'God of Miracles' - Miracles When You Need Them Most | East Coast Believers

hey we're right in the middle of a series and this series is just called god of miracles and this is the conclusion of the four week series all of our messages are always available on our east coast believers church app for free you can go back to our youtube channel and check them out if you want to go back and review them but i believe god is speaking a theme to our church and let me give you the genesis of this series it came out of a time of prayer during our vacation time and i just believe in the second half of 2021 that god wants to work some miracles in people's lives and in fact psalm 77 has been our text it says you are the god of miracles and wonders and almost almost to the point it almost describes i think our current generation where it says you still demonstrate your awesome power almost to remind you that hey we know god is god and he still works miracles and amongst us and in our midst and the truth of the matter is you can't read the bible a few pages without seeing a miracle in there and god is a god of miracles in fact i'll say it to you like this i don't think any of us would want to serve a god who wasn't a god of miracles we don't want to serve a god that we can understand we don't want to serve a god that we can just sort of put a little box or fit in a book we want to serve a god that's bigger than our comprehension amen everybody right and so and then jesus he chose his last words that he could have ever spoke on this earth before he went to heaven the record in the book of acts and his last words ever recorded when he walked on the earth were this but you will receive power when the holy spirit comes upon you and you will be my witnesses telling people about me everywhere notice this he didn't say you're going to learn a lot know a lot teach a lot he says you're going to receive power or in other words i don't want you just to talk about me believe in me but i want you to demonstrate me i want people to know that your life is different because of me now interesting this word power here it comes from the greek word dunamis that's where we get the word dynamic or we get the word dynamite interesting enough the word miracles in the bible it's the same exact word as power in other words miracles are always a demonstration of god's power in your life miracles it's think about miracles god will do what we can't do notice this he won't do what we can do he'll do what we can't do and there's a great definition of the word miracle i kind of put this all together but miracles are a surprising and welcome event that defy all logic from an earthly perspective how many could just use a welcome and surprising event in your life and it defies it defies all logic from from an earthly perspective what i'm saying to you is miracles are they do the impossible miracles they do the improbable miracles are unpredictable miracles often times in your life will be unprecedented in other words god shows up with a surprising and welcome event he'll do what you can't do now the thing about miracles in our lives and you read them in the bible we tend to sort of glamorize them and make them bigger than what they really are sometimes i mean there are the big miracles where jesus fed 5 000 and with five loaves and two fishes and and and he parted the red sea and those are the big miracles but sometimes there's miracles in there that are really where god was just meeting the needs of people god just wanted to bless people i know years ago when dean and i when we um we uh we moved over to france in 1995 and we were over there and um we based we were missionaries and we based out of a little town called uh uh versus outside of versailles called plaza and then we moved and then we traveled a lot throughout europe and and oftentimes we found ourselves in um in heidelberg germany we had a friend that started a church there and another friend that launched a bible school we were teaching a lot and they're kind of basing out of there and um and so we when we moved there we didn't have a lot of money but we bought this used honda civic and it had about 120 130 000 miles on it at the time and and we would drive all over europe and that little honda and so one time we were over in heidelberg and we needed to get back into france it's sunday afternoon after being at church and we need to get back it's about a four and a half five hour drive and our friend told me he said listen don't travel this is back in the 90s don't don't travel on a sunday afternoon in europe because most of the gas stations are shut down and and if you get in trouble you're not going to have any help out there and i wouldn't travel i'd wait till tomorrow but we had to get back and so we left sunday afternoon well if you've ever drive traveled between heidelberg and and fran and paris there's a mountain range you have to go through so we're going through the mountains about four five o'clock in the afternoon and this honda all of a sudden it just stopped stopped dead no one else was on the road but us so we pulled over and we're turning it and starting it and i'm not really mechanical but i get out and do a lot of guys do open the hood and i don't even know why i do it i look in there i don't even know what anything is in there and i just look and i don't even know if a wire was unplugged to plug it i wouldn't even know what to do so i'm looking like i know what i'm doing and we go back and try to start it it's starting to get dark and and the truth is even if someone did come by if i'm honest with you we didn't speak the language very for sure we didn't speak german we do a