Welcome to the Illuminate Church podcast.
We hope today's message is encouraging to you.
We are on this series called Weeds in My Garden.
Hasn't this been an awesome series?
It's it's been amazing walking through certain mental health
issues and challenges. And what does scripture teach
about these things? There's something that I love.
It's, it's this idea of describing something poorly.
OK, so I don't know if you've seen this before, people do
online, but pretty much they'll take like a certain topic or an
idea and they'll explain it, but just like, really badly.
OK, let me give you an example. Let me see if we can guess.
Orphan man who never went to therapy that dresses as a bat at
night, has to protect the city from another man that also needs
therapy. What movie is that?
That's Batman. OK, Yeah.
You they both need therapy. I'm just saying y'all need some
help. All right, here's another one.
One of my favorite movies. Paleontologist visits a new
theme park and leaves a bad review and the owner of the park
agrees. Jurassic Park.
Give it up. That's amazing.
Any Jurassic Park fans? Man, I love everybody.
Get copyright strike. I'm just playing.
I love that movie. Such a good movie.
If you remember, there's this one scene when you really get a
glimpse of the Tyrannosaurus Rex for the very first time.
They're in the car, they're driving to the park, and the
power pretty much shuts down. They're sitting in the park and
they're supposed to be waiting for this this T Rex.
And so the movie goes, they're sitting in the car, it's
raining, it's down pouring. This goat comes up from the
ground, and pretty much they're waiting for the T Rex to get a
snack. Well, power goes out.
They're sitting there and like, well, hold up, we'll try and get
power back up. And all of a sudden the camera
pans over and the goat's gone, which, you know, something bad
about to happen. All right.
And so they're sitting in the car and they're like, what is
that? And all of a sudden they hear
this roar. I mean, the most incredible
roar. And everyone is in the car just
completely stressed out. There's one guy specifically,
he's the attorney and he is just, he is so stressed out that
he decides to go running. Now, if you've seen Jurassic
Park and you've listened to Doctor Alan Grant, OK, the T
rex's vision is based on what movement?
My boy starts running. OK, Like, what are you doing?
So he runs out of the steel cage car and goes to this wooden
building building. He goes to sit on the toilet
because it's a little poopy kind of day, you know what I mean?
He's a little bit stressed out and he's sitting on the toilet.
And as the scene goes AT Rex comes up, knocks down this
wooden, wooden building and the T Rex stares at him like, man, I
got a midnight snack. Ain't daggering.
Some of y'all look the same way. Going to that closet at 12 O
clock in the morning. You shouldn't be doing that.
You shouldn't do that. And the T Rex like this is
amazing. The attorney gets eaten.
Why? Because he did not know how to
manage his stress, he was so stressed out and so fearful as
what was going to happen that he ran out of the safest place he
actually was. And although that's a movie and
it's kind of funny and it's a crazy scene, I imagine if you're
like me, every one of us is dealing with some form of stress
right now and it comes from literally every area of our
lives. You might be under pressure.
You might be facing big changes, feeling a lack of control,
shouldering heavy responsibility, staring into an
uncertain future. It might because you're dealing
with multiple issues at once, feeling the lingering effect of
our past struggles, or lacking resources and support you need.
It might be illness, injury, parenting, infertility,
bereavement, abuse, marriage, divorce, relationships, or
caregiving. You might have lost a job and
unemployed long term retiring, facing deadlines, the exams
work, strive for a new position. You might be moving, dealing
with difficult neighbors, worrying about money or drowning
in debt. Are you stressed?
Some of you are like, you know, I want to get more stress when I
came into church. You're so welcome.
I'm so glad I could answer that prayer.
So. But here's the reality is that
stress is not just emotional, it's physical.
So scientists say that stress changes your body.
So when you're under pressure, your heart races, your breathing
quickens, and your muscles tighten.
Adrenaline and cortisol flood your bloodstream.
And that's useful if you're running from danger.
That's useful if you're running from AT Rex.
But if the danger never goes away, what happens then?
And the numbers are alarming. The American Psychological
Association, Stress in American survey, 75%.
I want you to think about this 75%.
That's three out of four Americans report physical or
emotional symptoms caused by stress.
