All Systems Go | There Is A Cloud | Pastor Steven Furtick

the final week of our series there is a cloud God led me to a scripture in numbers chapter 9 I'm going to read this for you may be unfamiliar but hopefully it will build your faith and that is my prayer every time I stand in the pulpit to preach they God would use me to build your faith because it is your faith that enables you to experience God's presence in your life and so as we read this scripture I want you to just kind of like get a flow for it is it's unusual scripture right I don't know that I ever heard a sermon on it before but I was looking at how God gave his people this cloud they were they were coming out of Egyptian slavery and they were trying to get to the promised land but they were experiencing a delay you ever had one of those huh you have been stuck somewhere stuck in something so that's where they were and it was mostly their fault but you can't really blame them they were trying to figure out who is this God and who are we and all they had ever known was all they had ever known and so God gives them a gift in the midst of this and that's what I want to share with you about today Numbers chapter 9 verse 15 I'm calling this sermon all systems go all systems go you know like when they launch a rocket ship you also hidden figures and so so we're getting ready for what God is doing in our lives everybody say there is a cloud on the day the tabernacle the tent of the Covenant law was set up I need to say something right here every situation is a setup if God is in it here they are in the wilderness but God is still establishing his presence just one point that out so they set up this tabernacle which was a portable house for the presence and the glory of God and it says that there was a cloud that covered it from evening till morning the cloud above the tabernacle looked like fire that's how it continued to be the cloud covered it and at night it looked like fire whenever the cloud lifted from above the tent Israelites set out wherever the cloud settled the Israelites encamped at the Lord's command the Israelites set out and at his command they encamped as long as the cloud stayed over the tavern they remained in camp when the club remains over the tabernacle a long time the Israelites obeyed the lord's order and did not set out sometimes ever say sometimes sometimes the cloud was over the tabernacle only a few days at the Lord's command they would in camp then at his command they would set out now what's the common denominator whether they're coming or going they are doing it at the Lord's command and the whole reason they're in this wilderness is because they would not go into a place that God said he had promised to them so now they've got to learn some lessons and God is using this cloud as a personal trainer amen well I'm excited to preach about this today because it means that that God is developing their faith even though they were disobedient but he doesn't give up on them instead he uses the opportunity to guide them in a place where he didn't want them to wander but even in their wandering he was teaching them how to walk with him thank you Jesus so they were they were they were walking this cloud to go and listen to this verse 21 sometimes the cloud stayed only from evening till morning and when it lifted in the morning they set out whether by day or by night whether by day or by night whether the good times or the bad times whether I'm clear or whether I'm confused whether I did it right or whether I did it wrong God was right there night morning wilderness promised land wherever you find yourself there he is and so when the cloud would go they would go whether by day or by night whenever the cloud lifted they set out whether the cloud stayed over the tabernacle for two days or a month or a year the Israelites would remain in the camp and not set out but when it lifted they would not set out and by this point in the passage you're thinking we got it they followed the clouds but we don't got it you know we need things to be reiterated for us I mean how many times have you done the same dumb thing expecting a different result in your life thus far and you're only 12 let me read one more verse verse 23 at the Lord's command they encamped and at the Lord's command they set out they obeyed the lord's order in accordance with his command through Moses all systems go Halle and I just celebrated get ready to applaud big this is a big one we just celebrated 15 years of marriage [Applause] some of y'all look like you're too good to clap for my 15 years maybe you've been doing it 30 years 35 years but to me 15 it's above the average already beat the odds feels kind of good and I attribute our marital success to a couple of different factors I will list them for you in this order God Holly that's neck-and-neck dude like right there together and the third one is not me the third one is this is going to sound strange when I say it the invention of the GPS system the Global Positioning System if it had not been for the GPS system because some of our worst fight somebody over here must be like me some of our worst fights are in the car because I have no sense of direction and she is supposed to have won it was part of an unspoken prenuptial agreement I grew up in Moncks Corner South Carolina she grew up in Miami Florida she's supposed to know her way around places I told her I was country when I married her