"Moving From Fear to Courage" | May 2, 2021

hi i'm robert jeffress pastor of first baptist church in dallas we are so excited to have you join us on the i campus today for a time of inspiring worship and biblical teaching you are part of a vast online community gathered from all over the world we consider you a part of our first baptist church family and we hope you feel a part of what god is doing in and through first baptist dallas no matter where you are we hope and pray that this is a time you will grow in your relationship with god and others as we worship our savior together welcome to worship [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] well good morning and welcome to worship at first baptist dallas today we welcome each of you our guest i campus viewers let's stand together let's declare all hell the power of jesus name [Music] we [Music] you sound great church lift your voice [Music] lord who saves you by his grace [Music] sacred [Music] so [Music] is [Music] is [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] lord [Music] amen we crown him lord of all in this place today our god is with us and he raised here today king of kings lord of lords we ask that he open up the heavens and pour out his blessing as we worship him today we've waited for this day we're gathered in your name calling out to you your glory like a fire awakening desire will burn our hearts with truth you're the reason we're here you're the reason we're singing [Music] a mighty river throwing from your heart feeling every [Music] your presence in this place your presence in on our this we're looking to the sky descending like a clown you're standing with us [Music] we [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] show us your glory show us show us your power show us show us your glory lord show us show us show us your glory show us show us your power show us show us your glory lord [Applause] [Music] [Music] a mighty river flowing from your heart feeling every part of our praise [Music] every [Music] feeling every part of our brains [Music] praise his name this morning excellent worship church you may be seated we welcome each of you to first baptist dallas today and we also welcome guests joining us both here in the room today as well as on icampus we have a very special gift for our guest it's our pastors a place called heaven devotional 100 days of living in the hope of eternity guest as you came in this morning you received a worship guide you're going to find and close this guest card please take the time to fill this out and keep the card with you at the conclusion of the service take it outside these main worship center doors you'll find our welcome center our staff is waiting there for you to meet you to exchange your completed card for your gift and answer any questions you might have regarding our church if you can't make it to the welcome center you'll find some orange receptacles on your way out you can slip the card and one of those will mail you a copy of your gift if you're joining us on icampus just follow the link on your screen for your gift as well again it's great to see you this morning so many exciting events are taking place here at first baptist dallas let's all take a look together at the screen [Music] good morning we are so thankful to be together and worship with you today we have an exciting season ahead of us and we want to take a moment to tell you about a few upcoming events join us may 21st and 22nd for our first ever family outdoor adventure weekend this weekend will include fun outdoor activities for all ages and experience levels including fishing swimming ski shooting hiking and more space is limited so register now online to hold your spot then on may 23rd dr robert jeffers begins a brand new series but god a study of the life of joseph in this series we will learn about one of the bible's most intriguing characters his difficult experiences and how god worked all things for good that morning dr jeffress will also interview distinguished lawyer and former u.s solicitor general judge ken starr about his brand new book religious liberty in crisis you won't want to miss sunday may 23rd at first baptist dallas finally it is good to gather together to worship please help maintain a healthy environment for everyone by wearing your mask practicing social distancing and using our hand sanitizing station for more information on everything happening at our church visit firstallis.org events it's good to read god's word together and we'll do that now our scripture reading today is psalm 34 verses 3 through 8 a psalm of david and it'll help prepare us for the pastor's next message in this invincible series moving from fear to courage we'll use the new american standard bible as our scripture reading you'll see the words on the screens here in the worship center and for high campus as well and that will allow all of us to read god's word together and would you join me in standing so that we might honor the reading of his word psalm 34 beginning with verse 3 ending with verse 8 o magnify the lord with me and let us exalt his name together i sought the lord and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears they looked to him and were radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed this poor man cried and the lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles the angel of the lord encamps around those who fear him and rescues them oh taste and see that the lord is good how blessed is the man who takes refuge in him may god richly bless the reading of his word let's keep standing as we continue this time of worship and praise of the living lord the lord hears us when we call we call on him this morning the great i am i wanna be close close to your side so heaven is real and death is a lie i wanna hear voices of angels above singing as one hallelujah holy holy god almighty great i am who is worthy none beside thee god almighty great iron i want to be near near to your heart loving the world [Music] living again [Music] me the great i am [Music] the mountains the mountains shake before him the the demons of the name king of majesty there is i am [Music] great i am [Music] great i am [Music] great [Music] [Applause] [Music] i is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Music] is [Music] great i am we worship the great i am this morning jesus incredible worship you may be seated as ben lavorne our executive pastor comes now to lead us in our offertory prayer you'll have the opportunity to leave your ties and offerings in the boxes as you exit this morning of course you can also give online at firstdallas.org forward slash give online but as we continue our worship this morning i'll invite you as you're able to kneel all over the worship center as we go to the lord in prayer together heavenly father we come before your throne this morning we worship you as the great i am we proclaim that you are our lord and you are our god and as we prepare our hearts to hear a message from your word through our pastor this morning lord we thank you for that holy inerrant and everlasting word we thank you that you've revealed to us the gospel of jesus christ the message of salvation the truth that we can be forgiven through his atoning sacrifice we thank you lord for the great commission that you've entrusted to us not only that we might be your disciples but we pray lord that you would equip us to go and make disciples to proclaim your truth to the world lord as we meditate upon your word we pray that you would strengthen us that you would give us courage to be your lights to the world and we pray this in the saving name of jesus christ [Music] amen [Music] so many souls have tested him throughout the course of time so many still reach out to him with broken hearts and more and every one of them will say with no exception that they found that jesus never fed in the days of old he brought his people through and then he came to show his love and he died for me and you and then he rose again to prove that every story has been true that jesus never jesus [Music] jesus [Music] because jesus never [Music] sometimes this world brings trouble i find it so hard to bear i know i could not make it without jesus [Music] oh that jesus never [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] jesus [Music] jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] oh jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] thank you so much noelle larry and first dallas choir and orchestra for your music today we welcome those of you who've joined us in day one the multitude of you uh last week nearly 700 000 of you who are watching on our first dallas eye campus and the millions of you watching on pathway to victory thank you for joining us today i want to begin today by asking you three questions question number one do you believe god blesses those who obey him you believe that really apparently you do believe that god as he said is a rewarder of those who diligently follow him hebrews 11 6 okay question number two then can you identify one thing in your life you believe god would have you do that you haven't done yet one thing you could start doing that you know would be obedient to god question number three why are you hesitating in doing that one thing you believe god wants you to do and by doing is going to bless you for doing it what is causing you to hesitate i imagine in your answer somewhere is the word fear maybe you feel like god is leading you to quit your job and take another job or perhaps even start your own business but you're fearful of failure perhaps you're a single adult and you're in a relationship you know is displeasing to god you know you should break it off but you're fearful of loneliness maybe you're a parent or a grandparent and you have a prodigal child or grandchild you know you should sit down and talk to them about their relationship with god but you're fearful of rejection maybe you feel like god is leading you to give a gift to his kingdom's work but you're fearful of poverty running out of money maybe you will believe that you should take a stand for god an unpopular stand in your workplace in your school in your neighborhood but you're fearful of the blowback you know you're going to get for doing so fear fear is a paralyzing emotion that keeps us from moving forward and what we know is god's plan for our life or to use the other metaphor for our series invincible fear is one of those mountains that separate us from experiencing the blessing of god and today we're going to look at a group of god's people who forfeited god's blessing in their life all because of fear and in the process we're going to determine how we can move from fear to courage in our lives if you have your bibles this morning i want you to turn to numbers chapter 13. i want to begin by noting that there are two kinds of fear there is a positive kind of fear although originally god didn't create us with fear after the fall we have fear that warns us against danger in fact in our series courageous remember we saw that when we face a challenging situation many times we have that rush of adrenaline that gives us unusual power to either stand and fight that fight syndrome confront our fears or flight to run away from our fears most people many people go from fight or flight it's one or the other but there's a third reaction to a challenging situation that's to become frozen in place paralyzed that's not positive fear that is a paralyzing fear and we know that over a long period of time that kind of positive fear can have tremendous physical emotional and spiritual consequences in our life what are the consequences of prolonged fear other physical consequences according to medical experts the physical effects of prolonged fear include suppressed immune systems a disturbance in the sleep wake cycle eating disorders headaches muscle aches and all kinds of other maladies there are also emotional consequences of long-term fear edith hamilton has written fear is of all emotions the most brutalizing it's the feeling of being held under a pool of water and beginning to drown and then you panic as you realize you're there longer and longer and are going to die in the same way prolonged fear induces mood swings obsessive compulsive thoughts chronic anxiety and the prevalent thought that you're a victim but there are also spiritual consequences of fear remember the russian dissident nobel prize winning author alexander solzhenitsyn when he wrote about fear he said quote if we live in a state of constant fear can we even remain human the implied answer is no if we live in constant fear we are no longer image bearers of god people who have been made in the image of god were more like the animals that run and hide at every sound and shadow that is not how god intended us to live today when we get to numbers chapter 13 we're going to look at a case study in fear and how to avoid it now before we get into the text let me remind you the setting of numbers chapter 13. remember for 400 years the israelites have been living in savior slavery and bondage in egypt they've been praying for deliverance and god raised up moses to deliver them out of egypt and after sending those 10 