Discouragement - You're Not the Boss of Me

don't check out right now in fact everyone give a big round of applause for all that are joining online we still got a huge group that are joining through face talk and insta twitter uh and on the bayside app my name is pastor kurt i'm one of the pastors around here how many could use some good news this morning you get a little good news uh between hurricanes and internationally uh we need something i got a really big good news announcement right at the end of the sermon so uh definitely prepare your hearts for that this is a big big big deal before we do that i just want to encourage you if you're not signed up for the marriage conference yet you've got to get signed up it's happening just in a couple of weeks here uh we got levi lesko we got caleb kallenbach who's going to talk about human sexuality uh my mark and aaron clark are going to be there rayne carol johnson kelly and i there's two really big reasons you should do this conference one is we're providing child care from from babies all the way to fifth grade okay so what does that mean that means you can get a sovereign god-ordained break from your demon-possessed children on a friday night and a saturday morning it's just a couple hours on friday night couple hours on saturday morning get all this great content and the second uh big reason that you should join is is really honestly now right now in our world strong marriages are such a great witness to the rest of the world it's not just about making your life better it's really about changing our world we gotta quit complaining about the news and complaining about what this happened and that happens and got to make ourselves strong in christ especially starting in our marriages amen so marriage to 56316 get signed up for that and you will not be disappointed you did um go ahead and take out your sermon notes if you don't have sermon notes you can always text outline to 56316 they look just like this we're going to go really really quick through a really critical chapter daniel chapter 6. i'm going to just jump right in and help you set the scene for daniel chapter 6. what's going on here if you remember and i hope you listen to the last two weeks of sermon there was a spectacular from ray and andrew um daniel is jewish royalty and he's actually taken out of jewish royalties taken out of a very wealthy very comfortable very educated environment and thrown into exile in the babylonian kingdom nebuchadnezzar everyone say nebuchadnezzar it's just a fun name to say nebuchadnezzar takes daniel and he tries to convert him into a babylonian but daniel says culture you're not the boss of me and he stands up and remains both faithful to god and effective in his cultural setting fast forward 15 years his three buddies are thrown into a fiery furnace and yet faithful to god and effective in the culture and now we're gonna fast forward 60 years daniel taken out of his childhood of royalty has been faithfully serving god and effective in the culture and now he's probably in his 80s and yet here's the first film put it right in there daniel advances rapidly what happens nebuchadnezzar is conquered by the mede persian king cyrus cyrus comes in conquers the babylonians and then he puts darius the mead i know it's a lot of names we're going full game of thrones here this morning but you got nebuchadnezzar gets conquered by cyrus who's the ultimate king of overall persia but then he puts another guy over the babylonian empire that they just conquered he's named darius the me turn your neighbor and say darius the mede now darius the mede wants to prove himself to the persian king and he wants to keep all of uh the the spoils of war and so what he does is he puts a bunch of governors over in charge of everything to keep the spoils of war these governors are called by a persian name called sat traps but it just means kind of vice president government it means a guy that's really in charge and over all these governments our governors i mean that are in control of the situation he invites three of those governors to elevate and be over all the governors you still following me guess who gets to be invited one of the top three daniel himself so you have these persian royal family wealthy men coming in and getting these titles to be over these big areas to preserve the riches of the king and in the midst of them he says i'm going to put a guy over you who's a jewish exiled slave who used to work for nebuchadnezzar so daniel advances rapidly and the sad traps get jealous they plot jealously they're like we're not letting this jewish kid this guy this this this this 80 year old man we're not letting him be our boss he's not a persian he's not one of us so they go to the king and they flatter the king in order to entrap him my friend beware flattery if your teenager comes up to you and says you're looking skinny dad he just wants the car that's what he wants when i was in high school there was this girl in the great up for me my brother's grade and she came to me and one day and just out of the blue after a rally she said kurt i just want to always tell you i always thought this you have such wonderful eyes your eyes are so kind and nice and they're really i was like oh my gosh i don't even know what to do see i didn't have a lot of girlfriends in high school god gave me purity god protected me by giving me the gift of dorkiness i had the gift of dork and some of you are not shocked by that just kept me so pure um and so she she i started hanging out with this girl she's like would you help me study for this class and she's like you're so smart and you're so good and you're this and that and boy i like the way you