That's headaches, that's exhaustion, that's anxiety,
that's insomnia, that's depression.
And it's not just an isolated issue.
It's literally an epidemic. And here's what's even more
dangerous. Stress spreads.
So I don't know if you've ever, you know, if you grow up in the
90s or only 2000s, but you'd walk in the grocery store and
you see someone smoking a cigarette, and you didn't want
to get what second hand? Yeah, you don't want to get
second hand smoke. So what do you do?
You walk up. Like, actually, I'm going to go
through the other door. I'm not going to go this way.
I'm going to let you do your thing.
I'm going to head to the other side.
Or if you go to Vegas, they're still doing that now.
OK, I don't know. They're not in 2025, but they're
still doing that over there. But there's this actual thing
scientists call secondhand stress that literally just being
around other people that are stressed makes you even more
stressed. Like I'm imagining someone
walking into the office and you're just like, they having a
bad day. I'm a go, I'm a go around.
I don't even want to have that conversation because we don't
want to feel it. We don't want to experience the
same thing. And here's the hard truth is
that all those stress is normal. We all experience it.
Living a life of stress isn't, and the question is not whether
we will face it, but how we will respond.
And if we don't manage stress in healthy ways, it doesn't just
stay stressed, it develops into something far more dangerous,
something called burnout. Burnout isn't just tiredness.
It's literally emotional collapse.
It's numbness. It's cynicism.
It's a loss of energy, motivation, and hope.
It's literally a creeping erosion of your ability to live
and work well. And burnout, this is what's
crazy. It wasn't even a recognized term
until the 1970s when scientists began studying this silent
crisis. And now we know it's everywhere.
2/3 of Americans say they've experienced burnout.
And if you're in some professions like healthcare,
like teaching, like leadership, it's over 80%.
And so burnout develops in stages.
Stage 1 is emotional exhaustion. You're going through trauma,
you're going through stress, and you're just emotionally
incapacitated. Stage 2 is increased negativity
in doubt. So this is where the stress is
hitting you, and now you're starting to lose hope, You're
starting to get more cynical. Stage 3 is loss of emotional
stability, discipline, and resiliency.
And so the things that you practice may be working out,
maybe going for a walk, maybe praying, Bible study or
whatever. Do you begin to lose those
disciplines? Stage 4 is isolation.
This is when you shut off the world and attempt to try and
save yourself. Essentially, Stage 5 is
diminished work effectiveness in every area of life.
And stage 6 is identity impairment and confusion.
And some of you listening right now, if you were to be honest,
you, you might be relating more than you want to admit.
You're burned out. You're running on empty.
You're pushing past your limits for far too long because stress
doesn't politely knock before it enters your life.
It quietly invades. And burnout doesn't send a
warning. It comes without notice.
Until one day you realized you're running on nothing.
And the question is, what now? What do we do if we find
ourselves in that exact place? And as I was seeking the Lord
what He would want to speak to you this morning, he brought to
me this one passage. And so I believe with the bottom
of my soul that the Lord Jesus Christ wants to give you a
solution today. How do you overcome the stress
of life? How do you keep going even if
you want to give up? We're going to be in Second
Corinthians chapter 4. If you have your Bibles, you can
turn there now. If you need a Bible, you can go
and pop your hand up. We have ushers that have Bibles
provided for you. We can turn to 2nd Corinthians
chapter 4. If you need a Bible, you can
raise those hands. They'll have that provided for
you. Thank you, ushers.
And so Second Corinthians is an important book, one of the
largest letters in the New Testament in the Apostle Paul.
This is one of most likely 3 letters that he's writing to the
Church of Corinth about the reality of his suffering and
trials and promoting the gospel message.
And so if you survey the life of the Apostle Paul, I guarantee
you at some point in life he was stressed.
He wanted to give up, like he wanted to quit.
He didn't want to do this anymore.
And we know this because if we actually go later in the book,
in 2nd Corinthians 11, verse 24, the apostle Paul describes some
of some of his experiences. In verse 24 he says five times I
received 40 lashes -1 from the Jews stress.
Three times I was beaten with rods, stress.
Once I received a stoning stress.
Three times I was shipwrecked, stress.
I have spent a night and day in the open sea.