devastating plagues supernatural works of god pharaoh relented and told the israels to scran to get out of there as quickly as possible and so moses led them out of egypt they miraculously crossed the red sea that god opened up and went on the other side they went to mount sinai and they were there for a year to receive god's revelation and finally after that they were ready to enter into the promised land and the entry point was an oasis known as kadesh barnia and before they went in to take the promised land for for themselves notice the requirement the command of god in verse 2 god said to the israelites send out for yourself men so that they may spy out the land of canaan canaan was the promised land let them spy out the land of canaan which i am going to give to the sons of israel underline that i'm going to give this land to the sons of israel but you shall send the man from each of their father's tribes everyone a leader among them i can't tell you the number of pastors i've heard make this horrible application here they've said well the whole problem with the israelites was they sent out spies into the land and they became fearful they should have just gone in and possessed the land notice what the text says this idea of sending spies into the land wasn't moses idea it was god's command god said before you take the land send in the spies why well there were two purposes god gave them for sending in spies first of all to report the benefits of the land to encourage the people in other words god knew that if the spies went in they would see that it was indeed flowing with milk and honey and worth the sacrifice to possess it he wanted to give them a glimpse of their future in fact as we'll see in a moment they brought back clusters of grape to show them how productive the land really was here's a great leadership principle if you're ever trying to move an organization if you're ever trying to move your children from point a to point b if you're trying to motivate people give them a visual picture of the benefits of doing so you need to hold out to people the benefits of a future to make them willing to sacrifice for the future i remember at our previous church first baptist church of wichita falls uh i hadn't been there long when i realized that if we were going to be the kind of church god wanted us to be we needed to build a new worship center now our church had been in the same worship center for 83 years it was a worship center a sanctuary that was much like our historic sanctuary here in fact some of the same people had designed it and they loved that worship center and it was beautiful and uh even dr truitt had come up to dedicate that worship center when it was dedicated i think in 1913 but they were bolted into the pews there nobody wanted to leave that worship center and so i realized if i was going to encourage them to do that i needed to help them see what that experience could be like and i remember it was about the year 2000 scott and carolyn you remember there was about the year 2000 and a lot of churches were just starting to put in those big imag screens you know and a lot of people thought that was desecrating the sanctuary to put in an imag but a lot of churches started doing that and so on a sunday i took up a special offering to put in an imag screen in our old worship center why was i doing that well i told the people it would be so that we could see the words better when we sang songs and read the scriptures and you know the older people oh we're for that yeah if we can you know read the words better and and sing better that we're for that and it was true that imag screen would do that but in the back of my mind i knew that in a few years i was going to be asking them for a new worship center and before they would ever go for it we need to be able to visualize on that big screen what it was going to actually look like the benefits of having pews that weren't crammed together and of a new worship center and when that time came we were able to visualize what it was going to be like and the people were excited about it now moses back then did have an imag screen to show the people what the promised land was going to be like and so what they did was they brought back pomegranates grapes in fact the grapes were so big they had to carry them in on a pole now the principle is if you're going to lead people into the future you need to show them the benefits of doing so by the way parents if you're trying to lead your children to live a life that is pleasing to god you need to be able to paint a picture for them of what a life pleasing to god is like and how it will benefit them there was a second reason that they were to send spies into the land and that was to identify obstacles in possessing the land god wanted the people to see exactly what they were going to be confronting before they possess the land look at verses 18 to 19 see what the land is like and whether the people who live in it are strong or weak whether they are few or many how is the land which they live is it good or bad and how are the cities in which they live are they open camps or with fortifications now god had promised the land to israel remember verse two he said go send spies into the land which i am going to give you he said i'm going to give you this land but guess what you're going to have to fight for every square inch of it now could god have removed all the obstacles supernaturally without any effort on the part of the israelites of course he could have but he wanted to make them fight for the land so that they had some skin in the game you know if you are a parent maybe your child is reaching the age he or she can have a car they may ask you for an automobile perhaps you have the financial ability to give them that car outright but if you're a wise parent you'll make them earn some of the money they need to have some skin in the game so that they're going to take care of that car as well it's the same thing here as well the fact is when you look at almost every worthwhile accomplishment god requires some effort on our part god doesn't give it give us give it to us magically for example god said to adam and eve i'm going to give you a garden the garden of eden it is going to be perfect but you have a responsibility to cultivate it and to keep it god said to noah i'm going to send a flood into the world and i'm going to destroy the world and i'm going to save you and your family but you've got to build the ark in which to enter god said to the world i'm going to send my son jesus christ into the world to forgive sins but then he said to the church but your mission is to go into all the world and preach the gospel and here to the israelites god said i am going to give you that land but you're going to have to plan you're going to have to strategize you're going to have to fight for every square inch of it that means making preparation have you ever heard people say well we don't need to plan we just need to pray that's not what the bible says prayer is important but so is planning and exerting effort in proverbs 21 verse 5 solomon said the plans of the diligent lead surely to advantage but everyone who is hasty surely comes to poverty god's plan was for the israelites to spy out the land so that they could plan the conquest of israel so they send out these 12 spies the spies are in the land for 40 days scoping out north to south east to west of what obstacles they would encounter and then came the time for them to come back and deliver their report what did they say interestingly they were all all 12 said the same thing they gave the same report they said yes the land is surely flowing with milk and honey verse 27 and they brought back pomegranates figs and clusters of grapes but as excited as they were about the blessings they also reported a great obstacle that they face in the land look at verse 28 nevertheless the spies said the people who live in the land are strong and the cities they're fortified and very large and more moreover we saw the descendants of anak there who were the descendants of anak that word anik means strong neck and when we get to verse 33 we find out that the descendants of anak were also descenders descendants of the nephilim the nephilim do you remember the nephilim that word is used only twice in scripture here and back in genesis 6 4 and describing what the world was like before the flood now don't get lost here but remember genesis 6 there's a lot of controversy about what that passage means it talks about how the uh sons of god came and had sexual relations with the daughters of men and there's a lot of theorizing about who were the sons of god were they angels who left their abode and came in and fallen angels had relations with uh women and produced demonic children some people think and they think the nephilim the giants were actual demonic offspring of the fallen angels and the daughters of men i don't buy that i don't think that's who the nephilim were because when you look at genesis 6 they were already on the earth when this event took place between the sons of god and the daughters of men but what we do know about the nephilim everybody can agree is they were giants they were very big people and anak the descendants of anak were a part of the nephilim and so what uh these israelites saw were giants in the land and when they heard the word anak notice the reaction of the israelites to that report verses chapter 14 verses one and two then all the people lifted up their voices and cried and the people wept that night all the sons of israel grumbled against moses and aaron and the whole congregation said to them would that we had died in the land of egypt or would that we had died in the wilderness even though for 400 years they had been praying for deliverance from egypt how quick they were to say oh we just wish we were back in egypt the good old days how we wish we were back in egypt we would have preferred to die in the wilderness of starvation than have to face these giants so notice in verse six joshua the son of nun and caleb the only two of the twelve who had faith they tore their clothes as a sign of sorrow and then they spoke to all the congregation of the sons in israel they decided to deliver a pep speech on a speech on choosing courage over fear and so they said to the people the land which we pass through to spy out is an exceedingly good land if the lord is pleased with us then he will bring us into the land and give it to us a land which flows with milk and honey only do not rebel against the lord and do not fear the people of the land for they will be our prey their protection has been removed from them and the lord is with us do not fear them isn't that a nice speech all inspiring don't fear them god is bigger than our problems how did the people respond not well verse 10 and all the congregations said stone them with stones we need some new leaders let's get rid of these leaders and then the glory of the lord appeared in the tent of meeting to all the sons of israel as the people were getting ready to stone joshua and and caleb and moses and aaron suddenly god appeared he had had enough and beginning in verse 11 you see the rebuke of god i mean he chastises them for having experienced his blessing and now continuing their unbelief god said i've had it i'm going to wipe israel off the face of the earth and i'm going to start with a new people who will obey me now i'll have to say to you if i'd been moses i would say sick of the lord go after him just keep me in mind for this new group you're going to raise up but that wasn't moses reply in fact he argued with god he pled with god not to kill and destroy this people who were about to kill him you know what his reasoning was he said god if you do that if you destroy the israelites and start with a new nation your name will be blasphemed throughout the earth people will say look god couldn't even fulfill his unconditional promise to his own people don't do that god for the sake of your glory and your reputation i pray that you pardon the people forgive them of their sin and so god relented look at verse 20. so the lord said okay moses i have pardoned them according to your word i'm not going to damn them to eternal hell i'm going to pardon them for their sins but indeed as i live all the earth will be filled with the glory of the lord surely all the men who have seen my glory and my signs which i performed in egypt and in the wilderness yet have put me to the test these ten times and have not listened to my voice these people shall by no means see the land which i swarter their fathers nor shall any of those who spurn me see it god said i'm going to forgive their sin i'm not going to damn them to hell but they're going to pay a price they will die without ever seeing the promised land which i swore to them they're going to die in the wilderness and so for the next 40 years they wandered in the wilderness and everyone 20 years of age and older died in the wilderness except for joshua and caleb i'm not going to take away your salvation but i'm going to remove the benefits of your salvation you will not enter into my rest into the promised land i have prepared for you you say boy that is a