I told we talked about this and so we used to travel and I know this is prehistoric and primitive and I'm not relating to the young people anymore when I say stuff like this but when we used to print our directions off of a MapQuest what what our marriage our marriage was in trouble on those MapQuest directions because now we got it down I mean one Christmas she bought me a TomTom you don't remember nothing about a pompom now you got it on your phone you got Siri and everything like that but we used to wheeze boy we used to talk about things in the car and she would tell me when to turn but not when anyway what I'm saying is we made it somebody shall they made it and we made it because of the GPS because for me it's a real thing I cannot over emphasize to you and I must stay here for a minute because I do have a point to all of this and it really has nothing to do with GPS it's really a spiritual point I have found out in my life but there's a driver and that's a person that I am not really good at finding my way around by myself even as a pastor I probably shouldn't tell you this well I've never done this before I told Elijah that the other day he was arguing with me about something he wanted to listen to some blue yachty or something and I said you can't because I don't know his clean version is and instead well do you listen to worse stuff when you were growing up and I said but I have a parental right of hypocrisy now shut up and do this because I've never done this before we're going to do it the way I want to do it he did he said snoop was just as bad his album was called and he said the name of the album from 1993 so we had a discussion so many color to saved to come to this horse a big very commonplace but but thank you for coming and so we're talking I was like I know I never did this before and it kind of gave me compassion even for my dad you know he didn't have a dad I had a dad my dad's dad ended his own life on my dad was nine so one day I was going off about my dad to my mom you know he got giddy and this he Annette and probably some of my gripes were legitimate but she said back to me something she said he never saw it done he he's trying to stay but he never saw it it's like being the tour guide in a town you never been to and really raising teenagers in today's world is like being a tour guide in a town that changes every 10 minutes huh they used to have to go to the gas station to buy a magazine with pornographic material now they can get it on the same device they can read their Bible on so like how do you navigate that so I've come to the conclusion in life that I need a leader I need a leader God knows that about me he knew that about his children you know they were frustrated you know they were confused and he knew that they were following a man Moses Moses had Moses had had tried to talk God out of juice and yet he's the one God wanted and so God gave them a gift he came home kind of like it's a primitive GPS system did you see it in numbers chapter 9 God was doing the cloud way before Google okay and so this cloud ever say there is a cloud he put this cloud in the wilderness for three purposes please take notes because I believe there are three things that God wants to do in your life right now and I'm speaking to the person who has been in a state of confusion I wanted you to know that there is a cloud over your life whatever wilderness you find yourself in today whether as a parent or whether as a prepubescent you know I could be speaking to a pastor listening to this on a podcast what I want you to know that there is a cloud and God sent the cloud to guide you to guide you it's actually better than that because God did not just say he would guide you he said in Psalm number 46 that he would be our guide that's better because if God gave me guidance I know something about myself I'm not good at following it so when holly and i talked about directions she'll say you know you take a left and then there's a fruit stand and then there's a cow and then there's a thing and then there's a building and then there's a store and then there's a porch swing is red porch swing got american flag draped over she knows all these details of stuff that I don't recognize and then she'll look at me and she see my eyes glazing over and she said you know what I'll just give you the address and that saved our marriage it's I'm serious I have no this is how bad it is when I was a teenager I would not go get my driver's license not because I didn't want to drive I could not find my way around monks corner what is there to find in monks corner there's a Walmart and there's a high school I couldn't find it was so bad my dad my dad had to make me go get my driver's license he walked in the house one Wednesday was his day off it was summertime I had turned 15 months ago when I wouldn't get every time he would ask me you wanna go get your license because I'm so good revenue every time he would ask me do I want to go get my license I would tell him no it wasn't that I was scared of driving I was so embarrassed that I couldn't find my way around so I just kept putting it off in one Wednesday he walked in it was his day off it was my day off I worked at I had a summer job at the my first job was at pet rest Crematory and cremation service okay I started from the bottom for real don't look at me like I was glamorous and I was I was in my guitar my room playing my guitar he walked in said