Well, hello, central.
It is so great to be with you to those in the room with me, uh, to those of you who are watching or listening, uh, another campus or online.
So glad that you are a part of this as well.
My name is Jeremy and today we're continuing this series we've been in called travels with if you've got your Bibles and we'll recruit you to get those open to first Samuel chapter 18.
So if you've got a physical Bible, that's in the old Testament, you're gonna go over there.
If you got a Bible app, you can just type that in first, Samuel 18, uh, we're gonna be there in just a moment.
And today we're gonna look at, uh, a, a journey in the life of king David.
Now, king David is one of those guys.
Even if you have not read the Bible, if even if you're not familiar with the Bible, you have probably heard of king David.
It's just one of the most well known people throughout the scriptures and, and dominates so many, uh, stories.
In the old Testament and David is one of those guys.
I, I suspect a lot of us love because we want to be David.
We, we wish the things that happened to David could happen to us.
Cuz just seems like everything goes well for David.
Most of the time now, now the closest you and I get to this kind of feeling is social media.
Because we know on social media, that's your chance.
If you write something really brilliant or witty, it can be seen by the masses.
And so social media, the allure is it offers you that one rare glimpse of what it could feel like to have notoriety.
To have everybody on the web see something.
And, and so I know a lot of people, that's how we use social media.
And I don't know if you use it or why you use it, but I'm, I'm constantly trying to learn.
And so this year I decided I was gonna learn a new, uh, social media platform that I, I had not previously done.
I created a TikTok account, my wife and I both made one and we're like, all right, let's learn TikTok.
One of the things that's interesting about TikTok is often the people who are interacting with your videos don't know you.
Whereas in the other platforms, you usually have some connection with them already.
TikTok puts you in front of a lot of strangers and has the algorithm that works that way.
And so, you know, you really don't know on TikTok, like how many views is this video gonna get?
And.
So I start making content, having no idea, like, is this gonna take off or is that gonna take off?
And I'm just kind of monitoring, you know, and, and I'm putting some pretty brilliant content out there.
If I do say so myself and it doesn't go crazy, you know, but I'm like, all right, I'll keep working at it.
And then finally I hit it big.
I get my first viral video.
Now this is all relative, right.
Uh, viral for me.
Uh, this was, this was big.
I got 643,000 view.
On one single video, which to put in perspective of my entire life is probably more eyeballs on any one thing I've ever made than, than anything else in my life.
Right.
That's more than half a million people have viewed this one video.
Here's the problem.
I don't really like the video.
So like of all the videos I've made, this is not the one I'm proud of.
Like, yes, this is me at my, at my finest.
This is me talking about why my eight year old is still in a booster seat.
Like it's not cool dad TikTok at all, but this is the one that has gone viral.
And it's a little confusing to me, to be honest with you.
Like it, this has gone so well.
I'm reconnecting with people that I haven't talked to in years who have randomly found me.
Through this one viral video I made and went, Hey, I know that guy.
And like, we've reconnected.
And they're like, Hey, you're the booster seat guy on TikTok.
I'm like, no, all this cool dad stuff I was gonna do.
And that's.
What goes big.
And it's just a reminder to me of like, I can want this as much as I want.
You can want, you know, your life just to go easy and things to go well, but it doesn't work like that for most of us.
And so when we look at the life of king, David, a lot of us are gonna go, oh, must be nice.
Must be nice to have that workout for you, right?
Because maybe you feel a distance, but maybe if you're honest, you secretly want this.
You, you particularly wish this was is, is, is your journey.
But what we're gonna see in the life of king David is I think it's more complicated than we often tell this story.
Now, David, early on in life.
He he's a boy, uh, under the, the, the king, uh, Saul.
So king Saul is, is king and king Saul originally started off pretty.
Okay.
And then went downhill and God's like, look, Saul's not my guy anymore.
Uh, he's not the kind of king that I want.
So he sends the prophet Samuel to go anoint a future new king.
And Samuel goes to David's family looks over all of his older brothers, not you guys.
It's gonna be this boy.
Uh, this boy's gonna be king.
Now scholars suggest, uh, David was probably 10 to 15 years old when the prophet Samuel anoint him as the future king.