little bit of french but it went to help us anyways so here we are it's starting to get dark it's starting to get cold we're up in the mountains and we only thing we knew to do was pray and you'll laugh about this but the old school charismatic comes out of me we got out we prayed every prayer we knew we cast every devil out we knew we prayed we prayed in the spirit we prayed in what we knew in french what we knew in german and um and then we laid hands on that card and we command it to start in jesus name now i know you might not think this these things are true or not you might call it a coincidence but we worked on that car for 30 minutes i went and i turned the key and it started and i tell you something it was a surprising and welcome event that defies all logic from an earthly perspective truth is we drove all the way back about two and a half three hours more into into paris we didn't say a single word each other the whole time we just prayed and um here's what i'll tell you miracles usually show up when you're in a tough place miracles usually show up when you need them when they split the red sea it's because an egyptian army was coming when david when he killed goliath because they were facing an enemy when when jesus fed the five thousand with the five loaves and two fishes it's because he needed a miracle the man at the gate called beautiful has crippled for 38 years he laid there and laid there he needed a miracle today i want to i want to take you back to an old testament stories that wrap up this series now you're going to see sort of a theme if you've been in this series with me for the last four weeks you'll see a theme that we talk about in miracle after miracle after miracle in fact every message that i wrote in this is based on these sort of these three words if you want a miracle starts with asking it starts with believing and it starts with obeying just ask obey and believe and i've been looking for stories that sort of reiterate those three words over and over and over again in first kings chapter 7 17 rather in verse 7 this is the story of this widow woman at zerephath if you know your old testament history there's a famine going on let me give you some context of what's going on here it's at the very beginning of the famine and they're just starting to go through a dry time they're starting to go through a tough time i really when i put this together i was really thinking and asking the lord to give me a relevant word a holiest and spirit inspired word for your life today that would really impact you and touch you because i think there are people that are going through a dry time there are people that are going through a tough time our nation is sort of in a famine if you will through this pandemic and we're almost like i don't know maybe i'm the only one who thought this last year if i can just make it through remember march 2020 if i can just make it to easter then we think we can just make it through 2020. and then here we are 2021 it seems like it's going around things are happening again and so here we are it seems like we're going through a dry time it seems like we're going through a family here's this widow woman her and her son are in the middle of a famine a dry place in their life it says sometime later the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land which might describe where you feel like you are today then the word of the lord came to him go at once to zerephath in the region of sidon and stay there i have directed a widow there to supply you with some with with food so he went to zeraphath when he came to the town gate a widow was there gathering sticks he called to her and asked would you bring me a little water in a jar so that i may have a drink and as she was going to get it he called hey and by the way bring me a piece of bread a total guy thing to do oh if you're going to get me a coke can you go ahead and give me a bag of chips too while you're at it you know and oh in our house you know the kids are going out to the garage i'll say hey can you get me a bottle of water and so sometimes they'll bring them in without me even asking i know you're gonna ask for here you go in fact in our in our family we have this app and maybe you know parents you might like that it's called life 360. and the thing about life 360 is all all seven of our kids are excuse me all seven of us our five of our kids are all on this app and what it does it tracks their movements and so we know where they are and so it has little like you can set up like little little spots where it'll ding like a norms at work it's a normat church or dina at home when they drive and so i think my kids i really do i think they have it set up when i drive by a chick-fil-a at dings on their phone because every time i'm driving by chick-fil-a i get this text hey can you pick me up a sandwich can you get me a lemonade you know it's so that that's sort of what's going on here he said as surely as the lord your god lives she replied hey i don't have any bread only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil and a jug she said i'm gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son that we may eat it and die i mean this is pitiful i mean your last meal is going to be a piece of bread it's not even like a ruth crisp situation or acrobats or anything you're just going to eat this pitiful meal and die elijah said to her don't be afraid so god always in the middle of it says hey don't be afraid go home and do as you have said but first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me and then make something for yourself and your son for this is what the lord god of israel says can i tell