I See It Now | Pastor Dharius Daniels | Elevation Church

[Applause] well listen i love god's word i'm excited to share it today and um you know i'm thinking around this whole idea of questions and questions from the bible questions that people in the bible had about god this is what i've learned it's it's one thing for us to question god we see some of that in the bible it's another for god to have questions for us and when god asks us the question is not to gather information is to give it when he asks us the question he doesn't need to see something he's trying to show us something and uh it's around that thought that i want to read a few verses in the book of job job chapter 42 verse number 1 we see job responding to a question god asked him it says then job replied to the lord i know you can do all things no purpose of yours can be thwarted you ask job is saying god you acts who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge then job says surely i spoke of things i did not understand things too wonderful for me to know you said listen now and i will speak i will question you and you will answer me listen to what job says in verse 5 he said my ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you i last time i was here i taught from the subject i didn't see that coming i want to talk from this subject and our time together today i see it now clap your hands in the house and in your house if you're ready for god's word [Applause] you could be seated a danish philosopher and theologian soren kierkegaard is credited with this quote he says life is lived forward but only understood backwards he seems to be suggesting that there are some things that are going on or that will go on in your present that will only make sense in your future in other words just because something doesn't make sense now doesn't mean it doesn't make sense [Applause] it may mean you have not gotten to the place space or season in your life where god makes sense out of it [Applause] and i'm wondering if any of us can pause for the cause and do some reflecting in our own life and if we reflect objectively i believe we have to honestly admit that there were some things in our past that we did not understand then that we did not value then that did not make sense to us then that felt damaging then but now when we look back in retrospect we gain respect for that season because the thing i thought that was destroying me was the thing god was using to develop me come here joseph and my pit and my prism became the pathway to my palace [Applause] life lived forward but understood backwards kierkegaard is uh are articulating the essence of this principle i call the principle of perspective what does that mean where you sit determines what you see and what you see determines what you do where you sit determines what you see and what do you see determines what you do there are some things you can see that i can't see not because they don't exist but because we aren't sitting in the same place [Applause] because where you sit determines what you see and what you see determines what you do and this is why some individuals become confused dumbfounded flabbergasted when they look at your life in the midst of this uncertain season you're still living with a degree of conviction and certainty that they're looking at you when everything seems to be crumbling all around us but somehow you're still being held together they're looking at you when everyone else seems to be having pity parties you're having praise parties in the closet in the car in the living room on the ipad with the desktop come on talk to me we're having praise parties and people feel like well maybe they're just engaged in some religious fanaticism maybe they're just denying the reality of what's going on maybe they're operating with some sense of intellectual inferiority no no no no no you don't understand what i'm doing cause you don't see what i'm seeing and you don't see what i'm seeing cause you're not sitting where i'm sitting when i got saved i was raised to life in christ seated in heavenly places and so now i see things from a different perspective and i see what the enemy means for evil god's going to work for good so i don't have to wait until the battle is over but i can praise god right now because where you sit determines what you see and what you see determines what you do and this is important essential when we find ourselves listen to me please in job-like seasons pasadena's what is that what do you mean by that a job-like season i'm referring to a gentleman in the old testament named job there's a part of his story situated in a section of the bible called wisdom literature meaning that this part of the bible contains books that god wants us to gain wisdom from and job's story is put in the pages of scripture because god wants us to gain wisdom from job on how to handle job-like seasons darius what is a job-like season a job-like season is a season of ambiguity it's a season where you have to watch this where you have to keep advancing without some answers [Applause] it's a season where you want answers god refuses to give you [Applause] it represents seasons where where you have to move on without closure [Music] it's the season where god separates and differentiates what you think you need and what you actually need [Applause] it's god's way of saying you think you need an answer to advance and because i'm committed to supply all of your needs if you really needed an answer right now i give you one but because i haven't given you one it's an indication