dress i like your hair i like this i like that and i was like this is happening this girl's going to be my girlfriend this girl is one of the most popular girls in the class above being she's going to be my girl this is happening and one night we're studying and she looks at me she says can i tell you something i said yeah like here it comes and she's like it's a big secret i said you could trust me i've not told anyone this it's okay i was like she's gonna look at me in the eye and say would you be my boyfriend and that's gonna be anna she looked me right now and she said would you introduce me to your older brother cause i have a crush on him do not be fooled by flattery my friends because flattery will lead to discouragement what happens is daniel is faithful he advances rapidly the satraps plot jealously and the king responds foolishly they go into the king and they said hey darius king of the medes yeah you're the guy the persian king has appointed you over all of us man there should be a rule see they understood this this is what was so clever about their machiavellian plan here they understood that the king was prideful and that daniel was prayerful so they put together this thing where they said hey what if you put out a decree now in the persian culture when the king made a decree it could not be changed that's very important to understand could not be changed nebuchadnezzar in the babylonian culture he just did whatever he wanted but there was a little bit more layers to the persian culture so if you put out a decree could not be changed they said once you put a decree for 30 days no one can pray to anyone except for you darius to meet all the babylonian captains they've got to pray to you they're going to get up in the morning instead of praying to god over their cheerios they're going to be like oh darius bless this cheerios to my body you know what it's just going to be you and he's like that's a great idea i want everyone praying to me for a month so he signs the decree and this is what happened if you're still with me give me an amen daniel 6 10-25 we're going to do 15 churches look at your neighbor and say we're reading the bible in church wow here we go now when daniel learned that the decree had been published he went home to his upstairs room where the windows were open towards jerusalem three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed can't pray to anyone what's the first thing he does he goes and prays to god giving thanks to god just as he had done before then these men went as a group and found daniel praying and asking god for help so they went to the king and they spoke about his royal decree okay stop right there let me explain some why is he praying towards jerusalem well the answer is obvious in jerusalem is the temple and the temple is the holy of holies that's where the manifest presence of god is but it's even a layer more than that solomon the guy who built this temple on the inauguration of the temple solomon prayed over the temple and he prayed this prophetic prayer this is what he said he said god if ever throughout the history of your people they're scattered because of their sin and rebellion let anyone who's been scattered point their face towards jerusalem and pray and you will protect them and restore them he knows this prayer of solomon so he goes this is it that's that moment solomon was talking about i put my face towards jerusalem the satraps come to the king they said did you not publish a decree that during the next 30 days anyone who prays to any god or human being except you your majesty would be thrown into the lion's den the king answered the decree stands in accordance with the law the medes and the persians which cannot be repealed then they said to the king um daniel by the way who is one of the exiles from judah he pays no attention to you your majesty or to the degrees you put in writing he still prays three times a day you ever have an epiphany that you've really really messed up this is what happens here all of a sudden the king goes oh no and the sad chops go gotcha verse 14 when the king heard this he was greatly distressed he was determined to rescue daniel and made every effort until sundown to save him then the men went as a group to king darius and said to him remember your majesty that according to the law of the medes and persians no decree or edict that the king issues can be changed in other words uh cyrus the persian king is watching and if you don't do it the persian way you're going to lose face and you're going to lose his trust verse 16 so the king gave the order and they brought daniel and they threw him into the lion's den and the king said to daniel may your god whom you serve continually circle that word continually so important may the god who you serve continually rescue you a stone was brought and placed over the mouth of the den by the way is there any other place in the bible where a big stone is rolled in front of a cave and the king sealed it with his own signet ring with the kings and his nobles so that daniel's situation may not be changed then the king returned to his palace and spent the night without eating without any entertainment being brought to him and he could not sleep at the first light of dawn the king got up and he hurried to the lion's den where he came near the den he called to daniel in an anguish voice daniel servant of the living god has your god whom you serve continually been able to rescue you from the lions daniel answered may the king live forever may god my god sent his angels and shut the mouths of the lines and stop stop right there i got to tell you so there's always a debate about this passage whether daniel was real