today's the day we're going to get your life since I'm sick of this and I wasn't scared of the driving test I should have been the one thing that was sitting next to me where the driving says she was so mean the car kept cutting off every time I try to start my dad's Jimmy y'all remember the Jimmy mile every time I would try to stop every time my dad my dad's car was such a piece of crap when you try to start the car and put it in reverse it would cut off and so I was trying to back out of the parking lot of the DMV I couldn't get the car out of the parking lot and every time I put in a reverse that would cut off and the woman let me do it three times and she says sir in the history of my experience of 135 years administering these tests I've never done this but get out the car your test is over you failed in the parking lot my dad came running across the parking lot he sweat my dad's a big old guy sweating waving his arms give him another chance man give him another chance I forgot the talent this cars got some issues you can't have the air conditioning on when you have it in Reverse y'all didn't grow up driving these kind of cars I know you're going to BMW on your 16th birthday so I had a naked where is he calling like that I think a lot of believers have been given license to live in the fullness of the promise of God but I don't trust my sense of direction and so God said I see you you look like a sheep I see you turning left instead of right so I'm going to guide you the Lord is my shepherd the Lord is my that's a good thing he's my shepherd cuz I am bad [Music] I mean I am bad at finding my way so he said that he would make me lie down in green pastures I mean I don't want anybody to make me do anything little little while and you will want someone bigger than you wiser than you stronger than you just stop trying to shrink God down it into a formula that you can manipulate and you will come to the point where you'll say God have your way in my life make me lie down in green pastures David said he leads me beside still waters in that cool he restores my soul he leadeth me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death wait a minute we were just talking about still waters and paths of righteousness how did we end up in this valley of the shadow of death but sometimes the path of righteousness must pass through the valley of the shadow of death so that you can go through situations that look like seem like and feel like they are going to kill you but you get to the other side and you see a table that is spread of provision in the presence of your enemies if there is one thing I believe it's that goodness and mercy have been following me all my life [Applause] that is one thing that keeps me from going crazy I know God is guiding my life I really have come to the point where I believe that I can't always tell you where but I know who the Lord is my shepherd and I found out that he will use circumstances that he did not create he will even use confusion to guide me to confidence so so the children of Israel Vista you okay they come to the Red Sea they're confused but God put a cloud here it is before them this is Exodus 13 21 they're not in the wilderness yet they're not out of Egypt yet they're in between they're 15 years old they're about to get their drivers license they don't know where to go so look what God does by day the Lord sent a pillar and it went ahead of them and it is a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night because God will not always look the same way in every situation and sometimes you miss him because you are looking for him to appear in the form of a method and so you come to something I'm gonna turn my back so this just can be between you and God wave your hand if you're going through something right now that you do not fully understand right it's called being alive so now they're coming to this this transition point and they don't know where to go because they can't go back to Egypt but they don't have to get across the sea so God gives them a cloud and watch what the scripture says go back to 21 I want to make sure you don't miss it sometimes I go too fast on and we miss stuff he sent them the clock he went before them to guide them God's positioning system so wherever I go God went before me that sounds so simple but thousands of you don't believe that yet you believe that the good things that are happening to you are the result of the guidance of God but I'm telling you that God was using the chariots of Egypt and the whip of Pharaoh to make sure that they kept moving so God is driving them from behind and leading them as he goes before them say it out loud God is my guy faint like the devil might have been pushing you around lately let them know God is my guy and even if it's the devil pushing God it's the one who is pulling me into the purpose all things work together for the good so I need a guide and so the cloud went before them and it showed them the next step to take in the cloud and led them I need the Lord to lead me I need him to lead me to speak these sermons we're all in trouble as he doesn't lead me to preached I heard somebody say something in church one time they were talking about being led by the Holy Spirit okay and we probably heard that before that God led me sometimes Christians you said to say the craziest stuff all religions do some religions will will commit acts of terror and say that they were led