that you got the ability to advance without it and i need to pause today and i need to speak to somebody who feels like you're waiting on some answers and you're trying to make sense out of some things that don't make sense if god hasn't given your answer now it's because you don't need an answer now and maybe god's encouragement to you is to move on anyway is to advance anyway is to thrive anyway [Applause] maybe you don't need what you think you need to do what god is calling you to do maybe god's trying to wean you off of something that you become co-dependent on that he gave to you but you used the gift as a crutch and you became more confident in the crutch than you did in your christ [Applause] and he says in this season let me take that crutch to reveal to you that sometimes you don't know i'm all you need until i put you in a situation well i'm all you got [Applause] [Music] job likes caesars see this principle of perspective is incredibly important because it helps me manage wisely job-like seasons it helps me manage those seasons with wisdom so that our anxiety about ambiguity does not cause us to act impulsively you understand what i'm saying that right so so the the damage that anxiety about ambiguity can cause is not just what we feel it's what we do as a result of those feelings right it's like it's like a an old testament character named abraham who was very old in age and his wife was old also and god says to them okay you guys are going to have a child in the old age and so they were already old when they got the promise and watch this and watch this while they're waiting on the promise they they deal with a season i believe a season where they get to the point and they something causes them to act impulsively so sarah recommends that abraham hook up with someone named hagar and as a result of that uh she gives birth to a child named isaac what does isaac represent isaac represents the fruit of impulsive activity it's what you produce when you get ahead of god and it didn't stop abraham from getting to the place god had for him it just made the journey much more difficult than it had to be this principle of perspective helps us manage these seasons with wisdom because what you see sit determines what you see and what you see determines what you do so maybe there are times i don't understand what god is doing because i'm not seeing what god is seeing and i'm not seeing what god is saying because i'm not sitting where god is sitting i see to the corner he sees around the corner i see to the hill he sees over the hill i see today he sees tomorrow i see the crucifixion on friday but he lets me hang on the cross because he sees a resurrection [Applause] coming sunday morning and maybe god's not behaving the way we feel like we should he should be behaving maybe god's not intervening in the way we feel like god should be intervening because we're looking at the same thing but we don't see the same thing right an example of this is in john 11 when the bible says there was a man named lazarus who was dead and the scriptures say who who was uh yeah who was there and the scriptures say that jesus gets word of his death and he says these words lazarus has fallen asleep now everybody else is saying he's dead but from jesus's perspective he's asleep so everybody else is expecting the jesus to rush because lazarus is dead but jesus doesn't rush because in his mind lazarus is asleep they looking at the same thing but they aren't seeing the same thing and jesus is like i'm not rushing because you think what i'm actually doing is performing a resurrection but in my mind i'm just waking them up from a nap [Applause] because where you see it in terms of what you see what you say is what you do maybe that opportunity didn't manifest itself maybe that that that promotion didn't happen maybe that transfer didn't happen maybe that contract didn't happen maybe you being positioned at the department in that department didn't happen six months ago because god knows six months from now that department's gonna phase out see where you sit determines what you see what you see determines what you do and job's story is an incredible example of this reality we are introduced to this gentleman named job with these words in job 1 verse 1 it says in the land of us there lived a man whose name was job he was blameless and upright he feared god and shunned evil i very rarely have i seen the bible speak so favorably about a man and very rarely have i seen the bible give such detail about the character of a man so the writer of this narrative is trying to get us to see that if anybody should have been able to avoid seasons of ambiguity and uncertainty it should be this man it's trying to get us to see if anyone should be exempt from unfavorable circumstances and inconveniences it should have been this man but but this man starts experiencing this downward trajectory of tragedy and so the writer rather literally or metaphorically gives us some behind the scenes spiritual backstory to see what is happening to facilitate this tragedy and so whether literally or metaphorically the writer says that one day angels were lined up to have conversations with god and one angel a fallen angel named satan had to stand in line just like everybody else so he's saying uh that's how that's how much of a defeated foe he is he's got to stand in line just to get an audience with the father he over inflates his ability because he wants to intimidate us into believing he's got more power than he has but my bible tells me jesus gave us power over all