you something if you'll pay attention in the middle of your distress god's always trying to speak god always has a word to speak to you the jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the lord sends rain on the land so she went away and did as elijah had told her so there was food every day for elijah and for the woman and her family see god's miracles don't just touch you they'll touch those around you for the jar a flower was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry in keeping with the word of the lord spoken by elijah what i need you to know is this in the middle of a famine it seems like god's abandoned you in the middle of bad reports it seems like god where are you in the middle of those it seems like we could just say we would like a a welcome event we would like god to do something that defies all logic what i need you to know because when in the middle of a pandemic in the middle of a dry spot in the middle of the famine the world is freaking out but let me tell you what the bible says psalm 37 says they talking about you and me will not be disgraced in hard times even in famine they will have more than enough can i tell you something god is always god even in the middle of a famine god is still god even when you get a bad doctor's report what i need you to know is this god never says uh oh god never it's jesus and go i didn't see that coming we might not have seen covet 19 last in this long but can i tell you something god's not shocked can i tell you something he was here for covert 1 through 18 too he's never shocked he's never surprised and i need you to know something even in hard times even in famine god says i'll be there for you so here's the theme we've been talking about really how to manage moments like this there's a world system and there's and then there's what we call the kingdom of god now i need you to know something the kingdom of god and the bible is not a location it's not a place it's not heaven like a lot of us think it is the kingdom of god jesus said it's really a way of living life on this earth it's a system it's a set of beliefs it's a lifestyle and so the kingdom of god is not a place it's not a location it's a lifestyle that you live and so you've got this world and you've got the kingdom of god now in the middle of a famine the world wants to sell fear you need to know that now here's you maybe you don't know this but all news stations are owned by entertainment companies they don't exist to inform you they exist to make money you need to know that there's some good people in all of this but what they will tell you and i'm not and i'm certainly not being political i'm not saying people are lying but what i'm telling you is this is why they exist as to for ratings because the higher the ratings then the more they they can charge now what entertainment will tell you is this two things really sell fear that's why when hurricanes come and storms come no matter which one it comes i mean that's why publix is selling water i'm not saying it's wrong to do that but i'm saying that's why they sell fear and they sell desire that will always bring people back but in the midst of this the kingdom of god says we're going to have faith faith is just a trust in god the world says hey in the middle of a famine you're gonna be unsure you're not gonna like what i don't know what's gonna happen the bible says you can live with confidence see the world says be unsure god says no walk through a pandemic walk through a famine walk through a bad medical report not with being unsure but with confidence the world cells says hey live by your emotions whatever you feel right now live by that god says hey no live by your beliefs how you walk through a famine not not by fear and surety or emotions but by faith confidence and beliefs so here we go let's go back to the story first king 17. i'm going to take just four thoughts out of that in the next 20 minutes i have left with you it says as surely as the lord your god lives she replied i don't have any bread only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil and a jug i am gathering a few steaks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son that we may eat it and die and i of course i'm sure i'm looking at this she seems so casual like she's mentioning this i'm just gonna eat this bread and die almost like man you know like it's no big deal but also in the midst of this she's also and i give you context again this is the beginning of a famine and so a lot of theologians would say the famine had nothing to do with others she was going to die or not she was probably on a bad road anyways and what i would tell you is the issues i'm just going to eat this and die here's the first thing that we'll have to do if you want to position yourself for a miracle and i call it like this you have to change your approach i almost said this change your attitude change the way that you relate to god she's see in this moment she's already defeated she already lost her perspective she forgot who god is she forgot the nature and the character of god because the devil the devil will whisper to you in a famine the devil will whisper to you in tough times the devil will whisper to you when you get a bad doctor's report this is your new normal how many times have we heard that phrase this last year this is your new normal this is your new way of the devil will almost whisper that to you all the time and the devil he's very good at this here's what he's trying to do he's trying to remove god out of the equation in the midst of a tough time he's saying if i can just figure out how to get god out of the quai equation i can keep them