It's perceptive to us as sons and daughters who have invited Christ, the captain of our salvation, to sit on the throne of our heart.
SPEAKER_02: If you've done that, then you have permission to go and ask and receive.
SPEAKER_02: And from that place, these are the moments that can stoke fire in your heart for a lifelong release of the river of life, the river of water that wants to flow in our lives.
SPEAKER_02: And so that's the desire, that's the creation, that's where we're meant to live.
SPEAKER_02: We wrestle with the narrative of the world, the cultural pressures, the media narratives.
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, every given morning, there's a new script from either political party's playbook that's continuing to be unraveled, none of which puts us truly at rest.
SPEAKER_02: None of that actually sets us at ease.
SPEAKER_02: We love Tucker Carlson, but I promise you, tomorrow morning, as good as his soundbite's going to be, it won't bring you refreshment.
SPEAKER_02: Not deep refreshment, the refreshment that you crave as an eternal creature, as an eternal being that God's made you to be.
SPEAKER_02: We're divided in our desires.
SPEAKER_02: We have the kingdom of God and then we have the world around us.
SPEAKER_02: So we must be honest with ourselves about the nature of the relationship, church.
SPEAKER_02: The connection and presence we seek with Jesus is reserved for those who treasure him above all things.
SPEAKER_02: We can't dabble with God and live mostly in love with the world.
SPEAKER_02: It just doesn't work that way.
SPEAKER_02: 2 Chronicles 6, 19.
SPEAKER_02: God's scripture tells us this for the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to Him.
SPEAKER_02: Not half-heartedly committed to Him, fully committed to Him.
SPEAKER_02: Do we wane in our journey at times?
SPEAKER_02: Do we feel weary?
SPEAKER_02: Yes, and those are the moments where we need to re-engage and say, I know that I'm living half-heartedly towards you, but I want to live fully committed to you.
SPEAKER_02: Because on the other side of that is recovery, resilience, and restoration.
SPEAKER_02: Returning to familiar sin and habits will keep us separated from true intimacy with the Father.
SPEAKER_02: It's kingdom law, it's kingdom design.
SPEAKER_02: He's the architect of this relationship and how it's meant to operate.
SPEAKER_02: The bondage in our lives of lust and porn, alcohol, drugs, wrong relationships, and the desire for things of this world, which all eventually burn in the end, must be severed to experience total union with our Creator.
SPEAKER_02: He's offering full and complete healing and release because of the perfect work he did at the cross and the river of life that flows from that, the river of grace that he invites us to flow into.
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes we doubt that.
SPEAKER_02: We doubt that one that could actually be offered to us, that he would love us enough to want to do that, we would receive full and complete freedom and healing there.
SPEAKER_02: But I promise you, that is absolutely what's offered.
SPEAKER_02: And on the other side of that, deeper union with him and this operating in this living water that he talks about in scriptures.
SPEAKER_02: For the season, Christian in the room, been there, heard that, and maybe you have experienced a lot of rescue and freedom from those things, and that's fantastic and excellent.
SPEAKER_02: That's what we pray and hope for.
SPEAKER_02: But for some of us, there's still other areas that we're in a rut in, and maybe it's busyness, other priorities.
SPEAKER_02: Things that have crept up and become idols in our lives.
SPEAKER_02: That if we were to take an honest look and inventory of our hearts, what is pressing out this space and connection?
SPEAKER_02: For some of you here today, it could be an issue with pride, control.
SPEAKER_02: I have to maintain control in my world.
SPEAKER_02: I don't have space for God to move in that's, you know, in the arenas of need.
SPEAKER_02: I can control it, I can drive through this, I've seen it before, I've got the playbook for that.
SPEAKER_02: Unforgiveness, or a judgmental heart.
SPEAKER_02: All these are blockers to his spirit and connection there.
SPEAKER_02: So the question I have for you today is: Is your thirst righteous?
SPEAKER_02: Do you have a righteous thirst for God's kingdom, or are you still trying to quench that thirst with the things around you in the 3D?
SPEAKER_02: Do you have a righteous thirst for dwelling in the secret place with the king, or are you preoccupied with a worldly thirst that is consistently unsatisfying?
SPEAKER_02: Because our natural narrative is to grab the things in our purview, the things that are close, the things that are obvious, and we can medicate, self-medicate in those areas.
SPEAKER_02: And numb, really, all it does is just a topical numbing ointment.