Stress. On frequent journeys on, I face
dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my
own people, dangers from Gentiles, dangers in the city,
dangers in the wilderness, dangers at sea, dangers among
false brothers. Stress, Toil and hardship.
Many sleepless nights, Hunger and thirst, often without food,
cold and without clothing, not to mention other things.
There was a daily pressure on me, my concern for all the
churches. If I had to summarize the life
of the apostle Paul, it was stressful, it was challenging,
it was difficult. And so when he's writing this
letter, he's not writing it from a place of obscurity, hiding in
the desert, living his life. He's writing it from a place of
experience. He's writing it from a place of
lived trauma, of lived challenges, and inspired by the
Holy Spirit, He gives us this message.
And so I want to start here in Second Corinthians chapter 4,
verse 7, this is what he says. Now we have this treasure in
plague jars so that this extraordinary, extraordinary
power may be from God and not from us.
So here is my first point here is that we find power in our
treasure. So we have to start asking is
what is this treasure? He mentions just that we have
this treasure. Well, this is where literary
context in the Bible is so important.
If you go back to chapter 3, verse 17, it says now the Lord
is spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is
freedom. Can I get an Amen where the
Spirit of the Lord is? And by the way, the Spirit of
the Lord is in this church. The Spirit of the Lord is alive
and active. Verse 18, We all with unveiled
faces are looking in a mirror at the glory of the Lord and are
being transformed into the same image from glory to glory.
This is from the Lord who is the Spirit.
Isn't that incredible that because of Jesus, because of the
power of the Holy Spirit, we as believers can experience true
freedom. We can know God personally.
We are being transformed into Jesus people.
But what's an interesting point that he brings out is he uses
this phrase, clay jars. Why does the Apostle Paul use
this? Because clay jars in the 1st
century were very common. They weren't like the nicer
bronze jars which you'd put your valuables.
Clay jars were made cheap and broke easily.
So almost like our modern day plastic bottle, something that
would use for a little bit, it would break and then you kind of
throw it away. I remember years ago there's
this basketball, basketball player named Kyrie Irving has
incredible handles. And they had this show called
Uncle Drew. And pretty much he would dress
up as like this 80 year old grandpa and he would just show
up to the basketball court and just start dunking on people.
Like it was just amazing. You'd have all these young bugs
shooting hoops, slamming dunks and you'd see grandpa show up
and he'd be like, oh, let's see what you got.
And he would just cross everyone up.
It was so crazy. They ended up making a movie
about it. It was, it was awesome.
But like, why was that so crazy? Because no one was expecting
this ability to come from this old uncle.
The weakness of the vessel exemplified the power, The
weakness of what they viewed this uncle, this old uncle,
because of his skill set, and exemplified how glorious His
power is. Let me put it this way.
God is most glorified when He does the extraordinary to the
ordinary. God is most glorified when He
does the extraordinary through the ordinary.
We are made powerful when we recognize it was never dependent
on us to begin with, but dependent on Him and we were
never meant to be God. I want you to understand that is
there is burden and trying to be God for yourself, the stress of
trying to carry everything on your own.
No wonder we get burned out and our greatest treasure isn't what
we possess on our own, but what God has given us by His Spirit.
It's not your skill set, it's not your talents, it's not your
abilities, it's not your background.
It's the Spirit of God dwelling in each and every believer.
And because of that spirit, we can experience freedom,
relationship, and the transforming power of the Holy
Spirit. Through that dependence, we can
find power in our treasure. Verse 8, Let's continue.
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed.
We are perplexed, but not in despair.
We are persecuted, but not abandoned.
We are struck down, but not destroyed.
So the apostle Paul, now the Scripture gives us a view of the
Apostolic ministry that Paul is walking in.
And those that are willing to follow Jesus, he's like saying
if you follow him, if you live there, your life, this life,
this is what your life is going to be like.
And it doesn't seem very encouraging.
So what? Let's break it down a little
bit. Afflicted.
In the 1st century, this term was used of people pressing into
battle and experiencing eternal stress.
This word crushed means that you are almost confined to a space.
You're pressured, you're crushed, you're being closed in.
Perplexed is this idea of being doubtful, of being confused or
being without resources and despair is a complete loss.