stuck change it's almost like an airplane the reason i put this ward approach here it's almost like an airplane i i fly a lot and when you come in no matter what from right whatever direction you come in to orlando the pilot always has to line up for an approach so he can make a good landing a safe landing and the truth is when it comes to a miracle we have to line ourselves up to approach god we got to change your attitude from doom and gloom woe is me i'm not going to make it to i serve a god of miracles in fact the bible addresses this in hebrews chapter 6 and verse 18 he said so god has given both his promise and his oath these two things are unchangeable what god promised and what he said because you know why it's impossible for god to lie therefore we who have fled to him for refuge can have great confidence as we hold uh to the hope that lies before us this hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls you know what god says in the middle of a battle in the middle of a storm you know what's an anchor for your soul do you know what keeps you in the middle of the fight without giving up without quitting here it is god can't lie god meant what he said and he said what he meant everybody here's why basically what he's saying is to this widow woman don't throw a fit in the middle of your miracle don't have a temper tantrum in the middle of you we're all tempted to do it we're all tempted to blame god blame other people blame the government blame our boss blame this blame that he says don't do that what will keep you anchored is you remember god can't lie here it is the story keeps going in first kings 17 he said but elijah said to her don't be afraid go home and do as you have said but first now before you get your miracle there's something you need to do but first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me and then make something for yourself and your son he said here's what i need you to do lady instead of taking that loaf of bread and cutting it in half i need you to take that loaf of bread and cut it in thirds i need you to include me in there here what is god saying number two involve god in what is happening now i don't know what it is and you can take a small little test right now whenever you get a bad report or whenever you get the phone call or maybe if you have children when they tell you hey i have a i have a fever if your first response is to pick up the phone and call the doctor there's nothing we use doctors if you get a headache and your first thing to do is run to the medicine cabinet and get tylenol i do that too if you get a bad call from your spouse if your first thing is to do is call a friend can i tell you something god might be in the equation he's just not first in the equation our first response should be when we get a headache is pray first then take tylenol our first response should be is when our kids come to us with a fever pray first then call the doctor our first response should be when we get a bad report is to pray first ask god to get involved then call all the calling a friend calling the doctor taking time all that's okay but the truth is we got to get god involved first you know why god is always bigger than your problems always you notice what god will do here he'll usually when you get god involved he'll usually ask you to do something to help other people he'll get your eyes off of your problems and get your eyes on solving other people's issues that's what he'll do when whenever god gets involved he wants to make sure in the middle of this uh dry place this famine this pandemic that you're a blessing to others that you do random acts of kindness you know you want to know the biggest piece of advice i could ever give you when you're going through a problem is don't just focus on yourself but focus on others you know because people say man you know what it seems like your life you don't have we have problems can i just kind of tell you the difference between me and some other people is my problems don't define me i live for a greater purpose than my problems i get them we get bad doctors reports our recognition breaks too cars break down our kids aren't we have all issues that everyone else has but i live for something bigger than my problem involve god in what is happening and the story keeps going verse 17 but elijah said to her hey by the way don't be afraid and what he wasn't saying is hey lady i need you to toughen up what he wasn't saying is i need you to just don't be emotional and toughen up eat your last meal you're going gonna be at least you're gonna go to heaven here's what he said don't be afraid the third ingredient is this reject fear i need you to reject fear in the midst of this in other words don't make decisions when you're afraid can i tell you something when you're walking in fear that's the worst time to ever make a decision and in fact when you've got pressure in your life that's a bad time to make a decision remember the old days there was a friend here and last service and he was sitting on the front row and actually i bought a car from him for my daughter to go to college and um and he he asked me what i was doing he said i saw a pastor he came to our church he got saved his wife got saved whole family got saved there in last service and he said yeah that's true what i'm getting ready to tell you and so remember the days when i was a teenager we would go buy a car and you go to a car dealership and maybe buying a used car and you'd go look at it and bring it back let me think about it and then over in the corner it'd be three or four sales guys or ladies they'd be over there and they'd be over there talking and then