Ordinary Faith And A Dysfunctional Family

April 20, 2026

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Little time. And so I need to go on and get into this. Let's do this vision statement. If we can do this together, if we can put that vision statement up as we are trying to get this down in our soul. Come on, let's read together. We exist to help people become followers of Jesus who experience life change in community and make a difference. Amen. Amen. That is where we're trying to go. That's who we are. We have three guiding metrics. Are we growing as followers of Jesus? Are we experiencing life change in the community? And are we making a difference? Is that simple? That's simple. And really that leads into our series ordinary faith for an extraordinary God. Extraordinary God. Ordinary faith for an extraordinary God. I know some of us have this idea that you gotta have this super duper lead tall buildings in a single bound faith. You know, it's got to be superior to anybody else for God to use us. Amen. And that's all they got has. And that's what I hope to believe the Lord wants to show us in our text for today. Our meditation text comes from 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verses 27 through 29. Let us put this on the screen. Let us read this together. Here we go. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not to nullify the things that are. Amen. Paul there was talking about himself. He said, I can't even speak well, but God used it with his power to bring salvation to the Corinthian church. Amen. Chooses the unthinkable things to do his will. Amen. Yeah, the folk we wouldn't choose. That's who God chooses. Isn't that good news? Yes, Lord. And our text comes from Genesis 25, verses 21 through 26. Does not cover the entire story. I want to encourage you to read all of chapter 25, really to 27. And you really can go to 36. It's the story of Joseph, Jacob. But for our time, we're just going to focus on this context, the early part of his life, beginning at verse 21. Here's what it says. And the Lord answered his prayer. And his wife Rebecca became pregnant. The babies jostled. One translation said they struggled with each other within her. And she said, Why is this happening to me? So she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said to her, Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated. One people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger. The time came for her to give birth. There were twin boys in her womb. The first came out was red, and his whole body was like a hairy garment. So they named him Esau. And after this, his brother came out, and with his hand grasping Esau's heel, some say he'll catcher. So he was named Jacob. And Isaac was 60 years old when Rebekah gave birth to them. Amen. I want to talk about ordinary faith and a dysfunctional family. Ordinary faith. Tell your neighbor, you think your family messed up. Amen. Just hold on for just a minute. As we stated last Sunday, we said without thinking, most Christians have been trained to believe that the significant people in God's kingdom are only the superstars. What we hope to show is that God uses people of ordinary faith. But today I'm gonna go a little bit further and suggest that most Christians also have been trained to believe that the significant people in God's kingdom come from perfect backgrounds. They come from good functioning families. And thus we tend to believe that our family history, our family background, and any resulting missteps disqualifies us from God's kingdom purposes. We tell ourselves God can never use me because you don't know my family story. And for the record, every family's got some kind of dysfunction in it, amen. Tell your neighbor, your family ain't so holy to escape dysfunctionality, amen. All God's children got dysfunction, amen. If anyone came out of a dysfunctional family, it was Joseph. And I think it's apropos to quote the late Old Testament scholar Walter Brugelman here. He calls God, based on this story, he calls God the God of inversion. And in our parlance, that means he's the God that will flip the script. In other words, you think God will choose this person, but God will choose the unlikely person. We think God's gonna choose the person with the right education, with the right pedigree, the one that grew up on the right side of the tracks. And yet God chooses the one we would never choose. And that's the case here with Isaac this morning. We never would have chosen, I'm not Isaac, with Jacob this morning, we never would have chosen Jacob to be the pastor of a church. Too much mess in his family, y'all. We wouldn't choose him to be our pastor. We never would have chosen him to be an elected official to represent us in Congress. The social media scandal would be too much to bear. And yet God chooses him with no