by God to do that one thing I heard early they they were taking an offering in church I grew up in church but um it wasn't personal for me then you know like it was a religion it wasn't a relationship but when my relationship with God became real because only you can decide that they were taking an offering one day and the person taken the offering they said this phrase they said just did today as you feel lead and I was only like 17 years old but I knew well that's not going to work as I feel led because I mean let's just apply that feel lead to other areas of life okay if I ate what I feel led to eat there would not be enough venom in these United States of America to circumvent my waistline if I exercised when I feel led to exercise it would be once in January in once in May when I thought about looking good in a bathing suit and then I would decide I already got my wife who cares and I would never hit the job if I hit it when I felt okay try this tell your kids when you feel led to go to school find out with your employer I wasn't feeling less what have you went to work when you felt led to work but we will subjugate our relationship with God to our feelings now notice the cloud didn't ask the children of Israel do you feel like moving today would this be a good thing and you look at YouTube editor and God doesn't consult their mood see if they see you like moving now I have to feel it not being led by my feelings I'm led by my priorities you missed a whole lot just now it wasn't a real shouting statement but it is the difference between mature faith that will get you through the wilderness and the kind of faith that goes up and down and flows like this and has you going all around all different people all the time God sent them the cloud to teach them to prioritize their by say prioritize some people came to church today because they felt like it other people came to church today because this is the day the Lord has made I set this time aside and the less I felt like it the more I knew I needed to do it because I am NOT what you seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness that is a statement of priority not a statement of feeling not a statement of preference if I did everything I felt like doing I would have a prison ministry from inside the prison [Applause] if I preached when I felt like preaching you with hear three sermons a year for me I didn't preach because I felt like it although I did today I feel like preaching today I can't explain it a little extra caffeine will work a wonderful in your soul but even if I didn't feel it it's 11:30 and here come the people and the Word of God is here and somebody needs it is preaching time it's grace and time I don't live my hands cuz I feel like listen I am hearing on these words he's what how many worship them cuz these words but seven people said do it because he's worthy because he's worthy because he's worthy that's why I seek Him because he's worthy that's why I offer him the honor because he's worthy that's why I'm staying where he told me to say that he's worthy stay married 15 years being nice when you've you led to be nice stay married 15 minutes but if it's your priority God is my priority one way of saying this he's at the center of my life I think about that the tabernacle is in the wilderness it's a portable tabernacle many of our locations at elevation church still meet in rented facilities means we have awesome volunteers come early stay late set up teardown some of y'all didn't come to Elevation during that season and those of you who did are thanking God that those days are over but that's where you find out who your really faithful people are all in those trailers in winston-salem and in and out and we have we have portable locations well we didn't start that God started bad and he not only told them how to build the tabernacle when Moses went up and saw them for six days in the cloud after seven days in the cloud God spoke and some of you leaves too soon before God speaks when it's cloudy you quit listening but that's where God speaks in the valley in the cloud I feel God's presence in this place [Applause] so he told him how to build the tabernacle but he also told him where to put it he told them make sure you set it up in the middle of the camp so that everybody has to face it so that all of the tribes standing under their different banners have to face the same center so when I look at my life I realized that not only is God leading me but he is leading me from the center the cloud would hover above the tabernacle and the tabernacle would stay in the middle so watch this this is so powerful I should demonstrate it commit Jordan come here boy come here JJ wherever they went you can be the tabernacle and you can be the cloud I am making this up as I go all right but wherever they went this had to stay in the middle sometimes we are so paralyzed about where God is positioning us and so we go well does God want me to take this job or that job and we've become really flaky really flaky we won't commit this or that we're moving all around look good God want me to marry him you married him 27 years ago that is a done deal now what you got to do is keep the presence of God in the middle and so when God moves Luke you just gotta come on budget to help them with this doing a terrible job at it right now but so think about listen listen of all the ways God could have led them this is a strange scenario