TRIGGERED: Taking Back Your Mind In The Age Of Anxiety Part IV | Pastor Steven Furtick

series is called triggered this is week four and I just trust that you came expecting today for God to speak to you let's look at second Kings Chapter five I'll give you my title right up front title of this message is why I went off touch somebody tell them it's a long story [Applause] when I first decided to preach on this topic of triggered I figured that it would help me personally and then we could do group therapy but I wanted to do it from the Word of God because I am NOT a psychologist certainly not a neuroscientist or anything like that I interviewed a neuroscientist a few days ago and that is now on the Elevation Church YouTube so you can go and watch that I asked her questions related to the clinical reasons that sometimes we do the things that we do and had a conversation with her about not just understanding things with cliches and jargon that we sometimes use to cover up our lazy thinking and sometimes we spiritualize issues that are practical within the same time sometimes try to solve things practically that are spiritual and so it's just a great talk that's on the Elevation Church YouTube and you can check that out but this week I want to share a character study on a Bible character who is so familiar to me and by that I mean not only have I read this story quite a few times but I feel like I feel like I know this guy I feel like I met him one time in the mirror and certain things about him really spoke to me and so I just pray that the same will happen for you today as I read this text I want to just tell you the spoiler alert right up front Damon in second Kings chapter 5 has leprosy and gets healed but that's just a headline and so there's a lot to learn in the midst of it and I want to read a few verses and kind of drop in and explain and and move along in this narrative the Bible says in 2nd Kings chapter 5 verse 1 now naman was commander of the army of the king of Arum he was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded because through him the Lord had given victory to Aaron it's interesting the way that is phrased because it says it wasn't by him that victory was won it was through him and I think understanding that is very critical if you were to have any hope of remaining sane in your life just to know that God's gonna do it through you you know half of the time that I messed up is because I'm trying to do it for God and he's trying to do it through me but he can't do it through me when I'm trying to do it for him and so I just start forcing situations and then I'm frustrated and irritated and agitated and I'm mad at everybody and everything because I'm trying to do stuff for people and for God that God would like to do through me if I would yield myself and yield my will and this is even more interesting because naman is not an Israelite he's not one of these chosen people as they understood it at the time he's actually a commander of an enemy army from arimin that would consistently raid the Israelites and not only do damage to their crops but many times take their people away in bondage at the end of one of these raids and Bible says he was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded because through him he was highly regarded because of what he did he was highly regarded because of the results that he achieved he was highly regarded because of the outcomes that were brought about through his skill set and so he was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded because through him I'm reading it over and over on purpose because it's so profound that if we skimmed the surface we will miss the meaning he was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded because through him the Lord had given victory to Aaron and he was a valiant soldier but he had leprosy and incurable skin disease a non-lethal form of it in this case but a problem nonetheless he was great but and depending on when you see someone in the setting that you meet them in you might be sometimes more acquainted with their victories than their vulnerabilities that's why I advocate just a little bit of time dating just a little bit of time to see them in pressure filled situations just a little bit of time out of the candle light under the harsh neon glow of some of the trials of life just a piece of advice but I can't prove it in the Bible but I think you know depending on where you see someone determines what you see and I realize this more and more now because I think people think that they should behave in front of a pastor so when I meet people a lot of times I realize I might not be meeting the truest version of them do you know what I mean they might not always speak in Hebrew and Greek they might sometimes speak in other tongues but when when I really want to know about somebody especially on staff I don't go off of my first impression because I don't really trust my first impression of people anymore I used to I used to say I have discernment now realize that a lot of what I thought was discernment was really me just vibing off of somebody or maybe they reminded me of somebody and I didn't like some people that were really cool consistent people but I thought they were boring but the reason they were boring is because they're not always having to create drama in their life and I found out that drama works good in movies but in real life I don't want the ticket to that show so now and my preaching already this is just the first verse and what I learned about myself is I need to ask others I need to get references and at times I'll meet somebody on our staff and it's not a small staff and I don't know everybody on the staff anymore I used to I used to hand select people and oh man when when I hired the first staff member I got the opportunity to spend just hours and hours