purpose, no reason, only because he's good. And God wants to fulfill his purposes. So I'm gonna drop my thesis statement because I gotta run in a hurry. I got a lot to cover and a little time to cover. So here it is. Here's my thesis statement. God knows how to work our story with all the ugly details. I need to say that again, don't I? God knows how to work our story with all the ugly details. And ordinary faith is not a pristine and perfect faith. But ordinary faith says, in spite of the ugly details, I'm still holding on to my God. Because my story is not finished until God writes the last chapter. So what I want to do today is I want to make some passing observations of four characters in this story: Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob, and Esau. And then I want to conclude this with some very quick guidelines for an ordinary faith. First, I want to look at Isaac's faith, Jacob's daddy. At the onset, we are quickly alerted to Isaac's faith. He's a man of faith because the text opens up describing him as a man of prayer. Text says Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife because she was childless. And the Bible says the Lord answered her prayer. That word for prayer, the verb, it's a word that literally means to plead for her. And if I can drop a footnote here, brothers, it does our families well when our wives and our children hear us pray for them. Not saying that wives and children ought not to pray, but there's something about God that moves his heart when the head of the house, the priest of the home, prays for his family. And you ain't got to call all of the saints to pray for somebody. Just say a word of prayer, and you'll be surprised how much God will bless that. And that's what Jacob does here. He pleads for his wife. And based on what the text says in verse 26, it would suggest that he prayed 20 years for his wife. That's a long time, y'all. 20 years and no answer. And what that means is prayer is surely an engagement with God's presence. But it also involves discipline and confidence to believe that God will do what he will do. In other words, we got to recognize when it comes to prayer, just because God don't answer in the first four hours, that don't mean God is has stopped working in your situation. Sometimes God uses the length and the time to answer our prayer, to build some discipline, some faith, and some strength in us. We come asking God for one thing, and God says, okay, I'm gonna give you what you asked for, but you're gonna have a stronger prayer life. You're gonna be stronger in your worship life, you're gonna be stronger in your walk with me. You're gonna really learn how to lean on me in hard times. Tell your neighbor, God knows how to do it. He'll teach you how to pray when you don't know how to pray. Prayer is an engagement with God's presence. And just because I don't feel it, that doesn't mean God is not there. Plenty of times, plenty of times I've come into church and I didn't feel it. Plenty of times I've gotten my knees and I didn't feel it. But I called on him in house. And it amazes me when I go ahead and call on him in house. Does anybody know God knows how to show up? Keep on praying, keep on trusting, keep on calling. If you don't feel nothing, I'm dare you to call on God. He'll answer when you call. Oh, yes, he will. But also, too, I gotta say this answer prayer usually comes with a divine footnote. Many times we ask for one thing and God will answer it. But you better believe God is gonna put his slaver in it. That's what happened here with Esau. He prayed to the Lord. Lord, I I need you to, I need you to help my wife bear a child. God said, Oh, you you didn't pray the right thing. He didn't just bless her with one, bless her with two. Somebody said, Amen. And then not only that, he put a word behind it, he says, Look, the older one gonna start gonna serve the younger one. That's not what Isaac expected. Because sometimes when I ask God for something, he'll attach a divine footnote to how the answer is supposed to operate. Hear God in this one prayer, he is upending the conventional cultural way of structure and how a family is to be ordered. In that day, all the inheritance went to the oldest child: the land, the authority, the money, everything. But God is for the underdog, y'all. God is for the marginal. This is a text about justice. And as Walter Bruegerman said, he'll invert things, he'll flip the script to show you how much power he had. And it was not what Isaac expected. Because sometimes the answer comes with a footnote. Tell your neighbor, be careful for what you pray for. Be careful. Here's all I'm saying. Leave room for God to work the answer his way. Sometimes, hear me. Sometimes when we pray for what we want, say here it is, I'm sorry. Sometimes when we pray for what we want, God wants a whole lot more than