this is a fable and people say you know there's no way that the lion's mouths could have been shut and this is so ridiculous of course the lion's mouth could have been shut every place that an angel shows up he says an angel showed up to shut the lives of the mountains every place in angel shows up what's the first thing the angel says do not be afraid angels are very fearful i think daniel's in that lion's den and angel shows up and all the lions go meow i mean it's they're like we'll be over here we're just gonna be right here you and your old man buddy just stand over there and we'll just have some separation tonight i honestly think that's what happened the king was overjoyed and he gave orders to lift daniel out of the den and when daniel was lifted from the den catch this no wound was found on him circle that phrase i might come back to that because he had trusted in his god at the king's command the men who had falsely accused daniel were brought in and thrown into the lion's den along with their wives and children now did god approve of the wives and children being murdered no this is just what persian kings did this is what mead kings did this was a cruel and violent culture this is not god approving of that that's just what happened now also you have to understand the reason the king's doing this is he's removing all of the machiavellian plotters these were old men that were these governors these were their adult children that could have marshaled rebellion against them so the king just goes listen i don't i don't believe in the god of mercy and grace you're all going to get in the lion's den and the lesson to us is simply this those who live by the sword die by the sword those that engage in machiavellian political plots eventually get caught in their own plots and before they reach the floor you stay with me that one person right there and before they reach the floor of the den the lions overpowered them and crushed their bones very sad the king darius wrote to all the nations and peoples of every language in the all the earth may you prosper greatly i issue a decree that in every part of the kingdom people must fear and reverence the god of daniel just flips the situation why study alliance then what does this have to do with our situation here right now i don't know if you guys noticed this but on top of afghanistan and on top of the fires and on top of the political unrest and on top of another wave of covet there's a giant katrina shaped hurricane coming on the eve of katrina this is what this is what surfers call a double hold down now i've never surfed a day in my life i'm an art major but i know a few surfers i've played one on television i don't know but you know what a double hold down is you get on a very very big wave and the wave just pummels you how many have ever been pummeled in a wave and it just holds you down and the problem is you fight to get back to the surface and when you're just about to break the surface of the water to breathe guess what happens another wave you know why it's so discouraging in this season is every once in a while you let you think you let yourself think this thought it's going to end it's about to get over then afghanistan happens it's about to get over then a hurricane happens it's about to get over you open the door and the whole world is literally on fire it's a double hold down now what does daniel have to do with this the secret to understanding daniel chapter 6 is understanding how old he is if anyone should be discouraged as daniel if anyone has a right to lose his patience as daniel if anyone has a right to say god where have you been and why am i not released from this situation yet it's daniel daniel was faithful as a teenager faithful as a middle-aged person and now he's faithful in his old age he's been god honoring and effective in his setting when the dreams needed to be interpreted he interpreted him when he needed to stand firm in his convictions he did not alter his convictions daniel has all the right to be looking at god and saying where are you and why have you put me through this trial for so long i came from a royal family why am i under my second king of occupation daniel has every right to be that guy going get off my lawn grumpy old man and instead even at the end when he's released may the king live forever there's a brightness in him there's a grace in him there's an unaltered softness in his heart how do you handle wave after wave of discouragement and stay like daniel here's the key here's why we're studying this daniel is a master at handling discouragement let me just tell you you're going to have to learn how to handle discouragement it's not going away i mean how many people are married raise your hand you will be discouraged by the person who just raised their hand right next to you how many people own a human you're a parent you will be how many here have to pay any sort of bill how many here just went back to school discouragement is it's not a sinful condition if you feel discouraged it's normal it's a normal logical response to a broken world how did daniel do it how did he did it how did daniel outlast liars loopholes and lions three quick thoughts and i'm going to move quickly here one is daniel knew who was in control daniel never lost sight of or made the mistake of thinking that anyone but god was in control he didn't think nebuchadnezzar was in control he didn't think cyrus is in control he didn't think darius the mede was in control he didn't think the governors were in control he kept in mind who really had the sovereign control of all the situations now i i about eight months ago i was caught up in a situation where i was trying to help a