the power of the enemy he got a standing line [Applause] he's standing in line y'all he's standing in line and he gets to he he finally he finally gets his turn and god god's such a boss he gets his turn god say what's up you say none so where you been i just been to valentine and roanoke and melbourne and greenville and rock hill and university city just trying to find somebody's life to mess up and god says have you considered job wait a minute god wait a minute i just read in the land of us there lived a man named job he was blameless and upright he feared god and shunned evil and god says yeah how you consider job wait a minute there are some other people in my bible that i think might be better recommendations i'm going to see if i can find anybody that's honest have you ever felt like god i don't want this to happen to anybody but i am wondering why this happened to me and not the person down the street it's a powerful picture right of just ambiguity we don't have an answer i can give you some hypothesis i don't have an answer this it reigns on the just and the unjust that's the declaration of a reality that exists in the world but i do not have the rationale for that reality it's like man sometimes the worst stuff happens to the best people that's tough isn't it so he says have you considered my servant job and watch what satan says he says well does job fear god for nothing he says have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has hold up wait a minute the text says that satan says have you not put a hedge around him his household and everything he has it didn't say that god said i put a hedge around him his household and everything he has come on come on follow the floor he says uh where you been i've been all over trying to find somebody's life to mess up have you considered my servant job yes but you put a hedge around him his household and everything he has wait a minute you not only satan know who job is but you also know there's a hedge around them here's my question if god didn't tell you there was a hedge how did you know unless you tried to get to him previously and you couldn't because of the hedge and maybe we ought to pause and thank god for hedges you don't know about maybe sometimes we are so focused on the things that got to us not realizing that every day there are some things that don't get through because of a hedge i want to tell you for every time the devil got through there were more times he couldn't get through because of a hedge of protection that was around you now listen i know what it's like to praise god for things we know about that he did i want us wherever we are in the car in the living room in the kitchen i want us to praise god for the things he blocked that we don't know about his hedge he says he says have you not put a hedge around him and this household and everything he has it means you've been trying not just to get to me you've been you've been trying to get to my house some people in your house are being blessed by your hedge that's a result of your faithfulness to a god they want nothing to do with you hear what i just said there are times when people like why are you so committed to that church or why are you so committed to that god and they don't even realize that the reason i'm able to be who i am to you and the reason i the reason i am to able to handle you in a responsible manner is because of this very church you're complaining about and you're benefiting from a hedge that is protecting you that's a result of my commitment to god's church that you're complaining about complaining about what they benefiting from don't even know they benefit from your hedge so the bible says satan leaves presence of god and begins to engage in orchestrating so influencing some people to do some interesting things and then there are some unexplainable natural disasters that happen that also directly impact job so this is one of the things that happens the bible calls it a windstorm so we don't know during these times there weren't meteorologists and weathermen and so we don't know if this was a tornado or a hurricane but some natural disaster happened and it hit his children's house and he lost his kids now this is what the text says and it says while someone was giving him that news while they were still giving that news somebody else came and said listen all of your assets which were agricultural back in that day oxen cattle says a group of people named the sabians have just come they stolen that from you and and are you following me and while that person the bible says while they were still speaking someone else comes and gives some bad news i want you to see how the enemy is at work here it is sequential it is cumulative have you ever felt like if it's not one thing it's another have you not felt like when it rains it pours this is a strategy of the adversary to get us to act out of our anxiety because when the before the enemy takes us out he tries to wear us down did you hear what i'm saying so the sequential nature of what's happening weakens your resolve have you ever felt that way that okay i got big faith and i'm believing god and then you just get hit with blow after blow after blow and then your resolve is weakened samson your hair is cut and then when you lose your strength here come the philistines and the bible says in the midst of all of this job did not charge god with any wrong doing it's amazing but what i love about this story is that that very often is where teachers and preachers stop but in chapter 2 the bible says satan comes back to god