what we want. You praying to get your bills paid. God says, No, I want to raise up a whole community that can get their bills paid. You you praying for help for yourself. God said, No, I want to put all the hospitals out of business forever. That sometimes the prayer we ask for is too short-sighted, and God has a bigger vision for what he wants to accomplish through your praying. And we got to leave room that sometimes, whatever answer we expect, God may be doing a little bit more. Now, now I gotta deal with the ugly details in this because there's some ugly details in this, and what I love about this story is that God works in spite of the ugly details. Now, when you go to chapter 27, uh Isaac knew what the answer to his prayer was. But he he was gonna ignore it no matter what. He had his mind made up to bless Esau. That's what he was gonna do. He was disobedient, and yet, in spite of his disobedience, God kept working in his life in spite of the ugly details. Hear me today. There's a difference between consequences and judgment. A lot of times when we're disobedient or if we've sinned against God, we think God's gonna judge us. Trust me, you don't want God to judge you. And a lot of times we don't even understand when God judges us when he's judging us. See, the judgment of God is not fire and brimstone, it's not the wipe us out, it's not the curse us with disease. God just does this when he judges us. Okay, you all by yourself. Go right ahead. You all by yourself. And and to try to live life without God is painful. Y'all not hearing me today. So he doesn't judge us, but he will allow us to experience consequences. Now, why does he allow consequences? Because we need to learn a lesson. Consequences doesn't mean that God is mad with us, he just wants us to learn that's not the right way. Okay, y'all not hearing me. Okay, you tell your name, you added two minutes to the sermon. Okay. So let me say it like this. Some of us can testify. They told you, don't marry them. Okay. They told you, don't do it, don't do it. Mama told you, big mama told you, your cousin told you, your enemy told you. I don't even like you, but you don't want to get married to that. You did it anyway. And when they broke your heart, guess what? You didn't make that mistake again, did you? Tell your neighbor, that's consequences. God was not trying to judge us, but he's teaching us a lesson so that we don't go that way in him. Okay, I'm gonna move on. All right, here we go. That's what God was doing with Isaac, teaching him consequences. And the consequence was he didn't see both of his sons ever again because he disobeyed God. And yet God still kept working his story in spite of the ugly details. Let me move on. Rebecca's resolve. Rebecca was also a woman of faith. Watch how God blesses her. Isaac prayed. God didn't answer Isaac. Isaac prayed. He gave the answer to Rebecca. The revelation didn't come to Isaac. Brothers, she can hear from God too. That don't mean you get to tell him what to do, though, sisters. Preach, Pastor. But she heard from God too. She was a woman of faith. To the point that in a prophetic sense, God trusted her with divine revelation. So there's a sense that even her spirituality is being acknowledged. But where they mess up is, is in verse 27. The boys grew up, Esau became a skillful hunter. Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebecca loved Jacob. Rebecca and Isaac both started playing favorites. That was her mistake. She loved Jacob at the expense of her own son, Esau. And Isaac loved Esau at the expense of his own son, Jacob. Tell your neighbor, dysfunction. I hope we know by now that we ought not play favorites with our children. Come on now. I hope we know that right now. I hope we know by now. This is the quickest path to all kinds of dysfunctionality. Let me tell you something. I've been passing for most of my life. And the one thing that adult children struggle to get over is whether or not that parent loved the other child more than them. And I know we say I tried to love them differently because they had different needs. That's not the issue. If the child perceives that one got more than the other, we need God's wisdom to make sure that it comes out balanced and fair. And I hope to God, hope to God we didn't got delivered from this. See, there was a time when I was younger, parents would love the lighter child more than the darker child. Tell your neighbor, I hope we've gotten over that. Or here's one, they like the one with the pretty hair over the nappy hair. And to every child that got nappy hair, here's what Pastor said: keep your hair nappy. Because God is the one that made you, and everything that God made in his image is not ugly. I hope we've gotten over this favorites. I hope we've gotten over that. And what that means is, and here's where Rebecca made the mistake. She she