SPEAKER_02: You know, think about how many times I triage some of my kids and their play and some of the wounds that they pick up, and they come in, and the first thing we have to do is, okay, let's try and like maybe numb it, take the sting out.
SPEAKER_02: And the biggest fear comes is when he gets the medicine that's going to burn.
SPEAKER_02: You're like, before the band-aid's applied, we have to clean the wound.
SPEAKER_02: And so the world offers us just a numbing agent, but God offers us the deep cleaning, the cleansing, and then it seals that wound, and we can operate as we're designed to.
SPEAKER_02: For everything in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life comes not from the Father, but from the world.
SPEAKER_02: The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
SPEAKER_02: See, mercy, grace, and unconditional love are available to everyone.
SPEAKER_02: But the treasures of God, intimacy with him, the riches of his kingdom, these are available only to those who treasure him above all things.
SPEAKER_02: This is the secret of true unity, complete unity with Jesus, union with his kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: Psalm 84, too, my soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
SPEAKER_02: Some of you in this room, those words are precious to you because you've cried them, you've read them, you've wept them in your own life, that you, your heart and your flesh, cry out for the living God.
SPEAKER_02: Because you know it's your only complete and total satisfaction and restoration.
SPEAKER_02: So as awareness was building in me about maybe some waning resilience, some tiredness, some weariness, I was entering into what all, you know, good professional Christians do, as Pastor Steve likes to say.
SPEAKER_02: You know, we tap on biblical truths and processes in prayer and fasting.
SPEAKER_02: And in my times of prayer and fasting, my carnal desire for food has to wane before I can hear the clarity of the kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: The kingdom frequencies of heaven.
SPEAKER_02: At first, everything starts to look like a chicken wing.
SPEAKER_02: Just gonna be honest.
SPEAKER_02: And then what's released as I press into God?
SPEAKER_02: I'm just gonna say that in another version of myself, I probably would be a food critic.
SPEAKER_02: I like to eat, I like food, um, and I enjoy really good flavors.
SPEAKER_02: And when when maestros and artists can combine things that I've never even thought of, and you experience that on a plate, you're kind of like, wow, like that's kingdom, man, like Holy Spirit inspired.
SPEAKER_02: God gave us good food to enjoy.
SPEAKER_02: And therefore, when I press in, you know, I have to concentrate, refocus, steal my mind that I'm not just thinking about, okay, I'm fasting on Monday.
SPEAKER_02: I get a break it Wednesday evening.
SPEAKER_02: What's for dinner?
SPEAKER_02: Right?
SPEAKER_02: That's the wrong thought.
SPEAKER_02: But in my humanity, I'm just gonna be honest and vulnerable here that you know that is sometimes where I tend to go.
SPEAKER_02: Fasting in a busy season can be very challenging if you don't understand what's available from the Father.
SPEAKER_02: And what I'm learning is there's things that all of us drive, you know, and you and I'm and I'm mentioning food, but in our times of prayer and fasting, it can be other things.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's social media.
SPEAKER_02: And for some of us, we can't get wait, we can't wait to get back to the news feed or what's out there.
SPEAKER_02: And what did I miss?
SPEAKER_02: Let's catch up real fast.
SPEAKER_02: And you're like, oh, okay.
SPEAKER_02: You know, there's a story I was reading where this person would actually delete their social media off their phone because it was harder for them to go back to it every time they had to re-download it and log in.
SPEAKER_02: But for them, it was this connection, it was something that they had to get rid of themselves because it was an absolute juggernaut of a distraction and a blocker and was stealing and robbing space from the kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: It can be extra challenging for those who have only learned to fast from food and have not yet learned to feast on God.
SPEAKER_02: It's not that we're supposed to take things out of our lives and just remain empty.
SPEAKER_02: When we remove those things, then the idea is that we fill them back in with space, time, scheduling with God, feasting with him.
SPEAKER_02: Feasting on him in my mind means stop.
SPEAKER_02: And when I picture it, I try to, I'm trying to build this discipline where things come up in my carnal flesh and I'm starting to desire food or whatever that is, right?
SPEAKER_02: I picture a stop sign in my mind and it's in this red sign, and it's big, bold, white letters, and it's like stop and try and go there.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not doing it perfectly, but it is something I'm trying to grow in in discipline.
SPEAKER_02: Stop and seek him.
SPEAKER_02: I must give him all my focus, desire, and need, and I invite Jesus into everything.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus, I give you everyone and everything in my life right now.
SPEAKER_02: I'm here to meet with you.
SPEAKER_02: I want to be with you, I want to spend time with you.