and says yeah i need another round here's my question if you took his kids if you took his assets if you disrupted the course and the quality of his life why are you coming back in chapter two trying to get more access to job maybe it's because everything you took in chapter 1 was not what you were really after because satan's exchange with god initially said if you take his stuff then he will curse you to your face and break his level of commitment so maybe satan is coming back because he's frustrated that no matter what he took he still didn't get the one thing he was really after he was out the job's commitment and i want to tell somebody that's listening to this and watching this that the enemy is equally as frustrated with some of you because he's been coming after this and messing with that and infiltrating this and stealing that but he's upset because he's not getting the thing that he's after he wants your commitment to god but you've got a job-like resolve that says though he slay me yet will i trust him you can take everything but you cannot have my commitment [Applause] so satan says all right i got all this stuff but let me get access to him and job gets inflicted with personal sickness and suffering his wife is his only caretaker because his children are gone his assets are diminished he can't hire any help he's not used to living this way his listen his quality of life has diminished relationally financially and now physically and his wife who i don't believe was a bad woman i believe she got caretakers fatigued i don't think we should judge her whole story on a statement i think we at times paint an unfair picture of job's wife not excusing or affirming or endorsing what she said but stress will make you say things let me see if i can find the honest section if i'm teaching if i'm if you're honest say you teaching pastor put it in the chat listen to this listen stress and pressure [Applause] will make you say things listen to this you don't mean two people you really love and that's what she says she said it's interesting the coincidence she says she recommends to job that job do the same thing that god said he wouldn't do she said why don't you just curse god and die insensitive so everything in job's life seems to be unraveling at the same time and he did nothing wrong then all of a sudden his pseudo spiritual friends come over [Music] [Applause] his friends come over one comes over all deep you know i had a dream right and everybody's giving him all of his friends they're either trying to give him spiritual answers or religious platitudes that you don't want to hear in a season of them ambiguity god's got a plan i know [Applause] god's gonna work it all together for your good i know they misunders they didn't have relational intelligence they misunderstood the power of the ministry of presence that when there is trauma and ambiguity and pain you don't always have to offer words you give the gift of your presence the bible refers to the holy spirit as a comforter there are times where god helps us with strange and suffering seasons not by saying anything but by giving us the gift of his presence and sometimes many of you may feel like i don't know what to say i don't know what to do and it's like no sometimes the doing is in the being and job now at this point he's deflated he's confused and what he didn't do in chapter one he did he starts to question god and god sits silently and he listens from chapter 4 all the way to chapter 38. god says nothing job questions god i love this you know i love it the fact that job questioned god says to me he has a healthy view of god because you cannot hide your real thoughts from a god who knows them and there are times we deny what we feel right right and so and so all these chapters god just listened to job and then all of a sudden he says all right i'm kind of tired of this and in chapter 38 god speaks to job and in verse 3 this is what he tells job he says brace yourself like a man [Music] he says all right he says now i will question you you've had questions of me but now i have a question to you and i want you to answer me go on jesus where were you when i laid the earth's foundation tell me how i did that right he's talking about what calvin would call natural creation that demonstrates the genius of god that just creation itself is evidence of intelligent design it takes more faith not to believe in intelligent design than it does to believe in a god watch this who put the sun close enough to the earth where you can get his heat but far enough away will you not consume a god who puts just the right amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere so that you can breathe in a way a god who allows clouds to be filled with water the water to release itself in the form of rain to irrigate the land to grow what we need to grow to eat to feed the cattle that we need to sustain us and then evaporate back up in the atmosphere he says who marked off his dimensions surely you know since you know everything [Music] who stretched the measuring line across it or on what footings were it set or who laid its cornerstone while all the morning stars sing together and all the angels shouted for joy you know what god's trying god is god is asking job a question and he's not trying to get information he's trying to give it when god asks a question he's not trying to see something he's trying to get us to see something what is he trying to get job to see he's trying to get job to see i am the ultimate expression of intelligence and just because this watch