knew the culture, she knew that the oldest child is the one that's gonna get the blessing. She knew what her husband was gonna do, but she didn't trust God to make the vision a reality. So she took things into her own hands. I'm gonna help God out. Stop it, ladies. He doesn't need your help. He wants to hear your prayers. That's a different thing. She thought she could help God out, and she had him dress up to look, sound, and smell like Esau. And the consequence was she never saw either one again. Consequences. Yet, in spite of the ugly details, God kept working her story. I'm going somewhere. Third one, Esau's mindset. Esau lived for the moment. That's what his problem was. A great hunter, man's man, but he lived for the moment. You drop down to verse 29 through 34. He had been out hunting, comes in from the country. The text says he's famished. He's starving. And he says to his brother Jacob, quick, let me have some of that red stew. I'm famished. And Joseph said, First, sell me your birthright. We're gonna talk about him in a minute. He said, Look, I'm about to die anyway. What's the sense in dying if I if the birthright ain't gonna do me any good? So Esau had a fleshly mindset. No spirituality whatsoever. He lived for the moment. Here it is. Esau lived for short-term gratification. He was impulsive. Hear me well. Short-term gratification eventually leads to long term, unseen, painful loss. What we feel in the moment has repercussions long term. Love may give you what you need in the moment and long term, but lust will take you much further than you ever intended. That's the story with Esau. Esau lived for his appetite. He made a decision in the moment. He had to have it right now. I got to have it right now. I'ma die if I don't get it right now. I got to buy it right now. I gotta get married right now. I gotta have it right now. And then two weeks after they married, I'm ready to get divorced. Because it's impulsive. Because it's flesh, it's emotional, it's blinding. Text says in Proverbs 23 and 2, and put a knife to your throat if you are a man of great appetite. Paul says in Galatians 5:16, walk in the spirit and you shall not gratify the desires of the flesh. When we live for the moment, we can spend a lifetime cleaning up the mess. And that's exactly what happened to Esau. Later on in his story, it says he married two Canaanite women. Not because it was interracial, but because it was interfaith. God had told Israel, I don't want you hanging out with those folk who worship other God. God is not anti-interracial. Say amen. He's anti-interfaith. Amen. He couldn't, he wouldn't listen to that. And so when he learns that he's gonna lose the birthright, what does he do? He runs out and marries somebody within his own clan. Thinking it's gonna clean up the mess he already made with the two others. And a whole lot of folk operate like that. You haven't even healed from the first one, and you think the next one is gonna clean up from what you did. No, get delivered first from the first set. Calm down and get yourself right before you try to hop in somebody else's bed. Preach, Pastor, I am. My Lord. So the ugly details for Esau is not ugly details. Hear me well. He's an unspiritual man. Because when you look at Esau's life throughout the scriptures, he's never presented in a positive light. Matter of fact, Malachi really goes left on him. God says in Malachi, Jacob I have loved, but Esau I hated. Strong words. Why would God say that? Why would he use such strong words to Esau? Here it is. Because he had blessed Esau over and over again, and not one time did he pray. Not one time did he pause to worship. Not one time did he stop to give thanks. He knows that the only reason he got what he got was because the Lord was watching over his behind. And not one time did he pause to give thanks to God. He was an unspiritual person. So watch this. It's not ugly details in Esau's life, it's the fatal details. God does not force himself upon anybody. He wants us to come willingly to him. But if you know God has done something for you, you better say thank you. You better bless his name. You better let the world know if it had not been for the Lord on my side. God has been too good to me to keep myself quiet. Am I the only one in here that knows what God can do? Let the redeemer of the Lord say something. For what he's done in your life. If you know if it had not been for the Lord, you wouldn't even be here. You ought to testify. That's what made God mad. And I know that's strong language. I don't have time to get into what that hate means. If you got a question for that, ask me later. How I would got it, ask me later. I ain't got time to get through all that now. Explain it. Let me get to the fourth one so we can get to the finish this thing up. Jacob scheme. Jacob is a classic opportunist. In a word, Jacob is