harsh punishment going to kill every one of them why would he do that listen fear is not only a destructive emotion that keeps us from obeying god fear is a contagious emotion it's passed from generation to generation from family member to family member and just like sometimes doctors have to resort to chemotherapy or radiation to kill off cancerous cells that destroy the body sometimes god has to kill off he has to destroy the cancer of unbelief in a family or even in a church and that's what he did here he swore that those who had experienced his blessings would not his uh blessing and refused to believe his promises would not enter into the promised land and that leads us to talk about fear what is the problem with fear let me point out four problems with fear first of all fear distorts the size of our problem fear distorts the size of our problem i read somewhere that uh a fog that is able to cover seven city blocks has less than one glass of water in it did you know that there's not a lot of water there but it's enough to bring a city to its knees to paralyze it in the same way it doesn't take much fear to fog our thinking and our ability to function fear distorts the size of our problems fear is like a fun house mirror remember going into a fun house and looking at yourself in a mirror and the mirror distorts your image it presents an unrealistic picture of your image and that's what fear does it distorts the size of our problems secondly fear utilizes the wrong standard for analyzing our situation it utilizes the wrong standard for analyzing our situation i read this week that the tallest building in the world is in the middle east it's in dubai you know how tall it is 2717 feet that's a tall building and yet compared to mount everest 29 000 feet it's nothing but a mole hill the size of your problem depends upon the standard of measurement you're using to try to measure your problem i want you to go back to verse 33 for just a moment of numbers 13. when the ten spies were giving their report as well as joshua and caleb but notice what they said they said we also saw the nephilim the sons of anak or the descendants of the nephilim and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight and so we were in their sight they said when we saw those giants we became like grasshoppers in our own sight and so we became grasshoppers in their sight there's an important principle there how you see yourself is how others tend to see you if you think you're a grasshopper a pygmy guess what your opponents will think you're a grasshopper and a pygmy as well the problem with the israelites was they were using the wrong standard to measure their problem they were measuring their problem by their own ability and using that measurement they were grasshoppers but they should have measured their problem by the size of god and when you measure your problem by the attributes the power of god your problems become like grasshoppers a third problem with fear is that fear distorts or pardon me forgets the power of god fear forgets the power of our god it's so interesting to me that all 12 spies basically came back with the same report it's flowing with milk and honey they're giants in the land nobody disputed either one of those facts the problem was the conclusion the 10 said the obstacles are too great to overcome because they forgot the power of god they forgot god they left god out of the equation which is amazing when you think of what they had just seen they had seen god change pharaoh's heart to allow the people to leave in the first place they had seen god miraculously part the red sea that they could pass through they saw god close up the same red sea and destroy all of pharaoh's army they had seen god provide manna in the wilderness they had seen god miraculously display himself on the top of mount sinai they had seen all of these things but they had forgotten god in their present situation you know eight times throughout scripture god says there is nothing too impossible for him with all things uh with god all things are possible nothing is too hard just jot down these scripture references genesis 18 14 job 42 2 jeremiah 32 27 zachariah 8 6 mark 10 27 matthew 19 26 luke 1 37 luke 18 27 all of these verses say nothing is too hard for god so i thought this last week i'd take a couple of hours and do a word study of that word nothing what does it mean in hebrew in the old testament what does it mean in greek in the new testament when he says nothing is too hard to god you know after my study what i found out you know what nothing means nothing that's what it means there is nothing that is too hard for god don't make the mistake of forgetting the power of god fourth fear destroys the promise of our future that's the problem with fear it destroys the promise of our future stanley jones has written fear is the sand in the machinery of life but faith is the oil fear has a way of making your life come to a grand grinding halt and it prevents you from moving forward and experiencing the blessing of god what is the antidote to fear in a word faith now you probably thought i was going to say courage because after all the title of this sermon is moving from fear to courage but i said the antidote to fear is really faith why do i use the word faith now stay with me on this this is so critical remember in hebrews 11 we find the definition of faith hebrews 11 1 faith is the assurance of things hoped for it is the conviction of things not seen faith is an assurance and it is a conviction i use this definition of faith in our series on hebrews faith is believing that god will do what he has promised to do and acting accordingly faith is both a belief but it's also an action true faith will always result in an action faith is assurance that god will do what he has promised to do and the conviction to act according to that belief you saw that in abraham abraham believed that god would give him the promised land he believed it so much he folded up his tent and headed toward that land that he had never seen before that's what faith is it's not only a belief it's a belief that believes so much that it results in a conviction an action you saw that with rahab she believed that god was going to give the israelites the city of jericho and so she acted by risking her life and hiding the spies noah believed that god was going to destroy the world just as he said he was going to do he believed that so much he acted in conviction with courage he built the ark true faith is not just a belief it's a belief that results in conviction which is another word for courage if you say you believe with god what god has said but you do nothing you're paralyzed you're allowing fear to have the final word in your life but courage is the ability to move forward in god's promise for your life what is the antidote to fear it is faith believing that god will do what he has promised to do and acting accordingly how do you develop that kind of faith let me give you just three quick practical ways to develop a life that is governed by courage and not fear number one realize that fear is a normal reaction don't beat yourself up when you are fearful about a situation it's a normal reaction it's a normal response but it doesn't have to be your final response you see that in psalm 3. king david was a man after god's own heart he had seen the miraculous displays of god's power throughout his life and yet when he was faced with a threatening situation his son absalom was leading a rebellion against his father how did david react it wasn't with faith not at first in psalm 3 david wrote oh lord how my adversaries have increased many are rising up against me many are saying of my soul there is no deliverance for him in god but then david started to remember what god had done for him in the past and he says in verse 3 but you o lord are a shield about me my glory in the one who lifts my head i was crying to the lord with my voice and you answered me from your holy mountain can't you hear our choir singing that at psalm 3. david first of all responded in fear many are the adversaries that are rising up against me but you o lord are my shield realize that fear is a normal reaction but it doesn't have to be your final reaction secondly reflect on the promises of god when you are threatened by a particular situation reflect on the promises of god i had you read psalm 34 earlier this morning remember verse 4 i sought the lord and he answered me he delivered me from all of my fears could i encourage you to memorize some of those scripture verses i gave to you earlier about how there's nothing too hard for god commit those to memory or look up in the bible the promises about fear did you know somebody has counted up that 366 times in the bible you find the words fear not 366 times that's one for every day including leap year 366 promises it's as if god is saying fear not fear not fear not reflect memorize some of these promises of god about why we don't need to fear and thirdly remember and recount god's faithfulness to you remember and recount god's faithfulness to you psalm 34 that i mentioned a moment ago begins with these words i will bless the lord at all times his praise shall continually be in my mouth in other words david said i need to continually praise god for what for what he's done for me for my benefit and for the benefit of those around me we should be constantly telling people testifying of what god has done for us because just like listen to this just like fear is contagious so is faith and when people get around us they need to be encouraged by how great god truly is by the way families faith is contagious in your family your family ought to have a collection of stories you tell about god's faithfulness to your family stories that are passed down from parents or grandparents to their children and grandchildren in fact you tell them so often that your children roll their eyes whenever you start in again because they know it by heart they've heard that story listen they may be rolling their eyes but they're listening to you they will remember those stories remember that the old testament for hundreds of years was passed down an oral tradition from family to family to family until moses finally wrote it all down the first five books of the bible we need to have stories that we passed down not only families but churches need to have their own set of stories that they retell about god's faithfulness to their congregation to inspire future generations to trust in god as well know i started this message with a case study in fear the israelites who failed to possess the promised land they failed to experience god's blessings all because of fear but i want to end today by giving you another case study not in fear but a case study in courage and it's a story about you the members of first baptist church of dallas and i hope it's a story that will be told from generation to generation about what god does through a congregation that follows him many of you were here to see the story lived out others of you have come to our church since that time or joined us on line or on pathway to victory but let me share this brief story with you about how god blesses a people who believe in him when i came to the church almost 14 years ago i can't believe it's been 14 years but when i came in 2007 many of you remember what was happening in our church people were exiting the church the church was declining our facilities on these six blocks of downtown dallas were deteriorating and i came and shared with you a vision for recreating our church and our programming and our ministry of replacing these facilities in downtown dallas into a spiritual oasis in our city that would not only minister to our city but would have a ministry that through media would reach around the world through broadcasting which was really kind of a laughable vision when you think about it right then our media footprint consisted of one radio station kcbi radio and on television one uhf station here in dallas that nobody watched but that was the vision and you bought into that vision you said yes we believe that is what god wants for first baptist church dallas of course a natural question that many people had including me was well how much is it going to cost to do that pastor how much is it going to cost to destroy all of these facilities and start over again and so we had a deacon's meeting and uh we had a committee and the committee said we need some money to be able to study this proposal and hire an architect and come up with plans so that we know how much it's going to cost well how much is it going to cost to hire the architect 500 000 and at that time the church had millions and millions of dollars of debt from the most recent building program i wish you could have been at that deacon's meeting that night when we talked about borrowing 500 000 more money to plan how much money we were going to borrow to build a big building and it was quite a deacon's meeting and several spoke against it in fact we had a couple of fine deacons wonderful men who were so incensed by that idea that they ended up leaving the church they couldn't believe that this pastor was going to lead people to borrow money