Let’s Face It | Larry Brey | Elevation Church

are you ready for the word of god you sounded about 30 as ready as i need you to be let me ask y'all are you all ready for the word of god l.p skinner is coming to preach in just a moment hang on before he comes this is an epic warrior for jesus christ larry bride larry and janet were two of the original core team members of our church they've been with me all the way they believed in this church when it was nothing more than a sonogram janet told me because she was my dental hygienist at the time i said i'm going to plant a church she said have fun with that i would never go 15 years later she's on the front row but i'll get out of the way because i want to give him the pulpit i just wanted to say that this ministry would not be possible without this man from the time that he almost rammed the gate with his truck at a storage unit to get our equipment so we could have church at the providence high school atrium in the early days to the day that he almost broke the window out of my jeep cherokee so i could have a prop for a sermon illustration as you can see he's got an anointing of violence and i love him for it he hails from minnesota he is a former ncaa division one national champion wrestler or something like that maybe not he wasn't that good but he used to wrestle and what i want you to know about your dad corbin is that he's had my back at every turn no matter what i've asked him to do for the ministry dale and he's had my back at every turn it's just absolutely amazing that whatever we asked him to do to serve god he did it there are pastors in ministry that were burning out and we would always send your dad and we say if we could send them lb it'll be like a intravenous anointing thousands of churches around the world would say we would not be who we are without him and i say that to you today thank you for everything you've signed i want you to welcome to this pulpit today the man who has had more job titles at elevation church than i've had hairstyles the great larry bride come on [Applause] elevation oh i said how we doing elevation [Applause] [Music] um it's hard to come up after that um pastor stephen i love you 15 years ago i said to all that you have in mind i'm with you heart and soul my answer is yes now whatever question you ask the answer will always be yes i wonder if you've already said yes to the question that's waiting to be asked i wonder what would happen of your life if you predetermined the answer before you ever asked the question let's not have conditional faith let's not have a faith that's based upon convenience or comfort is simply saying yes lord yes lord and in the past year and a half all of us have experienced this thing called covid and i think there's two parts of every story that i get into that i always hear and the first one is something like this and then covet happened they could be talking about a marriage they could be talking about a funeral they could be talking about school they could be talking about alone and then covid happened and it's real it happened it did and it's affected all of our lives but there's always the second part of every story that i'm a part of anybody who goes to elevation first part is then coveted happened and the second part is and then pastor stephen preached it's real covet happened but there's a greater reality in the word of god i'm so glad that we live in a house that there's a greater reality and then pastor stephen preached what was it for you because he preaches sermons every week that'll that'll encourage you but there's some that mark the moment maybe it was comfort food same devils new levels built different what you call small unlearn your limitations for me though it was it was lonely places that was the sermon that mark kovet for me because covet affected us but there's a really reality and there was 30 people in the room last july when pastor stephen preached this sermon and he walked off the stage into that entire section here at valentine there's nobody in it and he got in the fourth row one two three four second seat over and he sat there and he talked about the lonely places and for me that hit me because that lonely place i wanted to stay as far away from it as i could i stay away from it by getting busy just saying how you doing today blessed and highly favored brother like i'll do everything i can to avoid that lonely place but pastor stephen does this thing where he kind of forces you into that seat in a loving way and he forces you to look at what you've been hiding from and today i want to talk about what god showed me in that lonely place i watched the sermon eight times that week and i cried every time because god was revealing wave after wave after wave of his revelation of the place that i didn't want to get to that i found the blessing when i sat in it and i just want to unpack for a few moments with you what god showed me in that lonely place maybe this would encourage you for anybody's in that lonely place for anybody who feels like they're outcast or overlooked for anybody who feels like they're marginalized or pushed to the periphery of life this is a word for you god's going to meet you in this place and it's not just going to encourage you it's going to mark the moment it's going to mark the moment of your life help me thank pastor stephen every week for getting in this pulpit and preaching words that we live on i love you pastor stephen thank you we honor you and the character i want to give