getting to know him so I I knew his strengths and weaknesses pretty well but now I will ask someone about someone and I asked somebody that works with them and has had to work with them in a pressure hopefully if I can if I can get somebody that has had to work with them when there was a deadline involved or has seen how they managed a disappointment you know and how they treat others and things like that so I will ask how is so-and-so let's say that that I wanted to know about JT I would ask I would be like hey how's JT and I would wait for the person who knows them not the person who met them but the person who knows them too I would wait for them and see how long they hesitate before they answer the question because I want to see how long they're gonna scroll through you know and sometimes people will say the right thing but it's the inflection in their voice they say it with that lets you know there's something else I'd be like hey I've noticed JT on our staff he seems like he seems like a great guy and if the person's voice goes up when they answer you got to pay attention to that and so it's like I'm house house JT and they go oh he's great and when they hit that falsetto like unnatural soprano note mister sound like Axl Rose you know of theirs I'm like but what everybody say but what because one thing that has really helped me in ministry and in life is to realize that everybody has two eyes 2 ears 1 nose 1 neck most people two arms two legs and everybody has at least one butt he was a great man but it's in the Bible people I'm not making it up it said that this great man he's great but the problem with being a preacher is I can see your eyes I can see your ears I can see whether or not you're taking notes and if you have a pin out I'm judging you so hard right now I hope you feel the vibrations of the flames of hell the issue with this arrangement is I can't see your butt and it's probably better that way spent a lot of my ministry preaching to people's heads breach into people's intellect and I messed around and pastored this church now for over 12 years and a mess surrounding got a few stray greys in my beard and I messed around and got involved in a few people's lives and I messed around and found out that everybody has a butt and the only way I knew it is that a few people showed me their there I know it's awkward and you know half the reason that sermons don't really register more than two hours sometimes is because we're all trying to cover our butt that's the strategy most people come to church with cyb cover your butt you cover it behind a big smile and appraise the Lord in a schandle Abacos arrabiata considered a basanta coyote Caleb [Applause] you know I could do that [Applause] do you know what I'm saying he was a great man but he had a skin issue and nobody can see that on the battlefield because on the battlefield I got armor we all have something that we use to cover a spot in our life let's be honest we're not talking about human anatomy here you have multiple bucks you are great with people but you don't take care of yourself you see I'm saying you are really good at succeeding and really bad at being content so I'm successful but I'm miserable I'm killing it at work but my 15 year old do I even have to finish this I got a great marriage I'm great but I'm not making any money right now and I'm I'm a good emotional provider but financially you know I never learned how to do that the thing about a really good encounter with God you can tell when you've encountered God it will expose your and the way it happens it'll often be an unlikely way let's talk about this in three stages the first is exposure naman is perhaps changing one day in his own home and verse 2 says bands of Raiders from Arum remember he's a captain he's a commander of these armies from arum which would often go out and take different people captive in one particular education the Raiders from Arum had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel and she served naimans wife and she said to her mistress if only my master would see the Prophet who is in Samaria he would cure him of his leprosy and so the Bible says something really important in verse 4 because you are not blessed based on the Word of God that you hear or the Word of God that you understand your base bless and your life has changed in accordance with the Word of God that you apply obey and act on that's why you can hear thirteen years of teaching and still be mean as the serpent in the Garden of Eden that's what no that's why you can hear a lot of teaching about love but if you don't make the decision to forgive the teaching about love will be snatched up by the birds of the air will not take root in your heart so verse 4 becomes really important if we really want to change if we really want to get beneath the surface and you know not just have a skin deep spirituality and a skin deep relationship with God where we can fake it for a little while we create stages to impress people and we have armor that we put on to go out into our job but we come home and feel like miserable miserable people to live with or we feel like we don't know how to be intimate but we know how to be impressive and so as long as people only see us from a distance they don't really notice we're starting to cover our skin and cover our souls and things that are just leaping out of us at all the wrong time verse four says that naman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said and this took courage and it took humility for naman to go to his master and show his but to show his vulnerability when he was a man with so many victories I just want to stay there for a minute because sometimes I feel like we use prayer as an opportunity to read God our resume you know and while I think it's great to celebrate all the goliaths that we killed sometimes