slick. Slick Rick Jacob. Always got something up his sleeve. And you better believe the narrative is always gonna benefit him. No matter who was wrong, no matter who was at fault, somehow it's gonna land. You either offended him or he should be the beneficiary. Jacob lived for Jacob. So look what he says to his brother. This is his brother. He says, I'm famished. Give me some of that stew. Without even thinking. Sell me your birthright. He's vulnerable. Now, I don't think the boy was starving. Let's be clear on that. Everybody knows he's overplaying it. Negro, you ain't hungry. Stop it. But but here is a man that's somewhat vulnerable, and he takes advantage of him at his weakest point. He's a classic opportunist. He's a manipulator. And yet God deals with Jacob. His brother Esau, when he had tricked him and had tricked Isaac into bestowing the blessing. Even though let's clear that up. How many of y'all know Isaac didn't have a blessing to give? Y'all do know that, right? See, that's that's the Achilles' heel of the story. Isaac didn't have no blessing to pass on. God is the only one that can bless. I don't want no man to bless me. I want Almighty God to bless me. Let's be clear on that. So so Isaac didn't even have the authority. But after he had tricked Esau out of the blessing, Esau said, Look at him. That's his name. He's a heel catcher. He'll trip you up. He'll steal from you. He'll make it seem like everything is fine. But the whole while, he's trying to manipulate. And I'm gonna just say it like this. This is simple. This is real simple. I'm gonna say it like the old folk. What goes around comes around. Say neighbor, ugly details. God was faithful to him. God protected Jacob, protected him, preserved his life. But what goes around came around. And so then the same way he deceived his brother Esau, deceived his father Isaac, and lied. He ran into his slick uncle, Laban. And the text says he didn't fool him once, but ten times. Tell your neighbor, there's always somebody slicker than you out there. But watch this. Through all that, God was still watching over him. Every time Laban changed wages, God took the little wages he had and gave him more. Every time he changed the terms of the contract, Laban changed the terms of the contract and said, Well, you can only have these sheets, the speckled sheets and the spotted sheets. God would bless and enrich those sheep and cause them to multiply while Laban's sheep didn't go anywhere. Every time that Laban tried to change the contract, God, who is an inverter, he can flip the script. Flip the script on Laban and bless Jake. I don't know who I'm talking to. Don't be mad at what folk have done to you. God will take the little that they threw at you and he'll multiply that and bless you time and time again. Let me go on three things very quickly. Three things. God knows how to work our story with all the ugly details. Three things. Number one, trust God to order your steps. Ordinary faith says this, God, I don't always understand all the details. I don't always understand how you work. I'm actually a little skeptical of some things you allow, but I'm gonna trust you to order my steps. Because remember the revelation, it was a destiny revelation. Two nations are worn in your womb. God had already ordained what was gonna happen to Jacob and Esau. While they were in the womb, hear me well. I don't care what your mama did to you, I don't care what your daddy said, I don't care what your grandma said, I don't care what your friend said, I don't care what your resume said, I don't care what your employer said. God had a plan for you while you were even in the womb, and God will fulfill it. Let me tell you my problem. And what happens is the devil knows how to multiply our pain and our misery, and it becomes so much it overshadows the vision that God has for our lives. And so the first step for some of us is just to trust that, in spite of all that I'm going through, God has a plan for my life. God has a destiny before I was even born. God had already charted my steps. You know what that means? He wasn't surprised by the ugly details in your life, he wasn't surprised by them in my life. But he knew that was a part of the narrative. And God said, I knew that was gonna happen in chapter three, but baby, you ain't seen chapter four yet. You ain't seen chapter five. I knew that's what you were gonna go through in chapter four, but wait till you see my conclusion to your story. Trust God that you have a destiny and that if we trust him, he'll make that thing happen. Can I share this personally? So I'm struggling with this preaching thing when I'm younger, back when dinosaurs roamed the earth. I'm struggling with this preaching thing, and I didn't really made up my mind, I'm not gonna do it. I'll just be a good servant in the Lord, in the Lord's army. I'll serve