you a couple of verses and then you'll be seated the character that god led me to is is moses it's in exodus chapter three it's just a few verses this is what i learned in that lonely place that maybe you would be encouraged with exodus three verses one to six it says now moses was tending the flock of jethro his father-in-law the priest of midian he led the flocked to the far side of the wilderness and came to of the mountain of god there an angel of the lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up so moses thought i will go over and see this strange sight why does this bush not burn up when the lord saw that moses had gone over to look he called him from within the bush moses moses and moses said here i am we would do well to consider the cadence of this text god is present but his voice is absent and it's easy for us to stand at a distance saying god speak but your feet aren't moving and the progression of the text indicates that as moses moved god spoke and i want to celebrate your decision to move towards god today to get out of bed and go to the orlando campus to get out of bed and go to the gaston campus to roll over in bed and to click on the link and just to watch those small movements god sees and when you make one small step towards god he comes moving towards you and some of you have felt like god you're at a distance and i can't hear you let's just move towards him and trust that he will speak to you today says do not come any closer god said take off your sandals for the place where you are standing is holy ground then he said i am the god of your father the god of abraham the god of isaac and the god of jacob at this moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at god and for the few minutes we have together i want to consider this subject i need your help announcing the sermon title to your neighbor if you're in a room maybe you'd say it out loud to your cat it's this it's look at you look at your neighbor and say this to him say let's face it now maybe there's somebody else you would have preferred to talk to look at them and say let's face it maybe in the comments you would drop in like some emojis type in the title let's face it you guys can be seated here at valentine in all of our locations thank you worship team now when i was in third grade i loved school i loved it i would sit for hours in the living room and doing my math and doing my science and doing my words it was amazing i would hear my mom little dorothy 4 foot 11 on a good day she would be yelling from the kitchen like i'm so proud of you my baby hercules you look you're so good and i'm like yeah my mom is proud of me i'm smart she's like you're so smart you're so smart and then one day at school my third grade teacher mrs rasmussen she gave me a note to take home to my mom it was stapled together and i thought oh my gosh she wants to like throw a party for me or something she's so proud of me i bet i'm gonna win like student of the month award or something like that so of course i did what every third grader does i open the note the staple didn't mean anything that was insignificant i opened the note but i tried to read it but but that was the problem i couldn't read very good and so i can make out a couple words i can make out one of the words like special i'm like oh mrs rasmussen thinks i'm special oh this is amazing yes miss rasmussen thank you and then i i could make out another word like slow i'm like obviously she's not seen me at pe like i am the fastest kid in the school mrs rasmussen i am very fast what do you mean she must not have seen me and then i came to this other word that i tried to read and i like ream i asked my buddy paul i said what's this word and he said remedial i said what's that mean he said it means you're stupid and i could tell you what i was wearing i could tell you where i was standing and that was the first moment in my life i felt shame i felt it it was like a close like like a coat you put on me and i wore it and so i took the note and i folded it back up and i'm trying to figure out a way to give this to my mom but i'm not going to give it to my mom so i took my little dukes of hazard lunch box and on one side it opened up and you had the thermos and all the stuff in it but on the other side if it had like a secret compartment the other lid opened and you would put like your napkin in there and your soup spoon and all that stuff so i thought that's where i'm going to put my note so i hid it in that little secret compartment so when i took it home and i gave my mom my lunch box the next day mrs rasmussen said did you give the note to your mom i'm like yes i did isn't it amazing what shame will cause you to do that's inconsistent with your character isn't it amazing what shame will get you to do and that day i went home my mom said are you going to do your math i remember telling no mom i'm not very good at it she says what do you mean i just i'm kind of done with that mom so i go back to school and the next week teacher's like well your mom hasn't called me because there was no text message back in this day and she goes here's another note take it home so i put it right with the other note in my dukes it has her lunch box a couple weeks go by she finally feels like i don't think your mom's getting these notes so here's what we're going to do she staples the note to my shirt true story of course i took it off my shirt and i put it right in with the other ones and a couple weeks go by and mrs rasmus is like