to draw up plans to go into millions of dollars of debt but those deacons the majority of them responded in faith and said let's go ahead and do it so we voted that night to borrow the money to study the plans for a new campus well the architects came back with a number they said to do what you're going to do it would cost at least 120 million dollars and maybe more well they might as well have said 120 billion dollars because no church in history had ever raised 120 million dollars for a single campaign no church had ever done that in fact just a few years earlier the most a church had raised was 80 million dollars it was a church up in chicago that was 10 times the size of first baptist church dallas they did 80 million dollars so i said to the fundraising consultants who said okay they said this is going to cost 120 million dollars how much could we reasonably expect to raise and they said under normal circumstances you can raise two and a half to three times your annual receipts well at that time we were receiving about 13 million dollars in tithes and offerings so three times that would be 39 million dollars they said but that's in normal times remember you all have just gone through a 50 million dollar campaign for the crystal center that people feel tapped out so that would be a stretch to save 40 million dollars well we needed 120 plus they said it's going to be less than 40 million dollars but again the deacons voted to move forward with having a campaign and so we started making plans to have a campaign to raise an unheard amount of 120 plus million dollars well that's when the bottom fell out you remember what happened in 2009 our nation went through the greatest recession since the great depression there was talk that the banks were going to close and fold we were in a financial armageddon and here we were planning to lead the largest capital campaign in history and i remember so well that march of 2009 we were making plans for this campaign the stock market was going like this and i remember the day the stock market hit the low in the s p 500 of 666. hundred and sixty-six now think about it today it's six times that but it was six six six and i began to go wobbly as they say and i remember um going to lunch that day with the chairman of our committee mark lavorne a great man of faith and i said mark i know we're supposed to do this but we only get one shot at this and maybe we need to pull back and wait do you think we ought to pull back and wait what should we do and we've known each other all of our lives we don't try to out spiritualize one another and pretend we're something we're not and mark said you know robert all i know to do is we just need to pray about it we just need to pray for god's direction and i was so desperate that's all i could do was pray and i couldn't sleep that night after our lunch and the next morning i got up and i knelt down and i said god i don't know what to do i know you've given us this vision but they're giants in the land there's no way we can succeed in this please show me what you want me to do if you want us to go forward give me a sign and please give it to me today now i know you're not supposed to pray that way i spent six years in seminary learning you're not supposed to pray that way but folks that's the best i could do i said lord give me a sign today that we're supposed to um do this so i got up a little bit later that day we had lunch scheduled amy and i did with two of our members andy and joan horner and we're going to meet at the petroleum club so we met down there we had lunch and they just come back from a mission trip and they were telling us about the trip and kind of out of nowhere andy said you know pastor i know things are difficult out there right now but i think we need to move forward with this campaign and i thought to myself lord is this the sign it's not much but i'm looking for anything i can get so i thanked andy for his positive word we said goodbye to them and i walked down the street back to the church i was walking to the ross avenue garage to get in my car to go to baylor hospital and make a visit after lunch so i was driving down st paul street and i was turning there on pacific when the telephone rang my cell phone and it was andy horner on the phone and andy said pastor i forgot to tell you at lunch that um joan and i have been praying about it and we want to give the first gift to this campaign for our new campus and i want to give you a gift of and he mentioned the figure it was eight figures it was the largest amount of money that has ever been given to this church or any church in america when he told me what he wanted to do i just about drove into the back of the majestic theater i mean i couldn't believe it what he was going to do years later he would say to me you know i don't know why i called you then we had been planning this for months i don't know why i called you i said i know why you called me and i told him thank you and when i told some other people about what andy had done they rose up in faith the jim donald family hollis and donna sullivan so many of you others you got inspired by what andy and joan did and when we added up the money from some of our key leaders it was 62 and a half million dollars and i came to you the church and i said we have 62 and a half million dollars by now the cost had ballooned 135 million dollars we have 62 and a half million dollars left to raise that was still a momentous amount of money especially when you take away the big gifts to ask a congregation our size at the time to give 62 and a half million dollars but on a sunday you came down to the front of that historic sanctuary and you pledged that amount of money and god gave us 135 million dollars we were able to build this new campus we were able to do so we have no debt on it whatsoever it is completely a hundred percent debt-free this new campus that you built not only that out of that new campus arose a ministry not just to our city but throughout the world today we've gone from that one uhf station to thousands of television stations every day where the word of god goes out across the nation hundreds of thousands of people watching online and if that weren't enough we hadn't been in that new campus a couple of years until we ran out of space again in our children's area in our preschool god brought these young families in such numbers that we had to add another two stories ninety thousand square feet to meet the needs of our children our preschool and our students and it all came because you responded with faith and not fear you know last tuesday night at our deacon's meeting mark lavorne stood up and he recounted what god had done over these last 15 years to think about it in 15 years the 50 million dollar crystal center the 135 million dollar new campus the 35 million dollar expansion of the horner family center mark said nearly a quarter of a billion dollars in buildings to the glory of god and if you look back on your program today less than nine million dollars of debt left on everything a quarter of a billion dollars that is unheard of and that shows what god does through a congregation you say pastor why are you telling us that today why are you telling us that story today i'd already planned to tell it earlier this week as a part of this sermon but then i realized today may 2nd 2021 is exactly the 11th anniversary of that day 10 years ago when you came down to the front of our old sanctuary and said we're going to be a church that's governed by faith by courage not by fear and god has honored you the most faith-filled people i know of anywhere because of that churches all over the world contact us and tell us because of what your church did we had the courage to step out in faith and do what god has commanded us to do so i say that first of all to say thank you but also to remind you that the same god who moved that mountain for our church and allowed us to experience the blessings of his promises that same god is available to you right now to help you with whatever insurmountable problem you have our great god is able to help you if you're willing to make the choice to allow courage not fear had the final say in your life let's bow together in a word of prayer this sermon is a sermon about the greatness of god not the greatness of first baptist church dallas the greatness of god we're grasshoppers compared to god but god is able to do exceeding abundantly be asked anything beyond anything we ask or think if we turn to him in faith i may be speaking to some of you right now who are christians who need to trust god with some insurmountable problem you're facing right now if so would you say god i'm going to trust you and i'm going to obey you and depend upon you to reward me for my obedience to you i'm moving forward in faith there's some of you right now who are not yet christians god is able to do the impossible in your situation as well he is able to forgive you of your sins whatever they are and offer you the gift of forgiveness and eternal life if you'll turn to him and today if you're here in our service or you're watching online and you'd like to receive god's forgiveness in your life i invite you to say this prayer privately in your heart as i say it out loud knowing that god is listening to you dear god thank you for loving me i know i have failed you in many ways and i'm truly sorry for the sins in my life but i believe what i've heard today that you love me so much you sent your son jesus to die on the cross for me to take the punishment that i deserve to take for my sins and right now i'm trusting in what jesus did for me not in my good works but in what jesus did for me to save me from my sins thank you for forgiving me and help me to spend the rest of my life following you in jesus name amen today if you're watching online and you've prayed that prayer to trust in christ i'm going to ask you to go to the top of your screen and click the link that says i prayed the prayer with dr jeffress as soon as you do that i'll be notified of your decision and i'll send you some free material this week about what it means to live as a christian don't wait another moment click on that link right now for those of you in day one or here in our worship center take out your card that's in your bulletin if you prayed that prayer check the third box i prayed the prayer with dr jeffress some of you uh maybe guest today if so check that box maybe you'd like more information you can check that box if you'd like to join our church today it is so simple just check that final box i'm joining first baptist church dallas did you know in the recent weeks we've had almost 200 people join our church just by checking that box if you check that box today you'll be invited to a special lunch uh three weeks from today sunday may 23rd and i'll get the chance to meet you personally would love to have you join us when you have finished filling out this card you can go by the welcome center exchange the card for a copy of our devotional a place called heaven or you can drop it in one of the orange receptacles we'll process the card and get the book to you this week thank you so much for doing that well i went way over time telling that great story of faith from our church history but i hope you were encouraged by it now before tyler comes ben is going to come with a very quick word you'll be interested in thank you pastor well god has certainly been good to us over the last year as we've worked to open up as quickly and safely as possible last week you heard pastor talk about the importance of coming back to corporate worship and fellowshipping together with the body of christ so we want to continue that effort to bring our church family back also be a great neighbor and minister to our community so to that in in two weeks from now sunday may 16th we're going to be hosting a cove vaccine clinic here on campus obviously we're not pressuring anybody to get the vaccine but if you're one of those who wants to get the vaccine and you haven't had your first shot yet you'll be able to do that here at church following our worship services beginning at 12 30 on the plaza so i hope that you'll take advantage of that opportunity and we are reaching out to our community those in downtown dallas and the surrounding area to do that as well tyler you come now and close our service thank you thank you ben let's stand together church a wonderful morning of worship together let's sing his praise this is my story this is my song praising [Music] this is my song praising my sake have a blessed day church hi campus family thank you so much for being here today and joining us in worship we hope that you are blessed by today's service make sure to invite your friends family and loved ones to join you each and every week right here on the first dallas i campus also stay connected with us all week long on our social media channels and join our new icampus global facebook group to know what's going on right here at first baptist dallas we love you guys so much and we'll see you next week hi i'm robert jeffress pastor of first baptist church in dallas we are so excited to have you join us on the i campus today for a time of inspiring worship