Focus | Dr. Matthew Stevenson | The Problem Is Not The Problem

today we're gonna do second corinth is the fourth chapter and i want to start at verse seven i'm reading this in the New International Version but we have this treasure in Jars of Clay KJV says and earthen vessels to show that this all surpassing power is from God and not from us we are hard pressed on every side but we are not crushed we are perplexed but we are not in despair we are persecuted but we are not abandoned we are struck down but we are not destroyed we always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body for we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus's sake so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body so then death is at work in us but it is a life that is at work in you for it is written I believed therefore I have spoken and since we have that same spirit of faith we also believe and therefore speak because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you to himself all this is for your benefit so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause Thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God verse 16 and we're almost done therefore we do not lose heart Alleluia though outwardly we are wasting away inwardly we are being renewed day by day for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all so we fix our eyes I'm trying not to run not on what is seen but what on what on is unseen since what is seen is temporary but what is unseen is eternal I want to hold somebody hand this morning until them neighbor the problem is not the problem there is not a more controversial figure in the New Testament than the Apostle Paul controversy surrounded his life it surrounded his career it surrounded his upbringing and there is so much scholarly debate about around why he was the Apostle selected to come outside of the normal trajectory of the other apostles he was not trained the way they were trained he was not disciple the way they were discipled he didn't even come from where the rest came from he was extremely different the Bible says that after he was confronted on the road of Damascus he had several events that happy to happen to him and the first of which landed him in the student status with a man by the name of Gamaliel he studied at the feet of the highest Jewish scholars to learn the traditional rabbinic approach to the scriptures he had to learn the prophets he had to learn the Mosaic law etc and then something happened to him elder torn we're midway in his discipleship process the Lord led him into a desert called Arabia for three years and wild in Arabia the Lord begin to download to him some revelations that would ruin how he was seen it was not enough that he was not raised with the twelve now he would be taken away to an environment and shown some things that the others could not see from this visitation and this series of events in Arabia the gospel of grace was revealed to Paul the Apostle which was a message that was troublesome for the other 12 you have to remember that these were men who were fighting to hold on to the law so much so that they had no room for love and and and they they love the law so much that conceptualizing how to love beyond the law was troublesome and you find that God deals with Paul very strictly and very strongly in this desert about the hypocrisy of Israel just wracked with this he was dealing with them about how it was a critical pastor mic for you to fight with people who had not been circumcised in the flesh and been not welcome those that were willing to be circumcised in the heart he he was he was revealing or God was showing him how they would argue about dietary law and about who could eat swine and shrimp and all of that and then he was dealing with their similarity to the Pharisees in that they were so committed to external cosmetic aesthetic changes and they put no real pressure on the inside remember it was that same Apostle Paul who was a murderer he was an antagonist if you will of those very same seared Christians and so God separated him to start to download into him a fresh paradigm now now now that word paradigm is going to be very significant to a few of you in a minute because there's a lot of you who are called to be more than an example let me show you what this means to you when you are dealing with anything in the realm of construction if I am an inventor and I have a concept that I want trademarked I come up with something that I design and and and and I present it before an approval board right that that there's a concept an example but that is always made of the cheapest material and when I'm done with that they throw it away that's different from a paradigm a paradigm is something that is the beginning point of a new reality you are more than an example God is not just trying to get many people to live after you he's trying to use your life to create a new point to people that's that's deeper than being an example and we understand whenever a person is a paradigm or whenever a person has a fresh paradigm there's going to be problems around it but what that means is that there's going to be many of you who approach things differently you come into things differently you conceptualize things differently and whenever anybody exhibits too much difference it attracts problems not only was the fact that Paul was a paradigm problematic people had a problem with purpose remember in the book of Matthew the tenth chapter God tells the original disciples I want you to only