So 10 to 15 years old, he knows this is what my destination is gonna be.
But if you fast forward in the story, David doesn't become king till he's 30 years.
So that means 15 to 20 years given, you know, his age that he's going to be on a journey to becoming king, knowing that that's coming, but not yet arrived at that destination.
And that journey is not going to play out that the way that David probably anticipates now early on it does, he gets success after success and God is with him and, and ways that you would expect, like, yeah, that should play out well for.
And it does.
And king Saul begins to notice.
David begins to give David authority and, and give him leadership over things because everything David does is going well.
Except there's this turning point.
If you're with me in, in first Samuel 18, we're begin reading in verse five.
And this is when there's a turning point in the relationship between the current king Saul and this future king David, who is this up and coming leader.
It says this, whatever David or whatever Saul asked David to do, David did it successfully.
So Saul made him a commander over the men of war, an appointment that was welcomed by the people and Saul's officers alike.
When the victorious Israelite army was returning home.
After David had killed the Philistine women from all the towns of Israel, came out to meet king Saul.
They sang and they danced for joy with tambourines and symbols.
And this was their.
Saul has killed his thousands and David, his 10 thousands.
This made Saul very angry.
What's this?
He said they credit David with 10 thousands, and me with only thousands next they'll be making him their king.
So from that time on, Saul kept a jealous eye on.
now we know what Saul can only suspect is that indeed David will take over this kingdom.
David will be the next king.
That will, will be the one to lead Israel and, and Saul begins to feel this.
And Saul begins to feel jealousy.
Why David?
Why not me?
And so this journey is not going to play out the way David expects because of what Saul is going to choose from this moment.
Now, one of the things that I learned from this story, and this may be true in your life as well, is that even when we are focused on the destination, God uses the journey to shape us.
So you right now might be going, okay, here's what I want to have happen in my life.
This is the destination I'm working toward that that is coming someday.
And, and you may be really trying to go quickly through the.
But God is going to meet you here precisely in the journey long before the destination becomes the reality long before you get there, he he's gonna meet you in the journey.
Now, now this can be hard for us, cuz oftentimes as Americans, especially, we don't really care about the journey.
Just get to the end, just get to the good part.
You know, we wanna get rich quick.
We wanna lose weight fast.
We wanna arrive at the destination.
I don't want a long journey to get me.
But what we have to remember is that the journey is always connected to the destination and that how you get somewhere is often more important than where you end up.
And I can illustrate this for you back in 1908, the New York times, uh, ran this article in their newspaper.
And I think this article's incredible just on the title alone, you know, something great is coming okay.
1908 New York times has this heading dog, a fake hero.
Which if you knew nothing else, you knew, this is gonna be a good story.
What pushes children into this river to rescue them and win beef steaks?
What I've got to know more, what is this dog doing?
Well, the article goes on to explain up to this point, there was nothing extra.
But rescues became more and more frequent and hardly a day pass, but that some unfortunate infant was brought safely to the bank by the dog, after an involuntary bath, it began to be suspected that the neighborhood was haunted by a mysterious criminal who just likes to push infinites into the river.
Uh, and a, a special watch was inaug.
Then the truth came out.
It was the dog, the noble lifesaver himself.
That was the guilty one.
Whenever he saw a child playing on the edge of the stream, he promptly knocked it into the water.
And then nonetheless promptly jumped in to the rescue he had.
Thus, this is great establi establish for himself, a profitable source of revenue.
ISN is great.
The dog's like, wait, wait, let me get this straight.
If I push these kids.
Then I get them out.
You feed me.
Okay.
Check.
You know this, dog's like gonna do that.
Now here's the question.
When you know what the dog was doing, do you still look at the dog?
Like a hero?
No, you're like, look, dude, you can't do that.
You're no longer saving the kids.
You put them in peril.
See the journey, shapes the destination.
And here's how I'll tell you if you wanna follow Jesus.
This is even more.
Because Jesus is gonna instruct you and ask you to live a certain way that the world is gonna say that's stupid.
Jesus is gonna ask you to accept a, a, a set of values of the kingdom that the world's gonna say that's naive, and you're gonna have to decide, do I live in this journey?