and biblical teaching you are part of a vast online community gathered from all over the world we consider you a part of our first baptist church family and we hope you feel a part of what god is doing in and through first baptist dallas no matter where you are we hope and pray that this is a time you will grow in your relationship with god and others as we worship our savior together welcome to worship [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] well good morning welcome to worship at first baptist dallas today it's great to see you let's stand together we welcome guests and i campus viewers joining us across the world today let's sing this great hymn together [Music] him [Music] saved is by his grace and [Music] every voice declare it together [Music] [Music] [Applause] lord [Music] [Music] we crown him lord of all king of kings lord of all he reigns in this place today may he open up the heavens and pour his blessing as we worship and praise his holy name we've waited for this day we're gathered in your name calling out to you your glory like a fire awakening desire will burn our hearts with truth [Music] we want to see you open up the floodgates a mighty river flowing from your heart your presence in this place your glory on our face we're looking to the sky descending like a cloud you're standing with us we want to see a mighty river from your heart we want to see this is our prayer today show us show us your glory show us show us your power show us show us your glory lord show us show us show us your glory us show us your power show us show us your glory lord show us show us your glory show us show us your power show us show us [Applause] [Music] open up the floodgates a mighty river flowing from your heart filling every part of our grace [Music] feeling every part of our grace [Music] praise the lord this morning incredible worship church you may be seated and let's turn our attention this morning to the baptistery thank you tyler good morning church this is carlos melchor carlos has been listening to our pastor on the radio and last december he decided to join our church and today he's here to follow the lord in believer's baptism call us because you have trusted christ as your lord and savior and in obedience to the lord's command i now baptize you my brother in christ in the name of the father the son and the holy spirit buried with christ in the likeness of his death raised to walk in a new way of life praise the lord we welcome everyone to worship here at first baptist dallas today and if you're a guest with us thank you for joining us both downtown dallas at our campus here as well as on our eye campus we welcome each of you and we have a very special gift for you as our pastors best selling a place called heaven devotional 100 days of living in the hope of eternity and guest as you came in this morning you received a worship guide you'll find and close this guest card please take the time to fill this out and keep the card with you at the conclusion of the service take it outside these main worship center doors you'll find right there our welcome center we can't wait to meet you our staff is waiting there for you to exchange your completed card as well as answer any questions you might have regarding our church if you can't make it to the welcome center you'll find some orange receptacles on your way out that you can slip the card in we'll mail you a copy of your gift if you're joining us on icampus just follow the link on your screen for your gift as well again it's so good to see each of you for worship lots of exciting events are taking place and upcoming here in the life of our church at first baptist dallas so let's all take a look together at the screen good morning we are so thankful to be together and worship with you today we have an exciting season ahead of us and we want to take a moment to tell you about a few upcoming events join us may 21st and 22nd for our first ever family outdoor adventure weekend this weekend will include fun outdoor activities for all ages and experience levels including fishing swimming ski shooting hiking and more space is limited so register now online to hold your spot then on may 23rd dr robert jeffress begins a brand new series but god a study of the life of joseph in this series we will learn about one of the bible's most intriguing characters his difficult experiences now god worked all things for good that morning dr jeffress will also interview distinguished lawyer and former u.s solicitor general judge ken starr about his brand new book religious liberty in crisis you won't want to miss sunday may 23rd at first baptist dallas finally it is good to gather together to worship please help maintain a healthy environment for everyone by wearing your mask practicing social distancing and using our hand sanitizing station for more information on everything happening at our church visit first alice.org events it's good to read god's word together and we are glad that we can do that in this corporate setting and also invite our eye campus folks to read with us uh today we're reading psalm 34 a portion of it verses three through eight and uh you'll see how that's woven into the next messages in this invincible series called moving from fear to courage the pastor will bring that in just a few moments we'll read from the new american standard bible the words from that version will be on the screen for eye campus as well as here in the worship center and we stand to honor the reading of god's word so if you'll stand with me we will read together psalm 34 beginning with verse 3 ending with verse 8. o magnify the lord with me and let us exalt his name together i sought the lord and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears they looked to him and were radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed this poor man cried and the lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles the angel of the lord encamps around those who fear him and rescues them oh taste and see that the lord is good how blessed is the man who takes refuge in him may god richly bless the reading of his word let's keep standing now as we continue this time of worship and praise of the living god the lord hears us when we call we call to him this morning our great i am i wanna be close close to your side so heaven is real and death is a lie i wanna hear voices of angels above singing as one hallelujah holy holy god almighty great i am [Music] is i wanna be near near to your heart [Music] singing as one [Music] hallelujah [Music] great i am [Music] god the great i am the mountains shake before him the demons run and flee at the mention of the name king of majesty there [Music] i is [Music] great i am [Music] almighty [Music] there is [Music] great i the am i am [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Applause] oh the greatest great island we worship the great i am today you may be seated as ben lavorne our executive pastor comes now to lead us in our offertory prayer well you'll have the opportunity to leave your ties and offerings in the box it says the exits as you leave the worship service this morning you can also of course give online at firstdallas.org give online but as we continue our time of worship i'll invite you as you're able to kneel all over the worship center as we go to the lord in prayer together gracious heavenly father we praise you this morning as the great i am you are lord and you are our god and we thank you for the opportunity to come before you and worship you together as your children lord we are preparing now to hear a message from your word through our pastor and as we do we thank you for that incredible word that you've given to us that everlasting inerrant word that word that reveals to us your gospel the gospel of jesus christ that good news of our salvation that we could be forgiven of our sins through his atoning sacrifice and we could spend eternity with you in heaven lord we thank you for the great commission that you give us in your word and how you've used this church as your agent of light to the world lord we pray that through your word as we meditate on your precepts you would strengthen us that you would give us courage to stand as a light to the world to proclaim your gospel and even as we give our tithes and offerings this morning lord we pray that they would be used to that end and that you would be glorified and we pray this in jesus name [Music] amen [Music] so many souls have tested him throughout the course of time so many still reach out to him with broken hearts and more and every one of them will say with no exception that they found that jesus never [Music] failed even the days of old he brought his people through and then he came to show his love and he died for me and you and then he rose again to prove that every story had been true that jesus never faced jesus never faces [Music] jesus you might as well give me behind me satan you cannot prevail because jesus never [Music] [Applause] this world brings trouble i find so hard to bear i know i could not make it without it's jesus encouraging to know however deep you're in despair or that jesus [Music] tell me [Music] i'll be the first to test that jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] jesus [Music] because jesus [Music] jesus jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] never oh [Music] he will [Music] [Applause] thank you so much noel and larry and first dallas choir and orchestra for your great music today we want to welcome the hundreds of thousands of you watching us on our first dallas eye campus we had nearly 700 000 last sunday who worshipped with us and the millions of you watching on pathway to victory i want to begin today by asking you three questions question number one do you believe that god blesses those who obey him you believe that most of you would say yes hebrews 11 6 god is a rewarder of those who diligently follow after him question number two what do you believe god is leading you to do that you haven't done yet is there something in your life you feel like god is leading you to do but you haven't done it yet the final question why are you hesitant in doing what god is leading you to do what is it that's prevented you from doing the thing that you know would result in god's blessing in your life i imagine somewhere in your answer is the word fear maybe you feel like god's leading you to leave your job and take another job or even start your own business but you're fearful of failure maybe you're a single adult and you're in a relationship that you feel god would have you break off but you're fearful of loneliness maybe you're a parent a grandparent and you have a child or grandchild who's a prodigal is living apart from god you need no you need to talk to them but you're fearful of rejection maybe you know you need to take a stand for god in your business or school but the only reason you haven't done it is you're fearful of the blowback you know you're going to get fear is an emotion that paralyzes us it keeps us from moving forward in god's plan for our life or to use the metaphor that we're using in the series invincible fear is a mountain that separates us from the abundant life god wants us to experience today we're going to look at a group of god's people who forfeited the blessings of the future because of fear and along the way we're going to discover some biblical principles for moving from fear to courage if you have your bibles turn to numbers chapter 13. as we begin talking about fear today i need to point out that not all fear is harmful there is a positive kind of fear sometimes we face a threatening situations we get that adrenaline rush that gives us the strength we need the boldness to either fight the situation or at least to run away from it fight or flight we've talked about that before and that's positive that can be useful fear in the short term can serve a positive benefit but there's another kind of fear a paralyzing fear remember there are three possible responses to danger fight flight or freeze and a lot of people when they face a challenge they become like the proverbial deer caught in the headlights they freeze and the fact is long-term fear can have some devastating effects in our life there are physical consequences to prolonged fear doctors tell us that the physical effects of fear include a suppressed immune system there's a disturbance in the sleep wake cycle eating disorders headaches and migraines and a host of other maladies there are emotional consequences to prolonged fear hamilton has written fear is of all emotions the most brutalizing it's the feeling of being held under and suffocated and when you realize you are suffocating you become even more fearful and panic that's what fear does it induces mood swings obsessive compulsive thoughts chronic anxiety and the prevalent thought that you're a victim but there are also spiritual consequences to paralyzing fear remember the russian dissident and nobel peace prize winning uh russian uh dissident alexander solzhenitsyn he spent years in a russian gulag and he asked this question about fear he said if we live in a state of constant fear can we even remain human the implied answer