this just because this doesn't make sense to you doesn't mean this doesn't make sense it's not that my ways job contradict reason it's my ways to transcend your reasoning my thoughts are higher than your thoughts i see something you don't see you looking at chapter 38 but i'm looking at chapter 42 where i'm getting ready to give you double for all of your trouble watch this this is what i want you to see in the midst of uncertainty god asks job a question because he's wanting job to get something he's wanting everything god said was about him he never told him why the sabians he never told him why the sickness he never told him why your wife said that he didn't give him assurance about it but he gave job assurance about him in the midst of uncertainty he says job you don't have to be certain about it as long as you're certain about me and so when you hit seasons where you're filled with angst and anxiety about what you don't know job teaches us to lean on what you do know and i do know god is good i do know god is faithful i do know god will come through i do know no weapon formed against me shall prosper i do know i'm more than a conqueror i do know he will restore unto me the years that the enemy stole from me he helps him walk through ambiguity not by giving him certainty about it but by giving him certainty about him [Applause] he says job i know you want to know the reason for all of this and i know you want an answer with this i know you want certainty about this but right now you just need to be certain about me and we're in an age of uncertainty when a season of unprecedented uncertainty you've got two options to focus on the uncertainty of it or the certainty of him [Applause] you can focus on what you don't know about it or you can lean on what you do know about him and i love it it's in our foundational text the bible says then job replied to the lord i know you can do all things watch this and no purpose of yours can be thwarted meaning that what you have for me will be performed in me and through me regardless of what happens to me that i'm surprised by this but you are not and this may feel like a delay oh to me but it is not denial no purpose of yours can be thwarted you ask who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge and then job admits he says surely i spoke of things i didn't understand things too wonderful for me to know he said you said listen now and i will speak and i will question you and you will answer me and in verse 5. he said my ears had heard of you i was blameless i was upright i was moral i hated evil but i didn't know that i didn't know you that i knew morals more than i knew you that i knew ethics more than i knew you that i knew religious platitudes and i knew scripture more than i knew you he said i didn't know how much i didn't know you until now he said my ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you i see it now i was i was complaining about the mess but missing the miracle that i was alive to complain [Music] [Applause] i wouldn't even be able to complain about the mess if it wasn't for the miracle of my survival you surviving that all your assets gone you surviving that all your children gone in an accident you surviving that your own wife telling you curse god and die you surviving that your friends turning their back on you telling you you need to repent you're surviving that and in the midst of this job did something i think we need to do in your home in your well not in your car if you're driving do it in your heart if you're driving there's a part of job's story where it says and job fell to his knees and he worshipped and this is what i've learned y'all worship is not therapy but it is therapeutic i i i think i think it says in psalms 82 you have established you've established through the praise of children and infants you've established a stronghold against your enemies did you catch that through the praise the praise created a stronghold a fortress offense in my thought realm because praise requires mindfulness on the goodness of god and those good thoughts about the goodness of god serve as a guard and a garrison that that blocks some of that negativity from getting there worship is a defense weapon [Applause] it's not just spiritual antics it's a spiritual weapon because it reminds me of the real thing i need to know in seasons of uncertainty god is good god is for me and god is faithful and i'm talking to you wherever you are all over the world god is good god is for you and god is faithful i don't have any more answers but god is good god is for you and god is [Applause] faith and may his favor go before you and behind you and besides you all around you in your weeping in your rejoicing he for you thank you for watching the elevation church youtube channel don't stop here join the e-fam our online extended family and join us live every sunday subscribe to this channel so you don't miss a single video or live stream and share this with a friend you can also support the ministry by clicking the give now button to help us continue to reach people around the world for jesus christ thank you again for watching god bless you

Channel: Elevation Church

Views: 403,701

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Keywords: elevation church, dharius daniels, i see it now, elevation church sermons, pastor steven furtick, steven furtick sermons, dharius daniels sermons, 2020 sermons, preaching, preacher, perspective, clarity

Id: ZMMVkbUu8Vs

Length: 41min 46sec (2506 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 01 2020