your sales gotta come over and go listen i need you i need you to make a decision right now because you see those people over there they got somebody who wants to buy that car right now if you don't want it they want it you're like wait wait what do you mean there's 50 of the same ones out in the park on the car lot and what are they trying to do they're trying to get you to make a decision under pressure and can i tell you something that god was god says this in the middle of your worst day don't be afraid because when you're in fear you're going to make wrong decisions it ha it happens to to all of us i remember when we were building this building um we uh we're just kind of our church was a few years old at the time and and this project was going to be 4.2 million dollars and that was to build and and to buy and to build it out and all that and i kind of like to stay in budget and i had some money set aside if we went over a budget well this project ended up being a little over five million dollars and actually 1.1 million dollars over budget and well doesn't seem like a lot of money but we're having to pay cash for that and so i'm just kind of working through all this and at the time i'm i'm you know i was i was before i had an executive pastor i was just kind of leading on my own in terms of terms of administration here and so i'm kind of managing the banker i'm managing the contractor i'm managing sort of the subs on site i'm managing our staff expectations i'm kind of running the church at the same time people are still dying and people still having babies and still getting married and all that that's all going on in the middle of all this and so i'm kind of feeling it but so i come home then he goes man how are you doing i'm like i'm doing great she's under pressure no i feel good you know are you sure because because as the man you want to go home and you want to portray confidence and you want to make sure you're leading your family well and so well it was a friday afternoon in our old location and i i'm in the office and my back is just burning i just feel this sharp pain shooting through my back so dina was there and she asked this is true story she was setting up for a ladies conference in the old it was the weekend before the ladies conference which is the same weekend we're in right now the weekend before the ladies conference this saturday everybody and so um and so i said kind of look at my back and she's not she goes oh man that looks awful she's i think he got bit by a spider or something so we had a friend that was setting up with her it's kind of medically you know inclined and so called her and said can you look at this and she goes man if i were you i'd get the doctor right away that looks awful shoes i think it's a spider bite well as soon as i heard that i have a close close friend his name will he'll remain nameless his name is ray jean and um but he had a spider bite of brown recluse in oklahoma and put a hole in his back about like that and so they just dig it all out and all his flesh got so i was thinking all that i'm like man i don't want that to happen to me so i called my doctor and he goes hey it's friday i don't really have time you can't i don't you had to go see a clinic i said no doc i'm coming in right now i'm coming in to see you and he said all right come on so i went in there and and so i go and he looks at it he goes he said no i need you to sit down man i've been to a lot of doctors and hospital rooms over my years whenever they tell you to sit down it's not a good thing is you need to sit down he said um are you going through some tough times right now i said don't think so he said what are you stressed about i said i don't think about anything he said um everything okay between you and your wife i said something you know that i don't know [Applause] i said i think so at least did he call you and um he said how about your kids how about your finance that's because what's going different in your life now that wasn't last year i said oh we're just building a building he started laughing at me he goes you have shingles it's on set by stress you're stressing about something and i didn't want to admit it but we're over a million dollars over budget and i've got to lead a congregation i've got to lead a team of staff i got bankers and i've got contractors i've got to keep all of this together and at night i would go home i put my head on the pillow and the devil would whisper this what if what if the church fails what if you tried to move too fast what if i god didn't tell you to get that building all the what ifs because you know what the devil tries to always do he always tries to get your eyes off of god always the psalmist david one of the worst days of his life i don't have time to set this psalm up but if you want to go read it psalm 42 he said this he goes man why why am i discouraged why why am i so discouraged why is my heart so sad it's like man i'm just discouraged he's really describing clinical depression why am i discouraged why am i so sad and what all counselors will tell you isn't therapist that when you're battling depression unless unless it's there's there's a few exceptions for it but most of it's because you can't see a way out there's no light at the end of the tunnel you just can't figure away like i could be sad for a few months but it looks like it's impossible to get out he said why why am i why am i discouraged why in other words the enemy will do this so he'll get your eyes off of god and he said he saw him as david said well i'll tell you what i'm going to do i'm going to put my hope in god and i'm going to praise him again you want to know