make sure you give your mom that note so she can call me and i can't even look at her because you know what shame causes you to do doesn't even let you look anybody in the face shame makes you feel so unworthy you can't even look at anybody i can't even look at mrs rasmussen and that little boy who used to do all those math things died and he would never come alive again and i'm walking on the way out to the school bus and accidentally hit my lunch box against the desk and it opens up and outfloats all my notes mrs rasmussen sees it she's like larry and i hide my face and i just start crying she comes in so gently and she says lb larry she says you've got a learning disability but i'm with you she said let's face it so in the text when moses hides his face i identify with that situation that's the lonely space that's the place where you go to where you hide your face because you don't even feel worthy to look anybody else in the face that's that lonely space for me so when god comes to moses in this scene in chapter three of exodus i get it god's got a job for him to do and he's like not me he gives them all these excuses not me send somebody else who should i tell him what about all these things and finally he gives this answer in verse 10 of chapter four says moses said to the lord pardon your servant lord i've never been eloquent neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant i am slow of speech and tongue and if you've grown up around the church world you've heard that voice before and every time you hear the character of moses preach he sounds a little bit like forrest gump with a stutter because i'm not that i can't talk very good and that's the story you've heard your whole life and you've believed a lie because that's not true this is the part about the lonely place it makes you believe lies that are not real they're not real because as i jumped into this lonely place and i started to inspect the story of moses i came to the book of acts where it's recorded luke records this in 722 and this busted the bubble of my perception of moses and maybe god wants to bust your bubble for how you see yourself today the stereotypes you have labeled yourself with the things you said i'm not going to do math because i'm dumb come on because in acts 7 22 it says this it says moses was educated in all the wisdom of the egyptians and was powerful in speech and what like that's got to be a typo that that doesn't really have that that's not in the bible because i always thought that moses was slow and he was dumb but what you're telling me is in the text if there's a place where it says he was powerful in speech and in action it's the same word that pastor referenced a couple weeks ago when he talked about the holy spirit when it comes on you it will give you power it's the same word that's he that's talked of jesus he says with him all things are possible so if the limitless potential of god is in this moment why is moses responding with an inferior answer and it made me examine myself are my answers really just excuses rooted in insecurity or are they responses grounded in truth what answers have you been giving that are rooted in insecurity because it's a story you believed when you were in third grade i'm stupid what is it where's that at this is the lonely place for me this is the place when god took me to that space i didn't want to look at because i couldn't look at my self but before we impugn his character it's under it's important that we look at the backstory never judge the behavior without knowing the backstory never never because how did he get here that would be a good question for you to type into the comments how did you get here how did you get to this point how did you get to these beliefs how did you get into the system where that defines who you are how did you get here and you're saying well i'm just not very smart that's a lie shut your pie hold that's not true but moses believed it but god simply ministered to moses in the moment but let's look at the back story i want to summarize if you flip a chapter over into exodus chapter 2 you could type it into the comments this would be your additional reading during the week verses 1 to 10. let me just summarize for you moses is born onto the scene he's got a mom and a dad amram is dad and joker bed is mom and at that time an issue had been an order had been issued among the israelites from pharaoh the king of the egyptians who said hey the firstborn must be thrown into the nile river the israelites are getting too big we can't let them overtake us so we need to exterminate some of them so they have a baby and the scripture says that he was a fine child it says that he was special in the king james it says goodly it's the same word that when god created he said it was very good the mark of god was on moses his mom and dad saw it and they said we have to protect it and so this week when somebody asks you how are you doing don't let it be just a backhand comment saying i'm i'm good no no no say i'm good i'm good god made me god formed me god fashioned me i'm good i'm good and moses mom and dad and they saw it so they hid him for three months wait no as a grown man he's hiding his face and his life started obscurity being hidden by his parents was his behavior something that was created by god or conditioned by man was the environment that you grew up in did it shape you to change your decisions for how you expressed yourself as an adult how did you get here moses it wasn't the story