go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel don't you go nowhere near the Gentiles and I don't think God was or Jesus was telling them that I love the Israelites more than the Gentiles I think what he was really saying was I don't trust you with the Gentiles because you are still immature and you are still more committed to your culture than my cause I'm going to wait till I find somebody different to entrust the Gentiles with them so I don't want you to go that way and when we read that Commission what we read it is is that God was coming to save Israel first all up until we find that Jesus says in his Great Commission go ye into all the world he did not just send His disciples to for the Israelites he wanted them to go into all the world but until he could trust people to handle the Gentiles he withheld that from them and so now Paul comes acts 26:18 to open their eyes and reveal unto them the way of God more perfectly but he was not called to the Israelites he was called to the Gentiles if you haven't noticed yet when you come in contact with your purpose you will also come in contact with problems purpose and problems go together there is no such thing as a person discerning their purpose without problematic things around it as a matter of fact when you tap purpose problems ensue and the whole point of problems is to pull you out of purpose so the devil loves when people get drunk by problems because they can't have problems and purpose the devil knows that if I get you inebriated with all of the problems of purpose then you will not pursue purpose for fear of problems the paradigm was an issue what he represented the purpose was an issue hid the difference of his assignment but not only was his purpose the issue do you know what else was the issue his people the people were an issue and it was not the people that opposed him that was an issue it'll get good in a minute it was the people who was doing similar things a different way we can do similar things a different way what I enjoy is the Apostolic conflict between Paul and Peter there was nobody more abrasive than Peter the Apostle here because you clean out no exaggeration and the Bible says that one day Paul got enraged about Peters own hypocrisy he said you were out here healing the sick and raising the dead and you still worried about shellfish and the Bible said that they argued so bad that Peter had to go away there was never a resolve to the argument what happened was Peter walked away and God began to deal with Peter about what Paul saw because the problem that Peter had was that Paul was preaching something differently and the Bible say that Peter went up and began to pray she came out of heaven and God told him I want you to rise killing me and then the Bible said that Peter said no this can't be gospel two more times God gave them the same exact vision let me tell you something don't you ever waste time in a conflict when you are right about something God will deal with who's wrong you got to know how to pull your energy out of there the devil wants you to get carnal and he wants you to get fleshly and he wants to wear you out in conflict but when a person really has the Holy Ghost God will make sure that he convicts him until there is a chain have a seat he dealt with Peter and he told Peter don't you ever again call something unclean that I have cleaned I want you to rise and I want you to eat and so Peter walks away with the changed attitude towards Paul and so now the other apostles have a problem with Paul and Peter I've given you a ungodly toxic trio of somatic issues that are going to introduce problems to you the first one is the paradigm what are you and why do you believe what you believe the second one is your purpose who called you to do this and the third one is the people that can't proceed that you should be the one to do it and it is in these contexts and temperatures that the Apostle Paul writes to the churches that he plans he does not just write for monologues sake but but he writes from his personal experience with navigating through a life of problems if anybody in the New Testament beyond Jesus had a life of peril and problem it was the Apostle he had so much problems that he got hard-hearted against the prophets and an activist glory to God came to ward him saying listen you're gonna be more effective if you stay away from Jerusalem and and Paul decided now I'm gonna go ahead and go there because I believe this is the will of God and activist I'll tell you what would your apostolic stubborn himself if you go to Jerusalem this is what's gonna happen you're gonna go out bound in chains and Paul ended up watch me now having to lose some of his influence but because he could have been more effective if he wasn't in jail he had the right now to his churches and you can see the grief and the letters because he would always say if I were with you in spirit it has been reported to me that this is happening I hear that this is among you he is now in the consequence of a man who did not handle problem the right way life is full of problems every ministry gift is going to have problems every call every season every year is going to present new problems if you don't learn how to deal with problems you'll never really reach your potential what I've learned is that there's a lot of people who cannot focus because they're too distracted by the problematic and the problem the greatest enemy listen to me that you're gonna have to face in this season is discerning distractions quickly here's why distraction is the breeding ground for