Living In Thornbush & Tumbleweed Times - Ralph Douglas West

hi I'm Ralph Douglas West pastor the church without walls I'm so excited you've joined us today our heart is the usher lost souls to Christ and a power believers dog spiritual maturity I'm three of the share that hardwood you today through the life transforming power of God's Word I also want to invite you to get data encouragement by signing up for my free devotional that Ralph Douglas West data log again I'm so glad you're with us the day I pray you'll be encouraged well this has been an exciting past week the most different kind of presidential election that we've ever witnessed in American history I said to my children this is a great time to be alive yes it is this is a great time leadership matters leadership matters presidentially after the bright light of hope that shine from the presidency of Abraham Lincoln it was followed by the dim dusky glow of Andrew Johnson the then-known world would say leadership matters it matters in business General Electric never became the General Electric that people knew after after the retirement of Jack Welch leadership matters to entrepreneurs after the demise of Steve Jobs stockholders have been criticizing since his death creativity is at an all-time low it seems to be gone even though we'll always download in something creativity according to these people has disappeared leadership mattered biblically to on the world stage a king had ascended to the throne named Saul he was followed by the poet King David and then by his sage son Solomon but after Solomon came his son Rehoboam who was certifiably a nutcase no seriously he disregarded good advice he adhere to ill advice he was hot-headed uncontrollable easily agitated he was one who had bad temperament poor poise and posture under pressure and he did something that no one else in Israel history had ever done and that was to divide the kingdom's anybody in that day and anyone who's a fan of history will tell you leadership matters and where there's the absence of worthy leadership on where the leadership will take its place thus leads us to the our story in judges chapter nine that somebody is going to lead Abimelech is a son of Gideon Gideon is not really cool in his grave yet before Israel derails and goes whoring after other gods she prostitutes herself out she embraces a different unethical lifestyle and now she has erected a Bill of Covenant and it's giving itself over to it Gideon has gone Abimelech sees a vacancy for leadership and under stealth he takes a journey to Shechem to his mother's brothers his uncles and he proposes to them that he would make a good leader if they would speak on his behalf to the powers to be and recommend him to the position when they are not moved initially he says well remember you and I were the same flesh and blood so in doing this he now sends out the proposal and they take it to who needs to hear it and they accepted they give him 70 coins he goes out and hires the worse riff-raff that he can find as hitmen and they go to Oprah his daddy's hometown and kills his seventy brothers on one stone it was a massacre as a bloody mess all of them gone except for one Jotham had escaped fearing for his life seeing this mayhem and Massacre he runs and he hides into furtive woods and forest and he holds up there and then it gets worried that by the big old treat well shrine had been erected his brother Abimelech have been crowned as king that's the first act and seemed of the story and out of it the lesson that we learn is that somebody is going to lead that's what Abimelech teaches us in judges chapter 9 when the word comes to Jotham of his brothers being crowned as king he he learned another lesson and that is not all worthy choices will accept the job Jotham goes to the pinnacle of Mount Gerizim and he cries out from the mountain for acoustic effects hey hey listen up and though Jotham is not a preacher he knows something about preaching and God and people theologians take God seriously poets take words seriously the preacher takes people seriously Jotham takes God and words and people seriously any crafts a parable a story we like stories I do people learn from stories you'll forget all of everything else I said but you'll remember the stories this is a parable it's a story with a meaning that teases the mind and activates our thoughts words that don't belong to me but they fit here today story awakens our imagination and Jotham now crafts a parable and he actually hears prelude to the method that Jesus would use when he talks to so many people once upon a time a group of trees needed a king and the trees went to olive tree and asked will you be king over us aha if tree said man do you know what I do I'm probably the most important agricultural entity in the field I'm used for daily usages I'm used for cooking and medicine lubricants and laxatives are softened leathers I'm poured over food for zest you want me to stop being productive to the world and humanity and to the gods and men to be demoted to waving over some trees the delegation went to another orchard to fig tree the rain over me I'm not as important as the big olives but my role in life is to add add mouth-watering sweetness to people that crave after that I mean they use me and fig newtons and fear why I bring so much enjoyment