strange how many would agree this is strange because if you want the people to get up and go put him on a schedule that's just some parenting advice by the way you decide to have a baby LJ put him on a schedule yet God does the exact opposite of what every parenting book tells you to do he wants to teach his children something so the Bible says that sometimes the cloud would stay for like two days and then it would move so they had to move because they had to keep thinking the milk and then it would stop and they would stop sometimes the cloud would stay for a year not want you to think about this just stay right there so somebody has to stay up all night is millions of people because we just read the Bible we think who wouldn't it be cool if God would give me a club to show me which job fatigue or which school of what my kids know it wouldn't be cool it would be horribly inconvenient cuz you'll always be thinking I'm gonna move in today and then just about the time you would unpack in the spot you were in and start moving again stop and the craziest thing about this whole scenario that is not mentioned in the text but is implied in the text and weren't really going anywhere did you know your Bible come on you know your Bible Jonathan at least you should you're an ordained minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ bucks just the security guy no he's actually a great example cuz I met him in college I liked him cuz he was a wrestler a successful wrestler he won a state championship he fought in MMA tournaments yeah you did yeah he did they were illegal unsanctioned MMA tournaments with interns at elevation Church but listen to me now that's not my point I met him on an internship the whole time I was at the internship I was complaining I didn't see buck until eight years later what did eight years later something like that he said seven seven years later I appreciate you correcting the story just that much which really didn't make a difference at all other than to slow down the momentum of my point I appreciate that I didn't know when I was doing the internship that he and I would travel we've been to six continents together preaching the gospel now sometimes he's an illustration sometimes he's making sure that everything is set so I can minister but God had to take me all the way through an internship that I didn't even want to be at we went to Hohhot China together we got chased through Chinese nightclubs together sketchy stuff before social media thank God but God was guiding us for where he knew he was taking us but he had to take us the long way for something that he wanted us to pick up along the way because if I hadn't have done that in turn if I had gone to trust in Southern University there would not have been a Holly boycott oh yeah her last name was worse than fertig when I met her she got an upgrade on verdict and that is no small feat but I couldn't go to trusten Southern they had to take my scholarship away because I had to go to Tiger ville South Carolina in the mountains in the woods where boys and girls are not even allowed to look at each other across the street cause it's a Baptist school I had to go to the Baptist school to get a point not girl because God knew he was calling us I'm trying to say that if you keep God in the system you don't have to know where you're going he's a God in the middle now before he's guiding me and he is teaching me to prioritize his presence and he will not do it in a way that I can predict because my tendency is to turn God into a formula and you know as well as I do that if God had moved that cloud at 7:00 p.m. every Friday they would have become more dependent on the system than the source and he loves you too much to let your faith become a formula so he's gonna can I say this I need permission even though you don't know what I'm gonna say I need you to trust my integrity God is using your confusion and I can hear it right now because on 1st Corinthians 14 on Facebook they're going to put first Corinthians 14 on there's people that sit around on Facebook and they have nothing better to do they're going to say on this clip they're going to say but God is not the author of confusion I read the same verse is talking about having an orderly worship experience and so it says God is not the author of confusion in other words don't everybody try to talk at one time or nobody's going to hear what anybody's saying that is the context of that verse he's not the author of confusion that doesn't mean he won't use confusion you know what I believe the only path to true confidence is through confusion because only after you've been through the confusion and after you've been through the valley can you say the Lord is my shepherd he told them I'm gonna put you in that wilderness for forty years but while you're there I'm going to train you to trust me I'm going to train you see we are so destination minded but the cloud didn't move because they needed a new destination study that sometime they got manna wherever they set up camp the only reason that God moved them around was so that they wouldn't get stuck in one system God said I don't want you to get stuck in a system that will short-circuit your fake [Music] so I'm going to allow life to throw you off balance from time to time and I'm going to put you in some situations where you don't feel certain because you can't have your certainty and God's confidence [Music] so I