deception by the time you are distracted you are on your road to deception and many of you are one distraction away from becoming Jezebel and from becoming Delilah you are on your roll to what you used to bind because you cannot identify a distraction accurately Paul opens up the fourth chapter of his epistle we're talking about the ministry of reconciliation and and and he's not talking about conflict between two believers Freddy he's talking about reconciling God and man he goes on to talk about how he is a partaker of the mercies of God and how God's mercy is what kept him through being shipwrecked and being turned on and the conflict and then he starts talking about the power of the gospel what he says is that the god of this age has blinded the mind of those who don't believe and so he talks about how it's discouraging to preach a gospel that men won't hear he is he is he is trying to articulate his internal conflict we're sounding like somebody that's hollering down a tunnel all to death people it is it is like the paradigm or the parable of a tree falling in a jungle and nobody hearing it he's got a lot to say and nobody to listening to this man is going through musings and meanderings about what his heart is doing during his life and Paul made a very strong habit I'm making a point of doing that there is a monologue in Romans behave chapter where he says o wretched man that I am he he's not talking to anybody he's reviewing what God showed him in Arabia and he says o wretched man that I am who will deliver me from his endless death why does that make sense because I'm showing you that your problem it's not your decisions and it's not your resources and it's not your enemies it's not your friends your problem is your lack of control over your emotion and one of the things that God told Paul or taught Paul through Arabia to being betrayed through being taught by Camellia he taught him to have emotions and not be led by them good God from Zion I know a lot of preachers a lot of leaders a lot of business owners that would be further if they could control their emotions and the devil knows that the easiest to ensnare a man god be praised and twins snare a people mister step into the door a very motion that God gave you emotion he gave you happiness he gave you sadness he gave you joy he gave you anger he gave you every emotional component every abstract feeling that you could have to explore your humanity the problem is not having emotions the problem is big emotional 2nd Corinthians 4 is no different from Romans 8 and that he begins to vent the varied spectrum of how a man and his emotions start to feel when there are problems tells them I'm going through so much on the behalf of who I'm assigned to I'm exposed to so many dangers on the side or because of who I'm supposed to deliver I have so many conflicts within because of who I'm called to and he starts to list several things after this thought but we have this treasure in the earthy earthen vessel and and we read that and we study that but we never really examine how God gets the treasure ah we think that Paul is just identifying what's in him but the point of this text is not to identify what's in them it's to identify how to get it out and God's got a way of pulling what's out of you out of you many of you have no real discernment regarding the principle of potential your potential means nothing because we can perceive it what happens is God allows problems to follow your potential out and until you learn how to handle problems you'll never have resource to get the potential out of you listen to me you don't see your potential in seasons of ease and you don't see your potential in seasons of Palmer and you don't see your potential in seasons of rest you got to go through a series of dramatic dramatic of trial and peasant tribulation and storm in order for you to see what you're really made of he says we have this treasure in the earthen vessel that proves that the surpassing power is of God and not of me you've got to understand hermeneutic lee why this makes sense Eric he is pointing to God's divinity and his humanity he is pointing to God's sovereignty and his finite nature he's saying there is something in me it's a treasure in an earthen vessel and I'm going through and facing everything I'm up against because you need to be clear that this power is not of me I don't have the ability to apostle you and I don't have the ability to intercede for you as a man where I've come from he always said I am the least of all of these you need to never be destructive about the instrumentation of my life what's coming out of me is not from me what's coming out of me comes from God and because it comes from God it has permanent impact on me for long-term benefits for you I need to tell you something you're not suffering for you you're not being tested for you you're not even maturing for you the whole benefit of everything you're facing and this season is called the assignment that is all your life so now he starts to list several potential issues here he gives this issue he says the difference between me and the rest of y'all is that you saw him die and you witnessed him be pierced and you saw him go all the way down in the grave and I wasn't there to see that this is getting good now I didn't have the privilege of witnessing that I wasn't there when all of you screamed out and I didn't see the temple torn from the bottom but a part of me wishes I had up because the difference between me and y'all is y'all got the memory but I've got to carry this death