Persecuted is this idea of being chased into fear or experiencing
oppression and being forsaken is left behind or deserted, Struck
down, This is what's so cool. Struck down is to castaway, lay
a foundation or sowing a seed, and destroyed is to die or be
ruined. So what is the scripture
teaching? Although this trial and stress
might have backed you in the corner, in Christ you can't keep
me there. Although in this season I am
confused and it seems like I don't have enough, in Christ I
will never lose. Although I might be stressed,
oppressed, and chastened to fear, in Christ I will never be
deserted. And although I am struck down
and it seems like my life is over in Christ, my affliction is
sowing seeds of a greater purpose.
That in the pain that God is sowing seeds, He's building a
new foundation that are going to bear much fruit in your future.
That's the promise of following Jesus.
And so when we follow him, God can use your suffering as a
foundation for something far greater in your life.
Isn't that a beautiful promise? That's a beautiful promise.
And how do we know that? Let's continue on in verse 10.
We always carry the death of Jesus in our body so that the
life of Jesus may also be displayed in our body.
For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus
sake, so that Jesus life may also be displayed in our mortal
flesh. So then death is at work in us,
but life in you. When we follow Jesus, we carry
his pain. And you might be asking is why
would I do that? Because here's the reality,
Christian or not Christian, you will experience stress.
Believer or not believer, you will experience trials.
And God promises the life of Jesus himself to come to life
through you. In this church we say we exist
to help people find abundant life in Jesus.
And in John 10/10 he says the thief comes to steal, kill and
destroy. But I have come to give you life
and have it in abundance. And here's the problem.
We have been deceived to believe that the key to abundance is an
easy life when Jesus lived in perfect abundance but suffered
greatly. I remember when I was a kid, I
got saved at 10 years old and I did not grow up in a Christian
household. It was very challenging for me.
I got radically saved and I went back home and my situation
didn't really change. And I didn't know it at the
time, but when I was 10, all the way up to a young teenager, I
would have these crazy demonic nightmares.
I mean, like, we're not talking like, hey, it was a bad dream.
You woke up kind of crazy. I mean, I would wake up at
10:00, 11-12 years old and run through the house like a crazy
person because I literally thought this, this demonic
oppression was attacking me. I didn't know what it was.
This was my experience. And so after years of doing
this, I was so stressed and so fearful.
There was only one thing I could do when I was a kid.
I didn't have a Bible for myself, but I had this
children's Bible. And I remember I would open up,
it would be like one O clock in the morning and I would be so
scared. I would run into my room.
I would grab that that children's Bible and I would
start reading. And all of a sudden the comfort
of Christ, the presence of God would just fill me and calm me
and provide relief for my stress.
And what I learned at a young age is that abundance isn't the
absence of suffering, it's the presence of Christ in the middle
of it. Abundant life doesn't mean an
easy life, it means that Christ is in it with you till the end.
And we see this in second Corinthians chapter one, verse
5, just a couple chapters earlier.
It says for just as the sufferings of Christ overflow to
us, so also through Christ our comfort overflows.
That comfort. When we experience stress, when
we're burned out, when we have these trials, we can find life.
It doesn't matter on circumstances, it matters on
God's presence. Let's continue in verse 13.
And since we have the same spirit of faith in keeping with
what is written, I believed, therefore I spoke.
We also believe and therefore we speak for we know not that the
one who raised Lord Jesus will also raise with Jesus and
present us with you. So here's my point here is that
we find faith in our triumph. It's really interesting that the
Scripture quotes in Old Testament passage.
This is from Psalm chapter 1, chapter 116, verses 8 to 10.
This is the Psalm of David, and here's what it says for you,
Lord rescued me from death. My eyes from tears, my feet from
stumbling. I will walk before the Lord in
the land of the living. I believed.
I love this. I believed even when I said I am
severely oppressed. I believed even when I said I am
severely oppressed. And Paul is saying that we can
have that same exact faith. Isn't that a beautiful thing?
That in the midst of suffering, the midst of oppression, the
midst of stress, we can have that same overcoming faith?
And the completed act of the resurrection of Jesus Christ
will bring to fruition this future moment, this moment when
we triumph over death and enjoy God's presence.