SPEAKER_02: Walking through a very difficult season in my life, I got to experience the aroma and how consistently he would show up in my desperation and my begging and pleading.
SPEAKER_02: He's so faithful for that, church.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm not unique.
SPEAKER_02: Some of you think I'm special, okay?
SPEAKER_02: But not in the way you mean it.
SPEAKER_02: We all have that ability.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm not unique and I'm not special.
SPEAKER_02: We all have this as sons and daughters who have made Jesus Christ our Savior.
SPEAKER_02: Ecclesiastes 3.11.
SPEAKER_02: He has made everything beautiful in its time.
SPEAKER_02: He has also set eternity in the human heart.
SPEAKER_02: Every human heart has eternity placed in it.
SPEAKER_02: It's part of your design, it's part of your architecture.
SPEAKER_02: And we see the world, and the world's understanding of eternity looks like this.
SPEAKER_02: I am born, I have riches, I have fame, and I have to leave a legacy because I won't live forever.
SPEAKER_02: Nobody does.
SPEAKER_02: Even the unsaved, unchurched, those that are absent of salvation of Jesus Christ knows that one day they will die, even though they chase that fountain of youth, right?
SPEAKER_02: But their goal is to say, what will I leave behind when I'm gone?
SPEAKER_02: As sons and daughters, we realize that this is just a glimpse, this is a vapor, this is just kind of a dress rehearsal for eternity, and the desires of our heart rest on the other side in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_02: And we're focused differently.
SPEAKER_02: And we should be.
SPEAKER_02: With that narrative, with that truth, with that knowledge, we have to steward that well because the messaging of the world is going to crowd that out, and it's going to try to convince you otherwise that there's more that you need to be doing now.
SPEAKER_02: Now, I'm not saying don't do things to provide for the next generation and all that.
SPEAKER_02: That's biblical, and you should be doing that.
SPEAKER_02: But not to the place where you're caught up with your own image, your own legacy, and it becomes a bit of a narcissistic pursuit of how valued you are.
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
SPEAKER_02: It's more of, I want to leave this as benevolence and care for them.
SPEAKER_02: I want to pause here for a moment and reflect on this truth.
SPEAKER_02: If you desire to become a whole-hearted person, you must reach the point where happily, lovingly, you give absolutely everything over to God in order to have Him.
SPEAKER_02: You make Jesus your everything.
SPEAKER_02: Not only is this the fulfillment of your heart's created eternal desire, but it will also be your source of all recovery and restoration.
SPEAKER_02: When we do this, church, it fulfills our greatest needs and we are fully restored.
SPEAKER_02: We fully recover.
SPEAKER_02: The things that we need to live this side of eternity, to walk the road, to endure what we need to as his sons and daughters, to be the light and the love of this world.
SPEAKER_02: It says, delight yourself also in the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: Psalm 37, 4, delight yourself also in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart.
SPEAKER_02: Again, scripture talking about the heart.
SPEAKER_02: The heart that has eternity placed in it, the thing that the life spring, the wellspring of life that's to carry us through our guidepost, the thing that we are to preserve and nurture the most, God places desires there.
SPEAKER_02: And when we enter into time with him, when we schedule that, when we enter into the secret place, his desires come forward.
SPEAKER_02: His presence will manifest and bring forward those good and truly holy desires in you.
SPEAKER_02: On the other side of your fear are your true and holy desires.
SPEAKER_02: Those are good things.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe he said, risk, you know, risk it.
SPEAKER_02: Some of you have thought about adoption, some of you thought about starting your own company, but fear has kept you from that.
SPEAKER_02: Some of you have even been called to missions work, both in the community and abroad.
SPEAKER_02: But what does that look like?
SPEAKER_02: And when we take that there, he strengthens those desires with courage and love and mercy.
SPEAKER_02: And we're able to come out of that secret place, more focused on the mission that he has for us to go and do his perfect will.
SPEAKER_02: I like how author Chad Harrington writes this about spiritual thirst.
SPEAKER_02: And we're going to talk more about thirst than hunger currently, but he says this spiritual thirst is our longing for vitality, peace, and delight in God.
SPEAKER_02: For the moment-by-moment refreshment that comes from his spirit.
SPEAKER_02: His spirit comes in, we're refreshed.
SPEAKER_02: And this captures his quote here, church, is capturing a kind of the language of my heart this summer has been I have a thirst.
SPEAKER_02: And I need refreshed with the Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: Feeling brittle, I'm feeling a little dry, and I need time with the Father.