how you flip discouragement you wonder how you flip depression you won't know how you flip a dark day as you get your eye you get there by getting your eyes off god and how you get away from it you get your eyes back on god you get your eye you start hoping in god again you start praying this is why like on a sunday morning when you come to church on a sunday morning and you feel all fired up it's because you're in the presence of god you're singing you've got a whole band up here we're singing that song about miracles amen you can almost feel faith just rush in the room and you hear a message out of the word of god you feel inspired you feel like i could take on the world but then it how many know monday and tuesday always come and here's the deal you can't have church seven days a week not with me as your pastor and um one week's one day a week is hard enough and um just kid but but you can't do this seven days a week you love the feeling that you get but you know what you can have seven days a week the word of god and the presence of god you don't have to have church to have this you don't have to have church to put your hope back in god you don't have to have church to praise them again you can do this at home and you can flip the script the same way the psalmist did so the story's going on all right as i rather now to use this verse she said he said don't be afraid for i am with you don't be discouraged this is why you're not discouraged you wanna know what you serve the god of miracles there's no situation that is bigger than your god he said i'm going to strengthen you and i'm going to help you so here's the story as we start wrapping this up in first kings 17 it says so she went away and she did as elijah had told her so there was food every day for elijah and for the woman and her family so she went and she did get him a cake she did get him some water for the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry and keeping with here it is the word of the lord spoken by elijah here's the last ingredient that is this do what god says because right in the middle of your worst day we all want god to wave a magic wand but he's usually going to give us an instruction there's a miracle on the other side of your obedience someone said i don't even what is obedience obedience usually for most christians is what is the last thing god told you to do what is the last thing what i will tell you is this it's usually never easy it's usually never convenient it's usually not safe in fact usually it costs you more than you want to pay usually requires a little more diligence than you really want to give here's what i want you to know obedience it didn't break the famine it just kept her sustained in the middle of the famine sometimes we can't maybe we can't stop the pandemic but god can walk through it with us through the pandemic he can keep us sustained in this here's what i want you to know is never underestimate how god can do something big through one small act of obedience just just one small act here's what i want you to know you're going to be better on the other side of your obedience you want to know what christianity 101 is i pray i obey i seek god and then i do you know one of the questions i get asked a lot from people is you know we have five kids or we have two older my older daughter natalie was up here today and then my son my 20 year old john mark's in phoenix in college there i have three other ones well about five years ago i was praying i was thinking about our older kids and and i get asked the question well how do you how did you raise your kids and what i want you to know is we have bad days in our home too what i want you to know is you know not all of our kids are perfect they make poor choices too sometimes and i think a lot of parents are assuming responsibility for choices their adult children make can i tell you something god had two children adam and eve and one half of them messed up and the other half right behind them okay and so we're assuming responsibilities for our kids all you can do is place values on the inside of them that when they get out there on their own they're going to make the right decisions but we are sort of like trying to work through some things as a family it was during 21 days of prayer and fasting because right now it's working out for us and so i was praying for our kids and i was praying about some situations because um it seemed like one of them was starting to choose some like wrong choices make some wrong choices and they were kind of starting to walk down the wrong path and i'm sure no one could ever relate to this with a teenager and your family and so we were sort of trying to walk figure this out and sometimes maybe you've never had this discussion with your children but i have didn't we teach you better than that and no matter how many discussions we had it seemed like it just was on that same path and it was during the 21 days of prayer and fasting i was thinking about my kids and and i was talking lord about them and god said to me said hey you don't want here's what i need you to do because i take praying for you pretty seriously like you you probably don't believe this but it's the truth i i pray for you every day i pray for this church and people in it you have a prayer covering and um i think it's one of the jobs of a pastor is not just to get up here and talk but to pray for you and lead you spiritually and so um but yet my family was some of them were making some poor choices and they're gonna make some great stories one day i just can't tell them to yet and um i need some more time between them and uh so i'm in this time of prayer at the 