Do I trust God with this lifestyle?
And I don't really know where this destination's gonna end up, but the means matter sometimes more than the.
and so we wait, we learn to be content in the journey.
We, we focus in and go, okay, God, uh, this, this is what I'm gonna do.
And someday we, we may get there, but I'm gonna trust you right now.
There's a, a social project happening online, uh, around the world where they make these little cars and they just invite people to share what is it that you're waiting on?
And then they, they let people post on all the things around the world.
Things that they're waiting for.
I think some of these answers are insight.
One person said, I'm waiting for success.
Many of us could relate with this.
Yeah.
Soon as I get that promotion, soon as this thing, and I'm, I'm gonna get that.
I'm get that raised.
I'm gonna get that achievement, right?
We, we are waiting for success.
One person, bro, I'm waiting for inspiration.
I wanna feel inspired.
I wanna feel something more than this and we can relate with that.
Sadly, one person wrote I'm waiting for friends that I don't have.
Someday.
I I'm gonna have some friends someday.
I'm gonna not be so lonely, but right now I'm just waiting.
One person wrote I'm waiting for my hog works letter.
Any fan of Harry Potter is like, yes, me too.
We're waiting for something magical to arrive.
Or this one I'm waiting for this journey to end to which most of us can go.
Yeah, me too.
Me too.
I'm I'm ready for this part to be.
I'm ready to fast forward.
Let's get to the good part.
Let's get to the decimate.
Let's arrive there and I'm sure David had to ask himself, how long is this journey gonna take?
See the boy David, who's gonna become King's God be wondering, when does this happen?
Enough already?
When do I get to be king?
And yet he waits and he waits.
And how does he just have to wait 15 to 20 years?
But this journey, this path to the kingdom is not at all.
What he probably anticipated.
It would be.
Saul is not gonna make things easy for him.
Saul's not gonna prepare him and help him and set him up.
Well, now, in fact, Saul's so jealous of him that SA decides, you know how I'm gonna deal with this threat.
I'm just gonna kill him.
And so we read these passages, numerous passages of, of David fighting for his life.
With the current king who is set on killing him.
Let me share a few of these first Samuel 18 verse 10.
The Merry next day, a tormenting spirit from God overwhelmed Saul.
And he began to rave in his house like a madman.
David was playing the harp.
He was sent there to calm Saul down as he did each day.
But Saul had a spear in his hand.
That sounds healthy.
And he suddenly herded it.
David intending to pin him to the wall.
This is, uh, this is a rated R Bible passage in the old Testament.
Right.
He's trying to literally murder David put a so, uh, spear between him and the wall, David being attached to it.
But David escaped him twice.
Like not once, twice.
And you guys think, okay, if someone keeps throwing a spirit at you.
You, you know, like we've developed an unhealthy relationship here, right?
This is not good for me.
You keep trying to kill me, but that's not the only time this happens fast forward a chapter first, Samuel 19 9, 1 day when Saul was sitting at home with spirit in hand, as he did the tormenting spirit from the Lord suddenly came upon him.
As David played, his harp saw hurled his spirit, David, but David dodged outta the way and leaving the spear stuck in the wall.
He fled and escaped into the night.
Here's what I find remarkable.
Have you ever seen a harp.
Like have you seen one?
Have you seen how people play a harp?
You have to like sit down around this massive thing.
David is sitting down, playing the harp and also has enough agility to Dodge, an incoming spear.
That's truly remarkable.
Right?
I mean, David is it's playing, watching SA like, oh, here, it's coming again.
Here comes the spear and runs outta the palace.
And he he's like, all right, uh, this is not good for me.
I'm not gonna play the heart for him anymore.
I'm gonna go somewhere.
So then Saul was like, fine, you're gonna run.
I'm going to chase you.
And that takes on the next version of their relationship.
First Samuel 24, 1 after Saul returned from fighting the Philippines, he was sold that David had gone into the wilderness of end Getty.
So Saul chose 3000 elite troops from Israel.
Ooh, the, the, the best of the best what's all about to do, uh, and went to search for David and his men near the rocks of the wild.
3000 of your best elite troops to do what to try and kill this guy.