the Giants in us are kicking our butt and we don't say anything about it until it's too late and I'm getting bolder every year I passed her as I commit more and more to preaching to the part of you that you would just assume hide and never mention because I think that's where real help is found and Neyman went to his master and and told him what the girl from Israel had said I mean this is this is a servant girl and naman is what a great man a great man he's a great man but he's got these spots that are starting to spread and if he doesn't do something soon there's no telling what might happen next and since there are no essential oils for this particular form of leprosy at this point in antiquity naman has to take the advice of a little girl and now we have a great man going to an enemy nation in Israel because of the advice of a little girl are you willing to obey God even if he speaks through something that seems smaller than you because I notice a lot of us won't a lot of teenagers will listen to me preach and roll their eyes at their parents and I don't understand that because I'm not paying for your college or your braces I'm not even buying you ramen noodles and sometimes I've noticed that men will listen to me preach but their wife knows them better than I do and could say some things that would actually help them it's getting quiet and even the women left me out on that one it's like that I'm a canceled reflective y'all don't help me with this sermon it's something about exposure and when a spot in your life everybody say spot a leprous spots something that is consuming you that others can't see when it is exposed by an experience that's the second stage I wanted to mention is experience because things will happen in your life and you'll come up upon situations that will expose something that you would prefer to hide and what you do next determines whether you get healed so naman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel it said verse 5 says that the King said by all means go I will send a letter to the king of Israel so naman left taking with him 10 talents of silver 6,000 shekels of gold that's like 75 pounds of each so naman is going to Israel with his resources to attain healing he's gonna he's gonna deal with this like he always deals with things cuz he's a great man he's a persistent man he's a prepared man he's a powerful man he's other things that start with the letter P as well and the letter that he took to the king of Israel read with this letter I am sending my servant naman to you so that you may cure him of his leprosy there's all kind of stuff wrong with that sentence it's like the telephone game we used to play when you pass a message along to somebody and it starts out we're having Joe chicken for lunch and it ends with I'm dying of cancer and you pass it down and it only takes three people this chain of communication has polluted the message itself because number one the servant girl didn't say the king can heal him it said the prophet can and sometimes we run to the wrong people because we have our own ideas about where our help comes from talk to me and it's not the king that is going to have the faith to get him healed it's the Prophet his name is Elijah but the king sends the commander to the king because you know this is this is to me the most logical way to get him healed we'll go straight to the top I'll watch the Kings response and this kind of interesting because when the King gets a letter and naman shows up with all of the accumulated wealth that he believes it's gonna take to get him healed you know how we have our own ideas about what it's gonna take to make a change in our life and I'm gonna do it I'm gonna do it I'm gonna go back and get my degree and I'll go back I'm gonna get my degree and I'm like I'm gonna eat so much kale it's gonna be coming out of my nose I'm not eating gluten again until 2024 I'm gonna do hot yoga and cold yoga and powerlifting and I'm gonna do it I'm gonna do it all Murray my Bible AMA delete every diss social media off my phone I'm never going on Facebook again I got my face in the book and he shows a little stuff that he thinks you can eat to get healed but his son 4/7 as the king of Israel read the letter he tore his robes and said oh my god you want me to do what I got this friend yo his name is Alex early he was my college roommate and he used to make prank phone calls in college and they were hilarious most of them were clean we were Christians but he had the ability to push people to their breaking point he was a big fan of a guy at the time who did prank calls name is Roy D Mercer and this guy was famous for taking people right to the edge and so we would laugh and we still have these phone calls recorded and one day I'm gonna release them on soundcloud and these phone calls to me just bring me joy at times in my life because everybody's reaction was the same he make up of million scenarios you know he would use this up name this alias do Wayne McGraw duw AI in E and put a thing over the e cuz it's French my name is du Wayne McGraw and he'd say my boy Bobby is throwing up all over the shag carpet because I came to grocery store and I bought bad milk and they would always say this no matter what scenario he made up one time it'd be Bobby's throwing up on the shag carpet one time it'd be I took my trousers to your laundromat and they shrunk up and now they're coming up around my thighs and I look like a European and you know but whatever scenario he would bring up their response was generally the same what do you want me to do about it [Applause] what look to the king the king is like you brought me a leper do you think I'm God I'm not a doctor I'm a king have you ever felt like life brought you something that was above your paygrade to handle god they're doing that thing again where they sit there and