SPEAKER_02: I need him to renew my mind, speak what's true, bring light, bring truth so that we can go out and accomplish what he has for us to do.
SPEAKER_02: John 7, 37 through 38.
SPEAKER_02: On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out.
SPEAKER_02: Now let's just pause.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus talks a lot throughout the scriptures.
SPEAKER_02: There's only a few times where he raises the volume of his voice.
SPEAKER_02: We see it in the temple when the money changers are there.
SPEAKER_02: And now at the feast, there's something so passionate on his heart that he's crying out.
SPEAKER_02: Like if you don't grab anything else I'm saying, grab this.
SPEAKER_02: We're at a feast.
SPEAKER_02: People are dining.
SPEAKER_02: It's joyous time.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's good things happening.
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus feels this moment, and he intercedes with crying out with this command, with this wisdom.
SPEAKER_02: If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.
SPEAKER_02: He who believes in me, as the scriptures has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_02: When we believe in Jesus, his living water flows from the place that we're supposed to preserve and protect, the wellspring of our life, he then transplants with the wellspring of his kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: Who's a little dry and thirsty this summer?
SPEAKER_02: Who's a little anemic from the sound bites of the media, the culture pressing in with not less than positive narratives?
SPEAKER_02: We were hiking the Grand Canyon one year, and we had left a little late for our normal journey.
SPEAKER_02: And I knew we were leaving a little late, and we were having to get out.
SPEAKER_02: It's about a six-hour hike back up the canyon.
SPEAKER_02: And we're gonna hit, we were my concern was we were gonna hit some switchbacks in the peak heat of the day.
SPEAKER_02: It's desert heat.
SPEAKER_02: It's you know, we're in the middle, end of summer, high 100 plus degree temperatures, and we had packed water and uh filled up my Nalgene, and Mandy and I were hiking out with some friends, and uh we'd got some really cool, refreshing water from the stream, plenty of agua to get us up the hill.
SPEAKER_02: And um I was so looking forward to that, and the heat started to come.
SPEAKER_02: And I knew I was concerned because we had heard that if you don't get past this certain part of the switchbacks in time, people have been known to die out there from exposure, from lack of resources, and lack of hydration.
SPEAKER_02: We came around the corner a couple times, we were making our way up, and it was time to pause in some shade wherever you could find it.
SPEAKER_02: Reached in my bag, started drinking my Nalgine, and it was wet, but it was hot enough that I could brew tea or make hot chocolate with.
SPEAKER_02: And so I'm like going, that is not the cool refreshment I was anticipating in my bag, and I was less than enthusiastic, but I kept drinking it, even though it was meeting the need of hydration, it was not refreshing.
SPEAKER_02: And so, too, I've equated that to the times of my life where I've tried to find and quench that eternal thirst outside of God's table, outside of his secret place with me, outside of his kingdom.
SPEAKER_02: The life of God flows through us like a river, a powerful river, unceasing, ever-renewing, ever-flowing river.
SPEAKER_02: That river is meant to flow in you and around you, healing you, imparting strength and connection with your King into your humanity.
SPEAKER_02: It soaks into our humanity.
SPEAKER_02: In order to receive the river of life, we love God with our longing for life.
SPEAKER_02: We love God and our desire to connect with Him and for life to feel full again.
SPEAKER_02: For those of you that have felt great loss, pain, wounding, maybe the food became bland and the sky gray, and the breeze wasn't even refreshing anymore.
SPEAKER_02: But you longed for life to feel good again.
SPEAKER_02: That's where things are decided.
SPEAKER_02: We enter in with our longing.
SPEAKER_02: We feel it, we become present with it, and it is in this place that we love God.
SPEAKER_02: We choose Him, we preference Him.
SPEAKER_02: Psalm 143, 6.
SPEAKER_02: I spread out my hands to you, my soul longs for you like a thirsty land.
SPEAKER_02: Have you presented yourself to God in that way, needing refreshment?
SPEAKER_02: My soul longs for you like a thirsty land.
SPEAKER_02: I'm thirsty for you today.
SPEAKER_02: John 4.14, Jesus said, Whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst.
SPEAKER_02: Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.
SPEAKER_02: That's where he takes our heart of flesh, our heart of stone, and gives us a heart of flesh, and in that transaction, the wellspring changes.
SPEAKER_02: He puts in us his river of life, a wellspring of living water that we can tap anytime we start to build that muscle memory and discipline to go back to the Father and get there.
SPEAKER_02: Today I want to give you kind of five disciplines to cultivating righteous thirst for God.