This, this youngster that's his up and comer.
The, the, the one that God has already said is going to be king Saul takes the very best elite of, of his army and tries to find and hunt down.
David two chapters later, first name of 26 1.
Now some men from Z came to saw Gabi to tell him David's hiding in the Hilla Hacka now, which overlooks J.
So Saul took 3000 of his Israelites, elite troops, and he went to hunt him down in the wilderness of Z.
Now, let me ask you this.
If you're David, how many attempts does Saul need to make on your life be before you start having some honest conversations with God?
1, 2 7.
I mean like at what point you're like, Hey God, remember me?
Yeah.
Uh, you, you anointed.
To be king, uh, long time ago now.
Uh, but I'm still holding onto that as up.
Here's the deal.
Your current king is a little bit nuts and he's trying to kill me and you don't seem concerned by that God.
So just a reminder, if you could stop him from killing me, that would be great.
That would help me be king someday.
If I don't die by the current king.
I mean, I can only imagine what David has got to be feeling a as the current king is trying to eradicate him, even though he knows God has.
That I'm going to be king.
I have been anointed of God.
And yet one of the most remarkable aspects in the life of David is what David doesn't do.
See some of David's finest moments are the things that David doesn't do.
For example, David doesn't throw a spear back at Saul.
Now how many of us a SP was so at you might be a little bit tempted to pick that sucker up and throw it back, you know?
Okay.
How do you like it when it's spirit sorn at you, David?
Doesn't do he doesn't throw Spears and, and, and, and the first time of 24, when Saul brings his 3000 troops to David, David actually gets the upper hand and has an opportunity to kill Saul.
And he doesn't two chapters later when Saul again, finds him, brings his 3000 troops.
David again, gets the upper hand on Saul and doesn't kill him.
To which point his own, uh, uh, David's own guys are like, look, God is giving you Saul.
He's literally allowing you to be king.
Just kill him, just take it.
You can win.
But one of the most remarkable things about the life of David is what he does not do.
And I think David asked himself a question that you and I would benefit from asking as well, what will winning cost?
what will winning cost me?
What will it cost me if I kill the current king in order to be king?
What will that ultimately cost me?
Do I want to be king like that?
David decides no.
And you and I would do well to reflect on the same thing.
What would it cost us if we got what we want?
And, and you can even extrapolate this out.
Culturally, if we culturally, as Christians got all the things that we want, if we won these culture wars, what would it cost us?
If we actually got those things?
We think we say that we want, if God answered every one of your prayers that you've been.
The prayers you made have prayed this morning or yesterday, or this week, if God just said yes to all of 'em, would it bring out the best version of you?
Would that allow you to be the very best you that is, is possible?
See that we go well, I think so.
I hope so, but I, I think we should just pause a moment and go, what will winning cost?
Now when I was a kid, uh, I grew up listening to country music.
We have any country music fans in the house today.
You're in my prayers.
Okay.
You were in my prayers because here's the deal.
Uh, when I grew up, I realized there was other stations on the radio and I never looked back.
Right.
But what it means is I don't really love country music today, but I have a weird knowledge of like that period of country music.
From when I was a kid and I, I know a lot of these songs and that meant that I was raised on the man, the myth, the legend, Mr.
Garth Brooks.
Wow.
Really?
No country fancier.
Okay.
Uh, so usually though Garth Brooks.
Uh, I'm talking vintage, Garth Brooks.
He got real weird later in life, not talking about that.
I'm talking vintage old school, my childhood Garth Brooks, that was Garth at its finest.
Right.
And Garth had some amazing songs that, that I was into as a kid.
And, and one of them in particular was called unanswered prayers.
And, and, and this is story of Garth and his wife running into his high school girlfriend and him thanking God that he never hooked up with her.
And I realized later as an.
That is a Savage dig on your ex-girlfriend, right?
Like Garth, she can hear this song, like you made it famous and just destroyed this woman's life because you're so grateful that you're not with her, like anyways.
Uh, but like Garth hides this whole song about so glad I'm not with her.
And there's a line in the song that says some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayer.
Now I'm not a Garth fan.
I'm not a country music fan, but I like that line.
Okay.