look at me like they always have it together and they have all the answers cuz I looked at my kids the other day and said I am NOT Google I am NOT a search engine I do not know furthermore I do not care get out of my face sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and replay things that I've said to my kids and feel so bad that I have to get up and baptize myself in the bathtub and get saved again just as I am without one plea Oh Lamb of God what do you want from me I'm only a man and the King says I know what this is this man what can I kill and bring back to life he's triggered because he is confronted with the situation that he is unable to transform and whenever life presents you with something that you were not equipped for so you gotta be a dad and you didn't have a dad you gotta pay a bill but God didn't give you a job you've got to step into something that you've never seen before with the faith to believe that it's already done and it can be exasperated to the point watch this that you allow your past experience to contaminate your perspective of the present moment remember what I said the the the king of Aran Benedetta ii would often go and invade ahora más lands or harms king of israel and so when he gets the letter saying hey can you help my guy name it can you heal my guy naman it triggered within him a traumatic memory of the last time he was attacked and so he goes off not because of the situation that he's experiencing but because of past experiences do you ever wonder why you go off and it's it's inexplicable like the level of the offense does not match the level of the outrage and you wonder why what was that all about have you ever with the elevation church sticker on your car said some words that weren't bless the Lord O my soul and wonder you know how y'all think Holly is so sweet what time in college she was singing a worship song in her Ford Contour and the song said I was there I was in the passenger seat the song said you are so patient with me Lord she didn't get to Lourdes before she was screaming at the at the Dodge Ram that pulled out in front of her and she's loud holly is like she's up here reflection be smiling but say something about Holly Ferdie what boat is that all about where did that voice come from wait and then the devil starts telling you all well you know you're not a real Christian you're hypocrite some of y'all are gonna lose it before the day is over because of your fantasy football lineup no not because of anything significant to anything having to do with real life in any way because of other men that have absolutely no effect on you other than $100 at the end of the season and you wonder why did I they go off like that it's understandable because we live in not only the age of anxiety but if you notice we live in the age of outrage to how tricky it is now to just get mad about anything that you don't like the first time you hear it well y'all aren't gonna like this part of the sermon I don't think too much but can I be honest with you I don't really care what shoes you wore to church today No maybe my perspective is different but I spent I spent too much time seeing people's butts to care about what you have on your feet today so I don't have time when team suicide is at an all-time high to check and see if you're wearing adidas or Nike if you got Yeezys or you want to just do it I don't really have time to debate with you about ass loose or a commercial or get mad about I really don't have time for it up here when people's lives are on the line I really don't have time for it in here when people are on antidepressants at a rate that's making them more depressed but they don't know where else to turn and we're running to all kinds of places is better leaving us empty but we want to fight there will be at least one comment on this YouTube video about the holes in my jeans are you for real right now but it triggers something you're not fighting me over shoes you're not fighting me over jeans what mama told me until you save your beard I can't watch you anymore this is psychotic she said I'm praying for you I don't want to say I'm praying for you I'm a fast forty days if you're bad bad stop I [Applause] don't know why I went off I think like for me this is just what I'm working through and so this makes you think I'm crazy you're right but I'm going through this season of my life where I don't want to keep blaming my environment or consulting things that happen in my life because the cross of Jesus Christ gives me a new reality and it really changes everything in the sense that all of my life has to be viewed through that lens of what he did for me and who he says I am if I'm not careful I'll be like the king who when confronted with an impossible situation that reminded him of a past hurt he inflicted the opportunity of his present moment with the pain of his past you see him saying he projected see every time he dealt with Arum it was an attack and now it's an opportunity for this man to be healed and see what God can do but if what you went through isn't healed by what Christ did for you you will treat the opportunity like an attack and I've noticed that like I spend a lot of my time fighting stuff that God is actually sending into my life I spend a lot of my time fighting against people that I'm not really mad at it's really not them tell the person next to you it's not you it's me it's me I'm a perfectionist and so sometimes when things are just like I want them to be or here's what really happens it really happens with my expectation put that word up there because when I expect it to be one way and it's the other like when I went off on my dad a few years ago it was because I rented him a house I moved him in my mom to Charlotte I well I didn't I didn't move in my hired movers and then they got fired because my dad was crazy and