in that day it was the story that had been unfolding his whole life and you got to peel it back you will not understand the scene of your life unless you rewind the movie a little bit and moses he's he's hidden and they said when he can hide him no longer they had to put him in a basket and toss him out under the nile river mama had to abandon him because she didn't know what to do with him could it be that god has hidden something in your heart and you haven't known how what to do with it and you've been staring at situations say it's not going to happen so i guess i'll just abandon it i wonder how many abandoned dreams are left on the floor of all of our services because you have given up on it and you've let's settle for the lie i'm just not smart i'm not good no that's that's that's not true that's not true that's not true so she has to abandon this thing can you imagine the pain of joker better she just hands over her her son onto the nile river the very thing that was created to destroy him now she has to lay him in but say but but moses older sister miriam was watching in the distance and she sees where the basket comes against the shore and it just so happens that it's near pharaoh's daughter where she's coming down and she's seeing this and god sees you and you might feel like you've been tossed out onto the waves of life but god is controlling the current and he controlled where she landed and he sees and she sees pharaoh's daughter come and get this baby and she just happens to walk oh do you want me to go get one of the hebrew mamas to nurse him for you she says yes so she takes moses back to his mom imagine the joy and joke of bed and hearing like oh my gosh this thing that i gave away come back to me oh my soul and the story gets even better they're going to pay me to do it oh i declare over you whatever the devil has caused you to forfeit god's going to restore it he's going to make him pay for it god's going to make you pay for it and he paid for it and it comes back to her oh my god you brought this back to me but then she hears the other part of the story but you can only have them for a certain time because pharaoh's daughter wants him as her son what god this isn't faith or maybe it really is so now joke about begins this process of training up a child in the way she he should go because she knows she's only got a finite time with him some theologians it would have been only about four years up to about eight years because the child would have needed to be weaned but in that time there wasn't a whole lot of bread on the israelite tables so they would nurse these children as long as they can be could because they kept more food on the table so it's reasonable to assume that joker bed was delaying the process as much as she could because she did not want to hand this child over but she knew she would have to one day so she begins the process of every day looking at most and say moses you're special you're a deliverer your god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob you're created for her to be a deliverer of moses and every day she'd speak it over and she'd speak it over and she'd speak it over and she'd make him repeat it back moses you're a deliverer you are special god's hand is on your life your god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob because she knows she's got to give him over to a household of the egyptians and not just any household the household of pharaoh ramses ii the one who wanted all the israelite babies dead she's got to give her baby too you imagine the uncertainty of this situation and she's got to hand her son over every day moses you can do this moses you can do this moses your god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob and every day every day every day training up this child because she knows he'd end up in a household where they did not believe that god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob no they had a bunch of other gods they were polytheistic they worshipped everything not the true god not the living god so she's got to hide the word in his heart that's so he can endure that environment when he gets handed over imagine the pain of joke about it she holds her boy's hand and she's got tears welling up but she can't let him be expressed she's going to say remember who you are moses remember who you are remember who you are and she's going to walk this child over to be handed over to the egyptians remember moses remember moses remember moses and i have to believe the sound of mom's voice is ringing in moses ears because now he's got to be handed over to the egyptians and the first thing he hears over here is forget forget all that don't let anybody know you're a hebrew god don't let anybody know he is trying to be conformed into the image of an idol in the egyptian household he would have had his clothes changed outside the palace he would have been given a completely new haircut and he was given the name moses moses was not his first name that was the second name we don't even know his first name that was not his jewish name that was his egyptian name and so by the time he gets to the palace he's hearing from his new mom forget all that don't let anybody know don't let anybody know but i have to believe in his heart he still hears mama's voice mama's speaking over my mama said my mama said i'm a deliverer my mama said i am special my mama said my god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob because he's going to have to sit in