There there's, there's something to that line.
Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.
Now I remember hearing that as a kid and I'm like, yeah, that's deep.
Yeah, I get it right.
Took me a while.
Took me a few years to really understand.
Yeah.
That is deep.
There is something to that.
And the older I've got, the more I have found that to.
See, let me just be vulnerable with you for a moment.
Some of the, the most transformative moments, some of the moments where I've seen the goodness of God the most are in some of the most painful seasons of my life, some of the seasons that absolutely did not go the way I wanted them to go.
For example, our family moved out to Oregon for three years, lived there for three years so that I could go be a lead pastor of a community.
I was enamored by the vision about what we were gonna do about what we had opportunities before us.
And I remember getting to a moment where I realized I have a choice to make in this context.
I can either keep this job that I love in a place that I love, or I can do what God is asking me to do.
and if I do what God's asking me to do, it's gonna cause me to let, let this go and, and leave this behind.
And I remember at that fork in the road, deciding, okay, God, I'm gonna trust you here.
Uh, and assume that this is all gonna work out well.
And, and let me just be vulnerable with you.
It didn't go well, it didn't play out the way I envisioned it.
It, it was the biggest hurt of my life.
It was the biggest hurt in my family's.
It, it has caused us to have years of healing to, to work through that.
And you're going, okay, I'm I'm gonna wait, cuz he's gonna tell me this resolved.
It didn't resolve.
There's no happening of this.
And if you ever wondered, like why do other people seem to have God show up and everything works out.
It's not just your life, that things don't work out.
Right.
I I've had to deal with this.
God.
Why did you allow it to play out this.
Why did this not play out the way I wanted it to the way I was asking you to, why did you not intercede the way it would've made sense?
I've had to wrestle with that over and over and over God.
Why did you allow this?
It's the same question I suspect.
David asked God, why are you allowing Saul to chase me?
Why are you allowing this?
And it's the same question.
I bet you've asked in your.
God, why have you allowed this?
Why aren't you doing something?
Why aren't you resolving this?
Why aren't you fixing this?
Why aren't you showing up and answering my prayers?
See, this is the part of the story that you and I can find ourselves in.
Why is God allowing this?
Well, as we look at David's life in particular, I can begin to offer a theory as to why go was allowing it, because I think often what chases us.
Is often inside of us.
See what's chasing us can often usually be somehow inside of us as well.
And I can illustrate this for you.
You ever notice that the things that most annoy you about other people are things that you do too.
well, like, like I'll give you an example.
Uh, in my life we have very loud children.
I'm talking very loud children.
We have five of them and you get all of them going to the same time.
It is like just noise, noise, noise, right.
It become the Grinch.
They literally make fun of me.
I'm like noise, noise, noise, like so much noise.
And so I have to like all the time, tell my kids, like you're here, bring it down.
Like, just so much just mute you, like gotta bring it down.
And almost every time I'm having one of these conversations, I'll glance over at my wife who is smirking at me because I'm one of the loudest people that she knows.
Right.
I have a loud voice.
I have a loud laugh.
Everything I do is loud.
And so, and my kids, I see it and it drives me nuts.
Why are you so loud?
This is how it works.
And you're the same.
And, and there's something, just think what annoys you the most about other people?
You probably struggle with it too.
It's probably in you too.
And so what I have found is that God often allows people who have these same things to bring some reaction out of us to figure out you're gonna deal with that, that thing that drives you nuts.
What other person you've got it too.
Are you gonna work on that?
And so when we go to the life of, of David, here's what I wanna, I wanna submit this argument to you and this, this may be hard for some of you if you grew up in church.
Okay.
Cause I know the story we've said about David our whole life, but here's what I would encourage you.
David was certainly a better king than SA, but David was not a different kingdom SA now some of you're like, whoa, you cannot talk about my guy, David like that.
Right.
I know.
I grew up in church.
David is a better kingdom SA, but David is not a different kingdom.
So God, why did you allow Saul to chase David for so long?
Because God was trying to remove something that was already inside David.
Now, how do I make that argument?
Because there's a, a number of examples.