it was so funny it really wasn't funny it's funny now can we laugh about hahahahaha okay but the day I went to see him and the story has a happy ending and we you know ended up being together and it was good and all that but in between remember Damon gets healed at the end of this story but there's some stuff in the middle that I want to talk to you about because in the middle of that that whole messy situation with my dad I remember going over to check on him one day and I was so proud of the house that Holly had found that we rented for them and my mom liked it and she was happy and my dad the first thing he said what do those I said isn't gonna work Beau and I know honor your father and mother in the Lord I know that Bible verse I promise you I know it I even know that that honor is cavada in Hebrew and it can also be translated glory and weight but the only thing I wanted in that moment i'ma just be honest with you I don't like to be disrespected and it felt disrespectful to me and so I went off it really wasn't what he said cuz really what he wanted was just a few small tweaks but I couldn't hear that anymore you know because my expectation was that he was gonna meet me at the door and give me a big ol hug and say my son and whom I am well-pleased and the top would the sink but he didn't read my script what it when people don't read your script meet your expectation and here's where the story gets good because I want you to notice that the same event that triggered the king and made him go into fear mode which is usually what's happening when we're lashing out or withdrawing because not everybody fights outwardly some of us Bob lit up inwardly and then we never go off one day we just tap out and you wonder how did they drop like that well it's usually a series of unmet expectations in in this case the king of Israel Jehoash he's traumatized to the point that he thinks that everything is a fight it says it in the text see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me that's verse 7 see how they're looking at me see they didn't even wave at me see I told this is this is a southern thing you're supposed to wave at people when you drive by on the town I grew up in you waved at everybody and the first time that we were driving through the neighborhood and Holly didn't wave the people I corrected her I was like what is wrong with you she's not from Moncks Corner she's from Miami and it's a different culture it's an inferior culture of rudeness and so any time that that you've been used to in your life you you've been used to fighting if life has really been a fight for you if you've had to fight for your mental health or you've had to fight for your emotional health or if you've had to fight through issues of bitterness and forgiveness because of abuse if you've had to you know fight for your own and fight to make it or if you had to fight your own family when you've had to fight over and over again everything looks like a fight everything looks like a threat everything sounds like an insult every time somebody doesn't check on you it feels like abandonment it's the the the trauma that's being triggered but what was encouraging to me and what I got up here to tell you about today cuz this is pretty depressing so far but the the same stimulus that triggered fear in the King's heart triggered faith in Elijah's the Bible says in verse eight when Elijah the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his ropes he sent him this message now watch this the King the king said who do you think I am you think I can you think I'm a healer Elijah said I know God is a healer so watch this have the man come to me and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel this man said where you see where you see opposition I see opportunity and the same thing that triggered you to tear your robes and freak out and fall down in fear triggered Elijah to rise up in faith Elijah said send them to me because the Word of God is with me now Elijah has an experience to build this expectation on Elijah has healed the waters at Jericho Elijah has multiplied the widow's oil Elisha has spoken to barren wombs and when that child died spoke life and it resurrected from the dead Elijah has dug ditches in dry valleys and seen God bring water from the direction of Edom Elijah has seen God do things that only God can do and so in an impossible situation that is beyond him shows up Elijah knows what to do bring him here to me I got something for naman I healed lepers for breakfast bring him to me and he will know not how great I am but how great God is so watch verse 9 I love this story naman went with his horses and chariots and his expectations in his leprosy and his greatness and his but and he brought it all because he wanted to be here I know you want to be healed of something today even though you've been covering it up and I know you use your charisma to cover your cracks and I know that nobody knows how dark the thoughts can really get for you sometime but I've been doing this too long to sit there and preach to your armor because a business leader walked up to me and told me that he had to kick his teenager out of his house he said we almost got in a fistfight he said I swung at him and missed now I realize this has gone way too far and the man the man had on khakis while he was telling me pleated khakis double pleated khakis no tattoos but didn't look like the kind of guy that would swing on his kid but I don't even really think you've seen your own butt and so you've been through certain things and then the weird thing is we all have short-term memory loss if we have one devotion and read our Bible one morning now we start judging other people when they flip out and so naman naman is on the verge of something I travel a long way to get here it's like a 90 mile trip and he's got a he's got a big