is no even though we've been created in the image of god when we allow fear to control our life we're not like those image bearers of god we become more like animals that run and hide at every sin sound and shadow today we're going to look at a group of god's people who allowed paralyzing fear to keep them from experiencing god's blessings and the account is found in numbers 13 and 14. let me remind you of the setting of numbers 13. remember for 400 years the children of israel had been held captive in egypt they had been slaves for 400 years and then god raised up their leader moses who led the exodus out of egypt god sent those 10 miraculous plagues that struck pharaoh and all of egypt and finally pharaoh said i think the original hebrew is scram get out of here and so they packed up as quickly as they could they left god parted the red sea uh the israelites passed safely through it then they arrived at mount sinai where they spent a year receiving god's revelation moses was on the mountain receiving god's instruction for how they would live in the promised land they left sinai and came to kadesh barnea an oasis that was the entry point for entering into the promised land and it's there that the story picks up in numbers chapter 13 as they stand on the edge of the promised land ready to inherit what god had promised to them god gave this requirement in verse 2 this command send out for yourself men so that they may spy out the land of canaan that was the promised land which i am going to give to the sons of israel underline that that's key god said i am going to give it to you you shall send a man from each of their father's tribes everyone a leader among them you know i've heard pastors make this tremendous error in preaching this passage they said oh if the people have had more faith they wouldn't have sent spies into the land they would have just gone in and possessed what god had promised to them they missed the simple point in this passage that it was god's idea to send the spies in god told them to send spies before they tried to take the land what was the purpose in that well he gave two purposes for the spies number one that they could report the benefits of the land in order to encourage the people they were to do this reconnaissance mission so they could come back and tell them how truly productive the land was and there's an important part of leadership exhibited there if you're ever going to lead people into the future you need to paint a picture of the future that motivates them god understood that he said the people before they invest their lives in fighting for this land they need to know the benefits of the land help people visualize the future do you remember back in 2000 around that time seemed like churches everywhere were installing these imag systems these image magnification systems we call them big screens and they'd have them in the churches in order to help people worship more freely not have your head buried in a hymnal but you could see the words and sing churches everywhere started doing that this church did it our church in wichita falls did it we all had the same name for our special offering it seemed like vision 2020 you know help people see the uh words more clearly vision 2020. well we had the similar effort in our church in wichita falls but i had another reason for wanting to put that imag system in i told the people it was so we could you know worship more freely and sing the songs and so forth and that was all true but i also knew that in a couple of years i was going to challenge them to build a new worship center and they had been bolted in their pews for 83 years in the old worship center there and i knew it was going to take something to get them out of that pew and into a new view they needed to see a visual depiction of what a new worship center would actually look like and it worked when people saw that vision they got excited about the future if you're leading a company and you're trying to move your employees and your organization somewhere give them a vision of the future parents if you're trying to move your children and teenagers to be more obedient to god learn how to paint a verbal word picture that helps him understand the benefits of following god that was the first purpose to encourage the people there was a second purpose and that was to identify the obstacles they would face in possessing the land they sent the spies to report on what obstacles there were look at verses 18 and 19 see what the land is like and whether the people who live in it are strong or weak whether they are few or many how is the land in which they live is it good or bad and how are the cities in which they live are they like open camps or are they with fortifications you know what's interesting is god promised that he was going to give the israelites the land remember verse 2 the land which i will give them but he also told them you're going to have to fight for every square inch of it i'm going to give it to you but it's not without your effort you know again parents uh if you have a teenage child and they want a new car you may have the financial means to give it to them outright but if you're a wise parent you'll make them pay for part of it that way they have some skin in the game they feel responsible for that automobile it's the same way with god throughout scripture you find this uh principle that is that god uses our effort coupled with his power to achieve his purpose i mean god could have removed all the obstacles in the land if he wanted to without any effort on the part of israel the israelites he could have given it to them without any effort but that's usually not how god works god wants us to cooperate with him in any worthwhile achievement you see that throughout scripture god said to adam and eve i'm going to give you this perfect garden the garden of eden but your job is to cultivate it and to keep it god said to noah i'm going to send a flood and destroy the world i'm going to save your family but guess what you've got to build the ark to put your family in the ark god said to rahab the harlot said i am going to destroy the city of jericho and give it to the israelites but her responsibility was to hide the spies it's the same thing with the israelites god said i'm gonna give you this land but you're going to have to fight for it by the way there's only one significant significant accomplishment that god refuses to allow us to participate in at all and that's salvation god not only doesn't require it he doesn't allow us to exert any effort for salvation it is all of grace for by grace you have been saved through faith that not of yourselves it is a gift of god not of works lest any man should boast but for everything else god requires some effort on our part he said i want you to go in and spy out the land so that you can see what obstacles you can have and plan for it there's nothing unbiblical or unspiritual about planning i heard people say well we need to just pray and not plan no the bible says pray and plan proverbs 21 verse 5 the plans of the diligent will surely lead to advantage but everyone who is hasty comes surely to poverty well they sent the spies in it was a 40-day reconnaissance mission and after they finished looking north to south east to west they came back to give their response beginning in verse 25 of numbers 13. and the spies came back with pomegranates figs and clusters of grapes clusters so large they had to carry them on a pole and all the spy said the same thing they said yes verse 27 the land is flowing with milk and honey and fruit just like god promised but they also reported the obstacles verse 28 nevertheless the people who live in the land are strong and the cities are fortified and very large and moreover we saw the descendants of anak there who are the descendants of anak that word anik means strong neck powerful we find out in verse 33 that they were descendants of the nephilim now there are only two places in the bible the nephilim were mentioned one is here the other is in genesis chapter 6 verse 4. i don't want to chase this rabbit trail too long here but it is kind of interesting remember in genesis 6 we had that unusual passage before the flood of how evil the world was and it says that the sons of god went into the daughters of men and the question always is well who were the sons of god and who were the daughter of men and some believe that it is angels who rebelled against god who came and had sexual relations with women and they produced demonic offspring called the nephilim that were giants the only problem with that interpretation is genesis 6 says very clearly the nephilim were already on the earth when this event happened the daughters of men having relations with the sons of god what we can say with certainty is the nephilim were really big people they were giants maybe goliath was a descendant of uh the nephilim and the descendants of anak here were associated in some way with the nephilim and uh notice what happened as soon as the spies mentioned anak and giants you could hear the murmuring of the people you got to be kidding we're going to have to fight anak and the descendants of the nephilim look at verse 30. then caleb quieted the people before moses and said we should by all means go up and take the possession of it for we shall surely overcome it but the men who had gone up with him that is the other 10 spies said we are not able to go up against the people for they are too strong for us so they gave out to the sons of israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out saying the land through which we have gone and spined it out is a land that devours its inhabitants and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great size there also we saw the nephilim and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight and so we were in their sight when we saw the giants we felt like grasshoppers and then they looked at us and they thought of us as grasshoppers as well here's an important principle how you see yourself is how others tend to see you as well if you see yourself as powerless and capable weak that's how other people see you we hear a lot about self-esteem and i know there's a bad side to that concept uh that it can be a humanistic viewpoint self-esteem but not when you see yourself as god sees you yes apart from god we are weak and incapable but as paul said in christ i can do all things who strengthens me how you see yourself is how others see you as well they were terrified of the giants here what was the reaction of the israelites to these two reports the report of joshua and caleb that yes the land is filled with obstacles but we should go up and possess it as well as the ten who said no we can't overcome the obstacles look at verse one of numbers 14 then all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried and the people wept that night and all the sons of israel grumbled against moses and aaron and the whole congregation said to them would that we had died in the land of egypt or we had died in the wilderness even though they had been praying for 400 years for deliverance from egypt they said we'd rather be back in egypt than to have to face these giants we would have rather starve to death in the wilderness than face this so what happens verse 6 joshua and caleb tore their clothes as a sign of sorrow and they delivered a pep speech to the israelites they said look at verse 7 the land which we pass through to spy out his exceedingly good land if the lord is pleased with us then he will bring us into this land and give it to us a land which flows with milk and honey only don't rebel against the lord don't feel or fear the people of that land for they will be our prey their protection has been removed from them and the lord is with us do not fear them joshua and caleb gave a great speech that day a sermon entitled moving from fear to courage and the people responded how not with faith look at verse 10 all the congregations said let's stone them with these stones they were not a receptive audience they were ready to kill their leaders replace their leaders with somebody who wouldn't put them in peril like this and that's when god decided to show up verse 10 closes by saying then the glory of the lord appeared in the tent of meeting to all the sons of israel god had had it and in his rebuke numbers 14 he chastises them for their lack of faith and he said i've had it with this people i'm going to destroy the israelites from the face of the earth and i'm going to begin with a new people to show my glory through if god had said that and i had been moses i would say sick of god give them what they deserve just remember me when you decide to raise up this new people i want to be a part of that but interestingly that's not what moses does instead he begs god to change his mind in a great intercessory prayer he says god if you damn israel and condemn them to eternal punishment your name is going to be blasphemed among the gentiles people are going to be saying you're a god who wasn't powerful enough to fulfill his own promise to his own people don't destroy this people and god listen to moses verse 20 says so the lord said i have pardoned them according