If you look at, in David's life, once he does become king, where he does some jacked up stuff, I, I mean some stuff that you go, well, the, the perfect king, I don't think would do that most notably, the little story David and Baba, perhaps you've heard.
Uh, he, he sees this woman, uh, decides, Hey, uh, she's not my wife, but I, I like her.
So I'm gonna sleep with her.
Oh, when she's married, but her husband's a soldier.
He works for me.
So I'll just send him to war and get him killed.
That's no big deal.
Now here's the deal.
Uh, the best spin you can put on this story.
And I hear a lot of Christians put a good spin on this.
The best spin you can put on this is that's a horrendous abuse of power.
That's the good version, right?
A horrendous abuse of power.
And I would argue that's worse than anything Saul ever.
uh, by comparison, but what many people would say, uh, no, that's more than abuse, power, that's rape and murder.
And, and it's done by God's anointed leader.
That's a tough pill to swallow when you go, how is David capable of that?
And again, don't take my word for it.
Read the text, answer that question for yourself.
How is, is this anointed king capable of that?
There's another time where David is fling Jeru.
There's this guy named shimmy and shim eye is like, I'm gonna give the business to David.
So he starts throwing rocks in them.
He's raining down, insults on David, which you do not do to the king, but shiai is bold.
David's having a off day shim.
Like I'm gonna give it to him.
And he just rains it down.
Well, as their little time goes by, David's back in power again, Shemi I realize is uhoh that was a bad move.
David's back to, to, you know, having his, his power again.
Uh, I need to go apologize.
So Shemi, I.
Apologize, this David plead for his life.
Hey, I was outta line.
You have every right.
You can kill me, but please don't David makes an oath to him.
I will not kill you.
Don't worry about it.
I've forgiven you.
You don't have to worry about this anymore.
We, we are done.
We can move on and it seems like he did until on his death bed, he's having a conversation with the son, Solomon, who's gonna be the next king and all David who's about ready to meet Jesus face to face decides, you know what?
Remember that guy shimmy eye don't let him die in natural.
Kill him tells his son, Solomon someone goes okay, few years later, it's all in the text.
Solomon kills him, goes and kills shimmy.
I why?
Because Solomon needed him dead.
No, cuz David did David decided to break his oath to this person, this petty grudge he'd been holding for all these years because someone mocked him one time you go, well, who does that look like?
That's Saul behavior right there from the anointed God, uh, appointed leader of.
So, how was that possible?
See, I think God allowed David to be chased by Saul to remove some of the inner Saul in David, David.
This is in you, and I'm gonna give you 15 to 20 years to try to get it out.
And I'm gonna do the best I can using this guy to try to remove what's inside of you.
And we could argue, God should have taken 30 years and maybe David wouldn't have had these moments.
Right.
But the point is, there was a reason there was a purpose.
God was at work.
In this journey, even when it probably made no sense to David and I have found that God will do the same for you and I, God will meet us in our journey and God will be at work to bring out the best in us.
And, and God might use a person.
God might use a situation.
God might use a season of your life.
But God will be present with you on the journey.
And even when you want to convince yourself, God is gone.
God has stopped listening.
God doesn't care anymore.
God will meet you there and, and begin shaping you for who God wants you to be to the very best version of yourself.
And so here's a question I invite each of us to consider, as we reflect on the story of David, what is Jesus chasing out of me?
Now, I don't say chasing out of me in a, in a, a threat in a scary way.
Like he is pursuing you, you know?
No, no, he so badly wants the best outta you that Jesus will chase it out of you.
And some of these things, uh, Jesus is going look until you let go of that until that's less of who you are.
You're never gonna thrive.
You're never gonna be the person that I CRA you to be.
So, so what is it for you for a lot of us?
I think Jesus is chasing greed out of.
You, you ever find yourself being really bothered by people who have a lot by celebrities by the rich and the powerfully?
Oh, I can't believe them.
Maybe that bothers you so much because that's in you, maybe you're you're, you know, staring at what your neighbor has and you're obsessed with your neighbor or your coworker or that other person.
Maybe it bothers you so much cuz that's inside of you.
And right now Jesus is trying to chase that out of you.
Hey, that's not gonna allow you to be the best version of yourself.
You gotta release.