a religion class because he was trained by all the smartest egyptian minds and they were the leaders in the world at that time and he's got to send in their science classes in their religion classes when they hear about the god ra the god of the son or the god of the moon or the god of the alligators they had all these gods they worship and i have to believe he's sitting in these classes going yeah you get your my god he's the god of abraham isaac and jacob and he hears mama's voice just encouraging him just encouraging him pastor stephen preached it last week spiritual growth isn't always learning something new it's remembering something old i wish i could shake every single one and say do you remember who you are do you remember who you are do you remember who you are do you remember who you are and so moses gets raised in this household and then the story continues in acts chapter 7. it says this in acts 7 23 it says when moses was 40 years old he decided to visit his own people the israelites interesting story i believe that moses knew who he was he knew whose he was and he knew his purpose he weathered the storms for 40 years of living in an egyptian household and the moment came this is the moment god this is what i was created for this is what i'm called to do i'm ready i'm going to jump onto the scene and i'm going to deliver my people here we go god here we go god and because verse verse 2 um the next verse that tells us that verse 24 says he saw one of one of them being mistreated by an egyptian so he went to his defense and avenged him by killing the egyptian verse 25 moses thought that his own people would realize god was using him to rescue them but they did not the whole story hinges on that verse right there but they did not pastor stephen preached last week then they gathered there's a good day and there's a bad day but they did not see see moses he was prepared to stand against the egyptian but he wasn't ready to battle the disbelief of his own people he was he was prepared for the enemy he wasn't prepared for the friend we teach our kids to fight the devil but will we teach them to endure their friends but they did not there was someone who's supposed to look out for you but they did not they said they would be with you for good or for bad for better or for worse but they did not they said they were going to care for you but they did not they said they were going to protect you but they did not who is they who are the ones that were supposed to be there for you that they did not and it's not always the big day sometimes it's you thought it was funny but they did not you thought they'd be proud of you for going to that church but they did not and it was the rejection of the people he was called to rescue that caused him to pause in this moment the very people he was sent to rescue rejected him sounds very much like jesus doesn't it and the story continues he says the next day moses came upon two israelites who were fighting he tried to reconcile them but say men you are brothers and i'm a brother why do you want to hurt each other but the man who was mistreating the other pushed moses aside and said who made you ruler and judge over us and what you see in this pivot point this is a linchpin in the story of moses this is the shift in his life because up until this point he's like i'm created i'm ready here's my moment this is going to happen this is good but they did not and the voice of his mother saying you're creative for this and you can do this it faded in this moment he could not remember it their disbelief caused his doubt wow whose disbelief has caused your doubt but they were supposed to be there for you i just don't think they'd be the smartest decision with your life but they did not don't let they keep you from knowing who [Applause] who here's the question who made you rule and judge over us moses could have appealed at two different levels he's got two nature he's got an egyptian nature and he's got a jewish nature he he's a hebrew and he's egyptian he's got both of these natures and he's so conflicted he is on both of these things on both of these things and some of us are living in a world that you're so conflicted i got one hand raised with a red solo cup on saturday night but i'm raising it on sunday and worship and i'm conflicted i don't feel like i belong in either place i will make it real practical because some of us are straddling the fence in different worlds and we don't feel like we belong in either and when you give equal weight to competing voices you'll always be conflicted you'll always be conflicted but i do believe in my spirit that moses gave greater weight to the voice of his mom and his heart saying you're special you're delivered you're created for this and he could appeal to either of his natures because at an egyptian nature he could have said who made me rule and judge over you you might have heard of him he's my grandpa ramsey's ii pharaoh yo i can do whatever i want i'm the prince of egypt he had a very natural level that he could have appealed and he would have won that argument but he did why did he forfeit his memory in that moment because of their disbelief their disbelief caused his doubt and the entire direction of his life is shifted because of the doubt who has stolen in on you who has busted in on you and stole your faith because of their disbelief but he could have appealed if he would have remembered his mama's voice who made you ruler and judge over us oh wait mama said mama said