A few months ago, one of my favorite pastors, his name was
Vodi Bacam, and he was a bold preacher of the faith.
He passed away, I want to say weeks ago, maybe a month ago,
and I love it. There was one of his sermons.
This is what he says, and it's so telling concerning he, I
mean, he passed away in his mid 50s.
This is what he says quote for quote.
You're going to hear a rumor one day that Vodi Bacam is no more.
Don't believe it, don't believe it, don't believe it, because
though I die, I will rise with Christ.
There is no Christian that loses in the end.
I don't care how hopeless your story is.
I don't care how hopeless your situation is.
If you are a follower of Jesus, a believer in Jesus, there is no
bad ending for you. That's the promise we have.
And because of that promise, we can find faith in our triumph.
Verse 15. Indeed, everything is for your
benefit, so that as grace extends through more and more
people, it may cause Thanksgiving to increase to the
glory of God. So we find strength in our
Thanksgiving. This is the summation of the
entire section. When you live like this, when
you live with this boldness of faith, people will be saved
because of your faithfulness to God, and God will be glorified
because of what is being built, because of a people of
Thanksgiving. Listen, if we call ourselves
followers of Jesus, if we call ourselves Jesus people, the
people of God or a people of gratitude, what would happen to
your stress if you dwelt on your problems as much as you dwelt on
your blessings? What would happen to your pain
if in the moment of that you're going to, I'm going to go to God
in prayer, What would happen to your burnout?
If your attitude to your family to your job or this alarming
begrudging pain that you're experiencing and you substituted
that with gratitude. They can't exist at the same
time. James chapter one verse 2
through 4. That's why he says this.
Count it all as joy, my brothers and sisters, because you know
that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let
endurance have its full effect that you can be mature and
complete lacking in in nothing in a review of workers multiple
studies. This is crazy that people who
practice gratitude at least once a week showed showed significant
improvements in stress and depression, and those that did
not practice gratitude at least once a week did not experience
any benefit at all. Gratitude practice regularly
lifts the pressure to get a little physiological gratitude
activates. Pastor Tim has talked about
this. The parasympathetic nervous
system. This is our rest and digest
system. It lowers heart rate and reduces
stress hormones like cortisol. I, I want you to think about
this like we just found this out, like in the last few
decades that God and his ultimate Providence, hard wired
mental and emotional solutions and spiritual actions isn't that
crazy? It's like the science is just
now catching up. And so through gratitude, we can
find strength in our Thanksgiving.
And what's the result? What's the result of finding
power in our treasure, of finding life in our trials, of
finding faith in our triumph, or finding strength in our
Thanksgiving? The first part of verse 16.
Therefore, we do not give up. When we walk in the truth of
God's Word, we do not give up. When we face financial
pressures, we do not give up. When parenting is difficult, we
do not give up. When marriages feel strained, we
do not give up. When the world seems to be in
chaos, and my God, it does, we do not give up.
When the health challenges are overwhelming, we do not give up.
When relationships break, we do not give up.
When disappointment weighs heavy, we do not give up.
Help me out here. When faith feels weak, we do not
give up. When stress is overwhelming and
the burnout seems close, we do not give up.
That is a child of God rooted in the Word of God.
And why is that the case? The promise is real.
Amen. The promise is real.
The second part of verse 16, it says even though our outer
person is being destroyed, our inner person, your inner person,
is being renewed day by day for our momentary light affliction.
It's producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal
weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is
seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary,
but what is unseen is eternal. And what is tomorrow?
What is tomorrow for you? What is tomorrow for your
family? What is tomorrow for the life
that you're living? God promises renewal each and
every day. Every single day.
You know we're in October. Why wait for a New Year's
resolution? Why not a new day resolution?
Why not a new day? Why not wake up tomorrow?
Don't wait till Monday to start praying.
Don't wait till next year in January.
Why not a new day? Because God promises each and
every day. And here's what's so cool.
That renewal happens when even if your pain doesn't go away,
that God promises the renewal even if your situation doesn't
change. And here's the promise is that
our afflictions, our trials, our stress is temporary.