in my body you took a picture of it and you took a selfie of it but because God had me on a learning curve because of who I was called to I've got to carry in my body what you carry in your mind and it may be a bad memory for you but his death is making me it may be a bad picture for you but his death he said I am always the Lord in my body so that he can what happens what happens the Lord starts to kill you so they can live what happens to yourself yourself there is something powerful to do the problem ain't the problem I wished I wish I could have saw him I mean I could get over that quicker but I can't get over his death I can't forget his death his death is working in me and what blesses me profits Mikkel is if the man is in jail he there's very little he can do but hit but the death of Jesus was still working on him he was still being reminded of what he could not do and what he should not do he still understood what it was to be a barn sleep not only am i abondon change to y'all but i'm abondon children even in jail I can't act how I walk even even as a guilty prisoner even as somebody who's already been sentenced I'm continually convicted by the edicts of the word of God and the grace of God I cannot act how I want even though I'm already in limited I'm carrying his death what do you write this he gives this perspective he starts to let him know here we go now here's where it gets fun he lets him know whoa how he is able how he is able to have resolve about his prison sentence and how he is able to remain broken and contrite and and not arrogant even though he has been wrongly treated and he is going through alienation from the rest of the Apostles in it shows up in this text here because he says we we we we we are hard pressed and when I love Vaughn is that it wasn't coming from one direction the Bible say he was hard pressed on every side I'm talking about how to get the treasure out of the earthen vessel you can't decree it out and you can't declare it out and you can't drop a sigh it out you got to press it out and when God starts talking to you about focus he's talking to you is if it's the only way to get the other side in other words he will I will not be crushed there is a difference between gonna kill you is gonna get your potential I'm pressed on every side Mama's pressing me daddy's pressing me Bill's pressing me enemy's pressing me my friends is pressing me everybody's pressing me but the reason I can write you with a clear head this jail is because he let me be pressed but he did not let me be crushed but called from Zion he says we are perplexed there's some things I am what I'm listening to you is several levels of problems reflection is a problem you're going to have a moment when God is trying to get the treasure out of you where you're going to experience what the Bible calls purple action what that means is that they're going to be a series of questions that have no answers I know I'm talking to you there gonna be a series of things that you wonder that you pick me and that you peruse about and you're gonna lose some sleep over it but God what God but God a winner and these questions are going to come and they're going to come and they're going to come and they're going to have good God and they want to puff and they're going to try to blow your house down but Paul said even with my questions you know we're trying to figure out who my allies were my enemies were even with my purp lection I am NOT in despair what he says is that what I've learned behind these prison bars is to let unanswered questions remain unanswered because even if I don't have the answer the Lord has a way of gathering my emotions so that I despair you need to understand that in this season of your focus your questions are not going to make you sad I don't know who I'm talking to in here but some of you have been questioning why my father did this and why my mother did this and why my husband did this and and why my sister chose that you need to resolve that life is unpredictable and if you will surrender the question to the one who said he was the answer that he will prevent you from despair this is not the season for you to be found in your feelings the future is calling you so you got to get out of despair out of despair out of despair no life and what you want it to be but it's shown the world what it used to be crackhead no more you just need to look clarity prostitute over yourself I'm perplexed I'm perplexed come on I got ten minutes I'm perplexed what Paul is showing you is his very discipline his very basic skill of talking himself into sobriety he is writing to the Corinthian church in an exhortation but I believe he is being reminded as he is riding and a part of what he reminds himself is that with the apostolic call and the Greek word is true taya it means warfare it is a career of a sent one and the Bible says he is a reed and he is riding to the second Corinthians and what he tells them as I had experienced persecution I did not ask to be called to do this I would have preferred not to be called to do this I left my status I left my plane I left my calendar I left my right to be right I left my bay I can't even control what time I get up anymore see when you are a real prisoner you realize that you go to bed when somebody else says it you eat when somebody else is Sara Paul is saying you don't even understand I lost my rights because of who knocked me off of my horse and not only did I lose my rights I enrolled in some persecution and as he is writing about this persecution it's gonna