different couple groups of people and it was not going well and i was trying to be a good pastor in the midst of it got very complicated very intense and very heated and in the middle of me trying to help these folks a friend of mine said to me you know kurt this is a very complicated situation it would be good if you went and saw a counselor and asked the counselor's help to handle how stressful this is and i said no i don't think i need a counselor and the second i said that in my mind another little voice said no you're totally wrong you do need to go to counseling and that little voice will call it god i felt a little convicted because i've i've actually given this advice to lots of people this would be good for you to get some counseling for a while and get another perspective and get a mental health professional so i call this guy named jeff who's incredible counselor in our community and i've sent a lot of people to him i probably have paid for two of his kids to go to college i mean i i really i really like this guy he's great so i went to him and i said to my wife i'm gonna go for about three months at least because i think i'm gonna have to do some work in there before i get any epiphanies and i sat down with him he just started asking me questions and i started talking to him about how i was feeling what i was doing and about 45 minutes into the session he says to me kurt can i just say one thing to you and i said sure he looked at me said you're making this one mistake you're trying to control the outcome but when he said it i i was like god speaking to me and just like a thousand pounds went off my shoulder she said kurt your job is to bring the best version of you to this circumstance and know that only god and god alone can affect the outcome you're not in charge of the outcome you're not in charge of the outcome for your parents you're not in charge of the outcome for your teachers you're not in charge of the outcome for the state of the economy you're not in charge of the outcome for the uh um racial reconciliation in our world you bring your best version of yourself to those situations and three times a day you get on your knees and say god you are in control if there's one thing i want you to get in this season and you got to just hang on to it there's nothing else you learn from this sermon remember this it is god who's in control not you i want you to fire yourself from being the director and supervisor of results and step in to the job of just doing what you got with what you got where you're at bring in the best version of yourself what's the application here are you practicing a pattern of prayer how did daniel keep in mind that he wasn't in control how did daniel keep out of that spot where he put himself in the place of god it's really easy to do and you can have very good motives in wanting to really help people and put your safe in that place and also you know what causes you to put yourself in that place is when you start having some success daniel had great success and yet he stayed out of that harmful emotional place where you're trying to manipulate control and cause the effect of of the results and the way he did it was he stayed in the presence of god and he remembered the promises of god his mind was directed towards god not controlled you can't control anything my friend but you can have a meeting with the person who does here's my little exhortation to you can i say this really simple this is going to sound so simple but it's very profound talk to jesus every day just talk to him talk to him when you feel afraid i want you to say jesus i feel afraid when you feel anxious i want you to say jesus i don't even know why i feel anxious last night i'm just laying on my bed going jesus why can't i sleep i'm very tired i'm so tired i can't sleep jesus helped anyone know what i'm talking about okay i want to show you a picture um we got a lot of young people in this service so this would be very educational for you i'm going to show you a picture anyone remember what this is [Music] okay this whole section has no idea they're not laughing at all okay let me explain to all the teenagers in the room this is a thing called map quest and before our phones were smarter than us and told us where to go this is how you would find your way to places you'd never been before you would enter the destination in mapquest on your desktop computer that was a thing and then you would hit print and it would print out on the printer and you would grab these and i had so many of these in my car because they have no sense of direction there's like four inch pile at the bottom of the passenger seat of these and then what would happen is that as you were driving if you had a passenger they would read you they go left left left left left right now oh you missed it and god forbid that if it printed out two sheets and you only grabbed one and the last three directions or this is the worst one you're late for a job interview but your printer no longer has magenta so it won't print out you can't just carry the printer into your car horrible and the other thing about this map quest it ruined marriages everyone marries because every marriage is made out of one person who wants to jump in the car and just start driving that's me and every marriage has one person who wants to sit in the car for 15 minutes doing nothing studying the map that's my wife just memorizing every step where i'm going let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go who's got adderall let's go let's go in life and in driving there's a difference driving this is a great strategy to study the map and to know every turn by turn and if you can get all the turns