of life I belong to a party as much smaller than the big olive but no I don't want to be reduced that all I'm doing is presiding in some kind of function over some trees no further down the arch it they run into divine would you reign over us be our king and Vine said that that would be something because they use me for ceremonial acts they use me even in churches for Lord's Supper and when you can't get your tongue flowing properly people drink me because I know how to cut loose stammer in tongue my vine sometime is used for medicinal purposes but not most of the time I just bring so much joy to people that take me in I would it would be nice and I appreciate you asking me to reign over you but no I don't think I want to spend my better years of life ruling over trees so since were the leaders wouldn't lead tumbleweed was ask and I can tell many of you are not from Texas because all Texans know what a tumbleweed is and when Texans read judges 9 they get tickled by the time they get to tumbleweed because tumbleweed is about to make a proposal will you be king of us and tumbleweed full of thorns that agitates everything that comes around it that is belligerent and says says you're not playing with me are you and though tumbleweed is easily irritated tumbleweed is not as dumb as people think they are because temple weed makes a proposal and says now have you serious that you can come find shade draw near and live under my shade and that's where Texans are just falling out because all Texans know that the one thing that at umber we cannot do is provide shade one it ain't built to provide shade it doesn't grow to provide shade is high this allows shade and yet for people to believe that tumbleweed can provide what tumbleweed cannot provide is a mystery to me tumbleweed don't know how to give shade it doesn't know how to give conflict because tumbleweed have never done it in all of its life in fact you can put tumbleweed in a purple hot house is still gonna be a tumbleweed I'll give you shade and then tomba we said but I discovered that you're toying with me i'ma burn you up i'ma burn you up everybody that says something about me I'm gonna burn you up if you don't support me I'm gonna burn you up tumbleweed ain't down tumbleweed may not give you shade but tumbleweed will burn you up I know some of you you would want to take issue with that you know and said no that's not true and that's fine tumbleweeds are like rattlesnakes they don't make good pets ain't got no loyalty no way tumbleweed now I'm done now after the story Jotham now explains beginning at verse 16 and in and around verse 21 what he what he meant leaders lead and were the leader sometime declined a job offer but the last thing the story tells us is that God uses sometimes the unworthy for judgment on his nation look this is not a prediction those you've been around me no I don't play with God is worried like that this is not a prediction but emphatically it's a mystery you see what Jotham is criticizing is not so much the kingship the judgment is upon the people that would select the oven were the king in the first place Abimelech can't be king over god's people and less he has the support of the people of Shechem so Jonathan is saying look I'm not talking about a bimolecular see he's always wanted to be at the top he'll always wanted to be a part of the ruling class always but he can't get that by himself I'm concerned about anybody that can close their eyes to ethics and morals and value and bypass it that's what I'm concerned about this is not about red and blue or black and white but it does have something to do with common sense human decency love of fellow man and woman it does have something to do with that but God sometimes can use unworthy leaders to be judgment on his own nation let me say it again sometime God can use what's under judgment to execute judgment upon God's own people I don't know how God does it here's the word mystery is mystery you don't know how God's going you don't know how to nail God down to some table you cannot domesticate God you can't dictate to God what God's gonna do in fact God is disinterested this morning he doesn't care who's in the White House black white male female red blue that's not his issue what his concern is can my people who are called by my name arm of themselves seek my face turn from that wicked way being out here from heaven I'll forgive sins and I'll heal the land the roll this morning is not political for us it's theological I have nothing political to say this morning I let the pundits and I let the professionals and the experts in that discipline do that I speak this morning solely as the pastor of the church with our walls to his community of faith to say to us that God is mysterious and God works in mysterious ways judge not the Lord by feeble sense but trust God for His grace for behind his crowning Providence stairs his smiling face I said earlier and I said again it's a good time to be alive because you don't know what God can do until the sky get dog you don't know how God can keep you that sustain you and deliver you until your back is against the wall until it looks like all hope is gone God specializes oh yes he does and God can use the ugliest instruments to accomplish his will if the mystery God works in mysterious ways we've seen this throughout