make sense to you in a minute there is a semicolon he says I've been persecuted up he says I was never abandoned good call from desire you know what that means is that what tries to come over you when you are persecuted up is the overwhelming sensation that you've been left by yourself if you ain't never been persecuted you ain't never really understood how painful it could be if you are persecuted it feels like the whole world is against you feels like you don't know who to trust feels like you don't know who to confide in whose counsel to take up but Paul right but I was going through I'm a grass and something happened to strike me down it'll bless you in a minute I did not plan this we've got to stop acting like that everybody plans to fall there are people who have not counted some things in the equation I didn't want this marriage to go this way I didn't imagine that this job would in this way I was struck down and in life one of the problems are going to face is an unsuspected fall this is why the Bible says that one of you is overtaken by a fault she who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness you can't restore me in Pride and you can't restore me in self-righteousness you can't restore me from the place of your excellency if you want to restore me show me that you did it too until you show me my co-stars I'm not about to show you my what it is to be on my back after life to wonder where was God and where was help and where was family and I how he comes out of this he says I was struck down which means to be hit by something but I was not destroyed there's gonna be a season in your life where you're going to fall but the Lord is going to protect the fall prove it to his high name it means is going to get use after you falling even though you're on your back God has a way of standing around you to make sure that nothing comes out to take advantage of you you lay on your back some of you in here on your back right now you've been defeated by the power of lust and the power of depression but God's about to restore you he will not allow your fall to destroy here I don't know I'm talking like this but some of you got spouses that are falling apart but I promise I they will not be dish they will not be destroyed they will not be destroyed he lists all of these realms of problems and then he gets to verse 13 it is written that we so we speak we have believed so we speak we have believed and so we speak I wonder if your conversation reveals the character of somebody who's not distracted you can always hear confusion in the conversation people start to converse a confusing spirit comes out of them if they have no resolve about what God is doing and what God is saying it ends up coming out in their conversation all this did we just go through a series problems that were unavoidable the conclude is in verse 16 therefore I could run but while around this whole church I'm using the utmost amount of self-control because I'm excited that you can go through all of that and not lose heart there's a lot of you that think that losing heart is normal and natural but what Paul writes is that you don't have to lose heart here is what Paul is teaching us Paul is teaching us that problems are unpredictable they come with life they come with purpose they come with people they come with love they come with hate they come with romance they come problems are not avoidable but what Paul is writing to his disciples is the problem and go never be the problem life is short and but a few days the body's so it can't be that God wants us to stumble over problems there is one thing gory to go one thing one thing more powerful than every problem you will ever have if you get this you'll have victory forever the only thing more powerful than your problems is your perspective don't ever change a problem what he will do is change your person seppuku memory attire what God is doing inside of you is trying to see if he can get ahold of your perspective train your prospective and he can correct your perspective what Paul just showed us kina is that because of who he was God disciplined him in the realm [Music] many of you are stuck as you call yourself keeping it real and what you're doing is remaining pounds your perspective is an option you have the right to change your perspective and if God never moves the situation if he never changes a family member if he never alters where you are if he never gives you some money you can look at it as it is or you can pull those things that be not as though they were part is pulling on your perspective the problem ain't going nowhere it's gonna be how you look who writes about being passed down in joy he should be drunk glory to God he should be high he should be looking for some type of intoxicant but at the end of this he tells them all of this has happened to me and around me and against me but we do not lose heart and that statement of not losing heart means Jesus had trained him how to look at what he was dealing with pastor or you might want to move because I'm about to do a flip my favorite part of this verse mama is the last part you're riding the people who came right back you're talking to a church that you can't hear say Amen he's riding his epistle hoping that it makes sense he is appealing to their logic and their intellect and their emotions so when he writes this letter you know how he signs off he doesn't sign off and say sincerely Paul or sincerely your beloved he says the reason I don't lose heart because of things that are not [Laughter] [Applause] this is a