in the church. That was my plan. And so I was in sales, and and Lisa can testify to this. Everything I sold was like gold. It was gold. I I could sell you snake oil for a premium. Yes, I could. Once I had a target. Matter of fact, my whole sales career, I had one month I didn't get a bonus. Every month that I worked as, no, not every month, I'm sorry, every quarter, every quarter that I worked as a salesperson, I hit my number and above. Matter of fact, the Lord reminded me, brought back one time, I had taken over an account, and the previous salesperson had loaded up this account with product, which was gonna kill my numbers for the quarter. Because you got all these products where they don't need to buy no product, it'd be like next quarter till they buy something. So it's gonna kill my numbers. I got the planning and working with my supervisor. I planned a radio program, got all that product out of that customer's inventory that he bought enough product for that quarter, and I still hit my number. So I mean, everything, I mean, everything I got involved in terms of sales, I could sell it. So I'm I'm I'm about a year away from deciding to come to seminary. I'm doing well, I'm thinking about taking another job in sales that was more money. And the Lord, it was so clear, I was on the freeway. It was it was clear as day. I'm not saying he came down and spoke, you know, had a cup of coffee with me. I know some folk get that. That ain't how it happened. But it was clear as day. He said, Oh, okay, so you can sell anything to anybody, make all this money, and you can't even shed my goodness to tell people to get them to buy in how good I am. That thing leveled me. And it let me know then God had a He watched, he had to put me in sales to get me here. That's all I'm saying. He had to put me there to get me here because I never would have agreed to it and never would have seen it. Why am I telling this story? God has a destiny for every single person in here. I don't care what has happened to you, I don't care what you have done, I don't care what folk have said, I don't care what the folk have tried to discount about you, it's all a lie. It is not gonna be done until God said it's done. Let me give you my next point. Here's my next one. Trust God with your destiny. Here's the second one. Trust God's wisdom for your decisions. Hear me well. Ugly details are the result of quick, impulsive, bad decisions. When we make impulsive decisions, we're adding an ugly detail to our story. And here's all I'm saying. Slow down. Just slow down. Pause. Tell them, well, you know, that's that's really nice, but I need to pray about that. Well, you know what? Let me let me just give me some time to think about that. You know, I don't know. I don't know if I'm ready to make that decision today. Pray about it. And then after you pray about it, guess what you should do again? Pray about it again. And then after you pray about it, sit down and talk to somebody. Talk to somebody who's wise. It's interesting in the text. Uh uh, Abraham advised Isaac on his relationship choices. But Isaac and Rebecca never really advised their children about their relationships. Hear me, young people. Hear me well, young people. I know sometimes you don't want to hear from your parents, but they've lived five times where you're trying to get. And if you can't even talk to them about your relationship decisions, you ought to talk to somebody that's been where you're trying to go. Because a lot of times they see stuff you ain't never seen. They can look at people, no, baby, that ain't gonna work. I know you love that, but that ain't gonna work for you. That's a headache waiting to happen. They see things you cannot see. Wisdom. And a lot of times, look, and and and surely as old individuals, we gotta do better how we offer wisdom. Amen. Say amen. Sometimes we come with that hard line. Okay, that ain't the way you share wisdom, amen. But sometimes, y'all, you you you have to ask and seek other counsel. I ain't shame to say it. I ain't shame to say it. When I got time to where I felt Lisa was the one, and she'll tell you. I was running her by everybody. So I ain't making that mistake again. Nah, we ain't constantly tell your neighbor consequences. Teach you a lesson. Everybody, I mean mama, daddy, grandmama, granddaddy, friend, cousin. Well, why are we going to your interview? I just want them to see what they think about you. Because a lot of times when you're involved emotionally, there are just things you cannot see. Do I have one witness in here can testify today? And sometimes you need somebody objective, somebody who's not invested as you to look at that thing. Turn it over. Well, have you considered this, baby? That's wisdom. We've got to trust God's wisdom. Ugly details come out of that. Beware of the impulsive decision. Stay away from that. Seek