to your word moses i'm going to forgive them i'm not going to damn them eternally but indeed as i live all the earth will be filled with the glory of the lord surely all the men who have seen my glory and my signs which i performed in egypt and in the wilderness yet have put me to the test these ten times and have not listened to my voice shall by no means see the land which i swarter their fathers nor shall any of those who spurn me see it i'm going to forgive them moses but not one of them is going to enter into the promised land in fact he went on to say everybody 20 years age of age and older will die in the wilderness without possessing the land they're not going to lose their salvation but they'll lose the benefit of their salvation in this life they shall not enter into my rest you say why would god engage in such a severe punishment kill everyone millions of people in the wilderness why would he do that because god understood that fear is not only destructive it's contagious we learn fear from other people and just like sometimes chemotherapy or radiation has to be utilized to kill off cancerous cells in the body god knew that sometimes you have to destroy the cancerous cells of sin he knew that unbelief fear is contagious and could be spread from generation to generation and that leads to a discussion about what the problems or fear of fear are what are the problems of fear let me just mention four real briefly to you first of all fear distorts the size of our problem it distorts the size of our problem i read somewhere that a fog that covers seven city blocks has less than half a glass of water in it it doesn't take much water many drops of water to paralyze an entire city the same thing is true with fear fear has a way of stopping us in our tracks fear is like a fun house mirror did you ever used to go into fun houses at the fair and see yourself in a mirror and it distorted your image and it was sometimes frightening to see you just thought you look bad wait until you look into one of those mirrors that can be a scary thing to look at it's the same way fear distorts the size of our problems and that's why it's so destructive and that leads to number two fear utilizes the wrong standard for analyzing our situation it utilizes the wrong standard for analyzing our situation i read this week that the tallest building in the world is in the middle east it's in dubai it's 2717 feet high that's one tall building unless you're comparing it to mount everest that is 29 000 plus feet high then that office building is no larger than a mole hill it's the same thing with analyzing our problems how big are your problems well if you're measuring your problems by your abilities you're going to feel like a grasshopper and your problem is going to feel like a giant and it is a giant but if you measure your problems by the size of the god you serve then it's your problem that becomes a grasshopper then be sure you utilize the right standard in analyzing your situation a third problem with fear is it forgets the power of our god fear forgets the power of god i find it fascinating that in this story all 12 spies had the same report land flowing with milk and honey giants in the land nobody disputed that but they came to two very different conclusions the two spies joshua and caleb said yes there are problems but we can overcome the problem the ten said we have problems but they forgot the power of god which is amazing when you think about what they had experienced over the last year and a half i mean the supernatural plagues that changed pharaoh's heart the parting of the red sea for the israelites the closing of the red sea the ground the egyptian soldiers that were chasing after them the manna in the wilderness the miraculous displays of god in mount sinai yet they forgot all of those things when analyzing their current problem it is so easy to forget what god has done in the past you know eight times throughout the scripture the bible says nothing is too hard for god you may want to jot some of these references down genesis 18 14 job 42 2 jeremiah 32 27 in the new testament matthew 19 26 mark 10 27 other passages nothing is too hard for god i decided to spend a couple of hours doing a word study this week on that word nothing what did it mean in the old testament in the original hebrew what did it mean in the new testament in the greek language what does the word nothing mean and after a couple of hours of study i got some insight you know what the original meaning of nothing is nothing when he says nothing is too hard for god that's what it means nothing not a zilch is too hard for god fear forgets the power of god and fourth fear destroys the promise of our future e stanley jones says fear is the sand in the machinery of life and faith is the oil fear is like sand it only takes a few grains of it to bring our life to a grinding halt but faith is the oil that encourages us to move forward what is the antidote to fear now you might think i would say courage the title of this message is moving from fear to courage but no the antidote to fear is faith i want you to listen to this for just a moment because this is important in understanding what is faith in hebrews chapter 11 verse 1 remember that passage for faith is the assurance of things hoped for it is the conviction of things not seen faith is both an assurance and it is a conviction i've given you this definition in our series on hebrews 11. i said faith is believing that god will do what he has promised to do and then acting accordingly you see true faith involves first of all a belief that god will do what he's promised to do but it's not just a belief it's an action that's what the word conviction implies it is an action it is acting on what you believe and there's that long list in hebrews 11 of people who had true faith i mean abraham believed that god was going to give him the land but he believed it so much he acted accordingly he picked up his family and moved headed to that promised land noah believed that god was going to destroy the world by a flood he believed that so much he acted with conviction with courage he built an ark rahab believed that god was going to give jericho to the israelites she believed it so much she risked her life by hiding the two spies that's what true faith is it's a belief but it is also a conviction an action if you're paralyzed if you hear god speak but you don't move you really don't have biblical faith courage is just another word for conviction moving in light of what god has promised to do for you how do you develop that kind of faith how do you allow faith and not fear to have the final say in your life let me give you three quick principles here for developing courage in your life first of all realize that fear is a normal reaction i was reading people this week who said oh fear is sinful no it's not sinful if it's dealt with properly there's a normal reaction the key is to make sure it's not your final reaction remember psalm 3 david the man after god's own heart found himself in a threatening situation his son absalom was leading a rebellion against him he cries out to god in psalm 3 verse 1 oh lord how my adversaries have increased many are rising up against me many are saying to my soul there is no deliverance for him and god the jerusalem times was reporting david is finished his kingdom is through his own son is rebelling against him many are saying there is no deliverance for him in god but remember verse 3 but you o lord are a shield about me my glory and the one who lifts up my head i was crying to the lord with my voice and he answered me from his holy mountain can't you hear our choir singing that thou o lord are a shield david didn't minimize the fear that he felt but thank god his fear was his first response but not his final response realize that fear is a normal reaction secondly reflect on the promises of god reflect on the promises of god i gave you some verses just a few moments ago about nothing is too hard for god memorize a few of those recount them when you run into trouble when you run into a fearful situation in psalm 34 verse 4 david said i sought the lord and he answered me and he delivered me from all my fears one way god delivers us from fear is to reflect on his promises somebody has pointed out that there are 366 commands in the bible that begin with fear not fear not fear not 366 one for every day of the year including leap year god's trying to tell you something he's trying to tell me something do not fear and one way we keep from from fearing is by reflecting on what god has already promised number three remember and recount god's faithfulness to you remember and recount god's faithfulness to you i had you read psalm 34 a little bit earlier in the service it begins in verse 1 with i will bless the lord at all times his praise shall continually be in my mouth david said i'm continually talking about god's faithfulness why because it strengthens me to remember god's faithfulness but it's also a blessing to other people around me who may be facing their own giants when they hear me recount of god's blessing it encourages other people remember fear is contagious but so is faith faith is contagious and that's why as families we need to have a collection of stories of god's faithfulness that we passed down to our children and grandchildren of how god has been faithful to us and allowed us to conquer giants that were in the land do you have a group of stories like that stories you tell so often that when your children begin hearing it they roll their eyes and say oh not again they may be rolling their eyes but they're listening to you as you tell those stories of god's faithfulness to your children and grandchildren remember you know for hundreds of years the old testament wasn't written down the stories of genesis were passed down through oral tradition family the family the family the family till it got to moses who wrote them down we need to pass down those stories of god's faithfulness and by the way churches need to have their own stories that they pass down from generation to generation of how god has sustained and protected and empowered their congregation i begin the sermon today by giving you a case study in fear it's the israelites who failed to experience god's blessing because they allowed fear to have the final say in their life in these final moments i want to close with another case story a case study in courage and that case study and courage would be another group of god's people you the members of first baptist church dallas some of you were here to see this firsthand many of you have come to our church since that time or started worshiping with us online or by broadcasting so i'm going to close with this testimony of god's faithfulness when i came to the church 14 years ago and i can't believe it's been almost 14 years since i came but when i came in 2007 many of you remember what our church was like our church was declining people were exiting these six blocks of downtown dallas were deteriorating our present facility and i shared with you a vision for recreating our church not our purpose but recreating our ministries to reach more people and that involved completely removing our current facility and creating a spiritual oasis in the heart of downtown dallas that would not only reach our metroplex but would have a broadcast ministry that would reach around the world we would be a beacon for god's truth right here in downtown dallas for the entire year entire world and of course that that goal was particularly kind of laughable when you think about it because at that point our broadcast footprint consisted of one radio station kcpi here in dallas and one uhf television station in dallas that nobody watched but you listened to the vision and you embraced that vision of what god had for our church and of course the natural question we all had was how much is it going to cost to do that what's it going to take to do that so we had a deacon's meeting and we realized to get an accurate cost we needed to hire an architect to come up with plans the only problem was we didn't have any money to hire an architect it was gonna cost about five hundred thousand dollars we were millions of dollars we had in debt over uh uh this wonderful crystal center that doug atkins had led our church to build and god blessed us with but there was debt left on that and we had a deacon's meeting and talked about spending 500 000 and there were those who were opposed to it they just said we shouldn't be borrowing more money to figure out how much money we're going to borrow in the future that's just not good financial sense and in fact a couple of our deacons find men godly men but they were so incensed they left the church over it they said that's just not good fiscal management but our chairman of the deacons jay stiles and david brewer they spoke up and our majority of our people spoke up and they voted to enter into that study so we borrowed the money and uh the report came back mark lavorne brought the report back to our people to do what it was going to take to do what we wanted to do it would take north of 120 million dollars well that report might as well have said 120 