21 days of prayer and fasting right here in this building right here in that youth room over there the lord said to me say hey i need you to um pray for your kids but i want you to pray different this year i want you to take the pauline prayers ephesians 1 and ephesians 3. and i want you to pray them over your older two kids every day and not just every day but multiple times through the day so that's three or four times a day and the pauline prayers are found in ephesians like 1 and chapter 1 verse 16 and ephesians 3 14 and it just goes like this i cease not to give false praying for the church at ephesus knees i cease not to give thanks for you making mention of you my prayers that the god of my lord jesus christ the father glory to give unto you the spirit of wisdom revelation and knowledge of him the eyes your understanding of being lightened the eyes of your heart be flooded with the glorious light of the gospel that you may know the hope to which he has called you and it goes on and and what i knew what the lord was asking me to do was this wherever it said you to insert natalie in john mark's name so i so i started praying that way that day i ceased not to give thanks for natalie and john mark make a mention of them in my prayers that you the god of our lord jesus christ the father of glory will give natalie and john mark the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of him that natalie's eyes john mark's eyes of their understanding would be enlightened that they would walk in wisdom they would see things that others don't see that their heart would be flooded with the glorious light of the gospel that they wouldn't serve god because they have to they'd serve god because they want to and it went on like this i did it day after day after day same things going on in our home nothing bad or anything the same poor choices and then one day we just look back and they're on fire for god and they're serving god and they're getting their friends saved and they're living for him and they're singing worship bands and they're leading others and and the truth is is i really couldn't even write a book on what we did i can write a book on what we did wrong but i can tell you is this never underestimate how god could do something big through one small act of obedience it's usually your miracle's on the other side let me wrap it up isaiah said and i hate guys let us reason this to go like let's just have this conversation the lord's saying man your sins are like scarlet but they're gonna be white as snow though they are red like crimson they shall be white as well in other words i can flip everything around you've screwed up your life you've messed up your life but i can flip it but here's what i need you to do if you are willing and obedient you can eat the good of the land like if you could just do this you could eat the good of the land but if you refuse you got to go along with life but whatever you'll be devoured by whatever's going on like you'll be a victim of your circumstance rather than overcoming that's why i say like what is god saying is he saying join a small group is he saying you know be generous is he saying start a prayer life is he saying go through grow was he saying give god i don't know what he's telling you to do but on the other side of that is your miracle you know you know what i found out i i shared this a few weeks ago in one of the series i think one of the greatest stressors of a christian is unresolved sin i i really do i think it's it's stressed as a christian out like they want to get it right they carry that with them but one of the greatest joys of a christian on the other side of that when i thought about it is obeying god there's a certain joy that comes from doing what god asked you it's almost like as you know we have this puppy that's 10 months old now and um i am starting to love her a little bit and um but but there's moments where i don't but most of the time i do but what i do love about her is this i take her out in the morning and i mean it's just terrible i can't i've made fun of these people for all these years that walk behind their dog picking up their droppings in a bag that's me now i can't believe 54 years old that's what my life has come to you know what i mean but here's the deal but we take her out and and and she goes out and we were teaching her to be potty trained and she goes out and she goes pop that's a good girl you're going to party you go and party i'm out there in the yard at five in the morning talking to this dog like she's a human being and she's jumping up all over me and when she does good and she knows she's pleased you it brings her immense and it's kind of like a two-year-old three-year-old toddler when they know they're doing good it brings joy to them can i tell you something one of the on the other side of your obedience is not just your miracle it's a joyful fulfilled christian life the story wraps up right here i'm over time two minutes it says so there was food every day she got her miracle but not just for her but for elijah like god got blessed out of this the man of god and for the woman and her because when you get your miracle god is so big he's not just enough he's more than enough not only did she get blessed her family got blessed for the jar of flour was not used up the jug of oil did not run dry in keeping with here it is the word of the lord i don't know what god's spoken to you but can i tell you and that is your miracle [Music] you

Channel: East Coast Believers

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Id: d2SOXS8tkAw

Length: 41min 56sec (2516 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 06 2021