history we don't have to reach out into orbit and guess edit we are tangible historical evidence that God can take strange bizarre things and turn them to his purpose who would have thought that God would have used at Meza and Babylon to wake israel out of her lethargy and turn back to him who would have ever thought that God will use Cyrus the Persian King to turn against people back in that direction who would have thought that God would have used that neo Chaldeans to weight God's people up and said you better head back to where your hope and your promise and your future lies God works in mysterious ways we're almost increase Christmas I don't want to jump over Thanksgiving but we're coming to the Advent season in a couple of weeks and we were reminded that the mysterious of ways of God worked that the wise men the Magi who shows up are wiser than the governor Herod himself will read about an apostle paul who lonas ship and he's no captain than the captain of the ship God has a way of reminding us that he moves in mysterious ways oh yes he does and God can take the ugliest things and bring Beauty out of them that's a verse in the scripture God can take the earthly things I mean what looks just terrible and he can bring Beauty out of them let me close with another parable then a parable of never parable for this parable and that is look at the Acorn ugly Oh April ACORN hanging in the tree and in the fall that falls down rolls to the sidewalk into the street and a squirrel comes along picks up the eighth card finds a field buries it leaves it along and that acorn now begins to dissolve and integrate with the ingredients of the earth and it just vanishes away but a hundred years later you come back and there's a hundred-foot oak tree that's the result of a duckling aint card if God can take an old beat-up road over a card and bring promise and hope for a tree what you think he will do for the blood wash redeemed but those that put his trust in here it's a good time to be alive maybe not for you but it's a good time for me to be alive I'm gonna get a chance to see God do some stuff that he's been wanting to do because one thing we know about a tumbleweed it'll make you pray tumbleweed I'll make you get up and go to church tumbleweed to tell you I need to be in the room with some living bodies I need to be in fellowship don't worry about it they'll be here cuz when tumble we get through doing what tumbleweed is supposed to do we gonna have some church up in this place huh oh yes we are he's gonna be revival on Sunday morning you and I are part of a faith tradition where God took the ugliest thing in the world and turned it into the beauty of his glory if you could put Abraham Isaac and Jacob on the stage and then if you could put Matthew Mark Luke and John if you could put Peter Paul and James if you could put James and John and Andrew and Philip on the stage they all would save from the past Abraham Isaac and Jacob would say I saw it at the future and then Peter James and John they would say we live in its reality they would say we saw the Douglass piece of wood ever nailed together in our lives it was horrendous and on that cross on that piece of wood they nailed our Lord it was the worst thing that you had ever seen or heard in your life it was morning and groaning and tears and sighing and crying and earthquakes and temples being broken up and curtains torn in two it was dark it looked bad it was over Friday closed that's it done we're going home and before we could get what we were trying to go early on a Sunday morning some women went down to the tomb and said y'all leaving too early tell him that stone been rolled away Jesus that was killed on Friday and Barrett got up this morning and it's a good time to be alive because he's not over in Galilee he's not just sitting at the right hand of the Father he's walking in here now and trying to act somebody why you wringing your hands why are you pulling out your hair I can understand for eight years to read that hand because they don't have any hope in the eternal future ring in that hand because they'll split down the middle on their own their own their belief they don't know what to believe that doubting and disbelieving but you whom God woke up and God gave a new chance of wait a minute you blood wars Holy Spirit filled Bible readers early about 30 minutes ago I said it's a good time to be alive you were looking at meetings like he lost his mind well I'm here to tell you it's a good time to be alive how you know what God's gonna do how you know how bright the Sun gonna shine unless it has a dark backdrop I got the quote my line now I got to set my hope is built that is the right place to say it this is the right but my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness I dare not trust the sweetest frame but wholly lean on Jesus name I need a witness in here y'all got me preaching by myself here we are in Christ you seek him said have I got a witness here to order today's message please visit our website at RAF Douglas West org or you may call us toll-free at

Channel: ralphdouglaswest

Views: 23,418

Keywords: President, Leadership, America, Bible, Election, Donal Trump, President Obama, 11/9, 911, November 9th

Id: rAwCjqwI5Kk

Length: 28min 26sec (1706 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 14 2016