printed out it's a good thing to know them and compare them to the map it never happens in life you're never going to get a sheet that's going to tell you each and every one of those turns the truth is if god printed out a map quest of your life and told you each and every one of those terms you would need adult diapers you would just need it'd be too stressful so often god doesn't map it all the way out and this is one of the keys to daniel and how he didn't get so discouraged and cynical daniel did the next right thing he just did the next right thing so he gets taken into captivity doesn't get bitter doesn't get discouraged he just does the next right thing king has a dream just does the next right thing he's got a new king he's got to serve he does the next right thing listen to what king darius says about him twice he says two different times daniel the god who you serve continually you know how to actually have an effective life it's not to know every turn it's to be a person committed to the idea of serving god continually what would have happened if darius would have showed up and said god daniel i hope you're rescued by the god you serve most of the time i hope you're rescued by the god you serve three sundays a month no daniel made it through all these situations and came out of discouraging moments because he was that continually served guy look what it says about him says he was distinguished he was exceptional they couldn't find any corruption against him they tried to do a negative report on him a negative campaign against them opposition uh research on them and they said they found nothing and then compare that to these vicious viceroys these governors these these corrupt machiavellian plotters they went as a group went as a group went as a group over and over it says they were involved this is everything that ray was talking about two weeks ago when he talked about you're not the boss of me culture if you haven't heard that message now is the time you gotta go listen to that message because there's a difference between saying god you're my guide god you've got the results and saying ah you know what everyone's going this way so i'm going to go that way they're involved in a thing sociologists called groupthink what does group think it's making crowd-based decisions that discourage creativity individual gifting things like this or individual responsibility group thing is so easy to get into and it's hard to see when you're in it don't let anyone else but your creator define your direction i got a little place in the notes there where i've just kind of looked at darius we could study this whole chapter from darius's point of view it would be the anatomy of a bad decision you can go ahead and look at that if you're an eager beaver extra credit person here's the application who helps you make decisions so obviously who helped make daniel's decision he went before god three times why three times i think it's some metaphor for how he draw drew sustenance from god eats three times a day he prays three times a day he's making his decisions in a god-honoring god first god's truth point of view now he's still got his friends around him he's not making him in a vacuum but he's god first how are these manipulative lying governors making their decision they went as a group they went as a group they went as a group and that brings us to our final point daniel expected god's intervention daniel said you know what not only do i leave the results up to god i expect god to give me the results i know he's going to actually do something here what god does and how he does it and the timing differs from person to person and moment to moment one of the reasons god so powerfully restores daniel here is because he's restoring the nation of israel because that's where jesus has to come from jesus comes from the nation of israel and jesus actually is the person who does the ultimate intervention he comes and he saves us my friends you and i can look at this story and see that actually jesus is the greater daniel the only difference between jesus and daniel is that daniel was taken out of royalty jesus was taken out of royalty daniel was placed in a foreign situation that was very difficult jesus was placed in this earth both of them were threatened by jealous rivals and both were threatened of their life the only difference is when daniel came out of that tomb he had no marks on him when jesus came out of that tomb there was a piercing in his right hand and his left and there was a great wound in his side and wounds in both of his feet because the difference between daniel and jesus is this god intervened for daniel jesus is god and intervened for you and me my friend you can't control the outcome but you know the person who can i bet this week a pastor named pastor troy from las vegas i was introduced to him through brent newman brent's there on my right there um brent is chp long-time baysider incredible guy he was actually ministering to some cops in las vegas area and he got to meet pastor troy and that's the undersheriff of all las vegas they're there together pastor troy is just he's one of my heroes now this guy is doing so much in the community he went to the police and he said listen i used to be a gang member and now i have this great relationship with gang members i can help change their lives let's partner together he's one of these pastors that has a great relationship with the community a great relationship with gang members and a great relationship with police officers and he doesn't see that there should be any separation between those three he he he actually is causing some particular areas because the ministry they're doing in las vegas