season where God's gonna heal your broken focus your gaze you got to look at the right thing [Laughter] [Music] he doesn't sign off with an appropriate salutation he signs off and says we fix our eyes on that which is unseen I have a part two at 10:30 nobody is ever focused permanently by the scene if you focus on and from what's going on naturally a distraction is on the way you have to discipline yourself to get used to being motivated by instructed by inspired by encouraged by strengthened by reminded us what's happening in the unseen and the problem with our Christianity is that it's become so natural and so physical and so more Allah that we have lost the impetus that comes from being a believer who lives until the unseen who serves to the unseen but when you are free it's because of the invisible [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] to you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the problem problem it's not what you're facing what you're looking at [Music] all of us are going to face things it doesn't mean that the things you face to get your attention you will be persecuted he will be cast down you will be let down but you have the personal right to choose what distracts you the hardest thing to the science of focus is knowing what to do when we have a problem that's the devil's the whole point let me give you a bunch of problems about you try to navigate your way through this and if you get so intoxicated by the problems I've got you where I want you because here's the truth peace is a matter of perspective the devil is not after your peace he's after your perspective if he get your perspective your peace is already gone and if it is costing you your peace it's way too expensive you have to be in your right mind and in your right heart if the treasure is going to come out of you the problem may go never be the problem it's going to be your perspective certainly you're looking at a bunch of problems now what you're going to do how you gonna handle it God it's masterful and watching men navigate problems he has never fixed everything some things you don't even address he listens to you cry miss ends to you well and he looks because he is giving you a treasure the challenge with the treasure is that it is trapped inside of the earthen vessel and the way the Lord gets the treasure the thing he put in you from before the foundations of the way he gets it out it's not watching you be pressed watching you be knocked down watching you be persecuted watching you be cast down and seeing if at the end of all of that your testimony is a fixed oh I don't know who that's for somebody could have got the victory right there yeah it's gone wrong they're gone crazy he's stupid she rebellious but I fix that there is so much that can be born in your life if you learn to fix your eyes it's not a matter of what you see it's what you look at that somebody ought to give that place for perspective or you look amazing [Music] you need the victory not over problems we need to victory over perspectives I tell you very often the Lord does not allow what he is not going to use if he allowed it he intends to use it I'm gonna give you eight seconds to lose your mind you've been praised enough for promotion you've been praising it for favor you've been crazy when to play support [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] the problem it's not the problem it is your perspective if the Lord can get you to have the right perspective there's nothing that's impossible your problem will never be your perspective to change how you're looking at what you're looking at just what you choose to focus on whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are pure whatsoever things are of good report think on these Paige and if you don't you be swaddled by your problem overwhelmed you'll die because of looking at it God always gives way but there is no temptation that is common to me except that which has overtaken him but God has always given away to [Music] for many of you your way out is your prospective father I'm begging you give these people miracles kill them my god deliver them set them free but this morning our request is huge we don't want it in the natural we want an invisible tree us my god in our perspective help us to look at it how you're looking at it and forgive us for looking at it how we want how we're comfortable looking empty our mind and our meditation until it's pleasing to you we toss up the cynicism and the fear flashes of the negativity the pessimism the torment that comes with studying what we don't have and what did not happen and what we don't know deliver us and help us track dispose of the evildoers but he lusts in the realm of our perspectives finally God we like a brand new offering we release our emotions oh you are the oh yeah like a fresh offering we release re every one of them we release what makes us happy we release what makes us sad we release what makes us nervous [Music] into your head do we commit our spirit you promised that a broken and a contrite heart Jew will not despise lead us lead us lead Needham's lead us lead us it the way everlasting and we will never again follow our emotions we want to be led by you and the powerful name of the one who makes us whole we give you honor and we give you praise come on in the mansion blowing [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: All Nations Chicago

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Length: 51min 46sec (3106 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 27 2018