SPEAKER_02: And our leading passage for these five principles is out of Matthew 5, where Jesus is giving the Beatitudes sermon, and it's verse 6, and he's talking about those that are blessed.
SPEAKER_02: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.
SPEAKER_02: In the legal world, in trust documents, there was a big difference when there was the word may versus shall.
SPEAKER_02: May, you may, you know, get a distribution.
SPEAKER_02: Means you might, like it's there's some discretion there.
SPEAKER_02: Versus you shall means you will, right?
SPEAKER_02: So God here is saying you shall be filled.
SPEAKER_02: And we're going to learn here in the scriptures how he fills us.
SPEAKER_02: But before we can be filled, we have to empty ourselves.
SPEAKER_02: And number one is repenting from sin.
SPEAKER_02: This is the first and primary component.
SPEAKER_02: Our sin separates us from God.
SPEAKER_02: But when we confess, he is faithful and just to forgive us.
SPEAKER_02: Confession heals our union with God, and we enter into a deeper chamber of intimacy with him.
SPEAKER_02: It's our blocker.
SPEAKER_02: There's an action.
SPEAKER_02: He's done his side, he's created us, he sent his son in great benevolence and love to do the perfect work on Calvary, leave the empty tomb conquering death.
SPEAKER_02: But now we have the action on our side.
SPEAKER_02: Can we get over ourselves enough in our humility to bring our sin to him and let him heal us?
SPEAKER_02: That's what he desires to do.
SPEAKER_02: And when we do that, that's the first movement.
SPEAKER_02: That's our first movement and step and direction towards him, his table, and the river of life that he's offering.
SPEAKER_02: Second Chronicles 6 9, 16 9, for the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully on him.
SPEAKER_02: In 1 John 1 9, we are reminded faithfully if we confess our sins, if we do our side, he, God, is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
SPEAKER_02: Now we've then just made the transaction.
SPEAKER_02: We've just been cleansed of our unrighteousness.
SPEAKER_02: Now we can enter in for a thirst and hunger for righteousness.
SPEAKER_02: Number two, we have to reset, you have to reset your narrative.
SPEAKER_02: We live in the identity as his beloved.
SPEAKER_02: Take your thoughts and the messages from the enemy to the cross.
SPEAKER_02: Embrace the mind of Christ and recalibrate unhealthy narratives at Calvary.
SPEAKER_02: This is huge.
SPEAKER_02: You've all been given a narrative.
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes people are speaking into your life without permission, sometimes family.
SPEAKER_02: God bless them, y'all love them, but they'll just take permission that wasn't granted.
SPEAKER_02: I didn't ask for that advice, and I didn't really ask for your opinion, but they're going to give it anyways, right?
SPEAKER_02: They're going to tell you how they feel and think about you and how you blew it or messed up.
SPEAKER_02: Well, you've got to take that trash right to Calvary.
SPEAKER_02: You've got to soak that in the river of grace, and then you've got to start to understand and discern the narrative that the King of Kings talks to you in.
SPEAKER_02: Not the narrative of the enemy who wants to leverage and have you make agreements.
SPEAKER_02: He'd love to have you sit down at the table with him and say, remember what they said about you?
SPEAKER_02: That's true.
SPEAKER_02: That's who you are.
SPEAKER_02: That's not what the king says about us.
SPEAKER_02: 2 Corinthians 10, 4 through 5.
SPEAKER_02: Casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_02: What is the knowledge of God?
SPEAKER_02: The knowledge of God was that he created you out of his abundance and love and desire for worship back to him, and he loved you so much that he gave his son to die and redeem you for all eternity, to share his blood and shed his blood over you and to speak to that eternal place in your heart.
SPEAKER_02: That's the knowledge of God, that's who you are, that's the value you have.
SPEAKER_02: You have to renew your mind there.
SPEAKER_02: Bringing every thought into captivity and making it obedient to Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_02: He will reframe your mind, he will create new neuropathways in your mind, and he will speak truth to your heart.
SPEAKER_02: Number three, you have to rest in the secret place.
SPEAKER_02: See, God the Father waits for us in the secret place.
SPEAKER_02: He is always there, even if we don't feel it at first, but he is there.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus confirms that the Father is waiting for us here in Matthew 6.
SPEAKER_02: He says it in verse 6, and then he repeats it again in 18.
SPEAKER_02: We are designed to need rest, and resting with him is where deep restoration and true refreshment can happen.