crew with him and he needs a miracle and we admire him because he went I do at least I think to even get to this point takes faith and maybe one of the reasons I don't put a lot of condemnation or I try not to and my preaching is because I'm pretty proud of you who decided to show up anyway I know how many things could have kept you from being here and I'm pretty proud that you make the decision to bring your butt to church give yourself a hand for bringing your butt to church and if you're watching online you don't get to clap something them went with his horses and chariots stopped at the door of Elijah's house and Elijah send a messenger whoa this is not gonna go well because naman is a great man and when a great man comes to your doorstep you give him a great greeting and you welcome him by name man I'm a retire this is my last sermon y'all enjoy he sent a messenger to say to him go wash yourself seven times in the Jordan in the what in the Jordan you mean that money little excuse for a river that you like to celebrate so much in this nation of Israel which I don't even like anyway and he didn't even come to the door and naman went off no he literally went off not in the figurative sense he literally decided I would rather go home with my leprosy I'd rather go home and my arm fall off I would rather go I would rather die than be disrespected like this and when he heard this ridiculous command he says something very important and in the instruction it was a simple instruction it was a stupid instruction it didn't make much sense just like it doesn't make much sense when God tells you to forgive somebody so that you can be forgiven and you want to say well God if they ask for it I'll give it and God says to you I'm not talking about what they deserve I'm talking about your deliverance I'm talking about your clean heart I'm talking about your clear mind so if you want to get cleansed I need you to do something that makes no sense because there is no cure for leprosy it can't be cured it's got to be cleansed and it can only be cleansed if you obey this command and verse 11 starts so sad by there it is again I'm a preacher whole series one day on the butts of the Bible but naming stand in front of miracle stand it I mean the guys around him are like okay that's all we gotta do maybe you can keep the 75 pounds of silver and the 75 pounds of gold and you can just pass out the ten cents of clothing and and we could go home we could start back home that's easy somebody start running the water naming you want it hot you want an extra hot named me you want a rubber ducky get the towel ready you want some sunscreen but it's a funny thing about pride it's a funny thing about the small things it's a funny thing about something that seems beneath you remember the king was triggered because of something that seemed beyond him oh my god and naman is triggered because of something that seems beneath me you want me to do what uh I'm not doing that uh-huh no see because when your heart is filled with pride you try to write your own prescriptions this is how I want God to bless me this is how I want God to come through this is how I want God to heal me this is how I wanted to respond this opportunity I want this how so naman went away angry said this is two very dangerous words by the way this is this is maybe the two most dangerous words for you to interpret your life through I thought I thought maybe those two words are the two words that are standing between me and peace today I thought I thought my dad was gonna be grateful for the house now he's telling me about getting somebody over here to fix the huh I thought I thought you'd say thank you I thought you'd grow up and play piano I'll put you in lessons I thought I thought I thought he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God seem a man had it all planned out because that's what great men do great men make great plans and when those plans don't go the way that they were supposed to go great men go off great women go off because I had this family picture and here's where you were supposed to stand and here's where you were supposed to smile and here's where you were supposed and here's where you were I thought could those two words be busted standing between you and healing today I thought God says my thoughts are not your thoughts and my ways are not your ways for as high as the heavens are above the earth so are my thoughts above your thoughts and my ways above your ways but namin went away angry and said I thought that I thought he'd come out to me I thought I thought he would see cuz I had this worked out he comes to me and then I give him the gifts and I get the healing this is how this works not this time name it not this time this transformation is not gonna happen on your terms God's not gonna do it like you expect him he's not gonna be held hostage to what you thought so I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name the Lord is God and wave his hand he's supposed to wave he's supposed to wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy he doesn't like the place God told him to get healed are not a banna and far part of the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel I didn't have to come here for this could not wash in them and be cleansed so he turned and went off in a rage and one of his servants this guy needs a raise by the way went to him notice how beautiful the story is told is chronicled like this naman went to his master and said I need permission to go to Israel so he went to the king and the King said I can't do it then he went to Elisha with his chariots and horses and now naman went off in a rage and he's about to he's about to miss the opportunity to be healed because he is going off and here's why he went off because he didn't go in he went off because he made this decision about what