mama mama said mama mama said mama mama said i'm a deliverer mama said i'm special mama said i'm going to lead the egyptians or the israelites out of egyptian slavery my god is the god of abraham isaac and jacob so i guess my god made me ruler and judge over you he could have appealed at the natural level not at the supernatural level but he forgot both he forfeited it where in your life when you tell the story you go back to the backstory and you can come to this pivot point where did your life shift because of someone else's disbelief that caused your doubt they caused you for to forget who and the story verse 28 says are you thinking of killing me as you killed the egyptian yesterday when moses heard this he didn't even answer he just shut it down and he fled to midian where he settled as a foreigner and he had two sons he's so intimidated by the situation that he ran from it you'll always be defeated by something you're intimidated by moses was intimidated by something he did not understand and because he didn't understand it he was intimidated by it this doesn't make sense god i thought they were going to receive me so rather than actually sitting in this lonely place he hides he was hidden for the first three months of his life in exodus 3 read the story where he's hidden he's hiding in his face that's at age 80. this is at age 40 right here this scene so what does he do he hides himself and where does he go midian million can anything good happen from nazareth it's like midian midian the the egyptians would have referenced it as the abomination they would have called in the scripture says those detestable shepherds of midian so moses has got to go to the place that is detestable in the eyes of the family that he had it's the only place he could go to survive and as moses is heading towards a new place and everything he had is washed away and he's going to go to a place where he's got to learn a whole new language a whole new culture a whole new family a whole new job everything's going to be new it was the second time he would have went through this event in his life because the first time he had to do he went to egypt but as he was going to egypt he was heading to egypt on a with purpose but now when he's heading towards an idiot he's only moving with pain it's different this time isn't it say it's different this time it's different for moses it's different so when we see his behavior of hiding his face in front of god we got to rewind the scene to 40 years earlier when he's like god i tried it your way i thought i heard you in it it didn't work so now he's got to go live in midian he's going to get a new name this would have been his third name he's got to have a whole new family all that's forgotten and it says he lived as a foreigner in the land for 40 years whatever's unfamiliar is always foreign man talk about the last 18 months of our life in this unfamiliar territory but here's the thing for moses even if he became more familiar it was no less foreign because he always felt like he didn't belong there in fact he named his first son gershom which means wanderer foreign and so you got moses i was like god i thought i thought i heard you right i heard mama's voice and it did what she said and didn't work out didn't work out god because we talked about moses being egyptian and being hebrew well for the first seven years of his life he was he he was he was hebrew next 33 years of his life he was egyptian for the next 40 he's median we don't even talk about that part of his life isn't it funny how you skip over big parts of your life that shaped you and you forgot it [Music] because you want to forget the foreign part of it and you want to sit in a moment how are you doing a blessed and highly favored sister but you're a foreigner and moses so when the scene in exodus 3 gets picked up it says moses went to the far side of the wilderness the farce as far away from god as you could be and he paints a picture of moses sitting in this place and it's an image of contentment there's two competing visions of contentment in the scriptures one of them is is from the apostle paul when he pends the book to the philippian church i know it is to be in plenty and i know what it is to be in want i noticed have everything and nothing he says and have learned the secret of being content and he says this is all i'll ever be and it's the highest potential possibility for contentment because it doesn't matter where you put me it doesn't matter what happens to me i know who i am i know and i know whose i am this is all i'll ever be the pendulum swing of contentment now goes way over here to moses and he's sitting in the desert far away from the promises and all he has is pain and he says this is all i'll ever be a foreigner a wanderer this is my lot in life and it's the lowest expression that you could have for your faith i vacillate between these different levels of contentment i like to be like paul but some days i'm a lot like moses and i get it so when god comes to him in exodus 3. i get it i get it i get it and he hides his face he didn't start hiding his face in that moment he started hiding it 40 years earlier it's been in motion for 40 years and now you just see the expression of it and so god comes to him in the middle of this bush and in acts it picks up the story here and i love the way that axe unfolds this acts 30 it says after 40 years had passed an angel appeared to moses in the flames of the burning bush in the desert of mount sinai when he