wisdom, seek other individuals that have been there. And here's my last one: embrace God's grace. The reason why God continues to write our story in spite of the ugly details is one word, grace. And here's what I mean. Stop looking at grace as a past. Well, I got away with this. No, you didn't get away with anybody, anything. Stop thinking that. No, what God is saying is look, I'm trying to hold back some consequences and hope that you would come to the light. You don't want the consequences to come on. Come on, somebody. You know, if God allow all the consequences that we deserve, a lot of us wouldn't even be here today. And so what I'm saying is embrace God's grace. In other words, understand that God always works from the bigger picture and not the ugly details. And if he works from the bigger picture, we also need to trust him with the bigger picture of our lives. And trust him for how he's working in our life. Embrace God's grace. Don't just live under it, embrace it. Live and respond to it in a way that blesses your life. Let me wrap this thing up. And so I've been really amazed by this whole Artemis II mission that they did. That 10-day mission. And I've been reading a number of articles and just kind of amazed by the whole thing. Some of them say they had a spiritual experience and God bless you. God bless you. But I'm just amazed and, you know, how they, you know, they splash down. And you know, even to this day, six minutes, there's no communication, and they they're in that darkness for a while and what have you. But real what really got me was when they got to the dark side of the moon. And did y'all see that picture? They didn't have it up. Okay, I thought they would. They got to the dark side of the moon and they looked back at the earth. There it is. Thank you. Y'all understand. Wasn't that a beautiful picture? Absolutely beautiful. A big picture. And I said, you know what? That's a picture of God's grace. At a distance, it's one beautiful picture. But now think about the details that happen on earth every single day. Think about the details. We at war. Gas prices keep going up, still going up. We got a crazy president, amen. Countries divided. Families are a mess. Some of us don't know how we're gonna make it. You know what? We're dealing with mental health issues, vaccine issues. When you get close and get lost in the details, you're ready to throw up your hand. But when you back off and see the big picture, it's beautiful. That's a picture of God's grace. When God looks at our life, he always works from the big picture. In other words, we make the mistake of getting caught up in all the details. And what we need to do is step back like God and see the big picture of what God is doing in our lives. So we get caught up on the details. Oh, that person broke my heart. But God steps back and sees the big picture. But you ought to see what I've set up for you over here. Stop focusing on the details and step back and trust God with the big picture of your life. What happened to you in one moment that doesn't define you. God has a plan for your story. And your story is a big picture. And when God continues and finishes writing your story, it's going to be beautiful. Tell your neighbor, ordinary faith. Ordinary faith, that's all. All four of these characters had ordinary faith. And any one of them, God could have used to carry forward the story. But he did it with Jacob. And in spite of all his issues, he would learn from his consequences. But God was with him. Because God was focused on the big picture and not the details. I'm done. Let's take a moment and prepare our hearts for the Lord's Supper. What am I trying to say? Stop getting lost into the little details of the things that have happened to you. God is always focused on the big picture of your life and the ordinary faith to move that forward. God has a plan for you to make a difference, to be used by Him. It's not your skill, it's not your gifts. It's not whether or not you had the perfect background. It's whether you are available. And do you trust what God wants to do in your life? That's the issue. Ordinary faith. Lord, I just come as I am. I bring nothing. That's why the meditation verse was so meaningful. God takes the stuff that nobody wants. And he says, I'll take it and I'll make something great out of it. Don't forget what he told Israel. He told Israel, just just humbled them. I didn't choose y'all because y'all were the greatest on the earth. He said, Matter of fact, y'all the least. News flash. Didn't nobody want you. But I took the least and made y'all great. And many times we miss and think that it's something I can bring. No, God said, just be available. Just trust me. And if you trust me, we'll walk this thing out step by step. We'll make this thing happen for his glory. Come on, let's buy for a word of prayer.