he thought about it but he didn't go in you know I've noticed something about myself when I don't go into the presence of God when I don't go in and ask God what are you doing in this situation when I don't go into myself and seek for the Spirit of God to leave me I start going off and then I spend the next week fixing stuff then if I would have taken one moment and worshipped if I would have taken one moment and sought God's wisdom if I would have taken one moment and said you know what I don't want to fight about this I don't want to be right I want to be healed I don't want to prove my own power I'm gonna receive your power guy and what happens next is really beautiful because some of you are gonna do it today stand with me the servant came to name in and said something that I think is very prophetic and I hope you can hear it on the level which it is intended the servant chased naman down naman is on his way back to Damascus he's gonna walk 90 miles back home with leprosy still on his skin because of something that seemed too small and insignificant for a great man like him to do he's gonna spend the rest of his life with this disease because he didn't want to do what he was told to do and the servants say hey man sir naman if the Prophet had told you to do some great thing would you not have done it well of course I would cuz I'm a great man well if you're a great man how much more should you be able to do a small thing so when he tells you wash and be cleansed why not give it a try you know you've been fighting so hard justifying your side of the story and justifying yourself and why it's alright and why it's okay but but hey men why not if we already came 90 miles if we already came this far and that prophet is telling you that if you dip in the Jordan you can be cleansed isn't it worth a try you already went to your master and got the letter you already went with your horses and chariots now you've now you're going off in a rage but verse 14 is the happy ending and I believe it's a new beginning for for many of us today the Bible says so he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan I'm glad after naman went off he went in and he went in not just once not just twice not just three times not just four times not just five times not just six times but all seven often when you're in the process of obeying God you see no immediate effects of change it's not like your skin gets healed a little bit with every day you gotta have the faith to go through the motions even when you see no evidence who am I talking to him you gotta have the faith to go down and pray again to lift up your hands and worship and say I don't feel a thing right now but God is with me and God is for me and who can be against me and I will not fear though a host of enemies and camps about me I will not be afraid the Lord is my helper I lift my eyes to the hill my help comes from the Lord by your head and close your eyes for a moment I believe this is a significant word for someone in the room who is about to go off maybe you've been going off maybe you already went off I don't just mean temper tantrums breaking stuff throwing pictures around the room I mean that there is something that God has given you to do in your life that seems so ridiculous that you like naman are at the point of frustration I want to speak a word over your life today that in this moment the only way to receive healing is through your surrender as long as you want to stay in control of those situations they will continue to consume you and that's what the presence of God is for this is the Jordan River that you can dip in seven times the Bible says that when he did it his flesh was restored like a young boy in that amazing that the great man became like a young boy and he was healed and isn't it interesting that God's greatest goal and naimans life was not to heal his skin but to produce faith in his heart lift your hands in this moment Father I thank you for every person and I thank you for every problem I thank you for the great things and I thank you for the but somebody in this room has an addiction somebody in this room has an illness somebody in this room has a heavy depression and they see no signs of change and they have really really really attractive armor and so nobody can see but you what they're fighting with on the inside and they keep pushing people away that you send to help them in this moment God may this be the first dip in the process of their deliverance and thank you for the cross of Jesus Christ that we stand under and look to today for healing and forgiveness and redemption has already been accomplished I thank you that we are not healed cleansed or cured by achieving but by receiving stretch your hands high as you can stretch them we received your grace in this moment your mercy in this moment healing waters wash over our soul hey thanks for watching the elevation church youtube channel if you enjoyed this message take a minute click the subscribe button on your screen that way you won't miss a single video and if this ministry has impacted you and you'd like to partner with us to continue to reach others you can click the link in the description below to give now thanks again for watching and don't forget to subscribe

Channel: Elevation Church

Views: 718,640

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Keywords: Elevation Church, Pastor Steven Furtick, Elevation Church Triggered, Steven Furtick triggered, Triggered series, Triggered Part IV, Steven Furtick Why I Went Off, Elevation Church Why I went Off, Elevaiton Church Steven Furtick, Anxiety, Age of Anxiety, Elevation Church Anxiety sermons, Steven Furtick anxiety sermons, Elevation Church sermons 2018, sermons 2018, steven furtick sermons

Id: UUoNlO14qcs

Length: 52min 9sec (3129 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 10 2018