You gotta let go of that.
Maybe for some of us it's self-reliance that?
We're just convinced I'm I'm gonna do this life on my own.
I don't need other people.
I'm totally fine.
And so God's gonna allow something.
That's gonna challenge that where you're gonna need someone else and it's gonna be really hard and you're wow.
God, why are you allowing this?
I was like, cuz this self-reliance thing you've developed, isn't healthy.
It isn't the best version of you.
Maybe God's trying to remove some judgment out of.
And we can judge people in a, in a number of different ways.
Sometimes we, we proactively do it.
We talk, we gossip.
Hey, did you hear about so and so, or we cover, like, I have a prayer request from my friend over here.
Right?
That's a Christian way to do it, but we gossip about other people.
Hey, did you know, did you hear let's let's, let's break them down so that we feel better or the, the, the more prominent way to do it, we just do it in our minds.
You know what we call that people.
Oh, I'm just gonna people watch.
I'm gonna just judge you.
Oh, look at that person.
I cannot believe she's wearing that.
Who does he think he is?
That I, that is ridiculous.
And in these thoughts, we break people down and we feel so good.
We get life from it.
Maybe God's like, no, no, no, that's not.
That's not you.
That's not good for you.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna help you remove that.
I'm gonna get that out of you for some of us, perhaps it's pride.
Hey, I, I, I think I figured it out.
I think I've arrived.
I'm pretty good.
I got this big old, massive ego and, and it's my way or the highway.
And no one gets to challenge me and God's like, all right, I'll chase that out of you.
I'll help there because this is really holding you back and you can't see it.
And you don't realize that you don't realize how this is breaking relationships around you.
So I don't know what it is for you, but could it be possible that Jesus is using your current journey to bring out the best in you?
Right.
Christine Kana said it like this.
God is always using our today to prepare us for our tomorrow.
See God doesn't waste today.
God doesn't waste the journey.
God will meet you there, and God will bring life to you in the midst of it.
See, while my experiences in Oregon did not play out remotely the way I would've wanted them to God, a hundred percent used them to shape me into the person that I am.
And so much, I would say it this way.
I don't think I could have become this version of me without going through something like that.
Would I have chosen it?
No.
Do I want it?
No.
Would I give it up?
Never.
And I suspect it's true in your life as well that God has used that to shape me.
And so while that is an unresolved story, I do not understand why God allowed a lot of what got allowed in that season.
I've learned to trust God that you know what God, you are working for the best in me.
You are shaping me.
You are bringing out better things in me, and I'm gonna trust you.
I'm gonna trust that.
You know what you're doing?
Could you trust God with your journey as well?
So what we're gonna do is I'm gonna close by giving you just a few moments for you to quietly reflect with you and Jesus right now.
Cause there's one thing to go.
Yeah.
Great love David.
Awesome.
And we just move on to the next thing, but let's just stop for a moment.
Catch.
I'm gonna give you just a few moments with you and God figure out what journey are you in right now?
What questions do you have for God?
And can you trust God?
Can you invite God into whatever is happening?
Whatever is unresolved in your life right now to see how God wants to shape you.
Let's spend a few moments, then I'll close this in prayer.
Jesus, we invite you into the.
We don't know why it's played out the way it has.
David didn't know why all was trying to kill him.
I don't know why you let Oregon play out the way it did.
And each one of us could have a whole list of questions as to why you've allowed the things you've allowed.
Life.
And yet the opportunity before us is not to get it all figured out, but to learn how to trust you learn how to give over that journey to you to trust that you are shaping us and to better versions of who we are.
So Jesus collectively want, we wanna say yes to you, not just to the destination, not just to arriving somewhere, but to caring about how we get.
But how you shape us in the, in between, in this moment today.
And so, man, we learn to have courage to trust when it's hard, when we don't seem to get the answer that we want, when you don't seem to care, when you don't seem to respond, may we trust that you are still good?
You're still with us and you're still working for the good in our.
Would you give us eyes to see that and hearts to trust who you are.
And may you transform us into kingdom?
People who go out and affect all of those.
We come in contact with, with who you are because of how we've been shaped by you.
We pray all of this in Jesus name and all God people said, amen.