sent the clown to guide you I sent the cloud to teach you to prioritize my presence the cloud was above the tabernacle how many know not only is he central but he is above God has exalted Jesus and given him the name that is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee every sickness every disease every worry every attack every fear every knee will bow every tongue will confess I feel God guiding me right now I feel being worth going right into your heart Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory God the Father and notice the scripture says it was a pillar of court a pillar is an image of stability how can you have stability if what you're following keeps moving so so Jesus is getting ready to be taken up he's resurrected from the dead I'm fast-forwarding like a couple thousand years and he looks at his disciples and he knows like the children of Israel they have never been this way before he's got a mission for them he said you will receive power somebody shall power because God's presence is God's power it's not an accessory it's not a bonus feature God's presence is God's power up until this time they have been relying on God's presence in the visible form of Jesus Christ but you got to watch this something shifts and just before Jesus leaves the earth he's already taken the keys to death hell and the grave he's already paid the price for the sin that stood and kept record against us he's already nailed your condemnation to the cross he's already carried your shame he's already borne your burden he's already taken your sorrow and now he's standing and he's resurrected and he's about to ascend into heaven to be seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty from whence he shall come to judge to quicken the dead and he looks at his disciples and says you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be my witnesses watch this in Jerusalem in Judea in Samaria to the end I am sending you into an unstable world with a sore foundation and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem Judea Samaria the ends of the earth watch this and when he had said this he was taken up before their very eyes and the cloud hit him from their sight and they couldn't see him anymore but they didn't need to see him anymore because when he sent his spirit they got a GPS somebody shot I got a GPS I don't have to stay lost and lonely and confused and uncertain anymore Jesus and on today is the day all systems go today's the day you get your driver's license and you will receive power when the Spirit comes on you thing belies [Music] stabilize the quad kept going to show them that wherever they would go God would be in their midst I'm declaring this over your life today that there is a cloud in every wilderness there is a cloud it's not an external thing you keep asking for God to give you a sign on a text message er a sign to show up in the sky or something but the sign is within you the sign is on the inside he will not leave you or forsake you who am i preaching to today I really need to know because God said I want to guide you I want to teach you to prioritize and I want to stabilize you so I'm bringing you into some unfamiliar terrain because I don't want you to depend on your circumstance I want you to depend on my spirit so I gave you a GPS guide prioritize stabilize somebody shall I got a GPS come on this is this is better this this is better than knowing where you're going and know who is with you as you go [Applause] if you believe God is with you stand up on your feet right now if you believe he's guiding you if you believe he's taking you somewhere come on I need you to praise God in this moment like you've got Holy Spirit power come on break them in this moment god inhabits the graces of this people is wells in the midst of race he's welcome the mists of hallelujah it's well [Music] it's our God this will be the last day of your life that you will live without a guide I didn't say you wouldn't go through another Valley but today today we make a declaration God is guiding my life you know what that means that everything that comes against me has to work for me before it's all said and done the Lord is my shepherd the Lord is my shepherd the Lord is my shepherd come on touch 12 people tell the Lord is my shepherd the Lord is my shepherd he's guiding me providing for me Spirit of the Lord is in this place than where the Spirit is there's freedom you have been so scared so nervous because I don't know where to go and the Lord is my shepherd and there is a cloud I'll tell you what we need to do we need to establish a connection with heaven you know the Bible says since divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through him so everything you need Chris I just thought of this is in the cloud you know and begin what's in the cloud I need a connection with the source lift your hands come on lift your hands father we honor you we glorify you we bless your name we honor your presence come on open your mouth give embrace we magnify exalting solid God of all we don't do now hi Obama dialog here I about depression high above the snap when you're still young people [Music] Oh [Music]

Channel: Elevation Church

Views: 446,826

Keywords: Elevation Church, Pastor Steven Furtick, There Is A Cloud, emotions, marriage, parenting, spiritual growth

Id: Wfad5nSdJ0o

Length: 43min 26sec (2606 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 05 2017