saw this he was amazed at the side he went over to get a closer look and he heard the lord say i am the god of your fathers the god of abraham the god of isaac and the god of jacob moses trembled with fear and he dared not look it brought moses to the place where he's covering his face and i get it i get why he did it in that moment i so i so resonate in that moment with moses as he's in in the scripture it says that he called he called his name twice god did moses moses it's a hebrew term of intimacy it means that god is close means he's whispering because he's he's close but i also think there's a practical reason why he had to say his name twice moses and moses is like who i heard that name a long time who's who's that and here's the second moses it's like oh that guy died a long time ago i don't even want to think about him i just no i can't even go there like don't don't kick that door back up and he thinks it's just his mama's voice in his head but he pushed that down a long time ago that voice died and that part of him was over but he thinks it's just mama's voice and then he realizes like this ain't mama's voice this is actually the god that my mama spoke about talking to me and he hides his face i get it he's given up on everything and now the god that he had heard about is coming to him and he's like i can't no leave me alone god and his response to god in this moment is amazing and i think it paints a picture for the struggle of the lonely place in in exodus 3 11 it says but moses said to god and he says who am i who am i god i don't know who i am am i an israelite am i an egyptian am i a midianite am i a slave am i a prince am i a shepherd am i a failure am i a mistake who am i god i don't know who i am leave me alone i want nothing to do with you i tried it your way i stepped out like my mama said and it didn't work just leave me alone and i love the tenderness of god in this moment i love how god just gently pushes past of all the excuses that he's given in this moment and i think this is what god is speaking over you today as well i think this is what he's telling you because some of you know that hiding place you go to and moses is saying god i can't look at you because i can't even look at myself in verse 12 god said and god said i will be with you because i think god's telling moses moses up until this point you've only heard about me from your mama it's time for you to see me for yourself it's time for you to moses i'll be with you wherever you go i'm in it with you and i think god is telling him let's face it together i'm in this thing with you wherever you go because in the past all you took with you into egypt was a memory from your mama huh no no no god is saying i'm sending you back to egypt this time and it's not just a memory from your mommy it's my presence that will go with you i will be with you moses i got you i'm in this thing with you you don't have to do this on your own and i think some of us are coming to the point that maybe god is saying quit living off of mama's faith quit living off of mama's faith it's time for you to have your own faith it's time for you to see god face to face it's time for you to embrace god rather than just reject him because somebody else rejected you and i love the tenderness of god in this moment and moses asked god like who who who am i supposed to say sent me like if i go to the egyptians in verse 14. god said to moses i am who i am this is who you are to say what you say to the israelites i am has sent you and i think what god was speaking to moses in this moment he says you will never know who you are if you don't know who i am you've been searching for answers you've been searching for answers in yourself the real answers will only come outside of yourself it will only come from that space who am i god i'm saying i am i am your god and for 40 years up until this point point moses had lived as a foreigner he had lived as a failure lived is a fraud a fake all these things and he's hiding his face because he can't even look at himself and it begins this beautiful relationship that moses gets to have with god and in exodus 33 11 says the lord would speak to moses face to face as one speaks with a friend in this moment what i picture is is god gently grabbing moses by the chin and lifting it up so that he could see god's face and he spoke over him friend you've lived as a foreigner but i call you friend you feel like a failure but i call you friend you feel like you are such a fraud but i call you friend god speaks over you i call you friend and i will go with you i will be with you i'll never leave you i'll never forsake you i will be with you as one speaks with a friend and god is saying to moses let's face it together he would see god face to face and for me sitting in that lonely seat over there this last year has stripped a lot away from us and if i'm really honest one of my biggest struggles in my life is always my worth coming from my work my identity is so intertwined into what i do so that as i lost parts of job it wasn't that i lost parts of a job it's i lost parts of me and it made me wonder like who am i and i sat in that lonely seat and i'm so glad pastor preached on it because it was for me and that lonely place i had to ask the question god who am i because i don't know who i am and if you're in that seat or you struggle with that see maybe you would take comfort from how god comforted me he said it's the right question who am i he said it's just the wrong perspective