to have the violent death rate go down by 65 i said pastor troy how are you doing that he had this beautiful answer he said we're inviting god into the violence we're inviting god into the alleyways we're inviting god into the gangs we're inviting god in to the schools my friend here's the thing god wants you to take you out of your bad situation you've got a difficult thing with addiction you got a difficult thing with your son your daughter your relationship your business your job your direction god wants to help you he wants to intervene and take you out of that before he can take you out of it you got to invite him into it i said tell me what how does that really work he said well i'll give you for instance we had one middle school five years ago and this middle school about every three weeks something very violent a violent shooting would happen we just couldn't figure it out why was this such a troubled area and then it came to a head where in a crossfire situation an eight-year-old boy died struck by a bullet and died this pastor troy said we're not going to let this happen he went to the police with an idea he said what if we went at lunchtime in this middle school and just served the kids hamburgers and hot dogs and got to know them so cops and pastors would go into this middle school and they'd just be serving hamburgers and hot dogs and the kids started talking to them and opened up their lives and they said here's what happens we have fights among each other and then our older brothers and sisters who are in gangs hear about our fights and it gets to be a rivalry thing and it starts escalating and escalating until on a friday afternoon there's a big huge brawl and then that's where the violence just escalates and escalates and they said where's this brawl gonna be and they said well this one's gonna happen this friday at four o'clock you think you could do anything about it pastor he said let me make one call he got on his phone and he called his worship leader he said what are you doing this friday at 3 30. he said nothing he said how about we have some worship in church he said yeah you want me set up in the sanctuary said no i got an alleyway next to the middle school and they brought all the worship team and they invited other worship teams from around las vegas and they piled into that and then they let the parents know listen your kids want to have violence and fight in this alley but we're going to stand and we're going to worship and non-christian parents came out to this and started applauding they gave an altar call that first night 10 parents accepted christ a group of kids showed up and they just he said they're just standing there shocked listen to the lord no one's fighting and then about 10 of them broke off and they were going to fight somewhere else and a bunch of worship leaders got in a van and they followed him when they wanted to go fight that god started playing their guitars and their kids were like oh you're following us everywhere all right because we're going to invite god in we're not going to deny the situation run from the situation look at the discouragement and say it's not there we're not sticking our heads in the sand we're inviting god into the situation that could happen here that's got to happen here wave after wave of discouragement the answer is three times a day god you got the results you got the results but we're going to do the next right thing and watch you move as we invite you in to the discouragement to change it like only jesus can my friend if you've not accepted jesus christ into the center of your life that's step one you've got to invite jesus into here before he can handle any of the things going on in your life i'm going to ask every single person to bow their head and close their eyes right now i'm not going to bring anyone forward or do anything like that but i got this serious question have you totally and completely surrendered your life to jesus christ if you haven't right now i'm going to ask you to pray a simple prayer i'll pray out loud you pray in your heart right where you're sitting just say this directly to god i invite you into the center of my life thank you god for sending jesus thank you god that he died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins i accept his forgiveness right now lord i pray for my heart help me follow you every day and in every way just right now in this god moment right now no one looking around if you pray that simple prayer either as a re-commitment or a first-time commitment either in the room or online if you prayed that simple prayer i want to pray a prayer of blessing over you that you'd walk into that prayer i could bring you forward like i said i'm just going to pray over you if you prayed that prayer with me would you do me a favor right now would you just raise your hand and say yeah pastor curt pray for me pray for me put it up high wow father i thank you for every decision that was made every hand that went up either on-site or online god and i do pray that you would show them who you are just the way you showed daniel that you're the god of the outcome that they don't have to worry about every discouraging news that comes all they need to do is cultivate their relationship with you father keep them close show them again again how much you love them and in the name of jesus let them follow you every day and in every way

Channel: Bayside Church

Views: 1,929

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Bayside Church, Bible, Hope, Compassion, Love, God, Curt Harlow, Book of Daniel, Daniel, Discouragement

Id: 75ybAPsMjB0

Length: 35min 14sec (2114 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 29 2021