SPEAKER_02: Now, in this verse, he's talking about fasting, he's talking about looking disheveled.
SPEAKER_02: I want us to focus specifically on the text here where it says, But you, when you go, when you pray, go into your room.
SPEAKER_02: When you have shut your door, pray to your father who is in the secret place.
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't say when you start praying, he will show up.
SPEAKER_02: He's already there.
SPEAKER_02: God is so faithful to be waiting for you.
SPEAKER_02: He's already there.
SPEAKER_02: But you have to do two things.
SPEAKER_02: There's action parts here.
SPEAKER_02: You have to walk into the room and you have to shut the door.
SPEAKER_02: Because that's saying, I'm shutting out everything else.
SPEAKER_02: I'm shutting out the narrative of the day, I'm shutting out my stresses, my anxieties, and I'm going to meet with you and receive fully what you have for me.
SPEAKER_02: Number four, renew your appetite for God's word.
SPEAKER_02: See, once you've discovered that you were made to crave the nourishment of God's word, a true hunger develops.
SPEAKER_02: If you skip a meal, you soon begin to realize from the longing in your spirit that you have been fasting from Him, and there is a lingering hunger.
SPEAKER_02: Luke 1:53, He has filled the hungry with good things.
SPEAKER_02: You have to bring your hunger to him, and he will fill you.
SPEAKER_02: This is the promise and the revelation of the Beatitudes.
SPEAKER_02: Blessed are those.
SPEAKER_02: He's blessing you now because he's going to fill you with good things.
SPEAKER_02: Psalm 34, 8.
SPEAKER_02: Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
SPEAKER_02: Blessed is the man who trusts in him.
SPEAKER_02: In Psalm 84, 2, my soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
SPEAKER_02: And number five, we have to request and receive.
SPEAKER_02: We have to be audible.
SPEAKER_02: Come boldly before his throne with your petition for true, rich connection and refreshment in the river.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus, I need time with just you.
SPEAKER_02: We need to ask Jesus to come near.
SPEAKER_02: If we have emptied ourselves and desire him above all else, he will bring the meal.
SPEAKER_02: When we make space and wait for God to speak, he will bring light to the situation.
SPEAKER_02: We have the responsibility, church, to bring obedience and change to our mindset, to come into alignment with how the Father speaks to us, how he feels about us.
SPEAKER_02: You can't walk in the room, and I'm learning this too.
SPEAKER_02: You go in, you receive it, and then you step back out and you step back into your old narrative.
SPEAKER_02: Like just, I'm gonna take on my old mindset and I'm gonna believe the things that I'm wrestling with when I came into the room.
SPEAKER_02: And then I leave without actually fully grasping it and letting it settle in.
SPEAKER_02: So God set in my mind, in my heart, Holy Spirit, consecrate in me the things that you were speaking out over me, the things about my design, my purpose, my life.
SPEAKER_02: Might sound something like I'm a beloved child of God.
SPEAKER_02: I am his creation.
SPEAKER_02: He has not left me alone.
SPEAKER_02: He's never left, he's never been, I've never been by myself, he's always been there.
SPEAKER_02: Or maybe I'm called and equipped for my job, and I deserve the right to serve his kingdom with godly confidence.
SPEAKER_02: Some of you need to hear that today.
SPEAKER_02: You are equipped, and you have the right and have been called to serve his kingdom in the areas that he's calling you to do that.
SPEAKER_02: Because if it's against the opposition of the enemy's kingdom, then of course the narrative and the messaging is going to be different on the other side of the door.
SPEAKER_02: Renew your mind there.
SPEAKER_02: I am not always right, and I need to go low and lift God high in my life.
SPEAKER_02: I need to apologize to some people for how I've treated them.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe there's some humility on the other side of that door.
SPEAKER_02: There's a time that will come to all of us when we face the crossroads of choosing what is right versus what is easy.
SPEAKER_02: Choosing the right thing is how we experience his ongoing peace and blessing.
SPEAKER_02: True union.
SPEAKER_02: Matthew 7 7 says, Ask and it will be given to you.
SPEAKER_02: Ask, seek, and you will find.
SPEAKER_02: Knock and it will be opened to you.
SPEAKER_02: For everyone who seeks receives, and he who seeks finds.
SPEAKER_02: And to him who knocks, it will be opened.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to the Forn for War podcast.
SPEAKER_00: We hope today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.
SPEAKER_00: To connect with Pastor Steve's sermons, books, and blog, visit Steve Holtonline.org.
SPEAKER_00: God bless.