billion dollars because the fact is no church in history had ever raised 120 million dollars no church had ever done that in fact the most money a single congregation had ever raised at one time had been a church in chicago that a few years earlier had raised 80 million dollars and that church was 10 times the size of first baptist dallas at that time 80 million so i said to our fundraising consultants i said how much money could we reasonably expect to raise and they said well there's a formula two and a half to three times your annual receipts that's what you can expect to raise in normal times where our annual receipts were 13 million dollars so you multiply that times three that's about 40 million dollars far short of a 120 million dollars but they said that was in normal times and they said this isn't a normal situation you all have just had a massive 50 million dollar building campaign for the crystal center people are still paying off those pledges so it's going to be less than 40 million dollars whatever it is 40 million dollars well that was challenging enough that was a big enough giant to face but then the bottom of our country fell out in 2008 and 2009 we went into the greatest recession our nation has faced since the great depression do you remember it the recession of 2008 and 2009 i'll never forget in march of 2009 the s p hit below 6 6 6 i remember that number 666. today's it's six times that but then in march of 2009 it was 666 and i began to go wobbly as they say when i saw what was happening and i remember so well march of 2009 going to lunch with mark lavorne a great and godly leader who god raised up to lead this effort and we went down to the madeleines to have lunch and i said mark i know we're supposed to do this but look at what's happening in our economy we're going to get one shot at this if we fail we've doomed the church what are we going to do should we move forward or is god telling us we should wait and you know mark and i have known each other just about all our lives so we don't try to fool each other with being more spiritual than we are but mark said robert we need to pray about it we just need to pray for god's direction about what to do and so that night i could hardly sleep just tossing and turning thinking about this and the next morning i got up and got down on my knees and i said god you know what the situation is we're trying to obey you but we're looking at what's happening right now if we're supposed to go forward i need a sign from you and i need it today now i know you're not supposed to pray that way okay i spent six years in seminary learning you're not supposed to pray that way for signs but that's the best i could do so i got up and later that morning i had a luncheon scheduled amy and i were gonna eat lunch with a godly couple in our church andy and joan horner and we went down to the petroleum club and they just come back from a mission trip and they were telling us about their trip and just out of nowhere andy said to me he said pastor i know things are difficult out there right now in the economy but i just feel like we need to go forward in what we think god's leading us to do i thought to myself is that it is that the sign god it's not much but right now i'll take whatever i can get from you so i thanked andy for his positive word we said goodbye i walked down the street back to the church went into the ross parking garage got into my car to drive to baylor hospital to make a visit and i was going down saint paul street making that turn onto per pacific when my cell phone rang and it was andy horner and andy said pastor i forgot to tell you something at lunch joan and i have been praying about our new campus and we want to make the first gift to it the lead gift to it and he told me how much it was it was an eight-figure gift it was the largest gift that has ever been given to this church it's the largest gift our consultants told us has ever been given to any church and andy said i just wanted to let you know we're going to do that as i was turning on the pacific i almost went into the back of the majestic theater right there drove into it i couldn't believe it you know years later for years later andy used to say to me i don't know why i called you when i did we had been planning that for months to do it i don't know why i called you right then i said i know why you did god moved you and you listened and so when he announced that i shared with some of our people what god had done through andy horner and we had other families the jim donald family hollis and donna sullivan others of you who said if god can do it through them we want to be a part of it too and i came to you the church family on a sunday in the spring of 2010 and i said this cost has ballooned to 135 million dollar mark shared with us the report we have 62 and a half million dollars raised but we've got another 62 and a half million dollars that we still need that was still a lot of money especially for a church our size and especially after all the large gifts have been removed but on that sunday in the spring of 2010 you as a church responded not in fear but in faith and you came to the front of that old historic sanctuary and you made the pledges and when we added it all up it was 135 million dollars and today we are in that campus with no debt whatsoever no debt god did it god did it not any dead at all on this new campus and not only that look at what has happened since that time god has blessed the ministry of this church here in dallas after a couple of years of being in our new campus we had so many children and preschoolers and young adults and youth coming that we had to add two more floors onto that new facility 90 000 square feet 35 million dollars to accommodate the throngs of people coming to our church and not only that god blessed our broadcast ministry pathway to victory our church's broadcast ministry is the fastest growing christian media ministry in the world today reaching thousands of people from that one uhf station thousands of stations now reaching millions of people every day of the year the other tuesday night in deacon's meeting mark stood up to give a report of what god had done in our church over the last 15 years 50 million dollars for the crystal center that doug led us into 135 million for the new campus 35 million dollars for the horner family expansion when you added up nearly a quarter of a billion dollars for the glory of god and if you look at the back of your bulletin there is less than nine million dollars of debt on all of it to god be the glory great things he has done you say pastor why are you telling us that story it's a story of faith that needs to be passed from generation to generation but the reason i tell it today is this as i was preparing this message i already had it completed had the story worked in there it dawned on me wednesday that today may 2nd 2021 is exactly the 11th anniversary of that day may 2nd 2010 when you the members of first baptist church dallas came forward major commitment and said our church is going to be governed by faith not fear thank you church for being that kind of church god has blessed you because of it people all over the world say to us churches because of what your church did our church has been encouraged to step out in faith as well so i'd tell it to you to say thank you but also tell that story to you as a reminder that the same god the same glorious all-powerful god who moved a mountain for us is available to help you and offers to remove whatever obstacle you're facing right now so that you can experience that abundant life he's promised to you let's bow together in a word of prayer i'm asking nobody to leave or move for any reason i realize there are some of you who are christians right now who are facing a tremendous obstacle a mountain in your life and maybe you would say god i don't know how to get over this mountain how to get around it but i trust you the all-powerful god and today i'm going to do what i know you're calling me to do and i'm going to leave the consequences to you i believe you're a god who is and a god who is a rewarder of those who diligently follow after you give me the courage today to follow you but i also know there's some here today are watching this service you're not yet christians the impossible situation you're facing right now is the problem of sin we've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of god and it's impossible for us to ever remove that barrier that mountain of sin but that's what god offers to do for us when god sent jesus christ by his death on the cross he destroyed the power of sin and the penalty of sin in your life he's the one who offers you a brand new life that can begin now and extend throughout eternity only god can forgive sins and today if you would like to ask for his forgiveness and receive the free gift of salvation he offers you through christ i encourage you wherever you are to pray this prayer in your heart to god knowing that he's listening to you right now would you pray this with me dear god thank you for loving me i know i have failed you in so many ways and i'm truly sorry for the sins in my life but i believe what i've heard today that you love me so much you sent your son jesus to die on the cross for me to take the punishment i deserve to take for my sins and right now i'm trusting in what jesus did for me not in my good works but in what jesus did for me to save me from my sins thank you for forgiving me it helped me to spend the rest of my life following you and i pray this in jesus name amen today if you're watching online and you prayed that prayer with me would you go to the top of the screen and click on that link that says i prayed the prayer with dr jeffress as soon as you do that i'll be notified of your decision i have some free material i want to send to you about what it means to live as a christian don't wait another moment go to the top of the page and click the link i prayed the prayer with dr jeffress for those of you in our worship center today take out this card that is in your bulletin and if you're somebody who prayed that prayer with me check that third box and we'll send the same material to you i prayed the prayer to trust in christ maybe you're a guest you can check that first box maybe you'd like more information about the church check the second box maybe you'd like to join our church today in the last few weeks we've had 200 people join our church by checking this box and those of you who join today you'll be invited to a special luncheon i'll be hosting uh three weeks from the day sunday may 23rd right after this service i'd love you to be my guest to meet you and to welcome you to first baptist dallas so check that box i'd like to join first baptist dallas today when you've completed the card you can drop it off at the welcome center and exchange it for a copy of the devotional a place called heaven or you can drop the card off in one of the orange receptacles we'll process the card and get the book to you right away thank you for doing that now before tyler comes to lead our final song ben has an important word i think you'll be interested in thank you pastor well god has certainly been good to us over the last year as he has led us through all the challenges of 2020 and brought us back together in worship as pastor talked to us about last week it's so important for us to come together in corporate worship and fellowship with the body of christ and we've worked to reopen our church as quickly and safely as possible while caring for your spiritual health and your physical health also as we reach out to our community and minister to them and so to that end in two weeks on sunday may 16th immediately following this service our church is going to be hosting a coven 19 vaccine clinic for those who are interested in getting that vaccine now understand we're not pressuring anyone to get the vaccine but if you're one of those who desires to get the vaccine and you just haven't had the opportunity to do that yet you will have the opportunity to do that here immediately following our services beginning at 12 30 that day on the plaza we are doing that for you and we are doing that for our community we're inviting other churches to participate in that as well uh you'll be receiving some more information about that via email uh giving you instructions about how to register so you can take advantage of that opportunity now tyler you come and close our service thank you ben let's stand together church faithful is our god we worship him together this is my story [Music] this is my story this is [Music] have a blessed day church i campus family thank you so much for being here today and joining us in worship we hope that you are blessed by today's service make sure to invite your friends family and loved ones to join you each and every week right here on the first dallas i campus also stay connected with us all week long on our social media channels and join our new icampus global facebook group to know what's going on right here at first baptist dallas we love you guys so much and we'll see you next week you

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Published: Sun May 02 2021