he said god said he's spoken to my spirit he said lb you keep asking me who you are how about you flip it you hear me ask you who am i [Music] he's my beginning in my end he's my bride and morning star he's my wonderful counselor he's my ever-present help in trouble he is my rock he's my salvation he's my mighty refuge he is the gate he is my jesus he is my savior but the only way i saw that [Music] was in the lonely place and i sat and i thought about moses why did you why did you faint in the moment like i do pastor preached borrowed confidence [Music] you put your confidence in determines when it leaves i think moses put his confidence in what his mama said i think he put it in what the teachers taught him i think he put it in the thought that they would receive him and when that was taken away he had no confidence so if i put my confidence in what i do when that leaves i come to an identity crisis you and i can have confidence in the finished work of jesus christ you and i can have confidence in the salvific work of jesus that he's died of substitutionary death for your sin and for my sin because as jesus went up onto the cross they didn't nail him but he put himself up there they didn't take his life he gave it and as he's on the cross all the sin that should have been laid on you and on me was laid on him and there was a moment that the sin the wrath the the penalty for all the sin needed to be laid on him and as he stretched on the cross god had to turn his face away from his son for a moment and the sky grows dark and the veil is torn and jesus cries out in a loud voice my god my god why have you forsaken me because he didn't see his father's face he didn't feel his presence and for three days it was dark [Music] and the enemy thought they had won but after three days god turns his face back towards his son and he said let's face it here's the keys to hell in the grave rising victory and he broke the end out of a borrowed two and he rose in victory [Applause] you and i you and i can have the assurance that god sees you face to face why because of the finished work of jesus because when god looks at me he doesn't see lb he sees jesus and as jesus ascended he said i will not leave you as an orphan but i will send my spirit to live in you and where you go he will go with you god promises to be with you to never forsake you to never leave you and he's saying let's face it together whatever's going on in your life let's face it together because i'm with you if you go to the mountaintops i'm there if you go to the depths i'm there where can you go to escape his love he is with you that's the assurance you have if you've placed your faith in jesus and if you haven't placed your faith in jesus this is the moment that god brought you to this is the moment that will mark you for the rest of your life if you have never placed your faith in jesus he is asking you to come in and he says i will be with you in all of our locations would you buy your heads and close your eyes someone feels the presence of god in their spirit right now and you feel him calling you back to yourself as he ran after moses so he's running after you 40 in the bible means season first season of moses life was marked by man's rejection at age 80 it was marked when he saw god's acceptance would you accept him today would you receive him today in all of our locations all of our online or epham i need you to pray with me out loud pray this with me for the benefit of somebody who's making this decision to place their faith in jesus i believe that jesus christ is the son of god who died on the cross and rose from the grave to forgive me of my sin i give you my life i give you my sin i give you my shame forgive me and i'll spend my life following you with your head still bowed in your eyes they're closed if you just place your faith in jesus i'm gonna count to three when i get there without hesitation boldly shoot your hand into the air this is your moment this is the time where you see god one two three shoot your hand up all of our locations come on all of our locations ethan if you just made that decision let us know in the chat let us know in the chat come on let's celebrate that elevation come on now let's celebrate that elevation thanks for joining us today we pray that god spoke to you through the message that you just heard and you're able to take it and apply it to your life don't forget to comment in the chat and let us know what god spoke to your heart subscribe to the channel hit the bell stay up to date with the notifications of when we have new videos and when we go live there's a place for you to be a part of how god is moving here at elevation church for more information head to elevationchurch.org you can find all of the information on how to give get involved and join us live each and every week thanks again for being a part of the family we can't wait to see how god continues to work in and through your life right where you are

Channel: Elevation Church

Views: 207,546

Rating: 4.963151 out of 5

Keywords: elevation church, larry brey, let’s face it, elevation church sermons, pastor steven furtick, steven furtick, larry brey sermons, pastor larry brey, 2021 sermons, preaching, preacher, shame, character, purpose, insecurity, remembrance, doubt, contentment, confidence, truth, moses, mama said, deliverer, God of Abraham Issac and Jacob, sermons about shame, sermons about confidence, LB

Id: _I4I8MGERDg

Length: 48min 16sec (2896 seconds)

Published: Sun May 30 2021