And here's the thing, the stress we experience, it's because of
real struggle. Struggles that's real, but not
forever. Struggles, Yes, they're real,
but they're not forever. And I feel like the Lord wants
to speak to someone today that some of you are angry at God
because you've been dealing with an affliction for a long time.
And I understand and the Lord understands.
But here's the truth. Whether you believe in God or
not, you're still living in pain.
And why not walk with the God who doesn't look down on your
suffering, but suffers with you? That's the God that we serve.
Don't allow your pain to prevent you from drawing close to God.
Because here's what I know. If you could see tomorrow, if
you could get a glimpse, if you could get a picture of what God
has promised you, your problems today would lose its power.
If we could see that beautiful image when we see the King of
Kings seated in glory, enthroned in power beyond all of the
problems, all of a sudden what we are experiencing today would
fade away, just like this video. Let's play that video.
We press your name to protect us to.
Guide us, Lord, to see. Us through to give us all in the
name of. Jesus, the video.
Why did I just play that video? This is a video of Nigerian
Christians worshipping after five people were killed when
their church was burned by terrorists.
I don't think that stress in burnout adequately expresses
their pain. Whether you realize or not, over
the past decade over 52,000 Christians have been killed in
Nigeria, 18,500 have been abducted and unlikely to have
survived. More than 20,000 churches and
Christian schools have been attacked.
There's this website calledgenocidewatch.com and they
give 10 stages of genocide and Nigeria is in the last two for
Christians. Extermination in denial, the
extermination of believers systematically and the denial
that it's even happening by the government.
And I didn't play this to minimize what you're stressed
about. I don't want you to see it that
way. I played this to show that
although you can't always choose what happens in your life, you
have a God-given ability to choose how you respond.
What can the enemy do to you if you respond to worry with
worship? If you're in the car, stressed
by life, going into work, and you break out in worship?
What can the enemy do to you if you respond to your pain with
prayer? That although I'm suffering,
although this is what I'm experiencing, God, I'm coming to
you in prayer. What can the enemy do to you if
you respond to your stress with surrender?
That God, although I don't understand how this is going to
pan out. God, I surrender this to you.
What can the enemy do to you if you respond to the teachings of
this world, which is to get more stress and to pick yourself up
by your bootstraps and and make it happen and instead respond to
the truth of his word and through the spirits renewing
power, we can find hope and our tomorrow.
Do you believe that today that you can find hope in your
tomorrow by the Holy Spirit And as I begin to closeout the Lord
wanted me to read this passage. It's the story of Elijah and
Elijah in first Kings 18 has this miraculous encounter with
God where he's before the prophets of Baal and he calls
fire down from heaven to prove that that Yahweh is the one true
God and not this false God. And and what I love about this
context is because the next chapter is in light of that, the
next chapter filled with depression and agony is in light
of his biggest achievement, which I think is so interesting
because if you look, they've done numerous interviews of
people that have won the Super Bowl and won championships.
And they said the most depressing time was after they
won. They spent their whole years
trying to achieve something. And as soon as it happened, they
had a big dip. And here's what happened is, is
in First Kings 19, Elijah has run away because Jezebel, the
wife of King Ahab has promised to kill him.
And so he's been in the mountains for 40 days and 40
nights. He's in this cave.
And God spoke in First Kings 19 verse 9, it says suddenly the
word of the Lord came to him and he said to him, what are you
doing here, Elijah? What are you doing here, Elijah?
He replied, I have been very, very zealous for the Lord God of
armies, but the Israelites have abandoned your covenant, tore
down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword.
I alone am left, and they are looking for me to take my life.
Then he said, Go out and stand on the mountain in the Lord's
presence. And at that moment the Lord
passed by, and a great and mighty wind was tearing at the
mountains, as was shattering the cliffs before the Lord.
But the Lord was not in the wind.
And after the wind there was an earthquake.
But the Lord was not in the earthquake.
And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the Lord was not
in the fire. And after the fire there was a
voice, a soft whisper. And when Elijah heard it, he
wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the
entrance of The Cave. And suddenly a voice came to him
and said, What are you doing here, Elijah?
And I feel like the Lord is asking us in this space, asking
you, what are you doing here? I didn't ask you to go here.
I didn't ask you to live here. I didn't ask you to run away
here. What are you doing here?
And here's what's interesting is God knew why Elijah was there,
but he wanted Elijah to know. He knew the reason, but he
wanted Elijah to face it. Why are you here in the season
of stress, burnout, or discouragement?
Why are you running from what God has called you to face?
Why are you hiding in The Cave when God has called more of you
on the outside? And here's the God that we
serve. He didn't rebuke Elijah.
He revealed himself, not in the earthquake, not in the fire, not
in the wind, but in a gentle whisper.
And some of you, you keep waiting for God to shout from
the sky when he's been whispering in your spirit the
whole time. The problem is not that God's
not speaking. It's the noise of stress, fear,
and burnout that has been louder.
Think about that. It's not that God hasn't been
talking. It's not that God hasn't been
speaking. Is that the stress, the burnout,
the fear is a louder than his voice.
And what did God tell Elijah to do?
Verse 15 Then the Lord said to him, go.
God's response to Elijah's pain was a call to action, not a call
to quit. And so here's the question, what
is God asking you to do? What is God asking you to give
up? Jesus promises in Matthew
Chapter 11, verse 20. Come to me, all who are weary
and burdened, and I will give you rest.
That's the promise of Jesus. It's not a suggestion, it's not
an idea, it's not just a saying. It's Jesus's promise.
But here's the reality is that turning to Jesus requires us to
turn away from other things. Our rest comes through
repentance. Repentance is turning our old
way of thinking, our old habits, our old burdens, our old sins,
and facing the King of glory filled with grace and mercy.
And that my prayer for this church is that we would be a
people that don't give up. That when stress presses in, we
would press deeper into the presence of God.
That when burnout whispers, you're done.
We would hear this, the Spirit whisper back, you're not
finished, you're not finished, you're not finished.
That's what God is saying to you.
That we would be a church that finds power in our treasure
through the Holy Spirit. That we would be a church that
finds life in our trials through Christ's comfort.
That we would be a church that finds faith in our triumph
because we believe God's promises.
That we would be a church that finds strength in our
Thanksgiving through gratitude. That we would be a church that
finds hope in our tomorrow because of that future glory.
And when the world, when families, when Co workers look
at you, they don't see a people that's surviving stress.
They see a people living in a peace that makes no sense.
And when people ask the question, how do you get
through? There's one answer, there's one
Savior, there's one name, and that's Jesus.
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we welcome your
presence in this moment. God, I first want to pray for
our release. You told us to come to you all
who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
So God with open hearts and open minds, I pray God for us to let
go, to turn back, to repent, to turn to you the author and
finisher of our faith. And God, with that turning comes
restoration. So that I pray, Lord, a spirit
of restoration over this body in Jesus name, that there is a
people that will be freed from the burdens of life.
They don't have to walk in fear and stress and worry because the
God of all creation is near. And Lord, I pray God for those
that are in this room right now that have not made you Lord and
Savior, that Jesus you lived 2000 years ago.
God in the flesh lived a perfect life, was persecuted, was
crucified on the cross, living a perfect life that you died and
rose again, paying the penalty of sin and death.
And because we have faith in you, we can have life.
And so in this holy moment, with every eye close, every head
bowed, if if that is you in this room and the Holy Spirit is
drawing you to a relationship with the Father, when I count to
three, I want you to pop your hand up so I can pray with you
and for you. God is calling you home today.
123 That is you and keep your hand up.
We have are going to give you something I want to pray with
you and for you keep your hand up.
Thank you thank you Jesus anyone else.
The Lord is calling you home today.
Thank you Lord. Once you have that you can put
your hand down. Thank you Jesus, and as a
church, if we can pray this together, say, Heavenly Father,
I recognize my sin. And that Jesus lived, was
crucified, died, and was buried and rose again the third day.
And I have faith in that sacrifice.
And because of Jesus I can be forgiven.
Because of Jesus I can have new life.
And I commit to following you for the rest of my life in Jesus
name, Amen. Can we get it?
For those who just made the best decision of their life, God is
good. Thanks for joining us today.
We hope God is speaking to your heart through this message.
If you'd like to connect with us, you can text connect to
407-588-0115 or visit Illuminate dot church.
Have a great week.